Cynthia took another shaker and got to work. “Hey, do you want to hear something so awkward? My parents are trying to set me up with an orthodontist from New Jersey. They’re trying to get me off Bernard. This orthodontist guy is my uncle’s friend’s son, or something like that. My parents had him over for dinner three times last week … He takes out his floss right at the table—it’s so disgusting! And he had the nerve to call me hon.” She sighed. “Ugh, my parents think I’m past my prime … that I’ll settle.”
“Maybe you need to invent a fictional fiancé so they’ll lay off.” Madeline poured out the drinks with rapid reversals of her wrists. “Mr. Fake Fiancé could be named after our next imbibement: Tom Collins.” Madeline plucked more bottles from beneath a shelf of hair ribbons and slid them over the counter.
Cynthia splashed unmeasured amounts into a stemmed glass and took a sip. “Oof! Tom Collins is intense!” She laughed. “I’m not sure about him, Madeline. Maybe some of the other girls want a taste!”
Then Cynthia was off, proffering her drink to any takers.
Madeline continued her work, placing sprigs of mint on the rims of cocktail glasses. The music and voices were a heavy blanket over her ears. It was tropical; it was different; it was perfect. Madeline worked at a fast pace, until Lisa pulled her aside. She was asking for some advice about her boyfriend—was he going to ask her to get married soon? What did Madeline think? Funny how anyone would want her advice about men—but they always did. She was the matriarch of most evenings, and they came to her.
Lisa hovered expectantly, breathlessly. Madeline gathered her words as she chopped thin stems of herb, her palms damp.
Then she paused.
Her eyes flickered to the front of her store, as they did automatically now, throughout the days and nights.
There were a pair of eyes at the bottom of the intact window, peering through a tiny exposed sliver to the side of her mannequin display.
Then there was a flash of forehead. The tip of an ear. The side of a face.
Madeline left Lisa by her lonesome and bolted toward the door.
She strode with an upright posture, prepared for confrontation, as an itchy rage swept her body.
She no longer trembled. She was mobilized. She was ready to end it—to do whatever she had to do.
But the lurker darted away before she could get there.
Now there was only the still sidewalk.
Empty. But she wouldn’t just imagine men spying on them.
The man in the window hadn’t looked like Fred. The tip of his ear was a little pointy.
Nothing like Fred’s big old boxy ear.
It could have been someone sent in Fred’s place.
* * *
Madeline had never been able to understand Fred’s fixation with politics. He had been a post office clerk when they first met, but even then, he was always obsessed with promotion, and he worked his way to the top of their neighborhood post office. After they got married, he took a few law classes, switching jobs to become a legal clerk, then becoming an assistant to his boss, who was running for councilman.
He was obsessed with that campaign—much more enraptured with it than with her, though they were newlyweds at the time. Every night he ran through the newspapers, looking for mentions of his boss.
He would constantly mutter to himself, “I’ll be the one in those papers one day.” He was always on the lookout for someone writing “slander”—something he could tell his boss about, to “catch” them on. “More slander,” he would hiss. “But James will take care of it.”
She would always freeze in place when he said that. Fred wasn’t in the mob or anything of the sort.
Now she would become that voice he muttered about.
The voice of “slander.”
But she had spoken only the complete truth. And now the wives of Fred’s cronies had learned.
When these society ladies visited her store now, they acted more natural. Friendlier.
One lady even admitted that she was living a similar sham to the one Madeline had been in—married to a man she felt she couldn’t leave.
It wasn’t easy to leave a man who was in politics.
But the Starlite would continue.
Last night, after the other man peeked in, Madeline had given a hand signal to Gloria to stop playing the piccolo. She got the ladies’ attention by jumping up on a chair and tapping a spoon to her glass.
“I have an announcement to make.” Her voice quivered even as she worked to steady it. “We’re going to need to start putting in place more security features.”
The women exchanged glances. A flash of concern burned through the group, evidenced by their crossed arms, their nervous laughter.
“There’s a possibility we’re being spied upon.” She pressed her hands together to stop the shakes. “A couple of times now, I’ve caught men peering in through the window. Tonight was the second night, which makes me concerned. And I want to ensure the safety of all of you.”
“Maybe the cops are onto you, Madeline!” Harriet quipped.
A couple of women laughed. Most just glared at Harriet. Madeline ignored the joke and stared through the intact window again.
If she covered that window up, no one could peek in; but that might not be safe, because someone could be right outside.
“Do you think one of the men was Fred?” Cynthia asked, in a low voice.
Madeline didn’t respond. “Here’s our plan, ladies.” Her voice rose, strident above a song on the record player. “No more entering the Starlite after eight PM. When you travel here, you must arrive in groups, so you’re not walking around alone. We’ll go through and figure out who lives near whom and set up rides.” Her voice cracked; she cleared her throat. “And nobody can leave until the sun is up. I’ll order more cots for those who want to sleep. I don’t want that door opening and closing late at night. Anyone can come in, and anyone can be followed.”
The ladies’ nervous giggles were replaced by a strange silence, offset only by the ticking of the clock in the back of the Starlite.
Madeline kept the same brisk voice. “I understand if nobody wants to come anymore.”
She scanned their faces. Many of them bit their lips, staring in the distance.
None met her eye.
Their fun was over.
Madeline got down from the chair, her feet unsteady. She tripped a little; it was so dim in the storefront.
Then she began to cry.
She covered her face.
Her breath came in choking sounds—in convulsive sobs.
She knelt down on the floor, and the heaviness of her blood kept her down as it churned through her veins like sludge.
Catherine Huxley raced to her, patted her head. “It’s okay, darling! Of course we’ll still come.”
Then other women ran to her—at first only two or three, but then all fifty or so, surrounding her in a mass of comfort and concern. Harriet squeezed her arm in little pulses as Cynthia stroked her hair. Even Lisa put her hand on Madeline’s shoulder, looking doe-eyed and worried.
Madeline’s face was splotchy as makeup dripped down her dress, and she cried even more, looking at the beautiful faces of her best friends.
She had done something good, making the Starlite.
Her tears dissolved and melted into her sweat. Even if it ended and nobody came back, they had grown these connections.
They had experienced something together.
“He can’t have the power anymore,” she whispered to nobody in particular.
Some of the women heard and nodded, which helped her more than they could imagine. Her sobs stopped for the time being, replaced by something resolute.
She had either done too little, or she had done too much.
But she hadn’t done anything wrong.
Madeline’s body trembled in waves beneath their reassuring hands, which gently patted her arm, her shoulder, and her back—until she reached stillness.
30
Elaine
April 1962
Elaine volunteered for extra work at the Chronicle whenever she could. She rotated her activities: she stayed late, did research, organized her desk, and went out for bites to eat with Nia or another coworker.
In the brownstone, nighttime was different. Chilly and silent. Every move she made magnified itself. A climb upstairs was a toil up a mountain. Efforts to make her own simple supper carried the drudgery of concocting a feast for ten.
Yet Catherine was free and easy, without a care in the world.
Catherine had earned a full-time gig, singing at an upscale jazz restaurant in downtown Manhattan. She belted out the hits in front of a five-piece band—swoony covers and originals composed by the band’s leader, a man she was dating. She stayed at his place most of the time, if she wasn’t at the restaurant. Though sometimes she stopped by the brownstone on her evenings off; at those times, she would forcibly drag Elaine to the Starlite.
But at the Starlite, things were too illuminated. The sounds of chatter ground on her ears. When someone turned up the volume on the music, it was like an assault. She would move to the quietest corner of the room and seek shelter among the tightly clustered racks of clothing.
But the ladies never failed to check on her; they always noticed when she was missing. They were so good to her. They stopped by to bring her casseroles and pound cakes. They gave her hugs on her fragile shoulders, though she puffed as the air squeezed out of her lungs.
She didn’t tell them that her freezer was full, and she didn’t avoid them. That would be ungrateful of her.
She slept on a fold-out cot in the storefront—she would change what would otherwise have been a long night alone into an easier-to-digest close to the day, surrounded by the snores and laughs of the ladies.
Tommy had never made a last will and testament. She knew his aunt Mary would claim the brownstone as her own. She was his only surviving kin.
The call finally came over two weeks after Tommy’s death.
His aunt was brusque; she was ready to assert ownership. “I didn’t want to bother you during the mourning period. But I think it’s time now for us to discuss some business matters.”
Elaine’s eyes snapped open as she rolled out of her torpor for a moment with a quickening of her lungs. “Business matters? Such as, Mary?”
“The house, the car. I just want to check—you never legally married Thomas, did you?”
“No, I did not.”
“I wanted to make sure. As his spouse, you would have had property rights. But there is nothing legally binding here. You know that I am the next of kin. Everything should have been mine already. My lawyer kept prodding me to call, but as I said, I wanted to give you some time. And I’d like to give you a little more time now. You’ll have a month to vacate the brownstone. Feel free to take any personal items that belong to you. But in a month’s time, I will be having my broker come to make an assessment, and everything will go on the market.”
Elaine bit her tongue, without recourse. “All right.”
“Also, I have to ask, Elaine, dear. I heard that Thomas died of intoxication. So, you weren’t monitoring him? Making sure he didn’t drink too much?” She cleared her throat. “Since you were cohabitating as lovers, you must have been very close to one another.”
A familiar tremble took its hold on Elaine’s arms. “He wasn’t my puppy, Mary. I couldn’t control him.”
“Oh, but that’s not what I’m saying at all. I just thought you might have been able to exercise a little more influence over the boy. He was really a boy, darling. After all he had been through with his mother dying so young, and his father having died more recently.”
Elaine’s breath fell heavy on the phone receiver. Her cheekbones receded, slack in her skull. “Mary, you know—”
“I’d better get going; I have an appointment with the beautician. But write down the date of April thirtieth. The broker will come on that date, and anything you want out of the house needs to be gone by then. Let me know if I can assist you in finding another place to live. I have a friend who owns a house who might be able to provide you with assistance.”
Elaine grasped the phone receiver and stifled a scream.
The restricted expression cut like a knife, deep into her chest. “Yes. All right. Ta-ta, Mary.”
She hung up the phone.
She got up, started to wander around. To straighten things—bring something back to the parlor. Wash a dish. She would leave the house, but she stopped short of the entryway again.
Instead, she would call Lisa. Though she had been surrounded by people on recent nights at the Starlite and during her time at work, she hadn’t spent much one-on-one time with a friend.
Lisa was always a breath of fresh air; she was uncomplicated, somehow. Innocent and rosy-cheeked. Interested in new things.
Lisa answered the phone on the first ring. “Hello?”
“Lisa, dearie. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“That’s all right. How are you? I haven’t wanted to call and disturb you.”
“That’s fine. I was wondering, would you like to come and visit? Have a spot of tea?”
“This morning? That sounds nice! I’ll get dressed and be over.”
“I’ll give you the address.” The brownstone was still a mess, things strewn everywhere. Elaine didn’t have any sugar, or cream, or milk. But having a guest would be an excuse to tidy up, to pretend that her surroundings still mattered.
She was breathless as she raced around the house, picking up stray articles of clothing and running the carpet sweeper over the rugs.
She paused when she drew near the front door, the zone of the bleach stains.
She went to the washroom and yanked out some bath mats to throw on top of the stains. She took some from the upstairs too.
No matter how she attempted to hide it, it was all still there.
* * *
The doorbell rang as Elaine scrounged in the cabinets to find a tin of tea.
She stepped down from the kitchen step stool, brushed off her skirt, and opened the front door.
Lisa was all smiles on her doorstep. Innocence shone through her eyes, a pure light from within.
Elaine was wistful. “You look gorgeous.” Lisa still had her youth, and although at age twenty-nine she was only seven years her elder, the gap could be measured in decades. “Come in; I’ll make us some tea.”
They stepped over the bleached patch of carpet, still visible between the bath mats.
In the kitchen, Elaine opened the freezer. “Care for a little tea cake?”
“Sounds scrumptious.”
Elaine gestured to the kitchen table, which she had made an effort to clean. “Have a seat, darling.”
“So how did things go—” Lisa hedged, then paused. “Did you end up having a funeral?”
“No. He was cremated. He has no family to speak of, save his aunt. I have the urn. I have to check with his aunt on what she’d like to do with the”—she gulped, then continued—“ashes.”
“Ask his aunt? But aren’t you—?”
“We weren’t married. His aunt is next of kin, so she makes the decisions. She’ll be getting this house soon too.”
“And how do you feel about that?”
“I’m happy to leave.”
“Do you have a place to stay?”
Elaine struggled to open her eyes fully, as though she were having this conversation from beneath the ocean. “I’ll go live with my coworker for a couple weeks. But she only has one bedroom, so I’ll sleep on a bedroll in the living room. We’ll see what comes after that.” She sat up in her chair, and she coughed. Her next words came in a high-pitched burst, almost a falsetto: “So, how is your work going? Visit any new places?”
“Well, I was just in India for a week. We went to the Taj Mahal and all that. It was gorgeous. But exhausting. And I really miss my boyfriend when I’m overseas.” Suddenly Lisa drew a sharp breath
as she glanced up at her surroundings in horror. “Oh gosh, I’m so sorry, talking about my boyfriend and all!” Her cheeks turned cherry red as she curled her lips inward.
Elaine moved forward with weak shoulders and patted Lisa’s back. “That’s all right, dear. I can imagine it must be tough for you and … Billy? Is that his name?”
Lisa reddened even more. “That’s right. Anyway, as I always said, I want to quit when I get married.”
Elaine’s teapot shrieked from the stove. She excused herself to prepare the cups and saucers and the tea cakes, which she had reheated in the oven. Even after being frozen, they had maintained a good texture.
Unlike Elaine, the tea cakes, when prodded, had quickly bounced back.
She sat back at the table and sank her teeth into a tea cake; her salivary glands pricked in pain. The taste evoked a moment from earlier in the year—a night when she and Tommy had been home at the same time. She had baked those tea cakes as they listened to his new records. Tommy had put his head on her shoulder as they watched the record spin, around and around.
“These are wonderful.” Lisa finished hers, then grabbed for another. “Maybe you could give me the recipe.”
Elaine got up. She had a task to do. Her hand ached to do an activity. She brought out a recipe card and penned the ingredients in her best handwriting. She had been frozen for activities, aside from work, and had written her last poem weeks ago, for Tommy’s memorial, at Madeline’s entreaty.
Lisa smiled at her hopefully. “So, what do you think about going to the Starlite tonight?”
“Don’t you have a hot date? It’s Saturday, isn’t it?” Elaine was sarcastic—not her usual tone.
Lisa laughed. “Billy’s working overtime today, and he told me that he’ll be exhausted. But I’ll go visit him at the construction site this afternoon. Maybe you and I could go to the Starlite afterward?”
“Maybe I’ll try and make a showing of it.”
She would just close her eyes when she walked out of the brownstone, past that stain.
Glimmer As You Can Page 17
