Olivia

by Judith Rossner

  Even Rennie was feeling friendly after a summer of eating camp food, and consented to come to dinner with the others. The girls were looking at a magazine Livvy had left on the coffee table, and Ovvy was standing on a stool to stir the gorgonzola sauce for the fettuccine, the only sauce with no tomatoes in it that they all adored, when Olivia walked in. For a moment, she stood at the door as though she were going to leave again, but then she came in and closed it behind her. She didn’t run to her room. Nor did she appear to notice the girls. She walked toward Ovvy and me almost as though she were hypnotized.

  I said, “Hi, Liv— Olivia, I’m doing fettuccine with one of your old favorites. Gorgonzola sauce. Will you join us?”

  Ovvy giggled. “You always sound like her name’s Livolivia.”

  Livvy said, “Thank you. She doesn’t believe me when I tell her that.” But she was looking between Ovvy and the stove.

  Ovvy attended more closely to the sauce.

  Olivia didn’t move.

  Leon knocked at the door. Livvy fled to her room, mumbled something about having too much homework to think about dinner. Annie opened the door and Leon came in, waved to me.

  I said, “Hi. I’m going to make dinner for the kids. And you, of course. If you’re free.”

  Leon was puzzled, because he was sane.

  He came past where Ovvy was stirring, to the place at the other end of the counter where I was assembling the salad.

  “What’s going on?” he asked me in a low voice.

  “How could anything be going on?” I asked back. “I haven’t even seen you.”

  He laughed. “That’s what I mean.”

  I couldn’t laugh with him, but I stopped making pretend motions at the counter.

  “You’re acting as if you’re mad at me,” he said, still sotto voce.

  “I don’t know how I could be mad at you,” I whispered back. “I don’t even know what you’ve been doing since I last saw you.”

  He laughed again. “You see? There it is again. Wait a minute. I know what you sound like. You sound like you’re jealous!”

  I said, “Don’t be ridiculous,” but I turned away from him because my face was hot and its color would give me away.

  “But I haven’t seen you all summer,” he said. “What else could I have done besides . . . besides . . .”

  Now that he was pfumfering around, I grew calmer.

  “Listen,” he said. “After dinner, we’ll send the kids upstairs and then we’ll talk. Okay?”

  A nice signal, but I was not about to be tricked into reading signals instead of realities.

  “Unless you just want me to go upstairs and stay there,” he said, forcing me to shake my head, to acknowledge that even at nine o’clock in the evening, there might be some reason I wanted to see him.

  We had a pleasant What-I-Did-This-Summer dinner, after which I brought Olivia a tray with a plate of fettuccine and, on impulse, a glass of seltzer with about a tablespoon of wine in it, as her father had always done. To my surprise, she opened the door and accepted it with a thank-you. The kids were very quiet. A little while later, Leon took them upstairs, whispering that he’d be back soon. I cleaned up the kitchen, then paced the floor, trying to decide what I’d do if he returned too late, without defining what too late would be.

  “Now,” he said, when he’d finally come down and I’d brought some espresso to the table, simply because it was farther from Livvy’s room than the sofas, “tell me what I’ve done besides being a nice Jewish doctor in a place where that’s what every single female Jew and Gentile is looking for.”

  The truth made me relax slightly. My hands rested on the table, around the little cup. He placed a hand around the one closer to him. It might have been my breast, for the thrill that went through me.

  “So,” I said, though it wasn’t easy, “did one find you?”

  He shrugged. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  That didn’t mean a thing. I moved my hand out from under his hand.

  He said, “You’re pretty possessive for a woman who wouldn’t even go to bed with me.”

  “I’m not being possessive,” I lied, because I felt ridiculous. “I’m being careful the way you’re supposed to be in this day and age.”

  “Well,” he said, “I haven’t been near anyone’s rectum all summer. Or anyone who’s been near anyone else’s.”

  I said, “There are other things to be careful about.”

  “Like what?”

  I said nothing.

  “Anyway,” he whispered, “for the past two years I’ve carried condoms around with me all the time. In case I meet the girl of my dreams and she’s not prepared for me.”

  “And you haven’t met her?” I asked sweetly.

  He shook his head.

  “Who will she be when you do?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure yet,” he said. “But I decided it would be better if she was Jewish. And if she could cook.”

  I stood up. “Am I supposed to be applying for some kind of job?”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake.” He stood up. “I don’t know what’s going on, but . . . Look, Caroline, I spent a lot of years trying to pacify a woman who basically just didn’t want me. I was always trying to figure out what I’d done to put her in her moods. I’m not doing it anymore. You’re not my wife. You’re not even my girlfriend. You wouldn’t go to bed with me, for Christ’s sake. And you’re acting as if . . . as if . . . Maybe I’d just better say good night.”

  I got sane. And scared.

  “You’re right. I’m sorry.” I went over to the sofa that was farther from Livvy’s wall, sat down.

  He thought about it.

  I said, “I missed you.”

  He came over to sit next to me, let his arm rest on the sofa in back of me. I twisted around to embrace him, kiss him. We held each other and kissed for a long time. It felt unbelievably good. I was almost unbearably excited. How long had it been that I’d been deprived of this most basic of pleasures? I might have stopped to feel sorry for myself in retrospect if some better reason for stopping hadn’t come up: Livvy called over the wall to ask if she could make a phone call.

  “Sure,” I called back, artificially natural. I pushed away from him, wiping my mouth although neither of us had been wearing lipstick. “I’m not on the phone.”

  Leon whispered, “Shit. Just when I thought I was finally getting to seduce you.”

  I smiled. “Remember, they’re not even real walls.”

  Cautiously, Livvy came out of her room, tiptoed across the living room in back of us, her every motion telling us that she knew something was going on. She dialed, asked for Mayumi, thanked the person, hung up and dialed again, began talking to someone.

  “Oh, well,” Leon whispered, “it’s time for my kids to spend a weekend with their grandparents.”

  “Oh? Your parents take them?” Nothing he’d said about them at that first dinner had suggested . . .

  “Nope,” Leon said, “my wife’s parents. My kids are their only grandchildren. They have a beautiful place in Connecticut. Greenwich.” He winked. “That’s why I vacation on Long Island.”

  Livvy had returned to her room, making it a particular point, or so I’d felt, not to look toward the sofa. Leon was as much with me as though he hadn’t gone upstairs. There was no way I was going to sleep. I felt as though I could run a few miles, but the prospects for even a walk were poor. The apartment was comfortable, but outside it was warm and muggy, and Fifteenth Street was empty and uninviting, although there would be some activity on Eighth Avenue. I undressed, put on a long T-shirt, washed, brushed my teeth, and turned on the computer. On Friday I would be seeing Sheldon and a man named Bob Kupferman, the only cable executive who’d expressed interest in talking to me after seeing the tape. I was supposed to come up with some ideas that “were just as much fun” as the pasta murder, and the blender fusillade. I kept trying to explain to Sheldon that the fun had come from the spontaneity, and that other good thin
gs might happen if I was allowed to just swing with . . . That was it, I’d said. Maybe there could be a small audience that asked questions and made comments and set me off. He’d dismissed the idea out of hand. Said it sounded too much like school. And who was I to argue that one with him?

  Most of the subjects that interested me, he’d already informed me were “boring for TV.” When I asked what that meant, he said there was “nothing to look at.” I’d told him the visual part came in the doing, but he’d dismissed the notion. Sheldon had readily believed I was two professors’ daughter. But the stuff that struck me as interesting wasn’t academic, it was just . . . well . . . interesting.

  I had notes about purity as opposed to inventiveness, about breaking down the mental barriers that existed where cooking was concerned. Some people wouldn’t marinate anything in soy sauce, ginger, and garlic because the combination was Japanese, others would never try the wonderful Italian hams and salamis they saw in Bleecker Street windows, or the exotic fruits and vegetables you could find now at Oriental markets around the city. I’d put kiwi slices on a lovely marinated-shrimp dish from Food & Wine, and my father had teased me about becoming one of the kiwi people, but the combination was superb. On the other hand, there was the real possibility of losing variety, not to speak of history, if everyone’s national ingredients got married. On the third hand, it was possible to argue that when you played this way, still another species was born. Homeless foods?

  Sheldon was certain that nobody was interested in the line between being a meat-eater and being a cannibal, though he’d been fascinated when I showed him the wonderful Escoffier recipe for turtle soup, especially parts of the section called “Particulars of the Operation,” which began, “For soup, take a turtle weighing from 120 to 180 lbs., and let it be very fleshy and full of life,” and, having given detailed slaughtering instructions, goes on to describe the dismemberment: “To begin with, thrust a strong knife between the carapace or upper shell and the plastron or lower shell, exactly where the two meet, and separate the one from the other. The turtle being on its back, cut all the adhering flesh from the plastron, and put the latter aside. Now cut off the flippers; remove the intestines, throw them away, and carefully collect all the green fat.”

  “Holy shit!” Sheldon had said. “A hundred and eighty pounds.” But then, as though he’d been caught peeping in the ladies’ lounge, he cast aside my notes, said there was no way we were dealing with a hundred and eighty pounds of turtle. When I pointed out that the same issues were involved with a chicken or a lamb chop, he shouted that I was to drop the whole thing, “Right now!”

  Nor had he seen as a possibility the differences between men and women in tastes or in cooking ability, his definitive statement on the issue being, “The whole women’s movement gets a hard-on if you tell them there’s a difference between men and women.”

  I said, “Listen, Sheldon, there’s stuff in here women’ll love.” I’d proceeded to read him some of the quotes I’d collected. Nietzsche: “Woman does not understand what food means, and yet she insists upon being a cook!” Samuel Johnson: “Women cannot make a good book of cookery.” And others. I was curious to know if any of the bias against women as serious chefs had to do with the fact that, until modern times, we had been so burdened with arduous kitchen labors as to be kept from adventure. Sheldon was not curious.

  There were economic issues. It was safe to guess that women who worked in their own kitchens had dealt with more financial limitations than had chefs like Escoffier and Christoforo di Messisbugo, who’d come to cooking purely by choice. In trying to check out this issue, I’d discovered that the classic chef’s toque was a white version of the black hat worn by orthodox priests, and had probably originated in Greek monasteries, where famous cooks had fled to escape persecution. I’d love to compare women’s being kept out of the priestly orders and out of the important kitchens. No mastery of food, no direct line to God.

  Sheldon couldn’t have cared less. Nor did the matter of whether there were legitimate distinctions to be made in the matter of male-female tastes interest him. I’d never met a heterosexual North American male of my generation or older who adored fruit, or a woman who didn’t. Although the young men now, often of less determined sexuality, seemed to eat seeds, nuts, and raisins, even fresh fruit, with pleasure.

  Sheldon thought diets would grab a lot of people. My response had been to read him a passage from Brillat-Savarin: “Gourmandism is far from unbecoming to the ladies: it agrees with the delicacy of their organs, and acts as compensation for certain pleasures which they must deny themselves, and certain ills to which nature seems to have condemned them. . . . A married couple who enjoy the pleasures of the table have, at least once a day, a pleasant opportunity to be together; for even those who do not sleep in the same bed (and there are many such) at least eat at the same table; they have a subject of conversation which is ever new; they can talk not only of what they are eating, but also of what they have eaten, what they will eat, and what they have noticed at other tables.”

  This cooled him off on diets, at least briefly, and I’d tried to get him interested in the subject of drinking. I had many good quotations, beginning with the old Italian proverb “Beware of the man who doesn’t drink,” going through a rhyme from She Stoops to Conquer.

  When Methodist preachers come down

  A-preaching that drinking is sinful,

  I’ll wager the rascals a crown,

  They always preach best with a skinful.

  “Where’re the visuals?” he’d wanted to know. “You gonna stand there and get drunk while you cook?”

  I’d recently started a file on Jewish food, that is to say, on Jewish-Italian, Jewish-German, Jewish-Arab, and Jewish-Jewish food, and had entered some anecdotes and recipes on the computer. I’d begun with my childhood discovery that Jewish bakeries’ corn bread, which has no corn in it, was called that because korn was the German word for wheat, gone on to a mythical Italian who was furious to hear that the Jews were the first to use artichokes.

  Sheldon had been irritated that I didn’t understand the difference between an Idea and a Concept. Now, sitting at the computer, I tried going for something that would be recognizable as a Concept, came up with two ideas I thought might pass for same. First, there was Basics for Brides, in which young women would be taught some rules about cooking and kitchens throughout the world. Second, there was the one I called Cucina Casalinga. Literally, the language of the kitchen. Of the home. The language of food that was passed on from mother to child. It would be easier for me to do if we confined ourselves to various regions of Italy, but not impossible, as long as I had time for research, to extend to other countries. I made a few preliminary notes for Cucina Casalinga, thinking of basics Anna had taught me when she first came to us. Finally, tired as well as exhausted, I turned off the computer and went to bed.

  Leon was on my mind as I fell asleep, but he wasn’t in my dreams, which at first were jumbled, chaotic. Then I dreamed that I was on television, doing a show called “Cucina Casalinga,” and Livvy appeared in front of the camera and said, “Mother-daughter, hah! She never let me in the kitchen! She hit me when I asked how to make farsumagru!”

  I awakened distraught and in tears. It hadn’t happened, of course, but that didn’t matter. It felt true.

  Maybe what Livvy had been looking at when she walked in today was just Ovvy and me, working happily in the kitchen. As she and I never had. As we mostly couldn’t. Certainly we couldn’t have worked—played—in the kitchen when the restaurant was open. And it had never occurred to me to offer to, say, bake cookies with her when we weren’t. We’d normally purchased our cookies, and cookies were what kids loved most to make, if Max and Annie and Ovvy were any indication. What else might I have asked her to do with me in the kitchen? The answer came back, simple and painful: Anything. When I’d had time for her, it was time to get out of the kitchen. Walk. Talk to people. Get a gelato. She came into the kitchen like a
trespasser. No wonder she wanted nothing to do with me or my cooking. No wonder . . . Maybe I could talk about this with her sometime, see if she was interested in learning to cook any particular kind of food. It didn’t have to be Italian. There was a wonderful Japanese cookbook I’d been drawn to because M. F. K. Fisher had done the introduction. Livvy might get a kick out of making a Japanese dinner for Mayumi. Livvy and Mayumi had become part of a group that included three other girls, Juno, Sumara, and Shevaun. This was the group that had made me realize none of her friends was Jewish, which might or might not have happened naturally at the High School for the Humanities.

  The one besides Mayumi who sometimes came home with her was Shevaun, a tall, slender black girl who’d been extremely reserved until one night I served her and Livvy a roast with the walnut sauce I’d been working on for my class. Shevaun was crazy about it. I remember wishing Sheldon were there as this girl, who hadn’t spoken ten words to me in all her visits to the apartment, began to talk about her grandmother, a wonderful cook who’d used nuts, mostly peanuts but some walnuts, in lots of interesting ways, not just the peanut soup “everyone” knew about now. When she saw that I was interested, she told me a story that made me wonder if I could do a program on soul food.

  Her mother and grandmother had moved to New York from South Carolina in the early sixties. One day, they were standing on a crowded street corner not far from the United Nations, when her grandmother got very excited because right in back of them were men talking in the precise accents of their hometown. She turned to see who the men were, and found herself looking at two Africans in dashikis. Only at this point did she realize that the words the men spoke were foreign; it was the accents that were identical to her hometown’s.

  Shevaun had been pleased by my fascination with this story, had begun to talk about learning from her grandmother that the great Southern dishes like chitlins and sweet-potato pie had mostly been taught to Southerners by African slaves, rather than vice versa. I told Shevaun I’d love to talk to her grandmother or her mother sometime, that I was trying to put together a television program about food, but Livvy had grown restive as Shevaun and I spoke, and now she said they’d better go and study. Maybe Livvy would like to surprise Shevaun someday with a Southern meal cooked by the two of us.