Dialing her mother, Isabel hesitated, then hung up and decided to call her later. If she recounted the insult from the Turtle, her mother might use it to launch into a common harangue. Mama Ducci didn’t fully understand why women today insisted on being and doing everything. She was especially tough on Anna, whose husband was a stay-at-home dad. Isabel didn’t have the energy to argue on her sister’s or her own behalf.
ISABEL LOOKED AT a few of the account reports for the month, trying to concentrate on work. Her inability to focus just made her more paranoid. “Maybe the Turtle is right,” she wondered aloud. She rested her forehead on her folded arms to stem the return of nausea and the tears about to fall.
The hell with it, Isabel thought. She was just grabbing her jacket to leave for RHM when her phone rang. She waited for Tina to pick it up, then pressed the Tom button to privately listen in on who was calling. Isabel had named it the Tom button because she felt voyeuristic every time she used it.
She immediately recognized Christopher’s voice, and she momentarily thought to ignore the call but found herself unmuting her end to say, “I’ll take it, Tina.”
“I just wanted to check up on you,” Christopher said when he heard her voice.
“I’m fine now. I was distracted from my nausea when I was in the Turtle’s office and he made disparaging comments about having babies.”
“That’s because evolutionarily speaking, he ought to be prohibited from procreating. His is a gene pool we’d all be better without. The man is not human.” Christopher had had plenty of run-ins with the Turtle when he worked at Pink. The last laugh was on the Turtle when Christopher left the magazine, sullying the magazine’s biggest account and putting the Turtle in a compromised position. It almost cost the Turtle his job, and he had yet to recover from the humiliation.
“Well, bumping into you was the highlight of my day. I’m just about to head over to Red Hot Mama. There’s a big to-do about the new line Beth just launched. Apparently there are a lot of people who don’t think pregnant women have the right to nice underwear,” Isabel said, making a mental note to pick some up for herself while she was over there.
“Why not pick some up and meet me later?” Christopher suggested.
Isabel flinched but couldn’t bring herself to acknowledge the coincidental remark aloud. “Be serious, Christopher. Listen, thanks for checking in. I’m going to go . . .”
“I was really calling to see if you wanted to come with me to see a play tonight. We can have dinner afterward.”
“I’m not really up for it,” she said. She didn’t entirely trust herself to be alone with Christopher. Between her unfathomable sexual agitation and unpredictable nausea, and Christopher’s uncharacteristic attentiveness, she figured anything could happen—and none of it good.
“Please come. If the play sucks, we can leave. I’ll even take you home early if you get too tired. I’ll pick you up in front of Red Hot Mama at six.”
“Fine,” she said, surprising herself at how easily she had capitulated. “Sam’s not coming home tonight anyway,” she added, regretting it immediately.
“Good. See you soon.”
Isabel tried Sam one more time and left him a message saying she wouldn’t be home until later that evening. She didn’t offer any more information on the message. She could tell him about it when he got home—knowing beforehand that she was with Christopher wouldn’t make him feel any better about his extended stay.
RHM was located just a few blocks south of Isabel’s office. The storefront, framed in aluminum-cased windows, had a simple, modern vibe. The two floors above the store held the office space where Beth and Anna worked. Blue sawhorse police barricades were lined up in front of the building, and abandoned picket signs had been stuffed into the garbage can on the corner. The storefront’s plate glass window was cracked and had been temporarily repaired with gaffer tape. The acrid smell from the burned lingerie lingered in the air. Inside the store, Beth sat in one of the modern but lush moss-green armchairs. She appeared to be sleeping. It was unusual to catch Beth in a moment of repose. The front door was locked, as a security measure during the protest. Isabel thought twice about disturbing her friend. She tapped lightly on the glass door and was surprised when Beth turned toward her. Seeing Isabel, Beth stood and smiled a welcoming smile as she walked over to open the door.
“Hey, Is. Wow, look how thick and beautiful your hair is.” Beth stroked Isabel’s long golden-brown hair. “Pregnancy agrees with you.”
“Hey, sweetie. Looked like you were dreaming, sitting so still in the chair like you were. Are you upset about all this?” Isabel asked, sweeping her arms toward the debris.
“You mean the protest? Hell no! We’ll get more media coverage than we could pay for in a year. No, I was on the phone with Paul earlier. His mother is harassing him again about being sick. He sounded like hell. He actually passed out when I was still talking to him. His sister, Helen, was there to take him to the hospital.”
Beth took a deep breath and ran her hand through her short red hair.
“I wanted to meet them there, but Helen said that their mom doesn’t want me around, that I’ll just make the situation worse by showing up.” Beth practically spat these last few words.
Paul Marchand was the father to Beth’s daughter, Jessie. He’d been battling AIDS unsuccessfully for years and was often sick, in spite of the available treatments to combat the virus and its opportunistic infections. Beth had confided to Isabel that she was convinced he was trying to commit suicide through personal neglect.
“His mom still doesn’t get it?”
“No, she still blames me for his illness, which makes no sense whatsoever. You’d think she would have a clue between the pneumonia and KS. Anyway, all this mess”—Beth pointed to the store window—“this is very good news for us. Though I think your sister might be a little wigged out by the whole thing. You should talk to her.”
“What do you mean?” Isabel asked.
“I’m not sure what’s up with her. She seems a bit unhinged. Maybe it’s the protests, but I think it might be something else,” Beth said.
“Okay, I’ll try to catch her upstairs. See you in a bit.” Isabel went the back way up to the offices, where she found Anna behind the half-closed door of her office. She was putting her desk in order, getting ready to leave. When Isabel knocked, Anna was startled and let out a cry. Her hair was unkempt and there were dark circles under her eyes.
“Rough day, sis? You don’t look so great,” Isabel said affectionately as she fell into one of the purple Eames chairs across from Anna’s desk.
“Yeah, it’s been a crazy day. I’m just really beat. No news there. How’re you feeling?” Anna asked.
“Sam’s not coming home until Friday. I’m going to have dinner with Christopher.” What would be a non sequitur in another exchange was logical progression in conversation between the sisters. “I bumped into him today and threw up all over his shoes. He guessed I was pregnant before that, though. My breasts gave it away. Then he calls this afternoon and asks me to a play. I’ll never understand the man.”
“He is adorable, though.” Anna vocalized the completion to Isabel’s thoughts. She was the only one who seemed to understand the pull between her sister and Christopher.
Anna’s brow furrowed again, her mouth tightened. “I’ve got to get away from today’s madness. I need to see my kids.”
“Weren’t you going to meet to strategize about the undie-haters?” Isabel asked.
“Yes, but Maggie just called and said she’s got to take care of some crisis with her stepson, so we’re going to meet early tomorrow morning instead.”
A formidable triumvirate ran RHM: Beth Mack, Anna Ducci-Schwartz, and Maggie Harding, its publicity director and strategic consultant.
“Okay, little sis, see ya. Have fun tonight. And behave yourself.”
“Oxymoronic, that,” Isabel said as Anna kissed her on the nose, grabbed her purse, and left.
&n
bsp; Isabel stuck around her sister’s office for a few minutes. She sat in the desk chair and tried to see what Anna saw every day. There were photos of each of her boys as infants and a recent one of the two together, sitting inside a colorful Hoberman sphere, looking otherworldly and beautiful. Isabel wondered if having children made life more difficult or lent clarity to what was important. Isabel guessed the latter, but she still had some doubt.
She shook off the uncertainty and turned her focus to the wall outside Anna’s office. Hung side by side were the two ads causing the protests earlier. The one featuring tennis star Agnes Seymour holding her newborn child was a stunner. Over her lactating breasts, she wore a sheer black nursing bra with black polka dots and silk lavender trim. The right breast flap lay open, suggesting a glimpse of an extended wet nipple just suckled by the baby. She had on matching thong underwear. She looked strong and sexy and ripe. The copy line read, WANT SILK?
The ad next to it featured film star Milly Ling, about six months along, wearing a teddy and shorts in sheer mauve with black Xs sewn into the fabric and black satin trim. The copy line read, DO YOU WANT YOUR MAMA?
Isabel laughed out loud. She had to admit that the ads were gutsy, though hardly raunchy. The collection was tasteful and elegant—hard to find, pregnant or not. What a stroke of inspiration, thought Isabel. Leave it to Beth.
Isabel had tried to bring in RHM ads to Pink at its inception. Discounted rates for new product launches provided incentive for retailers, and it made sense for the hottest women’s magazine to have the exclusive first run. Pink presented itself as a progressive fashion magazine, but when the Turtle saw the ads he rejected them, saying the campaign would offend the other advertisers. Isabel took copies of the RHM ads along to her accounts to ask what they thought. Across the board, her clients went wild for them. Isabel tried to convince the Turtle that he was wrong to assume that they would lose advertisers if they went ahead, using her private research as proof. But the Turtle considered her action insubordinate and refused to discuss it any further. When Isabel told Beth, Anna, and Maggie about the Turtle’s position on the ads, Maggie suggested taking it to the gossip pages. But in the end, Maggie thought better of it and told Isabel it would be too easy to trace back to her.
ISABEL RETURNED DOWNSTAIRS to find Beth now standing outside smoking a cigarette. She absentmindedly offered a drag to Isabel.
“I’ll faint or vomit or both if I do,” Isabel said, disappointed. “Can’t wait to see what the Turtle has to say when he hears about all this on the news.” Isabel pointed to the break in the storefront window and the barricades. “He’ll be a self-satisfied prick for sure.”
“We can always turn it back around on him by putting in a story about how Pink is aligned with these freaks against underwear by refusing to take our money to advertise in the magazine. Couldn’t be good for the profile of the magazine. Just say the word. I won’t have Maggie do it unless you feel okay about it, though.” Beth’s opportunism took a backseat only to her closest friends and her family. Anyone else was fair game.
Beth headed upstairs to her office, much to Isabel’s relief. She wouldn’t have to explain to her friend exactly where she was going and with whom. Moments later, Beth returned.
“What are you still doing here? I thought you left. Headed home now, do you . . .” Beth trailed off as she saw Christopher pull up in a taxi.
Beth looked at Isabel with a what the fuck is he doing here? look. Isabel knew that if she acknowledged Beth’s silent question she might reveal more about what she was doing to Beth than Isabel knew herself. Beth was harder to fool than her own mother or shrink. Avoiding Beth’s inquisitive stare, Isabel grabbed Christopher’s hand and waved good-bye.
CHAPTER TWO
Anna
ANNA WAS STARTLED awake by a shooting pain in her right arm. She tried to move her left arm, but it had gone completely numb. It took a few seconds to assess the situation: her two young sons were attached to either side of her like Velcro. She reached over Henry, who was sleeping in the middle of the bed, for her husband, Jason.
“Baby,” she whispered into the dark. “You there?”
Her hand fell onto a bunched-up pillow, used as a barrier to prevent Henry from falling over the edge of the bed should he squirm from Anna’s grip in Jason’s absence.
Anna tried to disentangle from her sons without waking them. “Oh, guys,” Anna muttered. “We’ve got to stop sleeping like this.”
Jostled awake by his mother’s movements, Henry pushed himself up on his knees and held his face just an inch above his mother’s. Anna inhaled his sweet, moist breath.
“Ba-ba,” he articulated forcefully—he was hungry—before giving her his version of a good-morning kiss. He bumped his forehead against hers and smiled a wet baby smile, drooling onto his mother’s cheek. He then pointed to his big brother, Oscar, still asleep on the other side of his mother with one small arm flung across her body. “Oh, oh.”
“Shh, don’t wake Oscar,” Anna said without effect. “Let your brother sleep.” As if a one-year-old would listen to reason. Henry proceeded to hit Oscar in the head with his warm palm, getting the desired response.
“Henry, I’m sleeping, don’t do that,” Oscar scolded. Then, “Mama, are you here?” A common rhetorical question from her three-year-old: he asked it only when he was wrapped around her.
“Yes, Oscar, I’m here.”
“Are you staying home with me today?”
“No, sweetheart, I have to go to work, but I’ll play with you this morning until I have to leave, okay?”
“I want Papa,” Oscar responded, a tremble in his voice. He was going to start crying in a second.
Henry, growing impatient with the conversation, tried to throw himself off the bed. He couldn’t quite navigate the three-foot drop, and Anna had to grab him by the back of his pajamas to help him down without landing on his head.
It was only five thirty in the morning and the entire family was already wide-awake.
Just then, Jason came in with milk for the boys and a steaming cup of coffee for his wife.
“When did you get up?” Anna asked, yawning. “I didn’t even hear you.”
“About an hour ago. I couldn’t get back to sleep once Oscar came into bed.”
Anna and Jason had given up on trying to discipline the boys about sleeping in their own beds. Each evening started out with the best intentions, but by morning either they were all asleep in the same bed, or Anna was with Oscar in his bed or in Henry’s with him, or Jason was with either or neither, in which case Anna was with both in their bed. Sometimes the configuration changed several times in the course of a night. The first thing Anna did every morning when she woke up was to take inventory of who was where. This morning, they all stayed cuddled on the bed together and read books until Anna had to get up to take a shower.
“Okay, boys, I’ve got to get going.” She kissed Henry’s belly and Oscar’s head and gave Jason a lingering one on the lips before crawling out from the messy bed and heading for the bathroom. It was one of the most difficult parts of her day, the moment when she had to physically pull away from her sons and husband.
Anna hurried through her shower to give herself a few more minutes with the boys. She was dressed in what Oscar called her “work clothes”—Anna was certain it was the first time Jil Sander was ever referred to as “work clothes.” This morning she had on a sleeveless, formfitting dress in gunmetal gray with bright yellow piping. Her chestnut hair was held back with a sheer yellow scarf and her long legs were bare. Already sun-kissed from weekends outside with the boys, she put on some pale lipstick, a bit of mascara, and was ready to go, with an extra twenty minutes to spare. She found Jason and the boys blowing bubbles in the tiny backyard off the ground floor of their Brooklyn brownstone duplex.
“What’re you guys doing?” Anna asked cheerily, hiding how glum she felt on this beautiful June morning. What she wouldn’t give to put on her “play clothes” and hang out with
her family all day.
“We’re blowing bubbles with Papa,” Oscar answered. “You go to work, Mama. Leave now.”
“Okay, Oscar, Mama’s going.” Anna looked to Jason, who gave her a sympathetic smile. She hesitated before turning to leave.
“Go, now,” Oscar repeated.
Henry was climbing onto his father’s back and singing in an angelic high voice a monosyllabic version of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”: “Ma-ma, ma-ma, ma ma ma . . .”
“Fine. Good-bye, boys, have a fun day!” Anna said, trying to hide how hurt she was. Waving to Jason, she turned toward the door, but returned to kiss each one of her boys before leaving. Oscar pushed her away. He wasn’t making it easy this morning.
Anna took a deep breath as she walked away. Some mornings Anna had to use all her resolve just to leave the house.
When she got out of the subway in Manhattan, a voice mail from her husband pinged. She called him back.
“Are you okay?” Jason asked.
“Oh, yeah, you know . . .” Anna sighed to stop from crying, not so much from what had transpired this morning as from the call from her husband, who understood her so deeply. “I know what it’s about. It’s just uncanny how a three-year-old can cut to the heart like that. He’s brutal.”
“He doesn’t know what he’s saying, Anna. He certainly doesn’t mean it. He loves you like crazy, you know that, right?” Jason stating the obvious was comforting to Anna but made her want to cry even more.
“I’m fine, baby, really. Thanks for calling. I’ll check in with you guys later.” Anna clicked off.
She wondered what it was that made it impossible for her to get over leaving her family every morning. She knew plenty of mothers who couldn’t wait to get out of the house for a break. It caused nothing but heartache for Anna every day when she left. And the strain was emotionally depleting her.
Blue barricades along the sidewalk in front of RHM blocked easy access to the store and the offices above. Anna pushed one aside and squeezed through. When she got to the door, she thought twice about it and she returned the barricade to its intended secure position.
The End of Men Page 2
