Good on Paper

by Rachel Cantor

  Mo’ momos? he asked. Andi giggled.

  Dump me momo dumplings! she exclaimed.

  I got up with my plate; I’d had enough. Celebrating with an Oh Happy Day cake, as if it were a done deal! Did he no longer even feel the need to consult with me? Apparently not, because he knew what I’d say: Connecticut? It was unthinkable!

  Moving was easy for Ahmad: he was attached to people, not places. Well, bully for him! With the exception of a few sad years in Suffern and some sadder years in Rome, I’d lived my whole life in Manhattan; it was the only home I’d ever known. I had no family left to speak of, other than what I’d managed to create for myself; I had only this city: New York was witness to most of my past, and the only place I could imagine myself—packing Andi’s lunch for Bronx Science, organizing Bloomsday pub crawls for the Translators of Note, bringing grandchildren to the planetarium, watching the lively world from Slice of Park, eventually joining the alte kockers on the Broadway island. When I tried to imagine going back to the ’burbs, I felt panic, as if the world had run out of air. As if I were still married, still oppressed by my husband’s unimaginative good intentions, anxiously comparing lawncare products at Herb Groh’s UGrohIt, saying silent prayers over stunted shrubbery. What could life offer me there, what could life offer us? A place where each day, if we played our cards right, would be just like the day before. I could never let Andi live like that, her horizon no farther than the next picket fence. Could I afford to support her here on my own? Of course not. Is that what Ahmad was counting on? Undoubtedly.

  What were you thinking! I said, when he arrived in the kitchen with more dishes. Making a decision like that without consulting me! I am not a child—I have a life here!

  We’d be better off there; Andrea would be better off there.

  Why would you say that? Why would we be better off there?

  Why wouldn’t we? he said, opening the dishwasher.

  I started counting reasons on rubber-gloved fingers: museums, the Film Forum, the Balalaika. What’s in Connecticut? Lyme disease, off-road vehicles that never leave the road …

  Good schools, Ahmad said, counting on his fingers. Parks not overrun by rats …

  Connecticut? Connecticut isn’t ready for the likes of us!

  That’s bollocks, and you know it. I’d think you’d be willing to do this one thing for me. After all I’ve done for you.

  All you’ve done for me? You did me a favor by letting me give you a family?

  It’s time for a change, Shira. You’re in a rut! We both are. Andi needs role models who can show her how to change, take risks.

  You think living in Connecticut is a good example of risk-taking? I shouted.

  Ahmad was maddeningly calm. This was how he worked his opponents into a lather. I was no exception. As if on cue, Andi arrived in the kitchen wearing her Supergirl pajamas and clutching Tamika, her African American Orthodontist Barbie. Ahmad growled and chased her around the kitchen. She squealed as he picked her up and held her upside down by the ankles.

  Six points if you don’t laugh, he shouted, and she tried, with Supergirl resolution.

  Good night, Angel, I said, kissing her feet, then turned half upside down to kiss her nose. Who’s going to give you your story tonight? I asked, thinking, Pick me! Pick me!

  Ahmad! she shouted. Get me down from here!

  Ahmad flew her out of the room like a 320 Airbus, my little flying girl, and I stayed behind and cried: big tears, plop, plop into the Palmolive.

  24

  MYSTIC CLAM SHACK

  Over oatmeal the next morning, Ahmad explained Andi’s options: she could hang out all day doing nothing or she could have extremely good fun with him on an outing.

  This is what’s known in the kid business as a no-brainer.

  What should she bring? Andi wanted to know. Bag lunch? Shovel and pail? Should she wear play clothes or dress up, should Mommy curl her hair or braid it?

  Ahmad put down his cup, appeared to concentrate. Wear the Gap Kids overalls I bought you, and that green and pink flowered T-shirt. Sneakers. Braids, no curls. Ritz Bits in a baggie. One Ho Ho, pre-wrapped. Two dolls, your choice. And books for the car.

  Topeka! Andi cried, jumping up. We’re going on an excursion!

  Ahmad had a 1986 Mercedes SLE, with leather seats and a faux-wood dashboard, which he stored at great expense and rarely drove. Andi hopped in circles and shouted again, We’re going on an excursion! We’re going on an excursion! Then ran out of the room to get dressed.

  You can come, too, Ahmad said, in what sounded like an afterthought.

  I didn’t think so. Ahmad’s excursions usually involved traveling to outer boroughs to find curry ingredients he could just as easily find in Manhattan or driving along Riverside Drive so Andi could count boats on the Hudson. Then they’d find themselves in a park so Ahmad could read economics journals and Andi could play. Not my idea of a good time. Besides, I had work to do.

  I spent that morning considering Romei’s first poem, looking for antecedents in his early books. I’d been right: every line was a fragment of an earlier poem. He’d employed his earlier “anti-narrative” poems to tell a story—of how Esther refilled his inkless pen, allowing him to write “anti-narrative” poems. Twisted!

  I had already read all the pages Romei had sent me, I’d read them carefully more than once. It was time to “trot” the work: I’d retype the original, leaving five or six spaces between each line, then handwrite a quick “literal” translation above each line, adding towers of alternative translations above problem words, which is to say most words. I’d use different colored highlighters to note difficult phrases or lines I didn’t fully understand. If its rhythm was complex, I might scan the work, or I might note its rhyme pattern. On the back, I’d make notes about possible approaches, which elements seemed most important, what the author was getting at; I’d also start a leitwort lexicon, for key words that appeared several times. I’d end up with an indecipherable page, full of color, ornament, and scrawl, which I’d then throw away so I could get down to the real business of translation, trusting that everything I’d noted had sunk into my cells, available when I needed it.

  And if it hadn’t, there it was, in the wastebasket, where it would remain till I was done.

  I left the house just three times: to get a mocha frappe from Joe, a dunedog from Cohn’s Cones (Cohn’s served all manner of beach food—wieners, pretzels, slush), and another frappe from Joe. After the latter, I snuck over to Benny’s side display, which now featured books about motherhood and Jimmy Hoffa. Labor? Going into Labor? Labor Day!

  But thinking about Benny made me angry, so I returned to Joe’s for a cookie and ate it in Slice of Park. Benny and Marie were probably on an excursion, too, it being Saturday, when Benny always closed his store—everyone excursioning but me!

  I’d just finished my cookie when Andi called.

  I made a friend, she shouted. Her name is Lisa. She has a hamster, but she thinks it’s dead. She doesn’t mind being my best friend if I don’t make her play Chutes and Ladders. She’s nicer than Pammy. Now that Pammy’s got chicken pox she thinks she’s so cool, but she’s not!

  I couldn’t remember the last time my daughter had strung together so many sentences.

  That’s nice, I said. Where did you meet her?

  But Andi had passed the phone to Ahmad, who promised fried clams, then said, What? What? You’re breaking up!

  •

  I was setting the table for dinner. I thought fried clams was a joke, but was bringing out the Bounty just in case. And rehearsing what I should have said to Benny three days before, what I’d definitely say next time I saw him, which would be never.

  Ahmad was first in the door.

  Don’t be alarmed, he said as Andi burst in behind him, her arm in a cast up to her elbow, shouting, Look, Mommy! Look! Look!

  Andi! I cried, dropping the Bounty. What happened?

  Look what I got! she shouted, raising her cast in the
air. Her name was already written in sixteen colors along the ulna, and along the other side, Ahmad had drawn her, making a comical face and falling out of an apple tree.

  Which was when I saw the cardboard tub: Mystic Clam Shack.

  Mystic?

  You took Andi to Connecticut and she fell out of a tree?

  Look, Mambo! Everyone can sign! Ahmad got me magic markers that smell like fruit!

  How wonderful for you, I said, glaring at Ahmad, who shrugged. Do you want to tell me how you fell out of a tree?

  Headfirst, she said, chasing a squirrel at our new house.

  Into the kitchen! You, Ahmad! Into the kitchen!

  •

  Ahmad claimed not to understand. Kids hurt themselves all the time. It’s just a fracture, and besides, he wasn’t buying, just looking.

  Just a fracture? I shouted. Just looking?

  There were too many things for me to be angry about to know where to begin. He let Andi go up a tree? He’d taken her to Connecticut? To see a house? If he’d thought it was okay to take her to Connecticut, why hadn’t he told me?

  It’s not like you asked, he said. You could have asked.

  Why should I ask! You know how I feel about Connecticut!

  You were happy to be rid of her, Ahmad said softly.

  How dare you! I shouted, then lowered my voice. How dare you say I was happy to be rid of her! That’s a terrible thing to say!

  That’s why you didn’t ask. Because you didn’t care. You wanted to work.

  I didn’t ask, I said, my voice rising again, because I trusted you!

  A small voice behind me said: Ahmad, would you draw my bath? Tink already burned himself.

  Ahmad shot me a look that sent a cliché of shivers down my spine.

  We ate our clams cold and in silence, in front of the TV.

  25

  STUNNING VICTORY

  After the Friends rerun, Andi wanted Ahmad to tuck her in, but I insisted.

  C’mon, kiddo, I said, and she led me, reluctantly, to her room. Her pajama tops were on backwards. How many days had she worn them? Another night wouldn’t hurt. Her room was more or less in order: on the floor, a Barbie at the Beach coloring book, Monica Lewinsky paper dolls (Monica was Andi’s idea of a superhero: on TV every night, everyone talking about her clothes. Monica’s job may have lasted a minute, but she was no temp!). On her child-size desk, a children’s dictionary, a half-empty box of crayons. In the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, dozens of Nancy Drews, also a four-poster bed for Tamika.

  Where’s Tink? I asked.

  In exile, she said.

  Again? I asked.

  He wouldn’t do as he was told so I put him in the bathtub.

  You didn’t drown him, did you?

  How could I drown him if he’s not real?

  Okay. Into bed.

  She hesitated.

  I want to say my prayers, she said, and got into position.

  You kneel beside your bed?

  That’s the way Pammy does it.

  I knew she’d started doing this, but I didn’t know she kneeled—like a cherub in some Jerry Falwell newsletter. I called on my father’s ancestors for assistance.

  You know, Jewish girls don’t kneel when they pray.

  Really? she asked, interested. What do they do?

  I didn’t know. I tried to remember scenes of synagogue prayer from movies.

  They sit, I said. Sometimes they stand.

  Pammy kneels.

  Well, she’s not Jewish, is she? I said, beginning to despair.

  I want to do it like Pammy.

  Okay. I’m just telling you. So you know.

  Now I lay me down to sleep …, my daughter from another planet said, then scrambled into bed.

  Do you say that because you’re afraid? I asked, aware too late that the question was leading.

  Of what? she asked, and I was caught. I couldn’t say, afraid of dying.

  I don’t know. School beginning?

  She looked at me blankly. School was three days away, an eternity in child time.

  Why would I be afraid of that?

  What about nightmares? You know what my mother told me to do if I had nightmares?

  You have a mother?

  Of course I have a mother—what did you think?

  Andi shrugged. When she shrugged, her whole torso got involved, one shoulder higher than the other, head cocked, the very picture of puzzlement. I had to laugh.

  If you have a mother why don’t we see her?

  I stopped laughing.

  Because she’s not a nice person, Andi.

  Then I don’t want to know what she said about nightmares, she replied reasonably.

  I don’t know why I persisted, acting the part of Cora, a character from one of my short stories, who invents tales about a grandmother her daughter never knew.

  My mother said you had to tell yourself you were in a nightmare. Then you could either make the dream better or you could wake yourself up.

  I tried that, Andi said. It doesn’t work.

  I stared at my daughter, that miraculous mix of spirit and flesh.

  Maybe you need practice, I said, still wanting to give her something, something she could use. Were you afraid when you fell from the tree?

  If I fell again I wouldn’t be afraid!

  Oh?

  I’d pretend I was flying, she said, and spread out her arms.

  I sat down on her bed, trying to take that in.

  You’re supposed to tuck me in now.

  I pulled the guilt quilt up to her chin, making sure her cast was outside the blankets.

  Ahmad tucks me in tighter.

  I want to talk to you about Connecticut, I said.

  She looked at me solemnly.

  I know you had a good time there.

  She didn’t reply, expecting to have to wait out a lecture.

  You did, didn’t you?

  She nodded.

  Just because you have fun there doesn’t mean it’s a good place to live. Think of the things you’d miss in New York. Your playgroup, friends at school, musicals …

  Ahmad says we can go to matinees on weekends.

  What about Pammy and Martina? You’d miss them, wouldn’t you?

  Pammy’s stuck up, and Martina doesn’t like me anymore.

  Really? Why?

  I don’t know, Andi said, shrugging.

  You had a fight with your friends? I asked, stunned. They’d been inseparable since Chinese-Spanish-French quadrilingual preschool.

  Andi nodded.

  Ahmad says these things happen.

  Why didn’t you tell me?

  I don’t know, Andi said, shrugging again. You were busy.

  I always have time for you.

  You said I mustn’t disturb you when you’re working.

  I couldn’t argue with that—I had.

  There’s always time. I always have time for you.

  Oh, Andi said.

  Really!

  Okay, I heard you.

  There are lots of things about New York you’d miss if you left. You don’t realize it now because Connecticut is so new.

  I’d miss Ahmad more.

  What makes you think Ahmad would be there without us?

  It’s obvious. Besides, he told me.

  That’s not certain, I said, as if that made a difference.

  Plus, Andi said, the house is near a mall. There are no malls in New York City. Just stupid stores one after the other. No malls, no indoor waterfalls.

  We’ll talk about this more later, I said, leaning over to kiss her cheek, having no arguments to offer now except that of my own need.

  I’d have a bike, she added, and a pool. Does your mother live in Connecticut, is that why you don’t want to live there?

  My mother has nothing to do with this.

  It’s two against one, Andi said.

  Moms have veto power, even in a democracy. Ask anyone.

  You never want me to have any fun!


  That’s silly. Of course I want you to have fun!

  I’m staying up all night.

  Fine. As long as you turn out the light.

  You don’t think I can do it.

  Good night, Andi.

  You don’t think I can do it! she shouted as I shut her door. You don’t think I can do it!

  She continued shouting these absurd words, challenging me to—what? agree with her? believe in her? I bumped into, and ignored, Ahmad in the hall. He stopped in front of Andi’s room. I heard him open her door, then I heard the shouting stop.

  Not the stunning victory I’d hoped for.

  26

  RITALIN FOR THE HEART

  Andi had a nightmare. Angry men with baseball bats came through the window; they wanted to hurt the children. She tried to make them stop, really she did. Or rather, she hid while Ovidio shot them with his gun. I ran to her room when I heard her cry and grabbed her to me. She crumpled against my chest, a reluctant, shuddering ball; she would not be consoled. Ahmad, wearing only his pajama bottoms, came to the door. I told him about the dream.

  Damn your daughter’s Oedipal fantasies, he muttered. Andi pulled away from me, reached for him with both arms, her face smeared with tears. He took her from me and swayed with her, his arms strong against her back, his face nuzzling her neck, murmuring things till she fell asleep, still in his arms. Behind them, floating in the corners of the wall, lit by glow-in-the-dark stars, portraits of Ahmad and me, looking younger, more optimistic. I left Ahmad to put her back to bed and felt cold inside. When had I become superfluous?

  From my bed I stared at the Corot poster on my wall, made strange by flashing avenue light. I’d made a vow when Andi was born: she’d be the center and the circumference of my life, its organizing principle and its limit. I would never abandon her, not in thought, word, or deed. I’d be everything my mother wasn’t. Nothing would ever ground my girl: I’d make sure she flew to her big heart’s content. Was I a bad role model? Was Connecticut better for my baby?

  I’ve never been good at second-guessing myself. When that still small voice tells me to look at my life, I turn up the stereo, find anything to do but. The psychologists haven’t come up with a cure for what ails me: there is no Ritalin for the heart.