Mad Girls In Love

by Michael Lee West

  But I wasn’t sorry. Not one bit.

  October 15, 1993

  Dear Bitsy,

  I can’t believe that you’re 40 years old today. And our little Jennifer will turn twenty-two years old this New Year’s Eve. You know how I like to buy ahead, so I got her a cute Dior evening bag from the Episcopal Church rummage sale. I have missed you so much. I’m sorry I couldn’t get to London last summer, but I have all these dogs, and it’s just so hard to travel.

  Love,

  Dorothy

  January 3, 1994

  Dear Bitsy,

  Sit down before you read this. I have enclosed a newspaper clipping. Love,

  Dorothy

  FROM THE CRYSTAL FALLS DEMOCRAT

  Section F, Living, January 3, 1994

  Mr. Claude E. Wentworth IV announces the engagement of his daughter, Jennifer, to Pierre Armand Tournear, of Atlanta, Georgia. Ms. Wentworth is the granddaughter of Mr. and Mrs. Claude E. Wentworth III and Dorothy Hamilton McDougal and the late Albert McDougal. A 1989 graduate of Falls High, Ms. Wentworth attended Falls College. She is employed at Citizen’s Bank as a vice president.

  Mr. Tournear is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Thurmond Tournear of Marietta, Georgia. He briefly attended Kennesaw College and is currently employed at The Gap in Buckhead, Georgia.

  The nuptials are slated for May 15, 1994.

  Dorothy

  After Dorothy mailed the newspaper clipping to Bitsy, she called her granddaughter to complain about not having been told. Jennifer’s response was to tell her to take a chill pill. Then she said, “I totally feel your pain, Dorothy. But I WAS going to tell you.”

  Dorothy couldn’t think of a reply. She was sure Miss Betty had made Jennifer keep it from her. Nothing was enough for that woman. Not only had the lofty title of Grandmother had been claimed by that old witch, but Dorothy didn’t get to have a special name, and that irritated the hell out of her.

  “Are you going to tell your mother?” Dorothy asked. “Or shall I?”

  “Dammit, stay out of my business,” Jennifer cried. “If you tell her anything, I’ll personally send someone over to break your legs.”

  “I promise,” Dorothy said. “But it sure is funny that you always cash your mother’s checks but fail to return her phone calls.”

  “Stop meddling. Get a hobby.”

  “My family is my hobby.” Dorothy paused, then quickly changed the subject. “Where did you meet the Frenchman?”

  “Pierre isn’t French. He’s from Georgia.”

  “Well, that’s a relief.”

  “Oh, forget it. Just tell me Mack’s tuxedo size.”

  “Why?” Dorothy perked up. “Is he going to be an usher?”

  Jennifer just snorted. “No, I want to make sure he dresses appropriately.” Then she said to make certain that he ordered the tux this week.

  “What’s the rush?” Dorothy asked. “The wedding isn’t till May.”

  “I just want to be organized.”

  To Dorothy she sounded just like the crazies on Sally Jessie. Obsessive-compulsive brides cracking up on national TV. As if reading her grandmother’s mind, Jennifer said, “Make SURE that you tend to Mack’s tuxedo. Or better yet, just give me his measurements, and I’ll order it.”

  That night, Dorothy went over to Mack’s house and rifled through his closet, pulling together all his sizes. She wrote them down on an index card then she handed the card to her son, and told him to please call his niece and give her the information, that she was having fits over the tuxedo.

  Mack cracked open a Budweiser, sucked up the foam, and told her to handle it.

  Dorothy reached for the portable phone and punched in her grand-daughter’s number, then shoved the receiver into Mack’s hand. As he recited his sizes to Jennifer, his face turned pink. He was almost bald, a pale, blue-eyed, bald-headed man with purple bags under his eyes, not to mention a sour yellow complexion. If his liver is shot, Dorothy thought, I will give him mine.

  Mack’s forehead puckered and he said, “Inseam? Mama didn’t give me one.”

  He held out the receiver, as if gripping a live copperhead. Jennifer was yelling, “I have never heard of someone not knowing his inseam. What kind of throwback are you? Listen, if you want to come to my wedding, you’d better get your sizes in order.”

  Mack hung up the phone and scowled at his mother. “This is your fault. You didn’t give me a fucking inseam.”

  “No,” she told him. “But God did.”

  Part 8

  Bitsy Wentworth DeChavannes

  High above Green Park, in a drafty, rooftop conservatory, my heirloom Spode cup lay shattered on the floor, spilling Lung Ching tea over the stones. I was feeling pretty shattered myself. In my lap was an engraved invitation to the wedding of my twenty-two-year-old daughter. I’d known about her engagement; I’d even been expecting this invitation. Still, she had managed to shock me. I put on my reading glasses, then reached for the card.

  Claude Wentworth IV

  requests the honor of your presence

  at the wedding of his daughter

  Jennifer

  to

  Pierre Armand Tournear,

  on Saturday, the Fifteenth of May,

  at half after six o’clock in the evening

  nineteen hundred ninety-four

  Hammersmith Farm

  Crystal Falls, Tennessee

  Reception immediately following

  R.S.V.P.

  The R.S.V.P. had been X’d out in green ink; but it was the phrase “wedding of his daughter” that had sent my teacup flying.

  The heat rose to my face, and I fanned myself with the invitation, inhaling the faint scent of Boucheron. The fragrance evoked Jennifer, a small-boned, delicate woman with fierce blue eyes, her blond hair savagely cut into wisps that curled, Caesar-like, around a pale, broad forehead. We hadn’t spoken in months, not since our last long-distance squabble, which had begun with a disagreement over the pronunciation of Hermès, and ended with her slamming down the phone. I’d tried to reach her, but she wouldn’t answer my calls or letters. When it came to fashion, my daughter was up to date, but in all matters concerning me, she was merciless.

  Still fanning myself, I rose from the chaise and stepped over the wreckage. I slipped a John Coltrane CD into the machine, and as “Lush Life” began to play, I calculated the time in Tennessee, then grabbed the phone and dialed my daughter’s number before I could change my mind.

  “Hi,” I said, and my stomach lurched.

  “Oh, it’s you.” She paused. “I suppose you’re calling about the invitation.”

  “Yes.” Cradling the receiver between my chin and shoulder, I stepped over to the French door and pressed my forehead against the rain-pelted glass. A straggly arm of laburnum stretched over the lower half of the rooftop terrace. It reminded me of the wisteria in my mother’s garden. In a few weeks it would be blooming and bees would hum over the flowers. I had once foolishly pictured myself and Jennifer relaxing on the terrace, sharing a pot of jasmine tea and a platter of cress-and-egg sandwiches.

  “Ecru is totally classic. Don’t you love the pearl filigree?” Jennifer’s voice suddenly turned girlish, rising and falling with excitement. “Wait till you see the napkins and matchbooks. And my dress is, like, oh my God. It’s Vera Wang. A mermaid dress in oyster duchesse satin, and the veil is to die for. The tiara was made from Grandmother’s old Van Cleef & Arpels choker.”

  “I can’t wait to see it,” I said, trying to sound impressed, but I was distracted by the felicitous association of “grandmother” and “choker.”

  “And for the wedding,” she continued, “Pierre’s wearing a black tail-coat, white pique shirt with a white pique vest and bow tie. Ditto for the groomsmen and ushers, but with different boutonnieres. But you might know all of this if you lived within driving distance. Or even if you called once in a while.”

  “I have tried. Your machine always picks up.” I shut my eyes and pressed two fingers ag
ainst the lids. I started to ask if she’d received her birthday present—I’d sent it months ago—or if she’d read my letters. Not that it was important. Maybe I should let it go. One part of me was determined to rise above petty squabbles, but another part, the part I got from my mother’s family, demanded justice.

  What came out was, “Why was my name left off the invitation?”

  Jennifer released a long, stagy sigh. “I knew you wouldn’t understand.”

  “It leaves the impression that you don’t have a mother.”

  “Have I?”

  La Belle Dame Sans Merci, I thought and started to hang up, but with the receiver halfway down, I stopped. If I broke the connection, I would be severing one of the last fragile strands between us.

  “Look, I’m sorry if you’re upset,” Jennifer was saying. “I sent the invitation as a courtesy. I don’t expect you to come. That’s why I crossed off the R.S.V.P.”

  “Of course I’ll be there,” I said, breathing in faint traces of Boucheron, laburnum, and Lung Ching tea. “I wouldn’t miss it for anything.”

  “Why not? You skipped my childhood. Look, do us both a favor and disregard the invitation. Just stay on your side of the ocean, and I’ll stay on mine. But if you feel like sending a gift, I could use a Portmerion saucer. Unless you’d care to splurge on a teapot or a platter. My pattern is ‘Botanic Garden.’ Harrod’s should have it.”

  I heard a decisive click and the line began to buzz. I continued to hold the receiver, hoping that it was a mistake, that I would hear my daughter’s voice. Then, with one trembling finger, I punched redial. While the line rang, I prepared the words in my mind. Jennifer, there’s so much you don’t know. I’m not a villain, just a flawed woman who loves you beyond all else. But Jennifer was either ignoring her phone, or she’d left her house. I closed my eyes, hoping the answering machine would pick up, so I could at least leave a message. It didn’t. Finally I hung up.

  While “Seven Steps to Heaven” played in the background, I gathered the pieces of the broken cup. How strange that it had survived fifty years of upheavals in my grandmother’s life, and half as many in my own—including my hurried escape across the ocean—without so much as a chip, then finally succumbed to my own clumsiness.

  On my way to the trash bin, I stopped beside an arched window, with its soothing views of the park. I will too go to that wedding, I told myself. I’m not giving up without a battle this time.

  Through the window, I saw people rushing down Queen’s Path carrying umbrellas, huddled beneath raincoats. A decade ago, when I’d arrived in London, I’d panicked when the BBC weatherman had cheerily predicted rain for ten straight days. Now, all these years later, the rain was still falling. Down on the path, a punk with green hair approached an elderly gentleman who brandished his umbrella. The punk seemed unim-pressed and hurried down the path. The park had once been the site of duels, but now it was used as a shortcut from Piccadilly to Buckingham Palace. Not too far away, on Eccleston Place, my much-younger lover, Ian Maitland, was probably working in his gloomy publishing office, surrounded by galleys and FedEx envelopes. I was expecting him for tea. I imagined what he might say about my row with Jennifer. He would probably point out that “disinvited” wasn’t a word, but I couldn’t think of another one. “Uninvited” didn’t fit, either, because I had been invited.

  As I contemplated the etymology of the word invite, I wandered into the kitchen, set the kettle onto the stove, and turned up the flame. In the living room, on the CD player, John Coltrane had been replaced with Luther Vandross, who was singing “A House Is Not a Home.” To Luther, a chair was a chair, but I had to disagree: I was an interior designer, and I spent my days selecting fabrics, colors, and textures. Ian, who collectively dismissed my clients as “the Penelopes, Cynthias, and Daphnes,” had been surprised when he’d first seen my flat. He’d been expecting Osborn & Little, but instead he’d found worn slipcovers, lumpy cushions, overflowing bookcases, and a hodgepodge of woods and periods. It seemed to me that objects seldom brought peace of mind, but I kept my opinions to myself. It wasn’t my place to define another person’s happiness. So, whatever my clients wanted—whether it was a Russian antique or Flemish tapestry—I worked hard to find it.

  The phone warbled its two-note British ring. Thinking it might be Ian, I skidded across the polished floor and picked up the receiver. I was just about to say something provocative, when I recognized my mother’s voice, high-pitched and nasal, with just a touch of hysteria. “I hope it’s not the middle of the night over there,” Dorothy said. “I tried to figure the time difference, but I couldn’t remember if I counted forward or backward. Whoever dreamed up the time zones ought to be hog-tied. There’s no need to s-p-r-e-a-d time. It’s not butter.”

  “It’s forward.” I wondered if my mother was pacing while she talked—all of Dorothy’s telephones had twenty-foot cords, and she prowled around the house with the receiver tucked beneath her chin, while she used her shirttail to dust Hummels and bird figurines.

  “Your daughter just called me,” Dorothy said.

  “And?”

  “You’ve got every right to be upset over that invitation, but at least you got one. Of course, she says mine is on its way. But I don’t trust her. It’s those Wentworth genes. Claude’s people come from crocodiles. Thank goodness Jennifer inherited your prettiness and my sweetness.”

  I let that pass. My daughter possessed all the sweetness of an unripe persimmon.

  “She offered to have the invitations reprinted,” Dorothy rushed on, china rattling in the background.

  “But they’ve been mailed.”

  “You know what, honey? You need to drop this. So what if your name was left off? You’ve got the birth certificate to prove that you’re the mother.”

  “Haven’t you heard?” I laughed. “Claude is Jennifer’s mother and her father.”

  “Don’t be bitter, honey. It won’t do you a bit of good, trust me. I cornered the market on bitter. Besides, I know what’s wrong with you. It’s the change of life. Your estrogen is out of whack. When I was forty-one, I didn’t have a single hormone left in my body,” Dorothy went on. “I’ll bet your estrogen is on E.”

  “I won’t be forty-one until October.”

  “I know when your birthday is,” Dorothy said. “You’re a Libra, the sign of Air. Although you act like a Pisces. A fish out of water.” Dorothy’s voice turned strident. “You’ve just got to come to the wedding and show those Wentworths what you’re made of. Pack your finest outfits, okay?”

  “Outfits? I need more than one?”

  “There’s the rehearsal supper and the wedding,” Dorothy said.

  I wondered if I had time to dash over to Aquascutum or Jaeger, but alterations might take forever. My friend Caroline knew fashion designers from St. Martin’s and the Royal College of Art, but she was hiding out in northern Italy with a famous (and very married) rock star.

  “You’ve missed all the teas and bridal showers. Actually, I missed them, too. The post office keeps losing my invitations. At least, that’s what Jennifer claims.”

  “She’s utterly gormless.” I set down my teacup—a chipped Wedgwood I’d found in the cabinet—-taking great care to place it in the exact center of the saucer. “It means lacking sense.”

  “Then why didn’t you say that in the first place?” Dorothy’s voice began to rise. “England has plumb ruined you. Why, you can’t even talk like a normal Southerner. Why don’t you use words that I can understand?”

  “Like incurable paranoid schizophrenia?”

  Dorothy gasped.

  Damn, I hadn’t meant to say anything hurtful. I started to apologize but the line popped, then went dead.

  Dorothy and Jennifer

  After Dorothy hung up on her daughter, she walked out onto her screened-in porch and sat down in the glider. She wondered if a dizzy spell might be coming on—she always got one when she fussed with her children, or if Mack tried to bring home a girlfriend. Wo
rked like a charm, too. She glanced out into the yard. This morning, the weather-man had said the temperature might climb to seventy-five. Dorothy was wearing Gap jeans, the cuffs rolled up past her ankles. Her T-shirt said BLOOM WHERE YOU ARE PLANTED, which gave her a chuckle because it was so absurd. It made her think of funerals. The dead weren’t buried so much as planted, encased in pricey caskets. These days, the only flowers at the cemetery were store-bought.

  She ran a hand over her hair, smoothing the fuzz. Her eyebrows had been hastily drawn with a black pencil. She was big-boned and blond, her muscles hard beneath the wrinkled skin. Her facial tics had long since stopped, but another problem had taken their place: She was growing a small hump on her back. Redbook said it was a calcium deficiency. If this was true, her bones were on the verge of snapping to pieces. When she’d showed the lump to Byron Falk, he’d prescribed a medicine to squirt up her nose, which seemed like malpractice. She was hunchbacked, not allergic.