by Rand, Naomi;
“My father was a Broadway angel. By that, I mean an investor. He loved the theatre. He would bring me along as his guest because my mother was, well, let’s just say she didn’t care for any of it. She thought theatrical productions beneath her. My father and I went to all the openings and after parties. We’d stay up late, waiting for the reviews to come in. I used to bring my autograph book. They were so kind, all of them, all the greats . . . Mary, Ethel, Rex. They were so, so welcoming.
“I knew I wanted to perform. Even in grade school I loved getting up on stage. But my mother resisted. She had other ideas, the cotillion and all the rest and then a good marriage and children. She never understood me at all.” Brooke stared out, into her own past. Sam imagined she saw the disapproval her grandmother freely expressed. Brooke could be doing something as trivial as showing off a new dress and Katherine would give her that withering look. Brooke shrank away from it, from her. Win called their grandmother “the old battle-axe.” Yet in person, she was surprisingly prim and diminutive.
Brooke said, “There was no stopping me once I got my feet wet.”
Win raised an eyebrow, mouthing the rest. I took to it like a duck to water.
“I took to it like a duck to water,” Brooke continued. “The surprise was that I was even rewarded at all. It’s not easy. But then again, what is? And I’ve made such good friends. They’re like a second family.”
Actually, we’re your second family, Sam thought, as she exchanged another knowing look with Win. Brooke had abandoned them willingly, eagerly. They’d submitted to the worst babysitting on earth. Blasted out teens, lecherous boyfriends, come one, come all. It might have been different if their own father had stayed put, instead of running north, the twenty-two-year-old au pair in tow. It would definitely have been different if Grandfather had gone to see the doctor when he first started feeling ill, then the cancer would have been curable. It wasn’t by the time it was finally diagnosed. That funeral was huge, with everyone who was anyone in New York society paying his or her respects. Afterwards, Win snuck into his study to steal the lighter, to tuck it away and have something to keep. Once there was a girl named Samantha who lived in a house at the edge of a great dark forest.
“Are you performing in anything now?” Lucy inquired.
“As it happens, I do have a project. A one woman show.”
“That’s so cool. What about?”
“You’ll have to come and see,” Brooke said. “You and Sam.”
“Really? That would be so great.”
Lucy was enthusiastic, nary a wrong note struck. Great. Sam rolled the adjective round on her tongue. It seemed so long ago, yet she’d once idolized this same mother.
The doorbell rang. Win jumped up to get it. Sam recognized the voice. It was Dusty, nee Alexander Preston McQueen, asking, “How long are you back for?”
“A while.”
“How was Vegas?”
“Interesting. Like I told you on the phone, different.”
“What about Boston?” Dusty asked.
“Cold. Icy.”
Sam got the subtext. Win was always looking for love in all the wrong places. Undoubtedly there had been yet another girl, another misstep, another painful breakup.
“Sorry to hear it.”
“It wasn’t all bad.” Some other girl was, as usual, waiting in the wings.
Time to make good their escape. Sam lifted the white boxes of half-finished Chinese food off the table and dumped them in the plastic bags tagged with the ubiquitous “I Love New York” slogan. In the kitchen, she washed their plates and Lucy dried. The bell rang again and again. Win’s crowd poured in in a steady stream, all preppy Upper East Side party boys and girls.
“Hey, Sammy Pammy.” Dusty set a six-pack down on the kitchen counter. “Allow me to introduce myself,” he said to Lucy, extending a hand. “Dusty.”
“To his friends,” Sam said.
“We’re all friends here, I trust.”
“Exactly.”
Dusty smiled at her, cocking his head ever so slightly. Sam had a soft spot for him. He’d been Win’s best friend since the beginning of time or really just starting in kindergarten. He was six foot one with dirty blond hair, a square chin, blue eyes, and a muscular torso, courtesy of hours spent rowing crew.
Lucy shook his hand and smiled her winning smile. “Lucy Westcott.”
“How do you two know each other?”
“Roommates,” Sam said. “How’s grad school?”
“Not bad. College?”
“Fine,” she said.
“That’s it?”
“Actually, it’s pretty great,” Sam admitted.
“That’s more like it, Sam I am. I keep meaning to check up on you, but they keep us L 1’s busy.” He gave her shoulder a brotherly squeeze. He lifted one of the beers, popped open the top, and went off to join the fray.
“He seems nice,” Lucy said.
“He is. He goes to Columbia Law.”
“Really?” Lucy was clearly impressed.
A girl could do worse than Dusty, Sam thought. She believed Dusty’s trajectory was pre-ordained. No matter how high Dusty got tonight, he would make his way through the world without a hitch. In ten years, she was positive he’d be up for a partnership at Simpson, Thatcher. If things went on the way they’d been going, he and Win would drift apart. At some point, Win would call him for legal advice and Dusty would throw up his hands, then tell his faithful secretary to say he was out of town on business.
Win could still be Dusty. He was just as intelligent. But, instead, he was the perennial fuck up.
Yet, he was beloved. That was a gift, she supposed. Win worked the crowd. Sam wished she could help him. If only she had enough money to give him so that he would go away for good and figure out how to actually be grown up, not that she was sure what that actually meant considering their very real examples. Plus, Sam knew in her heart of hearts, it wasn’t about the money. Whatever he made, Win spent or gave away, then gave his heart to the wrong person, then came back to this place where the very air was poisonous to him. It was worse for him than for her, or at least she told herself that. Sam kept assuring Win that he was covered. He kept pretending not to hear her or understand what she meant. Or that she was sacrificing a lot to stay close and watch over Brooke for the two of them so he could make his way. Sam, frankly, resented it, resented him turning up like a bad penny. Or how he blew her worries about him off, saying, “I’m fine, just fine, Sammy Pammy.”
“I’ve got to go,” Sam said to Lucy.
“All right.”
Lucy turned to head out, but Dusty stood in the doorway.
“You guys are sticking around, right?”
“I don’t think so,” Sam said.
“Hey, come on. Where are you rushing off to?”
Lucy gave her a pleading look.
“I guess we could hang out for a little while more,” Sam allowed.
Twenty-seven people shoehorned into the living room. Six packs of Miller and Bud, a jug of cheap white wine, and a baggie full of pot were on the coffee table. When in Rome, Sam thought, duly smoking a bowl. It didn’t dent her somber mood. Her brain was clear as a bell jar. The rest of the group got sodden and wasted. It was lonely, perched high above the fray. Win bent in Lucy’s direction; indeed, Lucy was the fulcrum. All available males spun round her.
“It was like the desert opened up and grabbed onto me,” Win said. “It’s such a mystical place. Shit, you should go.”
Lucy nodded, but she turned away and found Sam. “Dance with me?”
It was the last thing on earth Sam wanted to do in front of these preppies with their half fried brains and noblesse oblige attitude. Still, Lucy had made a personal request. Her friend took her hand and led her into the center of the room. The O’Jays were getting on the love train in their striped bell bottoms, their hair combed into perfect Afros. Lucy was a tidy dancer, no weaving, no shimmying, and no shaking.
“You’re goo
d,” Lucy yelled over the music.
“Not really.” Sam had exactly two signature moves. The first involved rocking from side to side. The second was more full body, clapping and twirling. Lucy grabbed Sam’s hands and pulled her close, spun her away, then back, square dance style. And then Lucy gave her an ebullient kiss on the cheek. “Thanks so much for staying.”
“It’s no big deal.”
“I have so much fun with you.”
Sam blushed, her extremities warming. She’d stayed because Lucy was clearly interested in Dusty. Yet, Lucy was also making it clear how important Sam was to her. Sam thought of what Lucy had said to her when she’d worried about Brooke and Win back at the store, “You’re nothing like her.” It wasn’t completely true. All children were a little like their parents. Still, having Lucy buoy her and believe in her mattered so much. Sam swore she would not disappoint her friend.
Another record dropped. Sly and his stoned family were taking them higher. Brooke danced free form, smacking into everyone as she went, a one-woman wrecking crew. Sam tugged Lucy off to a corner of the room for privacy and safety’s sake. They weren’t alone for long. While Brooke bumped and ground away, a small crowd gathered round them; Dusty, Win, and an old friend of Win’s, Larry. They zeroed in on Lucy. Sam thought that she’d gotten it all wrong to even compare her to Fitzgerald’s Daisy, Lucy wasn’t at all shallow or careless. She was the opposite of that in every possible way. Meanwhile, Debbie Harry demanded that everyone call. Sam pumped the air with her fist. Lucy did the same.
The tempo slowed and Mr. Sledge crooned, “When a man loves a woman, he can’t keep his mind on himself.”
“May I have this dance?” Dusty asked.
Lucy looked to Sam, asking permission. Sam nodded, smiling, and retired to the couch. Brooke plopped down beside her. Thankfully, Brooke was focusing her attention on a girl who stared dolefully at Win. It turned out she’d met him in Boston and her name was Marnie. She was an undergraduate at Boston University. She had no idea what she was going to do with her life but Win was so incredible, wasn’t he? She’d given him a ride to New York. She was coming home to visit her parents. She said how special and fragile Win was, how he needed care and watering.
It was a recipe for disaster. Win would dump her. Those who loved him, he disdained; those who treated him like shit, he adored. But Sam couldn’t warn the poor girl. She would just have to experience it for herself.
The slow dance ended. Win played DJ.
“When are you getting some new records?” he yelled at their mother. To prove his point, he set the Bee Gees on the turntable. It was Saturday Night. They were feverish. Lucy tried to keep up with Dusty’s Travolta imitation. Win cut in. He was a far better dancer than Dusty but he’d lost out already. When the night fever ended, the record changed. Brooke took over as instructor; everybody was being schooled in the hustle.
Sam shut her eyes and wished for sleep. If only someone would transport her back to her dorm room.
“Hey.”
Lucy slid in beside her. Dusty wedged himself next to Lucy. The three of them took up the couch. Sam watched Dusty’s fingers wrap possessively round the curve of Lucy’s knee.
Win appeared. “How about another go?” he said to Lucy.
“I’m tired.”
“Really?” But Win grinned, acknowledging his defeat. “Dusty, my man.” He made a faux military salute and backed away.
Sam got up and went to the bathroom. She lay down on the black and white diamond shaped tiles, cooling her overheated body. She thought about Dusty and Lucy. He was decent. He was fair. He would make a good boyfriend. And then she thought of Michael. Suddenly that night came back, complete with its miserable ending and her furtive escape. Why couldn’t it have been different? Why couldn’t it have been the way she had always imagined?
Fantasy, meet reality.
Sam doused her face with cold water. The music was so loud it shook the bathroom walls. Outside the door, Van Morrison was begging her to listen to the lion. She was the lion or rather, lioness. In the living room, Sam found Dusty dancing with Lucy. Lucy had propped her head on his shoulder, and her eyes were shut. What did she wish for, Sam wondered? But she guessed that it was much like her own wish, that same absurd fantasy. She hoped that Dusty would be the one, her one and only love. It was silly, unrealistic, and yet it was what you were told to aspire to.
Real love wasn’t like that at all. Real love meant loving a real person, flaws and all.
Win was making out with Marnie. Sam admired the girl’s outfit, a velvet mini skirt over white tights, go go boots, a ruffled shirt, and vest. The buttons on her shirt were half undone. His hand was inside, prospecting for gold.
Then she realized Brooke was gone. Her body stiffened. She told herself not to panic, but rushed down the hall to her mother’s room. And found her face down on her bed, snoring softly.
Sam exhaled. All was well tonight in this microcosm of the great wide world.
She found refuge in her own bedroom. A pile of books sat on the floor. Digging through, she found her favorite children’s story, The Superlative Horse.
Long, long ago in China, Duke Mu was the ruler of the Five Provinces. The Duke was elegant, accomplished, and admired. But, most of all, he was a horseman and in charge of selecting the Emperor’s private stock. One day the Duke proclaimed that whoever brought him the superlative horse would become the head of the imperial stable. All the best horsemen in the kingdom chose their version of perfection; sleek black, white and brown stallions with flaring nostrils, pawed at the ground. Only one lowly boy looked elsewhere. His horse was from a country stable, used for nothing much, a dull-coated stallion with little grace and no apparent virtues. Yet, in the race to see which of these horses was really the best, the lowly country horse beat all the others, leaving them in its dust. That boy had seen what was below the surface and discovered the warrior’s heart, beating true, underneath the matted coat.
Good looks were only that, no more. And the lesson worked in reverse. Look at Lucy whose beauty was just as blinding as the superlative horse’s dun colored, matted coat. People didn’t think to dig beneath her glittering surface. They thought they knew the real Lucy, but all they knew was who they thought she was. Sam was the only one who dug down to find the real Lucy.
She smiled, then set the book down on the floor next to her bed and clicked off the light.
In her dream, she and Lucy rode through Central Park. Sam was astride a bay, Lucy, a black. Lucy’s horse leapt over a downed tree. Then it was Sam’s turn. The ground dropped away and they were airborne. It was incredible. Free of the earth. Free of restraints. The horse touched ground. Sam leaned in close, her face against its neck as its hooves pounded. They were racing flat out through the woods, and into a meadow, high grass brushing against the horse’s legs, against Sam’s own.
“Sam!” Lucy yelled, and Sam looked up to find her friend lifting her arms, letting go of the reins. Lucy stayed tight to the back of her horse, her legs gripping. She truly was fearless. My turn now, Sam thought as she followed her friend’s lead and let out a war whoop.
12
Muriel
November 1980
MURIEL SHOVED THE newspaper aside. They’d elected that terrible actor as president! You tried to explain to people what was in their own best interests, yet they were so impatient. Every four years they herded into voting booths like cattle, pressing the buttons on their way down the chute to the slaughterhouse. Ronald Reagan. She hadn’t cared for his acting, not one little bit. And worse than that, he’d been a red-baiter.
“Amazing what we do to ourselves,” Virgil said. He had snuck up on her again. “How did you like that book?”
Muriel had brought it back, intending to leave it here in the reading area. The Transit of Venus. Lovers who were fated never to be together, like Romeo and his Juliet. “I had to read it twice,” she said. “I wasn’t sure I got it right the first time.”
“The prose
is pretty dense.”
Dense like a fog. You had to push your way through, feeling the edge of things. She set it aside on the table.
“I guess you didn’t care for it.”
“But I did,” she told him. “I was just so shocked when I realized what happened. The man you barely recognize gets onto a plane that crashes with the hero Ted, after he and Caro have waited so long, after they’re finally ready to start a life together. Then it’s over. It seems so unfair.”
“Yes, it does,” Virgil agreed.
He took the other leather easy chair beside her. Didn’t he have business to attend to? But he was settling in. This was apparently going to be one of those conversations he struck up with strangers every day. She’d overheard him; he seemed to relish talking to students, town gossips, and tourists. No matter who they were, he had a kind word.
He was, Albert had said once, a born salesman. Albert had never cared for him. They’d frequented the same circles without ever really socializing. Then Virgil’s wife had died. Muriel brought over a casserole. He’d answered the door, and she’d just walked in and taken over. Cleaned for him. Cooked the casserole in the oven. She’d sat with him and watched television with him. She hadn’t asked one question. They’d seen that detective program, Hawaii Five O, with McGarrett solving the crime, then she’d said good night and gone home. The next day she’d gone to the funeral with Albert.
Muriel couldn’t remember what Virgil’s wife’s face had looked like. She remembered the way she’d dressed, lots of hammered metal jewelry hanging from her ears and round her neck. Virgil had gone right back to work and now here he was, still working. Work was his balm, she thought. He loved the customers, knew many intimately enough to ask about their mom, their dad, their kids. He knew the professors at Tufts and what classes they taught.
As for knowing her, they’d spoken mainly about books. But Muriel thought that sometimes, what happened in books seemed more real than real life. Virgil was thumbing through the one he’d loaned her.
“I had to read it again because I wanted it to be different,” Muriel said.
