by Sonia Taitz
“Bal a Versailles? That’s pretty old-fashioned. Don’t you mean Brown Sugar?” said Tim.
“Never heard of that one,” said Arlie, puzzled.
“I’m wearing Chanel,” said Abigail, who wondered why Tim was making up names for perfumes, and whether (and why) he was flirting.
“I wonder why you need to criticize me, Arlie. Just because you know more than I do about babies doesn’t mean you—please don’t demean me.”
“I did not be mean to you,” said Arlie, with dignity. “But if you really think that I—”
The fact that Arlie clearly didn’t know the word “demean” (and that she, Abigail, naturally did) gave her no satisfaction. Being smart and verbal had nothing to do with the contest for love in her home.
“I don’t think it, I feel it!” she said, almost shouting. “I feel put down all the time now! You don‘t know what it’s like to be a new mother!”
“Well,” said Arlie, quietly and calmly, “you know I had that abortion, and so I was not lucky enough to have the experience directly.”
Both Abigail and Tim looked stunned by the frank, bold intimacy.
With a small, bitter smile, Arlie continued, “And I honestly never knew I needed to give birth so I would finally please you—”
“You please me. You’re more than competent. I would like you to support me.”
“How I support you, you with all the fancy house and the money, excuse me? You understand?”
“You could try to notice that I’m a person, a woman, like yourself. I’m a human being, too, Arlie.”
“But Abigail,” said Tim. “She can’t do that when you’re from a different class and power structure. Don’t you see that it’s unfair to make that demand? That’s why you two are getting so emotional.”
“Yeah,” said Arlie. “Don’t yell at me for nothing I can’t do.”
“No, Tim,” Abigail persisted. “Arlie has status here. Don’t you see? I’m in Mothering 101, and she’s like—postgraduate. I don’t even know the alphabet, and she’s writing the thesis and grading the papers, and giving me Ds—”
“You’re jealous of her?” It was as though Arlie were no longer there.
“She knows so much more than I do. I never knew how much I never knew.”
“So go to the library.”
“Books! First of all, who writes them? Experts, mostly men. And the books are so confusing, they all say different things. It’s more a hands-on thing, it’s an art, and a feeling, you know?”
“You’ll get there.”
“Will I, Tim? Have you seen the way the baby looks at her?”
“You want the baby to look at you the way she looks at Arlie?”
“Yes, I really do,” said Abigail, her voice betraying a trifle more sadness than she intended.
Arlie seemed to feel that this sidebar had gone on long enough. She took a breath and resumed her own argument:
“Well, if you think I’m not doing my job properly, Ms. Thomas, then call up the agency, you know, and get a refund and send me promptly on my way. Because no one is ever unhappy with Arlie Rajani.”
Suddenly, Arlie’s face contorted downward. In a gesture Abigail understood, she held herself back. Standing very still, she covered her eyes with her hands. Tim put his arm around her shoulder and held her. Turning her head toward his tweed jacket, Arlie took a deep breath, inhaling all the wonderful Tim smells. Abigail knew exactly what she was inhaling.
Now, she cleared her throat loudly. Tim’s body made a slight shift, drawing her closer. Arlie exhaled, trembling, and pulled away from him. Standing alone, she faced her employer with an expression of strength regardless of outcome.
“I am ready now, Ms. Thomas. Call the agency. There are more babies and more jobs for me.”
“Listen,” Abigail said, trying not to dwell on the fickleness of nannies, or how plausible they looked in the arms of one’s lover, as though it were possible for them to fill your shoes—and your nightie. “You know I have confidence in you.”
“Yeah, the baby’s doing great,” added Tim. “Abigail told me she’s getting to almost twelve pounds.”
“Yes, that is true,” said Arlie, in proud, dignified tones. “Eleven pound, thirteen ounces. I weigh her just this morning before her first bottle that I give her.”
“Well, wow, that’s great then, isn’t it?” said Tim. “She was just a little peanut when she was born, and now she’s a—a—”
“A Brazil nut!” said Abigail, encouragingly. She looked at him and he looked at her. “A cola nut,” she tried again, thinking of an old commercial featuring these huge dark seeds.
“At least a filbert,” he said, exploding in laughter as Abigail did, too.
“What do you think, Arlie?” Abigail said, trying to include her. “A chickpea? Garbanzo.” The woman stayed somber.
“All kidding aside,” said Abigail, abashedly, “I really appreciate you. You’re indispensable to me and to Chloe. Please believe me.”
“I must quit if I make you unhappy,” repeated Arlie evenly. “Domestic Deliters send you someone who make you happy. Make you laugh like that.”
It was funny, Abigail thought. Arlie wants love just like I do.
“Arlie Rajani treat every baby like it was her very own,” continued the nanny, taking a step closer to Abigail. Abigail could feel the warmth of her body. She sensed a spice to it, beyond the manufactured heat of her eau de toilette. She wondered if Arlie had a boyfriend who could siphon off some of this heat.
“And that is why I make that comment about the perfume,” continued Arlie. “I need my child to be comfortable. That is my job, and I must do it.”
“I don’t want to start up again, but since we’re talking openly, why do you say ‘my child’ when she’s, you know, mine?”
“Chloe’s yours until the day you die. But she’s mine when I’m on the job. That’s how it works. You understand?”
“Yes.” She didn’t completely. Who could?
“My last boss, she make a big dinner party and tell me to serve it. I never say ‘boo.’ I serve, I clean up, and then I quit. They want me back now, they say Arlie, they cry Arlie, but I refuse them. I am a nanny, you understand? Not a maid and not a slave. And I know my work. My children always gain the weight, and they grow up tall and strong. And then I go on.”
It seemed noble, thought Abigail. Unrequited love in its purest form, perhaps. Planting trees for someone else’s shade. For hers.
“Now you go and do your job,” said Arlie. “And leave her to me. I will keep her clean and wipe her bottom. I will give her the milk and I’ll burp her. But all the time, you are the mama and she know it. She know it all the time. So don’t wear that perfume. Go wash it off and let her smell her mother.”
“All right, Arlie,” said Abigail, dutifully going to the bathroom to wipe behind her ears. After that she checked the bassinet to see if Chloe had awakened. She wanted to see her own baby, be seen by her.
“This her big nap. Shhh. You go. Best not to wake her and she cry and you get so nervy again, eh?”
“I can stay, right Arlie?” said Tim. “I haven’t seen the baby much lately.”
Arlie hesitated. “She sleep for a long time sometimes.”
“I can wait.”
“Well, I’ve really got to go,” said Abigail. No one said a word; no one stopped her.
For a moment, she hesitated. Was it proper to leave her nanny and her handsome man alone in the apartment? She had not slept with Tim since the baby’s birth, and Arlie was beautiful. It was odd: she did not feel as threatened by the thought of Tim and Arlie as she did by that of her daughter with Arlie. Perhaps I’m not really in love with him, she thought. My body is, yes, she acknowledged, feeling a sudden regretful pang for him even as she walked away. But not me.
26
As soon as Abigail had gone, Tim rose up to lock the door behind her. Arlie walked silently toward the door, as though to check that he’d done the job correctly. The hous
e was her domain, and she had to keep Chloe safe. Tim had locked only the bottom lock, so Arlie took care of the top one as well.
She bumped into Tim as he turned back to walk to the living room. For a moment he seemed to stand in her way. Then Tim walked over to the sofa, sat down, crossed his legs, and asked Arlie where she came from. She’d been on her way to check on the baby again.
“Huh?”
“I said, where are you from, originally? I used to live in the Islands, myself.”
“Guyana.” Arlie stood next to him now. Her expression read, Is that all?
The phone rang, and Tim swiped it up. He listened for a moment, then said, “Sorry, they’re not here. No, I have absolutely no idea.” He paused for a moment, then hung up and smoothly turned back to Arlie.
“That’s where—off the coast of South America?”
“Yes. It’s near Brazil.”
“Some kind of colony—French?”
“No, English. Used to be. Not anymore, though.”
Tim sprawled across the sofa and threw a leg up on the backrest.
“I grew up mostly in the Dominican Republic, believe it or not. At least my early years. So you’re Indian?” said Tim, craning his neck up to get a good look at her. He looked down at Arlie’s feet as well. That ankle bracelet was a nice touch, he thought. A thin little slave cuff. Some women wanted to feel that way—subservient.
“Long time ago my people came from there,” Arlie was saying.
“Why?”
“Why they come there? Bauxite. They use it for industry. Workers, you know. My father had a general store, though. I was brought up real, solid middle-class.”
“Oh, were you?”
“Yes. I had a good British education, you know, the uniforms and all, and here I trained with Domestic Delites to qualify for nanny.”
“How long did you study?”
“Three and a half weeks. Then I did the CPR and got my certificate accredit.”
“Come over here,” said Tim, smiling. Mixed with mistakes of content and speech, her dignity and pride were irresistible. “I don’t want to keep twisting around to see you.”
“I was going to check on the baby when you stop me.”
“She’s sleeping, right? Otherwise, it’s safe to say she’d be shouting and crying.”
“Yes, so maybe I should boil some bottles in the kitchen,” Arlie responded. “Baby will be thirsty after her nap.”
“Wouldn’t you rather sit by me?”
“I don’t think Ms. Thomas hire me for that.”
“Maybe she actually did. You do everything else for her. She doesn’t feel like taking care of the baby, so you do it. You get to do all the dirty work, see?”
After a long pause, Arlie spoke: “You two are not happy together?”
“Oh, ‘happy’ is a complicated word, especially for a woman like our Abigail. She’s a very complicated woman, and you can see all the joy that brings me. She doesn’t actually know what happiness is. Even when it’s staring her in the face.”
“Yes, she has everything, luxury lotions, the best stroller, even a good job. . . .”
“Not to mention the gorgeous little baby girl you help her raise.”
“But sometimes, you know,” said Arlie, rising to a new topic within her expertise, “these new mothers, they get a little sad. The hormones, and that. Give her time to adjust. That can be the reason.”
“Oh, sure. That must be it.”
“Sometimes, men don’t see it. But it’s common, understand,” she said. “It will pass, don’t worry. Sometimes their bodies hurt for a long time from the soreness. The birth, it rip you.”
“No, she’s put back together, all right,” said Tim. “She just doesn’t—she just doesn’t actually love me, Arlie,” said Tim. “I can stand on my head for her and she won’t really, I mean deeply, care.” Tim looked into Arlie’s face and felt he was about to cry. He hated himself for what he was doing. Who did he think this poor woman was, his nanny? Milagros? Did he think she’d hug him and make it all better?
Arlie looked away. “Excuse me,” she said, “but it’s not my job to talk about those things. It’s not my professional training.”
“Don’t make your mind such a slave, Arlie. Don’t be all ‘professional.’ I get enough of that from Abigail. Don’t be rigid. I’m talking to you as a person. As a man with a broken heart—to a woman who might have a human heart inside of her.”
Arlie hesitated.
“But Ms. Thomas, I see her smile with you, she laugh with you,” she ventured. “And you talk like you like each other, you joke together, you hold hands and that.”
“Sure. We like each other. We’re friends, we’re terrific companions.” Tim sighed jaggedly. “And sometimes she holds my hand because her heels are so high she needs a strong arm on the side. To keep from falling.”
“True! I try on some of those—” Arlie stopped midsentence, perhaps realizing she shouldn’t have confessed that.
“No, who wouldn’t? They make the legs look so, so hot, but can you walk in them? No.”
“No,” Arlie agreed.
“Couldn’t you—couldn’t you just sit with me, for one minute? The baby’s sleeping.” He patted the sofa and shifted over, giving Arlie room.
“Why you want to sit with me,” she said quietly, even as she sat down. “Movie-star man like you. Well-dressed, talk smooth. Have anyone you want.” Arlie’s eyes were downcast as her fingernails circled, scritching and scratching at the thin, mesh fabric of her hose.
“I don’t have what I want by a long shot, Arlie.”
The phone rang again. Tim swiped it up, listened for a moment, then slammed it down.
“Who was that?” said Arlie.
“Someone who keeps calling the wrong number,” he replied.
“Deep inside,” he continued, looking intently into Arlie’s confused eyes, “I’m actually as wretched a creature as you.”
“What are you talking about, I’m not wretched!” said Arlie, bristling. “You be amazed how much I send home, how much dollars I put in the account. Thirty, fifty, hundred, sometimes more. I don’t need anything. A dress, some shoes, a little rice, a honey cake.”
“And that crazy cologne,” he said, leaning over to breathe into her neck. Musk. He noticed the little bumps of skin, rising under his mouth. Goosebumps and a shiver.
“Arlie, I hope you won’t mind if I ask a little question.”
“What is it?” she said tentatively.
“You’re a caregiver. But who takes care of you?”
“Don’t trouble yourself about that,” said Arlie, flushing.
“Don’t you have any feelings?”
“Yes, of course I do. But I don’t like to bring them here.”
“But you do bring them here. You bring them everywhere, and that’s what’s so special about you. You’re able to give love freely and receive it.”
“To the baby, not freely, that’s my job and I get wages for it.”
“Get beyond that, Arlie. Come on; don’t be like Abigail Thomas, Esquire! Think beyond the professional. Don’t turn it on and off.” Arlie stared at him as though she understood. “Be real, be a person,” he persisted. “Have a heart, OK?”
“I do have a heart, what you think, I don’t?” her voice rose up. “I was married and divorced, you know.”
“Same as me. Married and divorced. We’re both brokenhearted. Another Guyanese, was it?” said Tim, moving closer.
“Yes,” she responded. “Marwan, that pig. Four years I give him my love and he—he—” Arlie began to cry.
“OK, OK,” said Tim, soothingly. He put his arms around her. For a moment she stiffened, but then Arlie’s muscles seemed to release as Tim hugged her. Slowly, slowly, he weighted her down until she lay prone on the sofa. She showed a certain blind obedience to gravity and nature. Then she stiffened again and spoke:
“Not here, I told you, not on the job. Maybe after work, all right? I mean it, after work,” s
he repeated. His body pinned her, but gently. It floated above hers, touching lightly everywhere. Arlie was talking right into his ear, talking softly.
“Baby, what does it matter, I’m here now, let’s not lose this moment,” Tim responded just as softly, pressing her down again, feeling her blood pound beneath his body. He was madly challenged by their situation. Why did every single woman prefer work to love?
“Your heart is beating so quickly. Are you starting to like me a little?”
“Yes, a little, but the baby—” whispered Arlie.
“Remember, she’s sleeping with a nice full tummy,” he murmured, his face nuzzling hers. His stubbled cheeks scratched at her soft brown face. “I know how good you are at getting that baby into the deepest, most peaceful relaxation. Abigail told me that. You’re a sorceress, you are. You have true female power.”
Arlie was listening hard; Tim felt her buzzing concentration. With his own legs he pushed hers apart.
“Now close your eyes and just let me make love to you.”
Tim’s heart beat wildly as he felt Arlie surrender. Looking down at her face, he saw old hurts blurring into a dreamlike state of trust. And he hadn’t even really touched her. How different from Abigail’s wary sexuality. He felt as if he and this woman were both floating in a hot, dark space where all transgressions were permitted. No one had ever let him in so far, without fear.
Hands shaking, Tim lifted Arlie’s billowing white skirt, a bridal veil that now hid her face from him. He put his hands on Arlie’s surprisingly tight and resilient pantyhose and began to roll them down. The shoes were the last to go, delicate, strappy sandals that he gently unbuckled.
“There you are,” he said, when he’d stripped her feet bare. The woman lay still below. Her breath came short and fast.
“Did your husband do this?” he asked, probing here and there with utter tenderness, alternating with rude demonstrations of will. “Or this?”
“No . . .” said Arlie. “No . . . Yes . . . I don’t know. . . .”
