Admissions

by Nancy Lieberman

  “It would be a lot less expensive than private school.”

  “Seriously, Michael. I’m really concerned about Pamela and Sara. If there’s trouble between them, I’m afraid we’ll be on Pamela’s shit list.”

  “Just because you’re an F.O.S.?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Friend of Sara,” he answered.

  “Yeah. Because I’m an F.O.S., I’ll end up an E.O.P.”

  “It sounds like schoolyard talk,” he said, laughing.

  “Hello. It is the schoolyard. But in this movie, the parts of the children are being played by the adults,” she answered darkly.

  “You don’t really think she would be that vindictive, do you?”

  “I hope I’m overreacting. But nothing would surprise me when it comes to Pamela.”

  “Let’s not worry about it,” Michael said dismissively, and returned to his dinner. But after a few moments he put down his chopsticks and asked, “Do you really think she might try to make trouble? I mean, in your worst nightmares, what could she actually do?”

  “A lot . . . or nothing. Either could be damaging,” Helen answered.

  “Have some sea urchin. It’ll put hair on your chest,” he suggested lightly.

  “The last thing I need is another depilatory challenge.” She picked it up and swallowed it whole.

  Sara was reading applications in her office, half-listening to Brandi, who was scheduling a tour and interview with a three-parent family with twins.

  BRANDI: Mrs. Barton, I’m going to have to leave it to you to coordinate with your ex and his wife. I’ve already accommodated you and the twins.

  MRS. BARTON: My ex has to be there. He pays the tuition.

  BRANDI: I completely understand. But when I spoke to his wife, she said she wasn’t able to commit to a date, and he hasn’t returned my calls.

  MRS. BARTON: That lousy bastard. He never returns my calls, either. In fact, he didn’t even return my calls when we were married, which is how I figured out he was having an affair with our nanny, who, by the way, is now his wife.

  BRANDI: I’m terribly sorry, but for the moment I think we should just focus on the issue at hand. I will leave you in on the twenty-first and assume we will see at least you and the twins. I’ll leave your ex’s participation up to you. As far as his wife goes, from our perspective, she’s ancillary.

  MRS. BARTON: That’s a nice word for what she is.

  BRANDI: Let’s not get into that. We’ll look forward to meeting you on the twenty-first.

  When Brandi related the conversation, Sara responded enthusiastically. “Good work. You handled that perfectly. Want to make a bet on who shows up for the interview?” Brandi laughed, and she added, “Five dollars, only Mrs. Barton.”

  “I’ll make it ten that it’s her, her ex-husband, and wife number two,” said Brandi, accepting the challenge. They shook on it, and then Brandi got busy trying to find an interpreter to help conduct next week’s interview with a non-English-speaking Korean family.

  After an hour-long workout at the gym, Helen got dressed in black slacks, black boots, and a white tailored shirt, her standard uniform for gallery prowling. With her hair down, a pale pink pashmina shawl around her shoulders, and large silver hooped earrings, she was instantly transformed from at-home admissions drone to art critic—unquestionably her preferred role. With a deadline looming, she was looking forward to finally getting started on her article, “Images of the Cockfight in Contemporary American Painting.”

  On the subway ride downtown, she double-checked the list of paintings she needed to see, and hoped she had enough time to fit them all in. She arrived at the first gallery—Marco Puttanesco—and, using all her strength, she pushed the industrial-weight cast-iron door that opened into the cavernous, garagelike space. Marco Puttanesco was an art world wunderkind who, at thirty-three, was one of New York’s most successful dealers of the school of painting known as “arte ricca,” a movement that emerged in response to the now passé “arte povera.”

  Of course, Puttanesco wouldn’t be caught dead in his gallery this early in the morning, so instead, Helen was greeted by the gallery director, Gabriel, who sported the requisite soul patch, hair gel, and heavy, black-rimmed glasses. He escorted her to the back room to view a black velvet painting by the Latino artist Carlos Gallomuerto. She was surprised to see how closely the work resembled the kitsch she saw at the Albuquerque flea market when she was in New Mexico last year doing research for an article on kachina dolls.

  “The referential quality of the work is quintessentially postmodern,” Gabriel explained. “The velvet imbues the paint with an eroticism that one would not generally associate with the cockfight.” He looked to her for a nod of agreement but didn’t stop when he didn’t get it. “Of course, the irony isn’t lost in the translation from the vernacular subject to the more metaphorical. Do you agree?” He stopped, demanding a response from Helen.

  “Exactly, that’s why I’m here. Could I sit down and spend a few minutes alone with the piece?” she asked, hoping to compose her own thoughts independently of this verbose twenty-two-year-old who, even though she hated to admit it, was actually quite astute. She wondered where he went to college, and then remembered that she made herself a promise not even to think about schools today.

  By the late afternoon she was ready to tackle the last gallery on her list. There a svelte young woman with spiky red hair that bore a striking resemblance to the chickens she had been viewing all day dragged out an enormous canvas. Her first impression was that it looked like a study of eviscerated poultry. On close inspection she discovered she was right: there were feathers embedded in actual chicken gizzards, necks, and livers, with a few razor blades scattered here and there. As she stepped a few feet back to take in the entire work, the gallery assistant piped in, “Are you aware of the name of the painting? It’s called Cocktales.”

  “I see. Thank you.” Helen smothered a giggle and jotted it down in her notebook, thinking that might make a good title for her article.

  Finishing up the last of her notes, she heard her name and turned to see an approaching woman pushing a baby in a stroller, with a café latte in an attached cup holder.

  “Helen Drager! I haven’t seen you in years! Not since Mommy & Me!” the woman shrieked in a grating outer-borough accent. “How is Zoe?”

  After a brief lapse of memory, Helen recognized Diane Spilcher, a fellow toddler group attendee of twelve years ago. Although Diane kissed her enthusiastically, Helen was more interested in the cup holder and wished that brilliant innovation had been around when Zoe was stroller age.

  “Zoe is great. How about MacKenzie?” she asked, proud of herself for dredging that one up. “I seem to remember she’s a year or so older than Zoe, so that makes her what? Fifteen? Sixteen?”

  “Good memory. She just started high school. And this is Ryan. He’s just two.”

  Helen wondered about the huge age difference but decided it would be rude to ask and probably involved more than she really wanted to know. “He’s darling. And you—what are you up to these days?”

  “Well, we moved to Jersey, so essentially, I’ve spent the last year mall-crawling on Route 17.”

  “Wow, that’s a shift. I think of you as such an, uh, urban person,” Helen said, careful not to sound condescending. The urban-suburban debate was one that Helen had gotten into one time too many and had finally learned to avoid altogether.

  “Believe me, it’s the last thing I wanted to do. But between us, we made the move last year when MacKenzie was dinged by every private school in the city. We could have papered her walls with rejection letters,” Diane whispered, as though there were anyone in this gallery who was remotely interested in her humiliating setback.

  Oh, God. So that could actually happen? Helen shivered. She really hadn’t entertained that possibility. “We’re just starting the ordeal and finding it rather stressful, too. Any words of wisdom?”

  “Two. Backup plan
.”

  “Yeah, a backup plan. Good advice,” Helen responded, having no idea what theirs would be, since the suburbs, in her mind, were not an option. She was starting to feel sick to her stomach.

  “You just never know. These schools are brutal. They get hundreds of applications for such a small number of spots. God only knows how they make their selections. If you figure it out, let me know, okay?” Diane sneered.

  Helen changed the topic, “What are you doing here? I don’t think of you as the, uh, gallery type.”

  “You know, I sometimes think that I culturally short-shifted MacKenzie and maybe that’s what she was lacking. So I’m trying to make up for it with Ryan.”

  Helen thought she had better drag Zoe along the next time she went out to look at art. They hadn’t been to a museum together in ages.

  With no hint about the agenda, Pamela had called a faculty and administration meeting for that afternoon. At the appointed time, Sara and her colleagues filed into the auditorium. As Pamela ceremoniously entered, there was a perceptible downgrade in the noise level.

  “All sit,” Pamela ordered, as if addressing a room full of first-graders.

  Sara wondered where Pamela had come up with the hideous mustard-yellow double-knit suit, recalling a similar garment she saw on Camilla Parker-Bowles in a recent PBS special on the demise of the royal family.

  “The purpose of this meeting is to announce a new appointment in The School,” Pamela began grandly. “Effective immediately, Felicity Cozette, the head of our French department, will be taking over the newly established position of associate head of School. All administrative departments will report directly to Mademoiselle Cozette, including admissions,” she announced, looking peevishly at Sara. “Mademoiselle Cozette will be responsible for the day-to-day activity in these areas and will keep me informed on a need-to-know basis. I will continue to retain full responsibility for our grade eight outplacement, faculty, the board of trustees, and, of course, finance. That is all. Merci beaucoup.”

  “Class dismissed,” someone in the back of the room whispered.

  “Long live the queen,” Brandi whispered to Sara.

  Sara looked at her and smiled, pleased to know that her take on Pamela was in sync with her own these days.

  When Helen returned that evening, Michael was already at home—often a sign that things at work were not going well. He was glued to the computer, surfing NBA.com, while simultaneously watching the Cooking Network on television. Helen often wondered how she ended up married to a man who subscribed to both Food & Wine and Sports Illustrated. The food part she understood and even appreciated, particularly since he could be counted on a few times a week to cook dinners that far outshined her own efforts. But she had a much harder time accepting what she considered to be the inordinate amount of time he wasted on basketball. Whenever she got riled up about it, she had to remind herself that in the panoply of husbandly vices, this one was fairly benign. And in a cruel twist of fate, Zoe loved basketball, too.

  “How was your day?” she inquired brightly.

  “Shitty.”

  “Oh. Sorry,” she said, secretly wishing the conversation could end here.

  “The chefs are still not speaking, and each is refusing to do the show if the other is still part of it. Now the Italian Mushroom Growers’ Association has canceled their sponsorship. They’re saying that they contracted to sponsor a show called ‘Two FunGuys,’ and don’t think that ‘One FunGuy’ will work. It’s a disaster.”

  “Sweetheart, in the big scheme of things, this can hardly be called a disaster. You have several other shows in production and a few in development. Why don’t you put the mushrooms aside and spend your time on new material? Like, what about the series about legumes you presented to Xavier last month? He was totally behind it, wasn’t he?”

  “Yeah, Xavier approved it. But now our legal department is embroiled in what seems like an endless negotiation with Mr. Bean’s agent.”

  “But at least it’s still alive. I love Mr. Bean! I always thought that would make a great show,” she continued coddling.

  “How was your day? You seem up,” he said in a tone of voice modulated to make sure she didn’t forget that he wasn’t.

  “My day was mostly good. I spent it looking at cocks,” she joked, expecting to get a rise from him. When she didn’t, she continued, “I was really enjoying myself until I ran into a woman I knew from Mommy & Me, twelve years ago. Remember Diane Spilcher?”

  “No.”

  “There’s no reason you should. We were never close. She moved to New Jersey last year after her daughter, MacKenzie, was rejected by every private high school they applied to in the city.”

  “And that upset you? That’s ridiculous. For all you know, her daughter is an illiterate juvenile delinquent with pierced eyebrows.”

  “You’re right. I hadn’t stopped to wonder why. I just panicked. But before hearing her story I hadn’t really considered the possibility of that happening to us.”

  “Don’t. It won’t.”

  “That sounds definitive. And may I ask what exactly this staunch belief in fairness and justice is based on?” she inquired.

  “Zoe. My faith in Zoe. She’s a great kid. We have nothing to worry about. And we have Rothschild. She gets all of the kids into good schools,” he said.

  Helen wished it were that simple.

  A little while later Zoe came home and reported that her French teacher, Mademoiselle Cozette, had been promoted to become the new associate head of School. Helen was a bit surprised, having heard nothing about this from Sara, but didn’t dwell on it until later that evening, when she checked her e-mail.

  Helen-

  P. has done something very weird. She’s promoted that dippy French teacher Cozette to be her second in command. Can you sniff around for me and find out what this is about? Like did The Board approve the position? Did they approve her choice? Anything you can dig up would be appreciated.

  Thanks,

  Sara

  She sent off a quick reply.

  Sara-

  I’ll learn what I can. There’s a parents’ coffee on Friday. I wasn’t planning on going (you know how both Michael and I feel about coffee mornings) but I’ll go just for you.

  You owe me one.

  Helen

  On Friday morning, Helen dutifully attended the parents’ coffee klatsch, held this month at the Winters’. When Zoe was younger, Helen used to look forward to these get-togethers, grateful to have a chance to exchange ideas with other mothers who were tackling some of the same child-rearing issues she was. It was always reassuring to discover that she wasn’t the only one who felt guilty about letting her daughter watch two hours of cartoons on Saturday morning so she and Michael could sleep past six a.m. Or to learn that other six-year-olds ate pasta with butter and cheese every night for dinner.

  But having reached the stage, both in Zoe’s life and in her own career as a mother, when comparing notes resulted more often in feelings of insecurity than in any sense of solace, she made a decision to boycott these get-togethers. Having a strong hunch that much of today’s conversation would be centered on high school admissions, and knowing that the last thing she needed was for her shaky confidence to be undermined, she promised herself she would only stay a short time.

  “Casual Friday?” Dana laughed as she opened the door and critically eyeballed Helen’s jeans and black turtleneck.

  “I make it a rule to never overdress,” she replied coolly as she critically surveyed Dana’s shiny red leather pants. God, she looks like a side of beef in those. How fitting. This foyer looks like a meat locker, Helen thought, looking disapprovingly at the glossy, gray walls.

  Dana’s decorator, Clyde Mason, was commonly known in Manhattan decorating circles as “Slide,” and for good reason: he had a penchant for Plexiglas, polished chrome, and casters, and a patent for the custom-made mobile units that his clients used for seating, storage, room dividing, and whatnot. Everyth
ing in the Winters’ home was on wheels and constructed out of putrid shades of Formica, Corian, Lucite, or whatever other slick materials Clyde found remaindered and got away with marking up to the hilt. And the garbage the Winters called art! Helen was stunned to see the three-foot-tall glass seal in the living room, recognizing the piece from a recent Sotheby’s auction catalogue, estimated at around forty thousand dollars. At the time she thought it looked more like a carved-ice wedding table centerpiece than a piece of sculpture, and viewing it up close, she concluded that her first impression had been correct.

  Ducking into the kitchen for a cup of coffee, Helen was immediately struck by its dinginess; the last time she saw harvest-gold and avocado-green was when she visited Michael’s great-aunt Gertie in Canarsie. And the filth! A dark sheen of thirty-year-old grease coated every cabinet door, countertop, and appliance.

  She was startled by a large cockroach scurrying across the floor, and then by the piercing sound of Dana’s voice. “You’re probably wondering how the kitchen could possibly look so dreadful when the rest of the apartment is so done. We’ve been desperate for Clyde to finalize the plans and begin a gut renovation, but he’s just impossible to pin down. It’s been three years since we moved in. I can’t tell you how frustrating it’s been.”

  “I can’t imagine,” Helen said in mock sympathy, wondering how Dana, a woman who didn’t work and had limitless funds, could tolerate this disgusting kitchen. No wonder April refused to eat—it was nauseating!

  She returned to the living room to the sight of a dozen or so women and two men seated rigidly, feet firmly planted on the floor in a valiant effort to prevent their chairs from rolling around the slickly varnished floors. The stay-at-home dads always look so uncomfortable at these gatherings, Helen thought, remembering back to the first and only time she had gotten Michael to attend. He had been the only male present that morning and eventually left in a huff when several irate women began a husband-bashing session, the subject of which was the pathological inability of men to detect a dirty diaper.