The Private Lives of Pippa Lee

by Rebecca Miller

  ‘Always looking on the bright side,’ he said to her.

  ‘Why can’t it be?’ There was a pause.

  ‘Maybe we should move back to the city,’ he said.

  She laughed. ‘We just sold our apartment!’

  ‘So we buy another one.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No, of course not. It’s just hard thinking this is the end of the line.’

  Pippa put her hand on his knee and looked around the room. She wondered what she could make for him. Maybe a glass of carrot juice. She had begun to feel a kind of desperation when they were alone sometimes, as if everything that they could possibly say to each other had already been said, and now language was useless.

  ‘That was good cheese yesterday,’ Herb said.

  ‘It was vacherin – I was so excited to find it.’

  ‘I love that cheese.’

  Another Woman

  A week later Pippa woke up with one arm asleep, pinned beneath her side. She felt as though her body had been crushed into the mattress through the night, her face mashed into the pillow. There was a rotten taste in her mouth. She sat up stiffly, shaking the blood back into her numb limb, which flopped helplessly from side to side like a separate being.

  In the kitchen, a thick, yellow continent of what looked like scrambled egg was congealing in the center of the Formica table. A box of chocolates lay open and ransacked in the middle of the mess. A fork was balanced on the edge of a chair.

  Remembering the surveillance camera, Pippa snapped her head back and looked up. The thing stared down at her with its cold glass eye, the red Record light blinking ominously. She couldn’t bear for Herb to witness himself like this. Every day she would wake up extra early; if there was evidence, she planned to clean it up, erase the tape. He would never know. Pippa wiped up the mess as fast as she could, scraped off a smear of dried egg yolk with her fingernail, her vision blurred with tears.

  She went into the den and shut the door, then shoved the tape into the mouth of the VCR. Her heart was pumping wildly in her chest. Seen from above, in black and white, like so many holdup videos Pippa had watched on television, her kitchen seemed sinister, like a crime scene. Pippa fast-forwarded the tape. Nothing. Nothing. Then a figure in white sped by, right through the frame. Pippa rewound the tape and hit Play. The room was empty again. A muffled, banging sound emerged from the TV. Then, a woman shuffled into the kitchen. It was Pippa/not Pippa. The stranger walked with an eerie, graceless gait, her posture slumped, her gaze downcast. This creature disappeared from the screen, came back into the edge of it, and started stirring eggs in a frying pan. She then dumped the eggs on the table, sat down in a hunched position, and scraped forkfuls of them off the Formica, shoveling them into her mouth with mechanical motions. Pippa watched herself with incredulity and revulsion. There was something inhuman about the scene.

  She smashed the bedroom door open with her fist. Herb sat up, stunned with sleep. ‘What –’ She was next to him, burrowing her head in his chest, her cheeks wet with tears. ‘It’s me,’ she said. ‘Herb, it’s me –’

  ‘Slow down, pal. What are we talking about here?’

  ‘The chocolate cake. And the eggs, and – I saw it on the video, oh, it’s horrible.’ He held her like that for a while, stroking her head.

  ‘I must be walking in my sleep,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t remember any eggs.’

  ‘This morning there were eggs. All over the table. She – I – dumped them on the table and – Oh, my God, this makes me feel insane.’

  ‘Didn’t you do it when you were a kid?’

  ‘That was just a couple of times I walked around.’ At fourteen, she would pace the upstairs hall of the rectory, her pillow under her arm, till her insomniac mother led her back to bed.

  ‘You sleepwalking is a hell of a lot better than me being senile,’ Herb said, rolling onto his side and drawing Pippa in, raising his knees so she was resting in a little chair of him. She felt his warmth along her back, tucked her feet between his warm, furry calves.

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘Sleepwalkers are a dime a dozen, honey. You can’t even get off a murder rap with that defense anymore. So don’t get any ideas.’ She was already feeling reassured. Herb had a way of casting light on muddled thoughts, dissipating the shadows. This rational viewpoint was inherited from his father, a darkly funny man who despised religion, all exaggeration, and musicals. He was the embodiment of deadpan. Herb’s mother had died of cancer when he was two; for years his father was a loving, if gruff, protector. He owned a profitable appliance store in Queens until he lost his business in the spending vacuum of the depression. With economic ruin came a darkening of Mr Lee’s humor. Ribbing of his intelligent son turned to bullying and, finally, a bitter, brutal dismissiveness of Herb as an effete intellectual, a fag even. For much as he pitied the dupes that looked to God as a balm to their wounded spirits, Mr Lee reserved his special disdain for those who thought they were better than other people just because they read books. Herb was hurt by this rejection at first, but mercifully it absolved him of feeling guilty for bettering his old man. He left for college on a scholarship at nineteen, alone in the world, determined never to be bullied by another human being for the rest of his life, his taste in literature already formed by the very man he had come to hate so much. He mistrusted extravagant metaphor, favored the driest prose. As Herb saw it, he was always having to dehumidify Pippa’s mind.

  She felt a touch against her tailbone, and then it was gone – then back again, insistent, like a creature pressing its nose against her back. She turned, closed her eyes, and kissed him.

  She was lying beside Herb, her eyes still a bit puffy from crying, when there was a knock on the door. She knelt on the bed and peered out the window, pushing the curtain aside. It was Dot. ‘Doesn’t that woman have a phone?’ Herb asked. Pippa pulled on her robe and walked into the kitchen.

  ‘Hi!’ purred Dot, standing on the threshold. She looked different this morning. Beneath the crazy network of sun worshipper’s lines etched into her deflated skin, Pippa could discern the sweep of a strong jaw. Her brown eyes were sparkling. Dot must have been a knockout.

  ‘You look lovely,’ said Pippa.

  ‘Are you kidding? I’m on my way to the beauty parlor. Have you been crying?’ asked Dot.

  ‘It’s just allergies,’ said Pippa. ‘Would you like to come in?’

  Dot’s eyes rose to the surveillance camera, then back to Pippa. ‘I came to invite you over to meet Chris,’ she said. ‘Herb is welcome too, of course, only I don’t want to disturb him.’

  ‘Chris?’

  ‘My son. He’s moved in with us. It’s perfectly legal.’

  ‘Of course it is.’

  ‘I mean, in the charter it says you can have relatives under fifty stay for up to six months. I’m just inviting a few neighbors, you know. I don’t want anyone to think we’re sneaking around.’

  ‘I would love to meet him. When should I come over?’

  ‘Around four would be good. We can all have a drink and be home in time to make dinner. I hope you don’t think it’s rude that I’m not inviting everyone over to eat.’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘It’s just, I hate cooking in large quantities. It never comes out.’

  As Pippa closed the door, she tried not to wonder about Dot. She sensed a tragic shadow there, a wound. Pippa suffered from an excess of empathy. Sometimes, she found the mystery of other people almost unbearable to contemplate: rooms within rooms inside each of them, an endless labyrinth of contradictory qualities, memories, desires, mirroring one another like an Escher drawing, baffling as a conundrum. Kinder to perceive people as they wished to be seen. After all, that’s what Pippa wanted for herself: to be accepted as she seemed.

  Motherhood and Cigarettes

  A little after four o’clock, Pippa meandered over to Dot’s house carrying a bottle of wine she had been keeping in reserve and wondering if she cou
ld possibly be pregnant in spite of the vestigial coil still lodged in her uterus like astronaut litter abandoned on the moon. Yet, no, rare as sex with Herb was these days, precautions were still necessary; eggs were meant to be fulminating inside her in this twilight of her fertility. The thought of a new baby now seemed absurd, even suffocating, much as she had loved being pregnant, addicted as she had been to the smell of her babies’ necks, the soft crowns of their heads. That room was shut and locked; she couldn’t pry it open.

  Herb had opted to stay home from the party. Visiting a former dentist, his wife, and their half-baked son was not his idea of a good time. Pippa walked slowly, looking up at the gnarled branches of an oak tree, dark leaves shivering against the flat, blue sky. She felt hollowed out in a pleasant, staring way. The nightmare of the videotape seemed far off, yet it had left an aftertaste: wind flattening a patch of high grass by the side of the road with a hiss, an old man straining to pedal by her on a bicycle – everything that happened around her seemed to be gathering portent, like a fluffy white cloud augmenting itself, building up into a mountainous, darkening tower that threatened aircraft and frightened house pets with its ominous rumbling. She stopped and looked at the number of the house behind her. 1675. She had overshot the Nadeaus’. She backtracked and went up their front walk, identical to her own but for a large ceramic toadstool in the center of the front lawn. It was painted glossy red, with yellow spots on it. She knocked on the metal frame of the screen door. There was no answer, so she pushed the door open and walked into a layout just like her own but with a strikingly different décor.

  The Nadeaus’ living room was a visual explosion. Red ivy crawled up the wallpaper, the couch was paisley, the armchairs were various shades of pastel. A miniature Victorian town was laid out on a mahogany dresser: tiny, cast-metal buildings – dry goods store, church, train depot – lined a sinuous railroad track. A glossy red steam engine shuttled along the track in a joyless mechanical loop. Every other usable surface in the room was jammed with photographs. Faces upon faces crammed up against one another: generations of babies, schoolchildren, old people, soldiers, brides from every decade since 1910. Pippa tried to take it all in, her eyes darting around the room like an alarmed bird, seeking a place to rest. At last her gaze alighted on Dot herself, sitting stiffly in a peach silk armchair in the corner, her chartreuse blouse and white slacks ironed, her hair a single, shining blond wave. She was staring ahead with a fixed expression. Pippa came up to her.

  ‘Hi, Dot,’ she said.

  Dot looked up at her with a steady, glittering stare. ‘Everyone is out back,’ she said hoarsely.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Pippa asked.

  ‘He won’t come out,’ Dot said.

  ‘Your son?’

  ‘He’s staying in his room. Can you imagine? A man of thirty-five locks himself in his room when his parents throw him a party?’ Someone laughed outside. Pippa glanced out the plate-glass window. A few people were on the patio, talking. Johnny, Dot’s husband, was listening to an ancient man, a drink in his hand, his head cocked. Johnny was short, bullish, slightly bowlegged. He had rosy, healthy-looking skin.

  Dot stood up unsteadily and took the wine bottle from Pippa. ‘It’s cold! You shouldn’t have. Let’s open it.’ Pippa followed Dot into the kitchen. Dot pulled out the cork and poured them each a glass of wine. ‘To motherhood,’ Dot said, knocking back half the glass.

  Outside, Pippa met a few of her neighbors. There were a couple of retired dentists, a saxophonist, a former chiropractor, a tiny woman who had written a book on child psychology. The sax player, a widower, was clearly hitting on the voluptuous wife of the chiropractor. They were both in their eighties. Pippa took it all in, stored it so she could tell Herb later. Pippa was a little high from the wine. She leaned back against the Nadeaus’ trellis and felt her hips loosen up, her left leg swing open. Living in Marigold Village made her feel youthful. She was once again the youngest woman around, just as she had been when she and Herb had first been together. Watching a bent old woman laugh a few feet away, she flexed the strong muscles in her calves, stood up straighter, pressing her breasts against her thin blouse. She felt the familiar arrogance of youth, as if her age made her superior, as if it were to her credit.

  Johnny Nadeau ambled over to her with his stiff-legged walk. ‘Hello, Pippa, glad you could come. A little eye candy,’ he said, winking.

  ‘Thanks for having me, Johnny.’

  He leaned in to her and whispered emphatically: ‘I’d appreciate if you could keep an eye on Dot.’ She could smell pretzels on his breath. ‘She’s having a hard time. I know she talks to you.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Pippa, glancing at the spot where Dot had been. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘She went back inside. I told her this was a bad idea,’ he said, shaking his head. Pippa started walking toward the sliding door. Again, the stage whisper: ‘Get her to drink a Coca-Cola.’

  Pippa walked into the living room. It was empty. She peeked into the kitchen. No Dot. She heard arguing, crying, coming from somewhere down the hall. She followed the sound, walking gingerly. Pippa imagined Dot and the half-baked son locked in a murderous embrace, Dot trying to drag him out to the party, the doughy son resisting, squeezing the breath out of her till she hung, limp and immobile, off his pasty arm. Pippa came to a bedroom door. They were in there. She could hear them. She knocked tentatively. The voices went silent.

  ‘Dot?’ she said.

  ‘Who is it?’ It was a man’s voice.

  ‘It’s Pippa Lee. I … was just looking for Dot.’

  There was a fumbling noise, then the door swung open. A powerfully built man in his thirties, with a thin, ashen face and broken nose, stared through Pippa with a look of blank aggression, his mind on something else. His meaty, naked torso was tattooed with an intricately painted Christ. The Lord was portrayed in color, from the waist up; he was bare-chested and had very large wings. Pippa peered behind the son and saw Dot sitting on the bed. Her eyes were red from crying.

  ‘Dot,’ Pippa said, struggling to keep her voice even. ‘Johnny asked me to find you.’

  ‘Look at me,’ said Dot. ‘I can’t go out there.’ She blew her nose into a large tissue.

  Pippa gamely held out her hand to the son. ‘I’m Pippa Lee,’ she said.

  ‘Chris,’ said the son, taking her hand with a surprisingly gentle grip. ‘Pleased to meet you. I’m sorry you had to be party to our little … thing, here …’ He now began rummaging through a duffel bag and pulled out a wrinkled shirt. Pippa noticed that the Christ’s wings extended over the man’s shoulders and partway down his back. Dot watched her decorated son with a sly expression as he tugged on the shirt, buttoned the buttons. ‘Take care of my mother,’ he said, fixing Pippa with an alarmingly frank gaze and backing up toward the wall. ‘I have to go.’ And with this, Chris climbed out the window and strode away. He had a rocking gait and leaned far back as he walked, chin tucked in, arms slightly curled, as though ready to be attacked. He opened the door of the yellow truck, swung himself onto the driver’s seat, and sped off.

  ‘He was such a sweet little boy,’ said Dot helplessly, shaking her head. ‘You can’t imagine.’

  *

  Several days passed, and, though Chris Nadeau’s bright yellow truck sped by Pippa on the road a few times, she heard nothing from Dot. She thought that perhaps shame about the scene at the party had made their friendship impossible. The son was scary. Poor Dot. To her surprise, Pippa found herself missing Dot a little bit. She wondered if she should call and see if she was okay, or if that would be awkward. The sleepwalking seemed to have evaporated. No new messes had appeared in the kitchen. Pippa felt a calm wash over her. The days passed in the quietest possible way. Ben called from the city every Sunday. Grace was in Paris, recovering from two weeks photographing in Kabul.

  Pippa was still baffled as to how it had happened. One minute, it seemed, Grace was photographing dog shows for the Hartford Courant. The next, she
was capturing horrendous images of maimed children, screaming women that showed up in The New York Times. Pippa was amazed by Grace’s fierce pursuit of the truth at all costs. Yet a part of her wondered, as she stared into the eyes of yet another terrified person running through a sea of dust, if there wasn’t something a little bit ruthless about photographing people in such distress. She hadn’t asked the question of her daughter, but there it was anyway: Was there a moment when you had to choose between photographing a person and helping them? But at least she was doing something, Pippa thought. Drawing attention to. Herself. No. Not fair. To conflicts, injustices. As opposed to Pippa. Oh well, she thought as she thumbed through a luxuriously illustrated cookbook: osso buco. Lamb Milanese. Spaghetti alle vongole. At least Herb was appreciative. He loved being taken care of.

  He had found a book written by an unknown, a high school history teacher in Idaho. It had come to him in a plain manila envelope, the address typed on a manual typewriter. When he saw it, he said, This is either a lunatic or the real thing. As it turned out, the book inside was that rare beast every publishing house is always praying for: an Easy Read of Quality. It was a historical romance, told in excruciating detail. Deeply moving. Expressive language. Would make a sweeping, epic film. Herb was serious about literature. He published most of the few giants left. But he was also a businessman, and receiving a novel like this in the mail was like winning the lottery. He could publish ten poets with the money this behemoth would bring in. It needed work, sure, but Herb was confident that, with some cutting and reshaping, it could be damn strong. He read the last of twelve hundred pages, folded his hands on the manuscript, and closed his eyes. He felt Pippa leaning over him as she bent to pick up his empty glass.