The Change Room

by Karen Connelly

  Andrew returned and shouted up the stairs. “Come on, you two! It’s time to go.” He turned to her. “Feel better then.” He came over and kissed her on the top of the head. “Do you think you’ll be well enough to come to the faculty gathering late this afternoon?”

  “Oh, shit, I forgot about that.”

  “I wrote it on the fridge calendar.”

  “I never remember unless it makes it into my work calendar. We have to sort out our various calendars before one of us forgets something important. Do you really need me to be there?”

  “No. I want you to be there. Come on, it won’t be onerous, I promise.”

  She made a face.

  “Honey, it’s a social gathering for the doctoral students, not a lecture. There’ll be wine. And Kajali would love to see you. We can still pick up the kids at Annie’s by six thirty.”

  Though it hadn’t been announced officially yet, he was going to be the assistant dean next year, so these social events would become duties for him soon enough. Not that he minded. He enjoyed most of the faculty gatherings, even the dreaded meetings, which mystified Eliza. She put it down to mathematicians being geeky together. And brilliant. Some of them were famous, in their number-filled fields, but she could never remember the geniuses’ names.

  “I’ll do my best to get there by five thirty. And I’ll have to work on the weekend for a few hours.”

  The boys thundered down the stairs; they were thrilled when Andrew took them to school. He raised his hands. “Whoa, you maniacs! Order, order in the court!” He directed the opera of boots and coats and school bags while Eliza went to heat her tea in the microwave; from the kitchen, she listened to the accusations about stolen mittens and pilfered cookies, then coats went on and she returned to kiss them goodbye. They shouldered the bulk of their backpacks, Andrew opened the door and out they stepped onto the front porch, then the street, waving at her from the sidewalk. Andrew left last, angling his wool cap jauntily. It made him look like an early nineteenth-century farmer, a Yorkshireman maybe. He tipped the cap to her. “Good day, my lady,” he said, hamming it up, yet genuinely gallant, handsome, too, his eyes cat-green and glimmering in the cold morning air, his hair more gold than grey in the sun. She loved him, utterly. He was inseparable from her life, the boys’ lives, the house, this good solid world they had built. She shut the door on the cold with a strange reluctance, not wanting to lose sight of her sons, her husband.

  They are everything, she thought.

  What more, monstrous woman, could you possibly want?

  —

  After work, she rushed over to the university in a cab. The reception was in one of the old stone houses on campus, its ivy winter-dried and brown. Inside, an immense fireplace crackled with burning wood. How had she forgotten about the fireplace?

  Within fifteen minutes, she stood near it, alone, with a glass of wine in her hand. As usual, she was mildly awed and fully bored by the company. After the initial greetings, she could never understand what the hell any of them were talking about, because they actually did stand around and talk about math. It was like another language, another country. What fascinated her was that Andrew lived there—he knew the lingua franca as well as several dialects—in a place where she was, at most, a dumb, attractive tourist. Occasionally, one of his more generous, socially adept colleagues—usually Kajali—would notice that Eliza’s eyes were glazing over, and would try to interpret, but it wasn’t like other languages; there was no direct translation. No matter. Eliza stood happily mesmerized by the fire. A chunk of wood, fallen below the iron grate, twisted with red-coal worms; orange flames licked at the blackened stones of the hearth. No wonder humans worshipped fire; it was ferociously alive.

  The wine was excellent. She took another sip and looked around the large room. Kajali spoke with quiet intensity to one of her PhD students, a young blonde woman Eliza had met once before. Andrew talked about her often, too. A new genius, apparently, with a name that sounded oddly mathematical. What was it again? Eliza admired her slender grace; she was wearing a long, high-waisted skirt and a nifty little Chanel jacket knock-off. Unexpectedly stylish for a math prodigy. Eliza tried to remember what area her brilliance illuminated. Algebra? Something called a theory of lies? Could that be it, or was guilt driving her crazy?

  No, she remembered now—that’s really what it was called. Lie theory. Andrew had tried to explain it to her. Something about a unifying principle for equations, based on symmetry, geometry. She was getting too hot, and stepped away from the hearth. The fire was eating up the oxygen. A moment later, the prodigy put down her glass of wine to slip off her jacket. The young woman’s arms were painfully thin, with popped veins and knobby elbows.

  Andrew crossed her field of vision, tall, smooth-moving, stopping here and there to chat with people. She felt an unexpected shiver of pride. He exuded male authority in the most non-threatening way. Was it the smile? Good looks? Or his slightly scruffy approach to fashion? The women drifted toward him. Soon Kajali and her student fell into the current and eddied around the wine table, where he handed his colleague a new glass of red and cajoled the student to have a splash more white, which she declined, accepting a glass of bubbly water instead. Cheryl, that was her name. Cheryl Link. The genius. Who did not like to eat. She lifted her blonde head toward Andrew and pushed a tendril of wavy hair behind her little ear. She spoke shyly, her eyes beaming. His height called the child out of people. Eliza had experienced that herself, early in their relationship, some deep comfort in his tall, solid trustworthiness.

  A sliver of nausea pushed toward her throat—guilt, eating away at her guts. What was her own theory of lies? How could she rationalize her fraction of betrayal? She watched the little scene unfold across the room. Women were so attracted to Andrew. She sighed. A long-married wife wasn’t a new lover either. She suddenly felt pathetically unglamorous and stupid. These math nerds understood the secret language of the universe, which she would never, ever learn.

  Andrew threw his head back, laughing benevolently upon (count them) two, three, four women. She felt a jab of suspicion, watching this attractive man surrounded by the female sex: maybe he was jumping into the sack with Cheryl Link! No—he was the most honourable man she had ever met. That was why she’d married him. Honour was an old, neglected word; no one took it seriously anymore. But when she’d got to know him, she said to herself, and to her mother: he is honourable. (Her mother had replied, in her now-practical way, “That’s nice, dear, but does he have tenure?”) Something restless and changeable in Eliza—something inconstant, she feared—had risen to meet his steadfast goodness. He was still that honourable man; she had not been wrong. Whenever he heard about some professor, male or female, getting romantically entangled with a student, then publicly outed, often after the student cried foul, he shook his head and allowed himself to say something mildly cutting, such as, “It’s hard to believe that idiot has a PhD.”

  If not a student, though, what about a younger colleague? The university was filling up with young assistant profs in their thirties. Eliza smiled, remembering her own lustful, baby-craving years. A childless woman in her mid-thirties could tear down an office wall with her bare hands if a viable sperm donor was on the other side of it.

  And look at them! The math genius harem seemed to get younger around him. Even Kajali, in her sixties, stood there tilting her head coquettishly. Granted, Kajali had a beautiful head; her long black hair was streaked with a single glimmering ribbon of silver-white. She seemed ageless. Cheryl continued to gaze up at him, too, one thin arm wrapped around her waist, hooked under the bottom rung of her rib cage.

  When she’d married Andrew, Eliza had been sure that he had nothing in common with his brother, save his looks. But she soon came to understand that he was as much a handsome charmer as Martin. The difference was that he charmed to no end, or at least not to the end of self-aggrandizement. He charmed quietly, often by attentive listening, which seemed to set him apart from o
ther men. Was it really that rare, still, for a man to listen to a woman?

  He didn’t always listen to Eliza, of course. Sometimes he tuned her out completely. But it was different when you were married. Domestic life demanded relentless and dedicated intimacy, whereas charm was predicated on not knowing too much, not being too close. To lean forward and listen meant that you didn’t know what the speaker was going to say. Listening was a way of pulling a stranger toward you without touching.

  But the honour remained. And he could still make her laugh.

  As though on cue, Kajali exclaimed in her musical Indian English, “Oh, Andrew! You can’t be serious!” and she clasped her hands together under her chin like a girl of fourteen. Her debonair husband and half a dozen women couldn’t be talking about math. Eliza took her wineglass off the mantelpiece and went over to find out what was so funny.

  15

  Bone Picking

  ANDREW’S PARENTS CAME FOR DINNER ON SUNDAY afternoon. His father, Bruce, drank too much wine and held forth as usual about politics and the economy. Eliza was always amazed by the way everyone listened to him so attentively, despite their boredom. She and Andrew disagreed once in a while, mildly, even as a tension slowly grew in the room. Eliza cleaned one little lamb rib after another, then gnawed on the bone to keep from speaking. Bruce blathered on about how the government needed to get its act together and attack the deficit or “our grandchildren will be paying the price.”

  Eliza sighed, and chewed on another bone. Just two days ago, she had noticed yet another chunk of money sucked out of the joint bank account. Surely for Andrew’s parents.

  Bruce reached over his plate for the wine bottle. Corinne, his delicate wife with tendons of steel, still pretty and vain at seventy-four, said, “My dear, you know how much I hate driving on the highway. Please don’t have too much.” Bruce smiled at her condescendingly and began to pour. He winked at Eliza. “I’m fine!” he said, raising a glass to his lovely daughter-in-law, the chef. Everyone toasted, the boys keen to clink their cups with their grandma’s crystal wineglass. Corinne repeated her complaint. “Bruce. I do not want to have to drive.” She took a tiny bite from her minuscule portion of rack of lamb. Then she cut another one of her roasted potatoes into dice-sized cubes.

  Maybe that’s how she stays so thin, Eliza thought, reaching over to manoeuvre a forkful of food into Jake’s mouth. He was old enough to feed himself, but it took forever. For the next five minutes she worked diligently at making sure the meat, at least, went into him. He was the slowest eater she had ever met, born into this family of hyenas. Except for Corinne: maybe he inherited his slow, careful style from his slender grandmother. But weren’t you supposed to have a little extra weight on you in your seventies? In case you got sick?

  Eliza said, “Marcus, please pull your chair in closer to the table. Your food is falling on the floor.”

  Corinne smiled coldly at the boy. Eliza couldn’t understand her coldness toward the children; when Genevieve came from Calgary for one of her rare visits, she was always loving and fun with them, even overindulgent, in classic grandmother fashion. Corinne said, “Come on, Marcus, your mother is right. You don’t want people to think you’re a messy slob, do you?” Eliza glanced at Andrew; he was pouring himself more wine, too, ignoring the way his mother insulted his child, and, by extension, his family.

  The two of them, fine old blade and rebel boy, stared at each other for a moment, while Eliza wondered if he would swear at her. After eyeing her for a few more seconds, he shrugged. “Oh, all right, Grandma.” He stood, pushed his chair in and sat down again. He even put his napkin on his lap.

  Corinne said, “There you go. I know you want to be a gentleman. Just like your uncle Martin. And your daddy, of course.”

  Here we go, Eliza thought. She’d been waiting for Uncle Martin to enter the conversation. Martin’s greatest fan, in his universe of fans, was his mother. Which was sweet, but still. She was blind to his faults. The old lady gazed at Marcus, then at Jake, the cold smile warmer now. “You both look so much like your uncle,” she murmured. Marcus chewed his meat, ignoring her, but Jake smiled. Eliza refrained from mentioning the obvious; Martin and Andrew were sometimes mistaken for twins. The boys, therefore, looked like their father.

  Oh, Eliza, you’re so petty, she said to herself, just before Corinne shook her head. “It’s such a mystery, why he hasn’t met the right woman.”

  No, it’s not, Eliza thought.

  “Any woman would be crazy not to want to marry him.” The monologue would proceed in one of various directions now. Corinne might become genuinely fretful about Martin’s geographical distance and his health: Was he okay? Would he ever come back and live in Toronto again? It would not be the first time that Eliza had watched her tough mother-in-law get anxious for her son. On the other hand, she might start talking about his latest international triumph. She kept up with everything he did through his Twitter feed and website. Or she might continue talking about the dearth of suitable women for her famous offspring.

  “It must be difficult for him to be single.” Bingo.

  Bruce grunted. “If he’d had the guts to propose to that last one, the English lady, she woulda married him.”

  Corinne’s eyes popped open. Perhaps she hadn’t had the English lady in mind. “Oh, I don’t think that was so serious. And she was in the same field. She was such a competitive woman, always talking about her projects. It would be hard to be an anthropologist and compete with Martin.”

  “Yes,” Eliza said crisply, “it certainly would be.” Andrew poked her with a glance. She fork-lifted some kale to her mouth and chewed.

  Corinne took a sip of wine. “He’s a genius,” she said, setting the glass down. “That is the problem. He cannot find his equal in a woman. And women don’t want to be helpmates to men anymore. So it’s been hard for him to find a partner.”

  Eliza met Jake’s concerned eyes, smiled. Her little human thermometer registered the rising tension; his eyes travelled from face to face, trying to figure out what was going on. His mother put some beets into her mouth and chewed; it was the best way to keep from talking.

  Andrew said, “Mom, Martin will find a wife if he wants one. And I don’t think it’s proper,” he said carefully, using the P word, which he used only with Corinne, who had an innate respect for it, “to talk about him like this. You two could discuss this stuff together on the phone.”

  Corinne pursed her lips. When she spoke, her voice was high, strained with emotion. “Andrew, you know your brother never talks to me about private things.”

  Bruce cleared his throat noisily. “He probably doesn’t talk to anyone about that stuff. It’s private. Remember? He’s an adult now. There’s no need to interfere.”

  Corinne cried, “I’m not interfering!” Eliza lifted her head, glanced from Corinne to Andrew, trying to figure out what had just happened. She had missed something. But what? The boys stared at Corinne, too, on alert, worried it was their fault. Their eyes widened as their grandmother spoke again, angrily. “I’m just wondering about him. Can’t I even do that anymore, wonder how he’s doing?”

  In a deep, gentle tone, Andrew answered, “Of course you can, Mom. We all do. We all miss him.”

  Not me, Eliza thought, peeved once more. Even when Martin was on a different continent, he could monopolize a conversation.

  Bruce immediately undid the effect of his son’s conciliatory words. “For Christ’s sake, Corinne! Martin’s a successful, grown man now. He’s perfectly fine. Stop worrying about him all the time.”

  Corinne’s face crumpled. The anger was gone, usurped by a sadness Eliza had never before seen in her mother-in-law. “I just want him to be happy! And I want to know that he’s happy!” Her eyes filled with tears. “Is that a crime?”

  The table was still and silent. The food and tablecloth and napkins absorbed Corinne’s words as readily as the humans did. Eliza looked from Bruce to her mother-in-law, once more to her husband. None o
f them would meet her eye.

  Unable to stand the tension anymore, Jake piped up, “Is Uncle Martin in trouble, Grandma?”

  Corinne made a strangled noise deep in her throat but smiled bravely at Jake, her eyes shining with tears. “No, Jake, Uncle Martin isn’t in trouble. I just miss him.”

  Jake tilted his head to the side. “I miss him, too, Grandma.” He reached over and patted her hand. “He’ll come and see you in the spring.”

  Andrew laughed. They all started laughing at Jake’s quiet assurance, his adult little-boyness. Eliza asked, “Anyone for some more wine?” Too late, she realized that this was not an invitation that Corinne would appreciate. “Or water?”

  Bruce boomed, “I’ll have some more wine.”

  Corinne only looked on disapprovingly, sadly.

  Bruce smiled at his wife and said, “Just a little splash, Eliza.” He raised his glass and Eliza poured in a small amount. A round of water, wine and juice pouring commenced, loosening up the taut atmosphere, rehydrating throats old and young. Jake smacked loudly after he drank a gulp of apple juice. Eliza smiled at him, thinking how sad it was that Corinne obsessed about her eldest son’s well-being. Her life wasn’t full enough. No wonder she went shopping so much.

  Andrew asked, “So, Dad, tell me. What did you do with the boat this winter? Did you store it at the old marina or drive it out to your friend’s place?”

  Eliza sat up straighter. The boat? They still had that boat? She thought that they’d sold it in the fall. She glanced from Andrew to Bruce to Corinne. None of them seemed to think it was odd to own a boat when you couldn’t pay your bills. She wanted to scream: You still have the fucking boat? Instead, she reached for her wineglass.

  Corinne was now instructing Jake on how to hold his fork properly. Eliza tried not to listen, focusing instead on the lack of resemblance between the woman and Andrew. Petite, WASPily reserved, narrow-minded—how on earth had she raised the boy who became Andrew, relaxed, squeamish about nothing, naturally magnanimous. He had his mother’s blue eyes, Eliza thought, and her attention to detail, at least when it came to math. But no one, seeing them together in a room, would think they were mother and son.