by Maile Meloy
The walk-in didn’t look like an undergrad, and she guessed he had come to lament his unwritten dissertation—to talk about the history of the electoral college or the double helix. She usually just let the grad students run on, hoping they would find their way to something she could address.
This one sat down easily on the couch—he’d done this before—and said, “This isn’t academic, really.” He had curly hair and seemed bright and agitated. She wondered idly if he was Jewish. He started talking about the university’s ombudsman. Leila had worked with the ombudsman: he was tall and very black, and had the voice of an actor and wore three-piece suits. He made an impression.
“I keep thinking about the ombudsman,” the young man said. “Because he gave this talk when I first started teaching, and he said, ‘I have one piece of advice for you, which should help you in your teaching and grading before it ever helps you with anything in my territory. That advice is, Don’t look for love in the classroom .’ ”
Leila waited.
“But I got involved with a student, a former student now,” the young man went on. “It’s the first time I’ve done that. Those girls—I’m sure you know this, but they show up all wide-eyed and flirtatious at office hours. I know most of them don’t really want to fuck their TA. They just want me to want them, and they want to please me. But it’s a little overwhelming.” He paused before going on.
“I think this was different. I’m sure everyone says that. But she never said anything in class or came to office hours. I didn’t even notice her at first, she was so quiet. I called on her once out of curiosity, and she got so embarrassed I never did it again. But I sought her out, I made up an excuse. I said I needed her notes. And then I couldn’t stop thinking about her.”
Leila nodded, to show that she was listening.
“So the first time we had…a kind of sexual encounter,” he said, “she left school. Her father died about a year ago, and she’d already left school once, and this time she went back to his house in Santa Rosa. I tried to keep things going, but she seemed sort of gun-shy. Finally I just went up there. She didn’t want me in her dead father’s house, so I got a hotel room and she stayed the night. And I thought—this is what I want. I know this is what I want. And then in the morning she told me her uncle had invited her to Argentina.”
Leila was mostly following the story, and only a small part of her attention was on the divorce papers in the drawer of the desk. She would have to remember not to leave them behind where her colleagues could find them.
“She’s been working on a novel,” he said. “I know that sounds ridiculous. She’s back at her father’s house now, working on it, and she just sent me a draft. It isn’t finished, parts of it are sketchy. But the point is, it’s about a girl like Abby who has a one-night stand with her uncle.”
Leila was suddenly alert and tracking. She had wondered when this would happen, working for the university. She had seen students who all complained about the same professor, and teachers in the same department with petty rivalries against each other. But the links had always been casual. She tried to remember Abby’s last name, Abby of the dead father and the affair with the young uncle.
“I mean, the novel’s about a lot of things,” he said. “It’s about a family, about being Catholic in America, which is not what I expected. It’s sort of like me writing about being Jewish in America.”
“Are you?”
“My father is, but—I didn’t grow up with it. The novel needs some more Catholic stuff in the revision. But I haven’t called to tell her that, because there’s this thing with the uncle in it.”
“And?” Leila said.
“I think that happened. I think she fucked her uncle. God, it’s so weird to say out loud. My Abby.”
Abby Collins. That was her name.
“Does this sound crazy?” he asked.
“I don’t think so,” she said carefully.
“I’m writing my dissertation about Poe,” he said. “So maybe that’s why this feels like a weird curse, that I would fall for this girl who’s in thrall to this uncle who took her out of my bed and off to Argentina. So I came here to say that this is a damaged girl, right? And I should move on, and never sleep with a student who’s screwed up enough to sleep with me.”
“That sounds like a good rule.”
“But this is the one I want,” he said. “Do you think she slept with her uncle?”
Leila paused. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe she didn’t,” he said hopefully. “In the book it’s only once.”
“Whether she did or not,” Leila said, “there will be things to work through. Some emotional inaccessibility on her part, from the sound of it. And the impact of her father’s death. And possibly a history of incest.”
He nodded.
“But it’s hard for me, working for the university, to encourage you in this.”
“I expected that,” he said. “Do you see a lot of situations like this?”
“Not exactly like this.”
“Does it ever turn out well—I mean with students?”
“What would ‘well’ be?”
“They don’t end up together, do they?”
“Not usually.”
“Do they come out unscathed?”
Leila studied his intent young face, and looked at the clock behind him, and thought about the divorce papers in the drawer, and how long and unpredictable life was.
“No,” she said. “They don’t. It’s all how you look at the scathing.”
43
WHEN KATYA CAME to Jamie’s room in Argentina, she caught him at a vulnerable time, though he might always have been vulnerable to the kind of seduction she laid on. Abby had just kicked him out, and Saffron had thrown Martin in his face. And then there was Katya on her knees, sucking his cock with an amateur’s enthusiasm and a professional’s skill. He forgot about Martin, he forgot about everything. He stayed up at night playing songs for her on the guitar, singing “Love unrequited robs me of my rest,” which wasn’t technically true, and “I’ve Just Seen a Face,” his own version:
Katya is a lovely lay
She could have looked the other way
But as it is she looked on me
And now I only want to eat her heart
Na na na na na na.
Katya laughed at the na na na s even more than at the changed lyrics, but he made her sing them, too: that was the part that summed up the joy he felt.
He thought the whole thing over, sometimes with Katya sleeping next to him, sometimes alone in his room listing pros and cons. He explored the estancia with T.J., to confirm that they liked each other, and he talked to Magdalena about what she was going to do next. She had a marriage proposal and would be moving away; her fiancé ran a farm for a rich English family. She was wistful about leaving T.J., but she didn’t seem to have any ideas about making her fiancé a stepfather.
Then Jamie went to Fauchet. He danced around the idea until he got the sense that Fauchet wasn’t against it, and they started to work out the terms. He would marry Katya, and T.J. could be released to the responsible home of Mr. and Mrs. Jamie Santerre. They would go back to San Francisco, and Katya would get a green card, and T.J. would get an American father. Saffron would get her mother’s money—which she was going to do anyway—but there would be a generous settlement to T.J.’s new guardians, and some money in trust until he grew up.
Jamie was determined about it; there was no other solution. There was something so abject about Katya, so utterly corrupted—he hadn’t anticipated the effect of it. She wasn’t like anyone. Even Saffron was always in control. So here he was escaping Saffron, and rescuing the orphan, all while fucking this odd little masterpiece of depravity, a girl raised from childhood to be his slave. He was in love.
When Abby found out about his plan, she was furious. She said they were using him. “Katya was raised by Russian pimps, Jamie,” she said. “How much of a warning do you need?”
> “She laughs at my songs.”
“There are millions of girls who will laugh at your songs.”
But there was no stopping him now. Jamie married Katya in Argentina, to facilitate the adoption. It upset his parents not to be there, but not as much as a City Hall wedding in San Francisco would have upset them. Abby refused to be a witness. It was thrilling to thwart his family for a noble cause. He was declaring his independence; he was finally growing up.
He flew to San Francisco alone and found an apartment, and Katya and the boy followed. They both seemed exhausted by the trip, but Katya cheered up when she saw the apartment, which was neat and comfortable and bright on the bright day when they arrived.
He found a small private school with young, Madgalenaesque teachers, where T.J. learned English with amazing speed. The public schools were too scary, and anyway he had Josephine’s money.
Katya was proud of her conquest: she had come for her child, and she had gotten him. There was novelty in living in America. And there was novelty in playing the loyal wife. She couldn’t cook, and she didn’t clean, but there were nights eating Thai food at the kitchen table, when Jamie made Katya and T.J. giggle helplessly, or when his lame attempts at pronouncing Hungarian words set them both off, and it felt like a family. Not a normal family, but Jamie had never expected that—it was the kind of crazy, invented family he had to have ended up with. It made perfect sense.
44
ABBY WENT BACK to her father’s house, after Argentina. Jamie wanted her to come to San Francisco to approve of his marriage, Peter wanted her to come to San Diego to be with him, and her mother wanted her to stay in the new guest room—which was Abby’s old room, repainted and refurnished—but Abby didn’t want to see anyone.
She set up her computer again at the kitchen table, went through Peter’s notes, and tried to fill in the parts he thought were missing. At night she read St. Augustine, and Abélard and Héloïse, and Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. She thought about Yvette and Teddy. It was part of every day: the dread of what would happen if she could actually finish the book, and someone would publish it.
Finally she called Jamie. “I think I might have a draft, of this novel.”
“Hey, that’s great.”
“It has an uncle in it who has an affair with a niece.”
“Oh, boy.”
“They have a baby.”
“Good God.”
“Is that okay? You said it was, once.”
“For them to have a baby?”
“For me to write a book. This book.”
“Really? I say a lot of things.”
“You seemed like you meant it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. If they ask, I’ll say it’s made up.”
“Good plan. Can I read it?”
“Soon, I think. Are you angry?”
“I don’t think so. But I haven’t read it.”
“I don’t want to tell anyone else yet.”
“Okay.”
“It starts with a Catholic mother raising her daughter’s baby as her own.”
There was a silence on the line.
“Did you ever find out if that happened?” she asked.
“No.”
“Do you think it did?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe we should find out,” she said. “I hoped for a while that you were my cousin, but now I think I hope you’re not. I’d like to know before I send this book anywhere.”
“I can see that.”
“That story line was your idea, too,” she said, trying not to sound as defensive as she felt.
“Are you sure I really meant it?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I thought you did. You should be careful what you tell people to do.”
“Most people don’t do anything I say.”
“Well, you should be careful what you tell me to do.”
“Now I know that.”
“I don’t think you’ll be angry.”
“Good,” he said.
“So can we ask Yvette?”
45
YVETTE WAS WASHING the dishes when Abby and Jamie pulled into the driveway. She had been singing to herself, like she used to sing with her sister Adele while they washed the dishes at home, as girls. Their cousins in Montreal taught them French torch songs, and Yvette was singing one of those:
Comme la vie est un songe, et l’amour un mensonge
Les plus beaux serments ne durent qu’un temps
Quand la femme est jolie l’adorer c’est folie…
Then, out the window, she saw the car.
Teddy was in the garage at his workbench, fixing a lamp, and Yvette wondered if he knew Jamie was coming and had forgotten to tell her. That would be just like him. She went to the door, drying her hands on a towel.
“What are you both doing here!”
“Hi, Ma.”
“Hi, Grandma,” Abby said and kissed her.
Yvette had just been talking to Clarissa about how Abby was holed up in her father’s house and hadn’t gone back to school. “How are you, sweetheart?” she asked.
“I’m okay.”
“I’ll get Teddy,” Yvette said.
“Wait a minute,” Jamie said. “I want to ask you something first.”
Yvette sat down on one of the chairs in the living room, and the kids sat on the couch like visitors. Then Jamie asked if Margot had been pregnant the year he was born.
Yvette was caught off guard. “What makes you ask that?”
“I was telling someone the story,” Jamie said slowly, “how you went into the convent and Margot was in France, and then how you went to visit Margot and I was born there.” He paused and looked to Abby, as if for encouragement. “And it sounded, to me and to this person, like maybe that wasn’t the whole story. And maybe it is the whole story, but I just felt like I had to ask.”
“I don’t understand,” Yvette said.
“Is Margot my mother?” he asked.
“ I’myour mother,” she said.
Jamie sighed, a little impatiently. “Did Margot have a baby in France?”
Yvette was so confused that she tried to remember if she could have forgotten a thing like that. Comme la vie est un songe, et l’amour un mensonge . “No!” she said finally. “She learned French, that’s all. She lived with my cousins. They can tell you.”
Jamie and Abby looked at each other. Teddy came in from the garage, looking pleased to see them.
“How about that!” he said. “Look who’s here!”
“Hi, Dad,” Jamie said. “Surprise visit.”
Still baffled, Yvette said, “Isn’t this wonderful, sweetheart?”
46
PETER READ ABBY’S NEXT draft and pronounced it a novel, and she locked up her father’s house, drove to San Diego, and spent the night in his bed. He wondered if he would have lied about the novel to get to this place; he guessed he would have told her the truth and hoped she would come anyway.
The old Frenchman in Argentina had given her the number of a friend in New York who owned a literary agency, and Abby had sent the book there, and they had sold it. But given a contract and a check, she seemed overcome by guilt and fear that she was going to outrage her family. Peter hadn’t asked her about the incest plot.
One night, sitting in his bed in her underwear and a UCSD T-shirt, she looked up from the manuscript. “How am I going to tell my grandparents?”
He was reading in the chair by the window and marked his page. “Don’t you think they guess by now? They know you’re writing something.”
“They don’t guess.”
“So you’re just going to let them find it in the bookstore?”
“No.”
“It’ll be okay,” he said. “You’ve made so much up.”
She looked sad and oppressed. “I’m not cut out for this.”
“You have some other plans I don’t know about?”
“I could be an academic.”
“You’re not an academic.”
“How do you know?”
“I know .”
“You liked my papers.”
“But I didn’t say you should be an academic.”
She pushed the manuscript away, across the bed. “Tell me about getting kicked out of college.”
“You know the story.”
“Only in parts.”
He thought about why she might want to hear it now and began deliberately. “I was drunk or stoned a lot,” he said, “and failing my classes, and they asked me to take a year off. Told me to.”
“Were your parents having trouble?”
“Some people manage to get depressed with married parents.”
“But were they happy?”
“Happy enough,” he said. “They live in the country of long marriages. They speak a different language.”
“That’s so strange.”
“I was supposed to get a job,” he said, “and show the disciplinary committee I could apply myself to something, but I spent the summer in New York and went to parties. Two of my friends had an apartment in the city and money for coke. I was always too broke to buy coke, which is lucky. I had a girlfriend who went to Stuyvesant, which felt very corrupt and exciting even though she was only two years younger.”
“You were having sex?”
A startlingly vivid memory of his high school girl wearing only a baseball cap came back to him.
“Manhattan girls didn’t mess around,” he said. “It almost killed me when she dumped me. Then it was the end of the summer, and my friends were going back to school, but I couldn’t. One of them had a lot of magazines he was throwing away. I was never a big porn guy, but there were all these pictures of beautiful girls—old-style, presilicone Playboy s—and they were going to the garbage. So I said I’d take them, and I packed them into two old shopping bags.”
