Lessons in Chemistry (20 page)

“I loved Madeline’s father,” she explained, her brow slightly furrowed. “It’s just that I couldn’t marry him.”

“It was an affair,” Walter said sympathetically, dropping his voice. “He was stepping out on his wife. Was that it?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “We loved each other completely. In fact, we’d been living together for—”

“That would be another great thing never to mention,” Walter interrupted. “Never.”

“—two years. We were soulmates.”

“How nice,” he said, clearing his throat. “I’m sure it’s all in order. But still, that’s not the sort of thing we need to tell anyone. Ever. Although I’m sure you had plans to marry him at some point.”

“I didn’t,” she said quietly. “But more to the point, he died.” And with those words, her face clouded with despair.

Walter was shocked by her sudden shift in character. She had a way about her—an authority that he knew the camera would love—but she was also fragile. Poor thing. Without thinking twice, he put his arms around her. “I’m deeply sorry,” he said, pulling her in.

“So am I,” she muffled into his shoulder. “So am I.”

He flinched. Such loneliness. He patted her back as he did with Amanda, communicating, as best he could, that he wasn’t just sorry for her loss but understood it. Had he ever been in love like that? No. But now he had a very good idea what it looked like.

“I apologize,” she said, pulling away, surprised at how much she’d needed that hug.

“It’s okay,” he said gently. “You’ve been through a lot.”

“Regardless,” she said, straightening up, “I should know better than to speak of it. I’ve already been fired for it once.”

For the third time that morning, Walter flinched. When she
said “it,” he wasn’t sure what she meant. Had she been fired for killing her lover? Or for being an unwed mother? Both explanations were plausible, but he far preferred the second one.

“I killed him,” she admitted softly, eliminating his preference. “I insisted he use a leash and he died. Six-Thirty has never been the same.”

“That’s terrible,” Walter said in an even lower voice, because even though he didn’t understand what she’d said about the leash or the six thirty time zone, he understood what she’d meant. She’d made a choice and it had ended badly. He’d done the very same thing. And both of their bad choices resulted in small people who now bore the brunt of their parents’ poor choices. “I’m so very sorry.”

“I’m sorry for you, too,” she said, trying to regain her composure. “Your divorce.”

“Oh, don’t be,” he said, waving his hand, embarrassed that his lurch at love could be compared in any way to hers. “It wasn’t like your situation. Mine didn’t have anything to do with love. Amanda isn’t even technically mine in the DNA sense of things,” he blurted without meaning to. In fact, he’d only just found out three weeks ago.

His ex-wife had long insinuated that he wasn’t Amanda’s biological father, but he’d figured she’d only said it to hurt him. Sure, he and Amanda didn’t look alike, but plenty of children don’t look like their parents. Every time he held Amanda in his arms, he knew she was his; he could sense the deep, permanent biological connection. But his ex-wife’s cruel insistence ate at him, and when paternity testing finally became available, he produced a blood sample. Five days later, he knew the truth. He and Amanda were total strangers.

He’d stared at the test results, expecting to feel cheated or devastated or any of the other ways he’d guessed he was supposed to feel, but instead he’d felt completely nonplussed. The results didn’t matter at all. Amanda was his daughter and he was her father. He loved her with all his heart. Biology was overrated.

“I’d never planned to be a parent,” he told Elizabeth. “But here I am, a devoted father. Life’s a mystery, isn’t it? People who try and plan it inevitably end up disappointed.”

She nodded. She was a planner. She was disappointed.

“Anyway,” he continued. “I believe we can make something with
Supper at Six.
But there are some things about TV that you’re just going to, well, have to put up with. In terms of the wardrobe, I’ll tell the tailor to ease the seams. But in quid pro quo, I’d like you to practice smiling.”

She frowned.

“Jack LaLanne smiles when he’s doing push-ups,” Walter said. “That’s the way he makes hard things look fun. Study Jack’s style—he’s a master.”

At the mention of Jack’s name, Elizabeth tensed. She hadn’t watched Jack LaLanne since Calvin died, and that was partly because she blamed him—yes, she knew it wasn’t fair—for Calvin’s death. The memory of Calvin coming into the kitchen after Jack’s show filled her with a sudden warmth.

“There you go,” Walter said.

Elizabeth glanced up at him.

“You were almost smiling.”

“Oh,” she said. “Well, it was unintentional.”

“That’s fine. Intentional, nonintentional. Anything will do. Most of mine are forced. Including those at Woody Elementary School, where I’m headed next. I’ve been summoned by Mrs. Mudford.”

“I have too,” Elizabeth said, surprised. “I have a conference tomorrow. Does yours concern Amanda’s reading list?”

“Reading?” he said, surprised. “They’re kindergartners, Elizabeth; they can’t read. Anyway, the issue isn’t Amanda. It’s me. She’s suspicious of me because I’m a father raising a daughter alone.”

“Why?”

He looked surprised. “Why do you think?”

“Oh,”
she said, with sudden understanding. “She believes you’re sexually deviant.”

“I wouldn’t have put it so, so…blatantly,” Walter said, “but yes. It’s like wearing a badge that says ‘Hello! I’m a pedophile—and I babysit!’ ”

“I guess we’re both suspect, then,” Elizabeth said. “Calvin and I had sex nearly every day—completely normal for our youth and activity level—but because we weren’t married…”

“Ah,” Walter said, paling. “Well—”

“As if marriage has anything to do with sexuality—”

“Ah—”

“There were times,” she explained matter-of-factly, “that I would wake up in the middle of the night filled with desire—I’m sure that’s happened to you—but Calvin was in the middle of a REM cycle, so I didn’t disturb him. But then I mentioned it later and he was practically apoplectic. ‘No, Elizabeth,’ he said, ‘always wake me up. REM cycle or no REM cycle. Do not hesitate.’ It wasn’t until I did more reading on testosterone that I better understood the male sex drive—”

“Speaking of drive,” Walter interrupted, his face scarlet. “I wanted to remind you to park in the north lot.”

“The north lot,” she said, her hands on her hips. “That’s the one off to the left as I pull in?”

“Exactly.”

“Anyway,” she continued. “I’m sorry that Mudford has implied you’re anything other than a loving father. I very much doubt she’s read the Kinsey Reports.”

“The Kinsey—”

“Because if she had, she’d actually understand that you and I are the opposite of sexual deviants. You and I are—”

“
Normal
parents?” he rushed.

“Loving role models.”

“Guardians.”

“Kin,” she finished.

It was that last word that cemented their odd, tell-all friendship, the kind that only arises when a wronged person meets someone who has been similarly wronged and discovers that while it may be the only thing they share, it is more than enough.

“Look,” Walter said, marveling that he’d never had such a frank discussion about sex or biology with anyone, including himself. “About the wardrobe. If the tailor can’t make those dresses more breathable, choose something from your closet for now.”

“You won’t consider the lab coat idea.”

“It’s more that I want you to be
you,
” he said. “Not a scientist.”

She tucked a few stray hairs behind her ears. “But I
am
a scientist,” she argued. “It’s who I am.”

“That may be, Elizabeth Zott,” he said, not knowing how true this would turn out to be. “But it’s only a start.”

The Average Jane

In retrospect, he probably should have let her see the set.

As the music started to play—that charming little ditty Walter had paid far too much for and that she already hated—Elizabeth strode out on the stage. He took a short, sharp breath in. She was wearing a drab dress featuring small buttons that ran all the way down to the hem, a stark white multipocketed apron cinched tightly at the waist, and a Timex wristwatch that ticked so loudly, he swore he could hear it over the band’s drumbeat. On her head sat a pair of goggles. Just over her left ear, a number-two pencil. In one hand she carried a notebook; in the other, three test tubes. She looked like a cross between a hotel maid and a bomb squad expert.

He watched as she waited for the song to finish, her eyes traveling around the set from one corner to another, lips pressed together, and shoulders tensed in a way that signaled dissatisfaction. As the last note played, she turned toward the cue card, scanned it, then turned away. Setting her notebook and test tubes on the counter, she walked to the sink, her back to the camera, and leaned into the fake window to take in the fake view.

“This is revolting,” she said directly into the microphone.

The cameraman turned to look at Walter, his eyes wide.

“Remind her we’re live,” Walter hissed at him.

LIVE!!!
the cameraman’s assistant hastily scribbled on a large board, holding it up for her to see.

Elizabeth read the reminder, and then holding up one finger as if to signal that this would only take another second, continued her self-guided tour, stopping to take in the kitchen’s carefully curated wall art— a Bless This House needlepoint, a depressed Jesus kneeling in prayer, an amateur painting of ships sailing on a sea—before moving on to crowded countertops, her brows arching in dismay at a sewing basket riddled with safety pins, a Mason jar filled with unwanted buttons, a ball of brown yarn, a chipped candy dish filled with peppermints, and a bread box across which
Our Daily Bread
was scrawled in religious script.

Just yesterday, Walter had given the set designer an A+ for his taste. “I especially love the knickknacks,” he’d told him. “They’re just right.” But today, next to her, they looked like junk. He watched as she paced to the other side of the counter, visibly blanching at the sight of hen and rooster salt and pepper shakers, hostilely eyeing the toaster’s knitted pink cozy, recoiling from a strange little ball made entirely of rubber bands. To the left of the ball was a cookie jar molded to look like a fat German woman making pretzels. She stopped abruptly, looking above her head at the large clock hanging on wires, its hands permanently fixed in the six o’clock position.
supper at six
was printed across its face in glittery type.

“Walter,” Elizabeth said, shielding her eyes as she looked out past the bright lights. “Walter, a word, please.”

“Commercial, commercial!” Walter hissed to the cameraman as she started to pick her way off the set down to where he was sitting. “Do it now!
Now!
”

“Elizabeth,” he said, launching himself out of his chair toward her. “You can’t do this! Get back up there! We’re live!”

“We are? Well, we can’t be. The set doesn’t work.”

“Everything works, the stove, the sink, it’s all been tested, now get back up there,” he said, shooing her back with his hands.

“I meant it doesn’t work for
me.
”

“Look,” he said. “You’re nervous. That’s why we’re taping without a live audience today—to give you a chance to settle in. But you’re still
on
—as in
on the air
—and you have a job to do. This is our pilot; things can be tweaked later.”

“So, you’re saying changes
are
possible,” she said, putting her hands back on her hips as she surveyed the set again. “We’ll need to make a lot of changes.”

“Okay, wait, no,” he said, worried. “To be clear, set changes are not possible. What you see represents weeks of solid research by our set designer. This kitchen is exactly what today’s woman wants.”

“Well I’m a woman, and I don’t want this.”

“I didn’t mean you,” Walter said. “I meant the average Jane.”

“Average
.
”

“You know what I mean. The normal housewife.”

She made a sound like a whale spouting.

“Okay,” Walter said in a lower voice, his hand waving fruitlessly at his side. “Okay, okay, look, I understand, but remember, this isn’t just
our
show, Elizabeth, it’s also the station’s show, and since they pay us, it’s usually considered good form to do what they ask. You know how this works; you’ve had a job before.”

“But ultimately,” she argued, “it’s the audience for whom we all work.”

“Right,” he pleaded. “Sort of. No wait—not really. It’s our job to give people what they want even if they don’t know they want it. I explained this: it’s the afternoon programming model. Half dead, now awake,
you know
!”

“Another ad?” the cameraman whispered.

“Unnecessary,” she said quickly. “Sorry everyone. I’m ready now.”

“We
are
on the same page, aren’t we?” Walter called as she made her way back onstage.

“Yes,” Elizabeth said. “You want me to speak to the
average
Jane. The
normal
housewife.”

He didn’t like the way she said it.

“In five—” the cameraman said.

“Elizabeth,”
he warned.

“Four—”

“It’s all written out for you.”

“Three—”

“Just read the cue cards.”

“Two—”

“Please,”
he begged.
“It’s a great script!”

“One…and action!”

“Hello,” Elizabeth said directly into the camera. “My name is Elizabeth Zott and this is
Supper at Six.
”

“So far so good,” Walter whispered to himself.
SMILE,
he mimed at her, pulling at the corners of his mouth.

“And welcome to my kitchen,” she said sternly as a disappointed Jesus peered over her left shoulder. “Today we’re going to have so much—”

She stopped when she got to the word “fun.”

An uncomfortable silence followed. The cameraman turned to look at Walter. “Go to commercial again?” he motioned.

“NO,” Walter mouthed. “NO! GODDAMMIT. SHE HAS TO DO THIS! GODDAMMIT ELIZABETH,” he continued soundlessly as he waved his hands.

But Elizabeth seemed to be in a trance and nothing—not Walter waving his hands, or the cameraman preparing for commercial, or the makeup person mopping her own face with the sponge reserved for Elizabeth’s—could break her spell. What was
wrong
with her?

“MUSIC,” Walter finally mouthed to the soundman.
“MUSIC.”

But before the music could start, Elizabeth’s ticking watch caught her attention and she came back to life. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Now, where were we?” She glanced at the cue cards, paused
a moment more, and then suddenly pointed at the large clock above her head. “Before I get started, I’d like to advise you to please ignore the clock. It doesn’t work.”

From the producer’s chair, Walter let out a short, sharp exhale.

“I take cooking seriously,” Elizabeth continued, completely ignoring the cue cards, “and I know you do, too.” Then she pushed the sewing basket off the countertop and into an open drawer. “I also know,” she said, looking directly into the few households that had accidentally tuned her in that day, “that your time is precious. Well, so is mine. So let’s make a pact, you and I—”

“Mom,” a little boy called in a bored way from the TV room in Van Nuys, California, “there’s
nothing
on.”

“Shut it off, then,” the little boy’s mother yelled from the kitchen. “I’m busy! Play outside—”

“Mmoomm…Mmoomm…,”
the little boy called again.

“Oh, for heaven’s
sake,
Petey,” a harried woman said coming into the room, her wet hands holding a half-peeled potato, the baby crying in the high chair in the kitchen, “do I have to do everything for you?” But as she reached to turn Elizabeth off, Elizabeth spoke to her.

“It is my experience that far too many people do not appreciate the work and sacrifice that goes into being a wife, a mother, a woman. Well, I am not one of them. At the end of our thirty minutes together, we
will
have done something worth doing. We
will
have created something that will not go unnoticed. We
will
have made supper. And it
will
matter.”

“What’s this?” Petey’s mother said.

“Dunno,” said Petey.

“Now, let’s get started,” Elizabeth said.

Later, in her dressing room, Rosa, the hairdresser and makeup woman, stopped by to say goodbye. “For the record, I liked the hair pencil.”

“For the record?”

“Lebensmal’s been screaming at Walter for the last twenty minutes.”

“Because of a pencil?”

“Because you didn’t follow the script.”

“Well, yes. But only because the cue cards were unreadable.”

“Oh,” Rosa said, visibly relieved. “That was it? The type wasn’t big enough?”

“No, no,” Elizabeth said. “I meant the cards were misleading.”

“Elizabeth,”
Walter said, appearing at her dressing room door, his face red.

“Anyway,” she whispered, “goodbye forever.” She gave Elizabeth’s arm a little squeeze.

“Hello, Walter,” Elizabeth said. “I was just making up a list of a few things we’ll need to change right away.”

“Don’t hello me,” he shot back. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Why there’s nothing wrong with me. I actually thought it went rather well. I admit I stumbled at the beginning, but only because I was in shock. It won’t happen again, not after we fix the set.”

He stomped across the room and threw himself into a chair. “Elizabeth,” he said. “This is a
job.
You have two duties: to smile and read cue cards. That’s it. You don’t get to have an opinion about the set or the cards.”

“I think I do.”

“No!”

“Anyway, I couldn’t read the cards.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “We practiced different type sizes, remember? So I
know
you can read the damn cards. Jesus, Elizabeth, Lebensmal’s ready to cancel the whole thing. Do you realize you’ve put both of our jobs in jeopardy?”

“I’m sorry. I’ll go speak with him right now.”

“Oh no,” Walter said quickly. “Not you.”

“Why?” she said. “I want to clarify a few things, especially
about the set. And as for the cue cards—again, I’m sorry, Walter. I didn’t mean I
couldn’t
read them; I meant my conscience wouldn’t
let
me read them. Because they were awful. Who wrote the script?”

He pursed his lips. “I did.”

“Oh,” she said, startled. “But those words. They didn’t sound like me at all.”

“Yes,” he said through gritted teeth. “That was
intentional.
”

She looked surprised. “I thought you told me to be
me.
”

“Not
that
you,” he said. “Not the ‘this is going to be really, really complicated’ you. Not the ‘far too many people do not appreciate the work and sacrifice that goes into being a wife, a mother, a woman’ you. No one wants to hear that stuff, Elizabeth. You have to be positive, happy, upbeat!”

“But that’s not me.”

“But it could be you.”

Elizabeth reviewed her life to date. “Not a chance.”

“Could we
not
argue about this,” Walter said, his heart pounding uncomfortably in his chest. “I’m the afternoon programming expert and I’ve already explained how this all works.”

“And I’m the woman,” she snapped, “speaking to an all-woman audience.”

A secretary appeared in the doorway. “Mr. Pine,” she said. “We’re getting calls about the show. I’m not sure what to do.”

“Jesus mother of god,” he said. “Complaints already.”

“It’s about the shopping list. Some confusion about tomorrow’s ingredients. Specifically, CH
₃
COOH.”

“Acetic acid,” Elizabeth supplied. “Vinegar—it’s four percent acetic acid. I’m sorry— I probably should have written the list in layman’s terms.”

“You
think
?” Walter said.

“Thanks much,” the secretary said, disappearing.

“Where’d the shopping list idea come from anyway?” he demanded. “We never discussed a shopping list—especially not one written in chemical form.”

“I know,” she said, “it came to me as I was about to walk out on set. I think it’s a good idea, don’t you?”

Walter sank his head into his hands. It
was
a good idea; he just wasn’t willing to admit it. “You can’t do this,” he said in a muffled voice. “You can’t do whatever the hell you want.”

“I’m not doing whatever the hell I want,” Elizabeth nipped. “If I was doing whatever the hell I wanted, I’d be in a research lab. Look,” she said. “If I’m not mistaken, you’re experiencing a rise in corticosterone levels—what you call the Afternoon Depression Zone. You should probably eat something.”

“Do not,” he said stiffly, “lecture
me
on the Afternoon Depression Zone.”

For the next few minutes, the two of them sat in the dressing room, one looking at the floor, the other looking at the wall. Not a word passed between them.

“Mr. Pine?” A different secretary poked her head in. “Mr. Lebensmal has a flight to catch, but he wanted me to remind you that you’ve got the rest of the week to fix ‘it.’ I’m sorry— I don’t know what ‘it’ is. Says you better make ‘it’ ”—she consulted her notes again—“ ‘sexy.’ ” Then she turned pink. “Also, there’s this.” She handed him a hand-scrawled note Lebensmal had dashed off.
And what about the fucking cocktail?

“Thanks,” Walter said.

“Sorry,” she said.

“Mr. Pine,” the first secretary said, appearing as the other was leaving. “It’s late— I need to go home. But the phones…”

“Go on, Paula,” he said. “I’ll handle it.”

“Can I help?” Elizabeth asked.

“You’ve helped plenty enough today,” Walter said. “So, when I say, ‘No thank you,’ I actually mean
no thank you.
”

Then he went out to the secretary’s desk, Elizabeth trailing behind, and picked up a phone. “KCTV,” he said wearily. “Yeah. Sorry. It’s vinegar.”