Nothing To Lose (A fat girl novel) (31 page)

“Well, I think that’s veeerry weird,” said Don. “You should fall apart. Just don’t get fat again. Drink instead. Turn to drink.”

She had been careful to set a full life in motion just for this eventuality. She had begun to have some influence at Sinclair and Chewalt. Her spaghetti commercial was in production. She had requested and received a sofa in her office, which amused her because she hadn’t really wanted the sofa, but merely to test the extent of her clout. A nice tailored, black and brown tweed sofa had arrived within a week of her request. It had round bolsters at the end to cradle your head in case you wanted to lie down. She was lying down a lot because she did not sleep well. This only made her more valuable to Herb Sinclair, who considered idiosyncratic behavior a true measure of creativity. He often walked in on her while she was resting and diplomatically closed the door after whispering, “Oh. You’re thinking.”

The loft was looking more beautiful every day. The only walls she had put up were to enclose the bathroom. Her friends loved the idea of no walls, but the workmen thought it was peculiar. They said that her job was the worst they had ever had. She stopped listening to what they said. The plumber was nice. He installed toilet, sink and stall shower for precisely the price estimated. Encouraged, she hired a cabinetmaker to make cabinets for what would ultimately be her kitchen. It looked as if she meant business. This was going to be a home.

Even with the real progress on the loft, January crept along. She couldn’t move in until the department of buildings issued a certificate of occupancy, which seemed to take forever. It was a busy time for news. A new president, the release of the hostages. One day while she was in the supermarket, the Muzak was interrupted by a news bulletin: three hostages had gone shopping in Wiesbaden and caused a minor riot. Mayor Koch had announced that the hostages would receive the biggest ticker tape parade ever.

“So how about the veterans?” said an old man on line. “When they came home from Vietnam, nobody looked up.”

“Virginia is the state with the most hostages,” said a young girl.

“That’s because all the spies live there,” said the same old man.

Instead of the perennial Have A Nice Day, her register printout said Welcome Home 52 Americans.

On the thirty-first of January, the telephone rang at 11:45 at night, scaring her out of her wits. She could have sworn later that she knew by the ring that it was a call from a long distance.

“It’s me,” said Luis sheepishly.

“I know,” she said.

“How are things there?”

“You should be happy you got out. We’re having the worst crime wave ever. Murders are up eighteen percent. How’s the work going? How are the sushi stands?”

“You know about the sushi stands? How?”

“Are you kidding? I read the business section, cover to cover.”

“Everything’s fine. Really fine. How about yourself?”

“Oh, great. The loft is livable. I have a bathroom with a door and the floors are done. It’s’ very big. Much bigger than I imagined. Have you stopped thinking about me yet, because I haven’t stopped thinking of you?”

“No. I think about you every day.”

“That’s good.”

“It’s not good.”

“It might not be good for you, but it’s very good for me because…well, it’s much harder than I thought it would be. Much harder.”

“I know.” Silence. “I thought you’d like my address and telephone number. In case you need something or…you know.”

“Of course. Hold on. I’ve got to get a pencil. While he held on, she went into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. “I can’t believe this is happening,” she said aloud. “I can’t believe my life is being dribbled away over the telephone wires. Please, somebody. Help me.” She went back to the phone and took his address and telephone number, after which he wrapped it up and said good-bye.

After the call, she began to make bargains with god. She would be good. She would be very good and maybe he’d call back. She took Harlan and his wife, Agnes, out to dinner to a French restaurant, which was a mistake. They felt uncomfortable and unable to order with confidence. Her father looked remarkably young and she put her arms around him when they met. He laughed an embarrassed laugh and looked sheepishly at Agnes. The evening was a flop and she could feel Harlan separating himself from her all through dinner. He was put off, or frightened or overextended. During dessert, she remembered how he had told her that trees would grow inside her if she swallowed fruit seeds, unless they were from apples, in which case the cyanide would kill her first. She had been terrified of swallowing a random seed.

She tried telling them about her job, but just as Marty Bell had warned them long ago, Harlan’s wife kept asking: “You mean somebody writes those words? That’s what you do?” This revelation made Agnes’ confidence shoot sky high. “Your father and I are going on a cruise for Easter.” She put a hand on his arm. “The poor man hasn’t had a real vacation in years.” She said it as if April had personally kept her father from enjoying his life until Agnes came to his rescue.

“That’s wonderful,” said April. She had not been to Queens for a long time and it looked as if she wouldn’t be going soon again. Mrs. Beck had moved to Israel and was living on a kibbutz. Greeks lived next door.

Twice that winter, she visited Sylvie, who had either recovered her appreciation of Ardsley-On-the-Hudson or resigned herself to the life she had. Sylvie had gained some weight and looked terrific. So did baby Alicia.

“I’ve never known you to be anything but thin as a stick, you look wonderful,” April told her old friend.

“Really? It’s the breast-feeding. I made me thirsty for beer and milk shakes.” She washed some lettuce in silence. “I’m going back to work in the fall,” she said as if sending out a trial balloon.

“That’s wonderful. Is that your idea?”

“Yes. The baby will be off the breast and Bradford is starting kindergarten. I’m going to be a paralegal…you know, like a paramedic”

“I know.”

“I might even go back to law school. In a couple of years, maybe I’ll run away and we can be roommates in the city.” She said it jocularly but there was a new rebelliousness in Sylvie’s tone that April found more difficult to hear than her former smugness. Why did she feel that Sylvie wasn’t strong enough to survive anything really bad? Perhaps it was transference. Perhaps she was the one who wouldn’t survive. Her heart felt leaden every day. California appeared in her dreams and in her imagination as the end of the world. She could barely believe that it really existed.

It was Don who finally convinced her she had to go to Califo0rnia and plant herself in front of Luis for one last try. “It’s more courageous to go than not to go.” He said if she didn’t go, he would never speak to her again. “He can’t ask you to come there unless he asks you to marry him. That’s the kind of man he is. But you can go. There’s no law that says you can’t just show up.”

It sounded so simple. “And if I go? Then what?”

“He’ll be so happy to see you and he’ll beg you to stay.”

“That’s what you say but you’re on my side.”

“So is he. He’s on your side, too. I feel it right in the gut.” He turned to Pierre. “You do, too, don’t you, Pierre?”

“Ees true. You must go to heem.”

“Just show up. Don’t ask or anything.”

“Just show up? The shock value will be good.”

He dialed and made the plane reservations. When the tickets came, she almost went right to the terminal and turned them in. She told Herb Sinclair that her mother had died and she had to go to California and make funeral arrangements. She begged god to forgive her for telling such a gruesome lie. In just twenty-four hours, if the plane didn’t crash, she would see him again.

Chapter Thirty-Two

In the first week, Luis knew California was the wrong setting for a man like himself. He didn’t prize body hair or casual dress. He liked wearing ties and somber suits and serious shoes. He missed his old neighborhood with the yelping dogs and skimpy trees. He also missed the discipline of hard work, which, in Southern California, was looked upon with grave suspicion.

Quite soon, Luis stopped working, too. It didn’t seem to matter what he did for his two thousand dollars a day. He could play golf or tennis or spend the day in the stress-relief center situated within the corporate park – or the corporate campus, as they liked to call the acres of evenly green lawns that surrounded the Whitestone Corporation building.

Perversely, his indifference to his position and its responsibilities reaped him sizable rewards. Two casual decisions – acquiring a chain of sushi stands and a small chemical plant that would make the chemicals for their existing paint division – proved to be pure gold. In spite of himself, his stock in the corporation rose.

His moodiness and a lack of volubility made everyone assume he was hard to please and they tried harder to please him. When he visited the chairman’s house – a spectacular mini palace – the chairman’s wife asked over and over: “Do you have everything you want? Can we get something for you?”

There were plenty of distractions for a wealthy, attractive man, although here he wasn’t as attractive as he had been in New York. Amid the spectacular-looking, affable, athletic male population, he was merely okay.

He visited his associates in their homes and swam in their pools built around natural rock formations. There was often a woman invited to be his partner. He dutifully took them to their house, kissed them lightly on the lips and thanked them for a pleasant evening. Most of the women he met were very thin and wore their hair pulled out in short, separated wisps that floated back in an unnatural way.

Unlike the men, the women were under active. They organized their actions to lead gracefully to the ultimate activity, which was sex. Their voices were geared to sex – throaty and difficult to hear. More than talking, they liked to smile – they had a repertoire of smiles that they used to answer questions. Facial expressions were big, too. Pursing the mouth to one side meant indecision – usually over what to order to eat. Pulling in the lips while looking to heaven meant disapproval – someone was being tacky. Raising eyebrows while pushing lips outward and chin upward signified confusion or ignorance.

There was little sarcasm and no one wanted to disagree about politics, art or religion. Even so, with life so proscribed and their future assuredly sunny, the women cried a lot in California. More than once he had seen evidence of tears on the face of a girl he had passed at a party or in the office.

He was sure his attitude would improve. What’s not to like? he asked himself over and over. A woman – a certain kind of woman – would make the situation more personal. Then it would begin to make sense. But where was he to find such a woman?

He missed his mother. He felt as if he were in a vacuum. No, no, forget the vacuum, it was more like a dream. He was disoriented. He missed his grandmother. He missed her as if she was already dead and he would never see her again. Maybe he missed all the safe women in his life to keep from missing the one unsafe one?

You know what Kafka said, April had told him at the worst moment at the airport: He said life is like being seasick on land. He didn’t believe Kafka had ever said that but it was a fine line nevertheless. He now felt seasick on land.

There were so many moments that could have stuck in his mind but the one that did the most strongly was very ordinary: the look on her face when she was rushing to leave the apartment in the early morning. “The night is over and I’ve got other things to do.” And when there was no response from him: “What’s wrong with that? What’s wrong with having a nice, friendly night and then going your own way in the morning?”

She had been right to protect herself. As it turned out, he had left her. He had left a strong, vulnerable woman with a lovely neck, compassionate eyes and a generous body. But how could he have done otherwise? How could he have brought her out here, like a pet, while he made up his mind? Come out, I miss you. Come out and let me see you again so I can make up my mind.

They had rented him a prim Victorian house high on a cliff. It was probably the only Victorian house in all of Los Angeles and it was filled with Mission furniture that was expensive and scarce. A nice black woman came every day to make his breakfast and his bed. In the afternoon, if he was coming home, she fixed his dinner and left it on the stove.

On one particular night, he drove up to his house and left his car in the driveway. The view was spectacular and he felt like standing there and taking it in. He stayed out for quite a while before walking up to the door.

He didn’t see her right away but thought he saw something familiar on the porch. It was the skirt. He was amazed that the skirt looked familiar and made him think of her. He had seen that skirt every day for two weeks on a mannequin at the entrance to Better Sportswear. How could he forget it? But then she rose from the hard Mission bench and came toward him. She was looking at him anxiously, waiting for his reaction. His lungs felt unnaturally full.

“I’m here on business,” she said quickly.

“Oh? What business?”

“No business,” she confessed. “Just for a visit. But I can’t stay long,” she added quickly.

“Are you going to start that again? You just got here.”