Mad Girls In Love (50 page)

High above Green Park, in a drafty, rooftop conservatory, my heirloom Spode cup lay shattered on the floor, spilling Lung Ching tea over the stones. I was feeling pretty shattered myself. In my lap was an engraved invitation to the wedding of my twenty-two-year-old daughter. I'd known about her engagement; I'd even been expecting this invitation. Still, she had managed to shock me. I put on my reading glasses, then reached for the card.

Claude Wentworth IV
requests the honor of your presence
at the wedding of his daughter
Jennifer
to
Pierre Armand Tournear,
on Saturday, the Fifteenth of May,
at half after six o'clock in the evening
nineteen hundred ninety-four
Hammersmith Farm
Crystal Falls, Tennessee
Reception immediately following
R.S.V.P.

The R.S.V.P. had been X'd out in green ink; but it was the phrase “wedding of his daughter” that had sent my teacup flying.

The heat rose to my face, and I fanned myself with the invitation, inhaling the faint scent of Boucheron. The fragrance evoked Jennifer, a small-boned, delicate woman with fierce blue eyes, her blond hair savagely cut into wisps that curled, Caesar-like, around a pale, broad forehead. We hadn't spoken in months, not since our last long-distance squabble, which had begun with a disagreement over the pronunciation of Hermès, and ended with her slamming down the phone. I'd tried to reach her, but she wouldn't answer my calls or letters. When it came to fashion, my daughter was up to date, but in all matters concerning me, she was merciless.

Still fanning myself, I rose from the chaise and stepped over the wreckage. I slipped a John Coltrane CD into the machine, and as “Lush Life” began to play, I calculated the time in Tennessee, then grabbed the phone and dialed my daughter's number before I could change my mind.

“Hi,” I said, and my stomach lurched.

“Oh, it's you.” She paused. “I suppose you're calling about the invitation.”

“Yes.” Cradling the receiver between my chin and shoulder, I stepped over to the French door and pressed my forehead against the rain-pelted glass. A straggly arm of laburnum stretched over the lower half of the rooftop terrace. It reminded me of the wisteria in my mother's garden. In a few weeks it would be blooming and bees would hum over the flowers. I had once foolishly pictured myself and Jennifer relaxing on the terrace, sharing a pot of jasmine tea and a platter of cress-and-egg sandwiches.

“Ecru is totally classic. Don't you love the pearl filigree?” Jennifer's voice suddenly turned girlish, rising and falling with excitement. “Wait till you see the napkins and matchbooks. And my dress is, like, oh my
God.
It's Vera Wang. A mermaid dress in oyster duchesse satin, and the veil is to
die
for. The tiara was made from Grandmother's old Van Cleef & Arpels choker.”

“I can't wait to see it,” I said, trying to sound impressed, but I was distracted by the felicitous association of “grandmother” and “choker.”

“And for the wedding,” she continued, “Pierre's wearing a black tail-coat, white pique shirt with a white pique vest and bow tie. Ditto for the groomsmen and ushers, but with different boutonnieres. But you might know all of this if you lived within driving distance. Or even if you
called
once in a while.”

“I have tried. Your machine always picks up.” I shut my eyes and pressed two fingers against the lids. I started to ask if she'd received her birthday present—I'd sent it months ago—or if she'd read my letters. Not that it was important. Maybe I should let it go. One part of me was determined to rise above petty squabbles, but another part, the part I got from my mother's family, demanded justice.

What came out was, “Why was my name left off the invitation?”

Jennifer released a long, stagy sigh. “I
knew
you wouldn't understand.”

“It leaves the impression that you don't have a mother.”

“Have I?”

La Belle Dame Sans Merci,
I thought and started to hang up, but with the receiver halfway down, I stopped. If I broke the connection, I would be severing one of the last fragile strands between us.

“Look, I'm sorry if you're upset,” Jennifer was saying. “I sent the invitation as a courtesy. I don't expect you to come. That's why I crossed off the R.S.V.P.”

“Of course I'll be there,” I said, breathing in faint traces of Boucheron, laburnum, and Lung Ching tea. “I wouldn't miss it for anything.”

“Why not? You skipped my childhood. Look, do us both a favor and disregard the invitation. Just stay on your side of the ocean, and I'll stay on mine. But if you feel like sending a gift, I could use a Portmerion saucer. Unless you'd care to splurge on a teapot or a platter. My pattern is ‘Botanic Garden.' Harrod's should have it.”

I heard a decisive click and the line began to buzz. I continued to hold the receiver, hoping that it was a mistake, that I would hear my daughter's voice. Then, with one trembling finger, I punched redial. While the line rang, I prepared the words in my mind.
Jennifer, there's so much you don't know. I'm not a villain, just a flawed woman who loves you beyond all else.
But Jennifer was either ignoring her phone, or she'd left her house. I closed my eyes, hoping the answering machine would pick up, so I could at least leave a message. It didn't. Finally I hung up.

While “Seven Steps to Heaven” played in the background, I gathered the pieces of the broken cup. How strange that it had survived fifty years of upheavals in my grandmother's life, and half as many in my own—including my hurried escape across the ocean—without so much as a chip, then finally succumbed to my own clumsiness.

On my way to the trash bin, I stopped beside an arched window, with its soothing views of the park.
I will too go to that wedding,
I told myself.
I'm not giving up without a battle this time.

Through the window, I saw people rushing down Queen's Path carrying umbrellas, huddled beneath raincoats. A decade ago, when I'd arrived in London, I'd panicked when the BBC weatherman had cheerily predicted rain for ten straight days. Now, all these years later, the rain was still falling. Down on the path, a punk with green hair approached an elderly gentleman who brandished his umbrella. The punk seemed unim-pressed and hurried down the path. The park had once been the site of duels, but now it was used as a shortcut from Piccadilly to Buckingham Palace. Not too far away, on Eccleston Place, my much-younger lover, Ian Maitland, was probably working in his gloomy publishing office, surrounded by galleys and FedEx envelopes. I was expecting him for tea. I imagined what he might say about my row with Jennifer. He would probably point out that “disinvited” wasn't a word, but I couldn't think of another one. “Uninvited” didn't fit, either, because I
had
been invited.

As I contemplated the etymology of the word
invite
, I wandered into the kitchen, set the kettle onto the stove, and turned up the flame. In the living room, on the CD player, John Coltrane had been replaced with Luther Vandross, who was singing “A House Is Not a Home.” To Luther, a chair was a chair, but I had to disagree: I was an interior designer, and I spent my days selecting fabrics, colors, and textures. Ian, who collectively dismissed my clients as “the Penelopes, Cynthias, and Daphnes,” had been surprised when he'd first seen my flat. He'd been expecting Osborn & Little, but instead he'd found worn slipcovers, lumpy cushions, overflowing bookcases, and a hodgepodge of woods and periods. It seemed to me that objects seldom brought peace of mind, but I kept my opinions to myself. It wasn't my place to define another person's happiness. So, whatever my clients wanted—whether it was a Russian antique or Flemish tapestry—I worked hard to find it.

The phone warbled its two-note British ring. Thinking it might be Ian, I skidded across the polished floor and picked up the receiver. I was just about to say something provocative, when I recognized my mother's voice, high-pitched and nasal, with just a touch of hysteria. “I hope it's not the middle of the night over there,” Dorothy said. “I tried to figure the time difference, but I couldn't remember if I counted forward or backward. Whoever dreamed up the time zones ought to be hog-tied. There's no need to s-p-r-e-a-d time. It's not butter.”

“It's forward.” I wondered if my mother was pacing while she talked—all of Dorothy's telephones had twenty-foot cords, and she prowled around the house with the receiver tucked beneath her chin, while she used her shirttail to dust Hummels and bird figurines.

“Your daughter just called me,” Dorothy said.

“And?”

“You've got every right to be upset over that invitation, but at least you got one. Of course, she
says
mine is on its way. But I don't trust her. It's those Wentworth genes. Claude's people come from crocodiles. Thank goodness Jennifer inherited your prettiness and my sweetness.”

I let that pass. My daughter possessed all the sweetness of an unripe persimmon.

“She offered to have the invitations reprinted,” Dorothy rushed on, china rattling in the background.

“But they've been mailed.”

“You know what, honey? You need to
drop
this. So what if your name was left off? You've got the birth certificate to prove that you're the mother.”

“Haven't you heard?” I laughed. “Claude is Jennifer's mother
and
her father.”

“Don't be bitter, honey. It won't do you a bit of good, trust me. I cornered the market on bitter. Besides, I know what's wrong with you. It's the change of life. Your estrogen is out of whack. When I was forty-one, I didn't have a single hormone left in my body,” Dorothy went on. “I'll bet your estrogen is on
E
.”

“I won't be forty-one until October.”

“I know when your birthday is,” Dorothy said. “You're a Libra, the sign of Air. Although you act like a Pisces. A fish out of water.” Dorothy's voice turned strident. “You've just got to come to the wedding and show those Wentworths what you're made of. Pack your finest outfits, okay?”

“Outfits? I need more than one?”

“There's the rehearsal supper and the wedding,” Dorothy said.

I wondered if I had time to dash over to Aquascutum or Jaeger, but alterations might take forever. My friend Caroline knew fashion designers from St. Martin's and the Royal College of Art, but she was hiding out in northern Italy with a famous (and very married) rock star.

“You've missed all the teas and bridal showers. Actually, I missed them, too. The post office keeps losing my invitations. At least, that's what Jennifer claims.”

“She's utterly gormless.” I set down my teacup—a chipped Wedgwood I'd found in the cabinet—-taking great care to place it in the exact center of the saucer. “It means lacking sense.”

“Then why didn't you say that in the first place?” Dorothy's voice began to rise. “England has plumb ruined you. Why, you can't even talk like a normal Southerner. Why don't you use words that I can understand?”

“Like incurable paranoid schizophrenia?”

Dorothy gasped.

Damn, I hadn't meant to say anything hurtful. I started to apologize but the line popped, then went dead.

After Dorothy hung up on her daughter, she walked out onto her screened-in porch and sat down in the glider. She wondered if a dizzy spell might be coming on—she always got one when she fussed with her children, or if Mack tried to bring home a girlfriend. Worked like a charm, too. She glanced out into the yard. This morning, the weather-man had said the temperature might climb to seventy-five. Dorothy was wearing Gap jeans, the cuffs rolled up past her ankles. Her T-shirt said
BLOOM WHERE YOU ARE PLANTED
, which gave her a chuckle because it was so absurd. It made her think of funerals. The dead weren't buried so much as planted, encased in pricey caskets. These days, the only flowers at the cemetery were store-bought.

She ran a hand over her hair, smoothing the fuzz. Her eyebrows had been hastily drawn with a black pencil. She was big-boned and blond, her muscles hard beneath the wrinkled skin. Her facial tics had long since stopped, but another problem had taken their place: She was growing a small hump on her back.
Redbook
said it was a calcium deficiency. If this was true, her bones were on the verge of snapping to pieces. When she'd showed the lump to Byron Falk, he'd prescribed a medicine to squirt up her nose, which seemed like malpractice. She was hunchbacked, not allergic.

Rocking back and forth, she stared through the screen mesh, trying to see what was coming up in the flower beds. In a few days the irises would bloom en masse, as Bitsy would say. The citizens of Crystal Falls took special pride in their iris beds. After the blooming season, the women would begin to “divide and multiply,” which sounded Biblical, but it was a gardening technique. The women dug up their irises, separating the rhizomes into Y-shaped pieces. Using a sharp knife, they cut chunks away from the mother rhizome, making sure each section had at least one bud and one root. Then they would replant the rhizomes. Personally, Dorothy thought the procedure was more like “divide and conquer,” because the ladies liked to sequester their plants, irises in one section, daffodils in another, nothing mingled together. However, the whole process of separating the babies from the mother rhizome wasn't too different from sending a child out into the world: neither could be accomplished without some type of severing.

In the old days, the Hamilton graveyard had been only a short distance from the house, and Dorothy had thought the land was haunted. She remembered squatting next to the tombstones, trying not to shiver, while Miss Gussie divided and planted rhizomes on graveyard day. She put a yellow iris beside each tombstone. Now, of course, the field was a subdivision. In the early '70s, Mack had inherited the land from Miss Gussie, which made up for years of slights. Well, it made up a little. He had moved the family graves and divided the land into teeny yards and built Hamilton Place. Once in a while, in one of the yards, an iris managed to punch through an expanse of crabgrass. This seemed miraculous, as if her mother, and all the women before her, were having the last word.

Dorothy stepped off the porch, into the yard, and paused beside the perennial beds. This time of year they were a mess, because the weeds were shooting up. She leaned over, snatched up a clump of God knows what. It might have been volunteers from the privet hedge, or even marijuana. When Clancy Jane had lived here, she'd been a dope fiend. She probably still was. Dorothy sniffed the weeds. A few seconds later, she felt strange and prickly. She couldn't remember if she'd taken her pills this morning; but then she never could.

What she needed to do was weed those beds. Yard work was satisfying—she just loved raking, mowing, mulching. It toned her muscles and calmed her mind. She was in darn good shape for a sixty-two-year-old woman. Although lately, the arguments with Jennifer and Bitsy had made her agitated. And now Clancy Jane's weeds had set off charley horses in her arms and legs. Nothing but pins-and-needles. Her hands prickled, the fingertips throbbing. Byron had diagnosed her as having panic attacks, but he was crazy. In case he hadn't noticed, she was no longer a mental patient, and she was entitled to have illnesses just like a normal woman. But no, he kept on prescribing brain pills. She took enough medicine to control the moods of a small country—Liechtenstein or Andorra. When Bitsy and Louie had been married, they'd sent her postcards from their vacations, otherwise Dorothy wouldn't have known about such places. Dorothy kept them pinned to her refrigerator with magnets, or stuffed them around the mirror in her living room. The picture cards had outlasted her daughter's marriage—and to such a nice man. Years ago, if anyone had told her that Bitsy would not only be living alone, but outside the continental United States, Dorothy would have laughed her head off. Then, after Bitsy up and moved to London—actually, fled was more accurate—Dorothy had phoned the girl daily, begging her to return
immediately
.

“Leave the man, not the entire
country
,” Dorothy had begged. Louie DeChavannes was one of the most gifted cardiovascular surgeons in New Orleans and the biggest liar in Louisiana. Bitsy had felt an urgent need to place distance between Louie and herself, and (Dorothy suspected) also from her outrageous relatives back in Tennessee. But mainly, the girl had left because of Louie's philandering.

“He can be a one-man woman,” Dorothy had protested.

“Don't you mean
one-woman
man?” Bitsy had said. “And no, he can't.”

Now Dorothy's lips felt numb, and she patted them with her fingertips. She wondered if she should take a Valium; then again, she might need a Lasix. Or maybe she'd already taken them. Oh, it was such a bother trying to remember this pill, that pill. Jennifer was always making smart-aleck comments about the amber bottles lined up in the kitchen window. Sometimes after her granddaughter left, the Valium bottle was empty. Well, never mind, that was
all right
. Jennifer had inherited her nerves from Bitsy and Clancy Jane, but the hoity-toity airs came straight from Betty Wentworth, and maybe just a bit from Bitsy, too. Personally, Dorothy would rather have panic attacks than pomp.

Out in the yard, her Pomeranians began to squabble when an old striped alley cat, a descendant of Clancy Jane's pride, strutted past them. Earlier this morning, she had tethered the dogs to her clothesline, using swivel hooks to prevent snarls and tangles—she needed to get a patent on that idea, it would sell like hotcakes. The dogs ran back and forth, barking and growling, the metal hooks zipping along the rope. The male rose on his hind legs, which were no bigger than the barbecued hot wings from the Piggly Wiggly, and clawed the air with his front paws. The alley cat trotted down the path, his tail crooked at the end, ignoring the uproar.

“Quit that,” Dorothy told the Pomeranians. She and Mack had taken the dogs to training classes at the fairgrounds, one at a time, and the hard work had paid off. The dogs settled down and began to pant. Dorothy leaned over and started yanking out weeds—they looked like privet branches. The Poms watched her, their beady eyes glimmering with intelligence. Then, two pregnant females began squabbling over a Nylabone—they were like human women fighting over a man. The five-pound bitch bit the three-pounder's tail, dragging her down the length of the clothesline. Dorothy planned to sell the puppies for three hundred dollars each. The name of her kennel was “Dorothy's Darlings,” and she advertised in the back of the AKC
Gazette
, featuring adorable photographs—Pomeranian puppies in teacups and little red wagons. And if people called her a puppy miller, she'd sue. She'd already put a warning in her ad: “I don't have a kennel! These puppies are home-raised with love.” And a clothesline, she thought, chuckling to herself. Truth be told, she'd rather raise dogs than children. Dogs didn't ask if you'd had your pill. They didn't ask for a g.d. thing except a pat on the head and a bowl of Eukanuba—Dorothy served hers Small Bites, ordered special from the Co-op. Though her Poms occasionally pee-peed on the floor, they'd never crapped on her. Which was more than Dorothy could say about humans.

She pulled up another privet branch and then paused to watch her dogs bounce up and down, play-fighting and sniffing each other's behinds, then she leaned over the flowerbeds and poked her head into a patch of bloomed-out peonies that her mother had planted way back in 1936. Most of Dorothy's people were dead, buried in Crystal Falls Memorial Gardens, and she made a point of keeping flowers—not artificial!—on the graves. She wondered who, if anyone, would tend to her grave after she was gone. She hoped Mack would bring a push mower, or maybe plant a few tulip bulbs, but that didn't seem likely. Grave-tending was woman's work, and there were no women in the family left around here, save Jennifer and Clancy Jane. Somehow, Dorothy couldn't see those two picking up a trowel.

Her family was dwindling, and it saddened her. She was the only one left at 214 Dixie—thank goodness Mack was next door. Yes, everyone was gone, but they'd left things behind. Stuck way back in a drawer, she'd found Bitsy's old perfume bottles, still smelling of Shalimar, and Clancy Jane's love beads. In the tip-top of a kitchen cabinet, she'd pulled out Easter candy, hardened and cracked. It broke her heart to think that objects outlasted people.

From the street, she heard the revving of an engine. She recognized the sound and rose up on her tiptoes, holding one hand over her eyes. Jennifer's red BMW rolled up the steep driveway, setting off another round of barking. Her granddaughter hopped out of the car and strode up the walkway, toward the kitchen door, her high heels clicking on the cracked pavement.

“I'm in the garden,” Dorothy called, waving the privet branches. The fat female Pom—Dorothy couldn't bear to call her a bitch, it was just too derogatory—made a perfect bow-wow bark, but the others sounded as if they were gargling with battery acid. Jennifer spotted her grandmother and headed toward the garden. The sun glinted on her short blond hair—a Mia Farrow haircut, Dorothy called it, although Jennifer had never seen
Rosemary's Baby
, much less reruns of
Peyton Place.
She always thought Dorothy was referring to someone she'd known in the mental hospital. Today, Jennifer's hair stuck up in all directions. She'd done this
on purpose
. Dorothy had seen the girl squirt mousse into her hand, then scrub it over the razor-shorn locks, letting it dry higgly-piggly.

Normally when the girl visited, she was decked out in outrageously expensive clothes, and she annotated each item for Dorothy's benefit, from the designer to the price. Today the girl was dressed like a punk funeral director: a short black skirt, black hose, ruched ivory top, and a black denim jacket. Not too much eye makeup. Tiny pearl studs in her ears, a discreet gold ring in her nose. She had a pierced belly button, too, although it was thankfully hidden under the top, along with a heart tatoo on her left shoulder. In the heart's center were tiny black letters:
CHIC
. These days, her hero was Courtney Love, whom she uncannily resembled except for the Mia haircut.

“You won't be wearing black hose much longer,” Dorothy called. “Memorial Day is nearly here.”

“It's weeks away.” Jennifer frowned at the Pomeranians, who kept lunging toward her, causing the clothesline to bow. “Those are the worst-natured dogs I've ever seen,” she added and stepped around the yipping animals, making faces at them. One Pom started rolling in the dirt, and the pregnant females fell on each other in a death lock, biting each other's furry throats.

Dorothy whirled around, facing the dogs, and screamed, “Leave it!”

The dogs froze. “There,” Dorothy said with a nod. “That's better.”

“They don't understand a word you're saying,” said Jennifer.

“Yes, they do. They're just not used to strangers.” She glanced toward the clothesline. The dogs had settled down, sniffing each other's bottoms, their lips drawn back, tongues coiled like elf toes.

“I'm a stranger?”

Of course, you are!
Dorothy thought.
You're flat-out peculiar.
Although, she had to give the girl credit—her black shoes were magnificent. Dorothy knew good leather when she saw it. She decided that Jennifer wasn't as pretty as Bitsy. Her features were Wentworthy—her nose was pugged, just like her daddy's used to be before it got broken, and her square jaw was Miss Betty's made over.

“I didn't mean that, honey,” Dorothy said. “We just don't get a lot of guests.”

“Are you saying that I should visit more?” Jennifer pawed the grass with her pretty little shoe, in an unconscious imitation of the male Pomeranian, who was stamping his paw, snorting like a pint-sized bull. “We talk on the phone all the time,” Jennifer added.

“Yes, you're real good to call.” Dorothy nodded at her granddaughter's shoes. “I love your pumps.”

“These?” Jennifer kicked out one leg. “Manolo Blahnik.”

“I
thought
so,” Dorothy lied. Truth be told, she didn't have a clue, although the name rang a distant bell. She wasn't familiar with shoe designers, even though Jennifer always brought over stacks of old fashion magazines, instructing Dorothy to study the fine print. And she'd looked at every single page. She never used to care about labels—she'd only minded if a dress made her look fat. But she liked to keep up with fashion so she'd have something in common with her granddaughter.

“You haven't mentioned my Birkin.” Jennifer lifted the boxy handbag: black leather with a gold padlock. “It's Hermès. Four thousand dollars. A gift from Grandmother Wentworth. She was on a waiting list. I just got it last week.”

“That's almost as much as a first-class ticket to London,” Dorothy said. Jennifer's obsession with fashion seemed like a desperate bid for attention, and also one-upmanship. She seemed to be saying,
Look at me, Mother. I like what you like, only
I
can afford it.
Dorothy had seen a case just like this on Sally Jessy.