Surface (18 page)

P
ART
T
HREE

C
HAPTER
23

C
laire sidled into her cramped window seat and took a parting glance at exile city. Smog hung low on the runway. The hint of a golden red ball hovered to the west, and beyond the wingtip stood the restaurant tower, a groovy homage to the Space Age where tourists sipped their Electric Barbarellas and watched 747s disappear into the LA smog.

She remembered visiting the restaurant as a child with her parents and Jackie, on one of her first visits to Los Angeles. A “cultural foray,” Mother had called the trip. Cora had laid out their traveling ensembles the night before in preparation for the trip: their best dresses, matching pea coats, and patent leather Mary Janes. She remembered Shirley Temples at the restaurant bar as the platform on which they sat rotated slowly around, and the thrill of the grand panorama beyond the windows. Although other details had faded with time, she did recall being happy then, a happy, wide-eyed girl poised on the edge of promise.

Across the aisle Claire heard a mother arguing with her teenage son in shrill whispers, but couldn’t bring herself to look at the boy’s face. Instead she thumbed through the latest
Vanity Fair,
trying to ignore the boarding chaos around her. As the engines screamed shrill during takeoff, she grasped the armrests at her sides and clicked her heels together. She propped her head against the window with a pillow, and wondered what it would be like for Nicholas boarding the plane with Michael for home.

As they reached cruising altitude, Claire closed her eyes and thought of grandparents’ weekend at Andover the previous year. Nick emerging from the hooting, stick-waving throng on the lacrosse field, his jersey grass stained and dotted with sweat. She, watching from the bleachers with Cora amid a sea of blue-sweatered spectators, her voice hoarse from cheering, and the smell of popcorn and freshly cut grass filling the spring air along with the electric rush of victory. The players pulling off their helmets and saluting grandparents, parents, and alumni; and there against the waning afternoon sun, her father’s lazy grin and Michael’s patrician nose in beautiful concert on her son’s face. Nicholas waves her down to the field. He has filled out since the start of the term and stands nearly a head taller than her. She wraps her arm around his waist and kisses his cheek. They high-five and whoop. She has never seen his eyes brighter or more fully alive, and her body warms with a sense of peace and gratitude.

 

Claire retrieved her baggage and drove into town in a rented Hertz Jeep. The lease on the Mercedes had expired while she’d been gone, and replacing it had clearly not been high on Michael’s to-do list. A few lenticular clouds punctuated the crisp sky as she headed west toward the downtown skyline, the brown landscape along I-70 sparkling with ice, and the expansive plains rolling into the distance. As she exited the freeway, a school bus pulled into the lane beside her. The children waved and pressed their noses into the windows, fogging the glass as they made faces at Claire. She smiled and waved back. At the first traffic light she checked her cell phone for missed calls, but there were none. She imagined calling Michael at work.
I’m in, the flight was fine. How about a leg of lamb tonight? I’ll roast a leg of lamb and we’ll celebrate.

Weaving from boulevard to parkway to side streets, Claire took a circuitous route to the apartment Jackie had arranged. In her long absence she had missed autumn, and the holidays, too, in their red and gold flourishes, and she focused on the canvas in front of her—bare tree branches, the breath of joggers floating white in the air. She opened the window and let the wind blow cold onto her cheeks.

As she made her way through the old-guard enclave of the Country Club neighborhood, the homes grew in size and luster. She surveyed the colorful mosaic of architectural styles from an outsider’s perspective, as if recounting the neighborhood of her past to the specter of her future. Stuccoed Spanish Colonials with wrought iron balconettes rubbed hedgerows with gable-roofed Tudors and red brick Georgians. She missed the charm of this little world where the neighborhood children decorated bicycles and wagons with pinwheels each Fourth of July and paraded through the streets behind an antique fire truck; where block parties and Halloween haunted mansions were still traditions.

She rolled on, approaching a gated drive guarded by two enormous reclining lion statues with security cameras perched behind their haunches. Slowing the Jeep again, she gazed through the vine-covered gates, unable to avoid looking. Her smile collapsed. Only two summers before, the Wrightsmans had set tongues abuzz like swarming hornets. When everyone thought Nicola Wrightsman would retreat in humiliation over catching her husband and her sister screwing in the bathroom at Campo de’ Fiori in Aspen, Nicola appeared the next day at the club in a thong bikini and ordered a bottle of Cristal. Cell phones burned and men left the driving range for a quick drink by the pool to glimpse her unblushing fuck-you to Roger Wrightsman and the joyful gossipers. Claire and Michael had been there together, watching the spectacle.

She maneuvered past Lionsgate and thought surely
Le Scandal Wrightsman’s
expiration date had passed. Good news for Roger. But had theirs become the story that eclipsed it, she wondered? It was hard to know what people might be saying now, hard to know what Michael wouldn’t discuss. Claire readjusted her posture and placed both hands on the steering wheel, hating the idea of people talking about her family when they drove by their home. She didn’t wish ill upon anyone else, but still, a little something to focus the spotlight elsewhere wouldn’t be so horrible either. A renovation disaster in the neighborhood, or maybe a minor “nan-nygate” of some sort. For a moment she wondered if it would be easier for Michael—the whole getting-over-the-past part—if they’d still been in New York, where yesterday’s humiliations tended to go on to ballsy, even happy second acts.

Claire rounded the corner onto her block and pulled just past their house. She sat for a moment, then twisted around in the seat to see her gate, made a U-turn, and drove into the driveway. She watched the property unfold, chimneys and tiled roof first, her anxiety thinning as the rest of the Spanish-Mediterranean came into sight. Automatically she reached her hand up to the visor for the garage door opener, rubbing the barren fabric there.

She turned off the engine and stepped out. There was no wind, but still Claire felt a smarting in her lungs. She crossed her arms against the chill and walked across the gravel to the lawn, carrying all the weight of the past months with her.

When she reached the grass, her feet sank softly into the mud beneath, and she looked up at her home. The large Palladian windows seemed to gape at her, and in the reflection of the glass she imagined the sheen of tears. She approached one of the Italian stone planters and plucked a frozen pansy from the border, squishing the faded bloom between her fingers and glancing toward the side of the house. Brown vines hung from the pergola, dripping droplets onto the patio below. She squinted and stepped back, remembering the thirtieth birthday celebration Michael had thrown for her, and the long kisses they had stolen under the pergola that night. Why hadn’t she come up with that story for Richard? she wondered. Stage fright, probably.

It had been a “Farewell to the Twenties” theme, with guests attired in Gatsby-esque finery. From the tented buffets and badminton court, to the orchestra surrounded by claw-footed bathtubs of gin and champagne, Michael had given her the most sparkling birthday party she’d ever had. “To my ever-beautiful bride,” he had whispered into her ear as they glided across the dance floor to “Yes! We Have No Bananas,” “you still drive me wild.” The stars were lavish, like everything that night, and seemed to bathe them in an ethereal glow. She had been crazy about him, and her cheeks ached from smiling, her feet from dancing. And in the midst of one particularly passionate kiss, she had overheard a woman comment that Claire and Michael looked so beautiful together, just like Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan.

Claire hadn’t thought about that comment since the party, but as she blinked away tears, she wondered now at the sad irony of the reference. Somewhere along the way, had she and Michael also gotten caught up in the vitality of the illusion like the doomed characters? She backed away toward the Jeep, seeing no beauty in the beautiful house, no warmth in the warm colors. She checked her watch. She needed to retrieve some things from inside, but she just didn’t have the stomach for it. Not right then. And she didn’t want to risk being there when Michael returned from work. No, she thought, feeling the sting of their last encounter, if she was going to adjust to this crazy new chapter, it would be far easier to keep a forward momentum. At least for the time being. She got into the car and drove away, speeding past the country club, and south to her apartment building. She hoped Jackie had picked out something a little better than the LA apartment. Amid the haze and confusion of that first week in Los Angeles, surroundings hadn’t seemed all that important. But now they were a bit more so.

When she pulled up to the handsome brick building, she was greeted by a row of sculpted junipers that stood at attention like soldiers. They were the same style she had once considered for her own garden. Claire killed the motor, took the key from the envelope in her purse, and glanced up to the building’s roof garden some twenty floors up.

Unlocking the door to her furnished rental number 611, she dropped her bags in the center of the spacious living-dining-kitchen area, thinking it wasn’t bad. She had almost grown used to living in other people’s spaces. The off-white walls, the beige pile carpeting, the tan plastic blinds. They were all alike in their lack of charm and distinction, these mini-dwellings of the itinerant. Bland palettes where one could create a home if one so desired.

 

“Hey, Jax, I’m back,” Claire said, sitting down on the queen bed’s peach floral spread.

“What?”

“In Denver. I’m at the apartment. You did great, sis.” She scanned the walls, which sported several hotel-quality landscapes, and the ceiling, which reminded her of large curds of cottage cheese. “It’s nice. Thanks.”

“You’re not supposed to be here until Saturday. I would have met you at the airport.” Claire could hear the concern in her sister’s voice.

“I know. It was a last-minute thing. Michael will be leaving for LA to get ready to bring Nicky back. And Nick’s therapist thought it would be better if we didn’t overlap. He needs a little time to regroup before the changing of the guard, and blah blah blah. So, here I am.”

“Why are you letting him do this to you?”

She stood and began pacing at the foot of the bed. “No one’s doing anything
to
me, Jackie. It’s just . . . the best solution at the moment.

“You’re sure about this?”

“I’m not sure about anything, other than that it’ll be good for Michael to spend some alone time with Nicholas at the hospital before he brings him home.” Claire said this as convincingly as she could, stopping in front of the closet and pulling open the bifold doors. “And it’ll give me some time to get things together on this end.”

“You’re being awfully brave about such a sucky situation.”

“Look, I know you don’t approve. I don’t approve. But given everything, my options were limited. So just keep your fingers crossed that I won’t be here for too long.”

“I could come down and help if Steve can get home in time to give the girls dinner.”

“I’d rather take it easy tonight and just get used to the place.”

“It’s okay, isn’t it? The apartment, I mean. I liked the building, but my taste is a little more Asti than Dom.”

She pictured Jackie’s crinkled nose on the other end of the line. “The apartment’s great, Jax. Really. Thank you.” She unzipped her garment bag with one hand, fished out a kimono-print robe, and set it on the bedspread in a screaming pattern clash.

“Are you still planning on dinner with us Saturday? It’s lasagna.”

“I’ll be there around five.” She hung up, smelling the faint remnants of someone else’s life all around her.

It had already grown dark, and though still on LA time, Claire felt the heaviness of the day closing in on her. She drew the blinds against the twinkle of the downtown lights, and dragged her garment bag and suitcase over to the tiny closet. One bulb hung naked from the ceiling, and she wiped down the shelves and bowed hanging rods as four empty wire hangers clanged together.

Sleep came fast that night, with dreams of Nicholas as a playful eight-year-old tickling her on a beach blanket on Martha’s Vineyard, his hair smelling of watermelon shampoo.

 

Although she promised herself she’d give him his space, Claire called Nick the next morning, hoping he’d be the happy Nicholas who’d kissed her good-bye with a smile, and not the angry, tray-hurling Nicholas.

“Hey, honey, how are you?”

“Okay, I guess. Where are you?”

“I’m back in Denver, remember? And I can’t wait for you to be here.”

“I’m sick of this place. It sucks.” His voice sounded tired and stressed. “The OT classes suck.”

“I know, babe. But just hang in there. It won’t be much longer.”

“They’re making me . . . do all these extra . . . classes and interviews. I supposedly had . . . a drug overdose? And that’s why I’m here?”

Same shirt, different day. She could hear the sound of plastic pounding on a hard surface—Nicky’s hand, she knew, gripped tightly around his cup and smacking his tray table. And she wondered if Michael’s presence, the shift in the routine, had put him on edge.

Patience and perseverance, dear.
“Yes, Nicky, that’s right. But you’re going to be home soon,” she said, keeping her tone upbeat. “And Aunt Jackie and Uncle Steve and the girls are really excited to see you.” She didn’t mention his friends, whom he alternately missed and dismissed out of apprehension and embarrassment. She would let him dictate the terms of inviting his old life back in when he was ready. That part, she completely related to. They didn’t discuss her new apartment or his outpatient therapy.