This Is My Life (14 page)

Tonight Jordan was watching a game show and eating canned peaches. His roommate, Ray, was asleep, his breathing a long, slow rasp. Erica whispered at first, but Jordan waved his hand impatiently. “Old Ray here can sleep through everything,” he said. “His breathing drowns out all other sounds. He's like a white noise machine.”

Jordan looked happier than Erica remembered ever seeing him. His life was pacific here; he floated through the day in his open-backed gown, hair streaming, paper shoes on his shuffling feet. She watched him eat the last of his peaches, and when he
was done he lifted the little fluted cup to his lips to swallow a drizzle of syrup.

“They treating you okay?” she asked.

“Just great,” he said. “This drug they're giving us, it has interesting side effects. Makes you feel kind of dreamy. We have to describe the way it feels, and I swear, they write down everything you say. If I said to the nurse, ‘It makes me feel like my heart is an elevator whooshing through the shaft of life,' she would write it down and it would appear word for word in
The Physician's Desk Reference
in a year.”

“When are you coming home?” Erica asked. She hadn't meant to say this, because she knew fully well when he would be back, but somehow it got out. As she expected, Jordan was annoyed.

“We've been through it,” he said. “Two weeks minimum, or else I don't get paid; you know that. You can be alone in the apartment for two weeks, can't you, Erica?”

She nodded and looked down. Of course she could be alone; she always had been, and it hadn't ever bothered her before. Erica had never thought there was really a choice. You
were
alone, and that was that; without knowing it, she had adopted a rudimentary existentialist attitude sometime around puberty, and it had stuck.

“You're very dependent on me,” Jordan said, and although he pretended to dislike this, his voice sounded boastful.

“We're dependent on each other,” Erica tried, and Jordan almost flinched.

“That's your interpretation,” he said, turning the television back on. “Think what you want.”

What was it, she wondered when visiting hours were over
and she was walking back through the dim and gleaming halls, that had made him like this? And what was it, also, that had made her accept it, even need it? Maybe it was because she knew nothing else, and could only guess at what was involved in the love between men and women. She could mimic it pretty well, and sometimes the mimicry cracked open, revealing a tender center. During those times she would forget herself, and say something to Jordan in a hushed, surprising tone, and he would look at her as if she were mad. “What are you
doing?
” he would say, disengaging, and she would find that her arms had been wrapped around him like ivy.

—

W
hen Erica got back to the apartment, she stood in the darkened doorway for a moment. This went beyond loneliness; she was actually frightened without Jordan there. “Hello?” Erica called out, just to make sure, as if a burglar or murderer would actually answer when called to. But she couldn't stop. “Anybody here?” she went on, in a voice thready and high. They had lived together in three different apartments in the East Village since college. This one was the most inhabitable of the three, but still she was frightened.

Now Erica snapped on the overhead light and watched the roaches zip into the seams where the walls joined the floor. Then she climbed the ladder up into the loft bed. Almost everyone she knew slept up at the ceiling in a loft bed, and the ones who didn't slept close to the floor, on futons. The real sign of adulthood, she thought, would be having a bed of normal height. But everyone's apartment was too small, and a bed was a thing to be hidden from view during daytime hours, away from
eye-level. A bed was something you needed to climb up to, or kneel down onto. Erica peered down at the apartment. From this angle, the room looked out of whack; if she stared long enough, it seemed to tilt and list like van Gogh's room at Arles.

There was a shelf up in the loft where she and Jordan stored cookies and a bent tube of spermicide and a television. This last item was a small black and white set that Jordan had purchased on the street. Surprisingly, it worked fine, as long as you didn't want to watch CBS. Erica almost never watched television; it was Jordan who did, and he favored strange shows: relics of the Sixties like
Hawaii Five-O
and
The Mod Squad
.

“Oh, oh, look at this!” he would call out. “Peggy Lipton's in a Nehru jacket tonight!” But Erica always ignored him.

Now, alone, she listened to the agonized street-opera outside, and when she had had enough of all the shouting, she turned on the television to drown the sounds out. Erica lay back against the pillows and began to eat from the bag of cookies on the shelf. Mallomars were perfect, as round and smooth as doorknobs. She wolfed them down happily and watched a talk show on which all the guests appeared to be losers. Maybe she could rush over to the studio in a cab and be allowed on the air to tell her own story.

The first guests tonight were the most terrifying couple Erica had ever seen. It seemed that twenty years before, when they were dating, the woman had decided to break up with the man. In a rage, he bought some lye, poured it in a Dixie cup, and threw it in the woman's face. If he couldn't have her, he reasoned, then no one could. The woman was blinded and disfigured, and the man, in his intense guilt and continuing passion, took care of her and soon they were in love again, and eventually they got
married. Now they had written a book explaining their story. “We have been virtual pariahs,” the woman was saying. She wore dark glasses and had a high head of jet-black hair. “No one will be friends with us,” she said. “As soon as they hear our story, they don't want anything to do with us. But they just don't understand.”

Her husband squeezed her hand and moved closer. “That's right,” he said. “I love this lady very much. She means the world to me, and always has.”

Erica could not turn away from the set. She imagined them at night, getting ready to make love, Mr. Lye gingerly removing Mrs. Lye's dark glasses, revealing a set of eyes as empty as a statue's. He had rendered her blind, and now they would be together always—she with her neediness and he with his overwhelming burden of guilt. That was enough, it seemed, to keep people bonded for life.

The television show dissolved to a commercial. Erica couldn't move; she was groggy from sugar, dazed by the testimony of Mr. and Mrs. Lye. And then something happened: An old dog whistle went off, silent to the world but audible to her. Erica leaned closer to the screen. She had heard a voice, a familiar summons. “
Are you a large woman?
” the voice asked, and Erica dutifully answered, “Yes,” as though she were being administered a psychological exam by a graduate student. “
Do you hide inside unfashionable fashions, embarrassed to show your body?
” the voice went on.

“Yes,” Erica said again, “oh, yes,” and then the screen was filled with Dottie Engels.

H
er father lived at Sixteen Coconut Court. All day Opal conjured up images of that street: its small, pastel houses shaded by exotic foliage, its automatic sprinklers turning on in the morning and off at night. Finally, she saw her father walking out onto the porch of number sixteen, reaching his hand into the mailbox, his fingers curling around the edges of what would soon prove to be her letter.

She wished she had never written him. It wasn't that her letter revealed anything personal; in fact, it was brief and unremarkable:

Dear Norm Engels,

I am not sure why I am writing you, but you have been on my mind lately, which I suppose is normal, considering. To make a long story short, I was wondering if you have any
interest in corresponding with me. It wouldn't have to be on a regular basis or anything; I'm just curious to know some details about your life, and maybe tell you some details about mine. I'll leave it at that for now. Please write, if you're so inclined.

Opal

Opal remembered the kinds of letters Dottie used to send back to her fans, how they were trimmed with extravagant punctuation. “Dear Susan,” Dottie would write. “Thanks very much for your kind words!!! I'm
so
glad I make you laugh. That's my job!!! Love & polka dots, Dottie Engels.”

Opal had gotten her father's address from a Miami telephone directory in the reference room of the library. He was the only Norman Engels listed, and as she sat with her finger poised beneath his name, it struck her as peculiar that she had never looked him up before, that she had never really been curious. But Dottie had eclipsed that curiosity, had stood directly in its light.

Opal wondered what her father's reply would be like. Certainly he would be surprised to hear from her, but not too surprised. In all probability, Norm still thought about her, about
all
of them, fairly often. He couldn't simply have erased an ex-wife and two daughters. Or maybe he could have. It was impossible for her to guess what Norm Engels would think when he went out onto his porch and opened his mailbox. He might stare quizzically at the letter for a while, letting the facts settle.
Once I had another family
, he would remember. But then his new wife would call to him from inside the house, where a ceiling fan spun slowly above her as she lay in bed. “Norm, any
mail?” she would ask in a sleepy voice, and he would have to call back no, there was nothing important, just a circular, just a throwaway.

You could never predict anyone else's response, Opal knew. Most people had hidden itineraries, and the surface never matched what rolled around beneath. Weeks passed and her father did not write back. She checked her mailbox at Yale Station each morning, but all she ever received were notices of academic warning, each one more threatening than the last.

When the dean finally telephoned and insisted she come talk to him immediately, Opal felt a surprising wave of relief. “Come in, come in,” he called when she arrived, and Opal walked past his secretary and into the bright office. Dean Marsden was springing up and down in his chair like a baby in a bouncer.

“It's one of these Scandinavian kneeling chairs,” he explained. “Ever seen them? Very good for the back.” He kept springing as he talked. He asked Opal if she was happy at Yale, and she admitted that lately she was not, that she couldn't focus on her work. She had “personal problems,” she said, knowing that this was the kind of vague term that kept you immune to further probing. Opal sat in Dean Marsden's office for twenty minutes, and by the end of the meeting she had agreed to his suggestion that she take next semester off. This was not a punishment, the dean said; it was important to him that she understood as much. It was merely a helpful measure designed to give her some time to “rethink” her commitment to undergraduate life. She could definitely come back to school in September; there would be a room waiting for her on campus. He spoke in a decent, careful voice, and Opal felt like Julie Andrews being sent away from the convent in
The Sound of Music
.

Then she remembered something. “What about my mail?” she asked.

“Your mail?” The dean stopped bouncing.

“Will it be forwarded to me, or can I have someone pick it up from my mailbox?” Opal asked. Her father would be writing to her soon; it was important that his letter did not get sent to the apartment, where Dottie would find it.

“Well,” said the dean, “I'm sure you could have a friend pick up your mail for you. You'll still retain your mailbox. We think of this as a
leave
; it's not permanent. Look,” he said, “would you like me to approach your parents? It might make it easier.” But Opal said she would do it herself.

When she got back to her room she called her mother, who listened as Opal stuttered out the news. When Opal was done, Dottie told her it wasn't terrible, it wasn't the end of the world. “I don't want you to crack up under all that pressure,” Dottie said. “I've read about kids who freak out at these pressure-cooker schools.”

“You're not angry?” Opal said. “Or disappointed?”

“No,” said Dottie. “So it's not the best time in the world for you. So we're both having a little trouble. Look, Opal, you'll come home and we'll spend time together. We won't starve; we won't have to do a mother-daughter act on skid row.” She was quiet for a minute. “I think I should tell you something, though,” she said, her voice strange. Opal tensed. “I've met someone,” Dottie said.

For a moment Opal didn't know what her mother was talking about. The phrase, coming from Dottie, made no sense. Opal thought for a moment. “Like a man?” she asked.

Dottie laughed. “Yes, ‘
like
a man.' To my knowledge he
is
a man, in fact.”

Opal felt her whole body flex, then stiffen. Over the years she had assumed that her mother had taken occasional lovers. There had sometimes been men in Dottie's hotel suites when she was on tour, and as a child Opal had heard sounds in the background over the telephone: the flushing of a toilet, or laughter that was frankly male. “Just a minute, Opal,” her mother would say, then she would cover the phone so all Opal could hear was something that sounded like the captive roar inside a seashell. Dottie had never come out and actually spoken of these men, and Opal had assumed they were just accessories and didn't really count. Dottie had always seemed self-contained: a huge, autonomous machine that ate and joked and generated its own heat and light.

But now Dottie was talking about this man, Sy Middleman, and saying that she wasn't sure she was falling in love, but that she felt comfortable with Sy. “It's just the thing I need,” Dottie said. “It makes me forget about my problems for a little while. I thought I should tell you now, before you come home, so you're not too shocked. Sy's been spending a lot of time around the apartment.”

Opal listened as her mother told her the story of how she had met him. Sy was a garment manufacturer who had been called in as a consultant for the Dottie Engels Collection, and he was the only man who would listen to Dottie's ideas, the only one who paid any attention when she got up the nerve to speak during merchandising meetings.

“When you get home, I'll tell you everything,” Dottie said to Opal. “We'll stay up all night talking.”

“All right,” said Opal, but her voice faltered.

“Will you be okay until then?” Dottie asked. “You know,
taking a semester off isn't the end of the world. If you need it, then you shouldn't be ashamed. And advertising a line of clothes isn't the worst thing either. We've got to keep these things in perspective, both of us.”

That night Opal sat on her bed and looked around her small dormitory room, trying to memorize its dimensions, the molding around the doors and windows, the slope of the floor. In a week she would start to dismantle this room, taking down the print of the
Arnolfini Wedding Portrait
from the wall and the books from the shelves. Her friends, when they heard the news, would come to visit one by one. As a joke, Peter would cover the mirror and Tamara would wear black.

I am being
suspended
, Opal would explain, and the word implied that she was still somehow fastened in place. But that wasn't what she felt at all; what she felt was that she, too, was slipping. It was a part of her lineage: a family act that performed without a net.

She should have been buoyed up by the fact that her mother had fallen in love, but somehow she was dubious. What kind of man could Dottie love? she wondered, and what kind of man could love Dottie? Opal tried to imagine someone substantial enough, someone tough and generous and a little raucous. The only person who fit this description was Dottie Engels herself. Dottie was hopelessly reflexive, Opal thought; she would have to have herself cloned if she wanted true companionship.

“Your mother is an original,” the babysitters used to say, watching Dottie perform on late-night television. It didn't seem likely that Dottie had really found her match; what seemed likelier was that she was desperate, and in her desperation she had begun to flail. She would take
anything
: an ad campaign
for fat women's clothing, and a man who listened to her when everyone else no longer would. The thought of Sy Middleman depressed Opal in advance.

“So?” Tamara would say, if Opal told her about Sy. “So what's the big deal? Your mother's a grown woman, she hasn't been married to your father for ages. I think it's nice that she's finally found someone. It isn't
your
life, you know. Leave her alone already.”

But Opal dreamed about her mother, saw her laughing and talking with poise on a talk-show stage. She saw the familiar sweep of dotted material, and the head of hair blown up like a skillet of Jiffy Pop. Opal clung to this image, even though it no longer existed. But that was all that anybody was left with, really: a series of stills that could be brought out and sifted through occasionally, as though visiting the permanent collection of a small museum. That was the only way Opal could maintain contact with her family, the only way she could get them all together.

The desire to keep a family together seemed primitive. Opal remembered watching
The Parent Trap
, in which Hayley Mills, playing identical twins, schemed to reunite her mother and father. There had been something frighteningly determined about the awkward split-screen image of those twins manipulating their parents' lives, forcing them into an awkward meeting and finally an embrace.

But all Opal wanted was to see everyone in the same room. It was a simple, visceral desire. She wanted to line her family up, the way she used to line up her stuffed animals on a windowsill. No one kept
still
in this family; everyone kept springing free and disappearing for extended periods of time. She thought
again of her father, and wondered if he would write her this week. Then she began to think of Erica.

The last time Opal had telephoned Erica, it had been at Dottie's request. “Please,” Dottie had said, “call your sister up and make sure she's all right. I'm so worried about her, down there in the East Village, living God knows what sort of a life, and she doesn't want to talk to me. Do it for me, Opal, and
don't
tell her I told you to call.”

So Opal dialed her sister's number, and was relieved that it was Erica who answered and not her terrible boyfriend. “I just called to say hi,” Opal said. She glanced up at Dottie, who had busied herself at the other end of the room and was actively pretending not to listen.

Erica's voice was level. “Is Mom there?” she asked.

“No, of course not,” said Opal.

“Put her on,” Erica said, and Opal went silent. Then she shrugged and held out the telephone to her mother. Erica was not stupid; she knew she had been set up, and Opal didn't blame her for being angry. There wasn't exactly an antagonism between the sisters; that was too forceful a word. It was just easier, Opal knew, for Erica not to have to
think
about this failure of a family. And yet there were times when Opal longed to talk to her. She wished they still had their walkie-talkies from childhood, and could signal each other when they were feeling bored or melancholy. She remembered the way Erica's voice would split right through the layers of static.

Opal wanted to come out and say:
Our mother has fallen in love
. She could imagine Erica's sharp intake of air, then the slow release. No shit, Erica would say. Tell me all about it. And Opal would launch into everything she knew, filling in the blanks.
Maybe she would even tell Erica that she had written to their father. She didn't even
like
Erica anymore; she was embarrassed at how Erica had turned out, so big and formless, so freaky, and yet Erica had
been
there over the years; she was the only other witness.

—

O
pal's suspension began on a Sunday. She packed her dorm room up in boxes and had them shipped to New York, and then she took the train down by herself in the early evening. When she arrived at the apartment, she rang the buzzer three times but there was no reply, so Opal let herself in. The apartment was odorless and quiet, but the living room was softly lit. Dottie was probably home.

“Hello!” Opal called, putting her knapsack and keys down on the hall table.

“In here!” her mother called back, and Opal headed in the direction of the voice. She found her mother in her bedroom, sitting in front of the vanity in a kimono. Dottie stood and embraced her, and Opal let herself be wrapped for a moment in fabric and perfume, while her mother asked about the trip, about her mood, about whether or not she was hungry.

“You're getting all dressed up,” Opal said when they had disengaged and Dottie was sitting back at the vanity, fiddling with the back of a pearl earring. “Are you going somewhere?” Opal asked, and Dottie told her that she was going out for the evening with Sy.