What’s Happening? (7 page)

“RITA” Mother yelled again, a hint of desperate, annoyed frustration prolonging each sylable until the name became a chant, filling every passageway in the house.

You rotten lazy bastard
. Rita's head shook with rage. Rita knew Mother was now disgusted, afflicted and tortured because her screams were not answered. If only she were sensible enough not to yell, not to demand, order, … once, … just once. Rita held her hands to her head to block out the haunting screams.

Someone knocked on the door. Rita looked up quickly. Before she had a chance to bid the person enter, the door opened and Father peered at her inquisitively, suspiciously, frowningly.

“Well? What's the matter with you? Can't you hear your Mother calling you? You need a special invitation?”

“I'm sorry,” she apologized automatically. “I'll be right down.”

She turned back to the mirror to check if she had adjusted and changed her make-up and hair sufficiently to look the way she knew her parents would think presentable. “Presentable” meant whatever was accepted and worn by Mother's and Father's friends, other people, the world in general. Mother's and Father's friends also only wore things that were “presentable.”

Father was standing in the doorway, Rita noticed, still studying her reflection in the mirror. Father was short—short and stocky, tending toward the paunchy. He hunched over a little with age, though he was only fifty-five, and waddled slightly duck-footed. His face, once seemingly bold and fearless, was putty-like, haggard, without conviction, forceless. He had been brave and tough, had fought to keep for his family that small glory he had achieved by his labor. He had been able, by incessant toil and adherence to a principle of conformity to social dictates, to lift them above the wretched life he had spent in a cold-water flat as an immigrant laborer's son, to give them a comfortable existence in one of Brooklyn's most luxurious sections, to make them respected in their Temple and neighborhood. And now he wanted only to be quiet, sleep and rest; his family was comfortable.

“Well, come on. Dinner's ready.” He continued watching and waiting. He searched for some physical defect or weakness, for the joint in her Village-wrought armor, against which he could loose the tirade of the respectable on living in the Village.

Rita stayed in the chair purposely, annoyed at his insistence in treating her like a child, like a mindless lump of clay.

“Well?”

“All right!”

Rita couldn't remember when this now-open conflict had started. When she was young everything had been fine. As she matured, feeling her own will and weight a bit, enjoying the social equality and freedom Father struggled to provide, the conflict began to rise. Perhaps it was because Rita didn't seem to fit exactly into the stereotyped position her parents felt they, and, therefore Rita, had to reflect. At first, this stereotyped position demanded that Rita supress only minor feelings or thoughts. As she grew older, however, the position became more arbitrary, demanding, oppressive. It was vexing to hear, This is what
they're
doing. This is what
they're
wearing this year. Why don't you be like
everybody?
Wasn't she a person too? Couldn't she decide for her own being? She, like Thoreau, wondered “
by what degree of consanguinity they are related to me, and what authority they may have in an affair which affects me so nearly
…” Who the hell are
THEY
anyway? This outside direction began to back up in Rita's mind like a log jam, until she felt
they
were prescribing her entire life.

She remembered how she began, just for spite, for kicks, to do things that this unwritten, unnameable code wouldn't have approved: how she stole cigarettes from Father's package, how the smoke tasted awful, and how she beat the smoke out of the bathroom window with a towel. It was an exciting feeling to have done something unusual, something daring, something she had thought of by herself.

After a while, this socially-dictated position which Rita was supposed to reflect became so ludicrous in her mind that she was able to follow the precepts which her parents and
they
dictated only with the same precaution required in taking vile medicine: swallow hard and grimace. This made her more sick and more restless, however. She couldn't stand the stifling rules imposed on her without reason; she couldn't stand being a lump of clay. She wanted either to enjoy life or to end it. Thus, she fled from her family's house to find the freedom and tolerance and independence for her own opinion in the Village. Then, whole areas of darkness fell away from her eyes. Like a newborn child, she began to discover hidden aspects of herself. Suddenly, she disagreed with her parents about more things than ever before. Somehow, they seemed even more stagnant, static, molded, the way
everybody
was.

Rita followed Father down the stairs toward the kitchen, wishing there might be a way through which they could understand each other more.

Their house was large and spacious. It was a private, three-story wood-frame house with turrets and ramparts and terraces reaching into the sky like a medieval castle. The architecture of all the houses on this street was similar. Each new house followed and matched the time-worn, approved pattern of the one before it. Father had had it built for Mother ten years before, and what a wonderful present it would seem, except that it was a demanded present, dedicated only to the neighbors, and erected not by love, or for the comfort of those who lived within, but by a need to have an external monument to the prowess of its owner.

Rita thought the house foolish, like everything else in it—wasteful, tasteless. It was foolish to build a house using modern materials to falsely recreate ancient expediencies—supporting beams which did not support but hung, just as the people within did not support changing life but clung frightenedly to prescribed traditions. “
If it was good enough for others, it's good enough for us
,”

The interior was decorated gaudily. Her parents and their friends were influenced in their tastes and followed those modes that were expensive, massive, and patently luxurious—regardless of the needs of the room. Velvet drapes hung in huge folds from a cornice across an entire wall in the living room. Ornate scallops topped these cornices, and flimsy curtains underscored them. Plush overstuffed chairs and couches were spotted about the room. A thick rug with a design of flowers and vases covered the floor. A piano that no one played and candelabra and knicknacks, all bedecked with designs and gilt, completed the ostentation of the room.

Her parents' entire life was, like this house, equally without reason. All undertakings bore witness to the fact that they could be afforded; money was spent for the sake of spending it, regardless of the tasteless, choking effect.

“You sit over here, dear.” Mother pointed to Rita's seat at the kitchen table. The kitchen was the family room, where the family spent its time. The gaudy, rich trappings in the other rooms were preserved and enshrined to the honor of
Pecunia Rex
. The family remained in the kitchen, content with the warmth effulging from the other rooms, not deeming themselves worthy enough to enjoy a luxurious life. Those rooms were reserved for friends and other worthy people.

The way Mother said “dear” annoyed Rita. It was hollow, and Rita wasn't deceived by this false show of sweetness. Had Mother called her a Village tramp, Rita might believe her. This sweetness was contrived and phony. Mother was too busy with the house and bridge games ever to have many real emotions.

“Randy,” Mother called to her young son. “RANDY.” The yell sent a shiver up Rita's back.

“Randy. Will you come to dinner …”

Randy was a hulking boy of thirteen, with glasses, a bent nose, thick fleshy lips, and crooked teeth. Mother loved her poor little Randy more because of his imperfections. He was Mother's favorite plaything and lover. Often, Rita had been revolted while sitting watching television at home, Mother in a shabby house dress and curlers in her hair, Randy lying on the floor like a bloated oxen in pajamas, when suddenly, about bed time, the boy would begin to hug and kiss his Mother. Randy knew that Mother liked to be told he loved her, and he would play his cards to the full to stay up late to watch another T.V. program. Rita felt sorry for Mother; Father was usually out and Mother alone. But these scenes with Randy were repulsive. Father, when he was out, was usually with another woman.
Why shouldn't he be?
Rita asked herself, considering the benefits of staying at home with his wife, her mother—the benefits of staying at home with a cretinous woman of forty, who felt firm only with the love of a child; a woman beyond whom adult love lay as a barren island; a woman who didn't know enough to get out of bed in the morning to get her husband's breakfast; a woman who wasn't woman enough to keep herself attractive for him; a woman who still enjoyed the childish gossip that she had enjoyed when she was eighteen; who got a kick out of smutty little tawdry jokes; and who coyly flirted when she was out with the “girls” on the town. Randy was the only human with whom Mother could feel at ease emotionally, and even this would change when Randy was old enough to go out with friends at night. Rita thought that Mother would soon have to realize that one had to be capable of love to be capable of being loved and that love wasn't something stocked up in a magazine, toy, or candy store. Love had to be understood and nourished for itself; in this house, Rita thought, they were lucky their bodies were nourished, much less their souls.

“Come on, Randy, sit down,” Mother urged lovingly, looking at him intently, admiration rippling her mouth. “Your soup is getting cold.”

Randy sat and Mother sat.

“Oooszp … oooszp,” Father sounded, drawing in his broth.

God, how Rita had learned to love quiet! She writhed inside with each spoonful Father sucked in. She hated everything about this place,—she loathed it, she despised it. So as not to hear Father's sucking, Rita concentrated on hating and loathing. Hate, she thought as she looked at the other people at the table bent over their soup, was a rather beautiful, meaningful emotion, reserved for things once loved. A lover hates with passion his lover who has spurned his love. Things can be disliked, loathed, resented, sickening, despised; without love there is either indifference or dislike. But hate gives rise to love, and love to hate, and each can become the other by a hairline change. Lovers should always be encouraged if their partners hate them in anger, for then they are truly loved.

The “ooszp … ooszp …” tore through Rita's concentration. She stared hopelessly into the lines etched on the surface of her soup. With her mouth set firmly after each opening, and a hand squeezing the napkin in her lap, she forced herself to eat with her family.

“So how's your apartment?” Mother shot at her in an offhand manner, smiling to instill confidence.

“Fine, … fine.” Rita looked up perfunctorily so that no one could start a discussion about her not raising her head and speaking with respect.

“And your roommates?”

“Fine, … they're fine …”

“Oooszp … oooszp.” Father tilted his plate to pull in the last few dregs of his soup. He was completely unconcerned with the other people around the table.

“Why don't you bring one around so I can take her out,” Randy suggested giddily, a childish sneer on his mouth. His eyes darted to Mother. She indicated a slight smile, then looked quickly at Father from the side of her eyes.

Father glanced at Randy sternly, annoyed, then down to his soup again. Father did not approve of talk about the interrelationship of boys and girls in the presence of his family. Consideration of these subjects was reserved for the bodies of Father and his girl friend, and the ribald, evil humor of his friends as they regaled themselves, ostensibly in secret, with crude stories.

“I don't think they'd be interested,” Rita replied with restraint.

“Why not? If they like you, they can't be too hot.”

Rita winced. This was a parent-approved way for Randy to speak because he was only a boy, a little child, … a child that did not know better, who could learn about life by chance as he got older, and besides, Rita … well, Rita lived in the Village.

Rita drew in an extra breath to squelch her rising anger. Her mouth chomped on the inside of her cheek as she stared at Randy. She looked down and tried to concentrate on her soup.

“What else do we have?” asked Father.

“Liver … mashed potatoes.” Mother stood to bring out the rest of the food.

“Mmmmm … a meal fit for a king.” Father rubbed his hands together with delight. “What else are you doing?” Father asked Rita as he waited.

“Working, you mean?”

“Anything. What are you doing at all?” He continued the general inquisition.

“Nothing much, … still a waitress, … still going to class three times a week.”

Disgust flickered on Father's mouth. His head began to nod with the weighty problems of the patriarch. He enjoyed even this grief of leadership.

“Well, I can't explain you anything, can I?” he asked. “You're gonna do what you want no matter …”

“Pop, let's not start another argument. I came home to see how everybody was, not to discuss what I'm doing. Can't we leave it at that?”

“Wait a minute! You don't mind if I tell you something?” He aimed a finger at her face, his eyes narrowing. “If you're so worried about us, you would be home more … so don't hand me that crap. I don't know yet what you want, but you're not gettin' nothin'. You live in that, “Green-witch” Village and then you come home and expect whatever you expect from your poor mother and me,” he snorted. “I let you get away with too much. I should give you a good slap in the mouth and make you come home, that's what I should do. I'm too good to you. Other fathers would let their daughters go and live in the Village by themselves, … hhmph. They'd cut their kids' legs off first.”