“Everything I think of is shit,” I said.
He patted my head. “You have to work through it, is all. Or with it. You know, ‘Nothing to paint, nothing to paint with.’ Just go as dark as you want.”
“It’s not even dark,” I said. “It’s just fucking stupid.”
“Then that’s good information,” he said. “ ‘If the fool would persist in his folly, dot dot dot.’ I’m sorry to be quoting stuff at you. Why don’t we walk over and get you some ice cream.”
“What, an affirmation of life?” I said.
“There,” he said. “Now that’s you. See how easy?”
Fed, flattered and fucked. I gained ten pounds that first year, and he didn’t seem to mind. He was a man who never put on an ounce, though his jawline had started to give.
—
I see that I’ve been painting myself as the little creepmouse victim-wife in a gothic novel—the house really did have a mansard roof: Was I not supposed to notice?—what with the attic room, the sad little plastic storage box and so on, the overwhelming older husband. My crack about the conjugal bed. But really, given who he was, he didn’t do one thing wrong. Yes, he paid the bills and picked up the check at restaurants, but he never slipped money into my wallet and he left it up to me to pay off my credit cards, or not. He even knew not to buy me a better car—at least not then. That crappy little Toyota parked by his handsome house for over a year and never a word out of him. He didn’t nag me about my divorce—in those days it took a year in New York State after you’d filed for separation—which I’m sure was why I got it happening so soon. He did give me his lawyer’s card, but only because I asked him for it. (The fee turned out to be suspiciously modest; I wouldn’t swear that he hadn’t supplemented it behind my back.) He did his own laundry, and sometimes mine. When he seduced me in the afternoon, he changed the sheets before bedtime.
If you’re thinking, Aha, so that’s where the bitch earned her allowance, no. If I could have any of this back—which I can’t, and which is a weepy thing to say, and I promise not to hit the elegiac note too often—it would be those afternoons in bed. My first husband must have read somewhere that the woman had to come first and often, so he would slam away at me (it was impressive, for a while) or go after me with his tongue until my clit was sore. “How many was that?” he would say as I lay there catching my breath. But this man would take me at my word if I told him I just wanted to feel him let go. “Ah, God,” he would say, plying the warm, wet washcloth he’d get up and bring us, “that was so irresponsible of me.”
All of which might have been the most insidious campaign ever by a man to convince a woman that he wasn’t a tyrant, and don’t think I didn’t suspect it—I wasn’t the ninny I’m sure I sound like. But wasn’t it on me whether or not I let myself be tyrannized, if he started showing his true face? And where was the line between tyrannized and taken care of? And if he pushed me to it, couldn’t I find pleasure in tyrannizing back?
I just had to trust that we wouldn’t get to such a place, or what was the point of my being here? Despite his money and his manner—and believe me, I could see why my husband had thought he was an asshole—wasn’t this a good man? Or at least good enough to suspect he wasn’t good enough. And wasn’t I a good woman? Or couldn’t I act as if I were?
—
A few weeks after moving in, I called my mother and asked if she’d like to come visit. I thought she needed to be reassured that I hadn’t done a crazy thing, not that she was any judge. I picked her up at the train in the middle of the afternoon, showed her the town—she called it “charming enough”—and left silences in case she wanted to talk. Apparently not. We stopped off to get stuff for dinner—the wife had left behind Cucina Paradiso: The Heavenly Food of Sicily, and pasta col tonno seemed easy enough even for me—and when I parked in front of the house she didn’t move to open her door. “This is it?” she said. “I guess you’ve come up in the world.”
“It’s not about that,” I said. “I mean, sure. But he’s really good to me.”
“That’s gracious of him.”
“You’re at least going to give him a chance, right?” I said. “It’s not like he’s Hugh Hefner in his smoking jacket.”
“Baby, as long as you’re happy. I will say, I never thought the boy was right for you.” She looked into the backseat. “Do you need some help with those?”
“Oh, the cook will see to them—let’s get you settled in. The butler will show you to the East Room.”
“Don’t kid your poor old mother. I’ll be good.” She opened her door. “You don’t really have an East Room, do you?”
“For Christ’s sake,” I said.
At dinner, he kept filling her wineglass and got her talking about the workshop she’d taken years ago with Stanley Kunitz, and how May Sarton, or maybe it was May Swenson, had once made a pass at her—those stories—and he told her about going to jazz clubs in New York as a young man and hearing Charlie Parker and Billie Holiday and how once, at a party in some loft, he’d sat in with so-and-so, playing somebody’s borrowed bass. Those stories. Back in the living room, he opened more wine and put on Frank Sinatra. “I trust you like the Nelson Riddle era,” he said to her. “We can go later, if you prefer the doo-be-doo-be-doo.”
“No, this makes me very happy.” The song was “I’ve Got the World on a String.” “Someone’s obviously briefed you.”
“Random guess,” he said. “There are times nobody else will do, right? When you’re my age.”
“I am your age.”
“You’re trying to butter me up,” he said. “I’m not that well preserved. Pour you a bit more?”
“Oh, why not.” She lifted her glass to him, leaned back and closed her eyes.
“You know, Mom,” I said, “if you brought anything with you, you’re not going to scandalize anybody.”
Her eyes came open. “Oh, God no. I had to give that up—this stuff they have today is way too strong for an old lady. I’m sorry. If that was a hint—”
“Far from it,” I said. “I know just what you mean.”
“I suppose if I get cancer, it might be a different story,” she said. “But for the time being.” She took a long drink of her wine and closed her eyes again. “My God, that voice. It’s hard to believe he’s turned into such a terrible man. I remember when he used to be a Democrat.”
“Happens to the best of us,” he said.
After he went to bed, I turned down her covers in the guest room. “All right, I’m sold,” she said. “I guess I’ve gotten to the age where I don’t mind.”