“Her father,” Corinne said. “Martin. Portia’s father.”
“I know Martin is her father. I just can’t divine the resemblance.”
“Well, there’s certainly no resemblance to — Wesley—” Corinne called over to him. “Must you read the newspaper? This is a social occasion. Otto, will you listen, please? I’m trying to tell you something. The truth is, we’re all quite worried about Portia.”
Amazing how fast one’s body reacted. Fear had vacuumed the blood right through his extremities. One’s body, the primeval parts of one’s brain — how fast they were! Much faster than that recent part with the words and thoughts and so on, what was it? The cortex, was that it? He’d have to ask William, he thought, his blood settling back down. That sort of wrinkly stuff on top that looked like crumpled wrapping paper.
“Laurie is worried sick. The truth is, that’s one reason I was so anxious for you to join us today. I wanted your opinion on the matter.”
“On what matter?” Otto said. “I have no idea what this is about. She’s fine. She seems fine. She’s just playing.”
“I know she’s just playing, Otto. It’s what she’s playing that concerns me.”
“What she’s playing? What is she playing? She’s playing radio, or something! Is that so sinister? The little boys seem to be playing something called Hammer Her Flat.”
“I’m sure not. Oh, gracious. You and Sharon were both so right not to have children.”
“Excuse me?” Otto said incredulously.
“It’s not the radio aspect per se that I’m talking about, it’s what that represents. The child is an observer. She sees herself as an outsider. As alienated.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being observant. Other members of this family could benefit from a little of that quality.”
“She can’t relate directly to people.”
“Who can?” Otto said.
“Half the time Viola doesn’t even remember the child is alive! You watch. She won’t send Portia a Christmas present. She probably won’t even call. Otto, listen. We’ve always said that Viola is ‘unstable,’ but, frankly, Viola is psychotic. Do you understand what I’m saying to you? Portia’s mother, Otto. It’s just as you were saying, there’s a geneti—”
“I was saying what? I was saying nothing! I was only saying—”
“Oh, dear!” Laurie exclaimed. She had an arm around Portia, who was crying.
“What in hell is going on now?” Wesley demanded, slamming down his newspaper.
“I’m afraid Bea and Cleveland may have said something to her,” Laurie said, apologetically.
“Oh, terrific,” Wesley said. “Now I know what I’m paying them for.”
“It’s all right, sweetie,” Laurie said. “It all happened a long time ago.”
“But why are we celebrating that we killed them?” Portia asked, and started crying afresh.
“We’re not celebrating because we killed the Indians, darling,” Laurie said. “We’re celebrating because we ate dinner with them.”
“Portia still believes in Indians!” one of the little boys exclaimed.
“So do we all, Josh,” Wesley said. “They live at the North Pole and make toys for good little—”
“Wesley, please!” Corinne said.
“Listener poll,” Portia said to her fist. “Did we eat dinner with the Indians, or did we kill them?” She strode over to Otto and held out her fist.
“We ate dinner with them and then we killed them,” Otto realized, out loud, to his surprise.
“Who are you to slag off Thanksgiving, old boy?” Wesley said. “You’re wearing a fucking bow tie.”
“So are you, for that matter,” Otto said, awkwardly embracing Portia, who was crying again.
“And I stand behind my tie,” Wesley said, rippling upward from his chair.
“It was Portia’s birthday last week!” Laurie interrupted loudly, and Wesley sank back down. “Wasn’t it!”
Portia nodded, gulping, and wiped at her tears.
“How old are you now, Portia?” William asked.
“Nine,” Portia said.
“That’s great,” William said. “Get any good stuff?” Portia nodded again.
“And Portia’s mommy sent a terrific present, didn’t she,” Laurie said.
“Oh, what was it, sweetie?” Corinne said.
Laurie turned pink and her head seemed to flare out slightly in various directions. “You don’t have to say, darling, if you don’t like.”
Portia held on to the arm of Otto’s chair and swung her leg aimlessly back and forth. “My mother gave me two tickets to go to Glyndebourne on my eighteenth birthday,” she said in a tiny voice.
Wesley snorted. “Got your frock all picked out, Portia?”
“I won’t be going to Glyndebourne, Uncle Wesley,” Portia said with dignity.
There was a sudden silence in the room.
“Why not, dear?” Otto asked. He was trembling, he noticed.
Portia looked out at all of them. Tears still clung to her face. “Because.” She raised her fist to her mouth again. “Factoid: According to the Mayan calendar, the world is going to end in the year 2012, the year before this reporter’s eighteenth birthday.”
“All right,” Corinne whispered to Otto. “Now do you see?”
—
“You’re right, as always,” Otto said, in the taxi later, “they’re no worse than anyone else’s. They’re all awful. I really don’t see the point in it. Just think! Garden garden garden garden garden, two happy people, and it could have gone on forever! They knew, they’d been told, but they ate it anyway, and from there on out, family! Shame, fear, jobs, mortality, envy, murder…”
“Well,” William said brightly, “and sex.”
“There’s that,” Otto conceded.
“In fact, you could look at both family and mortality simply as by-products of sexual reproduction.”
“I don’t really see the point of sexual reproduction, either,” Otto said. “I wouldn’t stoop to it.”
“Actually, that’s very interesting, you know; they think that the purpose of sexual reproduction is to purge the genome of harmful mutations. Of course, they also seem to think it isn’t working.”
“Then why not scrap it?” Otto said. “Why not let us divide again, like our dignified and immortal forebear, the amoeba.”
William frowned. “I’m not really sure that—”
“Joke,” Otto said.
“Oh, yes. Well, but I suppose sexual reproduction is fairly entrenched by now — people aren’t going to give it up without a struggle. And besides, family confers certain advantages as a social unit, doesn’t it.”
“No. What advantages?”
“Oh, rudimentary education. Protection.”
“ ‘Education’! Ha! ‘Protection’! Ha!”
“Besides,” William said. “It’s broadening. You meet people in your family you’d never happen to run into otherwise. And anyhow, obviously the desire for children is hardwired.”
“ ‘Hardwired.’ You know, that’s a term I’ve really come to loathe! It explains nothing, it justifies anything; you might as well say, ‘Humans have children because the Great Moth in the Sky wants them to.’ Or, ‘Humans have children because humans have children.’ ‘Hardwired,’ please! It’s lazy, it’s specious, it’s perfunctory, and it’s utterly without depth.”
“Why does it have to have depth?” William said. “It refers to depth. It’s good, clean science.”
“It’s not science at all, it’s a cliché. It’s a redundancy.”
“Otto, why do you always scoff at me when I raise a scientific point?”