You are the newbie (though not the youngest by a lot) so the others make certain things known to you. One of them is that it isn’t always like this. It is, as often, exactly unlike this. Diva behavior, bitchy queens, personality clashes — most of you have big ones, which on a tour bus means that there is almost literally not enough room to accommodate the magnitude of the sounds (vocal exercises that range from bizarre chicken squawks to simple scales sung by five different people in five different ways at five different intervals), and the things (hair accessories, undergarments, a drugstore’s worth of products), everyone scheming to skirt the one-suitcase-per-person limit (people need options!), and the opinions (political, artistic, religious — remarkable, really, that there hasn’t been a documented murder on a tour bus), and the assorted pre-performance rituals (prayers, meditations, chants, bells). But this doesn’t concern you now, here in Tulsa or Omaha or Wichita; what concerns you now is your castmate who plays Anxious, who stops by your motel room at midnight with a bag of Krispy Kremes and a quart of milk from the gas station next door. You’re about two months into the tour now; the nightly group hang has taken the predictable toll, and most of you over twenty-four are retiring a little earlier now, though you still get plenty of socializing done earlier in the day. No one misses who gets with whom, that’s impossible, so you make your peace with it, and it is noted by all that you and Anxious are often in a corner by yourselves, and bets are taken as to when the sexy festivities will ensue; the girl playing Anybodys wins by picking the earliest time slot.
Anxious — he knows you. He says things to you no guy has said before; that he feels like he hit the lottery; wants to know where you would live, if you could live anywhere at all; if you’d be interested in quitting everything and sailing around the world with him and a couple of dogs, maybe make some kids; he has some ideas for kids’ names, Adeline and Mabel and Billiam — which cracks you up, Billiam? you say, and he says No one will make fun of our kids on our boat—and you are more and more sure he’s the one. You like this idea very much. Let’s do it, you say. Yeah? he says, Yeah, you say.
So you and Anxious jump off the bus right that minute, laughing hysterically. You have no idea how one goes about buying a boat, but you’ve just hit Tampa, as good a place as any for that. You hitchhike to the nearest shore, giddy, thank the old couple who picked you up, jump out, ask some random guy where to buy a boat, he asks what kind of boat you’re looking for, you say an easy one, you’re new boat people, he says he’s got one for you, takes you to a nearby boat dock and shows you a boat. Mint Chris-Craft Roamer, 1965, sleeps ten. Practically drives itself. You don’t ask the price, or for any more details. We’ll take it, you say. Naturally, it’s perfect, room for the dogs and kids, so you jump on board, initiate the master bedroom, conceive. Where should we go? Anxious asks. You suggest going through the Panama Canal and then up to Alaska to ride some whales. He tries to explain that that may not be an option, but that you can go look at them; you say Well you don’t know, maybe we’ll find some open-minded whales when we get there. All right. Whale-riding it is. Your first stop: New Orleans. You get off the boat, eat beignets and pralines and listen to music on the street and dance in someone’s funeral, but then you worry whether that may not be a hundred percent cool, so you dance out of it just as quickly; wandering New Orleans you find a little dog roaming around, one of those ones that’s like a hairless Chihuahua but with a head of floppy hair in his face and ridiculous ears, ears that say I belong to you guys, and you pick him up and get him all checked out at the vet and name him Flavio and jump back on the boat and Flavio goes right to the front of the boat and perches himself on the bow like a little hood ornament, wind blowing his ears back like ear sails, like the power from his little ear sails could take you to wherever your destiny might be.
You discover that you’re having twins, a boy and a girl, because why not, and when they’re born they just pop out, it’s not like my pregnancy at all, it’s painless, like shoop, two beautiful babies, Adeline-Mabel and Billiam, done, next. You home-school Adeline-Mabel and Billiam, heavy focus on life experience and the arts, you were never all that good at math or science, but there’s plenty of science out there on the boat, and you sing songs, play guitar, and then you reach Alaska and a whale swims up next to the boat to let you on for a ride and it’s spectacular, whale-riding, you feel like this is what it all led up to, this whale ride, you, a giant mammal, the salt water, the sea air, the waves, the sky. The whale brings you back to the boat so you can pick up the rest of the family, Adeline-Mabel and Billiam and Anxious, Flavio in front, and you whale off into the sea and that’s it, the end.
— That’s good, Mom. Graziella doesn’t actually sing in West Side Story, but whatever, I guess.
— Seems like that makes it the perfect part for someone who’s scared to sing in public.
— Good point. FYI, though, you can’t get high when you’re in AA.
— You still have to go to that?
—. .
Good Women
You return home to Baton Rouge energized and excited. You tell Dad every detail you can remember about the trip: the few sights you saw (I went up in the Empire State Building! I went to Macy’s and Gimbels! Oh, I’ve never seen such a thing as Macy’s! Of course, the only thing I bought was a scarf on sale at Woolworth’s); every single word Carolina said about your singing (notable adjectives including facile! bewitching! like molten silver!); what you did with Audrey when she came to visit; your trip to the Automat (Great fun! Food behind little doors!); how you reunited with another friend who recently moved to the Upper West Side from Binghamton, a mezzo, who knows about an apartment you might share with her for the times when you return. Dad tries so hard to share your enthusiasm — he truly believes in your talent and is happy to see you so excited — but he feels this pulling you away from him, all of it, and that it’s not in his power to hold on tight enough to keep you. A small part of you wishes he would, it would be so much easier, safer, but though you will travel back and forth for two whole years, you sense early on that you’re putting off the inevitable. You continue to practice every day for hours, according to Carolina’s instructions; you do fewer and fewer of the typical wife things, but you also do the typical mom things, make supper, more sewing, reading to me (though at one point you are displeased with what you feel is my overly dramatic interpretation of Mother Goose: It’s not an opera, Mommy. You don’t make your voice go up unless there’s an exclamation point. Do it like how Daddy does it, just normal, I say, which provokes in you a desire to swat me on the behind that you thankfully resist). And you think about New York City, and what’s there for you, always, every minute of every day, no matter what you’re doing.