In A Country Of Mothers Read online

  One night while she was home writing, Jody heard sirens and tires squealing in the distance. She didn’t think anything of it. If anything, it seemed perfectly normal, just like New York. Then, without warning, there was a loud bang. The bulb in her Luxo lamp blew out as a car slammed into the corner of Jody’s apartment. Her computer lost its memory; a broken headlight and grille poked through the wall where the ficus had been. Police cars pulled up and spun red and blue light circles on the empty walls. Radios squawked. The doorbell rang.

  “Are you all right?” a cop asked.

  Jody nodded.

  “We’re evacuating the building until we can be sure the gas lines weren’t damaged.”

  “There’s a car in my apartment.”

  “We’ll have to get a building inspector. Is your phone working?”

  Jody shrugged, pointed to the phone, and the cop picked it up, listened, and started dialing. She turned off her computer.

  “Are you sure you’re all right?”

  Jody picked up her keys, wallet, and notebook, then followed the cop outside.

  Using what they called “the jaws of life,” the firemen cut the car roof open and peeled it back like it was a can of sardines. There was blood and metal everywhere. Paramedics started working on the two people inside even before they were able to pull them out. Photographers and camera crews showed up. Jody went around the corner and walked ten blocks before she could find a pay phone.

  “Some asshole broke a date with me — that’s why I’m home,” Ellen said. “You know how much I hate to be home.”

  “A car crashed into my apartment,” Jody said, perfectly calmly. “While I was in it.”

  “You wrecked your car.”

  “No, someone else’s car wrecked my apartment. They’re cutting the idiots out now.”

  “Are they dead?”

  “Almost.”

  “So listen,” Ellen said. “It’s kind of good you left New York, ’cause I’m being transferred to Dallas.”

  “Texas?”

  “I’m kind of looking forward to it. You know, cowboys and bronco busters.”

  “Big dick country.”

  “Exactly,” Ellen said. “Hopefully dicks with manners, if that’s not a complete contradiction in terms.”

  “When?”

  “About a month. It’ll be good. You can come sit on my cactus.”

  “I’ll look forward to it.”

  An ambulance sped past Jody, sirens wailing. “I should get back,” she said. “I wonder if the building will fall down when they pull the car out. I should’ve taken my screenplay with me.”

  “I doubt it,” Ellen said. “It’s earthquake-proof.”

  Ellen was right. When they pulled the car out, a few bricks fell, some cement crumbled, but the steel cables embedded in the cement basically held everything together.

  “Your mother called,” one of the cops said as they were leaving. “The machine picked up, but I overheard her. She wants you to call back.”

  “Thanks,” Jody said.

  “No problem,” the cop said.

  The super plugged the hole with sheets of badly sawed plywood and promised to come back first thing in the morning and do a better job. Jody dozed on the sofa, half expecting someone or something to come creeping through the plywood.

  22

  “What are these?” Sam asked. He was standing naked in front of Claire’s night table, his back to her.

  “What are what?” Claire asked, slipping a clean blouse over her head. She’d finally found a dry cleaner in Easthampton. They were dressing for dinner, running late.

  Sam turned around. The night-table drawer was open. The forms were in his hand. “You’re not thinking of doing this, are you?”

  The pink flush from the day’s sun rinsed itself from Claire’s face and she shivered. “What are you doing in my night table?”

  “Looking for the hydrocortisone cream. I got bitten.” He turned his calf toward her and pointed down to a red, swollen spot the size of a half-dollar. Sam flipped through the forms, fanning them with the fingers of his free hand. “I thought you were doing so well,” he said. “I thought you were over this.”

  “I am,” Claire said. “It’s research for a patient. Let me see the bite. It might be a tick.” She went toward Sam, but he twisted away from her.

  “Your name’s written on the top line,” Sam said, shaking the papers.

  Claire put her cold hands on his hips. His skin was warm, almost hot. She lowered herself onto her knees, ran her hands down his legs, stopping to examine the bite. She looked up at Sam, watching her, rubbed her lips against the insides of his thighs, and started working her way higher.

  “We don’t have time for this,” he said, stepping away. He dropped the papers onto the bed, pulled on his underwear and pants, stepped into his shoes, took his shirt off the hanger, and carried it with him out of the room. “We’re late.”

  Claire took the big suitcase filled with all her precious things out of the closet, stuffed the papers in, and got ready to go.

  “I’m sorry,” Claire said later that night as they lay at opposite sides of the king-size bed, as far from each other as possible.

  “We have such a decent life,” Sam said. “Why isn’t that enough? Why do you always want more? You’re never satisfied.”

  Claire didn’t say anything.

  “It makes me feel like shit,” Sam said.

  “It’s not about you,” Claire said.

  And each of them, while waiting for the other to say something, lapsed into an exhausted, fitful sleep.

  “We could stay here,” Claire said the next night when she and Sam were alone, stretched out on chaise lounges in the backyard.

  “Forever?” Sam asked.

  Claire ran her fingers back and forth through the grass. “Through the winter,” she said. “It’s cheap to rent off-season. It’d be a weekend place.”

  “What about the mountains? Something up near Woodstock?”

  “We already have this. We’re unpacked, we’re here.” She looked at the lights glowing in the upstairs bedroom.

  “It might be depressing.”

  “Romantic,” Claire said, moving her lips in an absent kiss. “The boys love being outside. It’s safe here; Jake can go off on his own. He needs that.”

  “You need it.”

  “We all do,” Claire said.

  Away from the city, the children seemed leaner, more muscular, and more curious than before. Jake was less of a doughboy. It was possible to have a conversation with him; he wanted to tell Claire about waves he’d ridden, things other kids said, and so on. Maybe it was something that would’ve happened anyway, but in Claire’s mind the change came from getting out of the apartment, out of town.

  “Would we really want to come out every weekend?” Sam asked.

  Claire nodded. “Long weekends.”

  She reached across, took Sam’s hand, and pulled it toward her, pressing it against her chest. His lounge chair tipped over, spilling him onto the grass.

  “What about work, school, our life?” he said, squeezing himself onto Claire’s chair. They lay on their sides, nose to nose.

  Claire shrugged, “Life goes on.” She hadn’t realized it, but since saying goodbye to Jody she wasn’t terribly interested in getting back to work. It simply didn’t matter as much. She’d adjust her schedule and her patients would never notice. She was entitled to have a life. After all, she was supposed to teach them how to make lives of their own — shouldn’t she practice?

  During the week, while Sam was in the city, Claire and the boys came home from the beach at five o’clock, when the lifeguard went off duty. They took quick showers, the boys outside, Claire inside, and went out to dinner — pizza, subs, and fried chicken in an almost religious rotation. On the way home they’d stop at the video store and Jake would beg for shoot-’em-up movies, justifying his choices by saying “But I already saw it once” or “There’s only a little killing in th
is one.” And then Jake and Adam and one or two kids from up the block would spread themselves out on the sofa, shove the cassette into the VCR and a pack of popcorn into the microwave while Claire hid upstairs reading back issues of The New Yorker.

  On Friday nights, Claire and the kids drove to the train station, waited for Sam, and then they all went down to Snowflake and lined up for soft ice cream. The weekends were great. With Sam there, Claire was off duty. She didn’t have to play lifeguard, chief tick-remover and bottle washer. They stayed on the beach until dark, swimming, flying kites, playing football. At twilight, with her family in front of her, Claire felt warm, equal to the moment. Watching Jake and Adam toss the ball back and forth with Sam, she held the kite strings and listened to the plastic wings flapping against the sky — the evening breeze and damp sand pulling her body tighter into itself.

  Back at the house all three boys showered together in the outside stall — in the “hot rain,” as Adam called it — and Claire waited jealously inside. She couldn’t strip off her bathing suit, fling it in the general direction of the clothesline, and mash herself into a flesh sandwich with the three of them. Nor could she line up in the backyard for a quick peeing contest — longest, farthest, fastest. But when the boys went to their new friends’ houses, when Claire and Sam came back from the beach alone, they stripped each other and, naked in the fading light, kissed against the picnic table, then stepped into the shower and did it right there where the neighbors, if they’d been interested, could have seen or at least listened. They showered and fucked and showered again and then wrapped themselves in beach towels still damp with sweat and tanning lotion.

  With the boys helping, Sam would light the grill and throw on something that had been soaking in marinade all day. From inside the kitchen, as she set the table and boiled water for corn, Claire could hear the sizzle and pop of searing flesh. And every night after dinner, Sam would take the boys out into the yard and make s’mores; they’d come back two shades tanner, faces flushed from the heat of the coals, with marshmallow, chocolate, and graham cracker crumbs glued in rings around their mouths, eyes bloodshot from the sun, salt water, and exhaustion. Claire would wipe their faces with a warm washcloth, squeeze toothpaste onto their toothbrushes, and stand with them in the bathroom, making sure the job got done. When he finished washing up, Adam would raise his arms into the air and Claire would lift his sweatshirt off, pull on his pajamas, tuck him into bed, and watch as he fell almost instantly into an effortless sleep.

  Near the end of the fourth week, when they were out for an after-dinner stroll, the couple next door, also out for a walk, asked when they were planning on leaving.

  “We’re not,” Sam said, looking at Claire. “Didn’t I tell you?”

  She shook her head.

  “I’ve been so busy I must’ve forgotten,” he said, teasing her. “The lease is signed, through May.”

  She hugged him. She kissed him. By the edge of the road, with the neighbors looking on, she slipped her tongue between his lips and flicked the roof of his mouth, the back of his throat, his one capped tooth. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you so much.”

  “I’m so jealous,” the neighbor’s wife said. “You’re so lucky — unbelievably lucky. We’re going back on Monday.”

  “I could stay here forever,” her husband said.

  “Well, maybe we’ll have dinner together one night in the city,” the wife called as they turned off into their driveway.

  “‘Night,” Sam said.

  “I love you so much,” Claire said to Sam.

  “Prove it.”

  “Come with me,” she said, leading him toward the beach.

  On the second day of September, Claire dragged her big suitcase out of the closet and carried it down to the car. She went through everyone’s things, tossed the essentials into a couple of small suitcases, arranged for the guy at the farmers’ market to take care of the cats, and unplugged the coffee maker.

  They backed out of the driveway, lightweight, almost unsteady. Sam drove down to the beach, and Adam got out of the car to say goodbye to the waves.

  “Why are we doing this if we’re coming back next week?” Jake asked.

  No one answered him. Sam took out the camera and finished off a roll of film with three shots of Adam pretending to kiss the sky, the sand, and the refreshment stand.

  Waiting for her in her office was a postcard from Jody. GREETINGS FROM LA was splashed across the front in multicolored script. On the back Jody had typed: “Survived the trip. Tomorrow am going to Frederick’s of Hollywood to buy school clothes. Hope vacation was good. More soon.” The card was still curved from being rolled through a typewriter.

  Claire immediately wrote back, using a postcard from the art museum in Easthampton: “Vacation great. Relaxed. Tan. Thinking of you.”

  After the brightness of the beach, the rich colors of the flowers in the yard, Claire’s office seemed dull. She bought four beautiful pillows made out of kilims: deep reds, oranges, and purples, meaty colors of substance. She’d had enough of the minimalist thing.

  Most of her patients came out of the summer frustrated in an encouraging way. They were determined to change, as if in the long light of August they’d seen themselves much more clearly. But as always, certain people seemed incapable of progress, and it was strangely reassuring to know that some things stayed the same no matter what. It gave Claire perspective and freedom.

  Claire’s patient Polly, the one Claire had taken for the abortion, came in and announced: “I’m pregnant again,” as if to say, What are you going to do now — have me sterilized? “My boyfriend came back.”

  Claire couldn’t respond. She sat in her chair trying not to do anything that could be read in any way. She wanted to make herself seem as flat as possible, neither positive nor negative.

  “And I’m getting married,” the girl said, piling it on like a fat woman ordering a banana split.

  Claire remained silent.

  “You’re disappointed in me, aren’t you? You think I couldn’t get married and be a decent mother if I tried. You think I’m too fucked up.”

  Who the hell am I to say, Claire thought to herself. Then again …

  “I don’t need your condescending bullshit,” the girl said. “My mother is happy we’re getting married. She’s having the wedding and everything, and you’re not invited.”

  Polly actually sounded like a six-year-old.

  “Are you happy?” Claire asked.

  “You just want me to be miserable to keep you in business.”

  “It sounds like you’re angry with me.”

  The girl didn’t answer. “Hey, you don’t owe me anything,” she finally said.

  It was a strange response. No one had mentioned debt.

  Do yourself a favor, Claire thought, and take a long walk. “Well, we’re out of time for today. Perhaps we can discuss this more thoroughly next week.”

  “Fuck next week,” the girl said.

  Fuck you, Claire thought. “Wednesday at three,” she said. “See you then.”

  She was changing. Until now, Claire had always been caught up in thinking of ways to punish herself, to make life more difficult. For the first time, she really had the sense that hers was a good life and it could be extraordinary. All she had to do was go and get it.

  As soon as they were back in New York, Claire started reading the real estate section of the New York Times, looking for houses. At first, mental circling was all she could do; it took her two weeks to work up to a nubby pencil, longer before she broke out a red pen; and it would be late October before she actually set foot inside any of the houses.

  In Amagansett, their winter neighbors were mostly homeowners who’d disappeared during the summer, going farther north where the living was cheaper, renting their houses for enormous amounts, earning a year’s worth of mortgage payments in the three short months of summer. They came back in September and spent the fall fixing up the houses, reshingling, adding dec
ks and extra rooms. Watching them was what got Claire really thinking about houses. She liked the idea of owning something.

  On weekends, out of the office, away from the city, Claire felt more than a little guilty. She didn’t argue when Sam had a car phone installed — he wanted to be reachable, whenever, wherever — and she was always checking her machine, making sure her patients hadn’t left emergency messages. She worried that she was inadvertently intimidating her patients into containing their problems between sessions: you are alone, the nightmare is true, no one will help you until next Tuesday at three.

  While Claire stayed inside the house, resting, watching the leaves change, Sam took the boys — equipped with wet suits — down to the beach, where they rode the waves until just before the first frost.

  For the first time in her children’s lives, she raked leaves. On a warm afternoon, the four of them worked their way around the house, sweeping the bright red and orange leaves into a huge pile, then took turns diving in. She went for walks with the women up the street and sat with them on the grass among the trees, not worrying about ruining her hundred-dollar skirts. She was returning to herself, becoming more herself than at any other time since she’d married Sam. She was making her life over, turning it into the one big life she’d been afraid to let herself have.

  In the beginning of October, Claire got a long letter from Jody, all about Los Angeles, school, her new friends, the internship working for a producer called Gary Marc — why does this man have two first names?

  As soon as Claire read the letter, she called Jody. They had a great conversation, lots of laughs. Even in Los Angeles, Jody was hers. She would always be hers.

  Almost immediately, Claire got into the habit of calling Jody once or twice a week in the middle of the afternoon, between patients, when she needed a laugh, a pick-me-up. On the phone Jody talked about things that maybe she wouldn’t have talked about in person, things that seemed easier for her to say with Claire twenty-four hundred miles away: nothing incredibly important, just basics — how Jody felt about herself, her family, about being alone in L.A., and how when you don’t know what’s in front of you, you become more attached to your past. Claire even gave Jody the number at the beach house. She didn’t know exactly why she wanted to be so available, so open, except that it felt perfectly natural.