PULLING DOWN THE staircase to the attic takes less upper body strength than she expected—certainly less than Ben made it seem. Everything’s under a thick layer of spongy dust. Good thing she’s wearing a mask.
She paws through old-fashioned manila folders. Paper crumbs sprinkle out. At last, she finds a black-and-white notebook, a child’s composition book.
The pages are dimpled, thickly covered with old-fashioned handwriting. A neat, flowing cursive, with extra swirls on the lowercase j and a double flourish on the capital M. No one writes like that anymore.
The ink is an unusual color, a bold, garish peacock blue, only slightly faded with time.
Emma opens the book to the first page.
Rapunzel; or, The Girl in the Tower
ACT I, SCENE I.
THE YOUNG WOMAN is alone in an institutional bedroom. A theater poster on one wall. She sits on the edge of a neatly made bed.
Meanwhile. I was in over my head, in love with a world-famous actor. Mr. H.
And now I’m put out to pasture, in a loony bin run by a crazy doctor and his wife, their nasty staff, and a cast of bleary old theater types with red eyes and shaky hands. They look like they’re all auditioning to play Marley’s ghost in A Christmas Carol. I swear I can smell brimstone and hear chains clank when they line up for waffles at breakfast. My heart breaks for them, but I can’t watch them zombie-shuffling to their tables. I used to be so kindhearted! Maybe life is making me hard.
They feed us a lot of sugar. It helps the alcoholics. But I get a special diet, with more fruit and vegetables. Mr. H. is paying for every strawberry. I’ve lost weight. Everyone’s upset with me, though they try to hide it. They want me fat.
My real life seems far away, though in my mind, I’m still the hopeful ingénue who got off the bus from Cincinnati and walked toward Times Square. Bright lights! The Big Apple!
I did what all those girls do. I found a roommate, a temp job, a basement apartment with a view of passing shoes. I went out for auditions. And even after all the noes, even after the casting directors looking straight through me, I was happy.
Hundreds of talented girls read for My Fair Lady. They traveled miles to sing and dance and Cockney-accent their hearts out. Everyone who got called back imagined a miracle: She was up for Eliza Doolittle! Her—and not Julie Andrews!
It was a miracle. I was one of the lucky ones.
I was a Cockney market girl, singing “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” behind Julie Andrews. I’d been sprinkled with fairy dust, touched by a magic wand.
Everyone noticed the first time Mr. H. fixed me with that gaze.
One night in the chorus dressing room I found a note from Mr. H.: Meet me after the show for dinner. Everyone—even innocent me—knew what that meant.
Mistakes were made.
Probably it was my fault, because he was my first, and the truth is, I didn’t always know what exactly was going on down there.
I trusted Mr. H. to take care of it. He was such an organized person. So in control. He knew his lines before the first read through. He knew where babies came from—and how not to have them.
I wasn’t his first girl. He was married and had a steady girlfriend who was rumored to be ill. But I couldn’t help hoping I would be the last. What a stupid chicken clucking her way into the fox’s lair!
I suspected he’d got other girls in trouble. He was so calm when I told him. He had a plan.
I had to fake a drinking problem, so I’d need to go to a rest home. That’s what I’d tell the producers, not that anybody cared. I’d slur my words. I was an actress. Favors would be called in. He and the show would work it out.
He would pay for me to take the cure in Dr. Fogel’s Hideaway Home. He said the only reason I’d never heard of it was that I hadn’t been on Broadway that long. Welcome to show biz, doll! He called me “doll.” He called every woman “doll.”
I would have the baby at Hideaway Home, which had excellent doctors, and I’d come back cured. Delivered! The child would be adopted by a loving family. Hideaway Home would arrange it, everything perfectly legal. I could return to the show. No one had to know. Everyone and everything—Mr. H and me included—would take up where we’d left off.
A plan with a lot of holes in it. I see that only now.
THE YOUNG WOMAN touches her pregnant belly with both hands.
I was glad that another woman was present. Mrs. Fogel. It was supposed to be comforting, but she reminded me of the evil housekeeper in Rebecca, one of my favorite films. It was all straight out of Rebecca: the house, the secrets, the whispering in the halls.
Mrs. Fogel seemed kindly. But the minute Mr. H. left, her true self emerged.
EMMA CLOSES THE book. She can’t read any more. Why did this woman—there’s no name on the book, and Emma’s already thinking of her as Rapunzel—write this? Like a play. Maybe just to record it, to remember. Or to stay sane. Why does anyone keep a journal?
She doesn’t want to take the book downstairs. It belongs in the attic. She’ll come back. She’ll keep the mask and gloves.
AT FIRST BEN calls three times a day, then two, then one. He sounds cheerful, and Emma’s glad. He’s gone from wasting his day on the internet to being busy much of the time, but it’s—more or less—fine with Emma. She’s glad when he enjoys his work. He’s in a better mood, more patient and affectionate.
On the phone, Ben says, “Are you sure everything’s okay?’
“I went up to the attic.”
He told her not to, but she did. Fine. Let him know she doesn’t do exactly what he tells her. Remind him that she sometimes does the opposite of what he tells her. She’s not going to mention the book. Emma shouldn’t even be reading it. That poor girl didn’t write it for Ben—or for her.
“I wish you wouldn’t go up there,” he says. “I specifically asked you. Who knows what you’re breathing in. What are you doing up there?”
Why is that word specifically so annoying?
“I’m just looking at stuff. Old books. Diaries.”
“Diaries? My Former Life in the Bright Lights and How I Wound Up on the Skids, by Tipsy Ingénue.”
“Something like that.” Emma fake-laughs.
“Are you eating okay?” asks Ben.
“I thought I’d finally try out the stove.” Even with the go-ahead from JD, she’s been hesitant. “I’ll start with something simple. Maybe an omelet.”
She hears something in Ben’s silence. Is he worried that the old-fashioned stove might malfunction and burn down the house with Emma in it?
Whatever he’s thinking, he doesn’t say it. He’s not going to make more rules for her to break.
“Be careful. Call me later. And… bon appétit.”
“Thank you,” says Emma. “I love you.”
“I love you too,” says Ben.
“I miss you,” Emma says, but Ben has already hung up.
EMMA BUYS EGGS from a little farm stand where you take a carton of eggs and leave four dollars in a metal box. The honor system. That means there must not be a lot of recreational drug use around here, though at one of the last city parties she and Ben attended, an unkind friend—a former friend now—told them that Sullivan County was one big meth lab. Conversations like that were partly why Emma had left the city. She was tired of people saying mean, aggressive stuff they think is smart or cute or funny.
Before leaving the city, she wasn’t aware of making careful plans, but it turns out that she brought what she needs. A copper bowl, a whisk, a frying pan. Salt and pepper. Bingo!
She misses Ben. But they’ll enjoy lots of meals together. Anyway, she isn’t alone. She and Little Person are eating dinner. There will be many such nights, mother and child enjoying a quiet supper in the soft evening light while Dad works in the city and comes up as soon as he can.
She separates the whites from the yolks, beats the eggs before folding the mixture together. She’s read a new recipe online: The trick is to cook the omelet slowly, with a lid.
Suddenly she smells a harsh acrid odor. Something is burning. Dear God, she’s all alone here. Ben will never forgive her if the house burns down before they really move in.
After a few endless seconds, she finds a piece of paper on fire under the burner behind the one she’s using. She pulls it out from the metal grill and slaps her palm down on the black burning edges, singeing her hand but saving enough of the paper for her to be able to read it.
It’s an invoice.
Mid-Hudson Antiques and Auctioneers.
Vintage stove. $900.
It’s stamped: PAID IN FULL. But there is no name… no recipient.
Emma checks the date. The stove was bought only a week or so before she and Ben came up to see the house. Someone—Ben—ordered the stove and had it installed before that first visit.
Emma must have mentioned her obsession with the stove she coveted, and Ben was taking a gamble, surprising her with the stove of her dreams to help persuade her to buy the house. If it didn’t work, he hadn’t lost all that much.
But how strange of him not to mention it. Isn’t it normal to want credit for doing something nice? Maybe he was afraid it might make Emma feel manipulated by his playing on her desire for a vintage stove. It was sweet of him to remember. Most men don’t even listen. Ben not only heard her, he went to great trouble and expense to make her dream come true. And he’s too modest to want praise, or thanks, or appreciation.
If that’s how he wants it, she won’t let on that she’s found the receipt. She won’t mention it. But it bothers her. Maybe it’s just that she and Ben have always been so close, with no secrets, or none that she knows about. She hates keeping anything from him—even if it’s about a nice thing he’s done for her—secret.
Later, on the phone, she says, “I cooked dinner tonight.”
Once more she thinks she hears the slightest note of… anxiety in his voice.
“What did you make?”
“An omelet. Like I said.”
“And… how did the stove work?”
“Great, except that I burned myself a little.” She might as well tell him. He’ll be coming up tomorrow, and she has a bandage on her hand. She’s surprised by how much it still hurts. She called her doctor, who said take Tylenol, but she doesn’t have any, so she’s toughing it out.
“God, Emma. Be careful. How did you do it?”
“I… thought the handle on the pan would cool down sooner than it did. Stupid me. It wasn’t much of a burn. The stove’s awesome. The omelet was delicious. I wish you were here.”
“I do too,” says Ben.
RAPUNZEL. JUNE 1, 1957
Well, so much for seeing my life here as a play. It no longer seems like a fun drama. I’m writing this as a diary now—no one will ever read it. Dear Diary. For my eyes only. Read at your own risk.
Emma closes the notebook. Then she opens it again. She wants to know what happened to the woman with whom she has two big things in common. They are pregnant. They live in this house. Surely that counts for something. Emma will never tell anyone what she reads, not even Ben. She’ll keep this woman’s secrets.
Dear Diary,
Sorry I haven’t written. I haven’t been feeling well. I’ve been reluctant—afraid—to complain. That’s why I’m glad I have you. Someone to talk to, even if I’m talking to myself.
You’re talking to me, thinks Emma. She pities her. Abandoned by her lover, surrounded by cranky actors, a shady doctor (if he even was a doctor), and his creepy wife. How lucky it makes Emma feel, a nice husband, enough money, a house that’s going to be gorgeous. A baby she can love—and keep.
She reads on:
Morning sickness is now all-day sickness. Every day is like having the same bad dream. I wake up to find Mrs. Fogel standing by my bed, with crackers to help the nausea.
One morning she said, “I’m trying to find out if that’s your real voice. If someone wakes you from a deep sleep, if you’d still sound like bad-imitation Marilyn Monroe.”
“That’s my voice,” I said.
“You’re good at this,” said Mrs. Fogel. “You should have been an actress.”
Her dry soda crackers don’t help. They make it worse, and I practically knock Mrs. Fogel over as I race to the bathroom. She has no sympathy. She doesn’t try to hide it.
The Fogels seem to know I’m an orphan.
Tears spring to Emma’s eyes. She and the mysterious diarist—Rapunzel—have that in common, too. They’re orphans. Did she also lose both her parents at once in a car wreck?
I don’t remember telling Mr. H. about my family. I don’t remember him asking. I don’t remember him asking one thing about me, except whether whatever he was doing felt good. I always lied and said yes. I wasn’t going to tell him I was thinking of my high school boyfriend, who was cute, but who is married and laying wall-to-wall carpet in our old neighborhood. My first week in New York, I got drunk and called him, but his wife hung up on me.
The Fogels must know I have no one to stick up for me, no one to help me.
I sing to the baby. “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly.” As far as the baby knows, I am Julie Andrews.
Mrs. Fogel cooks for me. She’s a… passable cook. The others eat fairly well, since Dr. Fogel always says that nourishment is essential to the recovering body. Many people who come here have been living on a liquid diet. Hardly any meat is served. Supposedly for health reasons, but probably because they’re cheap.
I eat what I want. The problem is figuring out what I want. Lamb chops used to be a treat. That’s what I ordered the first (and last) time Mr. H. took me out to dinner. After that, we dined on sleazy hotel room service. Now the smell of lamb makes me sick.
I’ve been craving oranges. Mrs. Fogel makes sure I get them. She says, “The baby knows what the baby needs. Vitamin C.”
The other day, I ate seven oranges. But it’s hard to fill up on oranges. So, Mrs. Fogel serves me soggy fried chicken, lumpy mashed potatoes, chalky creamed spinach.
I like wandering through the narrow halls and huge public spaces, into the theater where they stage those ghastly talent shows every other week. Someone plays the piano badly, someone else croaks out a mediocre song from the mediocre musical that “made” their career. It’s eerie, like watching a talent show staged by ghosts.
The average age of the residents is about two hundred. My fellow guests have been drinking hard for years. Maybe they handled it better when they were young. Or maybe they got away with it because… they’re actors! They played sober until they aged out of the part.
It’s like boot camp. Even in the snow, Dr. and Mrs. Fogel lead us all—I’d say there are twenty residents here—on marches through the forest. The doctor is right about one thing: The forest in winter is a tonic, good for our bodies and souls. When I breathe in that crisp cold air, I forget Mr. H. and my worries about the baby. I feel glad to be alive.
I hate the counseling sessions with Dr. Fogel. All the residents have them. Mostly they talk about their careers, the standing ovations, the flops that drove them to drink. Dr. Fogel asks them about their childhoods and (the women, anyway) about their sex lives.
It’s different with me. Dr Fogel wants to know what Mr. H. is like in bed. Perverted personal questions. Did he do this to you? Did he do that to you? Very specific. I can sense him getting excited under his (probably phony) white medical coat. At least he doesn’t “examine” me. Maybe he knows I wouldn’t put up with it.
Emma turns the page.
Three reasons not to run away from Hideaway Home:
- Pregnant and no money.
- No friends.
- No family.
One plus one plus one equals three equals no place to go.
One morning, in the breakfast room, two old guys—Mr. Bergen and Mr. Leath—asked to sit at my table. They told me they wound up in Hideaway Home because they played Macbeth. The bad-luck role. They were drinking smuggled vodka in their fruit juice.
Another bad thing about this place is the Cold Spa, which I’m spared. I can hear them yelling when they’re plunged into a bathtub of ice. I can look out my window at ice dumped on the lawn at the end of Cold Spa day.
No one’s saying what will happen to the baby. If they know, they’re not telling me.
Sometimes I’m afraid they’ll steal the baby, and my child will grow up in a home full of Broadway drunks. If I have to, I’ll sneak the baby out. I’ll kidnap my own child.
EMMA PUTS DOWN the notebook. There’s only so much she can take. And there’s something about it that feels—superstitiously, she knows—unhealthy. Who was this unlucky young woman? There must be plenty of stories like hers. But this one happened here.
One afternoon Emma picks up the black-and-white composition book and a pamphlet falls out, an eggshell-blue examination book. She’d found books like that among her mother’s possessions when she died. She still has them somewhere, in storage. Maybe now that they have this big house, she can retrieve them. But why?
Her mother’s papers were mostly session notes in the neat script that grew smaller and shakier as she grew older. That was how Emma and her dad first knew something was wrong. Emma’s dad was driving her mom for a second opinion when their car got totaled.
Emma wishes she’d appreciated her mother more, even if her mother wasn’t always… maternal. Emma would give anything to have her here now, to talk about being pregnant. As a mental health professional (it always annoyed Emma when her mother called herself that), Mom might have something to say about a time when Hideaway Home was a treatment center for actors with substance problems. Her mother was never all that nice to her. Mom did nothing to build up her confidence. Her parents thought she was weak, and she’s never stopped showing them that they were wrong.
The writing in the exam book is the same as in the composition book, the same elaborate penmanship, the same overly bright peacock-blue ink.
Emma reads:
It’s crazy how humans are born. Crazy that a man and a woman can… do that… and then the woman builds a body out of her body and maybe a little of his. The first person who made the connection between sex and having a baby nine months later was a genius.
EMMA PAGES THROUGH the book with growing excitement. She’s read plenty of baby books: informative, reassuring, sometimes maddening, but this… this is what she thinks.
Emma could have written it. She’s pretty sure she’s said something more or less like this to Ben. It’s no accident that they bought this house, that she came up to this attic and found the journal.
It could have been written for her.
By her.
She’s reading the little blue book when she feels the baby stir inside her, a flutter so light that she can’t be sure if she imagined it. Then she feels it again. The baby is moving.
She edges closer to the dusty window, for light and air, though the window is curtained with spiderwebs and dead flies.
She looks out at the field behind the house.
She sees them again.
The girl and the baby. Standing in the field.