12

“Susan, Maudey would like to see you.” Maudey’s secretary smiled briefly and scurried away, having done the dirty deed.

Susan rinsed her brushes slowly, pulling them through a rag so that they would dry pointed, capped several bottles of paint and said a soundless goodbye to the drawing board that seven months before had seemed a banquet table to her. She looked around her cork-­tiled wall, at the stats, (the Thanksgiving Meal was there, still lovely), the picture of Andrea and Lou on the Fire Island ferry (their first affluent summer), the print of Hopper’s “Sheridan Square Theater,” a photograph of an office party (Tara and she, in mirrored positions, the Tweedledee and Tweedle­dum of the art department).

She knew Maudey would handle the whole thing beautifully, as indeed she did.

Maudey’s office (the purposeful disarray, the needlepoint pillows always out of place, the horse photographs everywhere and just the right number of ribbons, displayed offhandedly) had briefly been something for Susan to strive for: if not an artist, she would be a power. Now it was another failure.

Maudey, behind her desk, smiled as Susan entered. Smiled and pushed backward away from the desk to assume a position of fraudulent ease.

“Come in, Susan,” she said, and Susan noticed with admiration the mixture of friendliness and sorrow in her voice. The burden of power.

“Sit down, dear.” And Susan, a child before the principal, obeyed.

It was done with amazing speed, considering how difficult it was for Maudey to let anyone go; indeed, the woman had postponed this inevitable meeting out of her own guilt and distaste for what she had to do, and her feelings for Susan. It was like turning on a friend, betraying a lover, disrespecting a parent. But Maudey was a pawn in the hands of others; she would regret this meeting deeply for a long time.

In five minutes, Susan was out.

Tara said nothing when Susan told her. She got up from her drawing board, painted a mustache on the woman she had been drawing (sweet but useless) and took Susan in her arms.

“Let’s go to lunch,” she said.

“It’s only eleven.”

“Fuck ’em.”

They went to a small Japanese restaurant in the west fifties, sandwiched between apartment houses, normally crowded but empty at that hour. The waiter, who had a feeble grasp of English, thought they were making a reservation for later, but then was convinced they meant to eat now. He showed them to a table in the rear, after looking around briefly, as if his line of vision was impaired by the many customers.

Then, after they had sipped their martinis for a moment, Tara said (with genuine sadness—the discrepancy between hers and Maudey’s was almost comical), “How long?”

“Two weeks, if I want them.”

“God, Susan, what am I going to do without you?”

“Just what you used to do, I guess—” and she saw that Tara had taken that the wrong way. “I’ll miss you, too.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“I will. Stop looking like that.”

Tara smiled faintly and went back to her martini. “Look, we’re not at the border of Russia with me emigrating to the new world. I still live in New York.”

“Sure, sure. So did Thelma Johnston.” Tara finished her drink and signaled the waiter.

“Who’s Thelma Johnston?” Susan hurried with hers.

“We used to work together at Fawcett. Un autre, s’il vous plaît.”

“Lunch?” The waiter, all teeth, grinned.

“Not till the buzz arrives. Two more,” she pointed at their empty glasses and he understood, hurrying away through the mob in his imagination.

“What happened to her?”

“Dunno. We had two ladies’ lunches and an evening at the ballet. You lose track, you know?”

“Not us, nitwit.”

“Says you. Honest, Susan—” and the gin and the moment were evident in her eyes—“what’s going to become of me without you? I’ll actually get some work done,” and then, grabbing her chest, “Jesus, I may even have to go to lunch with Gertrude! Garçon, make that a double.”

Their second martinis arrived (“Lunch now?” “Lunch later.” “I bring menus?” “You keep menus.”), and the mood flowed from restrained despair to unalloyed giddiness.

“. . . We’ll have to make you a care package,” Tara was saying as she plucked Susan’s olive away from her, “Magic Markers, brushes, pads . . .”

“Petty theft is the opiate of the white-­collar worker.”

“I’ll drink to that. Hey, you think you could get the Xerox in your purse?”

“Bit by bit. It might take a while, though.”

“Fine by me.”

“You think Maudey would get suspicious if I came back every day for, say, a year?”

“Fuck Maudey.”

“If nobody else wants to, why should I?”

They huddled.

“You think she’s gay?”

“That would be the least of her problems.”

“What do you think she does with that horse of hers? Have you noticed all the research material on Catherine the Great in her office?”

“Why?”

“Susan, everyone knows that Catherine the Great was trampled to death by a horse that she had mount her.”

“What?”

“Keep it to yourself.”

A third round of martinis found them suddenly tired and sullen. The waiter, weaving his way toward them, this time through filled tables, carried two menus with a look of such determination that Tara noticed it clear across the room.

“You hungry?” she asked.

“Nope.”

“Menus.” The waiter thrust one toward Tara, no teeth on display this time.

“I’ll have veal Parmesan,” she said, refusing it.

“What?”

“Veal Parmesan.”

“No veal Parmesan. Sushi, tempura . . .”

“Isn’t this an Italian restaurant?” Tara said, and the waiter looked to Susan for help.

“Sushi, tempura, sashimi . . .”

“Sorry—” and Tara stood up—“I never eat Chinese food.”

Susan walked Tara back to the office but didn’t enter the building with her.

“I’m going to play hookey,” she said, embracing her.

“When will we three meet again?”

“In the morning.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“Go quickly and don’t look back.”

Which is exactly what Susan did.

Walking home (it gave her an odd, pleasant sensation, not having to race home to her other job), Susan lingered in front of the window of Sam Goody’s, wondered who Kiss was, and whether Patti Page was old and fat (I saw the harbor lights, they only told me we were parting . . . ), bought a Sabrett (she was hungry, after all) and swam downstream through the packed school of executive salmon, all hurrying back to their offices to spawn corporate decisions. Like Maudey’s. (Fish gotta swim, Maudey gotta fire . . . ) She was aware that she was, if not precisely drunk, not capable of driving a tractor trailer at that moment. And certainly not capable of caring whether or not September’s Home Cooking had her pumpkin pie on its cover.

But she would miss Tara. Badly.

And Jennie? Jennie was back in Washington. She had gotten used to missing her years ago. (“Tara, meet Jennie, Jennie, Tara.”)

She crossed Fifty-­ninth Street against the light, (a cab materialized solely to berate her) and chose to finish her holiday by walking home through the park, the memory of her dead squirrel only subliminally advising against it.

The air, sweet, a hint of summer, added to the gin, and Susan found herself heading resolutely to the zoo; it had been years since it was a regular stop on Andrea’s outings (zoo, carousel, Rumpelmayer’s). Now that she was the mother of a sophisticated eight-­year-­old, the zoo, puppet shows, so many pleasures were out of bounds. But this time, on her holiday, the choice was hers, and the zoo was the choice.

The seals were the first stop, as always (start at the top and work down). There were three, one male, lazy and sluggish on the rocks, two females, careening through the water like torpedoes, surfacing to look amid the faces for their feeder, disappearing again. She remembered signing a petition years ago to stop the slaughter of seals; it gave her an odd feeling of belonging. The others standing around the fenced pool were tourists; she had a vested interest.

Then the gorilla, sitting with shriveled crossed legs, looking back at everyone as if he knew something they didn’t. He glanced at Susan and left the outside cage, hobbling inside, his naked rump held high, as if in derision.

The lioness did the same; took one lazy look at Susan and disappeared within.

And the cheetah.

It occurred to her (an amusing thought, nothing more) that she was downright unpopular with the animals today.

And then the antelopes, usually unresponsive to any but their own innermost thoughts, made the joke a worry. They were hobbling around their small enclosure (had she once also signed a petition to have the cement flooring ripped out?) when one sniffed the air, turned its head to stare at her (it wasn’t her imagination; it did look directly at her) and then, as if it had given an inaudible warning to the others, all hurried inside.

And Susan remembered the squirrel, so strangely fond of her, and the second squirrel, floating dead in the pool at the Frick.

She left the park and walked up Fifth Avenue, growing despondent. Animals have a sixth sense, or so many people said. What would Yuri make of it? Would he have a word for it? (“It’s not a portent of doom,” he would say. “What about the squirrel?” “A coincidence.” “And Jimmy?”)

At Seventy-­second Street, she turned east (it was a little after three), thinking she might walk up Madison and look in the gallery windows to dispel what was fast becoming a foul mood.

It worked, as always. The new artists were clever, several enormously so, but nowhere in her reactions was that special thrill of spotting a genius, a voice. But they were clever, damn them.

She wandered on, feeling a mixture of jealousy and condescension, trying to be kind, failing, until she reached Eighty-­sixth Street, crowded with shoppers and schoolchildren. She glanced at her watch; a little after four. Andrea would already be home, ignored by Mrs. Diamond. She remembered her own afternoons at home with her mother, and hurried to a crosstown bus and her daughter.

“Can you be home tomorrow morning?” Lou asked over dinner. “They’re going to install the phone.” He purposely avoided looking at Susan.

“I can be home permanently.” She turned to Andrea. “Eat a few beets, honey. They’re good for you.”

“Don’t like beets.”

“I know, but eat a few, anyway.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” And Lou continued to look at his plate.

“I’ve been fired,” was all that she said.

“They taste awful.”

“I know but they have vitamins in them.”

“I take vitamins in the morning.”

“And some at night, too. Come on,” and she spooned a beet into her daughter’s unwilling mouth. “Chew it, Andrea. It won’t dissolve.”

“How come?” Lou finally looked at her.

What to answer? Susan loathed telling him the real reason: that she was fighting an evil force (alone, with no help from anyone, including him), and that left little time for things as dispensable as jobs. No, that answer would only lead to a hurt silence and, inevitably, to an argument.

“Hard times,” she said (nothing more would be necessary at this moment, in a world filled with them).

“I’m sorry,” he said but he didn’t look it. “Do you mind?”

“Not really. Andrea, chew already.”

They didn’t speak of it again and Susan, angry, spiteful (rightfully so), pretended she had forgotten to get dessert and left the eclairs in the refrigerator, where no one ever went without first asking her to fetch whatever it was they wanted. She would have hers later, alone.

The evening weighed heavily on her; Lou sat in the kitchen going over a movie contract (“Let him see the eclairs. I hope he sees them”), and Andrea settled down, as always, before the television set, having begged to be allowed to stay up late and see a science fiction movie on Home Box Office (the price: three beets).

Susan, in the bedroom, moved the single night table to Lou’s side of the bed (where the intruder, the phone, would sit), tried to read, gave it up, and took a hot bath.

As she lay there in the hot water, drifting, counting her disappointments (her mother had warned her against that, possibly because it usurped her position as court complainer), Susan’s mind went back to other, better times.

They were in Florence, she and Lou, walking on the Ponte Vecchio, arms around each other, in shirtsleeves and jeans, looking young and American and cocky, reveling in their love and faultless future. What incredible power had brought the two of them (just the perfect two) together? Lou could finish her every sentence; she could sense his moods before they were fully on him.

They strolled up the Arno, making jokes in broken Italian, pinching each other’s bottoms (they were still not used to each other’s bodies after two years of marriage) being honestly, frantically in love. And then they went back to the pensione, and Lou was inside her, taking her, owning her, being her.

Lying there in the water, she thought of Jennie. Jennie, who might never know what it was like to be loved like that. (“If you know a nice single man for Jennie, don’t be bashful about telling her.”) But then, of course, she was being foolish. Jennie might have known it many times. Just because she was single didn’t mean she was always alone. Things change. Lovers change. They sit at kitchen tables reading contracts, withholding themselves, forgetting intimacy, forgetting you.

Once more filled with self-­pity, Susan left Florence, (the Arno, like her bath water, ended up in a sewer) and toweled herself dry. She wiped the mist from the medicine-­chest mirror and took a harsh look at herself. She had been pretty, almost beautiful, a little while ago. She was still attractive (smart eyes, her father had always said), but middle age was there around the eyes, coming out at the corners of her mouth. (Was her nose larger, or was that only an imagined Jewish fear?)

She put on a robe and went into the bedroom, noticing, almost with surprise, that the night table was on the wrong side of the bed. And its clock read quarter after ten.

Way past Andrea’s bedtime.

“Oh, my God, are you still up?” she said (of course she’d still be up; had they kissed goodnight?), entering the living room where Andrea was sitting much too close to the set. (“Honey, it’s bad for your eyes,” was virtually a nightly chant.)

“A few minutes more, Mommy!” This said with desperation.

“All right, but only a few.”

She settled down on the couch, drawing Andrea away from the set, closer to her. She listened for the sound of the refrigerator door being opened in the kitchen but heard nothing.

On the set, what appeared to be a spaceship (her jargon; Andrea, quite properly, called them space vehicles) was moving through what appeared to be space (this was the new art, special effects; was everything about her obsolete?) at a dizzying speed. All hands seemed frantic (the usual frenzy of actors trying not to smile). Susan watched, attentive for a moment (that was her usual endurance for space vehicles) and admired one of the young actors (no doubt a surfer between film commitments). And then the ship (vehicle, damn) careened toward something out there in the starry blackness, something large and without stars, totally black, circular, ominous, magnetic. Too late Susan recognized it as a black hole—she had seen the coming attractions for the film, hated it on sight. Instinctively, she knew she was watching something important, something with great meaning for her, to her. Transfixed, she stared at the television set (heart beating faster now, mouth drying so quickly she could feel it). The ship moved closer to the dreadful thing, being sucked in by it, no chance of getting away now, either the actors or her. Then they plunged (and her with them) into the thing, down into its special-­effects void, through concentric circles of blackness, going round and round, dizzy (she was perspiring), faster, through circle after circle, screen a jumble of blurred faces and blackness, breathless, frozen in time, round and round and . . .

Susan looked away from the screen, aware that she was virtually panting.

What was it? What was this thing that was happening to her?

And her eyes sought it out again.

They had gone through the black hole and emerged somewhere else.

A figure, too squared-­off to be a man, too humanoid to be anything else, was standing atop a craggy hill. There were other hills in the distance. All demented. Deformed. Like nothing in this world. And there were flames rising up between them, a mist of smoke and ash, an air so thick and dense it defied breathing.

It was hell.

She was watching hell. An artist’s hell but hell nonetheless.

And suddenly, wretchedly, assuredly, she knew where her phone calls were coming from.