Modern Lovers (13 page)

A
ndrew was happiest when he was busy. Ever since the night of the party, he and Elizabeth had been great. It was as if she understood that he needed her to just be on his side, to support him, and he understood that she needed him to be present and supportive like always, and so they were. It didn't hurt that they were having sex more often—it wasn't quite back up to trying-to-conceive levels, which had been exhausting for both of them in the several years after Harry was born, when they were so intent on giving him a sibling, but it was good, really good for people who had been together for two decades. It was a part of their relationship that had always been satisfying, a gentle reminder that they still knew how to do things right. Not that Andrew actually knew how often anyone else had sex. He assumed that Elizabeth knew whenever Zoe or any of her close friends had an orgasm, that she got a text message automatically, but guys weren't like that, even guys like him.

Tuesday mornings were the guided-meditation group, Wednesdays were yoga, Thursdays were dharma talks, and Fridays were the cosmic trances. Andrew knew he probably wouldn't be able to go every week, not without giving Elizabeth some big, drawn-out explanation. He could invite her, maybe, but she might hate it or poke fun, and then he'd have to explain to Dave how his wife wasn't into getting
transcendental. Elizabeth had always been supportive of his various endeavors, but for now, he wanted to keep it to himself.

Most days, Andrew walked over after Elizabeth left for work. They'd set up a woodshop in the garage, and Andrew was building some bookshelves for the rooms upstairs. Dave would wander in and out, half dressed. Sometimes he looked like he'd just woken up, with tiny clusters of sleep still in the corners of his eyes, and sometimes he looked like he'd been up all night. They'd talk a bit, just one rung up from basic office watercooler chitchat. Lately Dave had been talking about a boat—a floating EVOLVEment.

“In the summer, it could be here in Brooklyn. Maybe docked next to the Brooklyn Bridge, where Bargemusic is, all decked out so the tourists want to know what's going on. And then in the winter, we sail south—Vieques, Saint Maarten, maybe.” Dave had his arms crossed over his bare chest. He had a patch of hair in between his pecs, a fleur-de-lis of brown curls.

“Do you sail?” Andrew asked. He was sanding a giant piece of wood, a shelf that would run the length of the main yoga room. He knew enough to do that—he was good with his hands. Dave had never asked if he was an expert craftsman. That wasn't the vibe—if you thought you could do it, you could do it. One of the young guys with short dreadlocks and a wide smile popped into the garage and said he had some tools in the trunk of his car, and he could help Andrew put the shelf up when he was done.

“When I was a kid,” Dave said. “Here and there. It's all muscle memory, though.” He tapped a finger against his temple. “It's all still here.”

“Me, too,” Andrew said. He didn't like to talk about his family, but it just came out. “I took sailing lessons every summer, near my parents' house on Long Island. We spent three days on land just tying and untying knots, before they even let us get our feet wet. I tried to teach my son, and he could not have been less interested.”

Dave laughed. “You're a real polymath, man, I love it.”

“I don't know about that,” Andrew said, “but I guess I've been able to do a lot of different things.”

“Did you do any racing?”

“Sailing races, you mean? No. In my father's fantasies, yes. He would have loved a good regatta trophy or two around the house, but I was never that kind of kid, not really. It was always a great disappointment to my parents that I was more interested in Buddhism than in country clubs.”

Dave made a sympathetic
mmm
. “You ever go to India?”

“Once, yeah, when I was nineteen.” Andrew put the sander down. He'd licked out a small groove by mistake, and the wood looked like a cresting wave. Dave didn't seem to notice. “I spent some time traveling around. Jaipur, Kerala.”

“Nice,” Dave said. “That's what I'm picturing—totally different vibe than the house. I want it to be
pink
, you know? Bright. Colorful. Like nothing else. And people could stay for a night, or maybe for a week, as it sailed around, doing treatments, working with our people. Like a floating retreat. EVOLVEBoat. BoatMENT? Not sure what it'd be called yet.”

“That sounds amazing,” Andrew said.

“I'm glad you're into it,” Dave said. “We should talk more about it later.” He clapped Andrew on the shoulder. “This is beautiful, man. Wabi-sabi, right?” He nodded at the piece of wood and turned back toward the main house.

“Right,” Andrew said. The garage was cool and quiet. There was some faint music coming from inside—he couldn't quite make out what it was. The Kinks? Big Star? A young couple came out of the back door with plates full of rinds and peels for the compost bin. Andrew gave a friendly salute, and they waved.

What did he look like, their dad? Their cool older brother? He really didn't know. When he and Elizabeth were in their garage, sitting
on their rickety wooden chairs, Andrew sometimes felt like a toothless old man in some Appalachian folk song. Elizabeth closed her eyes when she sang, and sometimes it made her look just like her mother, half-cocked on two glasses of chardonnay. Which was better than looking like his mother, whose face had been pulled back toward her ears so many times that it was a wonder she still had cheeks.

There were probably guides on the Internet for building a boat. Andrew could see it, the giant whalebones of the hull coming together beneath his hands. He wanted to make something that could take on the open water, something buoyant and beautiful.

W
eekday lunches were so boring that Ruby had started drawing a graphic novel about Bingo's secret life as a hairdresser in New Jersey. Eventually she stopped laughing at any of Jorge's jokes, and so he would just stare at her mournfully from behind the bar while muddling mint and squeezing oranges. Every time someone came in and wanted a table, Ruby would pretend to be from a different country. She was French, she was Japanese, she was Mexican. She thought at least one person would be offended and/or amused, but no one seemed to notice. Most of the customers were women in their thirties wearing clogs for no good reason, and so they were obviously not the most sophisticated audience for Ruby's performance art.

Her mum was in and out, bringing in flowers for the tables and boxes of dish soap from the trunk of the car. They were acting literally ridiculous, her parents. Ruby sometimes thought about sitting them down and explaining that all they had to do was act normal and that everything would be fine. Zoe was behaving like she was on Rumspringa on steroids, all cute outfits and glasses of rosé in the middle of the afternoon, and Jane was groaning like the Abominable Snowman. Ruby wouldn't want to be married to either of them, but that was their problem, not hers. At this point, what was the difference between being married and divorced? They still went over all the
Hyacinth stuff together. The only reason that the restaurant looked half decent was that Zoe had picked out every tile, every paint chip, every chair, every salt shaker. Running a marriage really couldn't be that different from running a restaurant. Whatever. Plus, being someone's parents meant that they would be linked for the rest of their lives anyway. There was no getting out, not really, and plus it didn't even seem like it was really that bad. Ruby had it much worse than they did. She was probably going to have to become an organic farmer or an exotic dancer, or something else that you only needed hands-on experience for, but hey, if they wanted to ignore her to focus on their own stupid problems, fine. She drew a hideous, glitzy ball gown like someone on
The Bachelor
would wear to get out of the limo and then added Bingo's head on top.

It was two forty-five p.m. They stopped seating for lunch at three. With only fifteen minutes left, Jorge would turn people away, and she could go home. Harry said he was going to pick her up, though, and so she was going to wait until he showed.

They'd hung out three times since the night at the house, twice just at night, on walks with Bingo, and once in the afternoon when Ruby's mothers were out. Harry was a quick learner. He seemed to know that the clitoris existed, even if he didn't know precisely where to look, and unlike some guys, he took instruction well, and wasn't offended when Ruby offered some tips. That was the one piece of sex advice her mum had given her—that it should feel good for her, too—and thank God.

It was easier in the relative dark, always. That way you could fumble around and touch a new body part without fully admitting that you wanted to.
Oh, was that me?
Oh, is that you?
Ruby liked to take off her clothes and watch Harry's eyes get enormous. No matter how dark it was, she could still see those giant circles, like in a cartoon. It was extremely gratifying. She drew a picture of him with flying saucers instead of eyeballs. The bell over the door rang, and Ruby looked up, expecting to see Harry.

Dust held his skateboard against his chest like a shield. Over his shoulder, on the sidewalk, Ruby could see Sarah Dinnerstein, her Whitman classmate and a fellow devotee of Dust and his army of church-step kids. Sarah had been pretty straitlaced until senior year, when she got her nose pierced and the inside of her lower lip tattooed with the word
LOVE
. People said she was on heroin, but mostly it seemed like she was on Nico, who, like Dust, had no real school affiliation and might have been twenty-five. No one knew for sure. In the fall, Sarah was going to Bennington. Ruby couldn't actually believe that Sarah Dinnerstein, who had four brain cells in her entire head, had gotten into college and she hadn't. The world wasn't fair. Sarah Dinnerstein had probably never had an orgasm. She probably thought female orgasms were a myth, like the Loch Ness Monster.

“What do you want?” Ruby asked.

“I come in peace,” Dust said. He leaned against the hostess stand. “Nico is having a thing today. All day, all night. We just came out to get some more drinks. Sarah wanted a Gatorade.”

Outside, Sarah was twirling around in the sunlight. She had heavy, babyish cheeks and a dress that was too short. “Jesus,” Ruby said. “Is she tripping?”

Dust licked his teeth. “Molly. You want some?”

The bell rang again. Harry did a double take at the sight of Dust but kept his head high, which made Ruby happy. “Hey,” Harry said, nodding at her.

“Hey,” Ruby said. She held out her fingers like a crab. Harry turned sideways to slide past Dust and let himself be pinched. Ruby slung her arm over Harry's shoulder, pulling him close. “So, maybe we'll come by, Dust.”

Dust raised an eyebrow. “Okay, man. You know where I'll be.” He dropped the board to the floor with a clatter, making Jorge jump. “Later.” He nudged the board out the door and did an ollie on the sidewalk, to Sarah Dinnerstein's great delight.

“We're not really going to a party with Dust, are we?” Harry asked.

Ruby shrugged. “I don't know. My friend Sarah is going. And Nico is cool.”

“Okay,” Harry said. “If you want to go, I'll go.”

Ruby slid off the stool. “Let's blow this pop stand.” She wanted to see if Harry's cheeks turned pink when she said the word “blow,” and they did.

•   •   •

D
espite having dated him for six months, Ruby had no idea where Dust lived, not really. His mom lived in Sunset Park, maybe, and his dad lived somewhere in Queens, but it was all sort of fuzzy. Nico, on the other hand, lived in a big house around the corner from Hyacinth, and she'd been there a hundred times. Nico's house was a semi-mythical place. His parents didn't exist. There weren't bags of lentils in the cupboard or eggs in the fridge. There weren't any photographs on the walls. The curtains were always closed. Harry was walking slowly, his hair falling in his eyes. Ruby brushed her hand against his arm.

“These dudes are not my friends,” Harry said. “I mean that specifically and also generally, you know, like in a philosophical sense.”

“They're not that bad,” Ruby said, even though they were actually worse than Harry could imagine. Ruby wasn't sure why she wanted to go to the party—it certainly wasn't to hang out with Sarah, whom she had never liked, and it also wasn't to make out with Dust, which is the only reason she would have gone before. It was definitely the most racially diverse social group she was a part of, which she liked. Everyone at Whitman was whiter shades of pale, as if all of them were in a competition to see who could be the most clueless about their own white privilege. The church-step kids were fuckups, but at least they weren't as bad as that. And she did enjoy the idea of making Dust
jealous, and she enjoyed the idea of showing Harry what her life was like, or at least what it had been like before. Now that she had graduated, everything seemed different—she wasn't a cool fuckup, she was maybe just a fuckup. Maybe she wanted to go because she was afraid that she and Dust were more similar than she thought. Maybe she wanted to go because she was afraid that Harry would get scared off and then she'd be left with Dust and Nico and Sarah, which is all she really deserved anyway.

There were a few kids smoking on the porch—Ruby knew them and waved. She reached for Harry's hand and entwined their fingers, even though holding hands in public was not something they'd done before. She looked back at him, and Harry smiled the way you smile at a YouTube video of a baby lion making friends with a baby porcupine, like you just can't believe how good the world can be. Ruby felt instantly guilty, but it was too late, and so they walked in.

D
r. Amelia was on vacation. Every other shrink in the world went away in August, but Dr. Amelia went away in July. Zoe had called three times and left messages, and finally Dr. Amelia called her back.

“Zoe,” she said. There were seagulls in the background. “I'm in Cape Cod. It's as pretty as a picture. It's the picture of health! What's up?”

Zoe was under the covers. Jane was at the restaurant, and Ruby was wherever Ruby went. She'd stopped trying to keep track when Ruby was fifteen and came home with a tattoo. She was a good girl, mostly, and Zoe trusted her. It was smart to give kids a little rope—that's what Oprah said. Of course, Oprah didn't have any children. Maybe she'd been talking about puppies. “Oh, nothing,” Zoe said. She felt her voice begin to waver.

“Jane called, too,” Dr. Amelia said. “I'll be home in three weeks, so why don't you guys come and see me then?”

“Okay,” Zoe said. She crawled downward, so that her head was closer to the foot of the bed, and collided with Bingo. “I was just hoping to talk for a minute, if that's okay.”

“What's on your mind?”

“How do you know when you should get a divorce? Do you have
some sort of chart? I thought I was sure, but I don't really know. You've seen us—what do you think?”

“You know I can't tell you whether to stay married or not, Zoe.” More seagulls.

Zoe closed her eyes and pictured Dr. Amelia in a bathing suit. It would be a colorful one-piece, maybe with a little skirt, the kind her grandmother used to wear. Dr. Amelia was probably wearing prescription sunglasses and a straw hat. Why
couldn't
she tell Zoe that? Everyone else was full of advice—Zoe's mother in Los Angeles, Zoe's aunts back in Michigan, people on the street. Why couldn't a therapist just give you a simple yes or no? Maybe Zoe needed a psychic instead, or one of those little paper fortune-tellers. Cootie-catchers. Yes or no.

“Are you renting, or with friends, or what?”

“You know I'm not going to tell you that, either.”

“How are the oysters?”

“Delicious.” Dr. Amelia exhaled heavily. “What's up, Zoe?”

“I think I'm good at my job,” Zoe said. She was trying not to cry. “And, you know, if we get divorced, will I have to find something else to do? I'm almost fifty.” The number scared her. Jane had turned fifty five years ago, and they'd had a giant party, and everyone had stayed up too late dancing. Ruby had fallen asleep on the bar, like a proper street urchin, little Brooklyn food-service Eloise. But when Zoe thought about her own birthday, which was still two years away, she wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Fifty was fine, but not if you were suddenly adrift. Fifty was fine only if you were in great shape and still got kissed at least once a day.

“You guys can sort out the business stuff after you sort out the marriage stuff. It doesn't have to all happen at once. No one is going to get excommunicated. One thing at a time. When was the last time you signed a really complicated contract? Divorce is a business, too.”

“But how do I know if that's really what I want?” Zoe was
whispering. She wanted to ask Elizabeth if she ever felt this way around Andrew, but saying the words out loud seemed cursed, like if you'd ever even thought them, if you'd let them pass through your brain and then lips, then your marriage was doomed. She didn't want to be doomed, and she didn't want to admit to Elizabeth that she was doomed.

“Do you love your wife?”

Zoe's ear and cheek were slick with sweat from the phone. “Of course I do. We have a daughter, we have a life. We just never have fun, you know? I feel like I have a roommate and I have to do her laundry. Sometimes when Jane kisses me, I forget that she's allowed to do that, like she's a homeless person on the bus or something.”

“Maybe you should try having some fun,” Dr. Amelia said.

Zoe wiped the sweat off her face. “Yeah,” she said. “Any suggestions?” She poked her head out of the covers, knocking Bingo onto the floor.

“When was the last time you went on a date?” Dr. Amelia said. “Maybe you need to kick the snow off your boots. Kick the tires. See if you can pump a little air into the bicycle.”

“I gotcha,” Zoe said. “We'll book an appointment when you're back. Thanks for calling. I'm sorry to bug you on your vacation.”

“That's what telephones are for. It's fine. You take care.” And then Dr. Amelia was gone, and Zoe and Bingo were alone in the house again. There was a thump downstairs, and Zoe called out “Hello?” but no one answered. The house had its own problems.