Becoming the Butlers Read online

  “Oh, of course,” I stammered, standing up as several letters slipped through my arms. The woman sighed as I stooped down to pick them up again. I always felt uncomfortable looking at the legs of people in wheelchairs; I think I even expected the useless limbs to do something insulting. People in wheelchairs never looked fat or thin to me, but just lumpy and gnarled. Although the woman was sitting upright with her chin held high, her arms seemed too short, like withering stems, her chest nearly concave in its flatness.

  “Careful now,” she chided. “We can’t forget the bills. Bonwit’s in particular gets nasty if you’re late.”

  This woman didn’t seem the type to frequent Bonwit Teller. Her round plain face, weathered by the sun, didn’t bear any makeup, and she wore no rings or necklaces or even a watch. She wore a simple light blue cotton dress, and if she hadn’t been in a wheelchair, I would have assumed she was a housekeeper.

  “Well, come in,” she told me, pressing a button on a box atop the left arm that made the chair’s rubber tires start to move. My grandmother had a broken-down contraption with stained canvas webbing and rusting arms; this machine seemed more like a remote-controlled toy car. The motor made a quiet humming sound, and the wheels moved soundlessly, only clicking when they stopped. I followed her in and placed the mail on a long marble table. To my surprise the apartment looked very much like our own; big, dark, and drafty, with stained wooden floors scuffed up with heel marks. Paint on the walls was peeling in places, and framed pictures hung at crooked angles. I could tell the furniture had once been elegant, but it was now worn and looked a bit like the chintz sofas and upholstered chairs you see in department-store ladies’ rooms. The only distinctive touch I could see was an old framed portrait of a stern-faced Colonial sort of man with a high collar and peaked triangular hat. His pale face, sharp cheekbones, and thin lips reminded me of Edwin.

  “Excuse me,” I asked the woman, “are Olivia and Edwin in?”

  “No, I’m afraid they’re not. But may I help you?”

  I hesitated, not sure I should confide in someone outside the family.

  “Have we met before?” she asked. “Olivia and Edwin so rarely bring their friends to the apartment.”

  “No,” I said. “Do you know when they’ll be back?”

  “I’m not sure. They never tell me their plans.”

  Maybe I should leave a message with their mother, I thought. She couldn’t be as intimidating as her children. I imagined her to be that type of society lady very involved with various philanthropies; knocking on Park Avenue doors for UNICEF, collecting old ball gowns and mink stoles for neighborhood thrift shops. Surely she would listen and accept my apology.

  “Is Mrs. Butler in?” I asked.

  The woman stared hard at me and blinked. Maybe this woman was a kooky relative—lots of rich families were chock-full of them.

  “I’m Mrs. Butler. Who are you?”

  This time I was the one who stared hard and blinked. The Butlers were supposed to be perfect; this woman in the wheelchair couldn’t be their mother. Where was the snappy Chanel blonde who lunched at Le Cirque? Still, Mrs. Butler’s infirmity filled me with the same relief as when I saw Edwin sweating: it took the shine off the family’s gloss, made them less exclusive, more attainable, within grasp. No one knew about Mrs. Butler. Like me, they had a secret about their mother.

  I looked around for a photograph of their father, hoping to see a remarkably handsome man. Those two couldn’t just pop out of nowhere. But there were no photographs to be found of either the father or the children. I looked at Mrs. Butler again. Her straight short hair was streaked with silver. Even my mother, who shunned cosmetics, refused to go gray. “Wrinkles you can’t do anything about, but this,” my mother would say, plucking a white hair with a tweezer, “is curable.” Mrs. Butler seemed comfortable with aging and I doubted she ever used any sort of skin cream. Laugh lines marked her eyes and mouth, and the skin of her chin was slack. I noticed that her two front teeth were a little crooked, but somehow they looked just right in her mouth. Her plainness comforted me. Maybe I had been intimidated too long by my father’s good looks. You could stare at this woman without hating yourself.

  “My name is Rachel Harris,” I began, looking down at my clenched hands, which were slowly turning white. “I broke into your daughter’s locker, and I’ve come to apologize.”

  “Well,” Mrs. Butler took a deep breath. “I certainly do know who you are.”

  “I’d like to explain why I did it.”

  Mrs. Butler didn’t answer, and for a moment I expected her to ring a bell which would summon a servant who would escort me to the elevator. I was about to walk to the front door when Mrs. Butler turned, swung around, and zipped down the hall. “Come, let’s have some tea,” she called, disappearing through a door.

  I followed her into the kitchen, a warm sunny room filled with hanging plants and at least five different wall calendars. The rectangular table held remnants of breakfast, and I guessed that the bowl of soggy Cheerios belonged to Edwin, and the half-eaten muffin with raspberry jam was Olivia’s.

  “This was brewed only an hour ago,” Mrs. Butler told me, lifting a kettle from the stove, “so it shouldn’t be too terrible.” She swiftly poured the brown liquid into two mugs and added two lumps of sugar. Her handicap didn’t seem to hinder her too much. I thanked Mrs. Butler and took a sip. The cold tea tasted vaguely metallic, and I tried hard not to wince.

  “Aren’t you hot in that hat and coat?”

  I unbuttoned my jacket and slowly slid off my beret. Mrs. Butler didn’t say anything when my hair tumbled over my shoulders, but I did notice she stirred her tea a little more briskly.

  “I see you’re staring at my wheelchair.”

  “Oh, not at all,” I said, hiding my flushed face behind the mug.

  “I believe it’s best to be up front with people in case they’re imagining awful things. A crippling childhood disease, for example. A car accident with a drunken driver. The explanation is very simple. I tripped on a rope on a dock in Nantucket, and landed the wrong way in the ocean. If it wasn’t for a nearby fishing boat, I would have drowned. It’s not that I don’t know how to swim…what’s wrong? Don’t you like tea?”

  “I shouldn’t be here,” I said miserably, putting my mug down. “Thank you, Mrs. Butler. I swear I won’t bother your family again.”

  “You’re not bothering me at all,” Mrs. Butler said, reaching over the table to touch my hand. “And I know you didn’t come all the way just to have tea with me, and pretty mediocre tea at that. I’m very curious to know why you broke into Olivia’s locker. She also told me you followed her into church one day, pretending to be her friend Monica. Olivia’s very angry with you, and Edwin was absolutely livid. I’ve never seen those two so overwrought. For a while there I thought nothing could faze them. I really should thank you. But enough from me. Please go on, I’m a good listener.”

  “Well,” I said hesitatingly, “I wanted to join your family.”

  “Join my family? But don’t you have your own?”

  “Yes. I mean no.” I took a deep breath and told Mrs. Butler everything: how my mother ran away with our super, the trip to Madrid and my meeting with George, my father’s drinking, and the arrival of the Vasquezes. Mrs. Butler didn’t say a word until I mentioned my vision at the skating rink.

  “But why Wollman?” she asked. “Olivia and Edwin only go skating at Rockefeller Center.”

  “See? I can’t do anything right,” I told her.

  “Yes you can.” Mrs. Butler’s cool dry hand rested gently on my wrist. “You came to see me, didn’t you? I just don’t understand why you had to break into Olivia’s locker in order to be her friend. There must have been an easier way.”

  “No, not with Olivia.”

  “It’s not easy being her mother, if that’s any consolation. And I have no idea how to become a Butler. When you find out, please let me know.”

  Mrs. Butler leaned over and pu
lled open a kitchen drawer. “I hope you don’t mind if I smoke,” she said, taking out a pack of Marlboros.

  “The same brand as my dad,” I told her. “I never thought you’d be a smoker too.”

  “I guess you didn’t think I’d be in a wheelchair either. Or look the way I do. I know I’m not what you expected.” Mrs. Butler struck a kitchen match against the table and lit her cigarette. “I’m not what my children expected. Sometimes I think the nurses switched both babies at the hospital. My husband’s no movie star either. I’ve gone through all the family photographs and there’s not one relative who could even be called cute. It’s as if those two fell off Mount Olympus.” Mrs. Butler inhaled so strongly that the red cigarette tip crackled and smoldered. She looked over her shoulder as she smoked, protectively cupping the cigarette with a palm. Her guilty and ashamed expression made her look years younger. Like Nicole, she turned her head to exhale. “I still feel like I’m a victim of a practical joke. One day a very ordinary-looking boy and girl will walk through the door and inform me that they’re my true children. Harris…” Mrs. Butler said thoughtfully, tapping the cigarette against her mug. “Your father wouldn’t happen to be a rather striking math teacher?”

  “How do you know?”

  “I seem to remember Olivia drooling about him over the phone. I’m curious to meet him, but of course I’m forbidden ever to enter the Winfield Academy.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s obvious, isn’t it? They’re ashamed of me. Even before my accident they never invited their friends over. But I doubt Olivia and Edwin have any close friends. Too risky. Like that boy in the plastic bubble: even a second of exposure could be fatal. They’re probably very lonely. So am I.”

  “But you have to be happy,” I insisted. “If you’re not, how can I—how can anyone hope…”

  “I think the best one could hope for is mutual respect,” Mrs. Butler told me, watching a spiral of smoke evaporate in the air. “And patience. Patience is so important. Oliver, my husband, didn’t have any patience. He believed my accident was intentional: As I already felt inadequate in comparison to such splendid-looking kids, I decided to make my metaphorical state reality. He’s a shrink, of course. He’s living with his receptionist in her god-awful apartment in Flushing. I think if he still lived on the Upper East Side the kids would consent to talk to him. But Flushing,” she said with a tight smile, “never. Such snobs. Luckily Oliver has loads of money and will keep paying for the apartment and the kids’ tuitions. Can you imagine if we had to move to Queens? Olivia and Edwin would perish instantly, like a pair of hothouse flowers.”

  A door slammed in the front hall. Mrs. Butler quickly stubbed out her cigarette and glanced at the clock. “They’re back,” she told me. “Don’t worry, they won’t bite. I’m still their mother and I’ll make sure they behave.”

  Mrs. Butler wheeled over to the stove and pretended to be busy as her daughter walked into the kitchen. A canvas bag brimming with heavy books swung from Olivia’s right shoulder, and she slouched in a lopsided, ponderous way, as if the books weren’t the only weight she had to carry. Olivia wore a butter-colored suede jacket, and a striped red and black scarf that trailed to her knees. Gold flashed from her ears, and silver bangles clattered from both wrists. Softly grunting to herself, Olivia leaned against the wall and struggled to take off her heavy boots. If she moved her eyes an inch, Olivia would be staring directly at me.

  “I knew these darn boots were a size too small,” Olivia mumbled. “But the guy wouldn’t believe me. Is there anything to eat? I’m starving.”

  Olivia lifted her eyes and I held my breath. She shook her head twice and would have lost her balance if she didn’t steady herself against the wall. “It’s you,” she exclaimed in wonder.

  The front door slammed again. “Mom,” I heard Edwin shout. “Did my shirts from the dry cleaners come back?” Edwin walked into the kitchen, his bright blue basketball jacket slung over his right shoulder. He looked pretty ragged, especially for Edwin Butler. His chin had broken out in small pimples, and his nose was raw and red. His shirt was wrinkled and an unruly cowlick stuck out to the left of his part, but his hair was still that lovely lemon color which made my mouth ache so. As our eyes met a streak of magenta moved up his face, starting from his neck to his cheeks and then his forehead. I felt so dizzy that I almost fell into a chair.

  “Do you know who this is?” he said, slowly turning to face his mother.

  “Yes, Rachel Harris. I believe she’s in Olivia’s class.”

  “This is the girl who broke into Olivia’s locker.”

  “And followed me into church,” Olivia added. “She’s a nut.”

  “A real crackpot,” Edwin declared, circling a finger around his ear. “She ought to be locked up. What is she doing here?”

  “She’s not crazy, only lonely,” Mrs. Butler said softly. “You two owe Rachel an apology. She’s my guest, and I won’t abide any discourtesy.”

  “Wha?!” Edwin shouted. “This girl practically committed a felony. Why don’t you invite Charles Manson while you’re at it?”

  “Edwin…,” Mrs. Butler said in a low steady voice.

  “I can’t believe this. All right then, if it makes you happy. I’m sorry, Rachel.”

  “Your turn, Olivia.”

  “Me? But why should I apologize? This girl stole my things!”

  “Rachel realizes it was a very silly thing to do. But you made it difficult for her.”

  “Difficult!” Olivia protested, rolling her eyes. “Was I supposed to leave my locker open so she could help herself?”

  “Granted,” her mother answered, “the theft was silly. But Rachel felt she had to go to extreme lengths to get your attention. Talk to her, Olivia. I think you’ll be able to forgive her.”

  Olivia turned stiffly toward me, her eyes averting my gaze. “I don’t know why I’m saying this, but I’m sorry, Rachel.”

  “And I’m sorry I stole your things,” I told her. “Your mother’s right. I did want your attention. And I did it in a very stupid way.”

  “But why?” Olivia asked, her voice now gentler. “I just don’t understand.”

  “Rachel wants to become a Butler,” her mother explained. “She wants to join our family since her own proved inadequate.”

  “Really?” Olivia asked, looking puzzled. She pulled out a chair and sat next to me. My idea obviously intrigued her. “How were you going to do it, Rachel?”

  “I wasn’t really sure. Once I thought I looked like a Butler, but it didn’t last too long.”

  “I knew you had your hair done at The Cutting Edge. Tom told me. He thought I was going into the movies.”

  “Were you hoping we’d adopt you?” Edwin asked reluctantly.

  “I guess. Now it seems such an impossible thing to wish. But it helped me.”

  “How?” Olivia asked, peering at me closely. Her eyes looked warmer, even green.

  “It helped me to deal with my father, and my mother, and all the craziness that’s happened this year.”

  “Cheaper than a shrink,” Mrs. Butler remarked.

  “Now if I could be anyone in the world,” Olivia announced, stretching out in the chair and propping her stockinged feet up on the table, “I’d be Barbra Streisand.”

  “Barbra Streisand?” her mother asked. “Why on earth…?”

  “I guess because she has a big nose and frizzy hair and can act rude and loud but still look beautiful. You see, she never has to try. She’d look beautiful slipping on a banana peel.”

  “How about you, Edwin?” Mrs. Butler said to her son, who was grimacing.

  “I don’t feel like playing this game.”

  “Just try.”

  Edwin shuffled his feet and cracked his knuckles.

  “Johnny Cash,” he admitted.

  “That’s who my friend Nicole wants to be too,” I told him.

  “Why Johnny Cash?” Mrs. Butler asked, her mouth open in amazement.

  “Bec
ause he could fall asleep in his clothes and wake up and go out looking like hell and not care that he didn’t brush his teeth or shower. He doesn’t have to say a word and everyone’s still impressed. And he’s always so sure. It must be great to be that sure all the time.” Edwin’s hand had somehow worked its way to his mouth and he nervously gnawed at a thumbnail. He really was a very insecure person. I wondered how many hours he had spent staring at a mirror, trying to figure out how to become Edwin Butler.

  “I only came to say I’m sorry,” I told the family. “I’ll go now.”

  “I’ll show you to the door,” Edwin said, moving toward me.

  “Good-bye, Rachel,” Mrs. Butler called out. “Thank you for coming.”

  “Thank you,” I told her. “I’m glad I met you.”

  “Surely you must have been disappointed,” she said, frowning.

  “No. Surprised. In a nice way.”

  Edwin wouldn’t look at me as we walked down the long hallway. I grabbed my beret and opened the door myself. “Bye now,” I murmured, heading over to the elevator. I rang the buzzer and tapped my foot nervously.

  “He’s deaf.”

  “Who?” I asked, surprised that Edwin was still watching from the door.

  “Simon. The elevator man. He lost his hearing aid. I’ll have to ring the doorman.”

  “Don’t bother,” I said quickly. “I’ll walk down the stairs.”

  I had opened the stairway door when I heard Edwin ask, “Rachel, do you still want to be one of us?”

  I stopped and looked at him. A shimmering piece of hair, like a golden leaf, had fallen in front of his right eye. I wanted to push it back and let my hand rest on his cheek.

  “I don’t think so,” I told him.

  “Oh,” he said quietly. “I liked the idea.”

  Then Edwin did something very strange. He wrapped his arms around his shoulders in a self-embrace, as if reassuring himself that he was still there. My answer seemed to threaten him, as if I were denying his very existence. The elevator abruptly swung open. “Simon,” Edwin said in surprise, dropping his arms. “I thought you wouldn’t hear the bell. Did you get a new hearing aid?”