Becoming the Butlers Page 6

  George’s studio was another large white room, but certainly not empty. Paintings were everywhere: stacked against the walls, leaning against doors, hidden in corners, lying face up on the white carpet, thrown in heaps and piles. Although I was aware of the room’s immense size, I still felt as though I could barely move without rubbing shoulders against the paint that would scratch like stucco, or without tripping over a still-damp canvas. In a way it was like George’s small bicycle room in the basement; he seemed to feel the need to cram his work into every available inch. I hadn’t forgotten the savagery of his art, the way he could use color like a weapon. You looked at his paintings and felt punched in the face. What did my mother think of such violence? And how did the white carpet stay so clean?

  “I’ve got to hand it to your dad,” George told me, seemingly more at ease among his work. “Never in a million years did I think he’d come all the way here. Just shows you can’t run far enough.”

  “George,” I began in a wavering voice, “your wife and children want you to come home. Mr. Oakes in 9C needs you too.”

  Mrs. Vasquez’s message seemed more ridiculous than ever. Why would George ever want his old job back? Here in Madrid he appeared already rich and on his way to being famous. Returning to his family was the decent thing to do, but maybe not the most advantageous. Back home everything had seemed so clear cut. Now I wasn’t sure what was right or wrong.

  “Mr. Oakes!” George declared. “I see you get your sense of humor from your father.”

  “No. That message is from your wife.”

  “Figures,” he grunted. The parrot followed us in and landed on George’s shoulder. He tickled the parrot’s throat, and the bird responded with cooing sighs of pleasure. “This is Mimi,” George told me. “The previous artist who lived here left this little girl behind. Mimi’s madly in love with your mother. She even knows how to recite her name. Come on Mimi,” he told the bird, clucking his tongue, “say Lizzie for us.”

  But the bird was not interested and flew off his shoulder with a squawk.

  “Mimi’s upset,” George explained. “Can’t stand it when Lizzie’s gone for more than an hour.”

  “Her name’s Elizabeth,” I told him.

  “Well she’s Lizzie to me and Mimi. Hey, can we just talk about something else for a moment?” George turned around and straightened a painting on a nearby easel. “You see, I still can’t figure out if I got this right or wrong. I think I’m going to call it ‘The Death Penalty.’”

  I looked at the canvas and saw five horizontal orange lines on a reddish black background, looking like smokestacks. In the upper right corner three wavy figures with fuzzy faces appeared to be screaming.

  “What do you see?” George asked. His fists were raised defensively as if his work were some sort of argument.

  “I guess smokestacks,” I told him.

  “Nothing else?”

  “Well maybe a man, like a scarecrow—dressed in another man’s clothes.”

  George’s mouth dropped open. “Really?” He bent over and peered into the painting. “That’s an amazing interpretation. Not mine though; I was hoping to portray the liberation of Spain after Franco, the rebirth of our country.”

  “Then why’s it called ‘The Death Penalty’?”

  “Very good question, Rachel,” George answered, nodding. “I guess I just like the sound of it.”

  “You’ve had her long enough, George. It’s not fair.”

  “I know it’s not fair, Rachel,” he said softly. “But fairness has nothing to do with it.”

  “Don’t you realize how much your family misses you?”

  George frowned for a second, and then leaned against one of the paintings. “You’re right, Rachel. Smokestacks. I better scratch the whole thing and start again. Marino downstairs is going to kill me. He thinks I’m the next Picasso or something, and keeps throwing money at me. It’s nice to have money for once. And I don’t even have to look down any clogged drains. I’m trying to be funny, Rachel. Boy, if looks could kill, I’d be buried three feet already. You don’t have to like me,” George said. “I’m not asking for your approval, just your acceptance. I’m here, and I’m not going anyplace.”

  I was terrified I would start bawling. The last thing I needed was my mother’s lover comforting me as I disintegrated into my usual blubbering self. Although I tried to detest George with all my soul, I still felt a little sorry for this man who would always look like a basement janitor.

  “Know what, Rachel? You look more like your dad now with that new blonde hair. What did he think of it?”

  “Hated it,” I answered reluctantly. “He even said Mom would sue him for criminal negligence.”

  “Hey! Something just crossed your face and I could have sworn it was a smile. Look, I’m hungry. Come into the kitchen and I’ll fix us both lunch.”

  He seemed eager to keep me shuffling from room to room, as if I would become confused by the change of location and forget my purpose. Although I was determined to remain stern with George, my stomach traitorously growled. When I caught up to him in the tidy white kitchen, he was already shaking a pan over a gas flame.

  “No one in the States knows how to make a good omelette,” George explained. “You’ve got to use whole milk, not skim, and just the right amount of sea salt and freshly ground pepper. The secret, Rachel, is the egg. The fresher the better, best just laid. You’ve got to bring that egg up to the light and look at the shell. The color is all-important. It can’t be too white or too beige, but, let’s say, pearl and chalk, with a little bit of cream. I guess that’s why I’m a painter,” George concluded. His face was bathed in sweat, and he concentrated on the omelette as if it had some special meaning. “I can’t stop thinking about color.”

  Although he was trying hard, I wasn’t going to let George off the hook that easily. “Didn’t you once think about the people you were leaving?”

  “All the time,” George answered, rubbing his forehead again. He closed his eyes and when he opened them, they looked shiny in the way hard candy gets when it’s stale. “Even though it was irresponsible, I had to give them up for your mother. I couldn’t keep both. That was the price I had to pay.”

  “How about my family,” I said. “My dad can’t stop drinking…”

  “That doesn’t seem new. According to Lizzie, James…”

  “Don’t call him that,” I interrupted.

  “You want me to say Mr. Harris?” George asked, turning to me. “Rachel, I’m not your super anymore.”

  Something sizzled behind us. George cursed softly as he grabbed the burning pan from the stove. “Here you go,” George said, sliding the omelette onto a plate. “A little well done but we don’t want any salmonella. Eat up while it’s hot. I also make great tea. What you need is really cold water and you can’t take the kettle off till it’s screaming.”

  Although the omelette smelled delicious, I made myself push the plate away.

  “I’m not hungry,” I told George.

  “Rachel, I know you hate me, but don’t hate my omelette. It’s a work of art.” George sat down and began to eat the omelette from my plate. “How old are you anyway?” he asked, peering at me through his heavy lids.

  “Almost fifteen.”

  “Isabel and I were sixteen when we got married. Her stepfather got her pregnant and she was ready to throw herself in the river. Sixteen-year-old pregnant girls in Mexico don’t stand a chance. I thought I was in love with her but I only felt sorry for her. She was so tragic and, though you can’t believe it now, beautiful.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” I asked coldly.

  “Because maybe it’ll help you to understand.”

  “Understand what?”

  “That I’m not such a monster. That someone who marries at sixteen doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing, and can’t help but hurt people when he realizes his mistake. That maybe your mom wasn’t so happy either.”

  “She was very happy,” I
insisted. “We all were, until you came around.”

  “Lizzie wasn’t happy, Rachel,” he said quietly. “Hell, why do you think she kept running away all the time?”

  “She just needed a breath of fresh air,” I said, hearing how hollow her explanation really sounded.

  “I know what she told you. I know what she told herself. If Lizzie loved your dad, maybe she could have stood up to his booze. She married him to get away from her parents. She was just a kid too.”

  “She did too love him,” I continued stubbornly. “He loves her and he won’t give her up.”

  “Well I could put up a damn good fight too,” George said menacingly. His hands curled up into fists and he waved the fork like a weapon. “But someone’s just going to get hurt. Let me try to explain to you what happened, Rachel. Your mother and I—now I know this sounds corny, but we both just got swept away.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, taking a fork and slicing some of the omelette. It occurred to me that if an outsider saw me sharing this plate with George, they might think we were father and daughter.

  “Swept away. Like being hit by a wave. Every time I was with your mother I had trouble breathing, and I felt as if I was almost drowning. No one and nothing else mattered. I remember once being stuck on the subway and thinking every second delayed is a second away from your mother…and I almost wept. I simply forgot about Isabel and the kids. You could walk into a room, speak to me, but I wouldn’t see you, and even if I answered, I still wouldn’t hear. Your mom felt the same way. She was the one who wanted to run away to Spain.”

  “She was the one!” I exclaimed. “I don’t believe it.”

  “I was willing to move out, never see her again, though God knows it would have killed me. But Lizzie found out...” George paused and looked away. “Never mind.”

  “What?!” I insisted.

  To my surprise George blushed. “Christ, I hate to be the one to tell you. Your dad doesn’t even know.”

  “I’m old enough,” I said in a steady voice.

  “I suppose we all are old enough. Lizzie was three months pregnant when she wanted to run away. I told her the baby was her decision, but she wanted to keep it. She’s seven months now; the baby is due in March. If it’s a girl, she wants to name her Rachel.”

  “Rachel,” I murmured. “It’s almost like having a second chance.” Then, shaking my head as if to clear what I just heard, I shouted, “You’re lying!”

  “I’m sorry, Rachel,” George told me. “Did you two think she’d come back to New York?”

  “Yes,” I admitted miserably.

  George took my hand and for a moment I let him hold it. His palm was coarse and warm and leathery, almost like a baseball mitt, and he squeezed tight as one hot tear spilled out of my eye. “I know it hurts,” he told me. “But I love her, Rachel. Your mother’s a miracle. I never thought a miracle would happen to someone like me. You shouldn’t have come all the way to Madrid. Poor Rachel,” he said, leaning over to get me a tissue. “Poor James. Poor all of us, really.”

  FIVE

  I didn’t cry on the way back to the hotel; I was way past crying. I had seen my mother and understood exactly what had happened. I never knew what the word ecstatic meant until I saw her face.

  After I left George I had gone over to a café directly across from their apartment building. Although the waiter was growing impatient with my one coffee order, I was determined to wait for my mother. I wasn’t too sure what I would do once I saw her. One plan was to rush out and stop her from entering her lover’s apartment, drop to my knees, and beg her to come home. Another scenario would be for me to publicly denounce her so that she would be the one to drop to her knees and beg forgiveness. What I hadn’t counted on was my mother looking so very pregnant.

  The café waiter in his poor English had made it clear to me that unless I ordered a meal I would have to leave. I was about to throw some change on the table when I noticed a woman in green crossing the street. This wasn’t any ordinary green but my mother’s favorite: a dark pine she called “New Hampshire Green.” My father labeled it “Girl Scout Green” and tried to get my mother to try purple, blue, orange, bright floral prints, and snappy plaids. No luck: my mother would only wear this color, and had to be persuaded in Reno to buy a pale ivory dress for her quickie wedding.

  I stood up and walked quickly to the railing. My mother wore a business suit, dark stockings, and even heels. She hadn’t been so dressed up for her own mother’s funeral. A shiny green raincoat was unbuttoned to reveal her swelling waist. If my father looked like a movie actor, my mother resembled one of those sprites you see on the labels of White Rock soda. My father even called her Peter Pan because she seemed ready at any moment to soar off into the sky.

  But now my mother was huge, and waddled more than walked. People let her pass, and women gave her knowing smiles. She would stop every few yards, and pat her stomach, as if signaling to the baby that everything was all right. Her face was sunburned too, and fleshier. She looked a lot like George. I wondered if all people who were deeply in love eventually came to resemble each other. I wasn’t worried she would see me. Her eyes were focused on her swollen belly, and I was nervous she might walk into a car.

  Yet her pregnancy wasn’t the only thing that shocked me. My mother had cut her hair, and it was now as short as a boy’s. She had been famous for long auburn hair that rippled past her shoulders like a glorious sunset. My father loved her hair, and loved to brush it for her. My mother would lean all the way down, the tips of her hair grazing the floor, and my father would count aloud after each stroke. When he reached fifty, he’d run his fingers through the silky shining strands like a prospector searching for gold. Cutting her hair seemed to me like a declaration of independence; a severance of her ties to the past. She was a new woman now, expecting a new man’s baby.

  Perhaps I could have accepted everything if my mother had only looked anxious, even a little unsure. But my mother positively glowed. She looked up into the waning sun as if challenging it to match her own warmth. She did not squint. I knew the color of her eyes when she was happy: a tawny yellowish-green which would glow as warmly as burnished copper.

  There was nothing I could say or do. At one point she walked so close to the café railing that I could have reached out and touched her arm. She wouldn’t have felt my hand. My father and I had become invisible. We couldn’t even be ghosts because she no longer had a past. The cool dusky air carried a whiff of her jasmine perfume, and I breathed deeply, determined to keep my only souvenir.

  George and I had exchanged oaths of silence. My mother would never learn about my visit, and James would never know that his wife was pregnant. Let him go home thinking he was a failure. My father could blame bad timing, bad luck, and still hope that one day she would be back. Mrs. Vasquez would continue going to Mass and lighting candles for her errant husband. I wasn’t being deceitful; only trying to protect everyone from the truth.

  I suddenly felt so exhausted that I dropped my head onto the table. The waiter rushed over, calling out in Spanish, and brought me a glass of water. I was so tired of looking for my mother and looking after my father. Someone should take care of me for a change.

  James wasn’t in his bedroom, and I instinctively knew to look for him in the Ritz bar. The room was more crowded at this hour, and at first I couldn’t find my father. Then I saw him, at the end of the counter, near where the bartender rang up change. He was half on and half off a stool, slumped over in a way that said, not only is this man drunk, but broken too. James was talking loudly to a short, bald bartender who was ignoring him. A group of men at a nearby table watched his routine and snickered among themselves. I gave them a dirty look as I sidled up to my father’s stool.

  “Hi,” I said cheerfully. “Did you have a nice nap?”

  Why did all drunks look like they desperately needed a shave? My father’s chin was covered with stubble.

  “There you are, Rachel, I was wonderi
ng what happened to you. I mean, how many postcards can you write?” James didn’t smell nice anymore, but stank of cigarettes and bad breath and booze. “Pablo,” he called out to the bartender. “This is my daughter. My wife named her Melody because she thinks she was conceived at Woodstock.”

  “I didn’t know that,” I exclaimed.

  “Well, you weren’t there, were you?” James looked terrible. I’ve seen my father in various stages of inebriation: swaying like a scarecrow in a storm, bouncing buoyantly as if balloons were attached to his limbs, even slithering on the carpet like a snake; but somehow this was worse. His face looked so puffed up that his eyes were no more than slits, and his lower lip looked swollen, as if he bit it or was punched. But no matter how smashed, my father was never incoherent. He spoke as directly as if he were giving a lecture, which is probably why he could, most of the time, get away with teaching Geometry drunk.

  “I was just telling Pablo here about Mr. Okito and our honeymoon in the Poconos. As I was saying, amigo…,” my father declared, not realizing that the bartender had walked away. “Here was this poor little lost Japanese man who ran after all the newlywed brides in our hotel. Seems that someone in Tokyo gave the erroneous advice that the prettiest girls in the United States could be found in the Poconos in June. Some goon nearly broke Okito’s arm because he asked his wife to dance. I took Okito aside and tried to make him understand exactly who all these very pretty ladies were. He was so mortified that he didn’t leave his room for three days straight. But he was very grateful for my help, and every fall, right around our wedding anniversary, he sent my wife and me the most beautiful fans from Japan.”

  My father paused, waiting for a response, and then slammed his right fist so hard on the table that the glasses shook. “So tell me, Pablo, why, last October ninth, no fans from Mr. Okito. How did he know, huh? Did Elizabeth write to him or something? Or was it some kind of Japanese ESP that told him this year nobody wanted to be reminded of any anniversaries?”