The Worst Kind of Want Page 3

  “A little aged, but then, we’re all older now. We’re going out to dinner pretty soon.”

  He laughs again. “Ah, Italian eating hours. Lucky girl. You’ll come home big as a house.”

  “Like you can talk,” I tease.

  This makes him laugh harder, the deep self-assured boom of a man who’s done well for himself. He’ll never make it as a writer, Dad used to say, but man, can that boy talk.

  Guy was my first everything. Limb to limb, sweat to sweat, every crevice explored. He only had to peer at my bare legs and I knew how it would end—in my parents’ bed when they were away, in the backyard, the back of his car, once on a studio jet. Everywhere. In my twenties he took me out to clubs, to gaudy, expensive restaurants, which dazzled me at the time. He liked to show me off, I think. But over the years the sex changed, became more caressing, more patient. In my thirties I thought he would finally propose. I thought, Enough of this charade, make it official. At the very least, Stop messing around with those puerile wannabe actresses, and let’s be exclusive. It was like that, my entire thirties. Waiting.

  “Did you go by the house?” I ask.

  “Yes, and I got the estimate from the exterminator. I don’t know why you want to sell. You won’t be able to find anything like it. Not to mention your mom will never let you do it.”

  I ignore him and pull up the calendar on my laptop, note the price and day the exterminator can tent the house. I ask if I need to call, or if Guy can handle it for me.

  “Mom is going to have to accept how things are,” I tell him. “Having a split-level beach house when you’re using a walker isn’t feasible.”

  It wasn’t until I was living there alone that the idea of selling became appealing. A house empty of people is not the same thing as an empty house. It is filled with ghosts. Mom’s stuff overflowing her walk-in closet, Dad’s collection of glassware undusted in the living room—what once was Chanel No. 5 and Nat Sherman cigarettes is now the chalky whiff of dust, the musty smell of mildew. And Emily—in her porcelain urn on the living room mantel, blocking the view of the Pacific. At night it takes on a bluish hue from the moon, as if glowing from within.

  “Why don’t you remodel, and then rent out one of the floors as a guesthouse? You know if you sell, it’ll be torn down. They’ll build one of those mega-mansions.”

  I bite my lip. I wouldn’t be able stand that, and Guy knows it. Before Mom’s fall I had been making progress in the garden. Pinching and pruning, removing the spent flowers from the globe mallow, trying to untangle the mess of honeysuckle vines, cutting back the lavender and sprays of purple sage. It might have been enough. To have my own garden. At least, that’s what I like to think.

  “Besides, where will you go? Anywhere other than LA and you’ll be all alone.”

  “Please,” I say, getting up to turn the A/C higher. “Let’s talk about something else.”

  He clears his throat. “Actually, I did want to talk to you about something.”

  I imagine Guy settling into a broad leather couch. He never sits at a desk, always the couch, where there is room for two. Knees apart, leaning back slightly so his belt buckle catches the light. Like the starting point on a map. YOU ARE HERE.

  I feel a flush creeping into my cheeks. My hair is sticking to my neck. This bloom of heat has been happening more and more. I don’t like to think of what it means. Instead I try to picture Guy. He isn’t unattractive. Average height, with salt-and-pepper hair cut military short, strong features but a weak round chin. I’ve always been partial to his eyes, which are blue like the bottom of a pool in summer, the corners tilting down making him look a little like Bogart.

  “It’s about Trudy,” he’s saying. Heat explodes at her name and I am on fire. “I know, I know, you advised against casting her.” He starts listing how wonderful she was in her last guest-starring role, how he thinks she’s the next real thing.

  “I think I advised against casting with your dick,” I snap.

  Immediately I’m frustrated with myself for getting upset. I get up, pulling my top off, and push the window open. I feel my nipples harden under my bra from the sudden gust of warm air. I take a deep steadying breath. “I’m sorry, I’m just looking out for your production, like any producer would.”

  He doesn’t remind me that I am not actually on the project, only a trusted confidant. And if I want to remain so, I’ll give him what he’s asking for, which is my approval.

  I hear him shift, the leather beneath him groaning. “I don’t care if it’s a small role,” he says. “No, I do, it needs to have lines. She wants to have lines.”

  I had dinner with them the night before I flew out. Trudy, rail thin and young—they’re always young. If I squinted she looked like all the others. Dripping in newly bought couture, from Guy, I’m sure. It had been the same when I was her age—but could I have ever been that young? Baby fat still in the cheeks, her fur coat slipping from one shoulder, exposing dewy skin. I had kept my cardigan on, even though it was a warm night, even though I’ve always been rigorous in my workouts: Pilates and cycling, an occasional boot camp if I can get away from Mom. My arms are nothing to be ashamed of, is what I’m saying. But skin changes after forty. It doesn’t matter if I eat right or buy the expensive creams. Little bumps, unsightly moles, skin tags. Burn it, slice it, get it off. But it’s never the same, it’s never how it used to be.

  “Why ask my opinion anyway?” I get up to pour water from a pitcher Hannah or Paul has left on the dresser, the ice already melted. “I’ve been out of the business too long.”

  “Don’t start that,” he says. “When you’re ready, there’s a job for you. I’ve always said that. I owe your family a lot.”

  You owe me a lot, I think. But don’t say it. I never say it. He promises to continue visiting my mom, and to call this weekend. I make a kiss-kiss sound before hanging up, telling him to give my love to Trudy. We both know it’s insincere, but this is how it is between us.

  It’s not yet seven, the light over the buildings is gray and balmy. Somewhere someone is smoking, I can smell it. But then there is Donato, standing below in the shadowed courtyard. I recognize the mop of unruly curls. Someone joins him. I squint against the fading light—I know that linen dress, the blond hair. I step back when she looks up. When I peer out again, she’s taken his cigarette. He steps closer to her—is that her giggle? But it’s lost in the surrounding city noise. A trash truck, glass bottles dropping, a dog barking, somewhere music is playing. And then she’s handing the cigarette to Donato, who puts it between his lips and watches her dash inside. He catches me then, a quick glance up, the ember of his cigarette sparking bright red.

  * * *

  I have a hard time sleeping, the dim light plays tricks on me. There is a flapping of wings, flashes of shadow along the wall. More than once I jerk awake to an empty room, the hum of medical equipment replaced with the buzz of cicadas. Starlings cry out somewhere in the city, like shrieking children. Downstairs, tableware clatters onto the kitchen floor. When I do drift off, it’s a deep sleep, and Emily is there. She is thirty-nine, skin alabaster white, so unlike my own, which is tawny and freckled. She’s running into the ocean by our house. I can see her long, lean back, the flare of her hips and buttocks, the slender curved legs—bowlegged—something she was insecure about, which cut her modeling career short. The ocean is not blue, but black, with froth as white as her skin. And it consumes my sister, just eats her up. Then she’s gone, and I wake in a puddle of my own sweat.

  When I come downstairs, we’re already running late for our reservation, and Tonio, Donato’s father, doesn’t arrive until we are about to leave without him.

  “Research,” Paul tells me. “We are onto something big.”

  Tonio says several things in Italian, his sentences running together, his hand running absently over his neatly trimmed silvery beard. “Sorry,” he says to me, smiling a little. “I will try to speak in English.”

  He’s much older than his w
ife, Marie, who must be in her thirties. He has a solid, broad frame, and is even darker than Donato, who is olive-skinned like his mother. They look nothing alike—although when Tonio turns in profile to greet his son, and they are side by side, there is the same jaw, a similar squareness in the shoulders. A hint of the man Donato may grow into.

  Outside, the streets are pulsing with energy. It rained while I slept, and the whole city glistens. That tingle of excitement returns. There are people everywhere. The men in expensive khakis and linen jackets mop their foreheads, while trying to attend to their dates, whose heels keep slipping on the slick cobblestone street. Tour groups strain to keep from getting separated. Students crowd the cafés and bars, music spilling out onto the street. Old people sit on their balconies, fanning themselves slowly. Taxis and mopeds attempt to push through the foot traffic. A cyclist with a glaring headlamp races by.

  Marie walks with her son, oblivious to the commotion. They are arm in arm, she is almost the perfect height to rest her head on his shoulder. Even in tortoiseshell glasses, her thick hair pulled up in a chignon, she looks very young. She’s dressed conservatively, a mid-length, pale yellow dress with a linen shawl wrapped around her shoulders. I walk with them, only so I don’t have to try to keep up with Tonio and Paul, who are ahead of us, deep in conversation.

  “Did you have a nice rest?” Donato asks me.

  I have not shaken the feeling of sleep, and with the gas lamps flickering along the stone walls and narrow streets, the scent of rain somewhere in the distance, I could be dreaming still. It’s as if Rome wants to win the part of Ancient City. Just the slant of the trees seems artificial, like props in a diorama. And then the stone walls and arches and roads all there to evoke poetic tragedy. It reminds me of a carefully curated head shot of a woman made to look like the girl next door, or the seductress, or whatever the part demanded.

  “It was a very long flight,” I say. “I think I could have slept for a week.”

  He pulls me toward him, just in time. A moped speeds by.

  “Are you all right?” Marie says to me. Donato yells after the driver in Italian, still holding my arm.

  We turn down a walkway so crowded that Marie is forced to let go of her son. We walk in single file past street peddlers who offer us purses and toys and cheap souvenirs. I pass a hunk of meat slowly rotating on a spit; the smell is thick and earthy. I’ve slowed to watch a man carefully shave off thin slices—the knife cutting right through, severing it as if it were a tender limb.

  “Sorry,” Donato says, bumping into me.

  I smile at him, which makes him smile too.

  “Stay close,” he says. “There are pickpockets.”

  “I’ve read that, is it true?”

  “When my friends and I were younger, we used to pick tourists’ pockets for fun, just so they know whose city they are in.” His smile has changed, an eyebrow has gone up, he looks sideways at me to see if I believe this.

  “You’re messing with me,” I say.

  It’s the first time I hear him laugh, openmouthed and unabashed.

  “Guess you will never know.”

  He’s so young and confident that something inside me bristles. I’d like to see him bend, if only a little, and I remember what Hannah told me.

  “You know, with that profile you could be an actor.”

  He stops laughing. “You think so?” He turns so I can admire his broad nose and chin; his ink-black hair, curly like his mother’s. I wish I hadn’t said it, because I realize it’s true. He is handsome yet boyish, infuriatingly so. The studios would love him.

  He lets out that laugh again, only this one isn’t at my expense. “Hollywood,” he says, blushing a little. “I’ve always wanted to go.” He casts a furtive glance toward his parents, who are a few steps ahead of us. “My parents would not like it.”

  I shrug. “Well, you’ve got that special something.”

  He’s so pleased that when we catch up to his mother he gives her one arm, and me the other.

  A group of boys are waiting for him outside the restaurant. All of them in stylish suit coats, deep V-neck T-shirts, hair immaculate, slick and shining. Donato breaks from his mother and me and joins them. There’s an eruption of boyish energy, of handshakes and laughing and cigarette lighting.

  “They are going to Club Fluid,” Marie tells me. “One of his friends is co-owner.” Donato jogs back to us. He bends to kiss his mother goodbye, tossing me a wink before rejoining his friends.

  At dinner Paul orders the fried artichokes and a tahini plate to start, with a bottle of Verdicchio, later a bottle of red with the pasta and meat dishes—ravioli with meat sauce, baked lamb and potatoes, Amatriciana alla giudia. “You’re in for a treat,” he tells me. “Best in Rome, they use salted beef instead of guanciale.”

  The conversation is limp, boring. Tonio asks how my flight was, then Paul inquires what airline miles card I use. Marie suggests I switch to this other credit card, telling me how much they’ve saved. The waiter keeps refilling my wineglass. We are seated next to the open window, thank goodness. There is a warm, gentle wind, blowing the thunderclouds out. I think of Donato and his friends at Club Fluid. I can picture the lighting, the dancing—girls will flock to them, I’m sure. When Donato had taken my arm, I caught a smell of aftershave. But his face was so smooth, shaving would be unnecessary. For a moment, I’d wanted to inspect him closer, run my fingers over his cheeks, along his jaw.

  “Are you feeling okay?” Paul asks. Marie and Tonio are looking at me. “You look a little flushed.”

  I realize I’ve started to sweat under my arms—I feel it drip onto my stomach. My hands are bright red. “It’s warm in here, is all.” I’m having trouble slipping my cardigan off, Paul helps me with it.

  “Maybe you’re allergic to sulfates,” he suggests.

  The waiter comes over and opens the window wider. The city smells dank, like compost, like the decomposing of something rich and fertile, layers and layers and layers of it.

  “What was I saying?” I pause to sip my ice water. I’ve lost the thread of my story. I had been telling Marie and Tonio about Emily and Paul’s wedding. “Well, it was gorgeous.” I smile at Marie. “The prettiest wedding I’ve been to. It was at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Marilyn Monroe once lived in one of the bungalows.”

  Marie sighs, touches her hand to her chest.

  I leave out how dazzling my sister had been in Vera Wang, her creamy white skin, those deep blue eyes, the blond curl that had escaped from her updo and rested on her cheek. Friends, distant relatives, neighbors, colleagues—my mother invited everyone. I think she wanted them to see how Emily had bounced back, that a celebrated academic obviously adored her. I remember Paul’s small gasp when she appeared in her wedding dress. It wasn’t loud, I might have been the only one to hear it, everyone else was paying attention to the bride. But I heard the sharp intake of breath, saw how he pressed his lips tight, trying not to cry. One untrimmed nose hair waving haphazardly with each inhalation.

  He makes me laugh, my sister said when I asked what it was that had attracted her to him. And he loves me. At her urging he left Oxford for a university in Irvine; they bought a house in San Clemente near a stretch of beach my sister had always liked. He took a leave of absence when she got sick that first time. Driving her to chemo and doctor appointments, taking care of Hannah, who was only a toddler then. And when she was declared in remission they went on a celebratory trip to France. Mom framed the postcard she sent from Paris, my sister’s lip print smeared from having traveled so far.

  The second time, though—when it came back years later and was determined to be terminal—Paul was devastated. The kind of clueless devastation that only an intelligent man can have. He buried himself in a new research project, made contact with a professor at Sapienza, the top university in Rome, who turned out to be Tonio, and who would later, after my sister’s death, help secure Paul a research position.

  I glance at my brother-in-law. During m
y retelling of his wedding he smiled and nodded and laughed at all the right parts, but I couldn’t tell if he had gotten choked up or if the Amatriciana alla giudia had really been as spicy as he proclaimed. He looks wistful now, staring blankly at his plate, napkin clutched in his hand, ready to dab at his eyes again if needed.

  “It’s very warm in here,” I say to myself, realizing I’m a bit drunk, and so hot that I’ve started using my cloth napkin to wipe at my forehead. Is this a hot flash? A similar wave of heat had hit me while the doctor at the hospital had been telling me about Mom’s condition. He could see that I had sweated through my dress, the beads of perspiration at my temples. Would you like to sit down, Ms. Messing? That first night I was alone in our house, I drank a bottle of Viognier and read articles on WebMD. I watched a well-produced video of a dancing uterus and ovaries sing about hair loss and fertility declining after thirty. I ordered something called a perimenopause diary but could not get past the first couple pages. Mood swings, hot flashes, night sweats, insomnia, hair loss, sore swollen breasts, pimples, vaginal dryness. There had been columns for each. Rate from 1–10.

  Does it matter? Mom had said when I asked how old she was when she started menopause. Everything’s downhill after thirty-five.

  When the wine was gone I was too scared to go downstairs for another bottle. Our house felt haunted. I jumped at any strange noises—crows outside, the water heater switching on. A dog barking in the alley. I smoked a partially crushed joint that Guy left the last time he was over, and passed out watching reruns of the sitcom I co-produced with him in my thirties.

  I run my hand over my neck, feeling my glands, imagining where my thyroid might be. I’ll find a specialist when I go home, maybe consult an acupuncturist or a nutritionist. There must be something to prevent menopause, just for a little while longer. I have not done enough, there hasn’t been sufficient time. Men are lucky. I watch Tonio talking, so distinguished with the silver in his beard and at his temples, the gently wrinkled forehead. I think of Guy, ordering the film crew around, how this always impresses the starlets. I imagine Donato at the club with his friends. The world makes room for them at any age.