Jo cupped her third cran-apple and tonic in both palms, resting the base of the champagne flute on her belly. With every breath she felt it nudge the underside of her large bosom. Her back was to a great panel of windows that gave out onto the lawn with its low wall that fronted the beach and would soon endow the room with reds and purples of another staggering West Coast sunset. Jo was not taking in the view because she’d seen it countless times and had grown inured to its extravagance. Instead she watched her husband, Calvin, engage and disengage with both the arriving and the milling guests. This was a sight which, after thirty years of marriage, had not ceased to interest her.
She had met Calvin in those halcyon days – halcyon was one of the words, like serendipity and egregious, that she liked to use in her own inner dialogues, but which she would never utter aloud, words she liked the fullness of, enjoyed their plumpness on her tongue, but whose precise meanings were a trifle vague to her, having not taken the time to enquire of a dictionary – those halcyon days of his youth when he was dashing and rich, driving a sports car and living in a small penthouse on Broughton Street in the West End. She had met him and fallen into a love that had matured but not abated one iota in all these years. Calvin’s feelings for her were, had always been, less clear. Jo was a pragmatist. She understood her limitations and was determined to make a go of it in spite of them.
Calvin’s feet splayed when he stood, giving him a defenseless, friendly air. Jo wondered, as she always did when she observed him in this stance, if a swift poke into his chest would send him tumbling ass over teakettle. The damp brow and loose smile, the glasses always just in need of a nudge back up his nose, added to his guileless appeal. He was fairly tall with sloping shoulders and a belly overhanging his belt, but his clothes were all tailored and made of wonderful materials that hung well, almost nattily, softening one’s first impression and giving him the respectability of taste and money well spent. In fact, he was not easy going or friendly, nor particularly defenseless, Jo mused, it was just his public demeanor, something he put on for occasions such as this.
The occasion was Thomas’ wedding. Thomas was Calvin’s father and at the age of eighty-three he was tying the knot for the third time, this time to Nicola, a vigorous sixty-one year-old with sparkling teeth and eyes to match. Privately the family was not pleased and they had grumbled among themselves. Even her daddy’s little angel, Samantha, had cursed her soon-to-be stepmother behind her back as a conniving gold-digging bitch, but they were all smiles and weak encouragement to Thomas’ face. Jo turned slightly to look at the two of them, Samantha, still good looking in a matronly sort of a way, pushing hard up against fifty, with her hand on Nicola’s arm. Samantha laughed her hilarious laugh, then, her eyes darting over the room, turned to whisper into Nicola’s proffered ear. They giggled in unison until Thomas sailed up to ask what was so funny and to engage them in a moment’s banter.
Calvin’s eyes fell on his wife at the window and his nod was imperceptible to all but Jo, who saluted in return with a minor upward tilt at the extremities of her lips. She always held herself aloof at these things, he thought. Never quite accepted by his family – not a drinker, never letting her hair down, getting too fat too soon. He looked past her out across the strand to the horizon – deep blue cut up now in the rising afternoon onshore breeze. They had met at a party – some school friend’s place – and he’d been drunk, as usual. His girlfriend du jour, Linda, was angry with him – apparently he’d promised they’d go elsewhere afterwards but now he was staggering and not inclined to go anywhere, except perhaps the floor. She’d stormed off in a cab as he made room for Jo beside him on the couch. Jo was prettily plump and soft and from the secretarial pool at the telephone company. Linda, excused forever from Calvin’s intimacy with her huffy exit, was a tall, slim redhead just finishing up her MBA – who ran completely to fat after her first kid, but who would have guessed –and ended up owning a telephone company by the time she was thirty-eight. Still, we find comfort where we may, and two months later Jo was pregnant.
Calvin gave his new stepmother, who had just been turned over to him by a beaming Samantha, his ardent, glazed attention. Her teeth shone as her crimson lips gushingly enunciated the gratitude she felt for her blessings, how it humbled her to be received into this family with such graciousness, how happy she and his father were… Calvin was fond of saying that his mother was the best of him, and whatever it meant, it was probably true. He had been twenty, she forty-two, when she had died of breast cancer. Born to wealth she had married it. She produced four beautiful, intelligent children and raised them with all the sophistication and class they were heir to. Calvin’s watery eyes crinkled as he smiled at Nicola. She was saying something about their shared college days and after a brief discussion it came to light that they had attended the same university and had, in fact, overlapped by a year – her senior year being his freshman. She seemed sweet enough and was trying hard. Her diction betrayed something, but he wasn’t sure exactly what. Maybe they’d dated. He’d had girlfriends a few years older than himself. Back in those wild years made crazy-wild by rage and grief. Maybe he’d fucked this little cutie. Probably he had. Who would remember? His mother had left him with etiquette, perfect grammar, serenity in the face of obduracy, an ear for classical music, taste in fine things that had never failed him, and money, that had. He knew this now and savored the contrariness of it. He would have blown his appreciation of French cuisine if he could have back then, but what’s bred in the bone…
Jo watched her husband’s hand rise quietly to Nicola’s forearm and rest there briefly – the same gesture his sister had made just minutes before. Of course, they’d all known Nicola for a year now. She’d moved into Thomas’ townhouse at least that long ago. Thomas enjoyed calling his mansion in the city his townhouse – made him sound blue collar, he thought. He called it that to differentiate it from the beach house in which he was hosting his wedding reception, and from the ski chalet, which was in the mountains, of course.
They’d all been pleased when Nicola showed up to keep Thomas entertained. His second marriage had been a disaster and had ended with a sizable expenditure, including the cape house in Cape Cod. It was surmised by all that Thomas had learned his lesson, but after fifteen years of aging bachelorhood and a string of lady friends…
Jo noted that Calvin had moved to the couch where he sat alone. She couldn’t tell for sure, but she thought his eyes were closed behind his sliding glasses. They’d pop open in delight if anybody approached him, but she guessed that nobody would. This crowd, for the most part, knew Calvin. She would leave him alone too. He’d be happier not to feel obliged to talk.
All four of Thomas’ children received the same, sizable inheritance from their mother, but Calvin was the only one with nothing to show for it. His two brothers were now millionaires several times over, having started fledgling businesses that had blossomed and branched over time to become mini-empires. Their father had invested in ventures with each of them and had apparently made out quite well. Jo thought that they must have inherited the business gene from him. Little sister Samantha had just left her money in the same mutual funds set up by her father at the time of her mother’s death, and had continued with her life – becoming a schoolteacher and wife and mother, and was now retired and more than comfortable. Calvin had been the only one old enough to be given the reins to his small fortune and in a few years he had splurged it all away. The halcyon days she’d called them, but actually they were the stupid days – irresponsible, drunken days. Days that her pregnancy had brought to an end.
Calvin was his mother’s son, noble through and through. He’d married her, no questions, no choice. Did he love her? She doubted it, then and even now, but you’d never know. He had just enough money left then for a small down payment on a small suburban house and that’s what he used it for. He was smart and, though not excelling in college, he’d developed skills. He found work at her telephone company and began making his way up the corporate ladder while she stayed at home to raise little Mary. With every paycheck Calvin whittled away at his mortgage, then, when Jo’s mother died of emphysema Jo inherited just enough to pay off the house and it mitigated her grief to be able to contribute so significantly.
Mary had chosen not to attend her grandfather’s wedding, saying she was too busy with her thesis. She’d been on the East coast for six years and was just months from completing a doctorate in Philosophy. Her parents were pleased and very proud and had no idea what she was talking about when she discussed her work.
All of the other grandchildren were in evidence however. There were seven of them, four with spouses, three with one or two toddlers and infants. Jo turned to look out the windows to the front lawn, her attention drawn to the squeals of children. Someone had set up a plastic wading pool and it was being filled with a hose. Nicola’s two daughters stood shoulder to shoulder outside, fussing over their covey of blonde offspring – two girls belonged to the elder, two boys, both in diapers, to the other. It was the girls who were shrieking – gamboling through the cold hose-water. Nicola appeared through the French doors and called to them impatiently, saying they would catch their deaths. The mothers wrapped the children in towels and tilted their heads together, no doubt grousing about their mother. Jo noted her relief that her daughter had decided not to come – then further noted that she had just changed her opinion of the matter – having previously been disappointed in Mary’s lack of familial diligence. Jo realized that on the rare occasions of Mary’s visits she didn’t want to waste the time in events such as this.
Thomas liked to spend Christmas in Maui and every few years he would rent a two or three beach condos and fly in the whole brood for a week or two. These trips were the only vacations that Calvin, Jo, and Mary ever took. After the house was paid for the excess money went into expanding and beautifying it. Jo hired a gardener to come and tear out all of the old broom and juniper hedges and replace them with rhododendrons and azaleas. She had two large raised garden beds created – one for vegetables and the other for flowers. A bedroom for Mary was put in above the garage and Mary’s tiny childhood bedroom was converted into an office for Calvin.
Calvin needed the office because, after almost twenty years of service, at the age of forty-four, the telephone company had laid him off. Part of a company-wide reorganization in which everybody over forty was deemed redundant. New blood, Calvin had muttered. He had started an on-again off-again consulting business, which he operated out of his home office and required him to travel more than he cared to.
All the while Thomas’ amazingly good health was observed but hardly mentioned. Tennis, Thomas was telling somebody, tennis every morning, every day of the year, followed by a massage. That’s the ticket – and no booze. Gave up booze at fifty-two. Saved my life. Calvin opened his eyes enough to see that Thomas was addressing two forty-something women he didn’t know. They smiled condescendingly at Thomas over their glasses of Chardonnay, something that Thomas would note but forgive them for later. Thomas never bore a grudge, which, Calvin mused, was probably a more likely prescription for longevity. He, personally, was banking on the no alcohol route, coupled with a certain equanimity that he tried to preserve, especially when confronted by all these assholes.
As if to punctuate this thought, his most junior sister-in-law, cocktail in hand, flopped down beside him and grabbed his knee. Drifting off already, are we Calvie? she giggled, wagging his leg back and forth. Drifting perhaps, he squinted briefly in her direction, but graciously not four sheets to the wind an hour before sunset. Oh, you old poop! Can’t a girl celebrate now and then? Since when did we start calling old sows piglets? She flounced to her feet, slopping whatever it was all over her blouse. You sorry sack of shit melancholic bastard, she hissed loudly enough for half the room to hear, then scurried off to the loo with Samantha close behind.
Jo’s smile didn’t betray her, except perhaps in her eyes, which sparkled momentarily. She was proud of Calvin’s wit and, although she hadn’t been able to catch his words she knew they were barbs custom built for Julia, her airhead sister-in-law. She had become accustomed to such outbreaks and skirmishes. They had once shocked and terrified her, but now she took them in stride like everybody else in the family. And Calvin wasn’t always the culprit, though more often than not he was. His hot buttons were Pollyanna liberalism, bad manners, and alcohol.
Jo remembered the bottles of rye whiskey he used to hide in the trunk of his car. That was back when they were in their mid-thirties. She’d been on his case about his alcoholism for a few years by then and had wrangled a promise to quit out of him. She went to AA meetings with him and preached from books she read about co-dependency and enabling. She herself had quit drinking years before by way of encouragement, but to no real effect. When she discovered that he was sitting in his car in the garage drinking shots out of a Styrofoam cup she almost exploded, but then she decided on a different tack. The next day when Calvin slipped out to the garage he found two bottles of rye in the trunk, his half consumed one and a fresh bottle, still in its liquor store bag, receipt and all. A couple of days later there was another one. After a few weeks he confronted Jo. What the fuck’s with the booze in the trunk? She shrugged. I was going to ask you the same thing. She didn’t call him a cheat or a sneak or a liar, but he knew he was all those things, and he never drank again. To give himself something to do at night he became a news junkie, began taking four daily newspapers as well as weekly news magazines and subscribing to every TV news channel available. With the advent of the Internet he sat online for hours analyzing all the conspiracy theories and shooting off terse commentary to like-minded folk and no doubt a few crazies as well. He began to gloat about the thickness of the FBI’s file on him. Nobody he knew shared his opinions or his depth of knowledge and so he had no friends – except his virtual friends online. His family wrote him off as a bit nutty, but harmless.
Calvin was out watching the kids in the pool, his bemused smile casting a benevolent net over the whole party of frolicking children. The sun was finally near the horizon, so shortly the towels would be employed, the pool drained, and the steaks flung onto the barbeque. A couple of kids began splashing water at Calvin’s trouser legs as their mothers scolded them and Calvin stumbled backwards in mock horror, lifting his leather-bound feet as though navigating great piles of elephant dung. The antics continued until the children were taken in hand and Calvin rebuked the mothers for spoiling his fun.
It had been years since Calvin had mentioned his father’s will, the occasion being the divorce fifteen years before. Besides a few specific bequeathals and a scholarship to his alma mater, the estate would be split evenly between Thomas’ four children. Some millions of dollars would come to Calvin. The subject came up because the divorce had caused the will to change. Prior, the second wife had been the main beneficiary. They had been in their early forties then and it had come as a shock to realize that Thomas had willed what they’d always assumed to be their inheritance to a stranger, this young woman with legs up to here and a penchant for diamonds. And thus the unspoken tension with the advent of a new wife.
Long after the magenta sky had succumbed to the inevitable embrace of nightfall and its radiance in the room had been replaced by candlelight Thomas rose to speak. The linen and crystal order mounted by the caterers had, by then, slipped into the chaos of a banquet ended – the long white table cloth wine-stained and strewn with crumpled napkins, plates of half-eaten slices of cake and boysenberry pie. Lipstick smudged the wine glasses, brandy snifters, and coffee cups. The children had all been put down in various bedrooms and several couples had already pled their excuses and departed.
Thomas cleared his throat. Life has been good to me, he said as he slowly scanned the faces all now turned in his direction. For fully a minute he was silent as he drank in the goodwill emanating from his audience. Eventually a few people coughed to remind him that he had their attention and he smiled warmly at them before continuing. We are told to count our blessings and I have been counting mine, or trying to, but they are far too numerous to count, so I will mention only one, the mother of all blessings, Love. I know it is unfashionable, even to the point of causing embarrassment, for a man of my age, who is not a priest, to mention the subject. Real men outgrow their poetic and sensitive natures as they outgrow their downy chins and high school sweethearts. We grow up to think of marriage as a business contract and our children as little empires we have nurtured then cut adrift. But really, they, marriage and children alike, are only Love, the product of Love, the recipients of Love, the providers of Love, the continuation of Love. I am awash in Love – Thomas paused to touch his napkin to his cheeks – I always have been. And today we are celebrating another blessing of Love, another cluster of blessings in this wonderful, ever-expanding, multi-layered, inter-connected web of Love. I love every one of you, and I know that it flows through you all, multiplying and compounding with every year. So now please welcome my newest love, Nicola, and her wonderful family into your hearts. Thomas raised his water glass to a tumult of scraping chairs and coughs and cheers and tears choked back and clinking Champagne flutes. To Love, he said above the din. To Love, all replied in unison. To Love.
Tears were dried, goodbyes exchanged and Calvin and Jo walked down the lane to their car. Nice toast Thomas gave, Jo said. Very nice, very nice, Calvin replied as he dug his keys out of his jacket pocket. I thought it was courageous and generous of him, she said. Calvin opened the door for her in silence and held it as she settled in. It closed crisply and he enjoyed, as he always did, the solidity of the sound, metal on metal clicking home. It’s a good car, he thought of the old Chevrolet as he walked around behind it, patting the trunk. He’d get another one when this one wore out. He opened his door and eased in behind the steering wheel, tilting it down into place before starting the engine. Jo was staring straight ahead out the windscreen at the corner streetlamp. He looked at her in silence for some time then leaned over to take her hand from her lap. She let him have it but otherwise did not move. He knew his shortcomings as well as she knew her own. With a finger he stroked each of hers in turn, his chin on his chest, vision clouded. Well, he said, I’m sorry, his voice barely audible. She shook her head and attempted to withdraw her hand, but he held it tightly. She turned to him. For what? His good fortune? His happiness? His love for her? She turned back to the streetlamp. Don’t be stupid, Cal. Again she tried unsuccessfully to disengage her fingers. It was too late, really, to make much difference to her, but for Mary, the money would be, or would have been, nice. Anyway, it was a moot point, he would probably outlive them all. Too bad he couldn’t just be more generous with it. Jo closed her eyes and sighed. She could feel the tension she thought she’d finally left behind, the suspicion that had dogged her, even to herself, all her life, gathering force within her. To keep it at bay she forced a smile. Cal, sweetheart, just forget it. We’ve done just fine.
Calvin was watching her from the corner of his eye, and he understood that, yet again, she’d misunderstood him. Well, it was just as well; a relief actually. Not a place he really wanted to go. So he grunted, continuing to squeeze her hand, holding the tension in his fingers for several seconds, then he released her, grasped the gearshift and put the car into Drive.
Todos Santos January, 2003