Almost Perfect (15 page)

“This house reminds me of some book I read when I was a child,” Stella tells him, musingly. “One of my father’s childhood books. Called
Sara Crewe
, I think. It was about a poor Victorian orphan girl who’s out in the rain one night, all cold and unloved, and she goes back up to her room and someone has filled it all with flowers and presents. An Indian prince, I think.”

“Sounds like you have total recall.” He laughs. “You read too much.”

Briefly, then, they kiss, and Richard tells her, “I have to go now. Later.”

Alone in her (their) old-new apartment, with Richard’s (her) cat, Stella tries to orient herself. Familiarity may come later on; now she simply has to find out where things are.

She starts by just standing where she was when Richard left—more or less in the middle of the room—and staring about. Then she begins slowly to walk around, to open a door here and there. She finds that things are more as they were than at first they looked to be: her clothes in their closets and chests of drawers; linens and towels and paper supplies in their closet. Wine and booze, cans and boxes of food on new-painted kitchen shelves. Her desk and typewriter in their place, in their corner.

But where is the little chest in which she always kept certain letters and notes—her most important things? Where is that chest?

She hurries all over the still-strange space, as she thinks, terribly: Of course, the chest was ugly and awkward. Richard just threw it out. He saw some old papers, maybe he shoved them into a drawer somewhere. How like him, so intolerant of anything not beautiful. He’s so selfish. This whole performance was some ego trip. His ego.
Where is my chest, and my papers?

Trembling, quite frantic now, she dials Richard’s number, but gets his recorded voice. “You have reached—” Not wanting even to hear him, she hangs up.

That little chest, now presumably lost to her, becomes in Stella’s lively mind a metaphor for everything wrong between them. A small and ugly paradigm. But this startles her; she had not often before articulated to herself the notion that anything was wrong between them.

Next to her bed (their bed), with its new deep-brown coarse wool cover, onto which Stella has just flung herself, there is a tall new bright brass reading lamp, elegantly resting on a brilliant-blue small lacquered chest. Almost idly, expecting nothing, Stella tries the top drawer of the chest—which opens easily, revealing a packet of letters, carefully wrapped in tissue paper. Her letters.
And the same is true of the next two small drawers, an easy opening to her things, all meticulously wrapped. And Stella, straining through bewilderment, recognizes in this bright-blue lacquered stranger her ugly old chest, miraculously transformed. And the tissue paper suggests an almost reverent regard for her possessions—precisely the reverse of her enraged suspicions, her suppositions.

Stella is as deeply embarrassed as if Richard could have known what was in her mind.

“Anybody home?”

At that sound, that night, Stella rushes toward the door, guilt and gratitude combining to fuel her ardor.

“Say, what’d I do?” he teases, familiarly.

“Oh, you’re only talented and brilliant and sensitive and generous and extremely handsome,” Stella tells him, laughing.

“Oh.”

There are so many versions of Richard, and she lives with all those different men. It is no wonder, Stella sometimes thinks, that she is frequently confused. There is the near genius in visual matters, who could imagine such openness, such bare-boned elegance in her ratty, awkwardly divided, small-scale apartment—and the generous, sensitive person who put it all together, for her. (For the moment she ignores the slight presumption, maybe a little more than slight, of his never having asked or consulted with her about such a radical projected change.) And then there is the plain ordinary man who comes home for dinner at night, tired and hungry, with not a lot to say. And then the raging furious stranger who sometimes, terrifyingly, emerges—the horrible drunk.

And: the most beautiful, fine-skinned, fair fresh flesh-smelling lover, whom she kisses, endlessly. (Does she kiss more than he does, more eagerly, fervently, strongly? Stella will not let this thought occur. Not yet.)

But it is true that she lives with all those people. And that she is often confused.

*  *  *

What Stella and Richard will do, they decide, is invite everyone they know to their party. An open house for Stella’s new apartment. And the subtext, so to speak, is a celebration of Richard’s new job; of course Al Bolling will be among those invited.

And Andrew Bacci and Margot and Justine and Collin Schmidt, and Tony Russo, Cats, and his Valerie. (“If they’re still together. I haven’t heard from him for a while,” Richard cautions. Stella refers to Valerie as Tits Galore, which Richard does not think is very funny.) Plus a number of friends from both their places of work, as well as from their former, other lives. Unstated is the fact that this is their first joint effort at party giving; some sort of statement about themselves as a couple is implicitly being made.

But it begins fairly soon to seem, to Stella, more Richard’s party. They call his caterer (the same pretty girls who did the bubble party). His florist. Stella, left to herself, would have done it all more simply: buy lots of cheese and cold cuts in North Beach, and flowers from Bloomers.

“Can’t I even pay for some of this?” she asks at some point.

“Oh no. I’ll let you give a party later on, when I go broke. Right now I’m really okay that way.”

Which in a way is all right with Stella; she is as broke as ever, maybe a little more so. She often buys a lot of fairly fancy food for their dinners, even though Richard shops too and almost always brings home wine and booze, not to mention all those flowers.

Still, in another way this does not seem quite right; they should share the expense of this party. It’s her party too, is it not?

The day before the party, a Friday, Stella stays at home to clean, and to think of and cope with last-minute details, like cocktail napkins, so far unmentioned, and Perrier, tomato juice, whatever, for the possible non-drinkers. Lemons and limes.

In the midst of her coping with most of that (she is just back
from the neighborhood supermarket), the phone rings, and Stella answers—to hear an unfamiliar, very enthusiastic woman’s voice.

“Hi, Stell, how’s tricks? Listen, hons, I’ve got some almost unbelievable good news for you, kiddo. Oh, by the way, this is Gloria. Gloria Bergstein—I’m your agent, remember?” A harsh cigarette laugh, which Stella is to come to recognize as readily as the exuberant voice. “Well,
The Gotham
is just nuts about your squatter piece, those people around Civic Center, or whatever you people call it. They love it. They’re offering ten for first North American rights, and maybe I can get them up, or maybe do better somewhere else, but I have to tell you I’m tempted just to go with it. What do you think? It’s long, of course, but they like that. Spread over two issues, they think.”

It is several minutes before Stella is able to understand that this flashy new New York magazine is buying her piece, a long rambling mess, as she thought of it, a mélange of interviews and opinions (mostly her own) about some people camped out at the UN Plaza and some other people, who insisted on feeding them. And that she is being paid ten thousand dollars.

Her first impulse, or one of the first, is to split the money, somehow, with all those people, the squatters and the feeders, all of whom she more or less got to know (several in both groups were Mexicans, with whom she found a special rapport). She dismisses this impulse, or almost dismisses it, as somewhat hysterical. But she will give them a big chunk of the money.

Her second impulse is to call Richard—of course!

“Baby, that’s great, that’s just really, really great. I always knew you had it in you, kid. This is super! Ten grand? Wow, you can start keeping me anytime. How much of that does your agent get? You don’t know? Well, honestly, Stell. Find out. Call her back and ask her. But, honey, I’m so pleased, I’m so proud of you. Now we have even more to celebrate at our party, don’t we. Stell, I love you.”

He arrives home that night with a huge sheaf of flowers, beautiful, white stock (so sweet-smelling) and purple iris. This is for Stella, as well as for their party.

*  *  *

I have never been so happy in my life.

That sentence dances through Stella’s mind on the night of their party, as she moves through the celebrating, admiring guests, in her new red silk dress in her beautiful new rooms. As she catches sight of Richard here and there, or as he joins her momentarily, now and then, for a small whispered joke, a quick kiss. She thinks, Never so happy. The room is full of flowers, of scents of roses and perfumes and sharp spicy foods, full of bright silk clothes, shining silver and glasses, pale yellow or deep red wines. She is so happy, Stella feels, that her chest might burst. It is one of those rare moments (she could hardly think of another one) when everywhere her mind alights seems propitious, and
good
.

Even her work is going well. She has talked on the phone with her new editor at
The Gotham
and has felt extreme intelligence, along with enthusiasm.

And she has wonderful friends.

And a lovely love affair.

Richard as a host is extremely energetic. He is everywhere at once, as a host is supposed to be. He neither drinks too much nor tells too many long jokes (Stella has observed him doing both those things too often at parties). But now he is too busy for drinking or for jokes; he talks quickly, vividly, to everyone there. He keeps glasses filled, he urges food.

Al Bolling dislikes white wine, he has made that clear—and by implication, people who drink it. His drink is Scotch. “I assume you have some, old man?” Fortunately they do. A tall, somewhat paunchy man with thick dark hair, very pale skin, shadowed eyes, Bolling, for most of the party, seems to keep to himself, resisting efforts by both Richard and Stella to draw him in. “I’m not much of a mingler,” he at one point says to Richard. “Observation is more in my line.”

“Well, observe away.” Blithe Richard.

“I like your lady. I hope you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Not at all, I’m delighted to hear it, I like her too!” And Richard gives Bolling his warmest good-guy smile.

*  *  *

Margot has come to the party alone. She meant to come with Andrew, of course, but he is at home with a bad summer cold. Nothing more (Margot is sure), but having tested HIV positive (as he more or less knew he would), Andrew is sent into panic (not unreasonably) by any ailment. Margot has decided to pretend not to take him seriously, in terms of health, and to hide her own panic in sheer silliness. “You’re just afraid you don’t look cute with a cold,” she chided Andrew. “So Richard will love you less.”

“Oh, Margot, come on.”

Having watched Richard with this new man, this Al Bolling, Margot comes to several conclusions. One is that Richard is overdoing it; he must need Bolling badly for something or other, and his famous charm is not quite working. Bolling is not quite as charmed by Richard as Richard thinks he is. This connection will not end well for either of them, Margot feels.

She also senses that Bolling has at least some incipient interest in her. Later, probably, he will ask her to go out to dinner; will she go? She is not at all sure that she will. He is attractive, but he looks very unhappy, and he looks like a drunk. Not her type at all. Not pretty. And she should go home early, to check on Andrew.

Justine, who has also come alone, without Bunny, is likewise casing the party; and trying to define, for herself, the considerable unease into which this scene has propelled her. Perhaps, she tries to tell herself, she simply cannot get used to, cannot accept, such a smart surround for her insouciant old friend, her dear old Stella. But should she not be glad for such an improvement? The place used to look so shabby. Or is it the slightly manic glint in the eyes of both Stella and Richard, the faint edge of hysteria, of hyper, unreal joy, that she senses? She frowns to herself at the unpleasantly probing, analytic quality of her own mind—and then looks up to see before her an extremely attractive small dark man.

“Hi,” he says. “I’m Tony Russo. Richard calls me Cats. Are you a friend of his too?”

Oblivious to almost everything but her own great pleasure in this occasion (she is also getting a little drunk, as Richard now is), Stella still thinks in stray moments of
The Gotham
, her article being there. Her money. Can she do it again? she wonders. She believes that she can. Her head is so full of ideas, of plans; she is dizzy with her own words. She will write more and more and be more and more successful, Stella believes on this night of the party.

She can almost believe that she deserves a man as radiant as Richard is. Looking across the room to where he stands, she feels her heart contract at the very sight of him—as, sensing her glance, he looks up at her and smiles, dazzlingly.

About three weeks after the celebration party, Gloria Bergstein calls early one morning to say that
The Gotham
has taken another piece of Stella’s, one that she has worked on off and on for a couple of years, about volunteer workers in local hospices, burnout, all that; it is somewhat grim, and the paper turned it down, finally, on the grounds that no one would want to read it. It is fairly short, and this time
The Gotham
is offering $7,500. “The best I could do, babycakes,” rasps Gloria, inhaling an early cigarette; it is 9:00 a.m. in New York, 6:00 in California. “But I’ll get them back up to ten next time, or else spit in their eyes.”

“God, Gloria, that’s okay, seventy-five hundred is terrific, I can’t believe it. That’s marvelous!”

“Just keep working, kiddo. We’ll be in touch.”

Stella hangs up the phone and turns to Richard, lying beside her in bed. Now wide-awake and propped up to listen. Stella asks him, “Did you hear that—can you believe it?” She is almost in tears.