Dolls Behaving Badly (20 page)

“Well, I have to get going. How do I look?” Laurel stood before me in her expensive blouse and cheap pants, her hair styled
only in the front, her stomach poofing out against the blazer so that she looked like a middle-aged housewife getting ready
to do the weekly shopping.

“You look great,” I lied, neglecting to mention the smear of strawberry down the side of her pant leg.

“Wish me luck.” She waved her hand and marched out the door in a pair of my heavy Sorel boots.

I cleaned up the kitchen, took Killer for a quick walk, and headed into work early, since I had a twenty-top reservation at
eleven a.m. Sandee was already there, hacking tomatoes for side salads, seeds flying every which way. She still wore her hiking
boots, along with an ugly flannel shirt in place of a blouse.

“You look like a lumberjack,” I told her as I tied my apron around my waist and got ready to prep the salad dressings and
desserts.

“Good!” A tomato quarter flew across the room and smacked into the wall. “I’m becoming a nun,” she said. “One of those orders
where you aren’t allowed to speak. Do they still have those, you think?”

I rolled balls of ice cream through a mixture of crushed cereal and spices for the fried ice creams. “What’d Joe do this time?”

“Nothing. I haven’t heard from him in over a week.”

“He’s probably down in Seward. A bear woke up from hibernation and got its foot stuck in a toilet in the harbormaster’s bathroom.
I saw it on the news.”

“Didn’t you hear me? I said I haven’t heard from him. That means no text or phone calls.”

“Doesn’t sound like Joe.”

“He’s a guy, get it?” Sandee’s voice was awful. “It’s all about sex or not having sex or having too much sex.” Her voice trembled,
and she put down the knife and took a breath. “It’s not about sex at all. It’s Randall. Joe says that as long as I’m still
married, then we’re committing adultery. He actually used that word, as if he were a preacher.”

“You should have him legally declared dead,” I suggested. “Put an ad in Vegas newspapers and if you don’t hear from him, that’s
that. Or hire a private detective. He could have an address and phone number in a couple of days. Call Randall, tell him you
want a divorce, and cut the cord, for once and for all.”

Sandee stopped chopping. “You’ll go with me? To the detective’s office?”

“Sure.” The idea frightened me for some reason. “Make an appointment and we’ll drive over together.”

After the worst of the lunch rush was over and I was wiping down the pantry counters, Sandee handed me a business card. “Toodles
O’Brien, Private Investigator,” it said, and had a photograph of an unsmiling Native woman.

“A customer left this—it must be fate. We’re meeting her at four fifteen. She doesn’t normally do same-day appointments, but
she had a cancellation and said to come on in. I’m heading home to pick up a photograph of Randall plus his Social Security
number.” Sandee picked dried food off her apron with her fingernails. “Can you believe I’m finally doing this? You can come,
right? Please tell me you can make it.”

I had grocery shopping to do and overdue movies to return, plus I needed to stop at OfficeMax to pick up a new printer cartridge
so Jay-Jay could print out his essay for Berkeley gifted camp, but I agreed nevertheless. Then I texted Stephanie that I would
be home late and could she please defrost the chicken in the freezer.

A little before four p.m., Sandee arrived. I almost didn’t recognize her. She wore a stark black blouse with a high collar
and an ugly floor-length pleated skirt, and she had her hair in a fussy bun that gave her face a sharp, prim expression.

“Jesus, what did you do to yourself?” I asked.

“I don’t want her to think I’m a slut.”

“You’re not a slut,” I said as I refilled ketchup and Tabasco bottles. “You’ve just been experimenting with single life.”

We drove over in her car, which was neater than mine, so neat that I marveled over the uncluttered dash and sole coffee cup
in the cup holder. Sandee pulled into a house tucked behind the Park Strip. Wind chimes hung from every tree branch so that
walking up to the front door we were serenaded with rings and soft clicks.

A thirty-something woman opened the door before we reached it. Her hair was twisted into four thick braids, and she had her
eyebrows, nose, and chin pierced.

“I’m Toodles.” She reached out her arm. A wolf tattoo circled her wrist. “Brother wolf,” she said, noticing my stare. “He
protects me. Sweets, you don’t have to take off your shoes,” she said to Sandee. “Anyone want coffee or tea?”

“Tea,” Sandee and I said in unison, and Toodles sized us up with her dark, beautiful face. “Devil’s club and rose hip,” she
said, motioning for us to follow her out to the kitchen. “I don’t usually work at home, but I didn’t feel like putting on
my boots and walking to the fucking office. Sorry about the language. I’m an Aries, which means I swear a lot. Actually, I’m
not sure if that’s true, but that’s what I tell people.”

Toodles was solid and muscular, and she liked to talk. “I came from the village, up by Point Hope. We didn’t have indoor plumbing,
used a honey bucket and it was no big deal. I saw my first toilet when I was six. I was terrified; I thought it was going
to swallow me whole.” She threw back her head and laughed. Her voice was musical and lilting, and it still carried a hint
of a village accent. “Now when I go back I bitch about having to pee into a bucket. That’s what they call progress.” She set
two steeping mugs of tea on the table and waved for us to sit down. “I almost lost it when I moved down here for college.
You know the story: Native girl from the village goes wild in the big city and loses part of her soul.” She stirred her tea,
and I noticed a series of etchings over her right hand. “Willow branches, for serenity,” she said. “Luckily, I didn’t lose
my soul. Know what saved me?” She leaned forward impishly. “I learned to make our Native foods: sage and mushroom sauce, fry
bread, salmon cheeks marinated in dandelion greens and nettles. I enjoyed that so much that I learned the white man’s cooking
ways, too, went down to Seward and studied culinary arts and then advanced my learning at Le Cordon Bleu.”

“That’s where Barry went,” I said. “That’s my ex-husband. He’s the chef down at the Hilton. And Captain Cook. And the Sheraton,
too—he moves around a lot, contracts himself out and—”

“Barry George?” Toodles leaned forward. “Met him at a banquet. We exchanged chowder recipes: moose for elk. Your ex, eh?”
She stared at me with her dark eyes. “That was before I got my private detective license.” She patted her large but firm belly.
“Enough of my story, what’s yours?”

Sandee explained about Randall leaving her alone in a Vegas hotel room, she showed photographs, and handed over his Social
Security number, birth date, and parents’ names and address.

“You’ve called his old friends?” Toodles asked. “High school sweetheart? College roommates?”

Sandee shook her head no.

“People don’t disappear. That’s movie bullshit.” Toodles straightened her large shoulders and suddenly looked imposing. “What
they do is go someplace familiar and re-create their old lives, right down to how they arrange their living rooms. Kinda sad,
isn’t it? We’re supposed to be the dominant species yet we have so little imagination.” She held the postcards in her hands
and closed her eyes for a minute, as if she were a psychic instead of a PI. Sandee fidgeted but I held out my hands for her
to be still.

“Okay, here’s the deal.” Toodles opened her eyes and stared directly at Sandee. “Your husband probably dyed his hair one shade
lighter or darker. If he wore contacts, he wears glasses now; if he wore glasses, he’s switched to contacts. He’s living with
someone younger than he is, probably much younger, he’s working…what was his profession before?”

“Accountant,” Sandee said. “For a hospital chain.”

“Now he’s working as an accountant for a supermarket or warehouse club. He’s driving the same make and color vehicle, has
the same credit cards but different account numbers, follows the same daily routine, and goes to bed and gets up at the same
time as before. The new girlfriend probably looks like you, or the way you looked when you were younger. He’s re-created his
life,” she said more gently. “He just did it without you this time.

“It’s a classic midlife crisis,” she continued. “You wouldn’t believe how often it happens. We are all so predictable.” She
sighed. “I took this job expecting excitement but instead found out how excruciatingly ordinary our lives are.” She sipped
tea and grimaced. “This one will be easy. I can have an address, phone number, and even photos in seventy-two hours.”

“Sev-seventy-two hours?” Sandee stuttered. “I’m not sure if I’m ready.”

“What’s not to be ready? You’re looking for the truth, and you’ll get it.” She excused herself, went into the kitchen, and
came out with a plate of cold salmon and a peppery lemon basil sauce. “I made this last night, when I couldn’t sleep. Dig
in. The salmon’s from the Yukon River—caught my share dipnetting last summer. Native rights.” She folded her arms across the
table and leaned toward me. “Now, you,” she said to me in that lilted voice, “tell me more about that delicious ex-husband
of yours.”

Wednesday, Jan. 25

“I STILL CAN’T GET OVER
the fact that someone finds Barry delicious,” I said to Sandee, as we cross-country skied along the Coastal Trail. Mexico
in an Igloo was closed for the day due to a faulty hot-water heater, and we were using the time to get in our exercise so
we could eat more later. “Do you think I overlooked too many of his good points? Everyone keeps saying what a great cook he
is. I feel insecure, as if I missed something.”

“You’re not fat,” she said, as we began to ski through the tunnel. “And you don’t watch the Food Network or read gourmet magazines,
so I’d say that cooking doesn’t mean that much to you.”

“I like to eat.”

“We all like to eat,” Sandee said, “and most of us eat too much.”

“But I cook,” I protested. “And bake. I’m always baking.”

“It’s not a passion, though. You’re not a foodie, which Barry needs, and he’s not into art, which you need. You loved each
other but couldn’t touch the other’s soft shine.”

“Soft shine?”

“You know, the place that’s the deepest part of you, the thing that defines you, makes you the person that you are. My mother
called it the soft shine, though she never found hers.” Sandee laughed bitterly, as we skied up a small hill and around a
curve. It was a cloudy day, the inlet on our right, huge chunks of ice moving slowly with the tide so it looked as if they
were alive. We both breathed hard as we skied along the side of the trail classic style. A group of thin, athletic girls from
the high school ski team zipped past us in their sleek tights and bright jackets.

“I hate them,” Sandee muttered, as we plodded along. My back pricked with sweat, and the air felt cold and damp against my
face. We skied in silence until we reached the downhill before Point Woronzof, where we stopped and looked out over the expanse
of beach. The sun was setting, lighting the sky pink and orange, and off in the distance the few tall buildings that made
up downtown reflected the light back so that it shined bright and fiery against the frozen water. We always paused before
the hill, since it had a tricky curve at the bottom and neither of us skied well on turns, especially while moving fast.

“Here goes.” Sandee dug in with her poles and pushed off. I waited until she was halfway down, then pushed off and flew down
the hill, my skis picking up speed, my poles raised, my knees tucked down as I alternated weight from one leg to the other
in an attempt to keep my balance. What is it about being out of control that is so enticing? Each time I skied a hill I didn’t
know if I would make it down without falling, and that made it special, something I both looked forward to and dreaded.

“Cross-country skiing is like love,” Sandee said, as we trudged back up the hill, our ridiculous skis splayed out so that
we took giant, lumbering steps. “Most of the time it’s boring and mindless, just moving along and following the trail. Then
you come to the hills, and going up can bring you to tears.” She paused to take a breath. “Everyone thinks the downhills are
the easiest parts, but that’s when you’re most likely to fall and get hurt. Do you get it?”

“Kind of.” We crested the hill and skied past a woman walking a dog in a sweater.

“It’s the effortless times that are the most dangerous, the times that you feel as if nothing could go wrong. That’s when
you need to beware.”

“You sound like an ad for a horror movie,” I joked, panning an announcer’s voice. “She was happy and then…beware.”

“Laugh, but think of it and it makes sense.”

“This is about Toodles, isn’t it?” I stopped so fast that a man skiing behind me crashed into the back of my skis. “Sorry,”
I yelled over my shoulder, and then I turned back to Sandee. “You’re not afraid of what she’s going to tell you. You’re afraid
of what she’s not going to tell you.”

Sandee’s face was scrunched tight in the dim light.

“You never loved him, did you? At least not in the shiny-spot way. Oh my god—” My ski had hit a rough lump of snow, and I
momentarily stumbled. “This is about guilt; that’s why you hired Toodles. You’re trying to pay for your guilt, the sin of
your relief.”

“Leave me alone,” Sandee snarled, trying to ski ahead.

But I stayed by her side. “The Oprah Giant says that to love is the grandest thing we’ll ever do in our lives,” I panted.
Now Sandee was picking up speed. “She says that—”

“Who in the hell is the Oprah Giant?”

I realized I had never told her, I hadn’t told anyone. They knew about my dirty dolls but not about my messed-up and troublesome
mind. So I explained about the diary and the blog and e-mail messages, and how each month offered a lesson to follow. I was
sure she’d laugh or make a joke, but she surprised me.

“That’s why you’ve changed.” She squinted at me in the hazy purple twilight. “Don’t get mad, but you’re different, Carla.
There’s an air about you, a lightness. People notice, too. Look at Francisco. He’s been coming in for over a year and suddenly
he notices you. It’s not a coincidence. There’s this feeling about being around you lately, I can’t explain it. It’s sort
of like eating a plum.”

After I got back from skiing, I started mixing up biscuits. Right as I folded in the butter, the door slammed.

“That’s that,” Laurel sat down across from me and shrugged off her coat. “Now I can sleep in again.”

I added milk and a handful of cheddar cheese. I was trying to replicate Gramma’s cheesy biscuit recipe but couldn’t get the
spices balanced.

“So there I was sitting at my desk skimming through sales documents,” Laurel continued. “I reached for the stapler but it
was empty, so I pulled out a box of staples, and that was empty, too. Five thousand staples.”

She looked at me expectantly. I looked back, waiting for more.

“Don’t you
get
it? Five thousand staples! I had stapled five thousand times.” She smacked the table. “I knew it was an omen. So I quit.”

“Y-you quit?”

“No more documents, no more smiling and showing houses to couples happier than I am. I’m done.”

“But what about money?”

“I’ll stay here with you until I have the baby. Then I’ll work something out with Junior. We can sell the house. The furniture
alone is worth a small fortune.”

I stared at her as if she were mad, but she was up rummaging through the cupboards. “The funny thing is, the minute I handed
in my notice, my stomach rumbled and I felt hungry for real food for the first time in months. What’s for supper? I’ve been
craving deviled eggs all afternoon.”

The phone rang while I mixed the dough up with my hands, butter and flour squishing through my fingers.

“Laurel?” I yelled, glancing behind me. She didn’t even look up from her laptop. “Jay-Jay? Stephanie?” I yelled, but no one
answered. Finally the machine picked up. I tensed, afraid it might be Francisco. I hadn’t seen him since the night we ate
with Barry. It made me shy, seeing the two of them together and knowing I had opened something I couldn’t easily close.

“Clara Richards?” a clipped and unpleasant voice wavered through the answering machine. “This is Betty Blakeslee, over at
Artistic Designs. We need to meet with you tomorrow morning. Would ten do?”

She paused as if waiting for an answer. “Our March client just canceled, and we’re left with you or a man who makes collages
from eggshells.” Another pause. “Bring three or four of your strongest pieces, a short bio, and a recent photograph. Ten then?”
The phone clicked, and I stood in the kitchen surrounded by spills of flour and milk.

“Oh my god,” I said softly and then louder, “Oh my god!”

Stephanie and Jay-Jay rushed into the kitchen.

“Are you bleeding?” Stephanie screamed, looking around as if for weapons.

“Collages out of eggshells,” I muttered, and then everything went dark and the dirty linoleum rushed up toward me.

I came to a few minutes later in Laurel’s bed. She sat at the foot, tapping away on her laptop.

“You have butter in your hair,” she said when she noticed I was awake. “I’m going to have to change the sheets.”

“Did I faint?” I’d never fainted before, at least not when sober.

“Junior e-mailed,” she replied. “He wants to talk. He said enough time has passed that we’ll be able to be ourselves, not
pure emotion. He actually said that—‘pure emotion.’ When did men start talking about feelings? It was easier when they were
Neanderthals.”

“Is it true?” I reached out and gripped her arm. “About the gallery? The call?”

“Betty Blakeslee is cheap. She tried to talk down the price of their house by a hundred thousand. I told her to stop being
so conventional, and she requested a different agent.” Laurel punched computer keys as she spoke. “Don’t let her know I’m
your sister, okay?”

“So it
is
true?”

Laurel nodded. “Tomorrow at ten. I confirmed, but don’t worry. I disguised my voice with an English accent and said I was
the nanny.”

“I can’t go tomorrow. I’m not ready.” I looked wildly around the room. “I have nothing to wear.” I jumped out of bed and was
halfway to the closet before I remembered that Laurel had relocated my clothes to the hall coat closet.

“Don’t worry about
her
,” Laurel said. “She doesn’t know how to spell, and her punctuation isn’t that great, either.”

I knew Laurel was trying to give me something. “Thanks,” I said. “Really.”

I rushed out to the living room and listened to the message over and over until Jay-Jay and Stephanie threw pillows and screamed
for me to please, please, please get over myself.

Thursday, Jan. 26

My gallery interview was a fiasco. Betty Blakeslee sneered at my prospectus.

“Barbie doll figures in your art?” she said. “One of the
other
galleries does that. It’s old news. The package you sent made it sound as if you were cutting edge.” Her voice dropped flat,
as if it exhausted her to have to talk with someone so obviously untalented. I took a deep breath and thought of the Oprah
Giant’s advice about managing conflict:
Stay centered. Breathe deep. Don’t let anyone steal your focus.
I breathed deep, I tried not to let anyone steal my focus.

“These are different,” I said. “They represent a story.”

“Don’t tell me,” Betty Blakeslee sighed. “You were sexually abused and now have a drug problem. Believe me, I’ve heard it
before.”

“No,” I said a little too sharply. “It’s about running away from home, not
home
home but the home of societal expectations and women’s roles.” Sweat dripped inside my bra. “Once you open the door of change
you can’t go back. That’s the loss part, and it hovers over everything. But here’s the thing.” I was on a roll suddenly, I
felt great. “We don’t understand our own subconscious so we’re always creating what I call dirty doll obstacles and—”

“Oh, Timothy.” She waved her hand and a swarthy man with mismatched socks trotted over. She introduced him as Timothy Tuppelo,
the gallery director. I dutifully stuck out my hand but instead of shaking, he bowed stiffly and then stuck his finger in
his mouth and busied himself with dislodging something from between his teeth.

“Timothy,” she commanded, “that mediocre landscape would catch more light on the other wall.” She examined her lavender nails
and rubbed something from her index finger. “Angela’s on bed rest and had to cancel her show.” She sighed again. It was obvious
she resented Angela for burdening her gallery plans with a difficult pregnancy. “The eggshell man sculpted a giant penis from
rolled and pressed chicken shells. Just because
some
men are fascinated with their dicks doesn’t mean the rest of us are.” She turned and shouted at Timothy again. “No, not
that
way. Toward the light, hello! Yes, like
that
.”

She clapped her hands and glanced at her watch. “I have an eleven o’clock due any moment. Can you show yourself out, Clara?”

“Carla,” I corrected. “It’s Carla.” But Betty Blakeslee was already striding down the hallway in her black pumps with their
squat heels, her skirt hitting exactly midcalf. As soon as she turned the corner, I collapsed against the wall. Timothy Tuppelo
hurried over with a cool washcloth, which he pressed to my forehead.

“I think I peed my pants a little,” I sobbed.

“Happens all the time.” His sleeve smelled of cumin and ginger. “That woman sucks the blood out of everyone she touches.”
He gave the washcloth circular little pats. I sighed and slumped lower.

“You an artist?” I asked.

“Did a show last year with the Dockers in Seattle.”

I was impressed. The Dockers was a well-known mother-daughter gallery team that sponsored one out-of-state show a year. The
competition was fierce.

“I weld junk,” he said. “Recycled art. This new one unfolds like a child’s pop-up book.”

After I pulled myself together, I thanked him and veered straight for Golden Donuts, even though it was miles out of the way.
I ordered four jelly-filled, three cream-filled, and four chocolate éclairs.

“That’s only eleven,” said the skinny girl behind the counter.

“Eleven?”

“Twelve makes a dozen, that’s what most people order.”

“Do I have to?”

“I’ll have to charge seventy-nine cents for each one otherwise. It’s your choice.” She shrugged as I stared into the glass
case, unsure which donut to pick: The glazed? The maple-filled? The colored sparkles?

“I-I can’t decide,” I whispered, my chin wobbling the way it does before I cry. The girl looked startled. Then she pulled
herself together and unfolded a box.

“Bavarian crème,” she said in a matter-of-fact voice. “It’s what my mom eats when she’s depressed, and you’re almost as old
as she is.” She arranged the donuts inside the box, tucked in the top. “Seven fifty,” she said, and I handed her my credit
card and she handed me back the donuts.