Emma Who Saved My Life (62 page)

I thought you hated barbecues. The suburban connection.

“Well, we might as well both be suburban since you're going back to sink into the abyss with that Sophie woman.”

And that was one more thing. If I took a break in the Midwest, I at least had a place to stay. Sophie had been to New York twice since I saw Emma at Bellevue, she had even bought a book of Emma's poems. “One complicated young lady,” said Sophie, smiling, putting down the book when she'd finished. The book purchase had softened Emma's smear campaign for a few months but she was back in force again.

“Don't marry that girl, Gil. It'll be Jim and Lisa all over again. Marriage leads to misery!”

Speaking of Lisa, I got another party invitation.

“Me too. Another advertising party, ooooooh boy.”

We oughta go, you know. Tell Lisa we're leaving. Emma had seen lots less of Lisa than I had, so she was squirming uncomfortably. C'mon Emma, you can play with Lisa's little girl.

“All those advertising yucks—I can't take it. And we shouldn't tell Lisa we're leaving town at a party. I guess we'd better invite her out.”

Which we did. Down to the Village to the Cafe Prato near Carmine Street. Emma and I staked out a booth inside, ordered cappuccinos, Emma insisting on a plate of fries.

“I can't believe I'm almost thirty, Gil.”

Gonna tell me your birthday at long last?

“Nope,” she said munching fries. “But I'll be in California for it. Hurling myself off the cliffs of Big Sur.” She laughed. “I really don't care about turning thirty. I feel my twenties were a write-off, but I'm going to get my thirties correct.”

You met ME in your twenties.

“Oops sorry. You know what I mean. Have a fry.”

Why don't you offer them before you goop them all up in steak sauce?

“Because you'd eat them all—ah, I see Lisa and progeny…”

In came Lisa, slipping in the booth across from Emma and me.

“God this has been forever!” she said, setting her daughter down to her side on the booth. “It's been years since I've been here. You remember Gil, your first day in town?”

It has crossed my mind.

“I associate this place with fierce nicotine fits—remember?” Lisa looked as good as we'd seen her in years, freer, more relaxed. “I thought I'd
never
quit smoking, particularly living with Emma the smokestack—we'd get each other chainsmoking pack after pack down here, remember?”

Yeah, we said, hoping to keep nostalgia at a minimum.

“But I did quit,” Lisa added, ruffling her little girl's white-blond hair. “I quit when I got pregnant, for
you,
didn't I honey?”

We have some news, I began.

“Just a minute…” Lisa's daughter had squirmed under the table and was now in the aisle, threatening to topple a waitress. “Honey, you get in here, you…” Daughter, giggling, ran down the aisle. “I said come here. Come here. Look young lady…” She used her last-straw voice: “NOW.” Daughter came running, Lisa scooped her up and set her firmly beside her. “Just sit right here and don't get into that…” Lisa moved the steak sauce out of reach.

“Yeah we had to come here one more time,” Emma said, hoping to open up the discussion of our departures.

But Lisa had plenty to talk about. Jim, mostly. She spoke in a serious adult tone so as not to interest her three-year-old.

“So I was right, there was someone else,” said Lisa. “Some copywriter at J. Walter Thompson. I mean, not that I blame him in a way, I've been a holy bitch to live with. But still. Anyway Jim and I talked it over and we don't want to get a divorce, at least not right away. So we're going to separate and see how that works for a while—I said PUT THAT DOWN, now … oh honey, look what you've done…” Lisa quickly whisked a few napkins from the dispenser and dipped it in her ice water and dabbed her daughter's dress now streaked with mustard. “I swear, would you … oh, honey, please just sit there, can you do that for Mommy?” Then back to us, continuing about her marriage's failure in an even and almost businesslike tone: “So anyway, I'm going to leave McKendrick Advertising, and go elsewhere. I've started sending out
ŕ
esu
ḿ
es. It would be too weird to be there at work with him every day—that may have been the problem anyway, seeing too much of each other.”

Why doesn't he quit
his
job at McKendrick, I asked.

“He was there first. I've been there five years, he's been there seven, his salary is higher, he has a future there, and I don't think I do. I mean, it's reasonable, very reasonable that I should leave—we're in agreement on that. And I want a change anyway. But we're not telling people that we're splitting up, as that might reflect on Jim or me and gossip in the ad biz is so bad, and we just want to be above that, you know?”

Yeah sure, I said. Emma was untypically saying nothing.

“So we're having this party. This party for all the people and I'll announce that I'm leaving to stay home with my kid or something, and people won't think we're splitting up. It's important that people aren't running around talking about your private life. So we're giving this party.
Please,
I want you both to come. It would mean a lot to me.”

Uh Lisa, she's in the salt now—

“Oh damn it … young lady I swear I … Would you look at what you have done?” Lisa gathered the pile of salt from the unscrewed saltshaker and swept it with a napkin into the ashtray. Lisa gave a light pop to her daughter's hand as she reached for something else and before she began to bawl, Lisa snatched her up and said, “NO, not a word out of you, we're going to pick out an Italian pastry now, all right? You want one, don't you? Here we go . .” She picked up her daughter and went up to the lunch counter, out of earshot.

Emma turned to me. “I don't know this woman, do I? Do you know her? I don't know her.”

Now Emma. She's got it rough and she's happy to be with us.

“Yeah, talk good ol' Gil and Emma's ears off when things go bad. I don't want to hear about her rotten husband when she doesn't call us but … what? Four times last year?”

She's a working mother and she came to see you in the hospital, and she invites us to parties and things—

“Those godawful advertising parties, no thanks, no thanks—”

Sssssh, she's coming back.

“So, anyway,” said Lisa sliding into the booth, her daughter still in the aisle, “that's that. We may reconcile, but you know … this is terrible, but I
want
to be single again. Not to date or anything, I mean, I've had enough of that. I mean to be by myself. I'm looking forward to getting out from under things. I want to start up my painting again. Remember? I was going to be an artist. Now I have lots more connections at galleries than I did. I mean, I didn't know anything the first time around—it was real amateur hour, you know? Here,” she said patting her daughter, “go sit with Aunt Emma.” Emma loved to hold the kid and bounced her on her lap, amusing her.

Painting, I said to say something, sounds good.

“So how are you two for roommates? Temporary, perhaps? Hmm? Anyone want a tenant?” Lisa laughed, grinning.

“Uh, gee,” began Emma.

There's something we gotta tell you, Lisa.

“Yeah,” said Emma, as it was her news: “I'm leaving New York, it seems. For my mental health.” As Lisa was looking stunned, Emma went on, stroking Lisa's daughter's white-blond hair gently. “I think I've had enough. It's time to go. I've gotten my book of poems published with the Women's Consortium Press and I can publish there again if I want. And so I applied to the Stanford Program for Creative Writing and they accepted me, because of my book of poems. And it will mean—I don't know—lots of opportunities and things, connections—”

Lisa looked shell-shocked, but said, “Yeah, that's just so great, Emma, that really is nice.”

“And so I'm California-bound, this Tuesday. Term starts next week and I'm pretty moved out and packed and—”

“California,” Lisa said numbly.

Everyone's clearing out, I said absently.

“Oh my,” Lisa sighed. And then it looked like she was going … going to cry, for pete's sake. She shielded her eyes and her voice got thick as she said, “Well doesn't that beat all?”

Emma and I exchanged glances and Emma immediately scooped up Lisa's little girl and announced that they were going across the street for candy, and as Emma left she gave me a nervous look. In a moment it was just myself and Lisa, who began to cry, noiselessly, tears trickling down her face. Lisa, I asked helplessly, what is it?

“Oh nothing, I'm so sorry, this is stupid—”

You're under a lot of pressure, a new job hunt and Jim and—

“No it has nothing to do with Jim … Jim the asshole,” she added, making herself laugh through her tears. She got a bunch of napkins and blew her nose, wiped her face. “I'm sorry, I really am—this is not what I wanted to do…”

Lisa, what is it? Something I can do?

She looked up at last, red-eyed. “You know, I had counted on something I shouldn't have counted on, I guess. I thought we could all … oh god, how stupid, I'm sorry—”

What is it?

“I thought we, like, could all get a house again. I'm richer now. We could go back to the Village where we started, get a decent loft. The three of us. I've been thinking lately how that was when I was happy. When it was just us three. Now we had a good time didn't we?”

Some great times there, yes—

“So you see, I thought, thank god, there's Emma and Gil and we can get back to what we used to be—plus one, of course, my daughter. I thought that would be so good…” And she teared up again, shaking her head, apologizing.

I decided to finish out our bad news by telling Lisa about my four-month tour with
'59 Mustang.
I went on about it a bit, good career move, I'll get some time off, etc.

“Congratulations,” she sniffed, smiling. “That won so many awards.”

Yeah the touring company ought to do real well. Pay is good. I even get to go back to my hometown, well, Chicago I mean. My agent sent a picture of me to the
Sun Times
and some lady is going to do an interview with me, local boy made good, all that.

“Yeah you've made it, you've really made it.”

Oh Lisa, I wanted to say, a chorus-guy with a few lines in a touring company, a four-month hell of bad motels and hick-town dates, no, no that was not making it.

“Well you'll write, won't you?
We'll
write.”

Yeah, yeah sure. Letters from the road—that'll be fun. And you have to keep New York alive and well for me, save my place …

“Of course,” she laughed, and we laughed and laughed some more and the tears seemed behind her, and for that matter, so did our good times and our youthful past, because there we were talking about writing letters, for christ's sake, which I've never been worth a damn at. Oh we're not going to write letters—who are we kidding? Chapters in life end and when they end they feel like this.

“Now when you get back to town,” said Lisa, after blowing her nose again, “you look me up. Maybe we can get Emma to come back to visit and then seduce her into staying.”

You know how hard Emma is to seduce, I said. And we laughed at the joke, Emma and her celibacy, still going strong.

She smiled and said something so unexpected from a beaming face: “I am so sad. I really counted on us doing it all again, things being like they were. That would have made me so happy.” Then she gripped my arm, telling me something that seemed to fight its way to the surface to be communicated: “I was as happy as I ever was with you and Emma. Sometimes I think back and go, girl, that was the good stuff, that was your wild time.”

Well, I said, maybe taking a wrong tack, we think that
now.
At the time I remember us being miserable and complaining and—

“No, I'm sure about this one. That was the best it ever was. That was the real good time.”

And if you can believe this, we actually went to this party of hers and Jim's. We were curt with Jim. We schmoozed halfheartedly among the advertising elite. There was the little announcement that Lisa was leaving McKendrick to stay home and watch over her little girl and everyone awwwwwwed, genuinely insincere about seeing her go, everyone wished her luck, piled on encouragement, love and hugs and kisses. (You never saw so much phoneyness in your life.)

“They're happy to see someone more talented than they are leaving the firm,” Emma said, beside me on the sofa, our party-watching post. “I'll give Jim this. The man has a nice apartment. Stocked bar, a VCR. Forget Lisa,
I'll
reconcile with the jerk.”

You're going to have to say a proper farewell to Lisa, I reminded Emma.

“Oh yeah? I'll sneak out. It's just better to finish it off, cut it short, turn and run.”

Yeah but …

“But what? I know what you're going to say, that it's unlikely I'll see her again for a long while, but that's all the more reason not to carry on and get dramatic. I don't
do
goodbyes. I don't.”

What about when it comes time to say goodbye to me?

Emma looked at me and we made one of those terrifying eye contacts that chilled us, melted us. “Well now, let's not think about that one,” and then Emma got up in search of more refreshments, and I watched her. It sounds like I still love her to say this, but there was never anyone who took up space quite like she did. She moved so gawkily, so awkwardly, almost stumbling toward the refreshment table, all elbows and wild gestures … and yet it was all perfect, completely consistent. And her voice, lilting and unendingly cynical, all sentences musically soaring to great heights always to end up with a big punchline delivered in a cynical alto. She was nasal and could whine and sing her complaints and—how do I explain this?—if anyone else carped and carried on like she did without that face, that tone of voice, those gestures, well it wouldn't work, it would be intolerable. On occasions like this I had to remind myself just how much I was not in love with her. But indeed I wasn't.