Venus Envy (15 page)

“I don’t appreciate your tone, son.”

“Never do. Never do.” Carter replaced the last glass on the neighboring table.

“I feel sick. Frank, let’s go home.” A silence followed this suggestion as everyone at the Armstrong table looked at an extremely healthy Libby. “I didn’t do
anything. I must have dropped the letter coming back from the mailbox, or maybe the mailman put it in the wrong box, or maybe—”

“Or maybe you should tell the truth.” Frazier folded her hands together.

“There’s been quite enough truth told, girl.” Libby spat venom at her daughter. She could have passed for a mamba snake at that moment.

“You took my letter.” Frank finally got it.

Libby pointed her finger at Carter. “I’ll never forgive you.”

“Momma, you never forgive anybody,” Carter said.

Libby, in a rhapsody of irrationality, turned Frank’s anger into an opportunity to inflict guilt and avoid the issue. “And that’s the thanks I get from both of you! Laura, take me home. I am not going to sit here and be insulted by my own children and given the cold shoulder by my husband.”

Laura obediently rose to guide a trembling Libby out of the room. Frank, Frazier, and Carter mutely observed.

Finally Frazier broke the silence. “Dad, we better talk.”

T
HE SPILLOVER OF LIGHT FROM FRAZIER’S OFFICE FAINTLY
illuminated the paintings in the main part of the gallery, casting an ethereal glow over the artistic labor of centuries. Inside the office Frazier and her dad sat on the sofa. Both had deemed it unwise to talk at the ball or anywhere in the country club, where the walls have ears.

Carter, happy to be excused from any duties involving emotional responsibility, merrily stayed on and danced with every woman in sight. Before ten o’clock he was three sheets to the wind and each time he’d lift a glass to his lips he’d declaim, “Couldn’t hurt a baby rabbit.”

It was just as well that Frazier and Frank missed the remainder of the ball, because Carter progressed from three sheets to the wind to bombed to finally shitfaced. When he left with Kenny’s date—not that outrageous in their part of the world, where people did seem to be oversexed—he grandly opened the door for Courtney.
She didn’t mind getting into his souped-up iris-colored Ford flare-side pickup. The purple truck glittered with excitement amidst the dull Mercedeses, Cadillacs, Buicks, Range Rovers, and sundry station wagons. So far so good, but when Carter slid behind the wheel he noticed that Yancey Weems’s 560 Mercedes was in front of him and Billy Cicero’s Volante behind him had squeezed him in so tight he couldn’t get out. He just backed up and crashed into the Aston Martin, then popped the clutch into first gear and smashed into the Mercedes. The lady of the evening screamed in amazement and quickly opened the door, launching herself onto the sidewalk in a heap of satin and tulle. She must have decided that anyone crazy enough to do that was too crazy to sleep with. Carter, laughing, continued on his collision course until he could wriggle out. He waved to the damsel as he sped into the night. When Yancey Weems beheld his Mercedes, its trunk resembling an expensive accordion, a friend had to administer smelling salts. He’d fainted dead away. Billy Cicero, made of tougher stuff and having learned from paying hefty insurance fees, quickly lined up witnesses, although Courtney, the best witness, had fled. He then strode back into the ballroom and hauled out his local lawyer to witness the hard evidence.

Maybe the booze couldn’t hurt a baby rabbit but it sure desecrated the Mercedes and the Aston Martin.

Both father and daughter struggled with their own problems. Tomorrow, when news of Carter’s folly would hit them, they’d handle that too.

Frazier remembered the opening line of her letter, since it was the same for each recipient. “By the time you read this I shall most likely be dead.” She pieced
together what she could. Frank, a man wedded to rationality, listened intently.

“You always worry about money, Daddy. I guess if I had a wife who spent as much as Mother, I’d worry too. Anyway, I hit you pretty hard for that in the letter and I begged you to enjoy what you have and most especially to put Mom in her place. She says ‘Jump’ and you say ‘How high?’”

“That’s the problem. You take her seriously. I let her blather on, I agree with her, and then I go and do what I want to do. As long as you don’t offer your mother any resistance you’ll usually get your way. You butt heads with her.”

“I think your way is devious.”

“Might be devious but it works. Libby needs to think she’s in command. So do you.”

Frazier bristled. “I do not. I happen to be more efficient than most people, so they might as well do it my way.”

“Okay.” Frank smiled. She had proved his point.

“Great, now you’re going along with me. Dad, don’t you ever get tired of women telling you what to do, when to do it, and whom to do it with? If it isn’t Mom, then it’s Mildred at the office.”

“Best executive secretary in the state. Honey, I need help. You don’t. Anyway, I tune out your mother when she starts listing my shortcomings. That’s her way.”

“Well, I don’t want to be in a relationship where I have to tune out my partner.” Frazier spoke sharply. “Sorry, Dad, I didn’t mean to sound that harsh. But it hurts me when I see you cave in to Mom, and it hurt me when I was a kid and you’d let her jerk Carter and me every which way she wanted. You never stood up for us.”

Frank ran his fingers through his thick silver hair. “I regret that, baby. But you know, when I was young things
were different. The wife ruled the house and the kids. I built a good business and paid the bills. Division of labor. In retrospect I think maybe we should have been more flexible. I wish I had spent more time with you kids. I guess being Libby’s child is harder than being her husband. I’m going to retire soon, honey, and when I do I’m going to spend more time with the family and on the golf course too. The clock’s ticking, you know.”

“Yeah, I do know, Dad. That’s why I wrote those letters.” She gulped in air and worked up her nerve. “What Mom’s fussing about is that I’m gay. I wrote everybody that. She says it will kill you. Damn, I don’t even want to repeat the stuff she said. I guess that’s why she destroyed your letter.”

“I’m not keeling over dead.” He ruefully smiled. “You’re a beautiful woman. I thought those girls were, uh, masculine. I don’t know how something like this happens and I think life would be a lot easier if you weren’t.” He paused. “But if that’s what you want out of life I’m not going to stand in your way. You’re still my daughter.” He reached out and brought her hand to his lips.

Frazier fought back the tears. She tried to speak but she couldn’t. Finally she whispered, “Thanks, Daddy. Why is everything so easy with you and so hard with Mom?”

Frank patted her hand and continued to hold it in his big paw. “The oldest story in the books. Fathers and daughters are close; mothers and sons. I get along with Carter about the way Libby gets along with you and yet I love him. He’s my son.” Frank’s voice rose in bewilderment, for he was not a man accustomed to discussing his own emotions, although he was ever prepared to absorb other people’s. “I love him but I can’t talk to him. I can’t reach him and he’s throwing his life away. Yet I can sit
here and talk to you and it’s like seeing myself again, young. We don’t have barriers. I look around at my buddies. Same story mostly. Tension with the sons and ease with the daughters.”

Frazier shrugged. “Different expectations, I guess. I think fathers are hard on sons.”

“I was. But I thought I was providing discipline, and I was hard on you too. You could take it. You were tougher. Funny what makes you know. I remember watching your lacrosse game, St. Luke’s versus St. Catherine’s, senior year. You were down two goals.”

“That wasn’t lacrosse—that was war.”

“Well, I saw you with new eyes. That monster back for St. Catherine’s slashed at you with her stick when the ref, or whatever you call her, had her head turned. She broke two of your fingers. I could see your little finger dangling. You kept your mouth shut. You scored a goal. You scored a goal! Now most kids would have run for the sidelines to bleat and wail and point the finger—forgive the pun. A smaller percentage of kids would have vowed to get even with the back and their focus would have been revenge. Your focus stayed on the game. You scored another goal in the last period. By the time the game was over your hand was so swollen it hurt to see it. I don’t know when I’ve ever been so proud of you. That’s when I knew you were something special. Carter would have taken his stick and brained the guy. He can’t control his emotions. You can.”

“Best game I ever played,” Frazier recalled. “I learned that from you, Dad. You used to tell me the secret of success is to watch the doughnut, not the hole.”

“Honey, well get through this somehow. And if you have a friend, you can bring her around. Mother will have to get used to it.”

“I don’t have a girlfriend. Right now I’m not sure how
many friends I do have of any nature, but I’ve got you and I’m sorry your Saint Patrick’s Day dance went pfft.”

“I’m not.”

They talked a bit longer and then Frank left with a heavy tread, for he would have to face a hysterical Libby. Frazier elected to stay in the office and clear away paperwork. She was too keyed up to sleep. She finally turned out the light at
1:30 A.M. AS
she walked through the darkened gallery a sliver of light, like a silver arrow, shone from the street lamp into the deeper recess of the gallery and played over the Mount Olympus canvas. Frazier stopped to admire the effect. She blinked, involuntarily stepping back. She could have sworn the wings on Mercury’s sandals fluttered. She hurried to the wall switch for the room and flipped on the light. She stared at the painting. The wings remained perfectly still, although Mercury appeared to have a smug expression on his face. She laughed at the tricks light can play on you and locked up for the night.

B
LASTED OUT OF BED AT 7:00 A.M. BY THE TELEPHONE
, Frazier rolled over onto Curry’s leg, provoking a muffled yelp. The dog raised her head as Basil leaped onto the dresser for a better view.

Frazier would have consigned this unwelcome call to her answering machine but whoever was calling would ring three times and hang up to avoid the machine’s pickup on the fourth ring. After a series of these incessant jangles Frazier succumbed.

“Hello.”

“Don’t try and be nice to me,” Libby shrieked. “What a hellacious mess and it’s all your fault.”

Frazier sat up. The cold gave her goose bumps. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

“Don’t you swear at me, young lady. I brought you up better than that. If you hadn’t kept your poor father up until all hours of the night, you’d know.”

“Mother, I haven’t had much sleep. I haven’t even had my first cup of coffee. What’s wrong?”

Libby sputtered but her desire to slap guilt onto Frazier with a trowel overcame the desire to take deep offense at her daughter’s tone. “Your brother, beside himself from the scene at the club, overindulged and wrecked his truck getting out of a parking space. That beautiful truck!”

“He wrecked the Ford in a parking space?” This made no sense to Frazier.

“He also wrecked Yancey Weems’s brand-new Mercedes and Billy’s expensive whatever-it’s-called.”

Frazier developed a sense of the accident. “He wrecked their cars too?” Frazier stifled a laugh.

“Yes. This is terrible. But you haven’t heard the worst part. Courtney Wood says he pushed her out of the truck. They found her wandering down by the swimming pool. Her dress was torn. She was scratched and bruised. Broke both heels on her shoes too.”

“Mother, how did she get into the truck?” Frazier positively enjoyed this.

“She left with Carter. Billy made an indecent proposal when Kenny was out of the room. Carter offered to carry her home.”

“Did Carter tell you this or is this your theory?” Frazier heard Mandy’s echo: “I have a theory.”

“Carter told me nothing. He’s hungover and sick as a dog, which I suppose he deserves. Laura called, frantic, just frantic, because Bobsy Krent at McGuire, Woods, Battle and Boothe phoned to discuss damages. Can you imagine the shock? ‘Damages for what?’ Laura asked. The sordid details immediately followed, I can assure you. Bobsy represents Billy. And, well, they say Yancey Weems is in a coma of grief, yes, a coma of grief. Laura
couldn’t get Carter to the phone. He used the ‘f’ word, she said.”

“We’d better wait for Carter’s version.” Frazier, like a skilled acupuncturist, inserted the needle. “Now, Mother, you don’t think Courtney had something else on her mind—taking advantage of Carter in his weakened state?”

“She’s no better than she should be,” Libby sagely noted. “And since Kenny Singer fires blanks, you might say, she wanted a real man. If her bodice were cut any lower it would have been at her navel. And Carter, with diminished judgment…. What Southern gentleman would refuse a lady a ride home?”

“You’re right, Mother.”

Libby, lulled by her daughter’s agreement, dropped her tone to “confidential.” “Ann Haviland found Courtney by the pool, freezing her assets I should think, and the story there is that Billy, when told of Courtney’s condition, said Courtney was a silly cow and only wanted Carter for his … part. Can you imagine such talk? And then Kenny socked Billy in the jaw.”

“That is news.”

“It got worse. Billy called Kenny a catamite! Kenny hit him again and then left with Courtney Wood, where Laura believes him to be even as we speak. They say Ann almost passed out at such an exchange.”

“As it’s now seven-thirty, I’d hazard a guess that wherever Kenny is he isn’t awake.” Frazier shuddered at Kenny’s public humiliation. It was a sure bet he didn’t call Billy any names.

“That means he’s seven come eleven.” Libby again sounded conspiratorial.

“Mother?”

“Eucie-ducie?”

“Oh, AC/DC,” Frazier corrected her. “Who knows?”

“I thought you people knew one another. And you have secret signs like Masons.”

Frazier shook her head in case cobwebs still lingered.
“I
don’t know anything about secret signs.”