On Turpentine Lane E-Book

Elinor Lipman

• Herausgeber: Lightning Books
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 373

Beschreibung

'Every page was packed with wonders' MARIA SEMPLEAt thirty-two, Faith Frankel has returned to her suburban hometown where she works in the fundraising department of her old school, writing thank-you notes to benefactors. Keen to get her life back on track she buys a sweet but dilapidated bungalow on Turpentine Lane.Never mind that her fiancé is currently 'finding himself' while walking across America and too busy to return her texts, that her witless boss has accused her of fraud, or that her father is going through a mid-life crisis that involves painting fake old masters and hooking up with a much younger woman — Faith is looking forward to a peaceful life in her new home.But when a policeman knocks on her door asking to look in the basement she discovers that the history of 10 Turpentine Lane is anything but peaceful.On Turpentine Lane is a madcap comedy from one of America's most acclaimed novelists..'A romantic comedy with just enough sly wit to keep it from turning sugary.' O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE'Light and tight… constructed with an almost scary mastery.' NEW YORK TIMES'Reminiscent of madcap romantic comedies of 1940s Hollywood' NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS

Leseprobe

BOOKS BY ELINOR LIPMAN

Into Love and Out Again

Then She Found Me

The Way Men Act

Isabel’s Bed

The Inn at Lake Devine

The Ladies’ Man

The Dearly Departed

The Pursuit of Alice

Thrift

My Latest Grievance

The Family Man

Tweet Land of Liberty: Irreverent Rhymes from the Political Circus

The View from Penthouse B

I Can’t Complain: (All Too) Personal Essays

Good Riddance

Published in 2020

by Lightning Books Ltd

Imprint of EyeStorm Media

312 Uxbridge Road

Rickmansworth

Hertfordshire

WD3 8YL

www.lightning-books.com

Copyright © Elinor Lipman 2019

First published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2017

Cover by Ifan Bates

The moral right of the author has been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Printed by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY

ISBN: 978-1-78563-201-3

The author is grateful for permission for the use of “In This Short Life” from The Poems of Emily Dickinson: Variorum Edition, edited by Ralph W Franklin, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Copyright © 1998 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Copyright © 1951, 1955 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Copyright © 1979, 1983 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Copyright © 1914, 1918, 1919, 1924, 1929, 1930, 1932, 1935, 1937, 1942 by Martha Dickinson Bianchi. Copyright © 1952, 1957, 1958, 1963, 1965 by Mary L. Hampson.

For Jonathan

Contents

1 WHAT POSSESSED ME?

2 A DIFFERENT MAN

3 STEWARDSHIP

4 INSPECTION

5 THE SECRET LIFE OF HENRY FRANKEL

6 POINTERS

7 HALLOWEEN

8 EXCELLENT FRIENDS

9 WHY TAKE IT OUT ON ME?

10 WHAT DO I DO NOW?

11 FAMILY CAUCUS

12 THE CONFLUENCE OF BAD THINGS

13 COLLABORATORS

14 STILL HERE

15 PROGRESS

16 VISITORS

17 WELCOME TO EVERTON

18 WHAT A PAL

19 I APOLOGIZE

20 I’M NOT BLAMING ANYONE

21 TEAM TURPENTINE

22 MIND IF I LOOK AROUND?

23 LET THEM LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER

24 OH NO, OH NO, OH NO

25 A LOT FOR A DAUGHTER IN ONE DAY

26 WHAT’S THIS ABOUT?

27 TOO MUCH? TOO CLOSE?

28 WOE IS US

29 HOW TO AVOID THANKSGIVING

30 BRATTY BROOKE

31 TABLE FOR TWO

32 DECEMBER 23–24

33 I WASN’T EVEN BORN THEN

34 CARE TO SHARE?

35 CODES OF CONDUCT

36 DEAD OR ALIVE?

37 I WASTE NO TIME GETTING OVER THERE

38 WE’RE DONE HERE

39 GOOD TRY, THOUGH

40 IF THOSE WALLS COULD TALK

41 IT NEVER SNOWS IN MAUI

42 NEITHER THE TIME NOR THE PLACE

43 OVERALL FRANKEL ANXIETY

44 IS THAT A YES?

45 POOR CHAGALL

46 WHY SO TOUCHY?

47 NEWS

48 NANCY KNOWS

49 “DEAREST NICK...”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Excerpt from Good Riddance

1WHAT POSSESSED ME?

If I hadn’t been naïve and recklessly trusting, would I ever have purchased number 10 Turpentine Lane, a chronic headache masquerading as a charming bungalow? “Best value in town,” said the ad, which was true, if judging by the price tag alone. I paid almost nothing by today’s standards, attributing the bargain to my mother’s hunch that the previous owner had succumbed while in residence. Not so off-putting, I rationalized; don’t most people die at home? On moving day my next-door neighbor brought me a welcome loaf of banana bread along with the truth about my seller. A suicide attempt…sleeping pills…she’d saved them up till she had enough, poor thing. And who could blame her? “Strong as an ox,” she added. “But a whole bottle?” She tapped the side of her head.

“Brain damage?” I asked. “Brain dead?”

“Her daughter had to make that awful decision long-distance.”

I’d negotiated and settled with that very daughter. Sadder and spookier than I bargained for? A little. But now I know it was an act more logical than tragic — what a sensible ninety-year-old felon might consider the simplest way out.

I first viewed the property through rose-colored glasses on a sunny October day. There was a brick path leading to the front door, a trellis supporting what might have been August’s wisteria, and a gnarled tree that hinted at future fruit. Inside I saw gumwood that hadn’t been ruined by paint and a soapstone sink that a decorator might install in a Soho loft. The linoleum beneath my feet made me want to look up the year linoleum was invented.

The real estate agent, who said she’d gone to high school with my brother, had been Tammy Flannagan then, was now divorced. How was Joel? Divorced, too, she’d heard.

“He’s fine,” I said, somewhat distracted by the carved pineapple on top of the newel post, yet another harbinger of domestic tranquility.

There was hardly anything to see on the second floor, just a bathroom from another century, and two square, darkly wallpapered bedrooms facing each other, one with a view of the street, the other overlooking the miniature backyard. The bathroom had a claw-foot tub, its porcelain yellowed and its plug desiccated. The small sink had separate hot and cold faucets, which, Tammy insisted, were back in style.

I asked which one had been the master bedroom.

“Does it matter? They’re equal in square footage,” said Tammy.

“It might matter to someone who’d rather sleep in a room where nobody died.”

She pointed silently to the back room, then directed my gaze to a hatch in the hall ceiling. “When you open that, there’s a ladder you can pull down.”

“Then what?”

“The attic.”

“Have you seen it?”

“Me personally? No. Someone from my office did, of course. I’ve been told it’s empty and dry. Want to see the cellar?”

I knew cellars were important — their foundations, water heaters, boilers, pipes, mousetraps — so I said, “Sure.”

“May need updating,” said Tammy, “but everything’s in good working order. This is a little doll house. I’d buy it myself if I wasn’t already in contract for a condo.”

I thought I should add, hoping to sound nonchalant about the property, “I’m engaged to be married. This would be fine for a single person, but I really need a bigger place.”

She helped herself to my ringless left hand, then dropped it without comment. I said, “We’re not a very traditional couple.”

“Congratulations anyway,” said Tammy. “Do you want to make an appointment to come back with him? Or her.”

“A man, Stuart. He’s away.”

“On business?”

His absence was hard to explain and harder to make sense of, so I just said yes.

Whether it was the impulse to change the subject or sound less like the real estate novice that I was, I said, “I couldn’t even think of moving forward without an inspection.”

But I’d already made up my mind. “A little doll house” sounded exactly right to me. Two bedrooms would be plenty, and I preferred baths to showers. There was a gas stove, green milk-glass mugs hanging from cup hooks, a one-car garage, leaded glass in the china closet, and a price that seemed too good to be true. So on that day, like someone who bought and sold properties with abandon, whose profession was flipping houses, I offered two-thirds of the asking price.

Tammy said, “Well, honestly, I don’t even think I can take that offer to the seller.”

I reminded her that this was a one-bath cottage, surely uninsulated, with an antique boiler and a postage stamp of a backyard. I’d have to start from scratch. “The wallpaper must be from the 1950s,” I scolded, at the same time thinking, I love that viny wallpaper.

Tammy looked up at the ceiling fixture, a white globe that was not unhandsome, and said, “I suppose I have to present your offer. Expect a counter-offer if she’s not too insulted to make one.”

“Every inch of this place needs updating. It’s my final offer. And it’s not like I’m in love with the place,” I lied.

It took one phone call, a counteroffer that I spurned, a fax, a signature, a return fax, and a relatively small check. On the other side was a lawyer representing the uninterested daughter five time zones away.

My counsel added to the purchase and sale agreement a sentence that struck me as curious: that if the lending bank refused to close for any reason — unrelated to my finances — I could back out.

“Is this standard?” I asked.

“Boilerplate,” she answered.

Simple. I signed it.

2A DIFFERENT MAN

The aforementioned fiancé was out of town for an indefinite period because he was walking across the continental United States. His purported goal was not necessarily the Pacific Ocean, but finding his own path in life. It wasn’t just his mission statement but how he talked, on the road or off, raising consciousness, searching for awesomeness in the everyday.

People often looked perplexed when I tried to explain Stuart’s expedition or what I saw in him. There was a time during the period I call Stuart 1.0 when his Instagrams almost exclusively chronicled our dates and were followed by a festival of hashtags expressing affection and devotion. There was a thoughtfulness that I saw as a predictor of husbandly attentiveness; there was a full-time job with the Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance that paid for the tickets and trinkets he hid rather adorably around my apartment.

As for the arena I’ll delicately call “relations” — had I been dealing with amateurs before him?

But he changed — and “overnight” isn’t an exaggeration. He started using words such as potentiality and wholeness after an emergency appendectomy. During his recovery, he quizzed anyone in scrubs until a nurse confirmed, “Yes, it could have ruptured; yes, people can die from that.” He emerged from his hospital stay a different man. It wasn’t organic or neurological, but social, a rebirth inspired by the free soul in the next bed whose worldview sounded good to Stuart, post-surgically, supine, and dangerously close to turning forty.

I gave it some time — accepting the new, softer, vegetarian Stuart 2.0. When friends heard about his walk and asked me if he was a non-conformist or a nut, I told them that this was just a new lifelong goal, to find himself by crossing the country on foot, a sabbatical of sorts after his agency had closed its doors.

I agreed to be one of his sponsors in the form of a jointly held credit card, which he vowed to use sparingly if at all. His quest sounded sincere: his embrace of everything and everybody, whether it was scenery or wildlife, or the people who offered him a couch, an indoor shower, a sandwich. I was skeptical that his lightweight cause would attract the goodwill and hospitality needed. But sure enough, thanks to coverage by local TV stations, big-hearted families stopped their cars to ask what they could do. I knew when he’d failed to find free lodging, because those were the days he blogged about constellations or the howling of coyotes, which meant he’d slept in his pup tent under the stars.

He wore a sign that said in search of stories on one side and, when flipped, free hugs in Spanish and English. At last count, he’d slept in three unlocked churches, one synagogue, one mosque, a few shelters, and several fraternity houses. Because he believed it’s dangerous to text while walking, he checked in less frequently than I liked. We talked several times a week unless his battery was dead or he’d had too much to drink, which happened while staying with frat boys, current or emeritus. When challenged about what was looking to me like debauchery, he said what he’d look like to his hosts was judgmental if he didn’t partake. And wasn’t the whole journey about “walking two moons in another man’s moccasins?” I was thirty-two. I wasn’t getting any younger. I said yes, I suppose so.

After four months on the road, he’d gotten only as far as Ohio. Have I mentioned that his mom was now married to her ex-sister-in-law, that his forsaken dad and uncle were remarried to women who founded a weavers’ collective, making Stuart the only child of three hippie families? When he first proposed this cross-country walk, I said, “Why don’t we drive across the U.S.? It can be our honeymoon.”

“Oh, really?” he said. “Maybe we can stop by Niagara Falls and Disney World in our RV.”

I should have recognized by his tone that he was being facetious, that suggesting a road trip by car not only bore little resemblance to the fulfillment he was seeking but also exposed me as a comfort-seeking, conventional vacationer who had the word honeymoon in her vocabulary.

Whereas his various parents put a good face on it, as I tried to do, my mother was openly cynical. She enjoyed asking, “Where’s Peter Pan this week? Meeting some nice potheads he’ll never see again?” I’m sure it would’ve been fine if Stuart had been a doctor or a banker, but since he was merely, of late, a self-styled philosopher who proposed without a little velvet box, she worried that he was using me. At the time, I thought that couldn’t be further from the truth, that Stuart wasn’t interested in material things, only love, moral support, and occasional infusions of cash to complete his journey.

No one, including me, was thrilled that he was twice divorced from the same woman, but I did make the argument that men who get all the way to forty without commitments are the true Lost Boys of this world.

I commented regularly under Stuart’s blog entries, signing every one “Faith.” His gratitude seemed excessive, always thanking me for logging on and going public with my commitment to his cause. It made me wonder if he’d forgotten that Faith was my first name.

3STEWARDSHIP

I had moved back to Everton, Massachusetts, from Brooklyn to take what appeared to be a stress-free job at my alma mater. My duties continue to be these: if you make a donation to Everton Country Day, especially if it funds a scholarship or endows a chair or names a prize after a loved one, I handwrite the thank-you note that describes all the good your money is doing.

Stewardship, as my position is called, is three-fourths of a whole job, with the remaining quarter understood to be beating the bushes for the annual fund. All of that makes my presence required at alumni cocktail parties and reunions, which I admit played a role in my accepting the job due to a social dry spell. In fact, Stuart and I met at an Everton function, not the most felicitous first encounter. I stopped him at the door because he was not on the guest list and was wearing a T-shirt depicting a silk-screened tuxedo, whereupon he defended it as a perfectly reasonable interpretation of “black tie optional.” When I realized he was the plus-one of a Silver Circle benefactor, the category designating gifts between $5,000 and $9,999, I apologized profusely.

Since joining the team, I’ve shared an office with Nicholas Franconi, whose bailiwick is Major Gifts. He was more senior on the job than I by six months; he himself was something of what we in Development call a “get” because he used to raise money for Phillips Exeter Academy. When anyone asked why the change, he’d say, “I did it for love,” then add, with a smile, “for Everton Country Day.”

In what Nick liked to call “Stuartship,” I taped a map of the U.S. on our office wall, like the ones in old movies, on which families followed their sons on the front. My pins, of course, represented Stuart’s progress. Soon I was sorry I ever started it because a sliver of an inch equaled hundreds of miles, and with Stuart on foot, nothing changed very fast.

Nick made a joke every time I stuck another push-pin into the map. “Voodoo?” he asked. Or “One small step for a man, a giant leap for…remind me?” I didn’t mean to laugh, shouldn’t have found it endlessly amusing, might even have taken offense on Stuart’s behalf, but I’d been having more and more trouble defining the what and why of the alleged mission. Because of Nick’s job, arm-twisting for major gifts, I once asked him if he thought Stuart could find a corporate sponsor.

“Nothing’s impossible,” he answered. Then, after several minutes, all innocence: “Bill and Melinda Gates would surely be interested in such a meaningful pilgrimage.”

It struck me as something my mother would say, except that Nick’s quip was accompanied by a wry smile. Abandoning that line of inquiry, I asked how his live-in girlfriend’s work was going, perhaps a little ungenerous of me since I knew Brooke was under-employed. Between full-time jobs, after having been a manager for two defunct boutiques, she sells high-end handbags on eBay, none of which I’d bought. They’re all oversize, decorated with hardware; many are fringed in a cowgirl manner or are “unconstructed,” according to the listing.

Nick admitted the goods didn’t reflect her taste, either, but retailing was all about knowing what sells, what goes in the window, and proper signage. At that point, after three months in Development, I hadn’t met Brooke. He didn’t bring her to what he considered work functions, just the way I couldn’t bring the absent Stuart. Nick’s screen-saver was a family photo of the two of them with a dog who’s since run away, all three wearing sun- glasses. Both Brooke and the dog had layered honey-colored hair. She looked pretty — fit and flexible, arms bare and tanned. The humans are grinning, and quite adorably Tramp is baring his gums in what looks like a matching smile.

One of the reasons Nick was drawn to Brooke was her pragmatism, he once mentioned. I asked for a definition.

“She’s a bottom-line kind of gal. She likes her creature comforts and is willing to work for them.”

Was that a good thing? I knew what he was implying: that employment was an important attribute in a partner or future spouse. Was he sending me a message that there was something he’d missed about Stuart that recommended him for the Gold, Silver, or Bronze Circle of my affection?

It would be the very thing I was missing: the original Stuart, the formerly attentive, employed, unphilosophical, sexually solicitous fiancé I used to know.

4INSPECTION

Was I supposed to have noticed the curled roof shingles, the severed ropes in half of the window pulleys, the pilot lights requiring personal igniting, the bird’s nest in the chimney, the asbestos insulating the pipes? It took an inspector, a friend of my brother’s — as was everyone in Everton to some degree — who shook his head sadly with each new prod from his inventory of inspection tools.

“Deal breaker?” I asked, watching him click a light switch on and off to no avail.

“Not my call,” he said. “I just write a report. People buy all kinds of places. But you might want to check what your P and S says about the inspection.”

“What would I want it to say?”

“That you have an out.”

Had my original visit been too hasty? Too starry-eyed? I called my lawyer from the front porch and got her paralegal, who said she’d look up the purchase and sale agreement. “Good news,” I heard after a musical interlude. “You have our default inspection clause.”

“Which means what?”

“That you don’t have to go through with it.”

“What if I want to?”

“Everything’s negotiable.”

“Don’t do anything yet,” I instructed.

I went back inside, called to Joel’s friend — a softball team- mate, it turned out — “Wally? How’s it going?”

His answer, not more than a grunt, sounded farther away than just one floor. Mystery solved: the ladder that led to the crawl space was now dominating the hallway between the bedrooms. “You’re brave,” I yelled up to him from the bottom rung.

“Not in the least,” he answered.

“Is there a light?”

“Flashlight. Mine.”

“Can you stand up?”

“Almost.”

“They told me it was dry and empty. Is it?”

“Dry enough. Clean. Pretty empty. Some stuff.”

A snapshot at that moment would have captured me with a dreamy smile, antiques floating in my mind’s eye. A steamer trunk? A dressmaker’s form? A trove of love letters? A Flexible Flyer? “Anything good?” I called.

“A whatchamacallit — a cradle.”

“Is it a nice one? I mean, an antique?”

“People expect me to know stuff like that. I don’t.”

I figured, at best, hand-carved and charming. At worst, I’d put it out on the curb with a sign that said free.

Sometimes things work out because it’s in the stars or because a smart real estate lawyer picks up her phone. In my case, the break came from the deceased seller’s distant daughter, who must’ve seen a future filled with more dud inspections and thought Faith Frankel might be 10 Turpentine Lane’s only hope. My lawyer called me at work, and gushed, “Are you sitting down?” Before I could answer, she said, “The seller is paying for all the fixes. For the roofing, the asbestos removal, the stuck windows. She didn’t budge on the stove’s pilot lights, but that was an easy gimme. What else? Doesn’t matter. She’s taking care of just about everything we asked for.”

I said, “I didn’t expect this! I thought you’d talk me out of the deal.”

“I first tried to knock another fifteen grand off the purchase price, and this was her counteroffer! Who wants to have to hire all those people and coordinate the repairs?”

“Did you accept?”

“Not without running it by you. I’m going to ask that we choose the contractor so you don’t get some unlicensed handy- man.”

“When will all this happen?”

“The work? ASAP. Before you take possession. I mean, you can move in before every little thing is fixed, but what’s the rush? You don’t want to be there with asbestos being excavated and a racket on the roof.”

“But it’s officially mine now?”

“If you still want it, and all the contingencies are met…absolutely.”

“Yes, I want it. Tell them my answer is yes to the repairs. It’s off the market, right?”

“Definitely. Besides…no, never mind. It’s nothing. We’re fine.”

I knew her unspoken words were No one else had given this house a second look, let alone made an offer.

I didn’t care. Even if it was the mangy one-eyed shelter dog of real estate listings. To me that made it all the more lovable.

Both Joel and my mother came for the walk-through the day before we closed. Tammy the agent was present, but I led the tour, pointing out my favorite features. The newel post! The leaded glass in the china cabinet — a corner china cabinet. The pantry. Who gets a pantry anymore? A clothesline in the basement! Hardwood floors in the bedrooms.

“Not sure if pine is considered hardwood,” Joel volunteered, then opened the nearest window — still stubborn despite new ropes and pulleys.

“Does it smell a little musty in here?” my mother asked.

I pointed out that cold air would fix that; let’s open another window and get some cross-ventilation.

“Has Stuart seen it?” my mother asked. And to Tammy, employing a tone I recognized purely as a way to dispense with her spinster daughter’s social status, “Stuart is Faith’s fiancé.”

I pretended to be studying the unexciting view of the driveway from the parlor window until I came up with “Not an issue. Stuart gave me power of attorney.”

“That sounds right,” said Joel.

“Who did you say was the previous owner?” my mother asked Tammy.

“A Mrs. Lavoie.”

“Widowed?”

“I should think so — she was at least ninety!” I said.

“Children?”

“One. In Hawaii.”

“Nieces or nephews? No one close by?”

“Ma! What’s with the third degree?”

“If it’s the title you’re worried about,” said Tammy, “everything’s in order. No one but Mrs. Lavoie’s family owned this house. Her in-laws came here as newlyweds, and apparently she and her husband took it over when the parents died.”

“Did they die here by any chance?” my mother asked.

Tammy said, “That I don’t know.”

“Do you know what year it was built?” asked my mother.

I was too annoyed to do anything but sputter, “It was 1906, okay? Would you like to count the rings on the trees in the backyard?”

“Don’t be so sensitive,” said my mother. “You know I’m interested in genealogy.”

“Since when?” asked Joel.

“As I’ve said so many times, it’s a little doll house, don’t you think?” Tammy cooed.

“And it does have what one might call personality,” said my mother. “Have I said that yet? Nearly charming. I can see the appeal…for you.”

Joel laughed. I’d taken a half day off for this walk-through and signing, and soon these five and a half rooms would be officially mine. Wait till my New York friends heard that I’d bought a whole house with two bedrooms, an eat-in kitchen, a parlor, a claw-foot tub, a backyard, and a garage for the price of a studio in Queens. As soon as the house was spruced up, I’d invite everyone to Everton for a housewarming. So far, no one knew that Stuart had proposed. Though I’d pictured a squealing dinner in a Dumbo café, with the sudden appearance of pink champagne, I’d hold on to that announcement. It’s the kind of news you want to tell your friends in person.

5THE SECRET LIFE OF HENRY FRANKEL

How did my father feel about Stuart? Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, they’d never met because my allegedly happily married father and mother had lived apart since Dad retired, just as Stuart was heading sort of west. For many months no one adequately explained why Dad had moved out, except for the wishy-washy reassurances that this was not an official separation. He dined with my mother a few times a month, and with Joel and me about half that. Once we learned of his semi-monthly visits with Mom, Joel jumped right in and asked if their sleepovers were conjugal.

“I told you. He pays the bills and mows the lawn, just like always.”

Joel asked me in private, “Do you think Dad moved out so he could fool around?”

I said, “Ask him.”

When we did see our dad, it was in Boston, at restaurants. We talked in generalities — about my work, about Stuart’s progress, about towing and plowing, which was Joel’s latest business venture. In retrospect, I see that we assumed that life in his little Gainsborough Street studio was too sad to ask about — just TV, the Sox, the Patriots, beer, and General Tso’s chicken too many times per week.

I began calling the situation “The Secret Life of Henry Frankel,” which I’d reference even in front of my mother. Finally, several months into the allegedly friendly separation, she said, “He’s made himself very clear. He wanted to paint, and he needed a studio.”

I said, “You’re just telling us now? Since when did Dad want to paint?”

“Since…I don’t know. It was his big retirement plan: paint every day, all day. The place is a mess, but he doesn’t mind squalor. I mean, it’s artistic squalor. With oil paint, there’s no easy cleanup.”

“You’ve been there?”

“I helped him choose it. Correction: he allowed me to come along when he was being shown some garrets.”

Joel said, “Well! Don’t Faith and I have the most evolved parents! I guess we shouldn’t have been worried about you and blaming Dad and, let’s be honest, thinking he had a girlfriend—”

“Or a boyfriend,” I added.

We were at my mother’s kitchen table, drinking sherry from cordial glasses, the only alcohol on hand. “He says it’s all about painting,” she said. “I have a spouse who’s married to his art.”

“And how are you doing with this?” I asked.

“I’m adjusting. It might be a phase he’s going through. Remember when he threw himself into golf? I was a golf widow for two straight summers. Now he doesn’t even go to the driving range.”

Joel said, “All of a sudden the father I’ve known for thirty- four years is a painter?”

“Do you know what abstract expressionism is? I believe that’s the term he used.”

Joel asked me — or did I ask him? — “Is it possible for two adult children not to know that their father is an abstract expressionist?”

“How could you have known? I don’t think he even knew,” our mother said.

“Have you seen his work?” I asked.

“Pictures of it. He e-mails me a photo when he finishes one.” Less than eagerly, she asked, “Would you want to see some?”

Joel said, “I’m not sure.”

I said, “I would.”

As soon as she left the room, he whispered, “They could be shit.”

She returned holding snapshots, three by fives, one in each hand. “I get these made up from his e-mails,” she said. “They do that at CVS while you wait.”

She gave one to each of us. Mine was a photo of an easel, on which sat a small unframed canvas depicting a gold square sit- ting on top of an orange square with a horizontal crimson stripe between them. Joel and I swapped; the other was orange on top of purple with a turquoise stripe between. I said, “I like these. They look happy.”

“Why wouldn’t they? Happy painter, happy paint.”

Joel emitted something like a hmmmff.

“Is this public knowledge?” I asked. “That he paints? Can I tell him we saw these?”

Our mother asked, “How about this: I’ll tell Norman Rockwell that I showed you two pictures from his Orange Suite, and you really liked them. Is that an accurate statement — that you like them?”

I said yes. Joel took another look, and said, “Okay, me, too.”

I asked her when the artist was next coming to dinner.

She squinted in the direction of the wall calendar, each month showcasing another dairy product from the local creamery. “I invited him for Friday, for beef Stroganoff, but he hasn’t confirmed.”

“If it’s on, could we come, too?”

“I can’t on Friday. I have a date,” said Joel.

Of course, that triggered the instant engagement of my mother’s and, to an only slighter degree, mine.

“Is it someone new?” she asked. “It’s always someone new,” I said.

I texted Stuart about the discovery: Mystery solved. Dad left bec he wants 2 paint. oil on canvas, abstract, mom OK w it so way better than I thought. Miss u.

I didn’t like using the abbreviations of a twelve-year-old, but Stuart believed it was stuffy to spell things out if you could get by with less, just like in life. He texted back the next morning, Was this 4 me?

6POINTERS

When it came to Joel’s social life, sometimes my mother and I could hover. Especially me, since I was subletting a one-bedroom apartment two floors above his until I took possession of my bungalow. He’d been married at thirty and divorced a year later, the innocent party, which I say not out of blind loyalty but as fact. He had the bad luck to fall for an adultery-prone woman named Brenda, whom the rest of the family considered unworthy.

I’d love him to meet someone deserving of his big unlucky heart. He isn’t the most conventionally attractive or fittest guy in the world, but for those who notice, his face wears his goodness quite handsomely.

Growing up only eighteen months apart, our solicitousness is a two-way street. The same night I told him about what I called our engagement and what Stuart characterized as “our promise,” Joel asked for the play-by-play. “Set the stage for me,” he said, taking a first sip from his dessert, a chocolate martini. “It’s research, in case I meet someone. All pointers welcome.”

I tasted his drink then ordered one of my own. “It happened the night before he left on his quest. We were having takeout from Peaceable Nation at my place, and we’d had a bottle of wine. And he quite literally asked for my hand. ‘Right? Left?’ I asked. First he snapped off a piece of the fringe from the scarf he was wearing — red cotton, made in India — then took my left hand and tied the thread around the fourth finger.

“I said, ‘Is this what I think it is?’

“‘It’s a placeholder.’

“‘For…’

“‘For when I’m back.’

“‘And then…’

“‘We’ll be together, under one roof.’ He patted my hand. ‘Good fit? Not too tight?’

“I said, ‘It’s perfect. A metaphor.’ I wanted to ask whether the ‘under one roof’ meant as husband and wife, or just room-mates. But I didn’t want to spoil the moment. Instead, I asked, ‘Would it be okay if I replaced it with something a little sturdier?’

“He told me that was his intention, of course; that’s what he meant by ‘placeholder.’ He said the red was no accident, that it had major symbolic heft in many religions and cultures.

“I asked, ‘And when you’re back, were you thinking we’d live here or at your place?’ He said he was subletting his apartment during his hegira, and the lessee had signed on for six months, renewable verbally or by text in six-month intervals up to eighteen months.”

I didn’t tell Joel the rest, that we’d made farewell love in a new position that Stuart said he’d learned from kabbalah teachings, and in the morning, his departure documented with photos destined for Facebook and Instagram, he set out more or less west. I’d made him three cheese sandwiches and three peanut butter and honey ones on pita bread. He said he’d eat dropped fruit that he’d source from orchards along the way, so just an apple and a banana to start with.

After he left, I looked up hegira. I don’t think he knew that its dictionary definition was “a journey, especially when undertaken to escape from a dangerous or undesirable situation.” Over the next few weeks, I switched from red thread to string to yarn and back to string when the wool made my finger itch. The infirmary’s nurse questioned my needing hydrocortisone cream when I could simply remove the irritant. I called Stuart and told him of my dilemma.

I must have woken him. “Red thread?” he repeated, his voice a little thick. “Remind me.”

7HALLOWEEN

I’d stayed home, giving out generous amounts of candy to the mere half-dozen trick-or-treaters in the apartment complex. Between visitors, I was reading Stuart’s Facebook posts, noticing he was looking thinner, which didn’t worry me since he was walking the equivalent of a half marathon every day. His tan was deepening despite his safari hat, his SPF pre- cautions, and the fact that it was late October. Though I made a point of “liking” all of his Facebook pictures, many I actually hated. He seemed to be running into old girlfriends and every female classmate from social work school; one might even have deduced that his route was not a spontaneous meander but a romantic scavenger hunt. I didn’t want to make an issue of his socializing with women he once dated, but each post unsettled me. I reminded myself that he chose me, committed himself to me; that I was the one with the red string around my finger.

And only those closest to him — his parents and I — had our credit cards in his wallet.

I didn’t want to be seen as a jealous partner, and it was hard to argue with “Am I not supposed to see/talk to/have a drink with interesting and accomplished women just because I’m not dating them anymore?”

I didn’t quibble with the “accomplished” because he would judge me a snob. Stuart claimed to be unimpressed by fame or degrees or job titles, especially if the latter fell into categories he considered conventional. He once said that if he had to be on a desert island with only one person and the choices were a doctor or a nurse, he’d pick the latter. Or between a college professor and a kindergarten teacher? A football player or a cheer-leader? In every case, he favored the less-lettered alternative.

Our engagement hadn’t gone public. Once I asked why, among all the signs he held up in photos, one never says love you, faith! Or even just hi, faith? He said it was because the signs were a team-building tool. He had a public persona, and — as with actors and celebrities — being perceived as unattached helps with socializing, which may lead to cash contributions, a necessary evil along his journey.

I tried his cell. He said he couldn’t talk — he was with hair and makeup at a cable TV station in Terre Haute.

“While you’re there, charge your phone so when you call me back—”

“Babe, gotta go. Seriously.”

He did call back after the interview, but not immediately; in fact, he woke me up. His greeting was “I hit the jackpot! The TV station is putting me up at a Hilton Garden Inn! I’m calling from the tub!”

I said something I’d never said to him, or to anyone over the phone, ever, maybe now from some altered sleep state, “Are you naked?”

I was expecting his answer to be at least a little encouraging. Such as “Why do you ask?” or “What are you wearing?” But all he said was “I’m in the tub, dummy. Of course I’m naked.”

I said, “Oh. Just trying to get a picture.”

Another guy might have said, “Really? Want a picture? I can do that.” But what I heard was “I think I was pretty good tonight. The reporter was giving me the usual tests about my motive, about what I was trying to accomplish, and I told her I was in the business of seeking kindness. That it wasn’t just for myself, but what I’d discovered was that the dispensers of kindness or generosity or a thumb’s-up from behind the wheel or support in the form of cash came away feeling better about themselves. And she said, ‘So you’re giving forward?’ which was really a great takeaway. I said, ‘Exactly.’”

I said, “Stuart? I’m in bed. I wish you were here.”

“Me, too, babe.”

“I’ve never had phone sex, but I can guess that one person in bed and another one in the bathtub would be a good start.”

I heard the slurp of the drain. “I can’t go there, babe. It’s been a really long day, and you wouldn’t believe how clean sheets and HBO appeal to me. And you know, of course, that the government constantly monitors cell phone conversations. There’s no such thing as privacy anymore.”

I said, “I have nothing to hide. And wouldn’t it be just some noises we made? I don’t think I’d be using actual words.”

He said, “I have another call. Gotta take this! It’s the producer from tonight!”

“Call me back—”

Maybe the station had gotten good feedback and possibly contributions. I left my bed and went to my laptop. His last blog entry had been posted at what he described as “twilight.”

I’m seeing kids on the streets of Terre Haute in masks and costumes & here are the messages I’m taking away: violence, gender bias, racism, missoginy, war, sexpot, Hollywood, commercial, commercial, commercial, so I started thinking of this 1 thing and couldn’t get it out of my head where are those little boxes kids carry while Trick or Treating, where you ask for money for Unicef instead of candy? If your reading this and its not too late — ask your kids if they really need candy or do they realize that some children have never tasted one single piece of candy in their whole war torn life? Plus they have TB, malaria and worse.

Peace,

Stuart

Not feeling terribly indulgent, I commented, “You can’t just send kids out asking for money without the official UNICEF box. BTW, they get candy, too. What kid is going to ask for JUST money?”

Naturally, I was having trouble falling back to sleep. It was 11:45, too late to call one of the girlfriends I’d been neglecting since meeting Stuart, so I texted Joel, who’d had an all-important date — all-important because it was his first online venture — membership having been my birthday gift to him. how was tonight? I wrote.

I had to wait until morning for the return call, which I mistakenly took for a good sign. “No go” was his greeting.

“Okay. Tell me everything.”

“I get to the restaurant, and she’s sitting at the bar dressed like an Indian maiden—”

“You’re joking.”

“It was her Halloween getup, supposedly on her way to a party afterward. I walked over, and said, ‘Nice to see you, Pocahontas. I’m John Smith.’”

“Good line.”

“Maybe. If she’d gotten it. But she had no clue that I was talking Jamestown. She thought it was my name even though my e-mails were all signed ‘Joel.’”

“Then what?”

“I told her I was just making a little Virginia Colony joke. John Smith was an actual person, and supposedly Pocahontas saved his life. I could tell she was embarrassed so I said, ‘Well, I could’ve been another total stranger named John Smith. No harm done.’ I sat down, ordered a martini.”

“Then?”

“She asked what I did. I said I have my own business. ‘Such as?’ I said, ‘Plowing and towing.’ That did it. She had to go to her Halloween party about ninety seconds after that.”

“And you think that was it — your job?”

“I know it was. She actually said, ‘I’m a teacher with a master’s degree. I hope you understand, but I don’t see myself with a truck driver.’”

“Then I hate her,” I said.

“Thank you. I will, too.”

“But don’t give up. Keep answering those winks, or smiles, or whatever they’re called.”

“I will if you will,” he said.

I asked him what that meant.

“Test the waters. See what’s out there. What’s the harm, with Stuart out of the picture?”

Maybe I didn’t correct that as fast as I should have; maybe I’d had the same thought myself but in a distinctly hypothetical way. “He’s only out of town. We’re engaged—”

First I heard an impatient huff, followed by a killjoy “Sometimes I wonder.”

I asked him how long he’d been having doubts about Stuart and me ending up together.

“You don’t want to know,” he answered. “The real question is are you having doubts?”

I could hardly admit that I’d suggested phone sex and had been spurned, so I told him that he was catching me when I was a little sick of seeing my fiancé with his arm around a different woman every day.

“Have you told him to cut that out?”

“He knows.”

“But he posts that shit anyway?” Before I could answer, Joel asked, “What would happen if you cooled it? I mean would Stuart say no way? Or would he say, ‘Babe, I didn’t want to be the one, but…’”

“How do you know he calls me babe?”

“Surprise, surprise.”

“Do you think he’d be glad if I broke it off?”

“Jesus! Don’t ask me that.”

“I suppose, even if I was having doubts, there’s plenty of time to make a decision. He’s only in Indiana.”

“Which may say it all…”

“Like what?”

“Like he’s in no big rush to get to the Pacific Ocean, i.e., to reverse direction, get on a plane, and fly back to his fiancée.”

Had I not entertained the same thought? But who can judge how long it should take to hike from Massachusetts to Indiana? I said, “Everyone has doubts, right? In every relationship?”

“Did you send him photos of the house?”

“Not exactly.”

“Does he know you bought a house?”

I told him I was waiting to see if I was approved for the mortgage. No point in getting Stuart all excited and then having to break the news —

“Is he a child? You have to protect him from news like ‘I got turned down for the mortgage. How’d you like to throw some money into the pot?’”

That’s when I admitted I didn’t want Stuart throwing money into the pot.

“Because he has no money? Or because you don’t want to own a house with him?”

“I can swing it myself” was the non-answer I mumbled.

“Good. Dad would probably cosign if that helped. If he ever called anyone back. All the banks in town know him.”

I tried Stuart’s phone and got his long annoying voice-mail message that provided his website address and philosophy of life. “It’s Faith Frankel,” I said after the beep. “Would you mind calling me back someday?”