Claire smiled and reached out to touch the pale kinked waves. Eric sighed and rolled on his side. She pulled her hand back, afraid of waking him. It had been several months since Claire had seen him, and already he looked more like a little boy, not the baby she remembered.
"I cut out the TV Guide for the day he was born, to put in his baby book." Jean pulled up a blanket to cover him, patted him so softly that he didn't stir. "You could get you one of these, you know. And you'll be thirty-five next week, so it's not like there's much time left. They have stories all the time on TV about women who wait too long and then figure out their body won't cooperate anymore."
"Evan doesn't feel ready to get married, Mom." Claire surprised herself by adding, "I don't know if I would want to be married to him anyway."
"Married? Who says you have to be married? I didn't have to be married to have you and Susie. And Susie may be as good as married to J. B., but she sure don't have the piece of paper to prove it." Susie had been the product of a liaison with an on-again, off-again truck- driving boyfriend who still occasionally showed up to take Jean out to dinner or to give Susie a birthday present two months after the fact. When she was growing up, Claire had actually envied her sister the certainty of knowing her father, and knowing that he loved her, at least in a small way.
Her mother turned and shuffled back down the hall in too-small metallic gold mules. Claire trailed behind her. In the living room, Jean huffed a little as she bent over and pressed a button on the bottom of the TV, flicking past different images until the opening credits for A Better Tomorrow came on.
"The batteries went out on my remote. I have got to get to the store today." Jean tapped on the forehead of a rugged-looking man with a stethoscope around his neck. He was holding an anguished conversation with a nurse while they stood inside a supply closet. "His ex-wife is one of the models on The Price Is Right."
Claire was confused. "The doctor's ex-wife?"
"No, honey, the actor's ex-wife. The character doesn't know that his new wife is really his half-sister, and she has amnesia because of the coma she was in after the car accident that killed his first wife."
To Claire's mother, TV was more than entertainment, it was a family that shared histories and connections. Maury Povich was married to Connie Chung. Mario Thomas, who had been the spunky star of That Girl! years ago, was married to Phil Donahue, who was still important even if he didn't have a talk show anymore. Fred Savage, who had been so wholesome on The Wonder Years, might now be seen beating his girlfriend to death on a "fact-based" TV movie of the week.
Watching her mother stare mesmerized at the TV set's manufactured tribulations, Claire felt a surge of gratitude for Charlie. Even before she had met her, Claire had already been distancing herself from these TV sets, this apartment, this way of life that wanted little and expected even less, but moving in with Charlie had speeded up the process.
Now that Claire no longer saw her mother every day, it was hard not to view her the way a stranger would. For one thing, a stranger would never guess that they were related. Claire was tall and thin, while Jean was short and nearly one hundred pounds overweight. Claire had red-gold curls; her mother's hair was currently dyed a frayed, fried blond. Claire seldom wore makeup. Her mother's mouth was a dark red Cupid's bow, outlined and filled in using colors from a makeup kit brought from a TV infomercial. The pitchster had promised that each kit was specially created for each customer. Jean had had Claire take a Polaroid of her to send to the people who custom-blended each order. The result could sometimes be frightening in the blue glow of the TV set—heavy-lidded eyes, lips so dark they were almost black, stripes of maroon blush that added false hollows to Jean's cheeks. Claire's mother looked less a vamp than an overweight vampire.
"I don't really have time to follow the shows anymore, Mom."
When Claire lived at home, her mother had spent every evening's commercial breaks filling her in on the big events of the daytime shows. The weird thing was that Claire had enjoyed it. "One of the reasons I came over was to ask you about Aunt Cady. I started wondering about her when I was cleaning out her trailer. Like, what did she do in the WACs? And did you ever hear anything about a boyfriend she had during the war? A guy named Rudy?"
"By the time I was old enough to pay attention to Aunt Cady, she was already an old maid working at the bank. No makeup and too skinny. Always so serious, with her nose in a book. Men like someone they can have fun with, someone with a little meat on their bones." Jean looked up at the ceiling, thinking. "Maybe I did hear she had a little something going on before I was born, but by the time she came home he was out of the picture."
"Do you know why they never got married? Or what happened to him?"
"Like I said, I wasn't even born when it happened. I'm surprised that anyone would have looked at her twice. Even as a kid, you heard things about what it had been like, you know, about how the women would do anything for a Hershey bar or a cigarette." She swiveled her eyes back to the TV, where two nurses were deep in conversation. They both wore the starched white caps that Claire knew had been out of favor for fifteen years. "Do you know how many women the average man sleeps with in his lifetime?"
"What? What's your source on this?"
"Geraldo."
"The man who put fat from his butt into his forehead?"
"Seven. The answer is seven. Don't you find that interesting?"
"Very." Her mother didn't seem to notice the sarcasm.
TVZTRU
Chapter 12The sputtering roar of the unmuffled engine of a car pulling up outside was loud enough to make it difficult to hear the TV.
"There's your sister."
A few seconds later, Susie walked in. She shrugged off her rabbit- fur coat, revealing the yellow-, orange-, and brown-striped polyester uniform of Spud City, where she worked as a prep person. Although still as thin as when she was a teenager, Susie now looked hollowed out and haggard.
"Hey, Claire. What are you doing around the old homestead?" Without waiting for an answer, she turned to their mother. "Is Eric asleep?" Her fingers, tipped with cherry-red nail polish, were busy unpinning her hairnet.
"He just went down for a nap about a half-hour ago."
"Then I'm going to take a shower. I can't stand smelling like grease for one more second." She went off down the hall.
"How are she and J. B. doing?" Claire asked her mother. J. B. didn't seem to have a job, although he sometimes worked as a day laborer doing construction. She remembered the last time she had seen him, on the Fourth of July. Hie five of them had watched fireworks on TV while eating a sheetcake her mother decorated with strawberries, blueberries, and Cool Whip to resemble an American flag. J. B. had worn a sleeveless denim shirt that showed off his heavily muscled arms, which were tattooed with a dragon, a dancing showgirl and a Harley-Davidson emblem. He and Susie took turns going out into the apartment's courtyard to light up cigarettes, as they had both pledged not to smoke around their son. Claire had liked him for that, and for the way he frequently scooped up Eric for a hug.
"They're still together, which gives her a longer track record than practically anybody else in the family. He's different, but I like him."
Jean stopped talking when Susie walked back into the living room. She was dressed in tight jeans, a pair of Candie's mules, and a rhinestone-spangled T-shirt that read Country Blues. A towel was wrapped around her head like a turban. She sat down in the armchair, unwrapped the towel and began to comb her fingers through her shoulder-length hair, still blond but clearly now with some help. "So, Big Sis, what are you up to these days? How come you're not at work?"
"I came by to ask Mom about something I found in Aunt Cady's trailer."
Her mom turned from the TV to look at her. "I thought you didn't find anything but that diary?" Jean had called Claire the day after her return and had been disappointed by her reply. When she had spoken to her, Claire had found herself neglecting to mention the painting and the troubling baggage it b
rought with it.
"Well, I did find something. An oil painting of a woman holding a letter. It's only about this big." Claire measured the air in front of her with her hands. "I think Aunt Cady got it when she was in Germany. That's why I've was asking you all those questions, Mom. When I first found it, I knew it was beautiful, but I didn't know if it were real. But I've shown it to a few people, and they think it might be very old. Maybe several hundred years, even. So"—she could feel her heart begin to race again at her audacity—"I'm going to take it to New York. That's what I came over here to tell Mom."
"New York?" Jean echoed. To Claire's surprise, she heard envy in her voice. "The Big Apple?"
Susie dropped the towel in her lap. "I don't understand. Why do you have to go to New York City?"
"I need someone to examine the painting, and that's where the world's experts are."
"You mean you have to find out if it's worth money or not?"
Claire couldn't think of a way to describe all her tangled thoughts about the painting. "That, and how old it is, and who painted it and maybe who the lady in the painting was. Mom, how do you think Aunt Cady came to have it?"
Her mother's answer surprised her. "Things go missing, don't they? And somebody has to find them, right?"
It wasn't until after Claire left that Jean remembered she hadn't told her about the reporter from the Medford Mail Tribune who had called two days before. The paper, he said, was beginning a series of in- depth stories on the recently departed, not to replace obituaries but rather to supplement them. Each story would give readers a glimpse of the real person who lay behind an obituary's brief biographical sketch and list of grieving survivors. The articles would profile the dead through interviews with relatives and close friends, as well as photos of particularly beloved mementos. Jean had told the reporter what little she remembered about her uncle's sister, but as for belongings, she had explained to him that Claire had inherited everything. He had been eager to follow up with her, and requested her phone number and her address, so that he could send a photographer—a stringer, he called him—out for pictures. Wouldn't he be surprised, Jean thought now, when he found out that Aunt Cady might actually have had something worth owning instead of just piles and piles of books.
Then the new soap—Sharing—came on and she and Susie settled in to watch. And by the time the show was over, Jean had forgotten all about telling Claire about that nice reporter.
The home office for Kissling Insurance, Inc., was located on the twenty-ninth floor of a downtown office building known locally as "Big Pink" for its pale copper-colored metal exterior. Patiently, Claire stood waiting in front of the firm's receptionist as she spoke into her telephone headset. She seemed in no particular hurry to finish her conversation. A flock of iridescent-winged starlings flew by the floor-to-ceiling windows. Surrounded by acres of polished dark wood gleaming under recessed lights, Claire felt out of place and unsophisticated. If this was how she felt standing in a Portland insurance firm, then what was she doing going to New York?
The receptionist laughed throatily into the tiny black mike of her headset. "Thank you again.... May I help you?"
Without the visual clue of a receiver being put down, it took a second for Claire to realize that this last sentence had been addressed to her.
"I'm here to see Evan Elliott."
"Do you have an appointment with Mr. Elliott, Ms . . . ?" The receptionist arched an eyebrow, clearly not remembering her, even though Claire had been here half a dozen times before to meet Evan for lunch.
"It's Claire Montrose. And no, I don't really have an appointment."
"Then I'll see if he is available. Please have a seat."
She indicated a low-slung leather and chrome armchair. Claire sank into it, her knees higher than her head. The receptionist began a low-voiced conversation, presumably with Evan. From a distance the headset was invisible, giving the impression that she was talking to herself.
"Mr. Elliott will see you now." Continuing her pretense of never having seen Claire before, the receptionist came out from behind her desk to point the way. Claire struggled up from her chair. She was used to being taller than most women. Now she had the slightly disconcerting sensation of being at eye level with the receptionist's red-painted lips, thanks to the woman's four-inch strappy heels.
They were the kind of shoes she and Lori called "fuck-me shoes" if they were in a catty mood.
Claire tapped lightly on Evan's door and then opened it. "Hi, Evan."
Evan looked up from his desk, a frown drawing his brows together. In front of him was a single stack of papers, lined up so neatly that they almost looked bound. "What are you doing here, Claire?"
"I thought I would take you to lunch."
"Lunch? But I brought my lunch." He really looked at her for the first time since she had entered his office. "Since when do you wear jeans to work?"
"I took the day off. In fact"—she took a deep breath—"I took the week off."
"Why?" He looked more put upon than curious.
"Since we got home from my aunt's, I've been showing the painting to people—first to Charlie and then to the guy who owns Eclectica, you know, that shop in Multnomah Village? They both said it was very old, maybe several centuries, and maybe even valuable."
"Right. I'm sure there are a lot of great works of art sitting around under beds in trailer homes across America." For the first time, Claire noticed that the bookshelves behind Evan were dotted with blue stickers from a label maker. She squinted. Under his set of phone books it said "Phone Books."
"They both said the only way to know for sure is to have an expert look at it. So"—she took a deep breath—"I've decided to go to New York for a couple of days. I'm going to get it appraised at Christie's or Avery's or Sotheby's." She found some renewed courage in the way the word Sotheby's rolled off her tongue. It sounded rich and exclusive and refined and British.
Evan sat back in his chair and steepled his hands. "You're going to go off on some wild-goose chase, based on nothing more than the opinions of your hundred-and-three-year-old roommate and some guy who runs a junk shop? No, I don't think so."
"What do you mean, you don't think so?" Claire echoed incredulously.
"You're not going to go, that's what I mean." Evan picked up his pen as if it were all settled.
"Are you saying that because of the plane trip? You're worried about it crashing?"
"Of course it's not because of the plane. Statistically, you have an eighty-five percent greater chance of dying in an automobile than an airplane. And that doesn't even factor in for that car of yours." He waved his free hand disparagingly. "No, you're not going because it's a waste—of time, of energy and of money. You're a smart woman, even if you never went to college, so if you think about it even a little I'm sure you'll agree with me."
A wave of heat swept through Claire. Clearly considering the matter settled, Evan wasn't even looking at her anymore. In his tiny, precise handwriting, he made a note in the margin of his paperwork.
She took a soundless step backward on the plush carpet, then another, until her hand was on the doorknob.
"Evan?"
"Hm?" he said, his eyes still on his paperwork.
"I am going."
She closed the door on his surprised face. A minute later, Claire found herself shaking behind the wheel of her car.
CC DDAY
Chapter 13Stumbling a little from exhaustion, her bag banging against her hip with every step, Claire emerged from the tube that connected the airplane to the airport. LaGuardia was a huge, ill-lit cavern. Balled- up food wrappers littered the ground around overflowing trash bins. People leaned against No Smoking signs, cigarettes in their hands.
On the plane, she had sat next to a woman in her mid-forties who wore her hair in two short blond pigtails, like an aging Olga Korbut. The woman had commandeered the armrest, so that Claire felt boxed in, her knees brushing the seat ahead of her.
As lunch was being
served, Claire's seatmate made an announcement. "I've written a book and now I'm going to New York to sell it." They were somewhere over what the pilot said were the Rocky Mountains but what was really only a sea of clouds.
Claire felt a flash of mingled respect and envy. "What's it called?"
"Freddie the Frog's Spiritual Journey."
She imagined a green grinning cartoon frog sitting on a lily pad. "So it's a children's book?" She took a bite of her stale turkey sandwich. From the front of the plane came the tink of silver on china.
The woman reared back, affronted. "No." She made a little puh sound at the stupidness of Claire's question and turned pointedly away to stare out at the clouds.
Later the woman had thawed toward Claire enough to begin chattering on about a recent plane crash in Indiana that had turned every passenger into flesh fragments strewn over a cornfield. "Did you hear about those two hands they found clutching each other? fust the hands?" she asked Claire, oblivious to the angry looks of the other passengers.
Now Claire stood with one foot resting on her suitcase, a safety tip passed along by Charlie, and tried to get her bearings. People streamed around her, as busy and self-possessed as ants. She felt self consciously tall and pale amid the sea of dark heads that bobbed past her.
Overhead, arrows and signs directed her to limousines, baggage claim areas, rest rooms, food courts, newspaper stands and taxis. This last caught her eye. She'd never been in a taxi and had planned to find a bus to take her into Manhattan. But when in Rome...
Outside, Claire took a deep breath, her first official lungful of New York air. It smelled of exhaust with a faint note of disinfectant. Even though it was ten o'clock at night, the sky glowed as if the sun were just about to rise. A long line of yellow taxis snaked its way to the taxi stand, where a matching line of travelers stood waiting. A man with a walkie-talkie waved the first person in line into the first taxi, and the line shuffled forward. That seemed easy enough. Claire joined the end of the line, and tried to affect a posture of boredom. She was relieved to note that her jeans and sweater did not seem terribly out of place.