TRACES OF THE PAST
At first, Alma Belasco and Lenny Beal, the friend who had recently arrived at Lark House, planned to enjoy San Francisco’s cultural life: they went to the cinema, the theater, to concerts and exhibitions. They experimented with exotic restaurants and took the dog for walks. For the first time in three years, Alma returned to the family box at the opera, but her friend got confused by the complications of the first act and fell asleep in the second, before Tosca managed to plunge a kitchen knife into Scarpia’s heart. They gave up on opera. Lenny had a more comfortable car than Alma, so they took to going to Napa to enjoy the bucolic landscape of vineyards and to taste wines, or to Bolinas to breathe in the salty air and eat oysters, but in the end they grew tired of making all these efforts to stay young and active, and gave in to the temptation of simply resting. Instead of going out on excursions, which involved traveling, looking for somewhere to park, and having to be on their feet, they watched films on television, listened to music in their apartments, or visited Cathy with a bottle of pink champagne to go with the gray caviar that Cathy’s daughter, a Lufthansa flight attendant, brought back from her trips. Lenny helped in the pain clinic by teaching the patients to make masks for Alma’s theater from papier-mâché and dental glue. They spent the afternoons reading in the library, the only shared area that was more or less silent: noise was one of the disadvantages of living in a community. If there was no alternative, they ate in the Lark House dining room, scrutinized by other women who were envious of Alma’s luck. Irina felt neglected; she was no longer indispensable to Alma.
“You’re imagining it, Irina. Lenny’s not competing with you in any way,” Seth consoled her. But he too was worried, because if his grandmother cut Irina’s hours, he would have fewer opportunities to see her.
That afternoon Alma and Lenny were sitting in the garden recalling the past as they often did, while a short distance away Irina was washing Sophia with the garden hose. On the Internet a couple of years before, Lenny had seen an organization dedicated to rescuing dogs from Romania, where they roamed the streets in wretched-looking packs, and bringing them to San Francisco for adoption by sensitive souls prone to that kind of charity. He was immediately taken with Sophia’s face, with its black patch over one eye, and without thinking filled out the online form, sent the required five dollars, and the following day went to fetch her. In the description they had omitted mentioning that the little dog had a leg missing. She managed a normal life on the other three; the only consequence of the accident seemed to be that she destroyed the tips of anything that had four legs, like chairs and tables. Lenny solved the problem by keeping an endless supply of plastic dolls; as soon as the dog left one of them without an arm or leg, Lenny threw her another, and that was that. Sophia’s only weakness was her disloyalty to her master. She was smitten with Catherine Hope and at the slightest excuse shot after her and jumped on her lap. She adored traveling in a wheelchair.
Sophia remained motionless under the stream of water as Irina spoke to her in Romanian to conceal her intentions as she listened in on Alma and Lenny’s conversation in order to convey it to Seth. She felt bad about spying on them, but investigating the mystery surrounding Alma had become an obsession for her and Seth. Alma had already told her that her friendship with Lenny began in 1984, the year Nathaniel Belasco died, and had lasted only a few months, but the circumstances had lent it such intensity that when they met up again at Lark House they could resume it again as if they had never been apart. At that moment, Alma was explaining to Lenny that at the age of seventy-eight she had renounced her role as matriarch of the Belascos, weary of fulfilling her obligations to people and keeping up appearances, as she had done ever since she was a child. She had been at Lark House for three years now, and was increasingly enjoying it. She said she had imposed the move on herself as a penance, a way of paying for her life of privilege, for her vanity and materialism. The ideal would have been to spend the rest of her days in a Zen monastery, but she was not a vegetarian, and meditation gave her a backache, so she settled for Lark House, to the horror of her son and daughter-in-law, who would have preferred to see her with a shaven head in Dharamsala. She was comfortable at Lark House; she had not given up anything essential and if need be she was only thirty minutes from Sea Cliff, although she had never yielded to the temptation of returning to the family home, which anyway she had never considered hers: first it belonged to her in-laws, and then to her son and daughter-in-law. At first she spoke to no one, and it was like being in a second-rate hotel, but as time went by she made a few friends, and since Lenny had arrived, she felt real companionship.
“You could have chosen something better than this, Alma.”
“I don’t need anything more. The only thing I miss is an open fire in winter. I love to watch a fire burning, it’s like the endless swell of the sea.”
“I know a widow who has spent the last six years on cruises. As soon as the ship docks at its final destination, her family presents her with the ticket for the next round-the-world trip.”
“I wonder why my son and daughter-in-law have never thought of that?” laughed Alma.
“The advantage is that if you die at sea, the captain throws your body overboard and your family doesn’t have to pay for the funeral,” Lenny added.
“I’m fine here, Lenny. I’m discovering who I am without all my ornaments and accessories. It’s quite a slow process, but a very useful one. Everybody ought to do the same at the end of their life. If I had any self-discipline I would beat my grandson to it and write my own memoirs. I have time, freedom, and silence, the three things I never had amidst all the noise of my earlier life. I’m preparing to die.”
“That won’t be for a long while yet, Alma. You look splendid.”
“Thank you. It must be love.”
“Love?”
“Let’s just say there is someone. You know who I’m talking about: Ichimei.”
“Incredible! How many years have you been together?”
“Let’s see, I’ll count it up . . . I’ve loved him since we were both about eight years old, but we’ve been lovers for fifty-eight years, since 1955, although there have been long gaps.”
“Why did you marry Nathaniel?”
“Because he wanted to protect me, and at that moment I needed his protection. Remember how noble he was. Nat helped me accept the fact that there are some things that are more powerful than my own will, things that are even stronger than love.”
“I’d like to meet Ichimei, Alma. Tell me when he comes to visit you.”
“Our relationship is still a secret,” she replied, blushing.
“Why? Your family would understand.”
“It’s not because of the Belascos, but Ichimei’s family. Out of respect for his wife, children, and grandchildren.”
“After so many years, his wife must know, Alma.”
“She’s never given any indication of it. I don’t want to hurt her; Ichimei would never forgive me. Besides, it has its advantages.”
“Which are?”
“For a start, we’ve never had to struggle with domestic problems like children, money, and all the other things couples have to deal with. We get together to make love. Besides, Lenny, a clandestine relationship has to be defended: it’s fragile and precious. You should know that better than anyone.”
“We were both born half a century too late, Alma. We’re experts in forbidden love.”
“Ichimei and I had a chance when we were young, but I didn’t have the courage. I was unable to give up on my security, and so I was trapped in convention. That was back in the fifties, when the world was very different. Do you remember?”
“How could I forget? A relationship like yours was almost impossible; you would have regretted it, Alma. Prejudice would have destroyed you both in the end, and killed your love.”
“Ichimei knew that, and never asked me to do it.”
After a long pause while the pair sat contemplating
the hummingbirds eagerly hovering over a fuchsia bush, and while Irina was deliberately taking her time over drying Sophia with a towel and then brushing her, Lenny told Alma how sorry he was they had not seen each other for almost three decades.
“I knew you were living at Lark House. It’s a coincidence that forces me to believe in fate, Alma, because I put my name on the waiting list years ago, a long time before you arrived. I kept postponing the decision to come and visit you, because I didn’t want to stir up dead memories,” he said.
“They’re not dead, Lenny. They’re more alive now than ever. That’s what happens with age: stories from the past come alive and stick to our skin. I’m so pleased we’re going to spend the next few years together.”
“It will only be six months, Alma. I have an inoperable brain tumor. I don’t have much time left before the worst symptoms begin.”
“My God, I’m so sorry, Lenny!”
“Why? I’ve lived enough, Alma. I could go on for a little longer with aggressive treatment, but there’s no point putting myself through that. I’m a coward, pain scares me.”
“I’m surprised they accepted you at Lark House.”
“Nobody knows what I have, and there’s no reason they should, because I won’t take up a place for long. I’m going to put an end to myself when my condition starts to worsen.”
“How will you know?”
“For now I have headaches, I feel weak and clumsy in my movements. I no longer dare ride a bicycle, which used to be my life’s passion, because I’ve fallen off several times. Do you know I’ve crossed the United States on a bike from the Pacific to the Atlantic three times? I intend to enjoy the time I have left. Soon I’ll be vomiting, find it hard to walk and speak, my eyesight will fail, the convulsions will start . . . But I won’t wait that long. I have to act while my mind still functions.”
“How quickly life passes us by, Lenny.”
Lenny’s declaration did not surprise Irina. Death by their own hand was discussed quite naturally among the most lucid of the Lark House residents. Alma’s view was that there were too many old people on the planet, people who lived much longer than was necessary for biology and possible for the economy. It made no sense to oblige them to remain prisoner in a painful body or a despairing mind. “Very few old folk are happy, Irina. Most of them are poor, aren’t healthy, and have no family. It’s the most fragile and difficult stage of life, more so than childhood, because it grows worse day by day, and there is no future other than death.” Irina had commented on this to Cathy, who maintained that before long euthanasia would be a right rather than a crime. Cathy knew that several people in Lark House had what they needed for a dignified suicide, and although she understood the reasons for making such a decision, she had no intention of bowing out like that. “I live in constant pain, Irina, but if I don’t think about it, it’s bearable. The worst was the rehabilitation after the operations. Not even the morphine dulled the pain; the only thing that helped was knowing it wasn’t going to last forever. Everything is temporary.” Irina suspected that thanks to his profession, Lenny could call on more expeditious drugs than those that came from Thailand wrapped in plain brown paper.
“I’m not worried, Alma,” said Lenny. “I enjoy life, especially the time you and I have together. I’ve been getting myself ready for a long while; it isn’t going to catch me unawares. I’ve learned to pay attention to my body. Our body tells us everything if we only listen to it. I knew about my illness before it was diagnosed, and I know any treatment would be useless.”
“Are you afraid?” asked Alma.
“No. I suppose that what comes after death is the same as before birth. What about you?”
“A little . . . I imagine that after death there’s no contact with this world, no suffering, personality, or memory; it’s as though this Alma Belasco had never existed. Something may transcend it: the spirit, the essence of our being. But I confess I am afraid of giving up this body, and I hope that then Ichimei will be with me or that Nathaniel comes to search for me.”
“If as you said the spirit isn’t in contact with this world, I don’t see how Nathaniel can come searching for you.”
“Yes, it’s true, it’s a contradiction,” Alma laughed. “We cling so tightly to life, Lenny! You say you’re a coward, but it takes courage to say good-bye to everything and cross a threshold without any idea where it leads.”
“That’s why I came here. I don’t think I can do it on my own, Alma. I think you are the only person who can help me, the only one I can ask to be with me when the time comes. Is that asking too much?”
October 22, 2002
Yesterday, Alma, when at last we could meet to celebrate our birthdays, I could see you were in a bad mood. You said that all of a sudden, without us realizing it, we have turned seventy. You are afraid our bodies will fail us, and of what you call the ugliness of age, even though you are more beautiful now than you were at twenty-three. We’re not old because we are seventy. We start to grow old as soon as we are born, we change every day, life is a continuous state of flux. We evolve. The only difference is that now we are a little closer to death. What’s so bad about that? Love and friendship do not age.
Ichi
LIGHT AND SHADOW
It did Alma Belasco good to have to systematically remember things for her grandson’s book, as at her age her mind was starting to fail her. Previously she would ramble on, and was unable to recall precise details, but now in order to provide Seth with satisfactory answers she tried hard to reconstruct the past in an orderly way, instead of jumping all over the place as she did with Lenny in the many idle hours they had at Lark House. She visualized different-colored boxes, one for each year of her life, and stored her experiences and feelings inside them. She piled the boxes up in the large armoire in which she used to take refuge as a child to weep floods of tears. These virtual boxes, overflowing with nostalgia and a few regrets, contained her deepest childish terrors and fantasies, as well as the wild extravagances of youth and the struggles, hard work, passions, and loves of her mature years. With a light heart, because she tried to forgive all her mistakes, except those that had made others suffer, she pieced together the fragments of her biography, spicing them with touches of fantasy, allowing herself some exaggeration and white lies, since Seth could hardly contradict her own memories. She did this as an exercise of the imagination rather than because she really wanted to create a false impression. The one thing she never talked about was Ichimei, unaware that behind her back Irina and Seth were investigating this most precious and secret aspect of her existence, the one thing she could not reveal, because if she did Ichimei would vanish, and with him her only reason to continue living.
Irina was her copilot on this flight into the past. Not only did the photographs and other documents pass through her hands, but she was the one who classified them and compiled the albums. Her questions helped guide Alma when she drifted into dead ends, which allowed her life gradually to become clearer, better defined. Irina plunged herself into Alma’s existence as if they were in a Victorian novel: the aristocratic lady and her female companion trapped amidst the boredom of endless cups of tea in a country house. Alma claimed we all have an inner private garden where we can seek refuge, but Irina did not like to peer into hers, preferring to replace it with Alma’s, which was far more pleasant than her own. She got to know the melancholy little girl disembarking from Poland, the youthful Alma in Boston, the artist and wife; she knew about her favorite dresses and hats; her first painting studio, where she worked alone experimenting with brushes and colors as she defined her own style; her old-fashioned worn leather suitcases, covered in labels, the sort nobody used anymore. These images and experiences were so clear and precise it was as if she herself had existed in those times and had accompanied Alma every step of the way. She found it marvelous that it took only the evocative power of words or a photograph for them to become real, and for her to make them her own.
Alma
Belasco had been an active, energetic woman who was as intolerant of her own failings as of those of others, but as she grew older she was softening, and had more patience with her fellows and with herself. “If nothing hurts, that means I woke up dead,” she would tell herself as she opened her eyes and had to stretch her muscles to ward off cramps. Her body was starting to become frail: she needed to find ways to avoid stairs or to guess the meaning of a sentence she hadn’t truly heard. Everything cost her more effort and time, and there were things she simply could no longer do, such as driving at night, putting gas in the car, opening a bottle of water, carrying bags of food. That was why she needed Irina. By contrast, her mind was sharp; she could remember the present just as well as the past, provided that she didn’t fall into the temptation of jumbling things up; neither her memory nor her reasoning failed her. She could still draw and had the same intuition for color; she went to the workshop but did not paint much because it tired her; she preferred to delegate this to Kirsten and the assistants. She never mentioned her limitations, confronting them without fuss, but Irina was aware of them. Alma detested old people’s obsession with their ailments, their aches and pains, a subject of no possible interest to others, not even doctors.