Rococo

  “That’s ridiculous.” Two stretches out on my chaise longue. “This is really comfortable.”

  “It’s stuffed with goose down and lined in Lee Jofa’s silk chamois number seventeen.”

  “Okay, waitress coming through.” Toot puts a tray of coffee and cake on the bed. She gives me a slice, then serves Two. She fixes my coffee and puts it on the nightstand, gives Two a mug, and pulls my straight-backed chair from the desk to sit down. We eat the cake and don’t say much.

  I look around my bedroom, decorated in serene white with silver accents. I pulled a real Elsie de Wolfe in here. It is spare, simple, and sleek. There’s a bed, a desk, a chaise longue, and that’s it. There’s never clutter—this is my haven. I can hear the ocean from my window, and even in winter, I sleep with it cracked to let in the fresh air. I look at my sister and my nephew eating their cake with the intensity of scientists sampling atoms in search of radium. The looks on their faces make me smile.

  Whenever I’ve felt sadness or despair, I’ve always turned to my work for solace. The rituals of my craft help me keep my mind on what’s important. Since my rejection at church a few days ago I’ve put together several corkboards with swatches and samples for my clients. I’m keeping busy.

  As I drive to the Baronogans’, I think about the House of B.

  Every decorator has a signature piece, something that he can place in any house, in any period, in any style that somehow defines who he is to the creative community. While I am known for my overall design (authentic historical) and point of view (freewheeling fun), my signature piece is The Ottoman.

  I hate coffee tables. If you find a decent one, please let me know. In twenty years and in hundreds of homes, I’ve never seen one that I thought was artful. But they perform a necessary function. You need them for drinks, books, magazines, feet, what have you. In desperation, I once sawed the legs off a Shaker dining table for an Early American home I was doing in Shrewsbury because I couldn’t find one that suited the room. Determined to never ruin another gorgeous room with a substandard table, I came up with an alternative. Why not take a traditional ottoman and give it a new purpose?

  I select an ottoman (or settee or upholstered stool) in a shape that works with the furniture configuration. I like a large piece with a good-sized surface, and a circular shape creates a better flow. Then I deal with the legs; black lacquer on the feet works in any decor, it makes the legs disappear. Then I let my imagination go wild. I upholster the ottoman with whimsical fabrics, adding wild trim (fringe, gimp, covered buttons, dangling crystals). After festooning, I have a piece of thick glass made to go on top, creating an instant multipurpose coffee table. When you need extra seating, simply remove the glass.

  I park outside the Baronogans’. I pull their final bill out of my file folder and go to the front door. Midge Baronogan greets me at the entrance with a kiss. I follow her inside. The living room looks lovely but needs some adjusting in the placement.

  So, I push the sofa in the Baronagans’ living room back about two feet, then take the floor lamps and anchor them at either end of the couch. I scoot the ottoman closer to the sofa.

  “Oh, B. I am cuckoo nuts for the ottoman!” Midge Baronagan, a tawny Filipina around seventy years old, steps back as I rearrange the pillows on the sofa. She is Geoffrey Beene chic in her simple pantsuit, a flowing white chiffon blouse over stovepipe white chino pants. A chain belt grazes her hip, then dangles to her knee. She wears delectable jeweled slippers in pale silver with a demi heel. “I love what you do! Such an artist!” Midge claps her hands. Her husband is a quiet man, chief surgeon at the best hospital in Trenton. I’ve met him only once, and he said whatever makes Midge happy makes him happy, including the ultra-expensive Japanese waterfall and goldfish pond I installed outside the dining room. This house is the jewel of Spring Lake.

  “I’m glad you like it.” I adjust the glass top to fit perfectly over the seams of the ottoman. I had a ball with this one, oval with simple wooden legs. I covered it with a deep blue satin brocade embroidered with a multicolored bird-of-paradise design. I used a six-inch silk fringe in pale blue from the base to the floor, then added a kicky ball fringe in gold around the top seam to give the piece movement. I covered forty-seven large buttons in cornflower-blue velvet and staggered them on the sides, giving texture to the satin. It’s a triumph.

  Midge puts her arm around my waist; her head fits into the crook of my arm. “Look at this room. It’s a masterpiece.”

  I have to agree. Midge loves blue. People who tend to decorate with blue as their base color are usually very upbeat, while clients who choose rosy reds are first in line for the straitjacket. Here I used shades of azure throughout the house and in the artwork. I found some casement fabric samples from Dorothy Liebes through a friend who had seen them in San Francisco. I took these squares woven with raffi and set them in rough-hewn frames, filling an entire wall.

  The home is an architectural wonder, a Modern Prairie style with movable inside walls (which I covered in a cornflower-blue toile chinoiserie wallpaper depicting the ancient healing arts I found at Houles) and glass-brick room separators that give an icy twist to the cool blues.

  Since the house gets so much sun, I made simple eggshell-colored muslin draperies, double-sided. The filmy muslin feels modern and young and gives the home a layer of softness and movement against the knotted-pine floors and stainless-steel accents.

  The walls are a shade of white I call “Movie Star Teeth,” so white it’s blue. I mixed the color myself using a flat white enamel, adding deep blue with an eyedropper until I achieved the perfect shade.

  I covered Midge’s twenty-foot L-shaped sofa in a cuddly navy blue chenille, her pillows in a Stroheim & Roman pale-green-and-midnight-blue stripe, a lovely combination in a woodsy setting. I found area rugs at Saxony, large squares of off-white and moss green with ribbon etching in a pale salmon. My pal Helen McNeill had to twist arms to find what I was looking for; we wound up sewing smaller area rugs together because we couldn’t find ones large enough.

  “Now we’re done,” I say to Midge. My voice breaks a little—I’ve enjoyed this job so much I hate to see it end.

  “But I don’t want to be done!” Midge swats my arm affectionately. “I want to start all over again.”

  “Now you know how I feel. If I could decorate every house in New Jersey, I would. And then I’d start over. There are millions of possibilities for every home, and in a lifetime we only get to try a few.”

  “It’s a shame.” Midge shakes her head.

  “Ah, well. As my dear mother used to say, our homes on earth are just hotel rooms until we get to our permanent home in the promised land.” I place my bill on the side table.

  “No, I mean, it’s a shame what happened at Our Lady of Fatima.” Midge gestures for me to sit down. “Shame on them! Here, right under Father Porporino’s nose, is the best interior decorator in New Jersey. The old saying goes, a king is never a king on his own island. They don’t appreciate you!”

  “It’s all right. I’ve come to terms with it.”

  “It’s wrong.” Midge looks at me with a steely gaze, the likes of which I haven’t seen since I recommended a pink dining room in her otherwise blue house.

  “I appreciate your concern.”

  She puts her hand on her heart. “I’ve been a Catholic all my life. The priest always has too much power! It was the same in the Philippines. Priests are nothing but little potentates, ruling over their kingdoms with God as their judge. Sometimes they go too far.” Midge pats me on the back. “This time he blew it.”

  I wonder if people know how painful it is for me to be reminded that I was passed over to renovate Our Lady of Fatima Church. I would never go into a bank and say to the teller, “Did you ever find that nine dollars you were short yesterday?” Or tell the guy at the gas station after he cleans my windshield, “Hey, you missed a spot.” Nor would I say to Dr. Wallace, “Hey, sorry about those four cancer cells you missed that cost
Aunt Snooky that additional four feet of colon.” No, I would never hurt someone who was doing his or her best.

  The problem is, I’m a stewer. I can hold a grudge longer than a lifetime (an incentive to embrace reincarnation now that I’m stepping back from Catholicism). I’m certain I’ll be taking several grudges with me into the next world, with matching axes to grind them. It’s like that peach pit I swallowed when I was six. I’m sure it’s still sitting in my gut like a stone and will be there on the day I die. I hold on to things!

  After a week of chronic anger, which led to sleepless nights, daytime dyspepsia, and a gassy, distended abdomen, I decide to take the bull by the horns. Sometimes there has to be a reckoning before one can move forward. Father’s day of reckoning is here.

  The red light is on outside my Lucky Confessional Booth Number Two, which means some sinner is in there, so I slip into the back pew to wait my turn. It’s funny how the place has changed in my perception. In just a few days, the church I’ve loved all my life now seems old and tired.

  I’ve spent years making this place beautiful in the details: well-placed altar linens and seasonal flower sprays made special with offbeat accents like grapes during Advent and cotton pods in the summer. If I didn’t do the flowers myself, I’d often stand behind the florist, giving instructions. Now all I see from font to altar are the flaws, the design missteps (like the cheap brass-toned light fixtures that replaced the old crystal ones), and the neglect (the peeling paint over the radiators and the toddler teeth marks on the backs of the pews). But these are no longer my problems. Let Patton & Persky figure out how to make this place look regal again.

  When Mr. Fonti, the bulbous town tree surgeon, exits my confessional, he heads directly for the altar of the Blessed Lady, where he kneels with his head in his hands. He must have committed a doozy of a sin to get what looks like a major penance. I heard he likes go-go dancers, a bad habit for a married father of nine.

  Taking a deep breath I approach the booth, yank the heavy velvet curtain back, close it behind me, and kneel down.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” I begin. “You know what? Forget that. These words of penance that have meant so much to me all of my life suddenly sound like a lie. I am not here to ask for forgiveness. You have sinned.”

  “I beg your pardon?” a stunned Father Porporino whispers back.

  “What do you take me for?”

  “Bartolomeo?”

  “How dare you hire Patton and Persky, those . . . those preppy Main Line Presbyterians! This is my church, my community. I worship here! I was baptized in the marble font, took my First Communion kneeling at the railing, took my confirmation and the holy oil from the bishop. I’ve been here all my life—twenty years longer than you!”

  “I’m sorry if you feel bad—”

  “Bad? I don’t feel bad, I am humiliated. Do you know the Latin root of the word ‘humiliation,’ Father?” He tries to interrupt again, but I steamroll right over him. “The root is ‘humility.’ The ability to be humble in the eyes of God. What do you think my devotion to this church meant to me? Everything!”

  “You should do good works for the satisfaction it brings others, not for acclaim.”

  “I’m not asking for fame, Father. I’m not Joey Heatherton looking to headline at the Sands after years of being an opening act. I deserved the job! Nobody has loved this church more than me. You took away my dream and handed it off to some second-rate Philly talent like it never mattered in the first place.”

  “They’ve won awards,” Father says meekly.

  “What does that mean to the heart and soul of this congregation? Most of them have never heard of Philadelphia outside of cheesesteaks and football—it is hardly the epicenter of interior design.” I begin to feel better and stronger, not afraid of Father Porporino anymore. My self-confidence rises like a tidal wave. “It would be one thing if you had democratically opened up the job to bids. Then at least I could believe that you were watching the purse strings. But to simply ignore, to deliberately insult, any local talent—”

  “But you are the local talent. You are the only decorator in town.”

  “Then your job was even easier! All you had to do was give me a call, or stop me on the steps after Mass and give me the heads-up that you were going elsewhere. Instead, I read about it in the bulletin! You seem to find time to single me out when you need me to raise money for the Bishop’s Annual Appeal. That’s what I’m good for—going door-to-door like a Fuller Brush man, can in hand, begging for the diocese. Well, listen to this, Padre, and listen hard; I am done with you and your cans and your fiefdom. You run your church with arrogance. A local boy is not good enough for your grand visions. No, you have to go to the big city to find a big name. You’re buying for the label, not the craftsmanship.”

  “They’re quite good, and I liked their portfolio.” Father bristles.

  “We’ll see if Patton and Persky support this church as I have all these years. Will they come at dawn on Saint Lucy’s feast day in the freezing cold and haul out the man-sized crèche figurines and string lights in the outdoor manger until their fingers bleed? Will they organize the pancake breakfast for the retarded and set the tables with festive linens because even retarded people deserve ambience? Tell me: Will they give up four weekends in a row to make gravy to freeze for the spaghetti supper to finance the new roof for the rectory so you won’t sleep in a draft and die of consumption? I think we know the answer. You’ve got a lot of crust, Father. A lot of crust!”

  “Are you finished?” Father Porporino seethes.

  I press my nose so close to the screen I taste metal. “In more ways than you can ever know.” I push the velvet curtain aside and stumble out. I’ve gone my whole life without disagreeing with authority of any kind: not a priest or a nun or a meter maid (I even spelled my name for one who was writing me a ticket once). It was always “Yes, Father,” “Of course, Sister,” “Give me the ticket, Officer.” Now I’m dizzy with anger.

  As I turn to go, I almost trip over Nellie Fanelli’s feet as she kneels before the pietà shrine. Then I swivel and poke my head into Lucky Booth Number Two.

  “And one more thing, Father. I had big plans for this church. Marble inlays and sumptuous fabrics and crystals and lights and an eternity font that would spit holy water well into the next century! You think about that when you’re meeting with Patton and Persky.”

  I take a deep breath and yank the curtain closed again. Nellie stands in the corner by the door waiting for me. Her white lace chapel veil, studded with small pink chiffon butterflies, is pinned to her gray-blue bouffant, holding it like saran wrap on leftovers. She looks me straight in the eye and with her gnarled fingers makes an “okay” sign. “I heard everything,” she whispers. “Va bene.”

  Nellie goes into the confessional and winks at me before she pulls the curtain shut. If I felt slightly guilty about telling Father Porporino off, I certainly don’t now. The Little People, in the form of pastoral laundress Nellie Fanelli, have given me their imprimatur. The House of B still carries some clout around here, maybe not enough to get me the Big Job, but it clearly means something to the people who really count.

  Despite the liberation of telling Father Porporino what I really think of him, by the night of my surprise birthday party, it’s all I can do to pull myself together. I’m blue, plain and simple, down in the dumps. During the day I function just fine, but the nights hit me like a trash-can lid. There’s no worse punishment than having to go out at night when you feel pitch-black inside. As I lock the front door behind me, I plaster a smile to my face. I inhale deeply to calm my nerves before I climb into Toot’s Cadillac.

  “Hey, Unc. Are you ready for your party?” Two, my chauffeur, grins.

  “I’ll give you five dollars to drive me in the other direction.”

  “Sorry. Ma already gave me a ten to get you there.” Two steps on the gas.

  “See, even my own sister sandbags me.” I pinch the crease in my
slacks from thigh to knee. “How many people are there?”

  “About a hundred.”

  “Dear God,” I moan. I think about all the years and all the parties that have come before this one. It’s like watching a slide show in my emotional ViewMaster. I remember my sixth birthday, when Daddy rented a pony that ended up having a mental condition and bucked Rosemary With The Lupus into the cherry tree, where she hung like a Wallenda until the mothers found a tall ladder to help her down. Rosemary was fine, but the pony was banished to Ohio to live on a farm. When I was fifteen, Toot and Lonnie took me and six of my friends into New York City for a floor show at the Copa. One of my best pals, Cookie Francesci, disappeared during a Carmen Miranda send-up. We couldn’t find him for three hours. It turned out that he hired a hooker and had sex standing up in the men’s room at Luchow’s. Then there was my thirty-fourth birthday, when I went into the hospital with a kidney stone and Father Porp gave me last rites. I’m sure my fortieth is going to be a doozy.

  “Unc?” Two grips the steering wheel and checks the rearview mirror.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m going to take a year off from college.”

  “Does your mother know?”

  “Not yet. I plan on going back. I just need some time. I’m having a problem fitting in. I don’t know what it is, exactly. I get along fine with everybody, but I don’t feel like I’m making progress in the theater department like I should. I’m missing something.”

  “I thought you were directing a play.”

  “I was. It got to be too much.”

  “Two, you know I think you’re brilliant, but you can’t start out your life quitting school because you don’t like it. Look, I have clients I can’t abide, but I go into their homes radiating joy and filled to the brim with good taste. I bring them swatches and paint chips and samples, and I endure their small minds, bad breath, and tight wallets because I’m a businessman. An artist, yes, but a businessman also.”

  “I don’t feel like an artist yet.”