“Of course. Alexander is lucky to have found Bill.” Tatiana didn’t like Margaret much. She kissed Alexander hello and goodbye too close to his mouth.
“No, no. Bill’s lucky to have him. He couldn’t do without him.” She lowered her voice. “Stevie is... don’t get me wrong, he’s the son, he’ll inherit the business, but he is just not cut out for...for hard work. Not like Alexander.”
Tatiana agreed.
And then Margaret said, louder, “Why do you still work? Your husband makes a very good living—and will make even a better one as soon as he resigns his commission.”
“I didn’t know my husband was resigning his commission,” Tatiana said, her eyebrows tensing. Nearby, Alexander shook his head slightly and rolled his eyes.
Margaret went on. “You know Bill and I have been seeing each other for a couple of years, but I’m already not working.” She smiled proudly. “Bill likes to take care of everything.”
Tatiana did not say, oh, congratulations, doesn’t that make you a concubine?
The sun was setting. They were sitting on their brand new deck, around their patio tables, smoking, listening to jazz and blues. Tatiana made some more margaritas, poured them for everyone, for her husband first. “Tania,” he said, “you didn’t want to make beergaritas?” He smiled. “From her friend from Mexico, Tania got a recipe for margaritas with beer that...”
“Let’s just say, we’d have four overnight guests after a pitcher of those,” finished Tatiana. Which is why she didn’t make them. “They light you up.” Alexander’s eyes twinkled at her.
“I bet they’re good for drinking games,” said Stevie. It was practically the only thing he said all afternoon.
“Steve, there you go, always with the naughty,” said Amanda, somehow seeming less happy about it. She turned to Tatiana. “So, Tania, when are you and Alex having another baby? Anthony needs a little brother or sister to play with in that pool.”
“It’s definitely time, Mand,” Tatiana agreed pleasantly. “When are you and Steve going to get married?”
“It’s definitely time, Stevie,” said Margaret, and laughed, and Bill laughed. Amanda didn’t laugh, but she did stop asking Tatiana about babies.
They were enjoying the evening, listening to Louis Armstrong, finishing the margaritas before dessert was put out, when Balkman said thoughtfully, “Wonder if this land is worth anything.”
They had been lounging near the swimming pool they had built in the frontier country, in the setting sun, near the mountains, overlooking the dimming mulberry desert under a violet sky. There was no one around. After Balkman’s question, Tatiana sat up straighter. “There’s nothing to buy here,” she said. “The U.S. government owns everything to the left, including the mountains. Down below us, it’s already been bought by Berk Land Development. There’s nothing available.”
Balkman pointed. “What about this right here, the land to the mountains?”
After a marital pause, Alexander said, “We own that.”
Balkman turned his head away from the saguaros. “Own what?”
Tatiana turned her head away from the saguaros and to Alexander. She made her gaze calm, her face inscrutable, but with her eyes it was as if she were putting a staying hand on him, saying, pride, soldier, it’s your pride talking. Don’t do it.
But she saw he couldn’t help himself. He must have really wanted to impress Bill Balkman. “Two hundred feet to the left, two hundred to the right, and fifty acres straight to the mountains,” said Alexander.
No one at the table spoke. They were in a silent picture, just moving without words.
Tatiana got up abruptly and began clearing the table. Loud sounds erupted—of her clearing the dishes and of Balkman exclaiming, “You own all this land? How much altogether?”
“Ninety-seven acres,” said Alexander.
Tatiana shook her head. The smile of pride was still on Alexander’s face when Balkman said, “Do you have any idea what a gold mine you’re sitting on? How much damn money we can make?”
Tatiana brusquely moved Alexander’s hand out of the way to get his plate and stared hard at him, wondering with frustration why it was so difficult for him sometimes to see even one chess move ahead. He saw it now, though; saw it nice and clear. The smile wiped off his face, he cast her a resentful glare—as if it was her fault!—and yelled for Anthony. “Ant, get out of the pool and help your mother.” Turning to Balkman, he said, “Bill, the land’s not for sale.”
“What do you mean?” Balkman boomed. “Everything is for sale.”
“Not this land.”
Tatiana laid her hand on Alexander’s shoulder. “What my husband is trying to say, Bill”—her voice was genial—“is that this land belongs to his family.”
“Well, surely you don’t need ninety-seven acres! You live in a trailer on a postage stamp lot. A bomb shelter would take up more room than where you’re living. Even with the pool and the work shed you’ve barely used up a quarter of an acre. You can keep seven acres.” He wasn’t even addressing Tatiana, who had spoken to him. He was talking directly to Alexander, his gestures all twitchy. “You sell ninety acres to the business, make a shitload—pardon my French—of money, and then we parcel out the rest into quarter-acre units. I will split the profit on the land with you fifty-fifty. Your wife here will be covered in diamonds by the time we’re through. She won’t be able to see the desert for all the rocks you’ll buy her.” He was feverishly calculating on a napkin—using one of her napkins to calculate his nefarious little math!
“Bill,” Tatiana said, still genially, “first of all, it’s not a trailer, it’s a mobile home. And second of all, the land is not for sale.”
“Sweetheart, please,” said Balkman, not even looking up, “let the men take care of business, all right?”
Tatiana took her hand off Alexander’s shoulder.
“Bill,” Alexander said, “the land is not for sale.”
Balkman wasn’t listening. “We can have a whole community here. We’ll call it Paradise Hills, Love Hills, Tatiana Hills, whatever you want. Ninety acres will parcel out to 300 units. We can even have a community pool, a clubhouse, charge annual fees. Three hundred units at a thousand dollars a pop just for the land, that’s one hundred and fifty thousand dollars for your end, Alexander. And the 300 houses on these lots will be twenty-five bucks a square foot, plus an extra fifty a square foot for the concrete bomb shelters we’ll sell for each one. If we cap the size of the houses at 4000 square feet—I don’t have a napkin big enough to calculate those profits!”
Tatiana stood up straight with the dirty trays in her hands. “Bill,” she said calmly, “even without the bomb shelters you’ll make twenty-six million dollars, but we won’t have our land. What would be the point of that?”
“Twenty-six million? How did you?—Well, there you have it! What’s the point? Sweetheart, because you’ll never have to work again. Alexander, she can just stay home and make you babies all day. Now where were we?”
Tatiana dropped her stack of dirty trays onto the new sandstone patio. The trays were metal and didn’t break, but what a clang they made, and all the food she had made that the Balkmans did not finish fell onto the weathered concrete tiles. “Excuse me,” she said. “Accident.” She crouched to clean it. Alexander crouched beside her. “Tell me,” she said through her teeth, “will you be resigning your commission before or after you give him our land?”
“Stop it.”
“You either tell him to leave my house, Shura,” she whispered, “or I’m going to tell him a few things he won’t want to hear.”
“What did I say?” he whispered. “Go inside and calm down.”
Of course he was right—dessert had not been served. Apple pie, blueberry muffins, chocolate chip cookies, strawberry shortcake that Tatiana made to show hospitality to her guests, to Alexander’s boss, to his boss’s family. Snatching the trays from him she squalled into the house.
Balkman opened his mouth and
Alexander said, “Let’s talk about this tomorrow.”
“Oh, come on—”
“Tomorrow, Bill.”
“You know, Alexander,” Bill said in a wise voice, “sometimes women get a little upset by things. They don’t understand the ways of men. All you have to do is show them who’s boss—they’re quick learners.” Bill smacked Margaret’s rump. “Aren’t they, hon?”
The next morning at eight, Balkman said, “Have you talked some sense into that wife of yours?”
Now nearly three years with Balkman, Alexander remained convinced that this was the right job for him, the right place for him. He was so convinced of this that he tried yesterday, after everyone had left, to convince Tatiana. That perhaps they could consider, just consider, Balkman’s offer. He was met with such uncommon, unusual and unwelcome hostility from his normally mild wife that he had to drop the subject before he said some things himself he would later regret.
This morning Alexander stood in front of Bill, his eyes cold, his arms crossed, trying to forget the sight of Tatiana yesterday, her eyes cold, her arms crossed. “This has nothing to do with my wife, Bill,” he said. “We’ve been offered quite a lot of money for that land. Ever since Scottsdale incorporated two years ago, the land’s value has gone out of control. It’s now worth $5000 an acre. That’s a return of nearly half a million dollars on our original investment. Believe me, if we wanted to sell it, we would sell it. We’re not interested.”
“But there’s so much money to be made!”
“It’s not about the money. It’s about the land,” Alexander said. “You’ve seen our life. We live simply. I realize it’s not for everyone. There’s much to be said for making more and spending more, but as long as we have enough for our small things, that’s plenty for us. And we have enough for our small things. The home is paid for. The cars are paid for. We want for nothing.”
“What about—”
Alexander stopped him. “Enough. Please. Let’s talk about our present business. Have you put together a budget proposal for the Schreiner house, or do you want me to do that? They’re eager to get financing and get started. And they’re willing to spend thirty a square foot to get the marble in all the bathrooms, not just the master.”
“Stop changing the subject. 50-50 profit on three hundred land parcels, Alexander! I tell you what, to sweeten the pot, I’ll split the builder’s commission on the houses with you, 75-25. You’re only getting a three percent commission now. Think how much twenty-five percent is going to be on—what did your wife say yesterday? Twenty-six million dollars? She was right, by the way.”
Alexander sighed. Of course she was right. And yes, the money was incredible.
Balkman must have seen his conflict. “Your wife is advising you poorly,” he said. “You should not listen to her. You should do what you feel is right. This is for your future and the future of your family.”
Bill was a fine one to talk about a family—not marrying Margaret so he could keep his options open. Well, Alexander thought, that’s right, why buy the cow when you can have the milk—
And suddenly his mind cleared. He remembered something. “Bill,” he said, “do you know how much cows were worth in Soviet villages?”
“What?” Bill said dumbly. He looked as if he had misheard. “In what villages?”
“Cows. In Soviet villages. Do you know how much you could sell your cow for, if you had one?”
“No—but—”
“Fifteen hundred rubles,” Alexander said. “Now, fifteen hundred rubles is a colossal amount of money to a Russian peasant, who makes maybe twenty rubles a month selling his fish to the collective. But if you sold the cow, your money would be gone in three months, while the cow would feed you for seven years.” He smiled. “I’m not selling my cow, Bill.”
Visibly aggravated, Balkman hit the desk with his fist. “Fucking cows. What are you talking about? I’ve taken very good care of you, Alexander.”
“I know. And I have taken very good care of you.”
“Yes, but what’s good for the business is by definition good for you.” Balkman paused. “The reverse is also true. How would that wife of yours feel about that?”
Alexander stood straight up in silence. To the left of Bill was a larger, more graphic picture of a naked Miss Viva Las Vegas. Something regretfully boiled up inside him. “Bill, if you don’t want me to work for you, fire me. Don’t threaten me, just do what you have to. But the land is not for sale. And do me a favor, leave my wife out of it.”
Balkman growled something in reply. Alexander waited, his arms crossed. He knew Bill couldn’t fire him—he needed Alexander to run the business. They didn’t talk about it again, but Balkman made it clear that he felt Alexander’s intransigence in matters of the ninety-seven acres was all Tatiana’s doing, just like Alexander’s not playing with the boys in Vegas.
The Boys and the Girls
“Dad really wants you to come to Vegas with us next month,” Steve said to Alexander, as they were having a drink after work with Jeff. “The International Builders’ Show is coming up. You must go. He’s going to have to insist.”
They had just been talking about their girls, who had had lunch earlier that day. What do you think they talk about? the boys wondered. Do you think they complain about us? Oh, sure they complain. We ask them to do things they don’t want to do, said Jeff. We won’t marry them, said Steve. Alexander wanted to say that his wife did not complain about him—but what if she did? What if she told the girls he thought he was always right? That he had to have almost everything his way? That occasionally he came home late and not sober and took his fill of whatever he wanted?
Now they were back to Vegas. “Something tells me you don’t get a lot of work done when you go.” Alexander grinned. “And what are you, your father’s fucking secretary? Bill wants to tell me something, he can tell me himself.”
“Come on, Alex, aren’t you the least bit curious about the bestial cauldron of libertine decadence?” asked Jeff. “I was.”
Alexander palmed his beer glass. His whole life in the Leningrad garrison before Tania was a bestial cauldron of proletarian decadence— with weekends off, officer duds, drinks and perks, and hot and cold running ladies.
“Boys, I have something to tell you,” Jeff announced solemnly. “I fear my Las Vegas days are over. I’m going to marry Cindy.”
“Oh, no,” said Alexander. “Not marry Cindy.”
“Cut the shit. Yes. She has informed me that there are other interested parties.”
“She’s lying,” said Steve. “Amanda tells me that once a month, like clockwork. I set my watch by it. Don’t fall for it; it’s a mantrap.” And laughed loudly at his double-entendre: mantrap had cruder meanings. “Don’t do it, Jeff, save yourself, don’t do it.”
Jeff turned to Alexander. “What do you think I should do?”
“Cindy will make a fine wife,” said Alexander.
Jeff lowered his voice. “I like her. I love her. I guess I’ll marry her.” He sighed. “But Alex, there are some things Cindy just won’t do. Is it unreasonable to expect your wife to do some of the things the ladies in Vegas do?”
“Amanda does them,” Steve said with a grin. “She does what I tell her. But her heart’s not in it. She does them just so I’ll marry her. It’s a mantrap.”
They all laughed. “Man, are you fucked up,” Alexander said. “She does what you want, mantrap and all, and you’re still not happy?”
“What do you think, Alex?” Jeff said. “Wives one thing, Vegas girls another?”
“Our boy hasn’t been corrupted by the Vegas girls yet,” said Steve with a shoulder shove at Alexander.
Yet? Steve had drunk too much too fast, and was now loose-lipped. “Jeff, man,” said Alexander, “you better pray this is not the kind of thing the girls talk about—how Cindy’s other boyfriend compares with you. What if you don’t stack up?”
“Hey, Alex, is it true?” Steve asked suddenly. “Manda told me th
e other day that Tania’s never had another boyfriend?”
Jeff laughed. “Oh, man, you’re so fucking lucky! No wonder you’re so cocky. You’re not stacking up to nothin’.”
Alexander jumped off the bar stool. His beer glass swilled on the counter unfinished.
“What, have to run home already?” said Steve. “It’s early.”
“It’s not early, it’s late,” said Alexander.
This is what Amanda, Cindy and Tatiana talked about at lunch: What was wrong with their bodies. Their feet were too big, their nipples too little, their ears stuck out, their behinds not enough. They were too big, too small, too flat, too tall. It was a Dr. Seuss book for nitpicking women. Staying out of it, Tatiana ate her fettuccine and thought about making it for dinner, with a little garlic bread and lemon chicken, or lime garlic chicken with salsa? Or...
“Tania, did you hear us?”
“Sorry, what?” She had forty-five minutes before Anthony’s bus and wanted to order a slice of cherry pie before she had to run. She continued eating. The bodily analysis was singularly uninteresting to her—she had moved far beyond the magazines and their counseling quizzes. “The Real Secret to a Long and Happy Marriage,”
“A Thousand Things You Are Doing Wrong.”
“Five Hundred Things You Can Do to Please Your Husband.” Alexander said and showed he was pleased, and she didn’t think about it beyond that. She and Francesca never talked about this. They talked about sons and cooking—and beergaritas. Tatiana smiled. That was the real secret to a long and happy marriage. She wanted to counsel the girls regarding wasting valuable time on things they could not change–-but what if they listened to her? Then what would they have to talk about?
“Tania, Cindy thinks Jeff is finally going to take the plunge.”
“Oh, that’s great, Cind,” said Tatiana. “But what do you think I should do?” Amanda said. “War is over, and it’s been not two war days, like you and Alexander, not three years like Jeff and Cindy here, but seven years! I’m twenty-five, still live at home, and despite all his promises and a ring, he just won’t marry me.”