A father and daughter. The mother was dead. She had died a year ago after a long struggle with an illness. They were a Jewish family. The time had come for the unveiling. The daughter had traveled from somewhere out of town for the ceremony. The father kept his voice low, just above a mumble. The daughter spoke louder and louder until—partly because for some reason the bartender kept turning up the music—she was almost shouting.
It was so hard for your mother.
I know, Dad.
What she went through.
I know. I was there.
She was brave, though. But no one could be that brave.
I know, Dad, I was there. I was there the whole time. In fact, that’s something I was hoping we could talk about. You remember how it was, Dad. I was the one taking care of everything. You were so worried about Mom, she was so worried about you. I understand how hard it was for both of you.
I remember how hard it was for her.
I was hoping we could talk about this, Dad. I was going through so much myself then—nobody really knew. You and Mom were there for each other, and I was there for both of you. But no one was there for me. It was like my own needs had to be pushed aside, and we’ve never really dealt with that part of it. My therapist says it’s why I’m having so many problems.
(Inaudible.)
I know, Dad. But what I’m saying is that it was hard for me, too, and it’s still hard for me, and I need for that to be acknowledged. All this time, and it’s still going on, still impacting my life every day. My therapist says it has to be dealt with.
I thought the service went well. What did you think of the service?
When I arrived back at my host’s apartment, I found her at the kitchen table with a mug of tea.
I saw you, she said—stumping me.
At the lecture, she said. I saw you there.
Oh, I said. I didn’t see you.
You were in the back, she said, but I was way up front. I was with a friend of mine, and she always likes to sit close. I saw you when we were leaving. Did you stop somewhere to get something to eat?
Yes, I lied, feeling ridiculous. Was it because I was ashamed to say that I’d stopped for a drink? In fact, I had not been able to eat at all since leaving the hospital that day, because of what I had seen—and smelled—there.
She offered to make me some tea, which I declined.
I don’t know about you, she said, but I really did not like that man. My friend was the one who said we should go hear him, because she’s a big fan. Honestly, if we hadn’t been sitting right under his nose, I think I might’ve got up and left. I mean, I know he’s a big intellectual and all, with important things to say, but I think tone matters, and his tone really bugged me. And I’m not saying he isn’t right about how bad things are—I tremble for my grandchildren’s future, believe me—but to talk like that, like there’s no hope, I don’t know, that just seems wrong to me. I don’t think anyone has the right to tell people there’s no hope. You can’t just get up and tell people there’s no hope! And it doesn’t make sense. He thinks you can take away people’s hope and then expect them to—what did he say?—love and take care of each other? Like, how is that going to happen.
I agreed that this was a good point.
And can you imagine, she said, if people ever really got so hopeless about life that they stopped having kids? Sounds like something from a dystopian novel. In fact, I’m sure I read that in a book somewhere. Or maybe it was that the state had made getting pregnant a crime. I forget. Anyway, I can’t believe he’s serious. Telling people to stop having kids. Who the hell is he?
He was my ex. But I didn’t say that.
And did you notice, she said, even though it was a campus event, there were almost no young people there?
I had noticed.
I guess it’s not really their thing, she said.
Well, I can’t say it wasn’t an interesting way to spend an evening, she said. What did you think?
I agreed that it was an interesting way to spend an evening.
Are you sure you don’t want some tea? Anything? A glass of wine?
No, that’s all right, thanks, I said.
Before I went to my room, it occurred to me to tell her about the man who’d left the talk whistling “My Favorite Things.”
Oh, that’s hilarious, she said. She had a sharp, tooting laugh. I never liked that sappy song, but I do know all the words.
And so, in yet another of that day’s odd moments, I stood in the kitchen of a strange house listening to a woman I didn’t know sing all the words to “My Favorite Things.”
* * *
—
In bed, about to turn out the light, I picked up the topmost book from the stack of mysteries on the nightstand. A psychological thriller in the tradition of Highsmith and Simenon, set in the seamy noirish world of seventies New York.
A man is plotting to kill his wife. He and she have not been married very long, and, except for a brief period of sexual infatuation after they first met, he has never really cared for her. Believably enough, given that she is mean and selfish and treats him with contempt, the man has come to hate her. Misogyny has always run deep in this man, partly thanks to a mother who enjoyed beating him when he was small. It seems he has never had sex with any woman—from the town prostitute he frequents to his lawful wedded wife—without experiencing intense shame. Beginning in childhood, with his own mother, he has often fantasized about murdering this or that particular woman. In his mind he dubs these women “candidates.” For strangulation, that is.
The man has arranged to take his wife on a second honeymoon to the Caribbean resort where they’d spent their first one. He chooses the resort hotel for the scene of the crime because he figures it will be quite easy to fake a break-in from the balcony of their room. The “burglar” will find his wife alone and end up strangling her. The man plans every detail with scrupulous care, then sits back to wait for the day of their departure, set for some months away. In the meantime, though, he detects certain changes in his wife’s behavior that he is unsure how to interpret. He becomes convinced that she is hiding something, something that might foil his plan. As it turns out, the wife’s secret is that she’d become pregnant. The man learns this at the same time that he learns that she has just had an abortion. A Catholic—albeit a lapsed one—the wife becomes obsessed with the idea that she is going to Hell.
The man can hardly believe his luck. No need to travel all the way to Aruba. No need to fake breaking and entering. Best of all, no need to wait. His wife has just handed him a wholly believable reason for her to take her own life. He has even overheard her crying to her best friend about her fear that, in the eyes of the Church, she is guilty of murder. And so the man begins to work out details of a new plan.