Olivia Goldsmith - Young Wives

“Hell, it won’t last out the walk if you use that much,” Jada retorted.

They walked for a moment in silence. “Do you think I’m getting fat?” Michelle asked, as she did almost every morning.

“Yeah. And I’m getting white,” Jada retorted. Michelle giggled. Then her face took on her serious look, the look that meant that soon the quiz would start, and Jada just wanted to put it off as long as possible.

It was early enough that the streetlights were still on, but as the two women passed under one it blinked off. “So where do things stand, Jada?” Michelle asked, predictable as an actuarial table.

“I don’t know. We never had time to talk.” Nevertheless, Jada raged about the condition of her kids and home the previous night as she and Michelle speed-walked past the quiet houses.

“You have to draw a line in the sand,” Michelle said. “You have to …” But Michelle caught herself.

Sometimes Jada thought her friend was afraid to give advice. “I don’t think I can stand it. I’m going to have to take an ax to his head, even though he is the father of my children.”

“Hey. When did that stop you before?” Michelle asked, and Jada had to grin.

Michelle definitely had a giving NUP—a term Jada had invented to categorize a person’s Natural Unit Preferences. Michelle was a generous friend, and generous to her husband and children. But somehow Jada just didn’t feel like taking pity from Michelle right at that moment.

“He’s gone crazy on you, Jada,” Michelle said. “If Frank ever …”

Jada tuned out because she loved Michelle—she was her best friend, even if she was from the south, white, had a stupid dog, and was sometimes thick as a plank.

It had been weird when Jada realized that she really didn’t have any close black friends anymore. She couldn’t hang with the African-American tellers at the bank and she didn’t relate to the few neighborhood strivers whose daddies and grand-daddies were professionals and who went to college—real sleep-away colleges. She certainly couldn’t relate to Clinton’s homies, who thought that double negatives were standard and career planning was marriage to a man with a job at the post office.

She and Michelle had a lot in common, but Michelle actually thought Frank was perfect and closed her eyes to all the funny stuff that went on in Frank’s business, not that any of it was funny. Jada knew there were county contracts, inside deals. Frank Russo thrived, even when the economy was at its darkest. There was no way that Frank hadn’t paid off officials, wasn’t connected to … Well, Jada didn’t like to think about it. It was none of her business. But a few years ago, when Frank had asked Clinton to join him in business, Jada had actually been relieved when, for once, Clinton had made the right decision. It wasn’t jealousy that made Jada believe that the Russos had a little too much cash. If Mich wanted to close her eyes to it, that was her business.

The Jacksons had bought Jada’s Volvo station wagon from the Russos. It had been Mich’s car. But Michelle got a new model every eighteen months or so. Since Jada had gotten the station wagon, Michelle had been through two—no, three—luxury cars, and she’d told Jada Frank paid cash for every one. Jada had to admit Frank Russo was a good man—for a man. Most importantly, he really adored Mich. But that didn’t fool Jada: when it came to his NUP, old Frank was a taker, too. In a way he was worse than Clinton. He had Michelle completely fooled. Jada doubted if Frank knew where the washer or dryer was in his house, much less the stove. If Michelle were to ever leave Frank home alone with the children for two days and Frank couldn’t call his mother over, the Russos would die of starvation, despite a refrigerator full of food. Frank, who could work with his shining dark hair to get just the right lift, was incapable of slapping a slice of Velveeta between two slices of bread, or sorting laundry, or making the bed. He made Clinton look like the black male Betty Crocker. And Michelle never complained.

Hey, girl , she told herself. Stop the comparisons. Try for a gratitude attitude. Drop the criticism . This daily walk, Jada thought, this friendship, and this safe and pretty neighborhood, were two of the good things in her life. She said a silent prayer, remembering to be grateful for her strong legs and lungs, her friendship and her home. She looked around at the houses, the gray trees glistening with the last of the frost. Pretty. “Look,” she said, pointing to new construction. “They’re putting a sunroom on.” She and Michelle checked every house improvement project and gave their approval—or not. Michelle looked at the hole knocked into the side of the brick colonial.

“Oh, I’d love that. It looks like it’ll be a real greenhouse. I wonder if Frank could build one for me?”

He should build a doghouse first , Jada thought, tripping over the leash as Pookie cut her off yet again. They turned to the right, Pookie pulling Michelle, who was almost slipping as the dog pulled her on the snowy street. As Jada looked away in annoyance, she saw the oddest thing—a face appeared in the window of a Tudor across the street for a moment. It was a face so pale that a trick of the light made it seem almost luminous, although the eyes were so shadowed that they seemed to recede into the darkness of the house. In the back of Jada’s mind something about the face seemed familiar, or … had she had a dream? She shivered and shook off the feeling. “I’d swear I just saw a ghost,” Jada told Michelle. “Otherwise there’s a scary-looking woman being held prison in there. Who lives in that house now?”

“Oh, that’s the new guy. You know. The middle-aged one who lives there alone. He’s Italian or something. Anthony. He has that—”

“The one with the nice cars?” Jada interrupted.

Michelle nodded. “The one with a limo service. And a very small mortgage.” Jada reflected that being a loan officer gave you insights others might not have. Michelle continued. “I don’t think he’s married.”

“Well, then he has a very unhappy girlfriend.”

“Maybe it’s an arranged marriage,” Michelle said. “You know, like they write away to Russia and order some young wife.”

“That’s not ar -ranged, it’s de -ranged,” Jada said. They walked on in silence for a while.

“So what are you going to do about Clinton? Will you force him to make a commitment?”

“Clinton? Commitment? The only thing those two words have in common is they both start with a ‘c.’ I mean, Clinton is the only guy in his ’hood who never got a tattoo. De Beers lies when it says it’s a diamond. A tattoo is forever.”

“I can’t imagine why he’d do something like this,” Michelle said. “You’re perfect.”

“Why he wouldn’t get a tattoo?” Jada asked, deflecting the discussion. Sometimes Mich just didn’t get it, Jada thought. Was it her kiss-me-I’m-Irish heritage? “That’s just it, Mich. I’m perfect, and that makes Clinton sick. I’m twice as strong as he is. He knows it and he hates it!”

“No! Jada, don’t say that! You’re going through a hard time—a really hard time—but that isn’t true. Clinton admires you. He doesn’t hate you.”

“I didn’t say he hates me . I said he hates my strength.” Jada sighed. “He could make it ten years ago when it was easy, but he can’t make it now when it’s hard. I could. I can . Shit, girl, I have to. And he resents me for it.” They came to the gate, where they turned around. Michelle, as always, patted the corner post. Jada, despite her mood, almost smiled. If Michelle couldn’t touch the post, she wouldn’t feel as if they had accomplished this bone-chilling, breathtaking three-quarters-of-an-hour of torture. She looked at her friend’s long legs, her skinny mane of perfect blond hair pulled back into a ponytail. She looked like a young colt—all legs and eyes and tail. Meanwhile Pookie sniffed and snuffed at the post as if the damn dog had never seen it before.

“But I thought they wanted us perfect,” Michelle said as they got moving again. “Frank notices if I put on a pound or don’t shave my legs. I mean he loves me anyway, but—”

“Hey, it isn’t about whether your legs are shaved. And it isn’t even that your legs are twenty inches longer than mine. We’ve got the same thing between them. Men want that without a lot of trouble.”

“Jada! That’s awful. I work hard to keep myself looking good. It’s not just about looks, but it’s not just about sex, either. I mean, I know it’s impossible, but I used to try to be perfect for Frank.”

“They don’t want us perfect,” Jada snapped. “They want us dependent. Unless we’re too damn dependent. Then they feel smothered. And they want us to take care of them. Unless we do it too much. Then they feel controlled. And they want us sexy, unless it means we want to make love too much. Then we’re demanding. Because then they feel castrated.”

Michelle sighed. “That’s harsh. You just have to talk to him. He’s your kids’ father. Talk to him when you get home now. There’s no time like the present.”

Jada had to admit she was pumped up. Her adrenaline was flowing. “You’re right. Cover for me at the bank. I’ll probably only be an hour late. I’m serving Clinton a little extra something with his scrambled eggs this morning.”

“Just don’t be bitter, Jada,” Michelle begged. “In spite of this, don’t get bitter.”

“Too late,” Jada told her friend. “I already am.”

In which Angie compares her father’s taste in decor with her own in clothing, and in which she’s briefly—very briefly—reprieved

Angela opened her eyes as she did—pointlessly—every morning at a quarter to six. The first thing she saw was the smoked glass mirror of the wall opposite the black leather sofa she was sleeping on. She closed her eyes. She was already so depressed she knew she couldn’t get up, and the day wasn’t ten seconds old. Her eyes still closed, she collapsed from her side to her back. Well, that could count as her exercise for the day. She pulled the shamrock green afghan over her head. Good. More exercise. Now perhaps the day would go away.

Actually, she wasn’t sure what day this was: her anniversary had been on Tuesday, and it felt like she’d slept for days. Hopefully it was Sunday. If so, her mother would be home from her trip to some seminar or other. She’d once again watched TV till dawn and hadn’t the strength to leave the den to go upstairs. She was camped at her dad’s house, which was decorated in Middle-Aged Suburban Despair. But Angie had no place else to go. Her mother had recently moved into a new apartment and Angela hadn’t ever been there. She couldn’t even sit in her mother’s space and take comfort from her surroundings. So Angela had been holding on, waiting for Natalie Goldfarb, giver of comfort, speaker of wisecracks, to get back so she could pour all of this pain and disappointment into her mother’s ear.

But what good would that do? Angela asked herself now. Under the blanket—in the bra and panties she’d have to wear for two, or possibly three, days—Angela tried to avoid that thought. But she wasn’t a kid with a boo-boo. What good could her mother actually do? Sure, she’d hold Angela while she cried her lungs out, but that was about it. Somehow, till this minute, Angela had felt that her mother could fix things. Not just that she’d comfort her and sympathize, but that she’d actually give Angie the key, the way to stop the relentless pain she was in. No—more than that. She would make the pain disappear, fix the problem, and make it go away. “Oh. The first anniversary I-cheated-on-you announcement. Sure. Daddy did it, too. You just …”