The Three Weissmanns of Westport

16

The winter blew through Westport, hard and fast, as if it were a season in a hurry, ready to get the whole messy business over with and move on. There was just one big snowstorm, which dissolved in the bright yellow sun of the following morning, and one ice storm that brought with it a townwide loss of power as branches fell to the ground, hundreds of them, sheathed in frozen rain, heavy and ornate as French mirrors. Some gray skies hovered, some wind blew through, a fair amount of rain fell. And then, suddenly, in February, deep blue heavens and gentle breezes and mud.

When the Weissmanns returned from Palm Springs at the beginning of January, the snow had just come and gone and the ground was oozing. Betty decided to take up online poker in an attempt to supplement the family income. Annie and Miranda had forgiven if not forgotten what each had said to the other and were on precariously good terms, but Annie tried to spend as much time as possible at the library. Even there, however, she felt the need to escape. When she could no longer stand the part of her job that required her to speak to board members and ask bibliophilic rich people for money, she would retreat to the library's attic and putter. She told the staff she was looking for artifacts, and she did discover a discolored letter from George Washington in a frame with cracked glass, as well as the first volume of the two-volume first American edition of Sense and Sensibility. But the main reason she dug through piles of broken chairs and abandoned space heaters was to be alone. It had become an aching, physical need. The beach in Westport, where once she had felt so free, now seemed to her to be teeming with the presence of other human beings: they were behind her in their houses, they were across Long Island Sound in other houses, they were a mile away on I-95, whizzing past her in cars. They flew above her, back and forth, in planes in the sky. They were even buried beneath her, or close enough, deep and silent, in the earth. Wherever she went, they followed. They spoke to her on telephones and wrote to her on computers. They sang from radios and hailed cabs and demanded she hold the elevator. It was not their fault, of course, they were only doing what people were meant to do, yet she found herself despising them.

But in the attic, there were just the things people had discarded, not the people themselves. A bulky electric typewriter. A framed diploma from Barnard College for Mildred Peacock Winship, 1927. Engravings, photographs — it was like picking up seashells. She was alone, blissfully alone. Who was Mildred Peacock Winship? Perhaps she had been a devoted member of the library's staff, a middle-aged unmarried person who typed and filed, collected her meager paycheck, and went home to a big frame house in the Bronx to make supper for her aging parents. Perhaps she was a trustee who had bequeathed to the library thousands of dollars as well as her treasured editions of Emerson and Hawthorne. Annie thought vaguely that she should find out. At the same time, she blessed Mildred Peacock Winship, for, whoever she had been and whatever she had done, she was now, blissfully, absent.

The attic was safe. It was quiet and remote. Like me, Annie thought. She was walking to the subway after a particularly tiring board meeting.

"Aren't you just so bwack and bwown?" a woman cooed to a dog tied to a parking meter.

When Annie emerged in Grand Central, a homeless man holding a battered coffee cup said, "Hello there, beautiful lady," and she was wondering whether to smile politely without making eye contact or just hurry past, when she realized he was talking to the woman behind her. On the train, she walked through the first couple of cars looking for a seat facing forward. She spotted a likely prospect — the back of a single well-groomed female head sticking up from the three-person bench — but when she got up to the female head and was about to heave her bag onto the middle seat, she saw it was occupied by a small child.

There was an awkward moment when, even as she drew back her bag, determined to avoid what could only be a very loud and very dull young companion on an evening when she wanted peace and solitude, she caught the mother's eye and wondered if she had already somehow committed herself to join the duo and if it would now be insulting to this doubtless doting parent to continue on her way. But even as she quickly and decisively decided in favor of insult over boredom and annoyance, the child in question spoke.

"Annie!"

And she looked down at the boy, focused, and recognized Henry.

Annie put out her arms, and Henry jumped to his feet and, standing unsteadily on his seat, gave her a hug. She saw the mother's face over his head. Henry's mother. It was instantly and unquestionably apparent. Not just the full cheeks or the set of the eyes. But that look, that proprietary mother look. "Oh, you must be Henry's mother," Annie said quickly, holding a hand out. "I'm Annie Weissmann. A friend from Westport."

Henry was looking around. "Randa?" he asked.

"Are you Randa?" the mother asked. "He talks about you quite a bit. I'm Leanne."

Annie sat down and explained that Randa was her sister, Miranda.

"Miranda's at home," she said to Henry.

The woman was blond, her hair short and straight, her narrow eyes a faded blue. She wore no makeup, and Annie could see at once why she didn't bother with it — her skin glowed, smooth as a child's. She seemed a little older than Kit, however. Well, Annie thought, returning her friendly smile, the man ran true to form in the age department, that seemed clear.

Henry climbed over his mother and pressed his face against the window. He stared at the passing lights and sang a jumbled version of the alphabet.

"You were in Africa?" Annie said, trying to make conversation that somehow did not touch on Kit Maybank.

"We're staying with Aunt Charlotte now. She needs some looking after. And the house is huge."

"Yes, I've heard that," Annie said, then fell into an uncomfortable silence, for how else would she have heard that except from Kit?

Henry unglued himself from the window to watch the conductor punch holes in his mother's ticket but not in Annie's monthly pass. Annie explained that she was a commuter, then explained what a commuter was.

"You go on the train every day?" he asked, his eyes wide with awe and envy.

"Two times."

"We saw dinosaurs," he said a little defensively.

After that, conversation flagged until they neared the station at Westport.

"We don't get off until Greens Farms," Leanne said as Annie started putting on her coat.

"Right. Of course. Your aunt's house is so much closer to the Greens Farms station. I like that station. And the little old-fashioned post office there. Kind of my favorite place in Westport."

Leanne laughed.

"I want to go to Randa's house," Henry said.

"You never met Aunt Charlotte, did you?" asked Leanne.

"I want to go to Randa's house."

Annie shook her head. "No. Never did."

"No. She and Kit are not exactly on friendly terms, so you wouldn't have."

"But you're obviously on good terms with her."

"Oh yes. She's a bit of a gorgon, but we love her, don't we, Henry?"

Henry sucked silently on his fist.

No wonder Kit had lived in the run-down boathouse. But what had he done to alienate his aunt? What had his ex-wife done to keep the confidence of her in-law? Annie wished she had time to pursue this interesting conversation. Of course, it was none of her business. But gossip so rarely was.

Henry continued to want to go to Randa's house, now in a loud singsong chant. Annie wondered if she should respond. She knew Miranda would be overjoyed to see Henry. But perhaps Henry's mother would not be overjoyed to drop her son off at the home of her ex's ex. It all seemed very complicated.

"I want — "

"Okay, okay," his mother said, clapping a hand over Henry's mouth. "Listen," she added suddenly to Annie. "You'll all come for tea. Yes. Perfect." She released Henry's mouth and dug in her purse. "Here." She thrust her card at Annie with a dazzling smile and an almost military sense of authority. "It's settled."

Annie laughed. Leanne reminded her a little of Miranda.

While Annie was rumbling home on the commuter train to Westport, Frederick was rumbling toward New York on the Amtrak train from Boston. Amber and Crystal were not with him. They had taken his car a week earlier. Amber was accompanying Crystal to Great Barrington, where they were house-sitting (Frederick could not bear to pronounce "home-sitting" even silently in his thoughts), then they would both continue on to the city to meet Frederick. They were all staying with Felicity and Joe in Joe's big apartment on Central Park West, although Felicity didn't know it. Amber and Crystal were going to be a surprise. Frederick chuckled, imagining his sister's face. They could all go to hell, he decided. He asked very little in life, really. Just to sit in his office and listen to the sea and write his books. Why was there always so much fuss?

His head back, Frederick closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on something other than the fuss. He had to write a book review and tried to compose his opening sentence, but the novel he was reviewing, a stark and painful allegory set in Las Vegas, was, finally, boring. Everything, he'd discovered, was boring as you hurtled toward the abyss. Fear, hopelessness — it turned out they were unequivocally dull. He decided to take up smoking again as soon as possible.

Amber and Crystal had spent the day shopping, starting on Fifth Avenue, ending up at the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle. They were meeting Frederick for drinks at Gabriel's, on the other side of Sixtieth Street. They perched on their bar stools, their shopping bags clustered around their feet. They ordered Cosmopolitans and waited.

"I feel very artistic," Crystal said.

"Don't you mean sophisticated? There's nothing artistic about shopping, or even cocktails, to be honest."

"Pardonnez-moi." Crystal contemplated her pink drink. "Hey, should you even be drinking? Doesn't it cut off their placenta or oxygen or something?"

"It's my placenta," Amber said. But then she saw Frederick pushing open the door and slid the drink away from her.

"Hey, Daddy-o," she said, standing and embracing him.

"You really have to stop calling me that, Amber."

"Silly," she said, kissing him.

He smiled. "Ready, girls? Once more into the breach?"

They gave him a quizzical look.

"Henry the Fifth, dear friends." He was insufferable, he knew. And rather enjoying it. And entitled, too, to a little self-indulgence. Think what was ahead. My God, think what was ahead. He took out one of his brand-new Marlboros.

"No smoking, sir," said the bartender.

Ah yes. No smoking in restaurants. How could he have forgotten? But then, he hadn't smoked in thirty years, so perhaps he could be forgiven. He slid the pack back in his pocket. "Well," he said. "All ready for another stab at my children?"

Stab, Amber thought. Yes, she was ready for that all right.

They arrived just at eight. Gwen and Ron lived in a two-bedroom apartment on the third floor of a brownstone on Bank Street. Frederick was a little out of breath from the stairs when Gwen answered the door. The cigarettes he'd smoked on the street had not helped.

"Oh!" she said. "Look who the cat dragged in. Amber and Crystal. I'm afraid I wasn't expecting you."

"'Unbidden guests are often welcomest when they are gone,'" Frederick said. "Henry the Sixth." He bowed. I'm on a roll, he thought. If only Shakespeare had written Henry the Seventh.

Gwen stepped back, viewing him with a puzzled frown. "Are you drunk?" She could think of no other reason that her father, so polite, so gentlemanly, would show up on her doorstep for dinner with two uninvited guests and then stand there and insult them. "You look pale. And you smell like cigarettes."

He was about to take out the red pack and proudly show her the depths to which he had sunk when Amber said, "It's the steps. He needs to do some aerobic exercise. I tell him to go to the gym, but you know how he is."

Gwen did know how he was. But she did not like it that Amber seemed to know, too.

As they set two extra places, Evan said, "Hey there, Freddie." He shook his head and laughed, then turned to Crystal. "So, how's the home-sitting industry?"

"You sit on homes?" one of the twins asked.

"I am a student."

The girl looked disappointed.

"Life coaching, right?" Evan said. "Do you have, like, a whistle? Gatorade?"

"I'd say you could use some coaching yourself, sir. In manners."

"I could use a lot of things." He held an imaginary joint to his lips and inhaled.

Crystal laughed.

"Evan!" Gwen said. "Jesus. There are children here."

"I'll say," Crystal said.

Evan pursed his lips in a pout. "I was just kidding around."

When shall I tell them? Frederick wondered.

"Amber, why don't you sit here, next to Ophelia?" Gwen pointed to a small stool wedged beneath a corner of the table.

"What a quaint little stool. Shaker?" She had been reading up on antiques.

Gwen nodded reluctant agreement with the intruder.

Should I tell them before they eat? Frederick wondered. That will ruin their appetites. After they eat? Then they will feel ill.

"What fun!" Amber had settled herself on the stool. "Don't I look like a little milkmaid, Ophelia?"

"Juliet," the child said petulantly, and gave Amber a kick.

Suddenly it was Frederick who felt ill. The bravado that had started in the bar deserted him. He looked at Gwennie. She had grown up to be a snob, it was true. But she was only protecting what she thought was important. She had been officious even as a child. He had always found it touching, her need to make hierarchical order out of a chaotic world. And Evan, so sarcastic and obnoxious these days. Perhaps he would outgrow it. Whether he did or not, Frederick knew he would always adore him. He watched his son torturing Crystal, playing with her like a cruel cat. Good luck to you, Evan, he thought. Those mouse sisters are cleverer than you think.

"I'm sorry Joe couldn't be here," Ron said.

"The economy." Felicity spoke as if the economy were a traffic jam. "Just terrible. I just barely made it here myself. But then I'm just a VP, and of course my part of the business is going so much more smoothly than the rest."

"I'm glad you're here," said Frederick, "all of you. Because I have something of an announcement to make."

"That's funny," Gwen said. "Because so do I!"

All eyes turned to her.

"I'm pregnant!"

Frederick and Amber exchanged a look as everyone congratulated Gwen and Ron.

"Now, what was your announcement, Dad?" asked Ron.

"Nothing," said Dad. "Nothing that can't wait."

At the apartment on Central Park West, Amber was sharing a room with Crystal, not Frederick. She had been shocked the other night when Frederick almost announced her pregnancy and relieved when Gwen's news made it impossible.

"They have to get to know me better," she explained to Frederick. "But when they do, you'll see. They'll love me. In spite of themselves."

And so, to Frederick's surprise, it came to pass.

"Gwen, would you mind if I took the girls to the Met today? There's a toddler tour of the European paintings..." "Oh, Felicity, you have managed to make this apartment both grand and yet so personal. You really used a decorator? It feels so organic to your personality. You must be a fabulous manager..." "Gwen, did you hear Juliet singing the Dora the Explorer song? Have you considered voice lessons?"

Amber was blatant, brilliant. Frederick watched with amazement as the flattery did its work on his prickly daughter and pricklier sister. If Amber had been rubbing her hands together and muttering how 'umble she was, she could not have been more obsequious. "I'm sorry — what? You made this dinner and you worked all day?" she said to Felicity. "If that handsome boss of yours were ever foolish enough to let you go" — and here she simpered at Joseph, who smiled foolishly back — "God, you could so get a job as a chef. I mean, who am I to even say that, just your grateful, useless houseguest, but I can't help it — you should try out for Top Chef. You're totally what they're looking for, totally telegenic."

And on and on it went, this sycophantic barrage. Amber went to Dumbo and found trendy baby blankets and bibs for Gwen. She appeared at Joseph's office with a basket of designer cookies and gave them to Felicity, then helped her pass them out to the employees, all the while giving the impression that it had been Felicity's idea.

"I went all the way to Red Hook for them," she told Crystal that night in a whisper. They lay side by side in twin beds.

"Why? There's bakeries all over this neighborhood."

"But they never leave Manhattan, these people. Red Hook is totally exotic. So that makes it like I made this big effort."

"But you did make a big effort."

"You have to invest in your future, Crystal. Don't you ever watch Suze Orman?"

Perhaps it was the massage that finally turned the tide of Amber's Barrow fortunes, for, as it happened, she was a truly gifted massage therapist, just as her sister had claimed. She offered frequent and free sessions. It was more than either woman could resist. Evan became a regular visitor at the big apartment on Central Park West, too, making faint noises of physical discomfort and twitching his shoulders (once bringing his latest girlfriend, a dancer, as well) until Amber picked up the hint and offered her help.

Both Gwen and Felicity were accustomed to a certain intimacy with the people who tended to their personal and cosmetic needs. The hair cutter, the colorist, the manicurist, the personal trainer — these were all members of a netherworld of women with whom they never would have thought to socialize, yet trusted as confidantes. Amber benefited from that familiarity and comfort. She fitted herself into the family as someone not quite an equal, and so not a threat, but she was not quite a servant, either.

Gwen began to ask Amber to join her for lunch, to go on shopping trips for maternity clothes. Amber stood in for Ron as her coach a few times at her birthing classes. They even went away for a weekend to a spa. Crystal accompanied them sometimes, but she was in hot pursuit of an insurance broker she'd met at a club.

"Crystal, he's very bridge-and-tunnel, okay? Just don't bring him around the Barrows."

"Why? You don't think they would like him?"

Amber laughed.

"Yeah, I know," Crystal said. "Hey, have you noticed that Evan pays a lot of attention to me? I think he might be hot for me."

Amber rolled her eyes. "Dream on. Anyway, you're better off with the B&T guy."

"Yeah. We go to really good clubs. Of course, you don't care about clubs anymore, being engaged."

"True," Amber said. "I have priorities." Then: "Which clubs?"