My Sister, My Love (29 page)
Mummy stared in astonishment. Mummy’s lips parted, and Mummy’s eyes brimmed with tears. Barely audible Mummy spoke: “Oh. Oh Bix. This bracelet is—too beautiful. Jesus has heard my prayers, and He has answered them. My husband is returned. Today has been the happiest day of my life—‘My cup runneth over.’”
Mummy’s tears were not the wrathful acid-tears of the past several months, that had so frightened Skyler and Bliss, but joyous scintillant tears of the kind usually reserved for the dazzling lights of an ice-skating arena, when Bliss Rampike was being crowned. And Daddy, hugging Mummy hard in clumsy-Daddy humility, Daddy-seeking-forgiveness, hid his large heated face in Mummy’s blushing neck and began to cry, too.
Deep-chested wracking sobs provoking Skyler to think
But this hasn’t happened before and so it can’t be happening again. Can it
?
*
(Editor
†
: Do we need to know that this is “a deep, exhausted sleep”—“a stuporous open-mouthed sleep”—“an uncanny sleep in which the glassy cobalt eyes were partly open, yet unseeing”?)
Yet another ending, required for a graceful segue into the next chapter (
is
“segue” a word?—a kind of cheaply trendy word, but often helpful):
That night waking abruptly not knowing at first where he was, in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar room, and his sister Bliss sleeping in the twin bed beside his, Skyler heard a sudden sound, a sound of protest, a sound of struggle, a thudding/thumping sound and—was it laughter?—Mummy’s sharp/startled/involuntary laughter, a moaning laughter, and what had to be Daddy’s
deep-baritone response, poor Skyler had no idea what he was hearing, should he be frightened, should he knock on the door between the rooms, or is it just Mummy laughing, Mummy laughing at one of Daddy’s silly jokes?—so Skyler presses a pillow over his head, if Mummy is happy, and Daddy is back to live with them again, then Skyler would be happy, Skyler would be very happy, and Bliss would be happy, too.
You can see why I excised this ending: it’s overwrought, and communicates its meaning too clearly. We prefer indirection.
*
My original title for these linked chapters transcribing the events of November 30, 1996, was “Cheap Suspense” but my editor insisted that I change it. And I have to concede, when is suspense
not
cheap?
Is
there a “costly”—“expensive”—“classy” suspense? Also, the outcome of Bliss’s competition at Newark is a matter of public record so, technically speaking, there can be no suspense: you know that Bliss won the coveted title Little Miss Jersey Ice Princess 1996 which was the “high point” and the “end point” of her career.
*
“F–ing”: pronounced “f”-“ing” to spare the tender ears of Bix Rampike’s children. A linguistic circumlocution sometimes employed by crude assholes like Bix Rampike.
*
Poor Skyler! As guts can become fatally twisted, and thus suppurating, in the abdominal cavity, so an overtaxed child’s brains can become twisted, and suppurating. And yet, I think we know what Skyler means here, at the end of this particularly overwrought scene of “domestic realism.”
Not that the scene ended here. No scenes in literature, as in movies, end as indicated, but trail on and on like broken-backed snakes. Here is the fuller, original ending:
And what of Skyler, shoving a slice of clammy-cheese-clotted pizza into his mouth, wildly ravenous as if he had not eaten in days?—Skyler staring at his demon-parents thinking helplessly
But this hasn’t happened before and so it can’t happen again. Can it?
Beyond this, a “poignant” ending:
On a sofa in the hotel suite, wrapped in the snowy-white ermine cape as in a child’s blanket, sucking her thumb and several fingers Little Miss Jersey Ice Princess had fallen asleep.
†
(No editor responded to this query! Which means, I guess, that no editor actually read it. So I think I will let it remain, out of spite.)
IN THE LOWERMOST DRAWER OF THE HEAVY CARVED MAHOGANY BUREAU IN THE
Rampikes’ “master bedroom” beneath Daddy’s (ironed, folded) boxer shorts, astonished little Skyler discovered, one day when Mummy and Bliss were gone for the afternoon, and the new housekeeper Lila-from-the-Philippines was occupied far away downstairs in the laundry room, these baffling items:
• a rumpled crimson silk scarf about thirty inches long, less than six inches wide, faintly stained
• ladies’ lingerie, black silk, lacy crimson, near-transparent champagne-colored: panties large enough to be Mummy’s but—so strangely!—lacking crotches; “brassieres” large enough to be Mummy’s but made of an impracticably flimsy material that could never support Mummy’s heavy breasts, with strategically placed holes
• a black silk garter belt, black silk stockings twisted together
• two masks: a black silk half-mask, and a crimson silk half-mask
• several chains of a lightweight metal meant to resemble gold, with heart-shaped links
• a flesh-colored replica of what looked, to Skyler’s astonished eyes, like a monstrously enlarged boy’s “thing” with a mysterious leather strap attached to its base
•
Gaspard de la Nuit
“
Oil of Eros
” in a six-ounce bottle that looked as if it had never been opened
•
Gaspard de la Nuit
“
Chocolate Licker
” in a similar bottle, that looked as if it had been opened, since less than half of the “chocolate licker” remained
Entranced, Skyler dared to lift one of the black silk half-masks, to peer through the eyes; and Skyler dared to sniff (but did not taste) the
Gaspard de la Nuit
“
Chocolate Licker
”; and Skyler dared to loop the crimson silk scarf around his neck, and wipe his warm face with it, and inhale its fruity/perfumy scent. Tyler McGreety would know what to make of such things! But not Skyler Rampike whose small heart beat so rapidly, he felt he might faint.
“Sky-ler?”—away downstairs a female voice lifted.
Mesmerized by what he’d discovered, knowing only that these items were, like the
master bedroom
itself, forbidden to him, quickly Skyler shoved the things back beneath Daddy’s underwear, and fled.
*
*
Was Skyler’s intrusion ever discovered, you might wonder? No. But then, yes.
“Sex Toys?” as a chapter title is provided by the nineteen-year-old S.R., not the nine-year-old who hadn’t a clue what he was looking at.
IF SKYLER IMAGINED WHAT
WAS,
BLISS IMAGINED WHAT
WAS NOT.
Nothing so upset Mummy as those occasions when Bliss “made things up”—“confabulated”—in the presence of outsiders. Especially, Mummy had to be vigilant in public places: if, for instance, an aggressive interviewer prodded Bliss into saying “wrong things” on live television which Mummy could not censure, or even edit, as in this remarkable interview with a slyly malicious female interviewer following Bliss’s Newark triumph:
Interviewer: You are such a natural on the ice, Bliss! How old were you when you learned to skate?
Bliss (long pause, shy):…before I was here, in that other place.
Interviewer: And where was that “other place,” Bliss?
Bliss (long pause, finger in mouth):…it was dark. I wasn’t there yet.
Interviewer: I don’t quite understand, dear. You weren’t “there yet”—?
(Seated close beside Bliss, an arm around Bliss’s small shoulders, Mummy registers unease, though Mummy continues to smile happily.)
Bliss:…before I was born.
Interviewer: Why, Bliss! Do you remember before you were born?
Bliss (nodding, so vehemently the silver tiara on her head nearly falls off ): It was a quiet time, no one was mad at me. No one yelled at me. There was ice, everywhere it was ice where the Turnpike is, you could skate and skate and…
Mummy (laughing nervously, adjusts the tiara on Bliss’s head, gently tugs Bliss’s finger from her mouth): What Bliss is trying to say is “a long time ago”—when she was four. And that very first year Bliss Rampike was crowned Miss Tots-on-Ice Debutante 1994—the youngest ever!
Funny? Chagrined Betsey Rampike didn’t think so.
Another time, earlier in Bliss’s career, and quite a surprise to Skyler (watching the telecast at home, alone with one of the Marias), following Bliss’s victory at the StarSkate competition, another female interviewer was complimenting Betsey Rampike on how “angelic”—“radiantly beautiful”—her daughter was, and Bliss suddenly became agitated, shook her head vehemently from side to side and, before Mummy could stop her, managed to pry off something small and pearly-white from one of her front teeth, to reveal, in glaring TV close-up, a tiny chip in the tooth.
Giggly/stricken Bliss stammered into the TV camera: “I was bad, I fell. I broke my tooth. I am not
how I look.
”
Poor Betsey Rampike! Roused on camera to the most fumbling and shame-faced intervention, trying to smile while profusely apologizing to the interviewer, gripping squirmy Bliss in a firm-Mummy embrace, and trying to extricate the small white dental cap from Bliss’s fingers before it fell to the floor.
Now, this
was
funny. Skyler laughed, and laughed.
AS IN ADULT (SEXUAL/MARITAL) LIFE THERE ARE PROVERBIAL “HONEYMOONS”
—
interludes of peace, idyllic calm, the highest and most naive of romantic expectations—so, too, in the lives of families there are honeymoon interludes, precious (if heartrending!) in retrospect. I am thinking of those several weeks in December 1996 and early January 1997 when like an old-fashioned schooner blown by balmy winds into seemingly tranquil tropical waters, the Rampikes entered such a phase, when Daddy returned, vowing to be a “God-damned good” husband and father.
Where once Daddy had stayed late at work, or traveled much of the time, mysteriously, now Daddy was home for dinner with his family every weekday night, or nearly. Daddy was home most weekends. If Daddy was to be even a half-hour late, Daddy called! Eager Daddy hugged, and Daddy kissed, and Daddy brought home surprise presents from the mammoth VastValley Mall which was on Daddy’s commute home from Univers Bio-Tech—“Just ’cause Daddy loves you.” Grinning Daddy spent “quality time” with his family at every opportunity and planned to spend more: “How’s the lush tropical island of St. Bart’s sound, for winter break in February? The Rampikes are booked for a guesthouse on the water.” And: “Next July, it’s the Grand Tetons!” It was a season of Daddy-plans. For Bix Rampike was the most American of daddies, seething with plans like maggots in a festering corpse.
The most exciting of Daddy’s plans was for a new house!
“Even a terrific house like ours, in a terrific setting, can be outgrown. It’s the nature of
Homo sapiens
to
move on.
”
Briskly Daddy rubbed big-Daddy hands together. A sharp laser light came into Daddy’s soulful eyes at the prospect of
moving on.
First weekend of Daddy’s return, following church services on Sunday Daddy spread out oversized sheets of architectural drawings on the dining room table, for his amazed family to admire. “The architect is none other than H.H. Stuart of New York City, who built the Steadley house out here. And I have the dream location for the Rampike Dream House: five acres of prime ‘verdant rolling hills’ in East Quaker Heights, New Jersey.”
Mummy stammered, “But Bix—you can’t be serious! You can’t want us to move from Fair Hills! Where we know such wonderful people, and have been made to feel so welcome! Quaker Heights must be twenty miles away, we wouldn’t know a soul. Oh!” Mummy winced as if she’d been struck to the heart.
During Sunday morning services at Trinity Episcopal, Mummy often became emotional, even tearful; Skyler was embarrassed of his dressy, glamorously made-up mother who listened so intently to Reverend Higley’s affable droning sermons and, when bidden, rose eagerly from the pew to “take communion” with an expression of joyous gratitude. Now Mummy was becoming so agitated, Daddy felt the need to wink at Skyler and Bliss to signal
silly-Mummy isn’t she
? but Daddy spoke respectfully to Mummy explaining that, yes, he was serious: “Might be, darlin’, I’ve made preliminary negotiations to buy the property. Quaker Heights is
très
upscale, Bets. If you’re worried about the neighbors. And don’t fret about not knowing anyone there, it’s because your enterprising hubby already knows certain key players in Quaker Heights, my new associates at Univers, who are strongly urging this move for us.
Verstayeh?
”
Even Skyler had heard of the Village of Quaker Heights. It was one of those “quaint”—“historic”—eighteenth-century New Jersey communities where General George Washington and his men had been “billeted” and which was now wholly owned and governed by wealthy Caucasians.
A sliver of unease pierced Skyler’s heart: new playdates? He would run away from home.
Mummy was trying to speak calmly, “Bix, I realize that Quaker Heights is a few miles closer to Univers headquarters than Fair Hills, but—think of our dear friends here! The wonderful clubs we belong to, our very spe
cial circle of Episcopal friends, how everyone here is aware of Bliss, and proud of her for bringing such renown to the community. And, Bix, you’re so popular! Every hostess in Fair Hills will be heartbroken if Bix Rampike moves away! I have worked so hard, Bix. I have worked like a dog, Bix. You can’t just destroy this again, Bix. You can’t revert me to zero again. And Bliss’s career is ‘going national’—soon!—and will consume even more of my time. You know what a trauma it was for me to move to Fair Hills, Bix. How no one liked me, how ‘existentially isolated’ I was, Dr. Stadtskruller thinks that my migraines are caused partly by ‘unassimilated trauma’ from that move when I’d just had a—a baby.” Mummy squinted at Skyler, and at Bliss, as if to determine which of them had been that troublesome baby. “And Skyler has his school, he’s devoted to! And Bliss has so many friends and well-wishers here! Why can’t we build a new house in Fair Hills, Bix? Lots are for sale in that new development off Woodsmoke Drive where the Frasses have just built a spectacular French Normandy house on at least four acres, and Glenna O’Stryker was telling me—”
Patiently Daddy said, “We can discuss the location another time, darlin’. When we are not so emotional.” A flicker of something like fury came into Daddy’s smiling face and faded almost too quickly to be detected.
Skyler glared at Mummy. Did she want Daddy to leave them again?
Quickly Skyler said, “This house looks really cool, Daddy. Must be a ‘McMansion.’”
But this was a goosh thing to say, Skyler realized. For Daddy laughed sharply and corrected him: “This is not a ‘McMansion,’ son. The architectural firm I have engaged does not commit ‘McMansions.’ This will be a custom-made wholly original split-level ‘Chesterfield contemporary’ not one of those cookie-cutter boxes the size of a Wal-Mart. This is Bix Rampike’s ‘dream house’—Daddy’s gift to his family.”
Mummy said uncertainly, “This is certainly a—a wonderful—surprise—but, Bix—don’t you think that you should have consulted me? I mean—maybe I could have discussed these plans with you, and with the architect?”
“You’ll be ‘discussing’ plenty with the architect, Betsey. And with his assistants, there’s a platoon of assistants at H.H. Stuart. Only just beware: architects bill by the hour. So when one of the team calls you, says ‘hello’ and asks how you are, remember he’s on the clock and if you gab away, you
pay.” Daddy chuckled deep in his throat, but there was a warning edge to his voice.
“And can we afford a house this size, Bix? And so much land, in Quaker Heights? I realize that you are making more money at Univers than you’d been at Scor, but—”
“‘More money’? Darlin’, you have to be kidding.”
“But—why? I thought—”
“Of course I’m making ‘more money’ at Univers, Betsey. Why the hell d’you think I left Scor, where I had a fantastic deal, for a salary cut? The bottom line is, and Skyler needs to hear this, too, for future information, ‘salary’ is just a fraction of corporate income. The deal Bix Rampike has at Univers, I wouldn’t need a salary. It’s the bonuses, stock options, restricted stock and ‘benefits’ that are the big draw, and I mean
B-I-G.
And with tax-deferred investments in a cutting edge field like bio-tech, we are not talking
S-M-A-L-L.
As the youngest member of the Univers executive team, Bix Rampike is, like, the most popular jock in the school, and while I am not claiming to merit such esteem, I intend to fulfill the expectations of my elders, and more. Damn more! ‘My family comes first with me’ is what I made clear when I was being considered for the job, and ‘
Homo homin lupus
’—my father’s wisdom—Greek for: ‘Man is friend to wolf.’ Meaning a man must be ‘man enough’ to acknowledge the wolf-blood in his soul, and to harness it. Harness that blood! And let me tell you, they were impressed. Now look here.” Daddy shuffled about the large, elaborate drawings, that covered sheet after sheet of tissue-fine paper; only on one sheet were actual drawings of a house, and an enormous house it appeared to be, producing in the viewer that frisson of vertigo you feel staring into the labyrinthine drawings of M. C. Escher.
*
As Mummy peered nervously at the house plans, and Bliss stared with a finger stuck in her mouth, and Skyler leaned close beside Daddy to see where Daddy was pointing with his big-Daddy forefinger, Daddy said proudly, “—custom-design seventy-five hundred square feet, six bedrooms plus a ‘guest suite’ with private sauna. And the ‘master suite’—that’s
Mummy and Daddy, kids!—with a private entrance and short-cut corridor to the swimming pool that is indoor/outdoor—state-of-the-art. We are not talking
S-M-A-L-L.
We are not talking
F-R-U-G-A-L.
We are talking ‘Olympian’—‘epic.’ Forty-foot ‘sunken’ living room. Two dining rooms: formal, informal. Plus ‘breakfast nook’ overlooking the terrace. Here’s the family room: our ‘entertainment center.’ State-of-the-art TV, CD and DVD and whatever the hell gets invented in the New Millennium. Next door is the ‘family fitness center’ where Daddy can beef up his pecs and Mummy can sweat out this spongey-crepey stuff”—playfully pinching Mummy’s thigh, as Mummy laughed/winced—“and if Skyler feels the urge to revamp his gymnast leanings, at a more mature age, that would be fantastic. And, not least”—drawing Bliss into a crook of an arm, brushing his lips against the delicate blue vein at Bliss’s temple—“for Daddy’s bestest-best li’l gal: an ice rink.”
An ice rink! Bliss stared, and blinked.
Since returning home, Daddy had been unusually aware of Bliss, as if taking notice of her for the first time. Murmuring now in Bliss’s ear, as if Mummy and Skyler were not present, “It came to me in a brainstorm the other night, sweetie, when I saw my daughter—my daughter!—skating like a demon on TV and being applauded by all those strangers, and winning big: Little Miss Ice Jersey. Had to be like a vision, tears just ran from my eyes, God damn I was so moved. Right away—first thing—I called my architect and left a message to add an ice rink to the Rampike home plan. And so he has done. Looks good, eh?”
Skyler, peering over his sister’s shoulder, feeling his mother close beside him, registered the faintest glimmer of a secret thought passing in an instant between Mummy and Bliss though neither so much as glanced at the other
The rink is too small! Too small for Bliss Rampike! A silly little-kid ice rink, for Bliss Rampike!
Yet after a pause Bliss said in a whisper, “Thank you, Daddy!” and beaming Daddy hugged his little girl and kissed her with a fierce hot Daddy-kiss.
“Thought you’d like it, honey.”
SKYLER WENT AWAY LIMPING, SICK WITH JEALOUSY. AS SKYLER HAD NEVER
—
well, rarely—been jealous of his little sister before.
Afterward thinking calmly
Because of Bliss he will stay with us longer. He will love us all more.
“SMILE PLEASE.”
Smile smile smile
please.
En famille
the Rampikes are being photographed seated on a sofa in front of their ten-foot gorgeously decorated Christmas tree: Daddy, Mummy, Bliss, and Skyler. It is Christmas 1996 and it will be the Rampikes’ final family Christmas photo, to be used on their Christmas card as on promotional materials distributed by Bliss Rampike, Inc. Except that this photo of my family is the one replicated
ad nauseam
, like certain video clips of Bliss Rampike skating, being crowned a winner, smiling into dazzling lights with that sweet little-girl smile to break the heart, the most “downloaded” of all Rampike family photographs, you can bet that I would avoid it altogether, for the miserable memory of this photo session, stretching beyond ninety minutes, and endured by poor Skyler in itchy trousers and Fair Hills blazer, sappy clip-on school tie, is as pleasant to recall as an attack of diarrhea. (Yes, which Skyler suffered from, too, after such stressful sessions as the photo-shoot, but never mind.)
This is the photograph in which both Rampike parents have managed to clasp little blond Bliss in the crooks of their arms, like awkwardly conjoined Siamese twins with a large stiff doll-child wedged between; with seeming casualness, Daddy has cupped his big left hand beneath Bliss’s small right foot in her gleaming-black patent leather shoe.
Gravely it has been noted that all photographs are posthumous.
*
Gravely it has been noted that we who have been photographed will be outlived one day by our “photograph-selves.”
The special horror of this 1996 Christmas photo of my family is that it is the final Christmas photo and that
no one of us could have guessed it at the time.
Even scowling Skyler at the edge of the cozy family unit could not have guessed. Fidgety little brat clasped and grasped by neither parent. And now a decade later recalling with—is it nostalgia?
*
—that most asinine of emotions!—the wonderful smell of the pine needles, the beauty of the freshly cut tree and the exciting ritual (yes it was exciting, and yes sulky Skyler did participate) of trimming the tree; how, as the photographer and his assistant were preparing for the shoot there came Mummy looking very glamorous but anxious as well, hairbrush in hand to run through Skyler’s matted hair, deftly Mummy’s fingers adjusted the crooked clip-on tie and Mummy stooped to peer into Skyler’s evasive eyes and out of earshot of the others pleaded, “Skyler, please darling for Mummy’s sake try not to twitch and make those awful faces! Try to look happy for Mummy’s sake, though Bliss is the family ‘star’ remember always, Mummy loves you best, for Mummy loved her little man first; this is our happiest Christmas yet for Daddy is back with us and we want the world to see how proud we are of Bliss and what an exacting trainer, she wasn’t scheduled to skate again, in public, in competition, until the Hershey’s Kisses Girls’ Ice-Skating Festival on January 11, 1997, in Hershey, Pennsylvania. For in America this season is decreed
family season.
(Eat your hearts out, you pitiable loners who don’t have families! Melancholy as Thanksgiving is, the Christmas–New Year’s season is far worse and lasts far longer, providing a rich fund of opportunities for self-medicating, mental collapse, suicide and public mayhem with firearms. In fact it might be argued that the Christmas–New Year’s season which begins abruptly after Thanksgiving is now the core-season of American life itself, the meaning of American life, the brute existential point of it. How you without families must envy us who bask in parental love, in the glow of yule-logs burning in fireplaces stoked by our daddies’ robust pokers, we who are stuffed to bursting with our mummies’ frantic holiday cooking; how you wish you could be us, pampered/protected kids tearing expensive foil wrappings off too many packages to count, gathered about the Christmas tree on Christmas morning as Mummy gently chided: “Skyler! Bliss! Show Daddy
and Mummy what you’ve just opened, please! And save the little cards, so you know who gave such nice things to you.”)