The Late, Lamented Molly Marx (44 page)
A late arrival, a tall, well-upholstered woman with a plump, unlined face and one white streak in her dark hair, slides into the row behind Annabel. She leans forward to kiss her cheeks and hold her close. Annabel surrenders herself to the embrace and snuggles next to this mother bear. “Aunt Moosey, you got here,” she says.
“We’re all here now,” Lucy answers. We are.
That includes a young, smiling rabbi who’s traveled in a red convertible from Edinburgh. A sunbeam bounces off the brocade of his silky square black yarmulke as he offers a
shalom
and calls Barry to pray over sacramental wine. Barry, who has traveled here without
Stephanie, walks a bit stiffly—last month he had his knees replaced, the price for all that running on unforgiving pavement—but he smiles broadly and is the image of his father’s pictures. He is one of those rare men improved by his shaved head. Barry raises the family kiddush cup brought from New York, his surgeon’s hands still steady around the silvery stem, entwined with grapevines and memories. I hear the Hebrew words, chanted in his strong, sure voice, and wonder what he is thinking.
I realize I no longer care or need to know. He belongs to another woman now.
The minister calls Annabel and Ewan, who places his hand on his wife’s slender back and they walk slowly and carefully, she cradling their sleeping child. The two of them reach the front and kiss. Ewan flicks away a tear from Annabel’s eyes. I have nestled within her, and this touch returns my powers with a jolt. The emotion Annabel feels is crazy glee dusted with the slight despair she always tries to chase away when she wishes I were present. Today, I am.
God, if you’re in this room, make her know that
.
“Will the godmother please come forward?” the minister asks.
Salagadoola, mechicka boola, bibbidi-bobbidi-boo
. We have a godmother. She walks to the front. For this occasion, the proud great-aunt is wearing sensible shoes and flowing sapphire blue clothing. With her white streak and her husband’s ring on her finger, she is, finally, Lucy in the sky with diamonds. She stands next to Barry and yes, there is an embrace—nothing showy, but a real, albeit short, connection.
“This child,” the minister asks, “does she have a name?”
“She does,” Ewan answers. He smiles at Annabel. “Her name will be Molly,” he says. “Molly Divine.”
Perhaps God is in the building.
“Molly Divine Campbell,” the rabbi says to the sleeping baby. “For whom are you named, my wee
bubbelah?
”
“For my mother,” Annabel says.
Long gone
, she thinks,
but in my heart, never forgotten
.
“For my sister,” Lucy says. “And if my sister is in this room, I hope she won’t mind if I read a poem she wrote when she was a girl.”
Will Lucy never cease to embarrass me? We’ll see about that.
“‘Strip from me the dove velvet mantle,’” Lucy begins.
Let the bay-pale corn silk glaze my shoulders
As I sing a duet with God
.
Before it all, I did believe in God.
The rivers echo choruses
The stars, a silver descant
,
Pebbles garnish the sanctified mud
The shells, the snails, the shadows of the starfish
.
Amid the crescendo, a plant grows
Chanting the liturgy of roots veining the loam
Beginning to learn of toadstools and Russian olive trees
.
Where did Lucy find this? Was I ever really a moony sixteen, waiting for my life to happen? Lucy’s eyes pierce me and press me to the stone wall.
My last dream lingers
Now I wait only for spring’s kiss
Go now. Let me fall in love
.
My sister removes her reading glasses, puts down the poem, and looks at Annabel and then her grandniece. “That’s what I wish for little Molly,” she says. “That she will fall in love.”
Amen. Let her fall in love, young and for forever, the way it seems that her mother has.
In deference to the mingling of two faiths, there will be no sprinkling of water on the baby’s head, though if Jesus were present, I’m sure he would be welcomed. He and I still have yet to meet, but others in the Duration, believers, have sightings all the time.
“The godfather? Will he come forward?” the minister asks.
He does, tall as ever, his eyes more deeply sunken than when they looked into mine. He has watched over Annabel all her life, cultivating the role of the witty, wandering uncle with the good stories and the good presents. He is a man who reveals little, a man nobody knows.
I’d always hoped Lucy and Luke might wind up together, but that was my naiveté on overdrive. Once, when both of them drank far too
much, they had an evening of unabridged, ill-considered passion, but afterward each admitted they felt my presence in the bed—even though I absolutely was not. Lucy and Luke sprang back to friendship before its statute of limitations expired. They stay in touch, largely through postcards annotated with cryptic messages. Lucy married many years ago. Her husband is a sculptor of some note and secretly jealous of the mystery his wife and Luke Delaney share, but this husband is not so envious that he would stop transforming Lucy into breathtaking art. My sister was born to be molded in clay, chiseled in marble, cast in bronze. Every piece he crafts shows her enduring strength and determination.
And Luke? Is he happy? I look at him and know. Not yet.
“Annabel has asked me to read a poem she has always recited on the anniversary of her mother’s death. Molly Marx,” he says, “was my dearest friend.”
There’s no way Annabel could read this poem herself and keep a dry eye
, he thinks, and wonders if he can. Annabel smiles, urges him to begin, and Luke and I both see my smile in hers.
“We are loved by an unending love.” I know this poem, written by a rabbi.
We are embraced by arms that find us
.
ven when we are hidden from ourselves
We are touched by fingers that soothe us
.
Luke breathes these words in a half whisper. As if he himself is hiding, he wears a soft, trimmed beard, a charcoal smudge on his craggy face, which is beginning to settle into the softness of sixty, which will be his next birthday. He speaks the poem from memory.
Even when we are too proud for soothing
.
We are counseled by voices that guide us
.
Even when we are too embittered to hear
.
We are loved by an unending love
.
Little Molly begins to stir. My daughter pushes back the bonnet to admire her baby’s face. She lifts the child so that Ewan can stroke her strands of pale blond hair. There are quiet words between them on
which I do not want to intrude, and I have no need to, because seeing Molly and Annabel is all I want.
Annabel, Ewan, and Molly walk down the middle aisle and through the opened doors, outside, where moss connects the old stones the way we connect with one another, our histories mingled. They chat with my mother and her husband, their friends, with Barry, with Hicks and Brie, with Lucy, with Luke, these people I have loved, brought together once again by, as Nana Phyllis would say, such a
simcha
.
Suddenly, Annabel puts her hand on Ewan’s arm and stops. She and Molly turn toward where my essence lingers, alone, back by the chapel, peeking out from beside an ancient oak. She is struggling to see someone. She smiles my smile. Molly opens her sleepy eyelids, delicate as butterflies. All our eyes meet, and love joins us as surely as if it were a live current. I know Annabel knows, and it is enough. It is everything.
Then Annabel blinks and returns to her life.
I, the late, lamented Molly Marx, take one last, long look. I am done. Complete. I am rested now. I can return to the Duration, for whatever is to come.
Can they feel it? I do not know.
Lucky me. I have had the privilege of working with a superb editor, Laura Ford, publishing’s rising star. I thank her along with Ballantine’s outstanding team, especially Susan Corcoran, Libby McGuire, Gina Centrello, Kim Hovey, Christine Cabello, Katie O’Callaghan, Alexandra Rudd, Rachel Kind, Rachel Bernstein, and Brian McLendon. Steve Messina, I am grateful to you and your colleague Sue Warga for the careful copyedit. Mary Wirth, Robbin Schiff, and Susan Turner, I applaud your choices for design.
Much gratitude to Christy Fletcher and Melissa Chinchilla of Fletcher & Parry for their energy and enthusiasm, as well as Howard Saunders and Shana Eddy of United Talent Agency, whose confidence and creativity I value tremendously. A loud shout-out, too, to fellow novelist Elizabeth Ziemska, whose early, rousing reaction kept me going.
Our Monday night writing workshop has been my steady pulse these last few years. Thank you, Charles Salzberg, for your leadership, structural brilliance, and deadlines, a writer’s most essential tool. Without them I’d still be staring at my computer in pajamas. I am indebted to Vivian Conan, Patricia Crevits, Sharon Gurwitz, Sally Hoskins, Paul Hundt, Marilyn Goldstein, Judy Gorfein, Erica Keirstadt, Margaret Kennedy, Patty Nasey, Leslie Nipkow, and Betty Wald. Your laughter and generous ideas are the Super Glue that keeps me together. Rabbi Rami Shapiro, thank you as well for your inspiring poetry.
My family is my loving infrastructure. Robert, Jed, and Rory, I adore you and am immensely grateful for your sharp wit and tender support. Betsy and Vicki, sisters both, thanks for taking the time to read rough drafts. Last of all, I am beholden to my parents, Fritzie and Sam Platkin. I’d like to think they are in the Duration, smiling.
A Conversation Between Molly Marx and Sally Koslow
Molly Marx:
Since you’re the author of
The Late, Lamented Molly Marx
, I thought it was high time for a conversation. Greetings, Sally Koslow, book-lady.
Sally Koslow:
Molly, it’s lovely to meet. Please allow me to say I’m sorry for your loss. I hope you don’t mind that instead of a condolence note, I wrote you a novel.
MM:
I’m flattered, but puzzled. Most authors write about the living. Where did you get the idea for my book? If you don’t mind me saying so, the concept’s kind of creepy.
SK:
I was attending the funeral of a neighbor and from what I knew of her, her eulogies didn’t add up. I began to wonder what the woman in the coffin might be thinking about these tributes. Would she be happy? Sad? Cynical? Shocked that hundreds of people turned out to say adios, given that she was a recluse? Whoops—I meant “very private person.” This led to my ruminating on how it’s a fundamental fantasy to be curious about who might attend our funeral and what would be said, both publicly and privately. I meant no disrespect to the deceased, but before I walked out of the service I knew I wanted to write a novel that flowered from this conceit.
MM:
Readers say this book is funny. “Witty” gets tossed about in reviews from bloggers and on Amazon.com, and
Publishers Weekly
notes the novel’s “hearty dose of hilarity.” But let’s face it, Sally, you are not a funny person.
SK:
Fair enough, though I’d like to point out that the epitaph my fellow high school creative writing students wrote for me was “slit her throat with her own tongue.” Or was it “pen?” Still, Polite Sally doesn’t feel she should repeat every rogue observation that flits across her brain. Fiction is different. Even your snarkiest thoughts—
especially
your snarkiest thoughts—have a chance of being pinned onto the page. Between us, I love that the book makes some people chuckle.
MM:
Why a mystery, when your first novel,
Little Pink Slips
, wasn’t in that genre?
SK:
Your story had to be a mystery because when I started writing it I didn’t know how you died. As the novel unfolded you and I discovered the truth together. I like to create characters who slowly reveal themselves.
MM:
No anal-retentive plot outline? No stickies wallpapering your office? I’m disappointed.
SK:
Sorry, but I simply try to tune in to my imagination and let it lead the way. It helps to take myself for a run and wait for ideas to bubble up.
MM:
You mean you’re not a bike rider, like me?
SK:
You’re much braver than I am. City traffic scares the sunscreen right off me. I rode my bike once on that path by the Hudson River where you lost your life and I was terrified—it was so close to the water! No barriers! Someone could drown there!
MM:
You’re telling me the two of us are quite different.
SK:
Not at all. I put a lot of me in you, Molly.
MM:
Those flaws of mine you listed at the beginning—they’re your flaws, too?
SK:
Yes, except that I’d rather cook than buy takeout, and I subscribe to
The New Yorker
, not celebrity magazines—those I read at the manicurists’. I’m also diligent about removing my makeup before bed and always laugh at my husband’s jokes. He cracks me up.
MM:
Here’s another way that we’re different. You don’t have a daughter, and my Annabel is—
was
(the hardest part of no longer being alive is remembering to use the past tense)—the closest thing to my heart. How could you possibly know what being the mother of a daughter feels like?
SK:
It’s true that I have two sons, Jed and Rory, and no daughters, but I was inspired by my six young, adorable nieces: Amaya, Ella, Ivy-Reese, Lily, Siena, and Zoe.
MM:
That letter I left for Annabel, where I listed my rules for life—are they your rules, too?
SK:
Many are rules I wish I adhered to, like printing out my pictures and putting them in an album, which, sad to say, I never do.
MM:
Given what we have in common, I gather it wasn’t hard for you to write me. Which character was the hardest to write?
SK:
Barry. He’s complicated and I wanted to do him justice. Despite his philandering, narcissism, and insensitivity, he could be charming and he tried to atone for his sins. He’s also a devoted son and a good father, even before he rose to the challenge of being a single parent. And while he didn’t do well by you, Molly, I believe he loved you. Marriage—never easy, right?
MM:
No kidding. Neither was having a sister like Lucy. Do you have a sister and was she the model for Lucy?
SK:
I have a sister, but she’s not much like Lucy. She got married when she was in college, has two kids, is of average height, and hates to run, although, like Lucy, she prefers practical clothes.
MM:
That reminds me. I wouldn’t call
The Late, Lamented Molly Marx
, chick-lit—parts of it were sad, heartfelt, and almost philosophical—but what’s with all the clothes?
SK:
I love clothes. I used to be an editor at a magazine, and got dressed up every day for work. Yes, Molly, one used to dress up for work, especially when he or she was an editor-in-chief, which I was for more than a decade. Now most of the time my stilettos and leopard-print coat hibernate while I’m working at home in running shorts, yoga pants, jeans, or pajama bottoms. I brought clothes into your story not only because you can tell a lot about a person by their clothes, but because I miss getting dressed up.
MM:
The German translation of my book,
Ich, Molly Marx, Kurlich Verstorben
, was a bestseller. Why do you think that German readers like my story?
SK:
A friend of a friend, a German professor, thought it might have to do with curiosity about contemporary Jewish culture, especially the customs of somewhat assimilated Jews in New York City, which play a role in the book.
MM:
Kitty would love to hear that. She’d take all the credit. Now, why all the poetry?
SK:
I assume you mean the poetry at the funeral in Scotland, as well as the lines from “Hiawatha,” when Hicks visits Chicago? When I was starting to write your book, I heard the poem “An Unending Love” and found it exquisite. Its author, Rabbi Rami Shapiro, gave me permission to include it in the book. The other poem at the Scottish funeral was something I wrote in high school. Good thing I saved our literary magazine,
Of Toadstools and Russian Olive Trees
. Its name was selected by our teacher from one of my own poems. I’ve been writing since I was a teenager.
MM:
Whoa—you had me at Hicks. Love that name. How did you think it up?
SK:
I didn’t. It’s real. I was visiting the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C., and this extraordinary name leaped out at me. To honor Hiawatha Hicks, SP4, who died in 1968, I decided to borrow his name. I’d like to think you’ll meet him in the Duration.
MM:
Me, too. And speaking of the Duration, those of us here thought it was our big secret. Who told you about it?
SK:
Sorry, but if I tell you I’m dead. No offense.
MM:
What do you want your readers to take away from this book?
SK:
If readers are simply entertained, I will be delighted. But I also hope that
The Late, Lamented Molly Marx
, will cause readers to reflect on the brevity and inscrutability of life and the complexity of human relationships. Perhaps it will foster a carpe diem attitude. I do think we all should try to pack in as much as we can, and never take life for granted.
MM:
What’s your next book about?
SK:
I’m fascinated by women’s friendships, especially when they don’t run a smooth course.
With Friends Like These
explores four women whose friendships get messy. Think of it as
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
meets the
Avenue Q
song “Schadenfreude,” which means happiness taken from the misfortune of others. Readers may see themselves and their friends in one or more characters.
MM:
My epitaph was plain vanilla—Barry picked it. What would you like yours to say?
SK:
“Just let me read one more page.”
MM:
We’ve got to stop now, or I’ll be late for the master class on the Moonwalk that I’m taking with Michael Jackson. The Duration has its perks! Thanks for the chat, Sally. I hope we’ll meet again.
SK:
Me, too, Molly. But not for a long, long time.