All the Lasting Things (18 page)

He returned indoors with the sound of it. Max heard it playing, there, beneath all the other sounds. Beneath the cold that bit fiercely into his being and, even with a fire in the grate, refused to let go. Beneath the glee of the game going on around him. Despite the dizzying excitements and perpetual disappointments of the night. A song. A shred of song he’d needed the cold and the quiet to latch on to. Now he held it by a thread. He clung to it like a child holding a balloon in a strong wind. It threatened to whip away from him, irretrievable, at any second. Crawling back onto the couch with the smell of the night on him, he sank drunkenly into Navi’s warm arms and threw his legs over Benji’s lap. He hummed.

They chastised him, trying to rub a little warmth into his bones, as they ran their last lap through a game of Celebrity. Paul, straining to act out a famous actor without benefit of words, gave his clues with imperious speed. On his knees, he touched a finger to his heart then held it in the air.

“ET!” Benji shouted.

Paul’s encouraging nod quickly gave way to more clues. He jumped to his feet, pointing at the fireplace.

“Fireplace.”

“ET in the fireplace?”

Paul shook his head vehemently. He mimed lighting a fire.

“Matches.”

“People!” Paul clapped his hands, no nonsense. “How are matches a celebrity?!”

“No talking!” came the unanimous response.

“Start a fire.”

Nodding, nodding, reeling in the answer as if it were a large fish, Paul practically jumped into Benji’s lap.

“‘We Didn’t Start the Fire.’ Billy Joel!”

“
Firestarter
,” Claudia offered from the doorway. “Drew Barrymore.”

“Praise Jesus!” Paul said as he plopped down, a show of utter exhaustion, into a chair.

Max closed his eyes. He had the sense that they were allied against passing time, against an evening that, no matter how they drank or sang or struggled to resist, was coming to its close. His moment with Claudia had come and gone. There would be others, there might be others, but this one he felt drifting inexorably away. He kept his eyes shut and listened to the party breaking up around him, the preludes to bedtime, Benji saying, “Does everyone know where they’re sleeping?” and “Fuck the mess. Leave it for tomorrow.” They’d created a refuge of food and drink and friends and (Max said the word to himself)
family
, who were, even with their shortcomings, even though he barely knew them, unaccountably dear. He didn’t want it to end. But it would. It was. He wanted more. More of his family. Yes, even more of Claudia, who had yet to convince him that she was anything more than (as Amanda Davis might say) a “royal pain in the hind end.” And yet. There was something he wanted more, something that would only come to him once the others had gone. He heard his tune playing beneath the racket, those few precious notes that rose above the general din and announced themselves to his ears.

Max turned sleepily on his side, snuggling into the couch as Navi stood and tried to pull him to standing.

“You can’t sleep here,” Arnav said with a note of parental reproof.

If only Max could hold on to that delicate thread of sound, that shadow of a song that made a stitch under all the other noise.

Benji squeezed Max’s foot. Then, seeing no movement, convincing Arnav to let him be, threw a blanket over him.

Max’s mind moved heavily, slow with liquor, but suddenly there, with the music, was this:

With her foot on the threshold she waited a moment longer in a scene which was vanishing even as she looked, and then
—something, something—
it changed, it shaped itself differently; it had become, she knew, giving one last look at it over her shoulder, already the past.

To the Lighthouse.
Cat had given a copy to Benji when Benji was in the hospital, and Benji in turn had given it to Max. A book about an artist finding her vision, Benji explained, for an artist about to find his vision. Max had read it twice, devoured it on the plane ride home, committed passages to memory, so the words he wanted now, the sweet and pitiful lament of Mrs. Ramsay as her own party came to an end, came readily to hand.

His family moved around him, clicking off lamps, gathering bags from the front hall, the loud, communal march up the stairs. Max didn’t move, trying to make out the sound that played below the roiling surface of their laughter. He lay as still as he could, trying to hear it. A few scattered notes. At first, he thought he recognized it as something they had sung earlier that evening, a snippet of Paul’s tribute to Billie Holiday twisted into another shape, but the closer he listened, the more certain he was that the notes were new. The notes were his. He didn’t know them. He wasn’t hearing them again. They’d scattered through his mind like startled birds as he crunched over the frosted grass and now, finally—thanks to Cat’s passing observation, thanks to his memory of Mrs. Ramsay bidding the night good night—they shaped themselves into a formation that sang out to him as it moved across the blank calm of the room. The phrase came to him for the first time, yet it was instantly familiar. It repeated itself. It formed like a silver-crested wave, swelling, swelling, before it folded in on itself and shattered, as on rocks, into silence. It was water moving against the shore. He kept his eyes closed and played the notes again. They were louder, more confident, drowning out the sound of footsteps overhead, over Benji’s stage-whispered promise to see them all in the morning, over Claudia (still in the room) softly saying his name. Here, at last, she was. Too late. At least for the night, too late. He pretended she wasn’t there.

“Max,” she said, approaching, closer, closer, until he could smell the toothpaste on her breath. She touched his arm with the lightest touch. “Max?”

The wave crashed and ended, not with silence this time, but with another sequence. The sound twisted and surged and leapt. Before him, Max saw a light switch on in the darkness, a lighthouse whose beam illuminated a boy cutting images from an illustrated magazine. It was James. The notes were James, springing sprightly, the bounding leap he would make if only he could get to the lighthouse. If only the weather were fine. If only—and here the theme was interrupted by a dark, heavy throb of Mr. Ramsay’s oppressive paternal shadow passing by.

Max heard the opening pages of the book. He was rewriting the opening pages of the book, translating them into the language of percussion and woodwinds and strings. He had to get up. He had to write it down. He had to be still so Claudia wouldn’t disturb him, because Claudia would be there tomorrow and the music, perhaps, would not. He felt the blanket being tucked more tightly around his chin, the sound of her giving up and slowly climbing the stairs. He ordered his body off the couch. He had to write this down. How would he remember if he didn’t write it down? But his muscles stayed beyond him. He called to her then, to Claudia, to Navi, but no voice came.
I have to write it down,
he cried as the song sank back into nothing. The silence of the house deafened him. He listened for the music’s return.
I have to begin.

The Sibyl at Cumae
for Henry

I said yes

to it and now it spites me.

Life! One year for every crumb

of sand on the beach. You

show me how to build castles

so I can spend the ages sweeping them out.

My cake is marble, shawled

with cobwebs, candlelit like a nebula.

Not even your song can make me eat it.

The knifepoints of flame, hammered long

by the owled night, are enough

to dress and dry a rack of meat.

I will never be young again.

I don’t think I ever was.

Melt the silicate and wrap it round my husk.

I will fit. I grow smaller every year. I

belong on the shelf next to the lilac seeds,

a hull to rattle, a voice in a jar.

10.

From: Claudia Fisher

Sent: November 24, 2012

To: Max Davis

Subject:

Dear Max:

Nothing I’ve said to you seems the right thing to say. Maybe there is no right thing. Or maybe there is, and here, hiding behind a computer screen, is the only way I can say it. I’ve started this message a hundred times and each time I delete it, thinking of another place to start. Maybe if I start here I’ll find the way. But this is me starting over, and look where I am.

My only words to you cannot be I’m sorry. I’m sorry is another wall to hide behind, and I’ve hidden enough in my life. When it comes to you and me, I did what I did because I thought it was right. I still think it was right. No matter how much hurt it caused. No matter how much of a mess I’ve made, I can see worse pain, a bigger mess with such clarity that my heart skips.

I’ve failed people I care about. You most of all. And yes, I do care. And yes, I could have failed you more. You tell me that you would have taken your chances. I won’t pretend to know your life with the Davises, but I look at you and do not see their fuckups, to borrow your phrase. You are a caring young man with a loving heart. You impress me deeply. There is your talent, but that is what the world sees. That’s not what I’m talking about. Your arms have been open so wide to me when I know I do not deserve it.

Part of me wishes you were more angry. I might know what to do with that. But your love? Love, sometimes, is the hardest to handle. It can bend us with its weight. I see giving you up through my mother’s eyes, and I have a hard time seeing my love in it. Even the words, her words: “giving you up.” In my mind, that’s not what I did. In my mind, I was protecting you. Safeguarding you. Loving you. And not only you, if I’m being honest, but me and Nick too. None of which makes me a hero. None of which, I hope, makes me a villain either. Do I regret? Yes. Somehow knowing that I did the right thing and feeling regret do not cancel each other out. Does any of this make sense? I feel like I’ve said nothing using all these words. They are a struggle to send.

Claudia

From: Max Davis

Sent: November 24, 2012

To: Claudia Fisher

Subject: Re:

Claudia—

I’m the age you were when you had me. If I had a kid today, what kind of parent would I be? Not a very good one, I guess. Navi & I talk about kids, but my dreams don’t have a baby in them, not yet, just like your dreams didn’t have a baby in them. Why would I blame you for that? I can’t say why did you choose your work over me when work is all I know. I try to understand. Maybe that’s why I’m not more angry. But I am angry. But I spent so much of my life feeling that way about everything—you & Amanda & being ground down by music when music was the one thing I could count on to lift me up. Anger isn’t what I want anymore. Plus, it’s harder to be angry when you understand. The more you look at a person, the more you understand them. Maybe I should be more understanding with my parents. What did they ever do to me that was so wrong? You said you were sure they did the best they could. Just like you did the best you could. But isn’t that what everybody says? Except the ones putting cigarettes out on their kids’ arms, but even they probably say they’re doing the best they can, which only means that most people’s best isn’t good enough. I’m not talking about you or Amanda specifically. I’m just saying. Do you know Philip Larkin? He’s a poet my boyfriend before Arnav introduced me to & he has this poem about how your parents fuck you up without even trying. Like it’s a contract or something you sign when you have a baby, saying you’re cool with basically wrecking another human being for life. I guess that’s what therapy’s for. Lol. Therapy & drugs & not the fun kind but the ones that screw with your mind until you can’t think straight. Sounds like I’m screwed either way. But I’m glad to hear that’s not the impression I make. I try to be a good person.

Max

From: Claudia Fisher

Sent: November 27, 2012

To: Max Davis

Subject: Re: Re:

Max:

Being a good person isn’t easy. There are days it feels like a twenty-four-hour job. I wonder if work gets in the way of that. Of being good. For me. I think of Frank Lloyd Wright and Corbusier and Philip Johnson. Two philanderers. One Nazi sympathizer. Not the finest men you’d ever meet, but then you look at the work. Johnson atoned for his anti-Semitism, but even if he hadn’t, who would remember it in the shadow of his Glass House, the Kunsthalle Bielefeld? They will stand longer than his stupidity. Not that adultery and bad politics are the province of men. Women, too, make terrible mistakes, but it’s different for women. Men can have it all. Work. Love. Family. Or, if they can’t, we forgive them the sins they commit while trying. The man can be flawed so long as the work is good. But women, we still expect to choose.

I sound like I’m getting ready to teach a gender studies seminar. When what I want to say is that I don’t doubt your goodness. You have been kind and incredibly patient. And then there’s
your
work. I have to trust what others say as I’m a complete idiot when it comes to music. Oliver has been tutoring me, though. Last night we listened to your recording of Philip Glass. Oliver says you capture the lyricism of Rostropovich. I wish I knew what he meant. Give me time. I’m a quick learner.

Claudia

P.S. I’m not comparing my work to Wright et al. So you know.

From: Max Davis

Sent: November 28, 2012

To: Claudia Fisher

Subject: Do you think . . .

. . . leaving our Subject lines blank means we have nothing to say?

It’s officially been a week—8 days actually—since we met. Happy anniversary! Do you think it’s odd that we had so little to say in person, but here we are talking like this on e-mail? Do you find it easier that way? I’m not complaining. I think I find it easier too. I’m not a huge fan of the phone. I hardly ever call people because I’m afraid I’m disturbing them & I NEVER leave voice mails because I hate the way my voice sounds. I’m text & e-mail all the way. I guess there are some relationships that work better when there’s some sort of distance built into them. Speaking of work . . . I’ve been writing. Like a madman actually. I have this idea for an opera & now that I’ve started, my pen is moving faster than my mind. I’m having trouble keeping up. I feel like I’m coming out of a fog & I’m finally able to do the work I want to do. Amanda told me that I’d miss playing within a week of giving it up. Wrong. She says I’m turning my back on the audience that’s been so good to me. I don’t think I’m doing that, but I don’t want to die knowing that all I did in life was play other people’s music. I hate the idea of performing these days & recording is even worse. At least performances are honest. It’s me, on stage, giving everything I’ve got. If I’m great, I’m grateful. If I suck, I’m happy I didn’t buy a ticket. Lol. Playing is a moment between me & the conductor & the audience, you know? We come together to create this thing, something that’s as alive as we are for the time it takes to make it & if I’ve done my job, the music doesn’t die when the performance is over. It’s gone. Like the moment, it can never come back, but it lives on in the people who heard it take shape. Without them, it’s not music. It’s practice. So they carry it with them as much as I carry it with me. It’s funny you mention Rostropovich because he visited me when I was 12 & played for me in my dining room—like, who the fuck am I?!?—& that moment shaped the way I hear Bach’s fourth suite. Forever. (Though tell Oliver I’m not him. I’m me!) Recording is a whole other story. When you’re a musician, most people think that’s your legacy, the record of your greatest achievements, but nope, I don’t agree. You’re in a studio for days on end, doing take after take after take, until a sound engineer steps in & stitches it all together like this quilt of the best parts & leaves you with a masterpiece you never actually played. It’s a lie. If I’m going to be known, I’d rather have it be for the music I write than for the music I only sort of played.

M.

P.S. You’re right not to compare yourself to FLW & company. Not because your work isn’t as good, which I think is what you meant, but because your work is yours. Think Beethoven when he said, “There are & will be a thousand princes, but there is only one Beethoven.”

From: Claudia Fisher

Sent: December 1, 2012

To: Max Davis

Subject: Something to say

M:

Happy anniversary to you too! May there be many more. And no, not always at such a distance.

I’m happy to hear work is going so well. What is the opera about? I know from my father that writing can feel a bit like making a soufflé, and though it’s a different type of writing I imagine the same must hold true: the more noise you make about it, the more likely it is to fall.

I’ve been a bit buried myself. The end of the semester approaches and I’m readying to grade 30 papers about eco-responsible architecture. I just finalized the designs for a space I’ve been working on, and I’ve started sketches for Nick’s site at Compton’s Mound, which he tells me he took you to see. When is the next time you’ll be in Alluvia? I know that Benji and my mother love your visits. I’m not sure when I’ll be back. I’ve already been home more this year than in the previous two combined. Not under the best circumstances. I miss my father. I miss my mother, too, though she’d never believe I told you so. My father’s illness has ruined him, but it’s also ruined her in many ways. I don’t think that had to be the case. If only she cared for herself as much as she cared for him.

It’s odd that I still refer to my parents’ house as “home” when I’ve lived away from them longer than I lived with them. Oliver and I rotate the holidays with our families, and this year we spend Christmas with his parents in Vermont. They have a lovely place in the mountains outside of Burlington, though whenever I stay anyplace more rural than 14th Street my fantasies about ax murderers kick in. I’ll leave you, for now, with that.

C.

P.S. I wasn’t exactly putting myself down by putting myself in the same sentence as FLW. I’m proud of my work. Though doesn’t every artist compare herself to those who precede her? That seems inevitable. Besides, I don’t feel bad that I’m not FLW or Eileen Gray or whoever. Benji is more the one who fears that History is going to sweep him under the rug. Not me so much. I understand his hunger for recognition. But I’ve never wanted it in the same way.

From: Max Davis

Sent: December 3, 2012

To: Claudia Fisher

Subject: Soufflé’s in the oven

C—

Do you think it’s odd how often I’ve been back to Alluvia since September? My mom thinks it’s way too much. I know this because she & I have started talking again. I feel like we’re hashing out the Treaty of Versailles, taking it slow, but she’s trying. Who knows? I’ve spent most of the fall with Navi in Dallas, but when I get homesick—or just sick of him, lol—I seem to end up with your family. My family, too, I guess I should say. I wish I’d known your dad before he got sick. Most of the time he thinks I’m Benji, which I don’t mind but I think Benji does. Evelyn offers me the big bedroom on the third floor, but I prefer to stay in Henry’s study & even with all the stuff that’s happening with your dad, it feels peaceful to me there. I get a glimpse of him. For whatever reason, I work better there than anywhere else, which makes me think maybe he left the place charmed. Then there’s Nick. He’s so sweet & available. He offers to fly me up pretty much every weekend like I’m in college & have no money, but he always wants to do these father/son things that I’m not sure actual fathers & sons do—fishing, football. Last time he asked if I wanted a PlayStation. It’s like he has this checklist that we’re working our way through. He even mentioned camping—talk about ax murderers!—but don’t say anything. I’m not sure he’d know I’m joking. Can I ask you something? What’s the deal with you two? You can tell me to mind my own business. Navi’s always telling me how nosy I am. He says if I didn’t stick my nose in other people’s shit, I’d have nothing to smell. Except he doesn’t say shit, because he’s Navi.

M.

From: Max Davis

Sent: December 9, 2012

To: Claudia Fisher

Subject: Did I offend?

Claudia:

Haven’t heard from you in a while, so I wanted to check in. I know you’re super busy, so don’t feel like you have to write back, but I’m afraid I may have pissed you off with my last message. Forget I asked about you & Nick. It really is none of my business.

Still your friend,

Max

From: Claudia Fisher

Sent: December 10, 2012

To: Max Davis

Subject: Honeybear:

A brief story: my father, as I’m guessing you’ve gathered from what Benji has told you, could be—let’s say—cantankerous. Not all the time. But he
was
a man used to having his way, and he didn’t like more people than he did because he thought most of them were silly and inconsequential and getting in the way. Those are his words, and it’s always astounded me that a man who wrote with such understanding would ever think of anyone as inconsequential. In other words, it was difficult to imagine him calling anyone “honeybear.” But once in a while, when he was feeling tender (or maybe when he was simply tired and his defenses were down) you’d hear him come out with it. I got a C in algebra. Benji fell off his bike. Actually, I think he said it more often to Benji, though Benji would never admit to that. It adds too much shading to the stick monster he’s made Daddy out to be. But that’s a story for another day. I tell you all of this to say that I am my father’s daughter and that the word “honeybear” comes no easier to me than it did to him. I think I’ve said it one time, to Oliver, maybe, after he stubbed his toe. So know that you didn’t piss me off. I have, in fact, been busy. (And I’m only halfway through those exams!) But that’s no excuse to go MIA. I’ll do better.