Do They Wear High Heels in Heaven? (11 page)

Lily

H
ow can you possibly cram a lifetime of lessons, everything you want your kids to know, into months, days or even a couple of years?

Justin, Tara’s boyfriend, is pretty much everything you’d want in your daughter’s first boyfriend. He is polite. He shakes Michael’s hand when he comes over. He gives me a hug now, as we’ve all grown closer. He wears a single little earring, a tiny gold hoop that if my high school boyfriend wore, my father would have beaten him up on the front lawn. Of course, no one ever said my dad was a very good parent, so I think the earring is just fine. A nose ring might have given me a jolt, but Justin is an A student, bound for college, and he wants to be a physical therapist and specialize in sports medicine. His dream job would be to work for the New York Yankees. Michael would let Tara marry him. Tomorrow. If Justin eventually gets a job with the New York Yankees, Michael will kick in a sizable dowry.

When I first lost my hair, Justin even got a supershort buzz cut as a show of solidarity. If Justin has a flaw, it is that he is cute. Too cute. If I was young and my hormones were going crazy, he would be the type of guy I would have sex. I worry about this.

“Sweetie?” I said to Tara one Sunday as we watched
Guys and Dolls
together for possibly the thousandth time. We were curled on my bed with a big bowl of popcorn, an afghan thrown over my knees. She was drinking a diet soda and twirling a tendril of hair as we both sighed over Marlon Brando. Singing. Michael considers this a mortal sin. Brando should not sing. Was not meant to sing. He was meant to wear a ripped T-shirt in
A Streetcar Named Desire.
But Tara and I forgive Marlon.

“Yeah, Mom?”

“I think Justin is a really terrific guy.”

Teens have a bullshit meter fine-tuned from miles away.

“And?” she asked warily.

“I was just wondering…if you two were thinking about having sex. If maybe,” I said hurriedly, “you wanted to talk to me about anything.”

She sat bolt upright in my bed.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

As the young, very sexy Marlon Brando sang “Luck Be a Lady Tonight,” I felt decidedly unlucky. Why did I bring it up?

“It’s just that I want you to know that if you ever need to talk to me about anything, I’m here. I think he’s terrific, but I also want you to be careful.”

Tara’s eyes registered fury. “You are so damn transparent, Mom. You invite me in here for some mother/ daughter time, and it’s all just bullshit—”

“Tara!”

“It is! No, I am not sleeping with Justin. We haven’t even talked about it. Okay…maybe we have, but we’re not going to do anything stupid.”

I started crying. It wasn’t fair, crying. It’s a cheap shot if used as a weapon, and I hadn’t intended to. I couldn’t help it.

“It’s just that in all the cancer books they talk about kids acting out. Kids of parents who are sick or siblings of cancer patients. I just don’t want what’s happening to me to make you feel as if I am too sick to pay attention to you. So that you have to go elsewhere.”

Every parent recalls the precise moment when they first shifted roles with their children. For me it was the time my father came over. Years ago. And he looked old. For the first time, I saw the lines of hard living, and I realized he was “old.” For Tara and me, this was our moment. She leaned over and hugged me. Then she kissed me on the forehead—I mean, who was the child here?—and whispered, “It’s okay, Mom. I don’t feel like that.”

I sniffled. “Thanks.”

She stroked my barely-there hair. “I love you, Mom. Sorry I got all bent out of shape.”

I shrugged. “You know, as long as we’re getting some stuff out in the open, I really need to ask you something.”

“What?”

I paused, then plunged ahead. “If I died, I mean, not from cancer, but say I got hit by a bus, do you want to go to England with your father, or would you prefer to live here with Michael?”

“You’re not going to die, Mom. You can’t.”

“Well, I really should have dealt with this a long time ago. So let’s say this is purely hypothetical, which is it?”

“I’m not going to England.”

“So it’s Michael.”

“No, it’s you.” She stared at me stubbornly.

“Think long and hard about this. Sometimes you and Michael bicker.”

“I have.”

“I’m going to fly over to London to talk to your father.”

“Does he know you’re coming?”

“Not yet. But I’ve thought about it. This isn’t about him and me. This is about you and Noah. Michael is the closest thing you have to a real father. And Ellie as a guardian—”

“Let’s not go there…” Tara shuddered dramatically, overemphasizing a look of horror on her face. We both laughed.

“England could be a wonderful experience…living overseas.”

“I don’t want to live there. If you go see my dad, can I come to London, too?”

I looked at her. What if she came to London with me and loved it? Wanted to become a London punk rocker, or go to Oxford? Where would that leave Noah?

“Sure. You miss your dad?”

“No. God, Mom, you think I don’t recognize your handwriting?”

“Huh?”

“All the years you bought Christmas presents and birthday presents, and signed the card ‘Love, Dad.’ Did you think that just by writing it with your left hand, or getting Uncle Michael to forge Dad’s signature, that I wouldn’t figure it out? For God’s sake, Mom, Noah’s onto the whole charade. I’m more curious than anything. And I suppose if I have to decide something big like this, I want to see if he misses me.”

“Of course he does.”

“Did you know his wife has never actually spoken to me on the telephone? We have to call him at the university. And you know, I just stopped calling after a while.
Months
would go by without hearing from him, Mom.
Months.
He always blamed it on the time difference. As if people in England and New York couldn’t possibly figure out a way to connect.”

“I know.”

“Hey, Mom? What’s so great about her that he’d dump us all?”

I bit my tongue. She’s got a set of knock-out tits and had the sex drive of a typical college student when he met her, not the sex drive of a woman in her thirties throwing up every two hours in the throes of a difficult pregnancy. Oh, and her parents are immensely wealthy, and at the time, we were lucky we had enough money for diapers, let alone the new washing machine we needed. Tara didn’t need to know all that. She was bright. She’d figure it out.

The next day, I told Michael I was going to Europe. He was over, cooking supper. George was working. They were great together, and I was thrilled for Michael.

“You shouldn’t be flying. Planes are just airborne germ factories.”

“I don’t have a choice.”

“You do. Can’t you handle this all by phone? Can’t lawyers handle it?”

“No.”

“I mean, this is the guy who dumped you. You need ‘face time,’ as Joe would say? After all this time?”

“Michael, you and I have been ‘tabling’ this whole guardian decision for four months now. I am asking him to give up his parental rights. I have papers for him to sign. I want you to be their guardian.”

“Think you might have wanted to confirm that with me before you took off on Virgin Atlantic? It’s too much responsibility.”

“I know you’re going to agree with me sooner or later.”

“Do you think I don’t love them?”

“No. I never said that.”

“This is all wrenching, Lily. It’s like I have two lives. One is normal. And one is full of death and horrible decisions. And my so-called normal existence is as a gay man. So what does that say to you?”

“What? You’re a homosexual?”

He rolled his eyes.

“I can’t believe after all these years I find out you’re gay. I’m shocked. Dismayed. Disgusted.”

“Please, Lily, be serious.”

“I’m seriously going to London.”

“Fine. Go.”

He continued stirring the marinara sauce, furiously. I saw his eyes move from the pot of sauce, to the refrigerator. Magnets with silly sayings like “My Mom Can’t Cook. Open Refrigerator with Caution,” and “Greetings from Florida” from a trip down South, held up “priceless” art from Noah and Tara. Report cards vied with postcards, which vied with snapshots from Halloween and Christmas, and even a footprint from when Noah was born stamped to a white piece of paper.

“Be careful,” Michael said more softly. “Don’t catch anything. Could be dangerous with your white blood count so low.”

“I know.”

“I need time to think this through.”

“I know.”

He kept stirring. “At least if I had them they’d eat well.”

I laughed. “And know the Yankee lineup.”

“Those things are important.”

“Exactly.”

I stood in back of him on my tiptoes and kissed the back of his neck. I slipped my arms around his waist. Then I pinched his ass. “For a gay guy, you’re pretty hot. I bet you could bounce a quarter on that ass.”

“You’re exasperating.”

“That’s why you love me.”

“I suppose,” he said softly, “you’re right.”

That night we ate dinner together. Later, when the house was quiet, I logged onto my computer and looked at flights. What do you say to the man who took your heart and sent it through a Cuisinart?

“I have to work late. I think I’ll just crash on the couch in my office, okay, baby?”

“No, it’s not okay, David. This is the second time this week. I’m eight months pregnant—that would be GINORMOUS in layman’s terms. Huge! And I’m running after Tara. And what if I go into labor in the middle of the night?”

“You have four weeks to go. You’re not going into labor.”

“I hate when you do that.”

“Do what?” His voice was edgy, weary-sounding.

“Act like you know what’s going to happen and what’s good for me. Michael brings me a pint of heavenly hash ice cream when I’m tired and exhausted.
You
suggest going for a walk so I don’t gain too much weight. As if the weight is more important than making me feel a little better, if only for a half hour.”

“Yeah. But then Michael isn’t going to have to hear you bitching that none of your jeans fit after this baby is born. Look…you’re not going to go into labor.”

“Are you cheating on me?” The question hung in the air. Like a lot of things. All our conversations were now punctuated with venomous words like “always,” as in “
You
always…,” or “never.” I wasn’t really sure what had happened, but I assumed that me getting up to pee eleven times a night had something to do with me being testy, and his not getting sex as often as he used to had something to do with
his
getting testy. But lately, he had stopped pressing for it altogether.

“You’re insane, you know that? Clinically insane. Maybe you should see a shrink.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You should be.”

He hung up the phone on me, and I sat in my bedroom and sobbed. I went to the bathroom and got an entire
roll
of toilet paper. A roll! And I sat there and made my way through it, blowing my nose and dabbing at my eyes. How could I accuse him of such a horrendous thing? After all, I had been difficult to live with lately, and he was working so hard to get his second anthology together.

He couldn’t be having an affair. We were going to have another baby, for God’s sake. A sign of how much we loved each other.

Prick is not a strong enough word for David. Well, Michael and I seriously considered calling him Prick. But we decided, when Noah was little, that him overhearing the word prick wasn’t such a good idea. He could repeat it. Like to his preschool teacher at the time.

So we settled on Spawn of Satan—Spawn for short, the way we affectionately preferred to term him.

Our dear Spawn. And Child Bride. Occasionally just The Bride.

He deserved his moniker.

He
had hung up on me.

He
had suggested that I see a shrink.

I took a deep breath.

I wondered if, when—if?—I got to heaven, God would let me put a hex on Spawn. Or do angels play nice all the time?

Michael

O
ut of the clear blue sky, some guy named Pete called Lily for a date. He contacted her voice mail at the paper. She was still managing to eke out her column every week, and Joe would assign her some features during weeks she felt good. Chemo was over, and she was doing radiation.

I’m Noah’s baseball coach, and spring training had started. He was in the shower, and I was boiling water for some pasta. She came home from the office—one of her face-time days with Joe—and said, “I have a date tonight.” She said it as if she were shocked.

“A date?”

She nodded. “With a guy who apparently doesn’t mind dating a woman with a crew cut.” Her hair had started growing in just the tiniest bit. Her eyebrows were still drawn on.

“You’re beautiful even without hair. Don’t you remember when Demi Moore did it for
G.I. Jane?
”

“Michael, you know, I’m not insecure about my appearance. But Demi Moore I’m not.”

“It’s a look.”

“Yeah. It’s a cancer look.”

“Well, obviously, whoever this guy is, he’s a man of substance and sees past the fact your right eyebrow is drawn on crooked and down into your inner soul and inner bitchiness. And apparently, he feels he can put up with that. Deluded man. Who is he?”

“Pete Bartlett.”

“Who’s he…wait, is he that math teacher from your chemo encounter?”

“Yes. He has hair now. He’s in remission. He had the good cancer.”

“Good cancer.” Michael snorted.

“He did. Hodgkins.”

“Well…look at this turn of events. Lily with a date.”

“You act like this is something surprising.”

“Hmm…call it a hunch, but I haven’t seen that particular sparkle in your eye since you met Spawn. Of course, here’s hoping this one is a keeper. A real keeper.”

She was standing in her apartment wearing her most expensive high heels, her favorite lipstick and her best black cocktail dress, back when we lived down the hall from each other. A raging New Year’s party was going on in her apartment, spilling out into the hall in the way New York City parties do—the apartments are just too small. It was wall-to-wall revelers, and somewhere in the overheated, cramped living room was her brand-new fiancé.

“David asked me to marry him,” she beamed, holding out her hand for me to admire the sparkling pear-shaped diamond perched on it.

“It’s beautiful, Lily,” I said without much enthusiasm, though the ring was pretty enough.

“Oh,” she pouted, “don’t be that way.”

“Don’t be what way?”

“That way. Try to act like you’re actually happy for me.”

“I am.”

She pulled her hand back and turned around so I couldn’t see her face.

“I
am
happy,” I protested.

“No, you’re not. You don’t like David.”

“All I ever said was I thought he was a bit of a rogue, so be careful. But I see you two are good together….” She still didn’t turn around. “Maybe I’m just jealous.”

“Jealous?” She turned around. “But you’re
gay.
You’re not even bi. We did that sloppy make-out session one night, but that was it.”

“You know,
it’s all about the sex
with you, isn’t it?”

She howled. “Me? My God, you go through more guys in a week than I do in a year!”

“No need to get catty. I’m just saying that the only reason to be jealous isn’t necessarily
S-E-X.
”

“Well then, what?”

“Did you ever stop to think of the end of disco?”

Lily turned to the counter and poured herself a glass of champagne from the open bottle on the counter.

“I need this,” she said. “I can tell you’re going to be obtuse instead of direct. I’m ready now. Shoot.”

“God, disco is dead.”

“Tell that to those people in there.” Though New Wave had taken over the airwaves, and we both loved The Clash, every time a disco song came on at a party, people still went wild.

I glanced through the door and could see friends dancing and singing out loud at the top of their lungs to “I Will Survive.” “Yes, that’s because half of your guests are gay. Nonetheless disco is dead. Studio 54 is gone. The Palladium is no longer the hot place to be. Cocaine isn’t in every bathroom stall anymore. And you threw out your leg warmers.”

“And that has to do with my getting engaged how?”

“It’s just that I thought the party would never end. I thought you and I would live this crazy life, both of us writing, partying hard, dancing, dating, staying up all night, going to Greenwich Village…doing all the cool stuff we do. I thought we would keep doing it forever.”

“Forever is a long time, Michael.”

“Well, the party didn’t have to be over so soon. Who am I going to play with now?”

“Considering I saw you sneak down the hall to your apartment with two different guys tonight, I would say you probably won’t ever hurt for playmates.”

“But you know our
Moonlighting
nights. The nights when we pig out on pizza. Our shopping expeditions to the flea market—not to mention the Macy’s day-after-Thanksgiving sale. It’s the fucking Holy Grail of shopping. Now I won’t have anyone to do that with.”

“I’m getting married, I’m not entering the convent.”

“Don’t patronize me. Things have already changed some and they’ll change more. And that’s just life. I hate being a grown-up. I don’t like change. And furthermore, can’t a guy be a little jealous?”

She threw her arms around me neck and pecked my cheek. “I could always try to convert you to the other team.”

“Not likely. But thanks.”

A slow song came on—I think it was Lionel Ritchie of all things. Lily and I started slow dancing, and midway through the song, David came in. He gave us a strange look, and I stepped away from her. I stuck out my hand, “Congratulations, David.”

“Thanks. I was just looking for my new fiancée.” He tilted her chin up in a way I suppose he thought was sweet and endearing, and kissed her on the nose. I wanted to retch.

So ten months later, I was a groomsman in a black tux in their wedding. And I tried to make peace with the oh-so-smug-and-handsome Professor Waters. But in the end, he turned out to be the Spawn, and I was still here.

“So, is sex a possibility?” I asked as she tried to decide what to wear.

She paused and looked at me. “Hmm. I would say it’s a definite maybe. Not in ordinary circumstances, but this guy…I mean, he just is different, Michael. He had left a voice-mail message once before, and I kind of blew it off. But he caught me off guard today and he had a million arguments why my being sick didn’t matter. In fact, he numbered them like Letterman’s Top Ten list.”

“Clever.”

“Number one was ‘Cancer makes you skip through the bullshit.’”

“That it does.”

“Agreed. So sex is a strong possibility. I mean, what would I be holding out for?”

She finally decided on a Donna Karan black bodysuit, a black wrap skirt, stiletto boots and a really pretty purple scarf around her head. She wore dangling earrings. Through this whole cancer ordeal, she had always made a point of wearing her lipstick, her heels, her best earrings. She did her makeup in a way to emphasize her lips, and she added a rhinestone pin to her scarf. She said it was akin to a mother’s adage to always wear clean underwear—should she have to go to the hospital suddenly, at least she’d look damn good—the better to snag a handsome doctor.

She left to meet Pete at a restaurant, and I went to check on dinner. Then I took the stairs two at a time to Noah’s room and knocked gently on the door. “It’s me, Noah.”

“Come in,” he grumpily replied.

“Why the long face, kid?” I asked. He was lying on his bed, tossing a baseball into the air with his left hand and catching it in the mitt in his right. His hair was wet and tousled from his shower, and the damp towel was in a crumpled heap in the corner.

He shrugged. “I dunno.”

I looked around his room. He had one foot still in real babyhood and one foot into he-man boyhood. On the shelf above his bed were stuffed animals of Elmo, Big Bird and Ernie, his favorite
Sesame Street
characters. I guessed he hadn’t watched the show in a couple of years, but that shelf was his place of honor. Next to them was a picture of his mom and me. A framed school picture of his sister was on his dresser—she didn’t make “the shelf.” Next to the picture of Lily and me, taken when she was healthy and we were at the beach, was a ball I’d caught at a Yankees game before Noah was even born and signed by Don Mattingly. I’d given it to him for getting all A’s on his last report card. And finally, on that shelf, was a Hot Wheels car in the shape of an Oscar Mayer Weiner. He found the car hysterically funny and “cool.” It made the shelf.

Posters of the Yankees fought for wall space with artwork from school and colored pencil drawings he had done of cartoon characters. His pet goldfish, Reggie, named after Reggie Jackson, swam in a small aquarium amidst plastic seaweed.

Noah tossed the baseball in the air.

Toss. Catch.

“If something happens to Mom, who would take care of me?”

Toss. Catch.

“Well…” Toss. Catch. “If something did happen to her that she couldn’t take care of you, then I would be here, of course. And I’d still take you to all the Yankees games.” Toss. Catch.

“I’d rather live with you than anyone.” Toss. Catch. Thud. He dropped the ball to the floor, and it rolled toward my feet.

“Well, you know, we’ll see about that.”

He stared at me, his eyes moist. I picked up the ball and gently tossed it to him. He caught it and resumed his game, staring at the ceiling and getting into a rhythm. Catch. Toss. Catch.

“You know, Noah, I can’t say for sure what’s going to happen. I just know that whatever does, we’re still going to be best friends, just like we are now.”

“Sure.” His voice was hollow and flat.

I felt myself willing him to stop tossing the ball. Willing him to stop and cry and maybe get it out, all this shit no child should have to be dealing with. I walked closer to his bed so he’d have to see me out of the corner of his eye. When he tossed the ball, I grabbed it.

He glared at me. “Why should I believe you? Mom said she would be fine, but she’s not. I can tell the way she’s tired all the time. Nothing anyone says is true.
You
told me she would be fine.” It was an indictment in the court of a little boy.

“We didn’t lie to you. The cancer lied to us.”

“It doesn’t matter. And if something happens to Mom…” He looked at the wall.

I sat down on the bed, and cupped his chin in my hand, turning his head toward me. “If something happens to Mom, what?”

“Then what? I can’t go to my
real
father. He doesn’t even know me. I bet you if he walked into my school right now, he wouldn’t be able to tell which kid was his. You’re my dad. I tell the kids at soccer and baseball and everything that you’re…my dad. I don’t really say it, but if they think you’re my dad, I just don’t tell them it’s not true. And I don’t want anything to change. You and Mom. And when you make me say my prayers, that’s what I ask God for.”

I didn’t dare breathe. There it was.

“But you know your Mom and I are just friends, right?” I whispered.

“Yeah.”

“And you know why, right?”

“Yeah. But it shouldn’t matter.”

I stifled a smile. Ah, if only I wasn’t gay. It was like talking to a junior version of my mother.

“All I can promise is to not lie to you and to do my best to make sure nothing changes, that I’m always here.”

I leaned over and hugged him. He stiffened and then I felt his shoulders tremble. I let him cry but didn’t say anything else. It seemed like a “real man” thing to do. Noah and I always joked about that. Real men don’t eat quiche. Yeah right. I love quiche. But real men don’t like the Mets. They don’t put ketchup on hot dogs, and they don’t forget to say their prayers. Real men are complex that way.

I let go of him and stood up. “Brace yourself. I saw your mother bought some kind of fake egg mix for breakfast tomorrow.”

“Barf.”

“Agreed.”

I went downstairs. The thought that Noah and Tara—as self-centered and difficult as she was now, at sixteen, not to mention her abysmal attempts at learning to drive—would end up with Spawn bothered me. I thought back to the night of David and Lily’s engagement. I thought the party would go on forever. But we all have to grow up sometime.