Double Happiness (8 page)

Everyone was waiting for Olivia to finish the third grade; then they would move to Rome. The new apartment awaited them, the hallways so long and wide, her father said, that Olivia could bowl. He was happier about moving than her mother. Already he was spending whole weeks away from them, getting Rome ready for Olivia.

Her father let go of her mother. He opened the back door and balanced on the threshold. Looking up into the sky, he took a
deep dramatic breath. Her mother shivered in her pale cotton blouse and watched the back of him. A tiny crease formed at the top of her nose. She turned and peeked into the oven, then called over her shoulder, Pete, it's freezing. Olivia will catch cold.

I'm fine, said Olivia.

You know what I was thinking? her father said, closing the door, coming inside. Why don't you and Olivia come into the city on Wednesday, spend the day, do some shopping?

Oh, that's impossible, her mother said. I have at least a half dozen appointments on Wednesday. She sounded slightly puzzled, like they were playing a guessing game.

Well, Olivia could come by herself.

On a school day?

It wouldn't kill her, he said, and drew an imaginary pistol, cowboy-style, and fired at Olivia. Something in her mother's eyes caught Olivia and made her forget to fall over dead.

See? he said, as if his point were proven.

Well, I don't know, her mother laughed again, scratchy and high.

I just thought it might be fun.

Probably it would be. Her mother used a big spatula to lift the sandwiches onto a green and gold dish. She placed it on the table. Get the napkins, angel; her hand brushed the top of Olivia's head.

You're not going to believe this, but I have to go back in tomorrow morning. Christ, this new marketing guy is an ass.

On Saturday?

Her father shrugged and nodded. He picked up Olivia's math homework and smiled.

But you just got here, her mother said. You've been gone for days.

I know. I know. It's crazy.

Her mother watched him for some time, as if he were still talking, then she finally said, Yes, that's exactly what it is. She reached for the soup pot, forgetting the mitt.

On Wednesday morning her mother's face looked clear but tired, aimed at the train tracks ahead. Bells started to ring and safety gates clamored down across the street. The huge train pulled into the station.

Her mother's sudden kiss felt dry and too light, like a dead bug blown across her cheek. Olivia said good-bye in a blur and started running toward the train. She heard her mother call out behind her, Darling, you have plenty of time. But she ran anyway.

The conductor shooed all the boarding passengers to the front of the train. Olivia walked through several cars before she reached the empty seat behind the locomotive. If there was a head-on collision she'd be the first to go, after the engineer.

Olivia pressed her face against the dirty glass pane and then withdrew it slightly. Her mother was looking for her, up and down the train. Bent forward in her ivory coat and off-white
stretch pants she looked to Olivia like a big wishbone strained to the limit.

A new driver named Nat was waiting for Olivia when she got off the train. He stood on the platform holding a cardboard sign above his head with
Olivia
written in red Magic Marker. She could see her name rocking back and forth in his hands.

Hello, Olivia?

Where's Boris? she asked when she was close.

He's no longer with us, sorry to say.

Dead?

Nat looked surprised, but he didn't laugh. No, no, he just has a different job now.

The long black car was warm and smelled like eucalyptus when Olivia slipped into the backseat. Nat explained he couldn't allow her to sit in front, as Boris usually did, in case of an accident. Olivia appreciated his sense of danger.

You can never be sure of the other driver, he said. How can you even be sure of yourself? You take precautions, you give it your best shot, what can I tell you?

She liked Nat. She liked the way he made slow wide turns as if he were driving the car in the air. Olivia watched the iced trees of Central Park skitter by. Soon the car came to a halt before the General Motors tower. Sometimes Olivia dreamed her father had the same leaning forward giantness of this building.

* * *

It was obvious to Olivia that Ann Marie was a secretary only in passing. She looked more like a fashion model, except she was short. She had lots of black curly hair. She wore a tight black skirt and sweater and very red lipstick. Ann Marie spoke with an accent.

Olivia, what are you becoming now? You are flowering and flowering, I think. She waved a little bird hand at Nat. He nodded to Olivia and vanished down the hushed hall. When the phone rang Ann Marie took the call perched on the arm of the flannel sofa, her short pretty legs crossed. Umm, she said, over and over.

A clatter of voices started up outside. The long hallway was decorated with fake Roman torches hung from fake marble walls. Olivia could see her father at the far end surrounded by people. She wondered if the “ass” was among them. She didn't think her father noticed her yet.

Ah, there he is, said Ann Marie, waving.

Olivia's father came in and hugged Olivia very hard, as if he hadn't seen her in ages, or she had come a long difficult way to find him. She could smell his aftershave, like a saddle just after polishing. Olivia loved that smell, and it made her want to hug her father more, to hug him now, while he was still exactly this way. He let her go and began slapping the pockets of his suit, searching for something important.

Well, what do you think of my girl, Ann Marie? he said, still digging for something, now in the interior pocket of his suit jacket.

She is more and more like her father, I think so.

Oh, really?

Yes, especially the forehead. She paused. Olivia's father smiled; he got the joke. He had an exceptionally wide forehead; it gave him the appearance of being very smart. And the brain behind, this is obvious.

What about beauty, Ann Marie? he said, as though chiding her. But that's her mother's province.

Ann Marie looked down at her perfect hand. She brushed a speck from her fingertip and said, Of course. Then she went outside to her desk without saying anything more.

Her father scattered some papers on his desk, then called to Ann Marie that he and Olivia were going to Bergdorf's. Ann Marie looked up from her desk and grinned unexpectedly. Her red lips made a nice curve, almost like a clown's, Olivia thought.

Well, pumpkin, it's not too inspiring, is it?

Her father surveyed the entire children's department with a kind of weary contempt. Then his eyes widened slightly. Olivia knew he had discovered the precise right thing, something a less skillful shopper would have entirely overlooked. The dress he'd targeted was navy blue with two lines of small, flat silver buttons running down the front. At close inspection it wasn't much different from her school uniform, except that it had a white collar.

What do you think? he said, holding it up against her chest. His eyes darted from the top of her head to her eyes to the dress. He was checking everything to make sure it was just right. Olivia's mother called this “effete,” but Olivia knew he was just talented, like an artist. Although she preferred lavender, lavender anything, and her mother always let her get it, her father had decided on the dress with the buttons and was looking for a salesperson.

Just then a woman with long blonde hair, wearing a puffy fur coat, entered the children's area and walked toward them on tippy toes as if she was about to surprise them, though they were looking straight at her. Perhaps I could be of some assistance, she said. Her eyes were blue and large. She seemed to think what she was saying was hilarious.

Wonderful, said her father shaking his head. Something in his voice caught Olivia and made her skin feel strange.

The woman stopped smiling, and Olivia realized she wasn't very old. That's a nice dress, said the woman, but she didn't sound sure.

Don't you ever think? asked her father. He sounded as if he expected an answer. The woman stared, her light eyes enormous and pale like the tips of two blue Popsicles. Olivia looked to her father, who seemed both very interested in this person and, at the same time, not at all—just like football, when he'd hoot through a game, then forget the score.

The woman backed up a step. Her puffy coat caught on a
pair of tiny jodhpurs. She yanked herself loose and dashed toward the elevator; she managed to squeeze through the closing doors at the last second. Olivia's father stuck the dress back onto the rack.

This place is hopeless, he said.

Who was that?

Nobody, said her father, shaking his head and watching the elevator. Really, absolutely nobody.

On the ground floor they passed a jewelry counter. Her father stopped to look. The saleswoman pulled out a pair of circular earrings made of ivory. He picked one up.

Looks like a Life Saver, said Olivia.

Well, we don't need that, said her father and replaced it on the velvet mat. He pointed to a little gold horse with ruby-chip eyes. The saleswoman retrieved it. Olivia's father pinned the horse to the collar of Olivia's coat. The saleswoman beamed.

What a father you have! she said.

Olivia shrugged, embarrassed, then immediately felt her father's irritation, his disappointment in her.

My daughter is a mime, he explained to the saleswoman. She had gray hair near her ears but giggled like a teenager. Her voice sparkling and high for such an austere face. Oddly, it was this woman Olivia would remember, this woman's manicured hand running through silvery curls, long after her father had moved from Rome to Cairo.

The saleswoman took Olivia's father's credit card. As an afterthought, he selected the panda by the same designer and nodded. The earrings remained on the mat. The saleswoman packaged the panda and gave Olivia's father his card back. He handed Olivia the small box and said, Give this to your mother. Which was rewarded with another wave of approval from the saleswoman. Then they were pushing out the revolving door. Olivia followed the soft gray cashmere of her father's coat pressed against the glass.

On the sidewalk it was just beginning to snow.

How about some hot chocolate, muffin? her father asked. Olivia was ambivalent about this nickname. She loved it because of her father, but feared it referred to her physically, that her face or her body resembled a muffin in some way. Her father rifled in his pocket and took out a sheaf of green bills.

It seems preposterous for you to come all this way and go home empty-handed, sweetheart. I think that blue dress was a hit. He handed her the money, You go back and pick it up while I get us set up for a snack.

He pointed in the direction of the Plaza Hotel, about a hundred feet away. Olivia knew where he meant. They always went to the Palm Court. But she'd never been allowed to go anywhere in New York alone before. Her father must be making a mistake that he would realize in a moment. But he patted her back toward the revolving door and said, You're going to be a
city girl soon, you know. And once she was moving inward, within her slice of glass, he was gone.

She passed the jewelry counter and waved to the woman but without her father the woman didn't seem to see her. On the third floor again Olivia picked up the navy blue dress with the two lines of flat silver buttons. She was nervous at first, but then she realized she liked shopping by herself. Her father was teaching her something. He was preparing her for Rome. She brought the dress to the salesman and handed him all the money. He gave her an enormous amount of change. It never occurred to her that she might have chosen anything she wanted.

On the street it was snowing harder now. The daylight was gray and dim but the Plaza lights were bright. The doorman's booth glittered like a fortune-teller's at a carnival. She knew her father was waiting for her, but Olivia felt a strong undertow of hesitation.

Across the street, directly before her, like a front yard for the Plaza, was a little square with a huge fountain. Because it was February there was no water shooting out. A painter huddled in the cold, his canvases perched against the fountain's parapet. Olivia crossed against the light and walked carefully up and down before the paintings, adopting her father's shopping attitude. Nothing jumped out at her.

Are you looking for anything special? asked the man. He stayed seated, and though he seemed young, his eyes looked
stripped of color. Olivia thought making all those paintings had been a strain. She tried harder to find something she could appreciate. Olivia bent to examine one small canvas, a dark sea of muddy squares touched all over with bits of white and gold, something to keep the squares from going under. She asked the artist what the painting was called.

Dawning Day
, twenty dollars.

Olivia decided she would show her father and if he liked it they could buy it together. She was excited now and ran through the stand of taxis to the Plaza.

The maitre d' recognized Olivia and smiled. They always sat at the same table. Her father's gray coat was draped on the usual chair back. There was a shivery-looking highball, nearly finished, and a squat silver pot on a doilied plate, but her father wasn't there. Olivia slid into the upholstered chair. The maitre d' held it for her, then pushed her in toward the table. The violinist smiled his plaintive smile. Tilting his violin toward his cheek, he began to play something that elves might play if they were having a good day. Olivia looked around for her father.

Through the door she could see the light turning purple outside. She looked toward the main lobby with its display cases of heavy jewels hung like paintings on the walls. There, Olivia spotted the top of her father's dark head. She was intensely relieved, but afraid he might be angry with her for taking so long.
Maybe he was searching for her. She waved to catch his attention, but his back was turned, and he was mostly hidden by a potted palm. She pushed back the extremely heavy chair and went over to the border of the Palm Court and was squeezing between two plants when all of her father came into view, and the person he was talking to.