The Unfortunate Importance of Beauty (3 page)

I knew that tone of hers. She was humoring me, to be shocking.

So I reminded her, “His suicide note said he killed himself over me and that my appearance was causing him pain.”

“I think this costume is an excellent idea,” she said. “Your beauty is a deadly weapon. Wielding it recklessly is irresponsible. You must treat it like a personal handgun—keep it hidden, handle it with care, and
never
point it at people, not even in jest, unless you intend to use it.”

I detected a note of anger in her voice, and I was no longer sure if she was humoring me or blaming me for Gabriel’s death.

“I wasn’t exactly flaunting my looks, you know,” I said.

“If you think your meager attempts to hide your beauty were successful, you’re deluded. Is a gun in a holster hidden?”

“You’re talking to me like I’m a five-year-old who accidentally shot my best friend to death.”

“That wasn’t my intention. Despite what his suicide note said, it’s not your fault he died. Your beauty is not you. But it is in your possession and you should control it.”

“Stop comparing my appearance to a weapon. I didn’t kill him.”

“Exactly. I rest my case,” she said, giving me a small smile.

Through her usual psychological manipulation, she got me to say the exact opposite of what I was saying at first.

“So you
don’t
think my disguise is a good idea?” I asked.

“Of course not. And I hope you don’t either.”

“Yes, I do.”

“It’s not your fault Gabriel died. And if you believe it is, you’re wrong. And if you still believe it is, forgive yourself for his death. And if you can’t, so be it, but you can’t be serious about wearing this disguise.”

“I am.”

She stared at me and finally gave up. “Fine. Anything that helps you get out of the house is fine.”

I liked the disguise. It felt like a punishment and a protection all at once, both of which I’d been craving without realizing it.

Breaking the news to my mother about my new appearance was not a fun prospect. I made an effort to dress well for the occasion—not in my usual sweatpants, sneakers, and ponytail. Instead, I wore an enormous pair of tailored fancy pants over my fat suit, and dressy black pumps, even with a slight heel. A very large silk shirt over my fake-fat jacket. I wore my well-combed gray frizzy wig, my subtly ugly fake teeth. For the first time since my parents had split up, I even put on a little makeup.

I wobbled toward the car, my huge thighs rubbing against each other. I opened the passenger door and said, “Hi Mom!” I plopped down in the seat next to her with a huff. It was strenuous carrying all that weight around.

She didn’t say anything at first, just stared, looking aghast. And then she asked, “What is this about?”

“This is how I have been looking for a while. And my life has been better. I’ve been happier.” My words were reminding me of people who break the news to their parents that they’re gay. “I like looking ugly,” I added bluntly.

Over dinner, we were silent for long stretches. She hardly looked at me. I, on the other hand, observed her carefully. She was now sixty and still hadn’t been with anyone since her brief attempt at dating after she left my dad.

“Why are you doing this?” she finally asked.

“It helps me cope with Gabriel’s suicide.”

“You weren’t responsible for his death, regardless of what his note said.”

I nodded, looking down at my food, my eyes filling with tears, inevitably.

“Is that really the only reason you’re doing this?” she asked.

“No.”

“Why else?”

I cleared my throat. “This is how I’m going to find the man of my dreams.”

She took this in. “Really. That’s an interesting method. Not exactly tried and true. Good luck with that,” she said, irritated.

“This is how I’m going to find my soul mate,” I repeated, “someone who doesn’t care much about beauty, who values other things about me—someone able to fall in love with me even if I don’t look good.”

My mother was gazing at me.

Gently, I added, “Someone whose interest in me won’t fade as soon as my looks do.”

My mother looked down. “So this is about your father and me.”

Unfortunately, my disguise put the idea in my mother’s head that I should go and see a therapist—a request she began frequently badgering me about and which I didn’t give in to until today: almost two years later, two years of wearing the disguise every day, making small improvements to it along the way.

THINKING ABOUT GABRIEL
always makes me want to read some of his letters again—something I do often. So, after calling my mother I go and fetch two of them and sit on the couch. With great care, I unfold his suicide note. His handwriting is beautiful and interesting, like he was.

Clenching my lips, I read it once more. I know it practically by heart.

Beloved Barb,

I’m so sorry I have to say goodbye to you and to life.

You didn’t know. I never made a declaration of love, nor even a declaration of desire. I was very careful not to send you signals revealing my feelings because I knew they were not reciprocated. And worse, I knew it would change our relationship and make you uncomfortable. You would never be the same with me again, never be yourself.

You often mused to me about your future, wondering what your life would be like, whether you’d have children and how many, where you would live, who you would end up with. But you never saw me that way.

You made a drawing of me, once, with that talent of yours which matches your beauty—that beauty that has grown so painful for me to behold. In the drawing, I felt you had captured my soul. You made me more attractive, more appealing than I am. If that’s how you saw me, why couldn’t you love me?

Meeting you meant I was doomed. It has sapped me of my ability to derive pleasure from anything but you. Everything is ruined for me because nothing can match you, nothing can compare. I’ve never been as happy as when I’m with you. And I’ve never been as miserable. Sometimes those two feelings are separated by only a moment.

My work, my success, people’s praise—all those things that mattered to me—mean nothing to me now. My professional ambition has deserted me because I know it will not get me your love.

Beloved Barb, I adored you from the moment I met you. You have touched my soul in ways you will never know.

Goodbye, sweet heart.

More later,

Gabriel

Reading this letter always leaves me devastated, even after all this time.

Those two words, “More later,” which under any other circumstance would seem very banal, baffled my friends and me for a while. That is, until I began receiving more letters from Gabriel—letters he’d prepared before his death and had arranged to be sent to me on specific dates when he knew he would be dead.

The second letter resting on my lap is one of those—Gabriel’s latest, and by far strangest, one. I received it two days ago and have discussed it with my friends at length. We have no idea what he’s talking about. It reads:

Dear Barb, Georgia, Lily, Penelope, and Jack,

One of you confessed to me that you did something very bad. I don’t want to reveal what it is until it’s absolutely necessary. And it will be necessary soon.

Love,

Gabriel

Chapter Three

A
fter folding the two letters and putting them away, I turn off the living room lights.

I’m tired. I go to the other room, which is not only my bedroom but my office. There’s a desk in the middle of this large room and a couch in a corner. The bed is simply a mattress on the floor because it satisfies my bohemian taste. I’ve lined the room with floor-to-ceiling storage space. I have built-in drawers that hold supplies for masks, sketches, fabrics for costumes, sewing equipment, etc. I also have a big closet where I keep dozens of costumes I’ve made or am in the process of making. My own clothes take up only a tiny portion of the closet because I have little interest in my appearance other than to make sure it’s bad.

I’m in the midst of getting ready for bed, taking off my fat, when Georgia calls in tears. She can’t sleep; she’s devastated about her lost novel in her lost laptop. I tell her to take a sleeping aid, and we’ll try calling the police again tomorrow. She says she already took one and it’s not working. I tell her to come over and sleep on my couch if she wants.

A half hour later, Georgia is sitting curled up on my couch, sipping a cup of hot chocolate.

I first met Georgia five years ago when I was the costume designer for the movie based on her novel
The Liquid Angel
. It was my first job in costume design, and it basically made my career, earning me a Satellite Award and an Oscar nomination. (I chose Gabriel as my escort to the Academy Awards, and we had a memorable time even though I didn’t win.) Job offers poured in after that and I dropped out of Tisch’s MFA program to devote myself full time to freelance costume designing. I haven’t since been nominated for another major award, though my designs continue to get positive reviews that praise their originality, freshness, and psychological insight.

Georgia and I became good friends right away and we often turn to each other during difficult times, such as now.

“I don’t see how I can write again, now that I’ve lost my best work,” she cries, putting down her cup of hot chocolate.

“You’re a great writer. You’ll write it again and even better.”

“I’ve lost work before. I don’t write it better. I write it worse.”

AFTER SHE LEAVES,
I work all morning on a series of masks and costumes I’ve been hired to design for a TV movie.

I would happily keep working till dinnertime without taking a break, if only I hadn’t promised our friend Penelope I’d have lunch with her and her parents. I always try to do whatever I can to help Penelope. She’s a dear friend who’s had a tough life. Or rather, she had a tough three days, six years ago. She was kidnapped and kept in a coffin for sixty-nine hours. She doesn’t often ask for favors, so when she begged me because she didn’t want to see her parents alone and she claimed they had always wanted to meet me, etc., I couldn’t refuse.

Penelope doesn’t want to see them alone because of the ongoing tense exchange she has with her wealthy father over the issue of her not yet making a living at the age of twenty-eight. He pressures Penelope to get a job, or to make money some other way, any other way. Instead, Penelope decided to take a pottery class. She discovered she had no talent for making attractive pots. Impressed with her classmates’ pots, which were merely ugly, not hideous like her own, she decided to open a store and sell their ugly pots. Her father disapproves of her business venture. He thinks the pots are ugly and her idea stupid. Worse, the pots aren’t selling and the store is losing money. And he’s the one who pays the rent on her store and on her apartment. He hasn’t given her a trust fund, just a monthly allowance for food, bills, clothes. If he wants to, he can stop supporting her at any time, and she would have nothing, not even a place to live.

It seems obvious to me that Penelope is tortured by her lack of achievement. She would give anything, I think, to possess a special gift, an ability; even the smallest, most modest skill.

She did make efforts to please her father over the years, she did try a few jobs, but hated them and left each one within a couple of months. The pottery class, however, she enjoyed greatly and she continues to take at least two ceramics classes every semester: Wheel Throwing and Handbuilding.

Penelope told me that each time she sees her father, which is every two weeks, he bitterly asks her how sales are going. She never lies, always says, “Terrible.” She’s becoming increasingly stressed by his questions.

PENELOPE AND HER
parents are already seated when I arrive at Cipriani Downtown. They shake my hand warmly. They don’t know I’m wearing a disguise. Penelope assured me she never told them. In their eyes, I must make a striking contrast to their daughter, who’s sitting there all prim and ladylike in her cream cashmere sweater set and her immaculately applied makeup.

The waiter takes our order. After telling him I want to start with the steamed broccoli and then have the grilled sole, no sauce, Penelope’s very skinny mother leans over to me and says, “I admire your discipline. My willpower leaves much to be desired.” She rubs her stomach, as though it were convex instead of concave.

“It’s not discipline,” I say. “I just don’t like fatty foods.” It’s ironic that I, of all people, possess the rare trait of not enjoying the things that destroy one’s beauty. “Fat and sugar make me want to throw up,” I explain.

“Really? Then how do you maintain your . . .” She seems unsure how to finish.

“Girth?” I offer.

She nods sheepishly.

“It’s actually not that easy to get rid of, you know. For emotional reasons, I guess.”

“I sure know what you mean,” she says, squeezing her bony upper arms critically, as though they were covered in a layer of thick flesh caused by years of compulsive eating due to emotional torment. “I don’t know how Penelope does it, with what she went through six years ago . . .”

I nod politely.

Not for a moment did Penelope’s father hesitate to pay the exorbitant ransom when his daughter was abducted. He got it ready as soon as the kidnappers told him the amount, but before he had a chance to deliver the money, the police found the criminals and freed Penelope. The kidnappers had kept her in a coffin so that she’d sound all the more distraught when her father asked to speak to her. They held up the phone to the coffin and instructed her to talk to him through its walls and describe her situation. She was crying and had to shout to be heard.

“Barb!” her father booms at me. It’s the first time he’s spoken since I sat down. “You make a living designing costumes, right?”

“Yes,” I say, hoping he hasn’t figured out I’m wearing one.

“You make a good living at it, from what I gather from the magazines.” Penelope must have shown her parents the few articles that have been written about me during the past couple of years.