Waking Beauty (26 page)

“Purvis,” said the woman. “There’s an M. Lewis at 79 Purvis Street. That’s close to here.”

“Seventy-nine Purvis.” I wrote it down.

“Just walk east on Winchester past the lights and it’s on the south side. Either the first street or the second street past the lights.”

“Thanks. I’ll start there. Thank you very much for your help.”

“No problem,” she said, guiding me out. “Good luck with your search.”

“Bye-bye,” I said, waving to the baby. “Have a happy birthday.”

“We will,” said the woman.

Then the pretty white door closed in my face.

I walked east on Winchester, past the lights, on the south side. The neighborhood had changed over the years, but there were still signs of the bad old days. Like the dirty U-Bag grocery store still hanging in there between the organic butcher shop and the gourmet coffee roastery. Like the trashy rooming house at 79 Purvis Street, a monstrous Victorian with peeling red paint and, as near as I could tell from the
sidewalk opposite, at least eight doorbells. There was a stack of ancient beer cases and a decrepit sagging sofa on the front porch. And on the decrepit sagging sofa was a decrepit sagging woman, who, astonishingly, looked quite a bit like me. The old me, that is.

I crossed the street to get a better view. The woman flicked her cigarette on the lawn, cleared her disastrously phlegmy throat, and lit another one right away. She was wearing stained sweatpants and a threadbare Speedy Muffler T-shirt. She was fat and ugly, and looked like me. Except the face was harder. Meaner.

“Take a picture,” she said. “It lasts longer.”

“Jeannie Coombes?” I asked softly.

“Who wants to know?” she sniped.

I stood immobile. Mute. This was not what I had expected. This wasn’t anything remotely like Fantasies 1 through
12
.

“Hell
-o-o
!?” She said it harsh. Sarcastic. “Can I help you?!”

No, I thought as I took off down the street. No, I guess you probably can’t.

Somebody was waiting on my front porch. A pimply teenager clutching the coffee-stained copy of Nathan’ screenplay, and five white tulips held together with a dirty elastic band.

“Allison Penny?” he said.

“Yes.” I was getting used to this now.

Not waiting for giddy expressions of delight, he thrust the script and bouquet at me, then dashed to a smashed-up BMX and pedaled away. For the first time in hours, I wasn’t thinking about Jeannie Coombes or Simon Penny. I was thinking about Nathan, about how he was the only person to listen to a passing remark and actually hear it and get it right (white tulips), and how I really wanted to see him, but really, really didn’t want to tell him that I wouldn’t be able to make it to his apartment for the special lasagna on Saturday night….

“No problem,” he said, going a little pale and drawing back from me. “We can do it another time.”

“Can we, please?”

“Sure. No probs.” He didn’t sound very convincing. He was grinning grim. A heavy silence, and then: “I guess I should get that screenplay back at some point.”

“What? I just got it, like, four hours ago.” I laughed. “Give me a chance to speed-read it at least.”

“Oh, I thought maybe you’d read it or something.” He looked down at his feet. As if my reading his script was the reason I had canceled our date.

“You’re crazy,” I said, reaching for his hand. No response. The mitt lay limp. “How about one night next week?” I said. “How about Tuesday? You don’t work Tuesday nights, right?”

“You’re not working next week?”

“No. I was just filling in. I’ve actually asked the DeSouzas to find a replacement for me.”

“Oh,” he said, withdrawing his hand and folding his arms across his chest. He cleared his throat. “So how is Allison? Have you heard anything?”

“Nothing has really changed.”

“Hmm.”

“So, how about Tuesday night?” I said. “Do you want me to come over on Tuesday?”

“If you want.”

“Of course I want.” I moved in for a kiss. His jaw was rigid and motionless. Tough-guy stiff. I persisted, working my way in. The mouth relaxed a little, opened. The arms uncrossed as he began to melt into it and respond. Then we were embracing and everything felt good and okay again, and I imagined the flowers on the patio swelling sweet and vibrating in the dark, and we were smiling between kisses.

“So tell me why you can’t come eat lasagna tomorrow?” He said it soft and playful.

Why indeed? Something about Heaven & Earth and Direct Access. Something about three thousand dollars and a hot tub overlooking the lake. I stepped back. “I’m sorry. I just—I have to go out of town for a couple days. There’s something I have to see to.” I couldn’t easily explain it, and I didn’t want to get into it. Even though I could tell he really wanted to know, and there was nothing soft and playful about the wanting to know.

He nodded, processing the lack of information.

“I’m really sorry,” I said. “I’ll call you Monday when I get back. And I’ll come over Tuesday night, okay?”

“Okay.”

After I left Nathan on the patio, I continued with the final leg of my cleaning route. I remember thinking, as I rolled my cart into IZ Talent Management: Well, this is it, the last office I’ll ever have to clean, and the last time I’ll have to contend with Peter Igel. I could hear the music playing, the faint jazz music coming from Igel’s office. Friday night. As usual he was trying to de-thong some Cindy Crawford wanna-be.

I was pleased to discover, when I’d cleaned my way back there, that the bratwurst-containing filing cabinet had been removed. The entire cabinet gone. And still I could detect the faintest trace of rotting meat under the aerosol pine that had been liberally spritzed. “Excuse me,” I said as I entered and made my way around the desk. The lady of the day was a beautiful black woman. Long and lean with a 1970s-style Afro dyed golden brown. She was seated close to Igel on the sofa, a binder of photos—her makeshift portfolio—spread open on her lap.

“It’s the nose that’s holding you back,” he said casually, barely glancing at the binder.

“You think?” said the woman, studying her face in a photo.

Igel scoped me as I did my thing. “Excuse me,” he said. “Have I seen you before?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You’ve modeled before?”

“Nope.” I carried his trash can to the cart and emptied it. I could feel his eyes on me. He stood up and stared hard as I passed by to put the trash can back under the desk.

“Just a second,” he said. “Would you like to model?”

“Um…I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe.”

“Because you could probably make a great deal of money if you cared to.”

The woman on the love seat smile-scowled and closed her binder. Igel rummaged through some things on his desk and picked up a strange metal instrument. “Come here for a moment,” he said, gesturing for me to come close. “Just for a moment, I promise.” He held the device up to my face. It reminded me of some sort of high-school math tool. Three hinged pieces of flat, pointed metal that accordioned in and out. “I knew it,” he said, moving the instrument over different parts of my face, taking measurements of some kind. “What an eye,” he said, laughing.

“What is that?” asked the woman on the love seat.

“This is a Golden Mean Gauge,” said Igel. “It measures the golden ratio—one to point six-one-eight. Phi. What humans universally perceive as ideal beauty. Proportional perfection. You see,” he said, moving the device around my face, “no matter how much the gauge opens or closes, the proportion remains the same. If I extend the gauge from the chin to the nose, the distance from her chin to lower lip is one, while the distance from the lower lip to the nose is point six-one-eight. Perfect. From the inside corner of the left eye to the inside corner of the right eye is one; from the inside corner of the right eye to the outside corner of the right eye: point six-one-eight. Smile,” he said. I did. “Even her teeth. You see, the front tooth is one, and the one next to it: point six-one-eight. Beauty is essentially mathematics. And this golden ratio is present in all beautiful things. It isn’t subjective, it’s universal.”

He continued measuring, and I thought, If that’s true, if beauty isn’t subjective, how do you explain the appeal of brutalism, the Pontiac Aztek, leisure suits, Fran Drescher…?

“Yup,” said Igel, tossing the instrument on the desk. “This young lady possesses a mathematically perfect face.”

“Try it on me,” said the woman on the love seat.

“Later,” said Igel. “What’s your name, then?”

“Allison Penny.”

“Well, Allison Penny, shall we pop into the boardroom for a minute to talk it over?”

“I don’t think so,” I said, moving to my cart. “The thing is, I’ve already been talking to the people downstairs. At the Malcolm Anders Agency.”

He laughed. “Sweetheart, that place is for catalog models. You can do better than that. Especially if you drop ten or fifteen pounds.”

Huh?! “But I’ve already had photos taken.
At this weight,”
I said archly. “And they paid for it.”

“Have you signed a contract with them?”

“Not yet, no.”

“You’re fine,” he said with a wave of the hand. “Their mistake for not signing you first. They’ll just have to eat the cost.”

It angered me that he was so willing to rip off Fiona and the agency, until I remembered that’s what I had been planning to do.

“Listen,” said Igel. “IZ Talent is one of the top players in town. Why start at the bottom when you can start at the top? Do you know how difficult it is to get a spot on the roster here? Particularly, my roster.”

“You should do it,” said the woman on the love seat, urging me with a bulge of the eyes.

I thought it over for a minute. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll sign with IZ Talent Management under one condition.”

“What’s that?” he said.

“That you personally and immediately undergo the following surgical procedures: nose job, lip augmentation, chin and pectoral implants.”

He looked at me as if I were a dog wearing a funny hat, taking a piss on his desk. Half amused, half annoyed. “What are you talking about? Why on earth would I do that?”

“You see,” I said to the beautiful woman with the non-phi nose, lounging leggy on the love seat. “That is the correct answer.”

Then I rolled out of there for the very last time.

It was a satisfying moment. It would have been a fine capper to my final night at 505 Richmond. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the capper, because when I took my cart back and collected my bags and went outside to wait for George, Nathan was out there, waiting for me. His presence registered like a punch in the gut. Panic filled me up and made me stupid.

“Hey,” he said.

“What are you still doing here?”

“Oh, well, I had to re-pot a root-bound ficus.” He laughed. “But really I just wanted to say good night.”

“Oh. Thanks.” I laughed like a demented person. I was thinking, Please, God, do not let George pull up until Nathan has skedaddled. “Well, good night,” I said, willing him to leave. “Call you Monday when I get back.”

“Are you taking a taxi?” he said, gesturing to the duffel bag slung heavy over my shoulder.

“Um, no. No…”

And then George pulled up. In the baby-blue Vanquish with the top down. He tapped on the horn and waved. Guilt grabbed my belly with hooked hands as I half-waved back. I looked at Nathan, who was looking at George. I didn’t know what to say. I blushed hot, laughed apologetically.

“Well, I guess I was wrong about the ugly-man fetish.”
Nathan smiled. “Have a great weekend,” he said. Then he walked away.

He walked quickly away.

George interrupted my guilt-soaked reverie, stepping onto the boathouse sundeck with Don and Dawn in tow. “Who’s ready for a hot tub?” he said, clapping his hands together.

“I think I’m ready for a nap after that lunch!” said Dawn. She sat on the lounge chair next to mine, gave me a condescending be-nice-to-the-bauble smile, and stretched out. Lunch had included two bottles of Chardonnay, much of which was consumed by me in an effort to drown the image of Nathan’s backpack bobbing off into the night.

“I could use a nap,” said Don, patting his belly.

“Shall we have a little lie-down, then?” said George.

“Sure,” I said, standing up. Don and Dawn were getting on my nerves. The whole couples dynamic was scraping at my sensibilities. I was happy to get away for an hour or so, even if it meant a sexual encounter with George, something I’d been able to avoid to that point in the weekend. Shortly after we’d arrived on Friday I’d gone to bed with a horrible headache. George had stayed up to watch satellite TV. When I awoke on Saturday, he was already up and about, preparing for Don and Dawn’s ten A.M. arrival. Breakfast had included a pitcher of champagne and orange juice.

“So you guys are gonna sleep down here?” said George.

“I think so,” said Dawn, glancing at Don, deferring to him. He nodded: yes. “Yes,” said Dawn.

“Okay. Come get us when you’re ready. We’ll do a hot tub and swim after siesta.”

“Sounds like a plan,” said Don.

I followed George up the cedar staircase to the cottage. It was the first time we’d been alone together since Don and Dawn had turned up.

“They’re great, aren’t they?” said George when we were inside.

“Yeah,” I lied. I didn’t think they were great, or even good. I thought they were interminably boring and insufferably stuck up. I couldn’t help but notice over the course of two meals how often either Don or Dawn would refer to someone as a “character.” Their dry cleaner, an “Egyptian fellow,” was a “character.” Their new neighbors, “an old Jewish couple,” were “characters.” Their Filipino cleaning lady was a “character.” Dawn’s Pilates instructor, a “crazy Serb,” was a “real character.” It became apparent that anyone who wasn’t a WASP qualified as a “character” in the world of Don and Dawn.

“But I can’t believe how big Dawn’s got. The last time I saw her she was a rake. Amazing what a couple years of married life will do to you.”

“She’s not that big,” I said. She was a little chunky, yes, but quite pretty-black hair cut in a 1920s-style bob, pale skin with pink cheeks, and wide-set blue eyes. Round, stupid eyes. “She’s pretty.”