Asymmetry - Lisa Halliday Page 0,23
quietly, when Gabriela moved to help. “I can do it.” Dwarfed by the plane trees, he looked smaller and frailer than he did in the close refuge of his apartment, and for a moment Alice saw what she supposed other people would see: a healthy young woman losing time with a decrepit old man. Or were other people more imaginative and sympathetic than she thought? Might they acknowledge that everything was still more interesting with him than without, and perhaps even that her gameness and devotion were qualities the world needed more of, not less? Behind them, the planetarium came aglow in violet. The halal hot dog seller began shuttering his truck. While Ezra adjusted his gloves, Gabriela gave Alice a sisterly wink and came to stand beside her, bouncing in the cold. “Samantha!” she said in a stage whisper. “Francine says freeze an egg.”
• • •
With a change at Ronkonkoma, the train took a little under three hours. Alice passed the journey drinking a bottle of hard lemonade and watching the rusted chicken wire and psychedelic graffiti of Queens give way to daffodils and doghouses, dogwoods and vines. At Yaphank, there was a smattering of chicory flowers along the tracks, quivering like tiny well-wishers. At the other end of her car sat an old woman who rested her hands on her purse and her purse in her lap, staring out the window at the scenery spooling by while a group of teenagers whooped and hollered all around her. Every now and again their horseplay spilled into the aisle, or bumped into the woman’s seat, or, in one instant, sent a baseball cap sailing into the arm of her periwinkle blazer. Even with the conductor bearing down on them, the kids carried on—hurling bananas, snatching phones—until, standing over them, the conductor cleared his throat and said:
“Excuse me. Is this lady bothering you?”
Like gophers into holes, the teenagers dropped into their seats and remained there for the rest of the ride, communicating in monkish whispers.
“Hi Samantha.”
“Hi Clete. How’s it goin’?”
“Not bad. Nice weather for a visit to the country.”
“It sure is.”
When they pulled into the driveway, Ezra was just emerging from his studio. “Sorry, miss!” he called out across the lawn. “Your reservation isn’t until tomorrow.” He came closer. “How are you, Mary-Alice?”
Alice widened her eyes.
“I mean Samantha-Mary. Samantha Mary-Alice. Mary-Alice is your middle name, isn’t it? But you prefer Samantha, don’t you, Samantha Mary-Alice?”
“That’s right,” said Alice.
“Anyhow.” Clete grinned. “See you Sunday, boss.”
As they approached the house, Ezra put an arm around her. “Ninety-three pages.”
“That’s great.”
“I don’t know if it’s any good.”
The cleaning lady worked around them while they ate lunch. Alice began to tell him about the old woman on the train, but as soon as she said “periwinkle” Ezra lowered his ginger ale and shook his head.
“Don’t sentimentalize her.”
“You always say that. Don’t sentimentalize people. As though I have a choice.”
“Sentiments are okay. Not sentimentality.”
The cleaning lady winked. “He is so funny.”
“Who?”
“You, Mister Blazer.”
“He certainly is,” said Alice, getting up. “Hey, the Yankees are playing the Red Sox tonight.”
“Hey, I’m going to take a nap. And then I’ll be in my studio. I’ve got some boxes to go through.”
“What boxes?”
“For my biographer.”
“What biographer?”
“My eventual biographer.” In the living room there was a thump. “Janice,” Ezra called over his shoulder. “Is everything all right?”
“I just killed the biggest wasp.”
“I thought George Plimpton was the biggest wasp.”
“I’m going for a swim,” said Alice.
“Wait, darling. What time’s your train?”
Alice looked at him.
“I mean,” he said, shaking his head, “what time’s the baseball on?”
It was cool for June; steam rose from the water as though a river of magma flowed only a fathom below. Rustling trees cast trembling shadows on the basin, whose layers had chipped away over the years to leave swirls of old grays, greens, and aquamarines, like an antique sea chart. Beneath the surface, Alice’s hands, still coming together and swiveling apart, began to look less like instruments of propulsion than like confused magnets, or hands trying to find their way out of a dark room. But still, she swam. She swam until the wind whistled and the sun sank pink behind the redbuds. She swam until her lips turned blue and her nipples knotted. She swam until a series of lights came on in the house and Ezra’s silhouette could be seen at the kitchen door, calling for her with the worried singsong of any homesteader calling for his dog.
Still dripping, she found on the bed:
A commemorative issue