Colum McCann - Let the Great World Spin

Quick quick.

Almost time.

She has been to four houses over the past eight months. All of them simple, clean, ordinary, lovely. Staten Island, the Bronx, two on the Lower East Side. Never any fuss. Just a gathering of mothers. That’s all. But they were drop-jawed at her address when she finally told them. She had managed to avoid it for a while, but then they went to Gloria’s apartment in the Bronx. A row of projects. She had never seen anything like it before. Scorch marks on the doorways. The smell of boric acid in the hall. Needles in the elevator. She was terrified. She went up to the eleventh floor. A metal door with five locks. When she rapped, the door vibrated on its hinges. But inside the apartment sparkled. Two huge chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, cheap but charming. The light chased the place free of shadows. The other women were already there — they smiled at her from the deep, pouchy sofa. They air-kissed, all of them, and the morning drifted smoothly. They even forgot where they were. Gloria bustled around, changing coasters, swapping napkins, cracking the windows for smokers, then showed them her sons’ room. She had lost three boys, imagine — three! — poor Gloria. The photo albums were thick with memory: hairstyles, running meets, graduations. The baseball trophies were passed around the room. It was a lovely morning, all in all, and it drifted, drifted, drifted. And then the clock on top of the radiator clicked to noon and the talk came around to the next time. Well, Claire, you’re up next. She felt like her mouth was made of chalk. Almost swallowed it as she spoke. Like an apology. Looking at Gloria all the time. Well, I’m on Park at Seventy-sixth. Silence, then. You get the six. She had rehearsed that. And then she said: Train. And then: The subway. And then: Top floor. None of it came out right, how she said it, like the words didn’t quite fit on her tongue. You live on Park? said Jacqueline. Another silence. That’s nice , said Gloria, a dab of light on her lips where she licked them, as if there were something to be removed there. And Marcia, the designer from Staten Island, clapped her hands together. Tea with the Queen! she said, joking, no harm meant, really, but still it pulsed, a brief wound.

Claire had told them, at the first meeting, that she lived on the East Side, that was all, but they must have known, even though she wore long pants and sneakers, no jewelry at all, must have intuited anyway, that it was the Upper East Side, and then Janet, the blonde, leaned forward and piped up: Oh, we didn’t know you lived up there.

Up there. As if it were somewhere to climb. As if they would have to ascend to it. Ropes and helmets and carabiners.

She had actually felt faint. Like there was air in the back of her legs. Like she might be trying to show off. Rubbing their noses in it. Her whole body swayed. She stammered. I grew up in Florida. It’s very small, really. The plumbing is shocking. The roof’s a mess. She was about to say that she didn’t have help — not servants , she would never have said servants— when Gloria, dearest Gloria, said: Hell’s bells, Park Avenue, I’ve only ever been there for Monopoly! And they had all laughed. Reared back and just flat-out laughed. It gave her a chance to sip water. Squeeze out a smile. Take a breath. They couldn’t wait. Park Avenue! Jeepers creepers, isn’t that the purple one? Well, it wasn’t the purple one. The purple one was Park Place, but Claire didn’t say a word, why show off? They left together, all except Gloria, of course. Gloria waved from the eleventh-floor window, her patterned dress against the window bars across her chest. She looked so lost and lovely up there. It was the time of the garbage strike. Rats out by the trash. Streetwalkers by the underpass. In hot pants and halters, even in the snow flurries. Sheltering from the cold. Running out to the trucks when they passed. Clouds of white breath coming from them. Terrible cartoon bubbles. Claire wanted to dash back upstairs and bring Gloria with her, take her away from the horrific mess. But there was no going back to the eleventh floor. What could she say? Come, Gloria, pass go, collect two hundred, get out of jail free.

They had walked to the subway in a close group, four white women, their handbags held just a little too tightly. Might have been mistaken for social workers. All of them neatly dressed, but not overdone. They waited for the train in a smiling silence. Janet nervously tapped her shoe. Marcia fixed her mascara in a small mirror. Jacqueline swept back her long red hair. The train came, a wash of color, big curvy whirls, and in they got. It was one of those carriages covered head to toe in graffiti. Even the windows were blotted out. Hardly a moving Picasso. They were the only white women in the car. Not that she minded getting the subway. She just wouldn’t tell them that it was only her second time. But nobody looked sideways at them, or said a rotten word. She got out at Sixty-eighth just so she could walk, get some air, be alone. She strolled up the avenue, wondering why she had ever gotten together with them in the first place. They were all so different, so little in common. But, still, she liked them all, she really did. Gloria especially. She had nothing against anyone — why would she? She hated that manner of talk. In Florida, her father had once said at dinner: I like Negroes, yessir, I think everyone should own one. She had stormed from the table and stayed in her room for two days. Her dinner was slid in under the door. Well, not slid under. Handed around the doorknob. Seventeen and about to go off to college. Tell Daddy I’m not coming out until he apologizes. And he did. Clomped up the curving staircase. Held her in his big round southern arms and called her modern.

Modern. Like a fixture. A painting. A Miró.

But it’s only an apartment anyway. An apartment. Nothing more. Silverware and china and windows and trim and kitchenware. Only that. Nothing else. Homespun. Ordinary enough. What more could it be? Nothing. Let me tell you, Gloria, the walls between us are quite thin. One cry and they all come tumbling down. Empty mail slots. Nobody writes to me. The co-op board is a nightmare. Pet hair in the laundry machines. Doorman downstairs in his white gloves and creased trousers and epaulets, but just a little secret between you and me: he doesn’t use deodorant.

A quick shiver splits through her: the doorman.

Wonder, will he question them too much? Who is it today? Melvyn, is it? The new one? Wednesday. Melvyn, yes. If he mistakes them for the help? If he shows them to the service elevator? Must call down and tell him. Earrings! Yes. Earrings. Quick now. In the bottom of the box, an old pair, simple silver studs, seldom worn. The bar a little rusty, but no matter. She wets each stem in her mouth. Catches sight of herself in the mirror again. The shell-patterned dress, the shoulder-length hair, the badger streak. She was mistaken once for the mother of a young intellectual seen on television, talking of photography, the moment of capture, the defiant art. She too had a badger streak. Photographs keep the dead alive , the girl had said. Not true. So much more than photographs. So much more.

Eyes a little glassy already. Not good. Buck up, Claire. She reaches for the tissues beyond the glass figurines on the dresser, dries her eyes. Runs to the inner hallway, picks up the ancient handset.

— Melvyn?

She buzzes again. Maybe outside smoking.

— Melvyn?!

— Yes, Mrs. Soderberg?

His voice calm, even. Welsh or Scottish — she’s never asked.

— I have some friends dining with me this morning.