Alison Lurie - The War Between the Tates - A Novel

But now, this afternoon, a ladder has been lowered into the hole, and she can climb out. Yes. It is Brian who is guilty now; it is Brian who can be exposed. Erica stands with her hand on the door of the station wagon, thinking hard through her headache. She must climb carefully; she must remember what happened last time, how Brian had eventually turned his guilt into hers. She must be armed against every possible counterattack. She must stay cool and not expose her own weakness—no sobbing this time, no passionate jealousy; no accusations without evidence.

But what evidence has she? Frowning, Erica gets into the hot Jar of Peanut Butter, slides behind the wheel, and slams the heavy door. When she confronts him Brian may deny everything. He may put on his professional manner and say that her accusation is not based on historical evidence, but on malicious secondhand or thirdhand gossip. He may accuse her, and Danielle, and Danielle’s acquaintance, of being malicious, suspicious, credulous women.

She turns the ignition key; the engine, as usual, roars once boastfully and dies. Suppose she is in fact suspicious and credulous. For a moment Erica considers this possibility, and what she feels is not relief. She sees her ladder being pulled up, up, out of the moral hole. If Brian is not guilty, she is as deep in the wrong as ever; and she will be in even deeper if she accuses him falsely. Though she does not yet quite put it to herself in these words, she wants him guilty.

Arroor, roor, rr ... Again the motor gives out. The air in the automobile is hot and thick; the plastic brocade of the seat feels sticky against Erica’s thighs, and the wheel is warm and damp. What she needs is more time, more ammunition: she needs to wait and watch Brian, to stockpile evidence and gather her forces before she attacks. There will not be too long to wait, Erica judges; and meanwhile she will have the satisfaction of knowing that whatever Brian may do or say, she is in the right again—triumphantly and thoroughly in the right.

5

IT IS LATE OCTOBER. The high winds have begun to blow and the trees to change color and fall apart, and everything in Brian’s life is changing color and falling apart and going wrong. His colleagues, against his advice, are altering graduate requirements; his students, against his advice, are altering their consciousnesses—in both cases for the worse. Constantly—at lunch in the faculty club, in class, even in committee meetings—arguments about national or campus politics replace discussions of the matter at hand. The war in Southeast Asia is escalating, and. Jones Creek is polluted with detergent.

At home too everything is falling apart. Most obviously the children, whose early adolescent rebellion, instead of running its course, has been escalating. In the past Brian has usually been able to ignore their behavior, but recent changes in his and their schedules have made this impossible. For years he has had no early classes, and therefore has been able to rise and eat breakfast peacefully after Jeffrey and Matilda have left for school. This term he has a nine o’clock. Moreover, the children have now succeeded, after a prolonged and disagreeable contest, in having their bedtime advanced to ten on weekday nights and eleven on weekends. This means that they are always around when he is home; that the radio and/or phonograph is always on, the best chairs in the sitting room occupied, the refrigerator door left hanging open, and the sink full of dirty dishes. Rational protests and attempts at serious discussion of the principles of family living seem to have less and less effect, and Erica is apparently completely unable to cope.

Things have got to the point where there is not just a conflict of generations at the Tates’, but a condition of total war. Hostilities begin when Jeffrey and Matilda wake at seven a.m. and continue throughout the day.

This morning it was Jeffrey who started it; he could not find his left sneaker. Explosions of shouting and cursing; banging of doors and drawers above; Erica leaving Brian’s breakfast on the stove to run up two flights and scuffle among the foul debris in Jeffrey’s closet; two fried eggs rusted to the pan.

Meanwhile Matilda attacked passively, by not getting out of bed. When she finally appeared in the kitchen, after prolonged bombardment, she was dressed for battle. She had recently dyed her hair (and the bathroom wash basin) a vivid and ugly salmon-pink, and was wearing purple flowered bell-bottom jeans and a boy’s skimpy sleeveless undershirt, stretched vulgarly taut by her developing breasts. She stood by the sink cramming jam toast into her mouth and exchanging insults with her father, mother and brother. When it was time to leave for school she pretended not to be able to find her social-studies book; Jeffrey simultaneously announced a rent in his jacket.

After the last door had slammed behind them Brian sat down at the kitchen table, already exhausted, though it was only eight a.m. The angry voices of his wife and children rang in his head still, and all around the room, like the echo of bombs and flak, along with his own angry voice:

“I can’t find my fucking shoe, that’s why!”

“Aw Dad, don’t be disgusting. I haven’t got time to change. Can’t you leave me alone for once?”

“There’s some awful stink in here. If you burned something, I’m not going to eat it.”

“What’s this crap?”

“Hey, Matildy, you really look grungy today.”

“Oh, why don’t you blast off?”

“Screw you.”

“Asshole.”

“Shit.”

“What’s the matter up there, for God’s sake?”

“Do you really have to shout like that?”

“All right, Jeffrey. Pick up that disgusting piece of toast you dropped on the floor.”

“You’ll, miss the bus! And don’t think I’m going to drive you to school this time. You can walk.”

Brian and Erica, like their friends, students and colleagues, have spent considerable time trying to understand and halt the war in Vietnam. If he were to draw a parallel between it and the war now going on in his house, he would have unhesitatingly identified with the South Vietnamese. He would have said that the conflict, begun a year or so ago as a minor police action, intended only to preserve democratic government and maintain the status quo—a preventive measure, really—has escalated steadily and disastrously against his and Erica’s wishes, and in spite of their earnest efforts to end it. For nearly two years, he would point out, the house on Jones Creek Road has been occupied territory. Jeffrey and Matilda have gradually taken it over, moving in troops and supplies, depleting natural resources and destroying the local culture.

From the younger Tates’ position, however, the parallel is reversed. Brian and Erica are the invaders: the large, brutal, callous Americans. They are vastly superior in material resources and military experience, which makes the war deeply unfair; and they have powerful allies like the Corinth Public School System. The current position of Jeffrey and Matilda is, from their own viewpoint, almost tragic. In spite of their innate superiority and their wish for self-government, they remain dependent on Erica's aid and Brian Tate’s investments. Worse still in some ways is the barrage of propaganda and lies they have to endure. Brian and Erica keep insisting publicly that they are not trying to destroy Jeffrey or Matilda, but instead fighting to preserve the best, the most enlightened and democratic elements within them. When they hear these lies, the younger Tates naturally feel exploited and furious. They refuse to negotiate, and retreat into the jungles of their rooms on the third floor, where they plan guerrilla attacks.

Brian and Erica are at a moral and psychological disadvantage in the war because they want to save face both at home and abroad. They have been favored by environment and heredity, and wish to think themselves worthy of their good fortune. They therefore desire (against all reason) to enjoy the affection, respect and gratitude of the people they are at war with and whose territory they have invaded; and they never cease to be deeply hurt and indignant that they are not receiving this affection, etc.