Deena Goldstone - Surprise Me

“That’s fucked,” Nate says as he pushes himself into motion and out of the room. “You want lunch? I’m heating up the leftover soup.”

“No,” Isabelle says, staring at the empty computer screen hopelessly. “I’ve got to manufacture something startling, and don’t roll your eyes,” she says, even though Nate is in the kitchen now, banging pots around, and she can’t see him. It doesn’t matter. She knows that rolling his eyes is exactly what he’s doing.

And then she hears him walk into the living room and turn on the TV, ignoring the fact that she’s trying to work in the next room. He likes to catch up on the noon news while he eats and calls out random bits of information he thinks are noteworthy every few minutes.

“Izzy, Tonya Harding’s husband, Jeff something or other, took a plea for whacking Nancy Kerrigan’s leg.”

“Really?” is all she needs to say to satisfy him.

“Whoa, that Tonya’s in trouble now.”

“Nate, I’m trying to work here.”

Thankfully, he’s quiet, and after forty-five minutes of staring at her computer screen, she hears Nate leave the house. He has an afternoon seminar, she knows, on drug policy and criminal intent. “Later,” she hears him yell as the back door slams shut. Always so noisy, as if every action has to be punctuated by an aggravated sound. And then the house is quiet. Perhaps she is the only one home, but she doesn’t think so.

The kitchen is empty; the dented tin pot he used to heat up the soup is still on the stove. They rented this old shingled house knowing there was no microwave or dishwasher, but somehow that hasn’t translated for Nate into the idea that he has to wash his own dishes.

She turns to the living room, where Nate’s soup bowl rests on the floor next to the couch, and paces from the fireplace they’ve never used to the large windows that look out on the front porch, which they do once the weather turns warm. She’s totally lost. She knows it. How can she come up with something that surprises Daniel Jablonski when she has no frame of reference? What would he consider startling? She has no idea.

Down the hall she goes, to the back of the house, and stops outside Jilly’s room, ear to the door. She’s trying to figure out whether her roommate is home and sleeping. Jilly has opinions about everything. Maybe Isabelle can borrow some surprising data from her. Quietly she turns the doorknob and peeks in. There Jilly is. Well, there is the top of her very messy, curly hair above the mass of sheets and comforter. How can one person sleep so much? She closes the door softly.

Deepti, Isabelle thinks, maybe Deepti is home. It’s hard to know, because when Deepti studies, it’s always in her room and she’s quiet as a mouse. There must be many surprising things she could say, coming from another culture to go to college. She knocks gently on the last door at the end of the hall.

“Deepti?”

“Yes, Isabelle? Come in.”

And Isabelle does. It’s like taking a step into another country. Immediately the vibrant, hot colors of Indian prints assault her eye. There are the patterned silk curtains at the windows, a batik bedspread, and Deepti sitting cross-legged on her bed in a green and pink sari, her chemistry books spread out around her in one circle and her class notes spread out in another.

“I have a question.”

“Okay.” Deepti puts her highlighter aside.

“What surprises you?”

“I am surprised that I ended up in Los Angeles.”

“Yes…but what surprises you about life in general?”

“Ahhh, a deeper question.” Deepti looks out the window to the side yard, where a star jasmine vine is in the midst of winding its way around a chain-link fence, obliterating ugliness and replacing it with beauty. Soon the jasmine flowers will perfume her room, and Deepti can hardly wait. Now she takes a quiet moment to contemplate Isabelle’s question.

“That people sometimes act kindly,” Deepti says finally.

“I used that already. Unfortunately.”

“What is this for?”

“Daniel Jablonski.”

“You have to give him the gift of surprise?”

“Yes! Exactly!”

“Then it has to be from you.”

Isabelle groans. “I’m the least surprising person alive.”

And Deepti laughs, a soft, rounded series of chuckles that always makes Isabelle smile, too. “Maybe not.”

By four o’clock Isabelle has managed to write not one word. She thinks it’s safe to call home now. It will be seven o’clock in Merrick, Long Island, and her father should be there, back from the train that takes him to the city each day and brings him home. If she had called his law office in Manhattan, he wouldn’t have had the time to hash out her question. And if she called home before he got there, her mother would be no help at all.

It is Ruth Rothman’s opinion, communicated to Isabelle in ways both subtle and overt, that her daughter is far too dependable to be original — she lacks the temperament. In their family, Ruth long ago claimed the mantle of “creative spirit.” During her long quest to find her particular métier, Ruth has tried painting, photography, ceramics, fiber art, and jewelry making. With each obsession, Isabelle dutifully stepped in to care for her three younger brothers, and when Ruth retreated to her bedroom — her latest passion sputtering out — drew the curtains, and took to bed, Isabelle picked up the slack then, too. Ruth’s migraines are legendary.

“Dad,” Isabelle says when her father, thankfully, answers the phone.

“There’s been another earthquake?”

“No, Dad, but I have a question.”

“Shoot.” She can hear the relief in his voice. He can deal with a question but not another natural disaster.

“What surprises you?”

“Give me the context.” Her father, always the lawyer.

“I’m taking this writing tutorial—”

“You are? What for? You write fine.”

“It’s creative writing.”

“Same question.”

“There’s a man here on campus”—Isabelle is wary, trying to explain something to her very practical father, who she fears won’t be able to understand it—“a published novelist, a wonderful writer actually, and every semester he takes on a student or two to mentor.”

“And?”

“And this semester it’s me.”

“You’ve finished all your other courses? You don’t have any requirements to take so you can fool around with creative writing?”

“Actually, yes.”

“Hmmmm.” And there’s silence while her father digests this.

Isabelle figures she’ll try once more. She’s desperate. “So, Dad, I have to come up with something that surprises him when I hand in my work next week, and I’m drawing a blank.”

“Well, of course, that’s a stupid assignment.”

Now it’s Isabelle’s turn to be silent. Her father sounds too much like Nate for her to continue this conversation.

“Here,” her father says, “say hello to your mother.” And Ruth gets on the line.

“Hi, Mom.”

“What’s wrong?” are her mother’s first words.

Isabelle sighs. “Nothing.”

“Then why are you calling?”

“I thought Dad might be able to help me with an assignment.”

“And did he?”

“No.”

“I could have told you that.”

“Okay, Mom, how are you? How’re your headaches?”

“They’re there. It’s what I live with.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Wait a minute, your father wants to say something.”

And Isabelle waits while her mother hands over the receiver. She hears Ruth questioning her father—“Didn’t you just speak with her?”—when they all know he just did. Then her father has to explain why he needs to talk to Isabelle again. Through it all, Isabelle waits. She’s used to the constant dissension between them. Finally she hears her father’s voice.