Wifey (2 page)

In terms of affluence America in the 60s reached a stage that other societies can only dream of.

—From
Good Times
by Peter Joseph

1

S
ANDY SAT UP
in bed and looked at the clock. Quarter to eight. Damn! Last night she’d told Norman she might sleep all day just to catch up. No kids for once, no demands, no responsibilities. But the noise. What was it, a truck, a bus? It sounded so close. And then the empty sound after the engine cut off. She’d never get back to sleep now. She slipped into her robe, the one the children had given her for Mother’s Day. “Daddy picked it out,” Jen had said. “Do you like it?” “Oh yes, it’s perfect,” Sandy had answered, hating it. Imagine Norman choosing the same robe for her as she had sent to his mother and her own.

She traipsed across the room to the window, rubbing her eyes to keep them open, spitting her hair out of her face. She looked down into the wooded backyard. He was in front of the crab apple tree, hands on hips, as if waiting for her, dressed in a white bed sheet and a stars and stripes helmet, standing next to a motorcycle. What was this? A kid, playing Halloween? A neighborhood ghost? No . . . look . . . he threw off the bed sheet and stood before her, naked, his penis long and stiff. Sandy dropped to her knees, barely peeking out the window, afraid, but fascinated, not just by the act itself, but by the style. So fast, so hard! Didn’t it hurt, handling it that way? She’d always been so careful with Norman’s, scared that she might damage it. Who was he? What was he doing in her yard?
Nineteen, twenty, twenty-one,
Sandy counted. He came on twenty-seven, leaving his stuff on her lawn, then jumped on his bike, kicked down with one foot, and started up the engine. But wait. It stalled. Would she have to call Triple A and if so how was she going to explain the problem?
Hello, this is Mrs. Pressman . . . there’s a . . . you see . . . well . . . anyway . . . and he’s having trouble with his motorcycle . . .
No. No need to worry. The engine caught and he took off, zooming down the street, wearing only the stars and stripes helmet.

She called Norman first, at the plant, and he asked, “Did it make ridges in the lawn?”

“What?”

“The motorcycle, did it make ridges in the lawn?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, find out.”

“Now?”

“Yes, I’ll hold.”

She put the phone down and ran outside.

“Yes, there are ridges,” she told Norman. “Two of them.”

“Okay. First thing, call Rufano, tell him to take care of it.”

“Right. Rufano,” she repeated, jotting it down. “Should he reseed or what?”

“I can’t say. I’m not there, am I? Let him decide, he’s the doctor.”

“But it doesn’t pay to put money into the lawn when we’re moving, does it?”

“We haven’t sold the house yet. It would be different if we’d already sold.”

“Norm . . .”

“What?”

“I’m a little shaky.”

“I’ll call the police as soon as we hang up.”

“I’m not dressed.”

“So get dressed.”

“Are you coming home?”

“I can’t, Sandy. I’m in the middle of a new solution.”

“Oh.”

“See you tonight.”

“Right.”

Sandy showered and dressed and waited for the police.

“
O
KAY,
M
RS.
P
RESSMAN,
let’s have it again.” She’d expected, at the very least, Columbo. Instead she got Hubanski, tall and thin, with a missing tooth and an itchy leg. He sat on the sofa and scratched the area above his black anklet sock. Plainfield, New Jersey’s, finest.

“My husband told you the whole story, didn’t he?”

“Uh huh.”

He whipped his notebook out of his pocket and made squiggles with his ballpoint pen. “Doesn’t seem to be working today.”

“Try blowing in it,” Sandy suggested. “Sometimes that helps.”

Hubanski blew into the end of his ballpoint and tried again. “Nope, nothing.”

“Just a minute.” Sandy went into the kitchen and came back with a pen. “Try this one.”

“Thanks,” he said, printing his name.

Sandy sat down on the love seat opposite him, tucking her legs under her.

“Okay, now I want to hear it from you, Mrs. Pressman. You say it was about quarter past eight?”

“No, quarter to.”

“You’re sure of that?”

“Yes, positive, because as soon as I woke up I looked at the clock.”

“And the noise that woke you sounded like a motorcycle?”

“Well, I didn’t know it was a motorcycle then. I just knew it was a noise, which is why I went over to the window in the first place.”

“Now, we have to be very sure about this, Mrs. Pressman.”

“I looked out the window and there he was,” Sandy said. “It’s very simple.”

“He didn’t ring the bell or anything, first?”

“Why would he have done that?”

“I’m only trying to set the record straight, Mrs. Pressman, because, you know, this isn’t our everyday, ordinary kind of complaint. So just take your time and tell me again.”

“He was wearing a sheet and he was looking up at me.”

“Now, this here’s the important part, Mrs. Pressman, and I want to be sure I’ve got it one hundred per cent right. You’re telling me that this guy rides up on a motorcycle.”

“Yes.”

“And he’s got a bed sheet over him.”

“That’s right.”

“Like your ordinary everyday kind of bed sheet?”

“Yes, plain white, hospital variety.”

“Okay, I get the picture. So let’s take it from there, Mrs. Pressman. Now, you look down from your bedroom window and he looks up. Is that right so far?”

“Very good, you’re doing fine.”

“Look, Mrs. Pressman, you might not believe it, but this is no picnic for me either.”

“Sorry.”

“Okay, so he takes off the sheet.”

“Right.”

“And he’s stark naked.”

“Yes, except for his helmet . . . stars and stripes . . .”

“Yeah, I already got that. So, go on.”

“Well, then he masturbated. And that’s about it.”

“You say
about.
Is there something else?”

“No, he got on his motorcycle and rode off. That’s it.”

“Naked?”

“Yes, I told you that.”

“So where’s the bed sheet, Mrs. Pressman?” He held up his hand, a hint of a smile showing on his face for the first time.

“I don’t know.”

“You didn’t pick it up when you went out to inspect the lawn?”

“No.”

“And you didn’t see him pick it up either?”

“No, but he might have. Because I was pretty upset at the time, as you can imagine. I might have missed that.”

“What I don’t get, Mrs. Pressman, is how come you watched the whole thing. I mean, you could have called us right off. We might have been able to get over here in time.”

“I was scared, I guess. I just don’t know.”

“How about a make on the motorcycle?”

“It was chrome.”

“Come on, Mrs. Pressman. You can do better than that. Was it this year’s model, a 1970? Or would you say it was five to ten years old?”

“I don’t know. They all look the same to me.”

He clicked the pen closed, stood up, and handed it to Sandy.

“Keep it,” she said, “I’m sure you’ll need it.”

“Thanks. Say listen, what about the dog? Your husband said you have a dog.”

“We do, a miniature schnauzer, Banushka. But he slept through it.”

“You’re sure he was white?”

“Who?”

“The guy—the exhibitionist.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Because a lot of these mixed races can look almost white.”

“No, he was white. Like you.”

He sighed. “Well, you haven’t given me much to go on, Mrs. Pressman.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Look, if you remember anything else, no matter how small, give me a call, okay? And in the meantime I’ll do my best.”

“That’s all anyone can ask for, sergeant . . .” Sandy paused. What the hell was his name?

“Hubanski. U-ban-ski. The H is silent.”

“I’ll remember that. Good-bye . . . and thank you.”

As Hubanski was walking down the front steps Sandy called, “Oh, sergeant?”

He turned. “Yeah.”

“I just remembered . . . he was left-handed.”

“
H
UBANSKI DIDN’T BELIEVE ME,”
she told Norman that night, over chicken piquant. She was really pissed about that.

“It is an incredible story, Sandy.”

“Don’t you think I know that?”

“How come we’re having chicken tonight? It’s Monday, we always have chicken on Wednesdays.”

“I didn’t stop to think. I just defrosted the first thing I saw when I opened the freezer. Besides, with the kids away, what’s the difference?”

“The difference is that I count on chicken on Wednesdays, the way I count on pot roast on Thursdays and some sort of chopped meat on Tuesdays. I had chicken salad for lunch.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Did you get this recipe from your sister?”

“No, from
Elegant but Easy.
”

“Not bad. You should have browned it first, though.”

“It’s a pain to brown chicken. That’s why I made this one, you don’t need to brown it first.”

“It would look more appetizing if you did, next time.”

“So close your eyes!”

“I’m just making a suggestion, San. No need to get so touchy about it.”

“Who’s touchy?”

Norman took off his glasses and wiped them with his dinner napkin. “I think what you need is new interests, especially now, with the kids away for the whole summer.”

Was he doubting her story too? “I have plenty to do. There’s the new house and besides that, I’m going to read. I’m going to do the classics. I told you that.”

“But you need to get out of the house more, to mingle,” Norman said.

“I don’t need to be around people all the time.”

“You lack self-confidence.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m trying to tell you, trying to help you, if only you’ll let me.”

“Do you want more rice?”

“Yes, thank you. I think The Club is the answer, San.”

“Oh, please, Norm, don’t start that again.”

“I thought we agreed that as soon as the kids left you’d give it another try.”

“Look, I told you when you joined that it wasn’t my thing . . . that I didn’t want any part of it. So don’t expect . . . don’t ask me to . . .” She got up to clear away the dishes.

“Look at your sister,” Norman said.

“You look at her.”

“Four years older than you.”

“Three and a half, but who’s counting?”

“She loves The Club, practically lives there.”

“She was always the family athlete.”

“Tan and firm, in terrific shape.”

“I failed gym in eighth grade, did you know that?” She put a plate of cookies on the table and set two cups of cold water, with tea bags, in the new microwave oven.

“You’re not in the eighth grade anymore, Sandy.” He took a bite of one of the cookies. “Pepperidge Farm?”

“No, Keeblers.” The microwave pinged and Sandy carried the teacups to the table. “Myra got straight A’s in gym, all the way through school. She won letters. She was a goddamned cheerleader!”

“You ought to learn to do more with the microwave than just heat water.”

“I don’t like gadgets.”

“Because you lack self-confidence.”

“What does self-confidence have to do with the microwave?”

“What do gadgets have to do with it?”

“I tried The Club, Norm. I took two golf lessons and two tennis lessons and I was awful. I just don’t have the aptitude, the coordination.”

“Don’t give me that shit, Sandy. You could be as good as most of the girls if you’d make the effort.” He crunched another cookie. “Why don’t you have your hair done . . . buy yourself something new to wear . . . you used to look terrific yourself.”

“Jesus, you sound like my mother now.”

“So she’s noticed too?”

“I’ve been sick, Norm!”

“That was months ago. That’s no excuse for now.”

Sandy went to the sink and turned the water on full blast.

“I guess I’ll walk Banushka,” Norman said.

“You do that!”

“Oh, San, for God’s sake.” He tried to put his arms around her but she brushed him away. “You’re so damned
touchy
these days,” he said. “I can’t even talk to you anymore.”

Anymore?
Sandy thought. But she didn’t say it.

As soon as she heard the back door close she picked up a plate and flung it across the kitchen. It smashed into tiny pieces. She felt better.

2

O
KAY.
S
O SHE DIDN’T LOOK
her best. But that wasn’t her fault, was it? She’d had a rough couple of months and was just beginning to feel healthy again. After an illness like hers it could take a year to get back to normal. And it hadn’t been a year yet. It had started last Halloween, at the supermarket. She’d felt sick at the checkout counter and had to be helped to the Ladies Room by the cashier. She thought she was going to pass out, but once she got her head down, she was okay. The manager had carried her groceries to the car, even offered to drive her home, but she assured him she was fine, that it was just the combination of the overheated store and her heavy jacket. Too warm for October.

In the car, on the way home, she’d been overcome by a wave of nausea and sharp pains in her head. She’d pulled over, feeling very much the way she had when coming down with mono, years ago. In a few minutes that passed too and she was able to drive the rest of the way home. Jen had greeted her at the door. “Oh, Mom, you look so cute with those Halloween decorations on your face.”

“What decorations?”

“Those little hearts.”

Sandy had run to the mirror. Good God, she did have little heart-shaped marks around her eyes and on her cheeks.

William R. Ackerman, M.D., P.C., Diplomate in Internal Medicine, with a sub-specialty in livers, had seen her late that afternoon. By then, the heart-shaped marks had disappeared. “Scarlet fever,” he’d said, relating her condition to Bucky’s recent strep infection. He’d taken a throat culture, then prescribed penicillin; one capsule, three times a day.

Within the week she’d improved enough to resume her family responsibilities, although she certainly wasn’t feeling great. Ten days later it returned, but much worse. A fever of 105, aches and pains in her joints, a strange rash suddenly covering her body; hivelike on her arms, measlelike on her stomach, blotches on her swollen face. She wanted only to sleep.

She was vaguely aware of routine household activity. Aware, but not caring. Aware of the children. “Is Mom going to die?” asked in the same casual tone as
Is Mom going shopping?
Aware of Norman’s anger. She never could understand his anger when she or the children were sick, when life didn’t go as planned, as if it were all her fault. Aware of her mother, called in by Norman to take charge, because in eleven and a half years of marriage he had never missed a day of work or a golf or tennis game. “Oh, my God, my God,” Mona had cried. “My little girl, my darling Sandy.”

This time Dr. Ackerman had stood at the foot of Sandy’s bed, not because he made house calls, but because it was Sunday and he lived across the street and it was more convenient for him to see her at home than to drive across town to his office. He stood there, looking down at her, ticking off possibilities on his fingers. “. . . or it could be indicative of thoracic cancer, leprosy, leukemia, lupus, or a severe allergic reaction.”

Sandy closed her eyes. She didn’t want to hear any more.
Please God, don’t let it be leprosy,
she prayed.

“I think we’ll go with the allergic reaction theory and start her on steroids right away,” Dr. Ackerman said.

“But what exactly is it?” Norman had pressed.

“Erythema multiformi. Debilitating but not fatal.”

So, she wasn’t going to die this time.

“There must be something she can do to prevent these illnesses,” Norman said. “Take vitamins or something. I haven’t got the time for all of this.”

And later, after the doctor had left, she opened her eyes to find Norman’s Nikon pointing at her. “What are you doing?”

“Just a couple of shots,” Norman told her.

“But, Norm . . .”

“Just in case.”

“In case, what?”

“Medical malpractice, you never know.”

Norman read the
AMA Journal
religiously, unusual for a man in the dry-cleaning business. Was he a frustrated physician? Or did his morbid interest stem from Sandy’s physical problems? Dr. Ackerman once told her she was the healthiest
sick
person he had ever treated. Healthy, because basically there was nothing wrong. She had been tested and re-tested. Everything was in good shape, although Dr. Ackerman once suspected her stomach of being in her chest cavity because he heard gurglings while listening to her heart. Not an illness, he’d told her, reassuringly, but a condition
we
should know about, for
our
records. He’d sent her to a radiologist who served her a tall glass of lime-flavored barium. But the X-rays only proved that her stomach was exactly where it should have been.

Camille,
Aunt Lottie had called her as a girl. But Mona said, “It’s not her fault, she has no resistance!”

She had her first important illness at ten. Pilitis, pus in the kidney. It had burned when she peed. How comfortable, how warm and safe, to crawl into bed and have her mother take care of her. Mona was a somewhat nervous but gentle nurse, catering to Sandy’s every need, every wish. The first few days she’d been too sick to do anything but just lie there, dozing off and on. Mona fed her the yucky chocolate-flavored medicine the doctor had prescribed and when the lab technician came to the house for a blood sample Sandy had vomited it all over him. Mona was terribly embarrassed. “Why didn’t you ask for the bucket?”

“I didn’t know,” Sandy had said. “I’m sorry.”

She had lain in bed for two weeks that time, listening to soap operas on her radio, doing movie star cutout books, reading Nancy Drew mysteries, and practicing upside-down tunnels with her tongue, learned during speech class, before Mona had rushed into school, demanding that Sandy be removed because “There is nothing wrong with my daughter’s speech!” “It’s her
ing
endings,” Miss Tobias had explained. “Her
ing
endings are as good as your
ing
endings, maybe better,” Mona had argued. And won.

In junior high it had been a three-year battle with atopic dermatitis. Everybody else had plain old acne but Sandy suffered through eczema-like patches all over her body and had to sleep with white cotton gloves so that if she scratched during the night she wouldn’t tear her flesh open. In high school she’d been tested for diabetes because of her fainting spells but the tests were negative. And then, as a college freshman, mono. A year later she married Norman, and marriage brought with it a never-ending parade of physical problems. Recurring sore throats, assorted viruses, stomach pains, a ganglian cyst in her right wrist, plantar warts on the bottoms of her feet, combined with two children who had inherited her low resistance, carrying home every available bug, and then, once she’d nursed them back to health, passing each disease on to her. But this, this erythema multiformi, was the most frightening, yet most exotic illness yet.

Sandy responded to the cortisone treatment, without side effects. “Lucky girl,” Dr. Ackerman had said, and within two weeks all the symptoms had disappeared, leaving her ten pounds lighter, tired out, and looking like hell.

T
HEY’D GONE TO
J
AMAICA
over the Christmas holidays. Myra and Gordon had insisted. “Look at you,” Myra had said, “a bird could blow you over. What you need is sunshine, sunshine and rest and besides, if there’s any trouble Gordy can look after you.”

“Gordon’s a gynecologist,” Sandy had said. “This isn’t a gynecological problem.”

“You think just because he’s a gynecologist all he knows about are pussies? I’ll have him talk to Bill Ackerman. We’ll let
him
decide what’s best for you.”

And Dr. Ackerman had given his blessing.

They had flown down to Montego Bay together. Myra, Gordon, and their twin daughters; Sandy, Norman, Bucky, and Jen. “If this plane should go down, God forbid,” Mona had said, seeing them off, “then I’m taking pills . . . maybe gas . . . my whole life’s on board!”

“You should be coming with us,” Myra said.

“I don’t fly, period!” Mona answered. And then she repeated her story about taking pills or gas to the ticket agent, who smiled and said, “No problem.” With what . . . the pills . . . the plane . . . Sandy wondered, taking every word literally. Flying was no joking matter.

She was a nervous flier but she played it cool for the kids.
See how brave Mommy is.
Once on board she prayed every half-hour and tuned in to strange noises, odors, flickering lights, calls for the flight attendants, suspicious-looking characters likely to carry bombs in their luggage, or whatever. And during takeoffs and landings she grabbed Norman’s hand and squeezed as hard as she could. He once got an infection because her fingernail pierced his skin.

Her oldest and dearest friend, Lisbeth, who was into psychology, explained it as Sandy’s need to control her own destiny. “If you were the pilot,” she said, “you wouldn’t be afraid. What you really ought to do is take flying lessons.”

“Oh, sure,” Sandy said, “I don’t have enough trouble driving the car. I still don’t back into parking spaces.”

“And your terror of thunderstorms is the same thing,” Lisbeth had said one summer day when the sky turned black and rumbly. “You have no control over nature.”

“So who does?” Sandy had asked.

“Nobody, but most people accept that.”

“Your explanation is very sensible, but accepting it doesn’t help me.”

“You’ve got to fight to overcome your fears, believe me, I know.”

And Sandy wanted to overcome her fears, was willing to fight, but not on this particular flight. She was too worn out to try anything new.

They’d landed safely, five minutes early, and were welcomed at the airport by a steel band and complimentary daiquiris. Myra had shipped three hundred dollars’ worth of meat with her baggage, packed and frozen in dry ice by her butcher in South Orange. She’d arranged to find the meat broker in front of the Air Jamaica counter but so far he hadn’t shown. Without him her meat would be confiscated. Sandy drank two more daiquiris while Myra ran through the airport in a frenzy, searching for him. Bucky and Jen, hot and bored, were chasing each other. The twins, sullen, as usual, complained about the lack of air-conditioning, and fanned themselves with magazines.

After an hour it was clear that the meat broker was not going to show and they lined up to go through customs. “Bastards!” Myra hissed. “It’s so unfair. They make it hard on us when we’re the ones bringing in the money . . .”

“Relax, lady,” the customs official said, “you got tree days to claim it before it’s confiscated . . .”

“And I’m supposed to trust you to keep it frozen for three days?”

“Sure lady . . . you come back wit de meat broker . . . you take de meat home wit you . . .”

“You expect me to give up a full day of vacation to come back here, unnecessarily?”

“Yes, lady. Dat’s de rule.”

“Oh, you people!” Myra shook her frosted head at him. “No wonder it’s like . . . you think . . .” She pointed at him. “Someday you’ll see.”

“Yes, lady.”

Myra walked off in a huff, gold bracelets bangling, chains swinging around her neck, and were those really perspiration stains under the arms of her beige silk shirt? Sandy had never seen Myra sweat.

The car was there, waiting for them, but even in the Buick Rancho wagon it was tight. Jen fished a piece of wool out of her goody bag and worked a cat’s cradle on her fingers, while Bucky polished off the rest of the cookies, melted by now. Connie and Kate sacked out. Sandy had trouble keeping her eyes open too. It took an hour and a half to get to Runaway Bay. At least none of the kids got carsick anymore.

Myra and Gordon had bought the house eighteen months ago, after falling in love with the area. It came complete with furnishings, four servants, a Rhodesian Ridgeback, and a name. Sandy had seen endless pictures of it but even they didn’t prepare her for the real La Carousella. Round, as its name implied, with a swimming pool in the middle, the roof opened to the sky above it, four bedroom suites around the pool, and a large, glass-walled living room overlooking the golf course, a separate building to house the servants, and a brand new Har-tru tennis court with adjacent thatched-roof bar.

“Hollywooooood . . .” Myra sang, dancing around the pool.

“Mother, please!” her daughters cried.

“Can’t I even enjoy my own house?” Myra asked. “So what do you think, San?”

“I can’t . . . that is . . . I’m speechless!”

“Can we go swimming, Aunt Myra?” Bucky asked.

“Yes, go and change. Everybody go and change. Last one in’s a rotten egg!”

Sandy, exhausted from the trip, said, “I think I’ll take a little rest first.” She didn’t wake up until the next morning.