Ark (21 page)

“Maybe you want to get a juice on the way,” the doorman said. Then he went to open the front door. A woman entered the building. “Ms. Sears, how are you?”

“Hello, Raul. Take these.”

The woman pushed her shopping bags into Raul's hands. Rebecca saw the woman in the reflection of the mirror. She thought she was the image of Marilyn Monroe, if the actress had lived another thirty years and never cleaned up. The face was attractive but bloated, the curled platinum blond hair badly damaged. The skirt and blouse were meant for someone a third her age. She walked straight past Rebecca. And once Rebecca saw her blue wide-set eyes, she recognized her instantly.

“It's Mandy Sears,” she said, quietly, to herself.

Rebecca had never liked Mandy, but she wouldn't pretend as if she had ever given her father's ex-lover a chance. Although, why was she here now?

Suddenly, Rebecca turned toward her and said, “You're Mandy Sears, aren't you?”

Mandy had stepped onto the elevator. She acknowledged Rebecca with a suspicious look. “I am. Who are you?”

“Rebecca Arkin, Oliver's daughter.”

“Ohhhhh, yes. Nice to see you.”

Rebecca drew her forefinger down one side of her nose and then the other, trying to make quick sense of the situation.

Raul had taken out a broom and was sweeping up near the front door. However, Rebecca, eyeing the doorman, wondered why he had addressed her by her last name and had acted so familiarly. Rebecca said to Mandy, “Do you live here?”

A red scarf hung over Mandy's shoulders. She brought it twice around her neck, and said, “I do, yes.”

“Oh,” said Rebecca, “okay, now I see.” But she didn't. Taking her hands to her face, she said, “How long have you been in the building?”

“Fifteen years.”

“Hmm. Fifteen years? And did you help my father get an apartment here?”

Mandy placed her hand in front of the elevator door to keep it from closing, and smiled a peculiar smile. She said, “Help your father get an apartment here? You could say that. Oliver called me up about four months ago. He took me for a drink. He said he needed a place. I have the extra apartment upstairs. So I've been letting him stay.”

“You've been letting him stay?”

“Yes,” Mandy told her. “For now anyway.”

“And what do you charge him?”

Mandy began to laugh. “Charge your dad? I would never do that. Especially with his money problems.”

Suddenly, Rebecca couldn't breathe. There was a pain in her shoulders.

“Your father is very sweet. It's nice to have him around.”

“Right.”

“And how've you been, Rebecca?”

“I'm fine.”

“You're a lawyer, aren't you?”

But without answering, Rebecca ran from the building. Passing the Morgan, her thoughts were forced into a standstill. Then she began saying to herself, “I'll get away from here. I'll just leave.”

She walked faster, faster. Cars were triple parked in front of an office building on Thirty-Seventh, and taxis fought to get through the pack. Rebecca was telling herself that she couldn't just leave New York though. She had work to do. But had Mandy meant it when she'd said she wasn't charging her father rent? She had, hadn't she? Then what had her father been doing with the money she'd been giving him? As if the answer to her question were on her phone, she looked at the device. She had missed three calls from her office. A man on the sidewalk was trying to get her attention. He had on headphones and he was dancing. He passed a glossy, index-sized card into her hand. She gave him a look, like he had violated her. Her skin hot and eyes filling with tears, she began to scream, “Don't touch me!”

But with the headphones on, the man couldn't hear her. Rebecca realized she was standing in the middle of the sidewalk. People were trying to get past. They knocked her one way, then the other. She had to get to the curb. But even that was difficult now, for there was no space for her to move.

XI: REFRIGERATION

 

Twenty minutes later, Rebecca went to the bank. In the desolate tinker-toy room, the teller accepted Rebecca's withdrawal slip and I.D. and, within a minute, passed an envelope with $7,634.08 back through the window. She went to sit on one of the couches in the waiting area. Soft music piped through speakers embedded in the ceiling. Rebecca took out her phone. But in how many words could she say it? Ten? Maybe fewer.

“I saw Mandy in your lobby. No more money.”

That explained it all, did it not?

At the next moment, Rebecca picked up her phone and began to write an email to her father. She spoke of encountering Mandy in his lobby, but also of knowing that he hadn't been paying rent all this time, that he had been lying to her and abusing her generosity. She said that he was cut off, and that he should stay away from her.

“Don't call me. Don't write. Don't show up at my apartment. I don't want to see you.”

She wished him well with his lawsuit. Then erased those lines, and said that he had behaved despicably and that she would never forgive him for this—and then sent the email.

A moment later, she thought,
I have to get out of here
. She left the bank and started home in a taxi. The street light at the intersection of Fifty-Seventh and Madison was off. The sun was blocked out by the IBM Building. Two white-gloved police officers blew their whistles, trying to get vehicles to pass. The traffic cop was screaming, “Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!” The driver slapped the steering wheel. He said, “Go where? Where does she think we can go? We've got no room anywhere.”

Fifteen minutes, the taxi was pulling up in front of Rebecca's apartment. She asked the doorman not to ring up for any reason. On her doormat, she saw the notice about the increase to her monthly maintenance and left it where it was, pushed open the door, dropped her bag, and started pulling off her clothes, first her jacket, then her top, next her shoes and socks, and finally her pants. The sun was bright in her room. She lowered the shades, crawled into bed, pulled the covers over her, and slept until 5 a.m. the next day.

The moment she woke, her overwrought nerves propelled her from the bed and she went out into the streets at once with her red Peugeot. She felt an instant gratitude for the bicycle. Without it, where would she be? Under the covers being devoured by her mind, in all likelihood. The exertion and the wind and the motion was a good temporary cure. At Fifty-Ninth, she cut over to the West Side Highway and rode downtown, past the Intrepid, and Chelsea Piers, and farther south to Battery Park. The city was so quiet and empty and peaceful. She circled back uptown through the Financial District and Tribeca. Crossing over Canal on Sixth Avenue, she cycled east on Prince and turned onto Wooster Street.

There was her grandparents' loft. A light was on in the art studio. A window was open, too. Rebecca stared in from the sidewalk across the street. Was someone inside? It seemed like it. She could hear a radio coming from there. And now she could see the dark hair and forehead and eyes of Jerome. What was he doing that caused him to move so rapidly from one place to another? More importantly, why was he there at all?

From below the window, she called out his name. He didn't hear. She tried again, to no avail, and decided then to ring the buzzer. Suddenly Jerome was leaning out the window. He was only one story up. However, there wasn't much light on the street, and he couldn't make out Rebecca.

“Jerome, it's me.”

“Rebecca?” He disappeared for a moment, and then stepped out through a different window onto a fire escape. Now he was smiling down at her. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same question.”

But Jerome was in a frenzied state, and he made nothing of her comment. He said, “You've got to come up and see this.”

Rebecca chained her bike to the scaffolding outside. Jerome buzzed her into the building. The elevator door opened onto the second floor, and Jerome was all of a sudden hurrying her into the art studio. Now he was holding out his hands in the direction of eight old refrigerators. They were white. The shelves of each were stacked with books. Jerome began adjusting the doors. He had a very specific idea of how they should be positioned. His expression was one of intense focus. He said, “Rebecca, I'm so glad you're here. I've been working from Ben's plans. They're amazing, aren't they?”

Rebecca was impressed. She said, “Yes, Jerome.” She made a loop of the refrigerators. She examined them from every side. “I think Ben would be very happy about this. You've pulled off something special here.”

“Thank you.”

Jerome seemed to become full of wanting and hope, and his facial muscles began to work to keep back tears. He went once around the refrigerators, walking off the emotion of it. And then, smiling through his grief, he stood up straight, his head cocked. His elbows pointed out at the sides. He told Rebecca to take a closer look. There were all kinds of books loaded into the refrigerators: encyclopedias, cookbooks, how-to books, fiction and plays and poetry. At the bottom of one refrigerator, the fruit and vegetable bins had been removed to make room for Ben's journals. Taking one in her hand and flipping through the pages, Rebecca examined her grandfather's frantic handwriting, his to-do lists, the way he boxed off important things. There was a sketch of a television with an X through it on one page; he had needed the cable company to come over and fix his connection. Three pill bottles were drawn into a margin on another page; it had been time to refill his medications. There was a lot of arithmetic being done. Ben might have found beauty in the coffee stain, the brown rings were everywhere. Rebecca saw how he had asked himself, on July 11th, 1992, to quit smoking cigars. That same day there'd been a deal on Ocean Spray cranberry juice at the IGA: 32 oz. containers, two for one. She turned the page, to July 12, 1992:

Need eggshells for the next piece. Go to Buffa's and ask for theirs.
Go to Bigelow. New shaving kit.
Bread, chicken, sunflower seeds.
Pay phone bill.
Amaze yourself!

Suddenly she looked at Jerome. Some new discovery had gripped him. He was crossing the studio to a refrigerator. He began re-angling the door. Shifting one refrigerator door meant shifting them all, however, and he did that now. It was difficult for Rebecca to believe that he wasn't simply delusional. Well, what did it matter if he were? Her grandfather's old assistant enjoyed moving these doors around. Why say anything about it?

“These refrigerators will be at MOMA one day,” said Jerome. “I'm going to make Ben famous. I mean that.”

“I'm sure you do. But how many unknown artists have become famous after death?”

“I don't know. How many?”

“You can count them on one hand.”

“If it's happened before, it can happen again.”

“What do you even know about any of this business?”

“I know that Ark was a genius.”

“Even if it were possible to get Ben's work out there, it would mean dealing with my father and his sisters. You'd be welcoming those mental cases into your life. That's not a problem for you?”

“No.”

“Are you aware that they're in the middle of a lawsuit?”

“Yes.”

“And you'd poke your head into that mix?”

“Yes.”

“And if they said no?”

“I'd do it anyway. He saved my life, do you know that?”

“Saved your life?”

“Yes.”

“Jerome, he hired you to work a job which a hundred people had already tried and quit.”

“He made me fit for this world. I can do anything now.”

“And you want to focus on making Ben famous?

“Who owns the rest of Ark's work?”

“It's not official, but I assume Doris will. The whole estate looks like it'll go to her.”

“So set up a meeting with Doris. I have to talk to her about this.”

“I won't deal in business matters with my family.”

“You won't have to be there.”

“Sorry, Jerome.”

“Do you believe in Ark's work?”

“Believe what? That it exists?”

“Would you be happy if people came to know about it?”

“I don't care. And being that he's dead, I don't think he would either.”

“Please, Rebecca. Talk to them.”

“No.”

“For all I went through with Ben, please.”

“No. I'm sorry. I have to go.”

Jerome followed Rebecca to the elevator. He was telling her that he wouldn't give up, he had big plans for Ben, he would put his whole life into the endeavor, he would convince Ben's children that he was the right person for the job, he would organize Ben's catalogue, he would make people aware of his art, get Ben a show, first in New York, and then in the world beyond it. Give him five years. Give him ten. He would do it all.

Rebecca wished him good luck. She was waiting for him to let go of the elevator gate so she could leave. But then, the moment he released the metal handle, she called out to him. She had one more thing to say.

She had to ask a favor of him. Yes, she had to say it: “You were a witness to my grandparents' last will and testament. My father needs you to testify about Eliza's cognizance at the time of her signing. Please, don't ignore him. He'll end up with nothing if you do.”

Jerome leaned back from the waist, struck by some idea. He said, “We could help each other, Rebecca.”

But Rebecca shook her head, and closed herself inside the elevator, pushing for the ground floor.

One week passed and then another. Rebecca didn't hear from her father. But what of the voice which had been chattering on in her head of late? Had it not reached a crescendo on her way home from work the other day? Had she not almost fainted on the subway platform during rush hour? To Rebecca, an emotional collapse of any kind seemed impossible just a short while ago. But bitterness, and rancor, and an uncertainty in herself had gained so much strength over these past weeks. She woke in the night worrying about whether her father could afford his breakfast. Then, sitting up in the dark, she would call him a hustler, a dirty manipulator. At the next moment, she would beat her chest, revolted by her own callousness. Why, he could make as many mistakes as he liked because he had raised and supported her for twenty-five years. But out on the red Peugeot an hour later, the sky still dark in the small hours of the night, she would think that she should cut him out of her life forever. He had conned her out of so much money. How could their relationship ever recover from that?