She had prettied up the entry counter with a bouquet of plump pink and violet dahlias in a small silver vase. I filled my red and blue hiking bottles to the brim, tightened the black tops, strode back to the garage, and shoved the glistening vessels snug into my newly installed left compartment. When I saw the bottles in their new setup, it felt like my brain had been rearranged.
I headed up the beautiful hardwood stairs that led to our second story landing. An Armenian craftsman seemed to pull these perfect oak planks from his hat. My wife had access to artists and artisans. She’d grown up in Los Angeles, so she knew people like the young woman who’d painted the beautiful blue and rose canvas hanging above our couch in the living room. It matched a jade end table with flowers etched into its sides.
We’d met through a matchmaker after I’d had an epiphany while alone at LACMA one day. I was on a bench in front of a Roy Lichtenstein lithograph. I was forty and had been dating the wrong women for a long time. I wanted a child but was nowhere close to finding a wife. The Lichtenstein female seemed a caricature of the many women I’d met, with sexy red lips and overdone lashes. Her face was shocked. She held her head in her hand. The cartoon bubble read, “I can’t believe it. I forgot to have children.”
From the padded bench, I stared at the lithograph. Oblivious to the men and women walking in front of me, standing behind me, admiring other art in the gallery, it was as if Lichtenstein had knocked me on the head with his knuckles.
“I forgot to have children.”
I enlisted a Jewish matchmaker and for fifty dollars got a great deal in meeting my wife, a kind-hearted social worker. Nicole, a lovely, petite blonde, who felt like home.
When the time came for one of my trips, I was a whistling tea kettle with my old friend Frank’s happy marriage advice steaming out the top. I needed to get to as remote a place as I could, even if my wife knew where I was. The further she had reached in to get hold of my adventure, the less I liked it. After I sold the groundbreaking 2121 Lofts project, a conversion of an old industrial property into a gardenlike community, and got a huge commission, I went on a hiking trip in New Zealand. I was thumbing through magazines in the lobby when the concierge announced, “Your wife is on the phone.”
“Hi, Honey, enjoying your trip?”
“Yes, it’s fine.”
“I tried to arrange a special massage for you but the schedule got screwed up.”
“That’s okay. You didn’t have to do that.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong. You know I don’t like contact on my trips.”
Now passing by Nicole’s makeup table, I saw myself in the oval mirror above her gold and green perfume bottles and open makeup trays. The mirrored doors of my closet were open. I pulled down the soft black bag I used for my desert trips. I hardly needed anything — just some shorts and a short sleeve shirt for my day hike Friday. Then not much more than a paisley yellow and white bathing suit for laying around the pool on Saturday. With the travel bag on the satin comforter of our bed, I tossed in my white short-sleeve shirt and tan shorts. I filled the bag with three pairs of underwear, a few t-shirts, and socks. It took all of five minutes to pack.
Downstairs, the garage door opened and shut. I heard Nicole’s heels click across the entry tiles. The downstairs bathroom door closed. After two minutes, I heard my wife’s voice bounce off the landing and into the upstairs hall, “Hi, Honey. Getting ready for your trip?”
I walked out of our bedroom, down the corridor, past a watercolor of desert rocks. “Yeah. Did you see my new containers from Bed Bath & Beyond?”
“They look nice,” she shouted up the polished wooden steps. “Honey, did you hear the weather report for the desert?” There was a measured, false lack of urgency in her voice. I disappeared into the bedroom again and waited a while, then went back on the landing. Nicole was already in the kitchen, so I projected my voice, knowing it would reach her.
“It’s just my usual trip.”
Her steps returned. “Maybe you should just lie around at the pool. A heat wave is scheduled to hit the desert just when you’re going. This weekend.”
“Don’t worry, it’s the same hike I always do. You have a lot planned for the weekend, right? Aren’t you picking up Kathy from the airport?”
“Yeah. Are you going to the same place?”
“I am. Don’t worry, it’s the same place I always go.”
Thursday, after a jerky night’s sleep, Nicole and I went downstairs. I filled my cooler with salads, milk, and juices for the trip. I’d done this same desert escape ten to fifteen times. Aside from a three-hour hike, I’d spend most of my time lounging around the motel getting stoned, writing poetry, and reading. I rushed the cooler out to my car before we sat down for breakfast. I filled my bowl with the special granola I bought for my getaways, and Nicole handed me some milk. The grocery bag on the kitchen table bulged with bread, chips, and treats from Trader Joe’s to accompany me in the passenger seat on the long ride to the desert. My wife hid behind her newspaper as I gobbled down my cereal, clutched the bag in one hand, got up, crossed the laundry room, pushed open the door to the garage, and threw this last item into the car. It was launch time for the long-anticipated break for freedom. I rushed inside to the kitchen and gave my wife a quick kiss on her forehead, careful not to interfere with her daily practice of obituary perusal. “Have a safe trip!” she turned from her pages to say.
“I’ll call Sunday as usual. Anything you want me to tell Hilary?” I was meeting our daughter.
“No, don’t worry.” She got up and kissed me goodbye.
The garage door clanked behind me, and I began to relax. The tension below my eyes that had felt like my nose was crunched up in a frown left me now. I leaned back in the seat and let my hands relax on the steering wheel. With one last thing to do before I headed to the desert, I took the 10 Freeway west to hook up with my daughter in Santa Monica. I was an hour ahead of our meet-up time so I went into Forever Twenty-One to fulfill a longstanding father and daughter tradition.
I told the clerk, “I’d like an $18, a $36, and one $54 card.” By making sure each was a multiple of the number eighteen, I threw in the extra blessings of Jewish mystical numerology. She was turning twenty-one but still felt to me like the fragile four-pound infant she had been when they finally released her from the neonatology ward.
Two months after her birth, I had carried her from our car. Nicole was in the bedroom getting the bassinet ready. The mummy-like bundle wrapped in soft white cottons sat beside me on the wide living room couch. I called out, “Nicole, what should I do with her?”
“Nothing. Wait a minute.”
I looked down at the doll-like face and withered, afraid to touch her.
“Okay, bring her in.”
“How should I carry her?”
“What?”
“Never mind.” I held Hilary out in front of me with stiff arms, carried her into our room, then placed the delicate being into her bassinet and breathed again.
Hilary opened the door to the bagel place in Santa Monica, and I walked up to meet her. We hugged hello. Her hair was tied in a comfortable
