Pug Hill - Alison Pace [56]
I want to say, then C.P. shouldn’t come at all. I want to say that Darcy isn’t really going to join a commune, and that even though Dad is the type of dad who strives to see the good in everything, who strives to fix everything that isn’t good, buying Darcy and C.P. a tent isn’t going to fix anything.
“Um, you could try REI,” I say instead of anything else. “REI? They sell tents?” Right after the word sell, I hear another connection pick up somewhere else in the house.
“Hope!” my mother shouts, aghast.
“What?!” I shout back.
“I thought we talked about not talking about the tent!”
“Uh,” I stutter and while it indeed would be logical to say that we haven’t technically discussed not talking about the tent, I know it will not help. “Uh, yes, but—”
“Caroline, why did you tell Hope not to talk about the tent?”
“Because it upsets you and it upsets Hope!” my mother shoots back, and I guess, yes, she’s right. It does upset me, all of it, and I’m kind of touched right now actually that she sees it this way.
“Well, Caroline, it’s upsetting!” Dad yells through the phone. “But we have to deal with it! We have to deal with it as a family! We need to address it! We need to FIND A SOLUTION!”
“I’M TAKING HER TO CANYON RANCH! THAT IS A SOLUTION! INDULGING C.P. IN A NON-OBJECTIONABLE TENT IS NOT A SOLUTION!”
“CAROLINE! STOP SHOUTING!”
“I’M NOT SHOUTING!”
“Uh, Mom? Dad?”
“WHAT?” they both shout at me simultaneously, in sync at least on something.
“I have to go actually, I’m going to be late for work.”
“But it’s Saturday,” my mom offers. It is now, I’m sure of it, her deepest desire to keep me on the phone to discuss with me why I felt it was necessary to bring up the tent when she specifically told me not to. Her second deepest desire is to not listen to me at all when I explain that I didn’t. “I know, but I’m actually behind on a few things and need to catch up. But I’ll call you both later.”
“Okay, then, bye Hope,” says my father, remarkably mellowed.
“Bye!” I say as breezily, and as quickly as possible, and hang up.
I stare at the phone in its charger, and for a moment, I contemplate calling Darcy up in California and talking to her myself about the commune. I just want to tell her that all she has to do is say it’s not true. But Darcy and I don’t really jive ever, not in any way that is productive, and if she does wind up going to a commune, I don’t want to be the one who called and pushed her over the edge. I want so many things, but what I want right now is not to feel like the whole world is only an exercise in powerlessness.
“I hope everything is okay, at least as okay as I want to believe that it is,” I say this out loud. I’m saying this, I know, to Darcy. I wonder if C.P. is really as Zen, as connected with the universe, as he says he is. I want to believe that if he is, maybe somewhere, in a tent whose manufacturers he does not find objectionable, he hears me. I hope he does. I hope he gives Darcy my message.
I look at my pillow, I want to sink back into it, pull the covers up high over my head. I wonder if the Law & Order I saved—the one with the Zoloft commercial—is still on my list of saved programs, or if it’s shuffled off yet. I think of the day stretching out in front of me. Not surprisingly, going to paint pottery at the place on Amsterdam loses a significant amount of appeal when its suggestion is not merely a way to antagonize Evan. I head for the shower and realize it’s true what I said: there are some things I need to catch up on. And some of those things even have to do with work. Going to work, I decide, dealing with the Rothko’s problems, and not my own, is nothing right now, if not a very good idea.
I walk slowly through the silent hallways of the Met, and just for a moment everything is so peaceful, like it used to be, before there was Elliot, before Patsy Cline kept piping up, belting out “Crazy” in the background.
I walk into the Conservation Studio, and while the silence is still there, the peace is gone. Elliot