Badges The Elder
“Babs Saperstein. I mean, really.”
“Hush, Claire. Be nice.”
“Like you, Kitty? Nice like you? No thanks.” The young woman laughed, then held out her hands, palms open, as if to ask forgiveness. “I just mean,” she looked at Melancholy, “no one can be as nice as you—you put up with him.”
“Why your mother let you monsters into this world will always amaze me,” said Melancholy. “They invented abortion for a reason.”
“I wish they had aborted Claire,” said another young woman who now joined them by the pool, drink in hand. “I wanted so much to be an only child.”
“Me too,” said Melancholy. “For you to be an only child.” He raised his glass to toast and then smiled. “I’ve had a little crush…”
“Hello? We’re twins. You can’t just like Penny. If you like her, you have to like me too.”
“Sorry. I don’t do crazy.”
“Melancholy.” Kitty put her hand on his. “Be nice.”
“It’s not fair, Kitty. You’re an only child.” Penny caught Melancholy’s eye and pouted. Her lips-
Badges The Elder
But then, you can be so gentle, Melancholy, so unexpectedly gentle. I’ve never met anyone like you, someone who is so selfish and completely self-absorbed, yet at the same time so self-aware of his own selfishness. Which means you try to work on it. Oh yes, Melancholy. I know you try. Don’t argue with me. I’m right on this one.
You know, Melancholy, that Father really thought highly of you? He would always tell me that boy of yours is a softy but he meant it in a good way. Father likes gentle people. That’s one of the reasons he doesn’t get along with Marco. One of the many—
Melancholy. Please. Don’t. I’m sorry. That was wrong of me. Don’t erase this message. I’m sorry. I made a mistake. I know you told me, and you didn’t need to tell me. You can forgive me, please? Please, I need you to listen.
As I was saying, you can be so gentle, Melancholy. When Peoples died that summer, I remember how you just held me. You put your arms around me and held me tight and let me cry, and we stood like that—how long were we like that Melancholy? It must have been most of the afternoon, because the next thing I remember was that it was dark, and we were late for the clambake the twins were hosting.
One of the things I loved about you, Melancholy, and you must know this is one of your finer qualities, is your height. I remember thinking it was like I was holding onto an oak tree or something. But the best part of all was how you said nothing. You just let me cry and cry and cry and didn’t say a word. Even though I know you hated cats and you probably thought it was ridiculous of me to feel so sad about the death of a pet. But you kept it all to yourself, Melancholy. Didn’t make me feel dumb, didn’t need to prove your superiority. Well, and here I’m smiling, not that day, anyway. No, that day you were my oak tree, tall and silent, which I could lean on.
Melancholy, I know you’re fanatical about being on time. You’ve told me so yourself. It’s a matter of ethics, Kitty, not to mention good manners. Ethics is just habituated intentionality, and habituated intentionality only requires a little forethought. A few minutes a day to plan ahead, and one can change the entire world. And good manners will win you everything.
That was always part of your infuriating charm, wasn’t it? The lecturing, I mean. Perhaps we can add another rule to your dating guide? Rule 2: assume the girl knows a thing or two about life. (Well, maybe this one is my fault. Sybil did warn me you did this, and I still…)
So, why didn’t this on-time ethic ever apply to me? Rule 3, and underline this one or burn this onto your soul as you always liked to say about important things. If you’re going to miss the bus to Maine because your train to Boston is delayed, and your girlfriend is waiting for you at the Portland bus station to drive you to her family’s summer house, then call her, Melancholy, call her so she isn’t waiting for you for three hours, wondering what happened.
Three hours, Melancholy! I could have strangled you, when you sauntered off that bus, like everything was just fine—strangled you with that light blue Hermès tie you like so much and which you wear all the time, including apparently when visiting a lakeside cottage in Fryeburg, Maine during the month of July. (Melancholy, no one will think less of you if you loosen up your fashion choices a little according to the context.)
But the bus. Oh God. I was so angry. And then you pulled out those flowers Three dozen roses, Kitty, one dozen for every hour I was late, and I didn’t even get the satisfaction of telling you off.
I shouldn’t be telling you this, Melancholy, but Mother still sometimes asks about you. She’s never forgotten that first meeting. None of us have, honestly. Please don’t get angry, but it’s become something of a joke in our family, the whole foreigner thing. When we were summering in Maine last year, Mother even tried to call herself a foreigner on the census form. She told us she was going to put as her ethnicity Some Other Race.
“How do you propose, Barbara, to fill in the blank?” asked Father.
As you probably remember—no, that’s not right. You wouldn’t remember, Melancholy, would you? Because you never remembered anything I ever told you about my family. It was always a one-way street, our conversations about family history, about how you descended from a glorious line of artists, whereas my family could only claim prominence in—how did you phrase it, Melancholy?
Oh yes. My family only excelled at bourgeois concerns. Bourgeois concerns. I guess you have little respect for the banking industry, which I can understand—except that you were working as a banker, when you said this about my family. Oh Melancholy! Sometimes you are just too much.
Anyway, had you been a thoughtful boyfriend you would have remembered that Mother, to those she knew well, preferred going by her middle name, Keen.
“I’m going to write Barbarian in the blank, if you must know.”
“Damn it,” said Father, “a joke is one thing, but this thing has gone far enough.”
He was annoyed enough to get up from his chair on the screened porch and start pacing. Do you remember the cottage and its screened porch, Melancholy? Maybe not. But I know you remember the outdoor shower. Surely even you… that was a lovely night, Melancholy, wasn’t it? We went swimming in the lake and then had to run back with only our towels because the twins stole our clothes—oh, Melancholy. I mean, all the pain has been so awful, but when I think back on that summer, when you came up to our place in Maine and we had those four weeks together, I tell myself It was worth it.
“The St Claire family has been in this country for more than three hundred years, and you Bradfords came over on the Mayflower, for Chrissake. Who are you fooling, Barbara?”
“Well, I think you’re behaving like a terrific barbarian, Charlie.”
With that, she got up, walked up to the big house and didn’t come down for the rest of the evening, and that night, Father had to sleep on a couch in the cottage. Honestly, though, he loves the cottage, so he didn’t mind so much.
Melancholy, here are a few rules for dating you should write in that little black notebook you’re forever scribbling in, ones even those dating guides from the Thirties would recommend, the ones you like to collect. I know you secretly study those books, even if you pretend you don’t, because I know you’re not nearly as ironic or distanced or uncaring as you pretend to be. I know you care, Melancholy. I know you cared for me, and that it was hard for you to admit that you loved me, like I loved you, and that you were afraid of those feelings and that’s why you hurt me. Because you cared and you were afraid.
Actually, I have only rule for you. Oh, Melancholy—have you ever wondered how silly this all is? When I think about how much I loved you… It’s not a contest, Melancholy. Just because you hurt me first, and you did, you hurt me a lot, when you ran away and didn’t call or let me know what happened. Five days, Melancholy! You disappeared for five days! Did you ever think about what I might be going through?
You didn’t have to talk to me, if you were mad at me, you could’ve just let Harry know you were ok. Melancholy, I thought you were run over by a car, or murdered, or kidnapped, or that maybe, that maybe, you had gone ahead and done what you promised me you would never do, what I made you promise when I agreed to move in.
Here’s the rule: When a girl tells you she’s had a nice time after a date, and she tells you she hopes she can see you again soon, call her the next day, Melancholy. Call her, if not the next day, then the next week. It’s not a good idea to ignore her for three months, and then suddenly, one day, out of the blue, when she’s gotten over feeling hurt and wondering what she did wrong, ask her to dinner.
Did you expect me to say yes, Melancholy?
