Rare Objects

“That’s not true.”

But she was serious. “You mustn’t fail yourself. Do you understand, Maeve? You mustn’t settle.”

There was a knock at the door.

“Who’s that?”

“Angela said she would stop by.”

“Angela?” Suddenly she seemed small and forlorn, caught off guard. “Tonight?”

I got up. “I’ll tell her I’ll see her another time.”

“No.” Yanking the strings of her apron, she pulled it off, handed it to me. “Keep an eye on dinner. I’m going to lie down.”

I poured some fresh coffee into one of my mother’s Staffordshire willow-pattern teacups and passed it to Angela. “Sugar?”

“Yes, please. These are nice.” She held up her cup, admiring the delicate blue-and-white oriental design. “I’ve never seen these before. Where did they come from?”

“They’re my mother’s. A wedding gift.” I smiled. “But we only use them on special occasions.” I wanted to make things up to her.

“I’m honored!”

I sat down across from her at the kitchen table. “I’m sorry we don’t have any cream.”

(In truth we never had it.)

We divided the zaletti in half on a plate.

“Here’s to you and your new job!” Angela raised her cup.

“Here’s to you and your new husband!” We took a drink, and then I asked, “So, what’s it like, being married? I want to hear everything!”

“Oh, Mae!” She blushed, gave me a slightly embarrassed grin. “I don’t know! It’s different. I mean, from what I thought it would be like.”

“How?”

Cupping her cheek in her hand, she pretended to concentrate on stirring the sugar into her coffee. “Faster!” she whispered back with a giggle. “Seems no sooner do we close the bedroom door than … you know, he’s on top of me!”

“Well, men are like that. You have to slow them down.”

“Mae!” She gave me a stab in the ribs. “You shouldn’t know these things! And it hurt.” Her face flushed pink again. “He kept apologizing!”

“What about the rest of it? You know, the bits that happen outside the bedroom.”

She rolled her eyes. “I hate living at his mother’s house. It’s like being a bug in a glass jar; everyone knows everything you’re doing all the time. But we haven’t the money to move yet.”

I lit two cigarettes on the stove and passed one to her. “No one’s got any money. At least he has a job.”

“Oh, he’ll have more than that when he graduates from pharmacy school—he’ll have his own business. We’ve got our eye on that corner shop on Salem Street. It would make a perfect drugstore.” She tilted her head, looking at me sideways. “What about you? How was New York?”

“Fine. Good to be home.”

Her eyes met mine. “Really?”

She could always see right through me.

I felt an awkward flush of shame, took a long drag. “Well, maybe it didn’t go quite the way I planned.”

“You never answered my letters.”

“No … I’m really sorry about that.”

“Are you upset at me?”

The hurt in her voice pricked my conscience. “No, Angie. Not at all. I wanted to write, really I did.”

“So why didn’t you?”

“I didn’t want you to worry, that’s all. It was hard.” I shrugged, tried to smile. “I had troubles.”

“What kind of troubles?” Her voice became stern, maternal. “What happened, Maeve?”

I wanted to tell her; I wanted to be able to tell her. But it was all so far away from anything she was used to, and it had been so long since we’d really spoken. Instead I grabbed at a half-truth, hoping that any confession might draw us closer again.

I inhaled. “I got in the habit of going out after work, hanging out in clubs. I guess I started to drink too much, Ange.”

“Oh, Mae!” The shock and disappointment in her face surprised me. “You mean bootleg gin?”

I knew Angela didn’t approve of drinking. In fact, I’d always hidden how much I’d drunk from her, knowing she thought of it as something only men did and distinctly unladylike. Wine was the exception, but like most Italians we knew, she didn’t count wine as alcohol. The homemade version her father and brothers made in the summer and kept stored in wooden barrels in the basement of the shop was sweet, fruity, and mild. Not even the police bothered to confiscate it. But still, I’d expected her to be more worldly and understanding.

“I wasn’t the only one! Everyone drinks in New York,” I said, “men, women, young, old, Park Avenue right down to a bench in Central Park! But it sort of sneaks up on you. And it does make everything messier …”

“Then just don’t drink.”

Nothing was complicated for Angela. It was one of the things about her that I loved but also resented. Everything that was black and white for her was gray for me.

“Well, I didn’t want to, not really,” I tried to explain.

“Then just don’t! Honestly, Mae!” She’d run out of patience. “They put anything in that stuff! You should hear the stories Carlo tells me!” Brushing some loose crumbs off the table into her hand, she shook her head. “You really need to settle down. You’re too old for that sort of foolishness.”

That was always the answer, no matter the question. If only I would settle down, behave myself. When we were younger, it was a reprimand leveled at both of us. But Angela had since become the model daughter, sister, and now wife. I was alone in my delinquency.

Tears welled up in my eyes. She was right, of course, and I suppose exhaustion and the stress of the day had gotten to me.

I started to cry, something I hadn’t done in almost a year. “I’m so sorry about the wedding! About everything! I’m really sorry I let you down.”

I hate crying; I’d rather be caught naked than with tears on my face.