coing

My daughter, Ava, stumbled into the parlor this morning while I was drinking my Earl Grey. Her hair was tangled around her head so that she looked like a deer caught in a net. She wore a torn white t-shirt--I suspected it was a relic of a boyfriend. Ava squinted at me for a moment, where I sat, and she said,

"I had sex last night, Mom."

I gripped my cup tightly in my hand, expecting that I would start forward in shock. But I didn't; I was still. I expect I disappointed her.

"Well?" I said. "Is he still here?"

I saw her posture change, showing that suddenly she was awake. I suppose that she had determined to tell me either last thing before she went to sleep, or perhaps it was an imperative revelation she had upon waking; in either case, I suppose that she rolled herself out of bed and came to tell me while her resolve was still strong in the initial stupor of the morning. Now, however, she was awake.

Ava is fifteen. She is my only daughter and we live together in a beautiful home. I never wanted children until I had her, and I have never wanted any others since. She is an accomplished violinist and a diver with her school's team. She does not want a debutante ball, or anything that hints of being a debutante.

In answer to my question, she said, "No, he left last night. After."

We both looked away from each other, for several moments. I was collecting my thoughts.

"Have I met him?" I asked. Ava has not introduced me to any boyfriends, as such, in recent months.

Then something terribly urgent occurred to me. "Were you protected?" I asked. "Was he protected?" Having asked, I felt better immediately.

Ava released a sigh, like a balloon. She fell defeatedly into the divan adjacent to my chair.

"Yes, mama," she said. "He was, and I am, too. That was all fine."


At that point, I am sure she told me who he was, and about the experience--what it meant to her and whether she felt good now, or bad. I know it was a long conversation, because it was afternoon by the time I wrapped up my hair and put on my sweater, and went for a walk in the neighborhood. I hate to confess it, but that is the first clear, meaningful memory I have of yesterday.

The air was warm, with a fragrant gravity, like a room recently left by a woman who was dressing for a formal occasion. The trees were still velvety and full, but beginning to show hints of turning. I turned the corner past our home and walked up Bank Street, thinking that perhaps in the end I would go to the shops; there was likely something we needed, that I was not thinking of, just then. As I turned the corner, my mind straightened and sharpened, like a diver about to take a great plunge, and suddenly I began to walk faster.

When I was nineteen, I was in Paris, studying art history--or, anyway, meant to be studying. Most of the time I spent with books, I had them propped on a cafe table and was sipping coffee behind them, or dangling a cigarette from my fingers and letting ash drop onto their pages. I did not actually smoke--I had more regard for the future of my skin than that--but I liked the way it made me feel, to have a cigarette smoldering in my hand while I sat at a cafe table in St. Germain or the Quartier Latin. Now and then I would press the end of it to my lips, just to save face.

At this same time and place, I met some friends at school who had friends who were Parisian, born and bred, who were musicians. They fit absolutely into the necessary space of bohemian associates, offering controversial opinions and contraband substances, rough surfaces to soften our snobbery, channels through which to vicariously attempt to live without consequences. I had a certain number of affairs, but never fell hopelessly in love with any of them, as did two of my friends at the time. I returned home quite safe, with some new clothes and shoes and a year abroad, to boast about.

And that was all. All.

As I walked, I could not stop thinking about Ava. Her golden hair like something out of a myth, veiling her face; her eyes, when she awoke, piercing like stars in twilight; her young careless body unassertive, unmindful, under the worn white t-shirt, which, like this first affair, she would wear for a time and then cast off when she wanted to change. Change is a plaything in youth; it seems altogether natural and easy. Indeed, it is natural and easy, at any age. Things come to weigh more, and their increasing mystery is fascinating, until suddenly it is too late, you have stared in the mirror too long. You find that suddenly everything is unbearably heavy, but you find it is useless to treat things as if they were light and frivolous again. Gravity is like a drug, that way.

I did stop into the shops; first I went into the market, but I paced too quickly through the aisles, realizing that there was nothing I wanted. The second stop was much better, at the boutique where they carry the products I use on my skin. I spoke for a little while with Angelique, the proprietress, who very kindly keeps me in practice with my French. A new hydrating creme had just come in; she gave me a small bottle to test its effects. I bought another vial of the renewal serum I depend upon. Then it seemed I should leave, but I stood there, fingering a pair of beaded earrings on a stand of cheap jewelry being sold for far more than it was worth, until Angelique felt called upon to say, "Sont mignons, non?" Then I started, and said, "oui," and I bought them and put them on, and she said again, "Oui, ils vous vont bien."

I confess that my thoughts, as I left, were bitter. She makes money by saying such things to me, by speaking French with me--she must think that is a terrible farce. Her generosity with words, with sample bottles of new products, is all part of her job. She is a fixture in this lovely neighborhood, but who knows if she actually lives here? She might live over a mechanic's garage or a pizza shop. We like to think of her as having an abode as gracious as ours, that she descends the stairs to work each day, or walks a certain number of blocks to her shop, like the rest of us do, with the same poise and calm as we all feel within her atelier. I tried to imagine Angelique going home to a squalid flat, or a boorish companion, drinking a bottle of wine by herself...I confess it was very difficult to imagine. In my vision of her, even bitter and boozy, the Hermes foulard she always wore remained crisply knotted under her grey linen jacket.

The products I took away from the shop fit into the pocket of my sweater. I continued to walk down to the end of the shop district, then turned again into the thick verdure of the residential. The homes on these blocks are truly palatial. One or two women were at work in their gardens, pruning rose bushes. They were not women I knew, but I lifted my hand and smiled. Other women, I thought, are in their kitchens, preparing food for parties, or just for the pure pleasure of it. Other women are on their treadmills, also preparing for parties--or, equally, just for the pure pleasure of it. It made me feel almost sick, strangely, the contrast of these women I imagined. Who would be happier, in the end? Whose husbands and families would love them the most? Who would look in the mirror and sigh with satisfaction, rather than discontent?

The cars shone the dappled sunlight off their polished black contours. An elderly man ran past me, with a sweatband around his head and a deep tan that spoke of Mexico or the Riviera. He lifted his hand and smiled as he chugged by. I nodded and smiled, as well.

I thought of Ava's glorious body, sharpening like the point of a Swiss-made pencil as she lifted her arms and prepared to fall from eight or ten feet above the placid, ice-blue water. The vision of her was like a dream, though I had seen it many times, in reality. I wondered if this boy, this affair, had ever watched her in that position of preparation, or if he had only seen her in the halls at school. I wondered if he cared about music, or beauty.

Even as I walked briskly down the street, I pulled the sample vial of creme out of my pocket, and looked at it. "Creme Hydrante au Coing," it said. Coing, I thought, wondering what it meant. It seemed a strange word to me, not lissome and elegant as most French sounds. In truth, it sounded very much like a profanity that I remembered from my associates in Paris, a vulgar name they would call women who slept with them, or who would not sleep with them. A terrible thing to confront, as you attempted to nourish your skin.

I lifted up the vial and hurled it into the air, high and far away from me. It disappeared into a flowering hydrangea tree.

I walked faster. Ahead of me, approaching again, was the same elderly man with the sweatband on his brow. He must have circled the block. He smiled again and nodded familiarly; apparently, in his mind we were old friends by then.

When I came home, I took out the renewal serum and dabbed it into the orbital spaces of my eyes, and around the rim of my mouth. I peered closely into the mirror, my nose issuing a light fog that eventually obscured my view.