Author’s Note
I think we could all use a break from the current crisis, which is depressing enough, God knows, so here’s another of my short stories.
I don‘t rate “The Painted Queen” as the best story I’ve written—though it’s good, I think—but it is my favorite. Why is that? Because this story, conceived as a tale of the uncanny, took on a mind of its own. Renate’s ugly house had a real-life counterpart that I, like Olivia Trent, used to pass on my way to and from work. Eventually it was torn down and replaced by a bank branch, but the memory of it stuck with me and one day I conceived the idea of that ugly house as a Bad Place in the manner of Hill House or the Overlook Hotel. But when I started to write, the story went elsewhere and all I could do was follow where it led. It was the most interesting experience I’ve had so far as a writer of fiction.
“The Painted Queen” is included in my second short story collection, The Double: Twelve Stories and a Poem, which is available on Amazon as a Kindle edition and a paperback edition. If you read and enjoy this story, I hope you’ll share it with family and friends, and perhaps even go on to read the other tales that comprise The Double.
On Locust Road, a quarter of a mile north of the intersection with State Route 101, there stood a house of peculiar ugliness—an ugliness somehow hard to categorize. It was a two-story ranch house with an attached garage, a style quite common in the subdivisions north of the city center. But it was different. It was ugly, Olivia Trent thought each time she passed it traveling to and from her campus job.
Perhaps, she thought, it was the way in which the house seemed to brood, hunch-shouldered, over its front lawn. Perhaps it was the unwholesome, dusty shade of its red brick facade, which not even the buttery sunlight of a late summer afternoon could temper. Perhaps it was the blank, dumb, staring character of its windows, or the skeletal pin oak tree to the side of the house, which clung to a third of its dead leaves through the winter.
Olivia lived farther north on Locust, in a lakefront condo that was rather too plush for her salary but not for her divorce settlement. She worked for Union State University Press as an assistant editor, shepherding academic tomes through the publishing process. The job was not too interesting and the pay was modest, but the benefits were solid. Now that she was past her fortieth birthday, Olivia was coming to appreciate solidity, surety, security. She was comfortable; she had her family and her interests; on the whole, she was content.
Though Olivia’s marriage had produced no children, she had a nephew, her older sister’s boy, whom she’d come to think of as the son she’d never had. Will, like his uncle before him, was on the Union Police Department. Officer Serve and Protect he sometimes called himself, striking a mock-heroic attitude that always made Olivia laugh. She and Will had hit it off when he was just a kid, six or seven years old, and she was barely out of her teens. And they’d remained close — closer, indeed, than Will was to his mother, a woman twelve years Olivia’s senior. Helen Trent’s seriousness, her reserve, her self-control, her judgmental outlook on life, recalled the family’s stern Puritan origins. That and the difference in their ages mitigated against a close sisterly bond. Olivia loved her sister, but dutifully, and she suspected that Will loved his mother in much the same way.
As for herself, Olivia entertained no illusions. As a young woman she’d been pretty in a bland, inoffensive way. That prettiness has faded over the years, however, and now she was merely plain. Her hair, a nondescript shade of brown, had become somewhat brittle. Her eyes, also brown, were unremarkable. Her figure, rather boyish, might still have attracted the occasional male glance. But Olivia was indifferent to matters of style. Her clothes, chosen with an eye to neatness and comfort, did little to accentuate her remaining feminine assets.
The ugly house on Locust Road was part of the wallpaper of Olivia’s life. She passed it twice a day during the work week and often on weekends. Sometimes — say on a snowy morning when it was necessary to pay attention to her driving — Olivia wouldn’t spare the house a glance. But she glanced its way often enough, always with the same thought: My, aren’t you ugly? And then she’d wonder what kind of people might choose to live in such a house. That it was occupied she had no doubt. The front lawn was well kept in summer, the trash and recycling bins traveled to and from the curb and the side of the garage, and over the Christmas holiday season the house was decorated with blinking red and green lights. But Olivia had never seen anybody mowing the lawn or trundling the trash and recycling bins to and fro, or stringing the Christmas lights, or pulling a car into the garage.
Her imagination, which never got much of a workout on the job, applied itself to the task of creating a cast of occupants for the ugly house. A misanthropic old man, perhaps, or a pair of elderly spinsters, or a writer — someone like Stephen King. Olivia felt that Mr. King, of whom she was something of a fan, might take inspiration from such a brooding, gloomy, unattractive place.
So it was with a pleasurable start that she noticed, one Friday afternoon of the first week of July, the sign posted next to the ugly house’s curbside mailbox: GARAGE SALE TOMORROW!
“A garage sale? Ollie, really.” Helen set down her coffee mug with a disapproving thump. “Those things are nothing more than a mechanism for circulating unwanted junk around town.” Being a high-school English teacher, Helen occasionally produced a neat turn of phrase.
“Well, I don’t disagree,” Olivia replied. “And I wouldn’t bother myself, except…”
“Yes? Except what?”
“You’ll laugh,” Olivia said. “Because it’s the house I’ve told you about — the ugly house on Locust.”
But Helen didn’t laugh. She frowned. “Oh, that. Honestly, Ollie, I can’t imagine what’s with you and that house. I’ve been by it too, you know. And I grant you, it’s a nondescript sort of house. But it seems perfectly ordinary to me.”
Olivia smiled. That was Helen: practical, hard-headed, unimaginative. That her sister could have spent so many years teaching literature without evolving some sense of wonder was itself a matter of wonder.
“Then I suppose I’ll have to go by myself,” she said.
“No, no.” Helen summoned up an arid smile. “If I must, I must. Anyhow, Frank’s off with his fishing buddies. But let’s wait until eleven or so, and then we’ll go to lunch somewhere. Scarpelli’s?”
“All right,” Olivia agreed.
It was a fine summer’s day: the sun tempered by clouds, the temperature in the mid-seventies, the humidity low. But the ugly house on Locust Road squatted on its lot as usual, brooding, sullen. The garage door was open and there were four folding tables set up in the driveway, loaded down with the usual odds, ends and debris. Olivia parked across the street and, with a sigh on Helen’s part, the sisters joined three or four other browsers among the tables.
Presiding over the sale was a slender woman, blonde. At first Olivia judged her to be young. But then she noticed something about the woman’s eyes, a steadiness, a watchfulness, something somehow old. But when she smiled Olivia saw that she was a young woman after all, certainly no older than thirty-five.
“Welcome,” the woman said. “I’m Renate.”
She spoke with a slight accent that Olivia couldn’t pin down.
“Please,” Renate went on, gesturing toward the tables.
As occupant of the ugly house, the young woman was not at all what Olivia had expected. She was, to begin with, handsome. That was the right word, Olivia thought as she picked up a china plate from one of the tables: handsome. Renate’s face was composed of planes and angles; her nose was elegantly aquiline; her eyebrows were dark and strongly marked; her eyes were ice-chip blue. Physically she was two or three inches taller than Olivia’s own five and five, slender yet curvaceous, long limbed, and there was something sinuous in the way she moved.
“Ah,” came a voice from behind, and Olivia realized that she’d been staring, blind-eyed, at the plate in her hands. “That’s an interesting piece.”
Renate stepped to Olivia’s side and took the plate from her hands. “The 1953 Coronation,” she said. “Of course, it’s not worth a great deal of money—they turned them out by the hundreds of thousands. She handed the plate back. “A small bit of history, though I can’t think how I came to acquire it.”
Olivia looked at the plate again and this time she took in its details. The vignette showed the young Queen posed so as to glance over her shoulder with a curiously enigmatic expression. There was also a crowned monogram. The inscription read CORONATION June 2nd 1953. A sticker gave the price: $12.
“Yes,” she said, putting the plate down. “History…” For no obvious reason Olivia felt a little flustered. But Renate seemed not to notice.
“One accumulates these things,” she said with a small shrug.
“I’m Olivia, by the way, Olivia Trent.” She held out her hand, which Renate took and pressed.
“It’s very good to meet you, Olivia Trent,” she said without offering her own last name.
“I’ve often wondered who lives here,” Olivia said. “I pass by almost every day, you see…”
“And it’s such a hideous house, isn’t it?” Renate laughed. “Oh, yes,” she added, noticing Olivia’s embarrassment. “Perfectly ugly. But the price was right, you know, and really the interior’s quite comfortable.”
“Well,” said Olivia, smiling now, “I suppose so. Ugly. And I always imagined — ”
“That such an ugly house must have an ugly occupant. Or a strange, eccentric, odd one, at any rate.”
“Something like that.”
“As you see, though,” said Renate, laughing again, “I’m a perfectly ordinary householder.”
“Yes,” Olivia agreed, though she didn’t think that Renate was ordinary. Not at all…
“I’ll take these.” It was Helen, holding a set of kitchen towels that looked brand new. She handed some bills to Renate, then said to Olivia, “Ready to go?”
“In a moment.” Olivia rummaged through her purse, found a twenty-dollar bill and gave it to Renate. “For the plate.”
“Well, I’m ready for my lunch,” said Helen as Renate handed Olivia her change.
It was odd, but after the weekend of the garage sale Olivia saw the owner of the ugly house fairly often as she drove back and forth on Locust Road. Sometimes Renate was jogging along the sidewalk, blonde hair in a ponytail, clad in shorts and a halter top that showed off her shapely limbs. Or she might be mowing the front lawn, or dragging the trash bin back from the curb, or checking her mailbox. And invariably, she marked Olivia’s passing with a wave.
One Sunday toward the end of summer, at Helen’s dinner table, she spoke of the ugly house on Locust and its surprising occupant. Helen sighed with sisterly exasperation and Frank showed no interest, but her nephew Will raised an eyebrow.
“I know that house,” he said. “And you’re right, Ollie. It’s damned ugly.”
“You see? Olivia turned to Helen, smiling a little. “You son, the trained police detective, gets what I’m talking about.”
“Patrol officer,” Will corrected her. “But tell me more about this woman — Renate, was it? She sounds interesting…”
But at this Olivia felt herself becoming defensive; she no longer wanted to chat about the occupant of the ugly house; and she changed the subject. Will looked quizzical for a moment. Then he shrugged and asked his mother to pass the chicken.
That evening, though, sitting in her favorite armchair with a glass of wine, Olivia chided herself. There was, after all, nothing between her and Renate. They were mere casual acquaintances. No doubt the connection she felt had to do with her past speculations about the empty house. Olivia smiled, remembering how she’d populated it with such a varied cast of characters…
Here in the living room of her condo, surrounded by so many familiar things, she mused that the ugly house had somehow filled a void in her life — a small but definite empty space. That it had nothing to do with her failed marriage, Olivia was quite sure. She and Keith had made a mistake, it was as simple as that, and when they came to realize it, their parting was fairly amicable. The marriage had produced no children and that was surely for the best, even though she sometimes regretted missing her chance at motherhood.
Seeing that her wineglass was empty, Olivia stood and went into the kitchen. The tiles were cold under her bare feet. She opened the refrigerator, removed the bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, and poured some. The bottle was still half full and all at once she wished there was a friend with whom she could share it.
Renate, for instance.
Olivia dismissed the thought and carried her wine back to the corner of the living room where her comfortable armchair and a book awaited. But as she sat, her glance fell on the Coronation Plate, propped on a shelf between a framed photo of Will in uniform and a glass bowl filled with potpourri.
“Olivia Trent. Hello.”
Olivia turned and found Renate, smiling at her. “Well, hello,” she replied, holding out a hand. But Renate put her hand on Olivia’s shoulder and pecked her cheek.
“How nice to run into you like this,” she said. They were standing just inside the south entrance to the mall. “Come, sit down and talk to me for a minute.”
Olivia noticed that they were obstructing traffic and smiled her assent. They sat side by side on one of the benches that were arranged in a hollow square around a low table. Renate, she saw, was carrying a couple of shopping bags, one from a boutique that Olivia herself sometimes patronized.
“Well,” Renate said, “hasn’t it been a glorious summer?”
“Yes. Yes, it has,” Olivia agreed. The sensation of warmth produced by Renate’s kiss still lingered. “The nicest for quite a few years…”
“But I think that you haven’t taken much time to enjoy it,” Renate replied in a serious tone. “Oh, now don’t you deny it, Olivia! I see you almost every day, driving back and forth. Such long hours you work.”
“It’s true,” Olivia agreed. “We’re rather busy. “One of the other editors gave notice some time ago and he hasn’t been replaced yet.”
Renate asked about her job then, and Olivia explained. “Most of it’s pretty dry stuff, of course. Just now I’m working on a book by one of the history professors. Austro-Hungarian industrial mobilization during the First World War, if you can believe it.”
“Hmmm, that does sound…dry. The Weltkrieg…”
“The Weltkrieg?”
“Some still call it that,” Renate said, “where I come from.”
At that, Olivia nearly asked just where Renate was from. But she wasn’t one to pry…
“What time is it, anyhow?” Renate asked rhetorically. She glanced at her watch. “Ah, lunchtime. Why not join me, Olivia? There’s a bistro downtown to which I’m rather partial.”
“Well…”
“I’ll drive, and you can pick up your car here on the way back.”
“Well, all right.” Olivia smiled and nodded. “That sounds like fun, Renate.”
“Good!”
They lunched well and by the time dessert was cleared Olivia felt that she’d made a friend. She even said so, whereupon Renate placed her hand over Olivia’s and nodded in agreement.
“I have a solitary temperament, I admit it,” she said. “But yes, friendship is important…”
“We missed you at Sunday dinner, Ollie.” Helen spoke in her trademark tone of prim disapproval. “Again.”
“Yes, I’m sorry,” Olivia replied. “But Renate and I — ”
“Oh, Renate. In that case, I mustn’t complain.”
Helen’s tone was so disagreeable that for a moment Olivia thought of terminating the call. Instead she laughed and said, “Honestly, Helen, instead of being glad that I’ve made a new friend you seem positively jealous of her.”
“Jealous of her? Now that’s ridiculous,” Helen replied in a tone suggesting that indeed she was jealous. “It’s just that you know so little about her, Ollie.”
“Renate’s a private person.”
“Well, never mind,” Helen said. “It is your life, after all. But do try to come next Sunday, won’t you? Will’s always so disappointed when you can’t make it.”
“Of course,” Olivia agreed. “I’ll be there.”
“And, you know, Renate’s quite welcome.”
“Goodbye,” said Olivia, and terminated the call. Attendance at Sunday dinner was one of those duties that Helen imposed on the family. Roast beef, roast chicken, leg of lamb, baked ham: the menu seldom strayed from the traditional standbys. She tried and failed to picture Renate at Helen’s dinner table.
With a sigh, Olivia returned to her work. She was copy-editing the footnotes for the book on Austro-Hungarian industrial mobilization: a tedious business. For a moment her thoughts strayed. Renate, she thought, must be German or Austrian. Wasn’t Weltkrieg was a German word…?
“Earth to Olivia,” someone said, and she looked up. It was Jerry, leaning against the file cabinet that stood outside her cubicle. He was smiling: dazzling white teeth in a handsomely sculpted mahogany face. Olivia brushed a strand of hair from her temple and smiled back. Like Renate, Jerry had an accent; he was a Nigerian immigrant. Also he was gay.
“You were deep into it, girlfriend,” Jerry said. “I was going for coffee. Want some?”
“No, thanks, I’ve had two cups already this morning.”
“All riiiiiight.” He winked and turned, heading for the coffee station.
Driving home that evening, Olivia noticed for the first time that the leaves were beginning to turn. The pin oak to the side of Renate’s house was touched with scarlet. The house itself looked desolate but that was just because she knew that Renate wasn’t home. “A family matter,” she’d said. “I must be away for a week or so. Oh, but nothing to be concerned about…”
Something in Renate’s manner seemed to discourage it, so Olivia had asked no questions. She was curious, though, and just as it had once peopled the ugly house, her imagination now exercised itself by inventing for Renate an exotic background: exiled dissident, former CIA asset, estranged wife or mistress of some prominent man. But nothing seemed quite right…
Two days later Olivia arrived home to find her nephew Will waiting for her. She’d given him a set of keys to the condo, but this was the first time he’d ever used them.
“Well!” Olivia said with a brightness she didn’t really feel. “To what do I owe this visit, Officer? Are you finally busting me for all those unpaid parking tickets?”
Will, who was wearing his uniform, didn’t smile. He looked, she thought, distinctly uncomfortable.
“It’s nothing like that, Ollie.” he said.
“All right, but come and sit down.” She indicated the sofa and took the armchair opposite. “Now tell me: What’s going on?”
“It’s Mother,” Will said. “She asked me to…” He trailed off, but Olivia divined what he was hesitant to confess.”
“It’s about Renate,” she said. “Isn’t that right? Helen nagged you into…into checking up on Renate.”
“Well…yes.” Will shrugged. “I told her it was ridiculous and that I’d be damned before I did it. But you know how she is. ‘Olivia knows nothing about this woman. Yet suddenly they’re thick as thieves. There’s something not right. I just don’t trust her.’ She went on and on like that, wouldn’t leave it alone, so in the end…”
“Jesus Christ!” Angry color rose in Olivia cheeks. She wasn’t mad at Will, though. “That bitch! I’m sorry Will, I know she’s your mother. But honestly!”
“Nothing came of it,” Will put in hurriedly. He sketched a smile. “No wants, no warrants, no red flags. Your friend’s a solid citizen — ”
“Don’t say another word!” Olivia put up a hand. “This was a terrible violation of Renate’s privacy, and I don’t want to know about it.”
“All right.”
“And I’m very disappointed in you.”
“Sorry.”
“And you’re never to speak about it, Will.”
“I’ll have to say something to Mother.”
“Then just tell her what you told me. But not one word more.”
With profuse apologies, Will grabbed his cap and showed himself out. Once the door had closed behind him some of the steam went out of Olivia’s anger. Perhaps, after all, it was for the best. She knew her sister well enough. Having observed due diligence, Helen would probably let the matter drop. Olivia resolved to help that process along by appearing at dinner on Sunday. It would mollify Helen and anyhow, Renate was out of town.
Her sister’s suspicions had their effect, though, nagging at Olivia’s mind. For it was true: Between Renate’s reticence and her own reluctance to pry, she knew very little about her new friend. Renate was probably German, had lived in America for many years, worked for some company in Fitchburg. The rest was a blank. Olivia hesitated for some time, but finally she nerved herself to ask a few questions.
She spoke up on a Friday evening in early October. They were sitting on the sofa in Renate’s living room, having a glass of wine before going out for dinner. As always, Olivia was struck by the contrast between the house’s ugly exterior and its elegant, welcoming interior: an amalgam of well-chosen furniture, lush carpeting, books, art prints. An antique sideboard served as the bar. Light classical music played softly in the background. There was no television in this room; the raucous outside world was not admitted.
“Oh, but Olivia, your curiosity is perfectly understandable,” Renate said. “And I haven’t been very forthcoming, have I?”
“Well…” Olivia looked into her glass. “I didn’t want to pry…”
“You’ve told me so much about yourself.” Renate shook her head ruefully. “But I? Close-mouthed as always. There’s no great mystery, though.”
And Renate explained that she was the daughter of a German diplomat who’d been posted to Washington DC in the Eighties. “So, you see, I grew up in this country. But then we returned to Germany…”
Her story turned out to be banal enough: a bad marriage, some years of strife, an exceedingly messy divorce. “So I decided to return here. It seemed best…”
“But why here? Union, I mean?”
“For the most pedestrian of reasons, employment.” She mentioned a name that was familiar to Olivia: a manufacturing firm that had a plant at the Montachusett Industrial Park in Fitchburg. “It’s actually a subsidiary of a German corporation, Renate went on. “And as it happens my uncle, my father’s younger brother, is a senior executive. So…” she shrugged. “And it’s really the perfect job for a solitary person like me: Most days I can work from home.”
Yes, Olivia thought, the facts were pedestrian enough. But somehow, they didn’t make Renate seem less exotic…
“And as for my trip back to Germany, there was a death in the family. An aged aunt.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry…”
There was a moment of silence. Then Renate smiled.
“Why don’t we stay in tonight?” she said. “We’ll finish this bottle of wine. And I can find us a bite to eat in the kitchen.”
“I’d like that,” Olivia replied. “Very much.” And she put her hand on her friend’s knee.
“Girlfriend, you are looking radiant this morning!” Jerry flashed his brilliant smile. “So what’s up?”
“Oh, nothing,” Olivia replied, not looking up from the mug into which she’d just poured coffee. “I just woke up feeling good, you know?”
Jerry glanced out the window. The sky was overcast and a dismal fall of rain fogged the air. A chill wind was blowing dead leaves across the parking lot. “Uh-huh,” he said. “Because, you know, it’s such a lovely day.”
“I happen to like autumn weather.” Olivia stirred sweetener into her coffee. “This has always been my favorite season of the year.”
“I can see why…”
Back at her desk, Olivia cradled the warm mug in both hands. Radiant, Jerry had said. Well, she felt radiant. Awakening before dawn, she’d experienced a moment of emotional vertigo. Had it been a dream? But no. As sleep dissolved Olivia realized that it had happened, she’d been taken into Renate’s arms, into Renate’s bed, and there…
“Shall I see you again?” Renate had asked, sending her on her way with a kiss late Sunday afternoon. But Olivia gave no answer. Returning the kiss with a fervor that stopped her breath and loosened her limbs, she’d turned away in confusion, hurrying through the front door, down the front steps of the ugly house, fumbling in her purse for the car keys.
But she knew the answer. Olivia picked up her phone and tapped out a one-word text message that she was sure Renate would understand.
All that day it seemed that people’s glances, their casual comments, were pregnant with significance. The change in her — of course they must sense it. And that feeling was no figment, she told herself. Hadn’t Jerry seen something? She thought of confiding in Jerry, the only one of her coworkers whom she regarded as a friend. Or was it just because he was gay and could be expected to understand? But how presumptuous to assume such a thing! And besides, this was not only her business but Renate’s as well. So she said nothing.
There was no immediate reply to her text message.
Olivia took a different way home that afternoon, so as not to pass Renate’s ugly house. Her thoughts could find no focus. One moment she was remembering the years of her marriage to Keith and the slow process of dissolution that led to their divorce; the next she was thinking of the way in which Renate’s lips had caressed her own. Then, with a sudden fusion of memory and sensation, Olivia perceived what had been missing from her marriage: not love but passion. Oh, she’d loved Keith well enough, he’d been a decent, well-meaning, dutiful boyfriend, fiancée and husband. But she’d never burned for him, not even in bed with him, not even in the throes of orgasm. They would perform their coupling, cuddle for a moment, and lapse into sleep. How different it had been with Renate! Olivia searched her memory for evidence that she’d harbored this seed of passion all along. There’d been a crush on her best friend in high school — ethereal, spiritual, never physical — and again with a college roommate. In later years Olivia had dismissed those episodes as adolescent curiosity, youthful frivolity, of no particular significance. Now she knew better. Now the seed had fallen on fertile ground.
The condo seemed forlorn that evening. Olivia stood just inside the door, looking into the living room with its carefully chosen appointments, and it seemed a foreign land. Her eye fell on the Coronation Plate, and she noticed how vividly it stood out from its surroundings, and how the young, painted Queen gazed steadily over her shoulder as if to say Yes, Olivia?
Her phone chirruped then. It was a text message from Renate.
“Olivia…my darling…I do understand. The surprise. The confusion…”
“It isn’t that at all. Well, the surprise. But I’m not confused. I was confused and you…”
“Shhhh. There’s no need to talk about it now…”
An autumnal storm had blown in; rain was drumming against the bedroom window. Olivia glanced at the clock on the dresser opposite the bed. It was nearly midnight.
“I need to talk about it, though,” she said. “This is my life, Renate…”
“But you’re tired, my darling, and you need to sleep.”
“I’ve been tired, without ever knowing it.”
“Oh yes, I understand.” Renate turned on her side and placed a hand on Olivia’s cheek. “It was much the same for me. I never told you why my husband and I divorced. Well, perhaps now there’s no need for an explanation. Peter didn’t take it well, no, not at all. Then the…other thing…failed as well. Hence my exile here in Union, Massachusetts: a place as far from Munich as it needs to be.”
They laughed together. Then Olivia said, “I have to decide what comes next.”
“We have to decide,” Renate whispered.
“I know.”
They spoke then of the future as the wind rose and the rattle of the branches of the pin oak tree sounded through the closed window.
“How fortunate for you that I’m an excellent cook,” Renate said playfully once matters were arranged between them.
“Mmmm, but could you tell me just one thing?”
“What, my darling…?”
“Why me, Renate?”
“Because of your beauty, of course.”
“Now that isn’t true,” said Olivia, but she was smiling in the dark. “I do own a mirror, you know.”
“Which reflects nothing but the surface of things.” Renate moved closer to kiss Olivia, long and lovingly. “But I see so much more…”
“Excuse me?” said Helen. “I’m not sure I heard you properly, Ollie.”
It was Sunday and Frank was carving the roast beef. Olivia was quite certain that Helen had heard her properly, but she repeated her news anyway.
“Renate and I have decided to move in together,” she said. “To be specific, I’ll be giving up the condo and moving into her house.”
A stony silence greeted this announcement. Will, clearly embarrassed, was looking down at his plate. Frank had stopped carving. Helen’s face bore an expression of prim disapproval.
“I hope,” Olivia added, “that you’ll all support me in this decision.” That sounded so stuffy that she had to smile. “By which I mean, just be happy for me, all right?”
“All right?” Helen snapped. “There’s nothing right about this, nothing at all. It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard of. Sell the condo? Move in with Renate? What could you possibly be thinking, Ollie?”
I’m thinking that I’ve been lonely for a long time, and that I didn’t even know it. Olivia lifted her wineglass and held it up to the light. Aloud she said, “Renate and I, we’re good together. We complement one another. I can’t explain it any better than that. And I shouldn’t have to.”
There followed another stretch of silence.
“So suddenly you’ve discovered that you’re a…a lesbian? At the age of forty-three?” Helen shook her head. “That’s the most preposterous thing I’ve ever — ”
“Do you have to put a label on it, Helen?” Olivia could feel the color rising in her cheeks. “Do you have to reduce it to that? My sister the lesbian?”
“Now you know very well that it isn’t that! I voted for Barack Obama, for heaven’s sake!” Helen’s voice rang with self-righteous certitude. “Why, the assistant principal at my school is gay and I never — ”
“Oh, I see. Some of your best friends are gay.” Olivia was definitely angry now. “That’s fine for them. But not for your sister. Is that it? Well, thanks!”
“Ollie, it’s just that I’m concerned for you,” Helen said after a moment. She was biting her lip.
“Well, don’t be.” Olivia snapped. With an effort she moderated her tone. “It’s my life and my decision and quite frankly, Helen, what you happen to think about this is your problem, not mine.”
“But if nothing else, think of the financial issues involved.” Helen persisted. “This isn’t a particularly good time to put the condo up for sale, you know.”
“That’s true,” Frank put in. “She’s got you there, Ollie. Better to wait.”
“Actually, I was thinking that Will might like to rent it,” Olivia replied. “What do you say, Officer? How does a bachelor pad on the lake sound?”
“Are you kidding?” Will flashed a smile. “How soon can I move in?”
“You see?” Olivia said to her frowning sister. “Problem solved.”
“Well…” Helen seemed at a loss. “I just never…I mean…it’s such a shock, Ollie…”
“Yeah, a shock,” Frank said. He resumed carving the roast beef. “But she makes you happy, does she?”
“Yes,” Olivia nodded, looking with some surprise at her middle-aged, meat-and-potatoes brother-in-law. “She does, Frank.”
“Then good for you, Ollie. Pass the carrots, will you?”
Dinner proceeded for a time in silence. Olivia noticed that Helen kept glancing her way with a troubled expression. Eventually she said. “Ollie, I apologize. You took me by surprise, that’s all. Of course, if it makes you happy…”
“That’s all right.” But Olivia could tell that her sister hadn’t changed her opinion. She disapproved, would always disapprove, would always be jealous. There would be no peace between them on the issue of Renate, merely a truce…and no more Sunday dinners.
Over dessert, Olivia and Helen discussed the impending move. Talking of practical matters seemed to help Helen regain her balance and she became brisk. “So have you set a date?”
“Not really.”
“Well, you and Renate should decide. Frank and I will be happy to help.” Helen shot a glance at her husband.
“Absolutely,” Frank agreed.
“Now I suppose that most of the furniture can go to the Goodwill but you do have some nice pieces,” Helen went on. “Dad’s roll-top desk, the marble-topped end tables. You mustn’t let them go, Ollie.”
“We’ll find a place for them in the house,” Olivia assured her, thinking as well of the Coronation Plate. There would be a place for that, too. “In our house, I should say.”
“Yes, the house…” Helen pursed her lips. “It’ll be hard, getting used to the idea of you living there. Because it’s right, what you’ve always told me. It’s such an ugly house.”
Olivia smiled. “You’ve never seen the inside,” she said.
That was wonderful! I love your writing! There was an uneasy feeling to the beginning of this story, much like the unease felt with a new relationship--but then it resolved into a beautiful ending. So good!