Cleopatra and Frankenstein(38)

Cleo looked at her father, who had visibly colored.

“You didn’t say anything,” she said to him.

“Miriam’s right,” he stammered. “It was very last-minute.”

Cleo’s face hardened. She should have known there was no end to the ways in which her father could disappoint her. Frank gave her leg a sympathetic squeeze under the table.

“So, what did you think, Peter?” she asked. “Of New York?”

“I don’t know how you two can live here,” said Miriam. “The noise! And it’s filthy. I saw an actual rat yesterday.”

“It’s a fine city,” Peter said. “Very fine. But it’s not for everyone.”

“My mom always used to say, don’t fuck anyone who doesn’t love Manhattan,” said Frank.

“Well, let’s not be vulgar,” said Miriam.

“At least she has an opinion,” said Cleo, glancing at her father.

Miriam, catching this, gave the table a light slap of her turquoise-manicured hand.

“So true,” she said. “Opinionated women just aren’t celebrated enough, are they, Cleo?”

“And some a little too much,” said Cleo.

“Ah! Here’s our food!” said Frank.

Two burgeoning silver platters of seafood on ice were placed ceremonially before them. The ruby-red lobsters sat at the center, their shells cracked open to reveal the plump flesh within. Nestled around them were fresh shucked oysters, chubby pink prawns, green-lipped mussels, and clams the size of a human palm. Flimsy white paper cups of tartar sauce and thick slices of lemon finished the impressive display.

Frank emptied his glass and passed it back to the server.

“I’ll have another,” he said, then turned to the table. “Let’s feast!”

Miriam continued to do most of the talking while they ate. She had been asked to contribute to a psychological study on childhood trauma and masturbation and was regaling them with the story of her own first orgasm, which she achieved at the precocious age of four and a half. Frank marveled that neither she nor Peter asked a single question about Cleo the entire time. Not about where she lived, how they’d met, who her friends were, what she was painting, or any other facet of her life in New York. Finally the abundant platters were reduced to a collection of scraped-out shells floating in melting pools of ice and whisked away.

“Do you have any baby pictures of Cleo?” Frank asked. “I’d love to see them.”

“Do you know something, darling?” said Miriam. “We don’t.”

“I didn’t think …” began Peter.

“We should have brought some photos of Cleo’s paintings,” said Frank. “She’s so talented.”

“How old were you when I met you, Cleo?” asked Miriam, ignoring this.

“Fourteen,” she said.

“So Humphrey must have been eight,” she said. “God, he was precious.”

“Cleo was a beautiful child,” ventured Peter. “Hair like spun gold.”

“Oh yes, she was a beauty,” said Miriam. “Until that ugly tomboy phase. Can you believe it, Cleo, I still see some of those skater boys you used to hang around with in town? I call them boys, but they must be men now. What was the one you were so fond of with the funny name? Ragamuffin? He works at the Café Nero now.”

“Ragdoll,” said Cleo. “His name was Ragdoll.”

“Oh yes, that’s much more sensible.”

Miriam raised an eyebrow at Frank in wry collusion. He looked away from her to Cleo, who was staring blankly at the checkered tabletop.

“Was this in London?” he asked.

“Miriam and I live in Bristol,” Peter said. “Cleo spent a year with us while her mother was ill.”

Frank glanced to Cleo again, but she was no longer at the table. She was back in Bristol, back to being fourteen. It was the first time her mother had been put in psychiatric care, but it would not be the last. Ragdoll was older, eighteen maybe, named for the loose-limbed way he fell off the skateboard. She had been ice-skating with some of the girls from her new school when he saw her. She was spinning in a slow orbit, arms outstretched, when he leaned across the partition and caught her wrist, pulling her toward him. None of the other girls could believe it, that she went with him so easily. But she was not like them. She was unmothered, unmoored. He took her under the overpass, where the boys carved and swooped on their boards in the gathering gloom, and later to a council flat with a single mattress on the floor. She lost her virginity to him that first night. Afterward, he had peeled the condom off and disposed of it in an empty pizza box. When she came home, no one asked where she had been. No one asked her that night, or any other night she spent in that house.

“I didn’t know you lived there,” said Frank.

“That’s not surprising,” said Miriam. “You hardly know each other!”

“We know the things that matter,” said Cleo.

“What Miriam’s saying is we just don’t want either of you to rush into anything,” said Peter. “You’re so young, Cleo, there’s no rush.”

“Please don’t speak for me, darling,” said Miriam. “But you’re right, Cleo is certainly very … young.”