Part 4

Happiness Sold Separately
by Lolly Winston

(Page 4 of 5)

She waves to Ted as she backs out of the driveway. He looks up from his table saw and waves back, smiles-a flash of white teeth and faint dimples. Elinor closes her eyes for a moment and imagines his smell-sawdust and Mountain Spring deodorant-and wishes they could lie side by side on their comforter for the rest of the day. Stripped of passion. Down to just love.

More than anything, Elinor loves her husband's face. A big, handsome Irish face. Boyish, yet slightly jowly with age. Pools of brown chocolate for eyes. Thick lustrous hair she'd clutch and hang on to when they made love. She hates her husband and loves his face and hates herself and . . . thump, thump, she backs over the curb at the end of the driveway. Ted looks up, waves his hand for her to steer to the left, smiles. She waves back, pausing under the shade of the big oak tree in their front yard.

After the second in vitro, Elinor would lie under the tree, trying to calm herself. It was hot that spring. In the evenings after work she'd drag an old sleeping bag outside and take refuge on the cool grass, reading and dozing. Ted would join her, grabbing a beach chair from the garage. "Can I get you anything?" he kept asking Elinor. He'd nervously tap his palm against the arm of the aluminum chair, his wedding ring making a little clinking noise that made Elinor want to scream. She felt bad for being so irritated. What was wrong with her?

Now, as she heads for the gym, Elinor flips down the visor to look in the mirror. She runs her fingers through her shoulder-length hair, which she's decided to wear down for once. As soon as she gets rid of her husband's girlfriend she's going to get a new haircut. Maybe whiten her teeth. She snaps the visor back into place. Today Gina's going to evaluate Elinor's health and fitness needs and develop a workout plan for her, the receptionist who scheduled the appointment explained. Gina and Elinor will work together to accomplish these goals. Except that Gina's goal is to sleep with Ted, and Elinor's goal is to make Gina go away.

Gina meets Elinor in the lobby at the club. She doesn't seem to know who Elinor is. A blank-yet-pleased expression passes over Gina's face as they shake hands. Is Elinor as unrecognizable as all of the other drooping, middle-aged women at the gym? Gina's fingers are long and thin. She's wearing black warm-up pants and a collared shirt. Her long, light brown hair is pulled into a high ponytail, with bangs that fall into her eyes. She's lithe, buff, but not exactly beautiful. Her face is a bit flat and her eyes set far apart, reminding Elinor of a flounder. These cheekbones certainly wouldn't break a man's heart.

They sit at a table in the snack bar. Gina asks a list of questions, filling in the answers in small, square handwriting. She is all energy and spunk. Nimble fingers, spry ovaries. Beautiful eggs. A group of retired men share a pitcher of beer at a table next to theirs, even though it's not even noon. This is the quirky thing Elinor loves about their gym: The snack bar serves brownies and beer alongside the smoothies and salads. Elinor would like to join the gentlemen. Give in to gravity and Father Time.

"Age?" Gina asks. Her lips shimmer with rosy gloss. "Thirty-nine," Elinor lies. While she had no problem turning forty, she does have a problem saying forty, especially in the company of Gen-X fitness Nazis who are romancing her husband. "The real problem may be your age," the doctor had gently explained when Elinor first couldn't conceive. While she hadn't looked forward to turning forty, she never thought her birthday would constitute a medical emergency.

"Really? You look great," Gina says without looking up. I lost my ass, Elinor wants to say, as though it might actually be here at the gym's lost-and-found. She wishes for a moment she were consulting a fitness expert for real. It's a shallow, vain thing to fret about, but what she hates most about aging is the southern migration of her buttocks after two decades of sitting on her duff for corporate America. Somewhere along the way she lost her figure- the small-framed size 4 build she'd had all her life. Then the infertility treatments made her belly bloat, like an overripe melon. Elinor doesn't mind the two coppery age spots forming on her hands, or the crow's-feet crinkling at the corners of her eyes, but she wants her body back.

Gina says she's going to weigh Elinor and give her a stress test and body fat analysis after they finish the paperwork. Then she'll recommend classes, such as spinning and yoga!

The flax in Elinor's purse on her lap is heavy in a comforting way, like a cat curled up there. She'd been all riled up driving here, but now she can't think of a single thing to say to Gina. She's too tired. She figures she hasn't had a good night's sleep in about two years. While she can barely keep her eyes open during office meetings and conference calls, she lies awake at two AM cataloging a dizzying inventory of worries: donor eggs, adoption (foreign or domestic?), mounting medical bills and insurance forms.

"What would you say your overall fitness goal is?" Gina asks. Once, while walking on the beach in Hawaii, Elinor saw a woman fishing. At first she thought the woman was a man. But when she reached the fisherman, she realized he was a woman, with beautiful white hair cropped short and blown back in the wind. The woman wore khaki shorts and a black T-shirt, and her legs were muscular and tan. She was solid and as beautiful as the scenery. Yet she was sort of genderless-not really feminine or masculine, just a person, smiling up into the sun, the ocean a sparkling carpet before her. Just fishing. She looked at peace. Not worrying anymore about crow's-feet or how her rump would look in a tankini. Elinor wants to tell Gina that this is her fitness goal.

Gina leans across the table and looks at Elinor intently. Her wide-set eyes are green and almond-shaped and her skin is flawless. The bangs-falling-into-the-eyelashes look is definitely sexy.

"To lose fifteen pounds," Elinor says. "And firm up my . . ." everything, Elinor wants to say. But she doesn't want to admit this to her husband's lover. She clears her throat. "To firm up my butt. I don't get to the gym much. I'm too busy." I am successful, she wants to tell Gina. Okay, maybe not at the things that matter now. But at the things that mattered before. Did you know, if you live in Holland and your pipes freeze, you legally get the day off with pay? Elinor is a fountain of knowledge when it comes to international employee relations law.

"First thing?" Gina says. "If you'll let me? I'm going to come to your house and clean out your cupboards."

Elinor laughs. "And mop the floors?" "I'm going to purge your carbs," she says firmly. "Your pastas, breads, and cereals?"

"Cereal?" Elinor asks. "Cereal is the worst!"

"Uh..." You're taking my husband and my Frosted Mini-Wheats? Elinor considers this unlikely scenario: Gina, at Elinor and Ted's house, cleaning out the cupboards. Gina and Ted sweating under the bright lights in the kitchen. The whole thing out in the open.

Remorse. An apology. More important: an agreement. Gina will never come near them again. "Okay," Elinor finally tells Gina. "But it'll have to be in the evening. I work during the day." "Sure," Gina says.

"My husband will be there. Is that okay? He wants to cut carbs, too. Well, he already is. He started without me." Elinor hates the bitterness in her voice. Maybe after they give Gina the boot, Elinor and Ted can take a trip to a tropical resort. Eat steamed fish and brown rice and soak in a tub for two. Run on the beach and have sex on the marble bathroom floor of a luxury hotel room. Elinor will catch up with Ted. Lust and exercise. They don't sound bad at all.

"Great," Gina says. "I can fuck both of you." But Elinor is sure she said help. I can help both of you.

As Elinor sprinkles tarragon over three chicken breasts, she feels the need to prove to her husband and his lover that she can cook. Gina is due to arrive at their house in forty-five minutes. Elinor's fixing a low-fat, low-carb dinner-broiled seasoned chicken breasts, zucchini split and stuffed with ricotta cheese and chopped mushrooms and onions, butter lettuce salad sprinkled with the ubiquitous flaxseeds, and fresh berries for dessert with just a dollop of whipping cream. She begins setting the kitchen table for three.

Ted turns the channel on the little TV in the kitchen to a Nova show about coal. "Too fine to use in the steel-smelting process, the coke is sold for heating and cooking on small stoves," the narrator says.

"What do you know?" Ted says. He's mostly interested in factual things. Details that don't require you to form an opinion. "How come three?" he asks, looking at the place mats.

"A gal who might join my book club is coming over." Elinor sets out the napkins and silverware. Soon this will be a part of the past. They'll get their lives back. Ted regards the TV.

Elinor sprinkles more thyme and tarragon on the chicken breasts, worrying that they're going to taste bland-as bland as sex became with Ted before they quit making love altogether. She wonders if Jerry Hall's mother ever really uttered those infamous words: "In order to keep a man you must be a maid in the living room, a cook in the kitchen, and a whore in the bedroom." Gina's a whore in the kitchen. Innovative, Elinor will give her that. Meanwhile, Elinor's become a lump in every room: in the bedroom, in the kitchen. Maybe because she had to become a numb lump on the doctor's examining table to ward off the pain of all those procedures. "Just a little pressure," the doctor would say. Why couldn't they use the real P-word? Pain. This might hurt. Instead there were euphemisms: pressure, a pinch. Once, when Elinor had an outpatient procedure to remove cysts on her ovaries from the drugs, they let Ted accompany her. "Squeeze my hand," he whispered sweetly. Elinor grimaced, a flame of pain shooting toward her hip. Ted's hand was solid and warm, the only comforting thing on the planet.

Copyright © 2006 by Lolly Winston

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