ChrisA

Secret Places • Bathroom

Rose never told anyone why she was always in the bathroom—her husband assumed that her “difficulties” originated in the distant past. She had been married for twelve years before she met the Doctor, and that was nearly a life-time ago when she lived in a cramped city apartment without any privacy. Not until she moved into the house in Barclay Park, with a spacious marble bathroom all to herself, was Rose finally able to have a moment of peace.

And these moments came frequently. Something went off in her mind, like a trigger, that told her she had to go, she had to go. Rose hurried to the bathroom, remembering that she shouldn’t hurry, because just last week she fell and bruised her upper thigh on the hard marble tiles. Her fingers reached for the edge of the vanity top as she sidled her way to the toilet. Once she was safe inside the little chamber, behind the fogged glass door, Rose tried to shut everything out of her mind. She tried to relax. And sometimes she would fall into a state of deep concentration, wherein the magazine rack on the wall, the toilet paper dispenser, and the little chamber itself disappeared. During these moments, she was absolutely alone, and the noises that had been eddying around in her mind all day long, became suddenly still, and she could hear a quiet sound, like the gentle murmuring of a small, defenseless animal crouched inside the moist walls of her bones and tissue.

But nothing ever seemed to come out. (Sighing.) The deep concentration continued for longer durations—and she could almost feel something giving way—but no, there was nothing. Her imagination was deceiving her again. She always thought that she had to go to the bathroom. Maybe it was just another false alarm. She waited ten minutes longer. Twenty minutes. She picked up a magazine, Reform Judaism.

Rose’s bathroom looked like one of those grottos in the South of France where sunlight peaks in through a crack in the cave and reflects off the crystal ponds inside. Orchids and azaleas were set in brass at the foot of the oversized marble Jacuzzi. Bonsai plants sat on high nooks. The polished floors were grey and glistening, and mirrors gave the illusion of infinite space.

But every so often her son would tramp into the bathroom, bust open the fogged glass door, and see his mother’s naked thighs wedged over the toilet seat. Startled by her son’s intrusion, Rose flexed the great winged-shapes of her arms. Don’t you dare come in here Lethe Bashar—she would spat out at her son, shooing him away with her large, flapping arms. Don’t you dare, Don’t you dare, now with threatening inflections. Leave Mommy alone, now passive and subdued. I said I’m busy in here, vulnerable. Leave me alone, helpless.



Rituals • Housecleaning

Except for the marble bathroom, everything in Rose’s house was white. She lived in a white house with white walls and white floors, and the slightest smidgeon of a fingerprint on Rose’s white walls was liable to send her into a panic.

Housecleaning was an activity that had to be engaged on many levels. There was the weekly scouring of the house; and there was the regular, daily cleaning. A grey van packed with Polish and Slavic ladies arrived at Rose’s house every Thursday morning to accomplish the former of the two missions, which entailed bleaching the grout between the tiles, cleaning out the refrigerator, vacuuming all the rooms in the house, cleaning the mirrors, wiping down the windows, polishing the cabinets, and various other jobs that are too numerous and picayune to list here. The battalion of cleaning ladies was distinct in purpose and duty from the two “regular” housekeepers who also acted as “nannies”. In accomplishing her overall vision for the household, Rose had wanted two women who could act as her “right hand men”. Over a succession of ten years, Ross communicated her ideal to Dora and Mabel, her two full-time housekeepers. They reflected her wishes, desires, and neurotic character in eerily similar ways.

Dora, who was closer to Rose’s high-strung temperament and grasped Rose’s “Vision” perhaps better than Mabel, broke stride down the marble hallway nearly twenty times a day. She was like an athletic ostrich attempting flight indoors. The brunt of the work fell on Dora, who was younger and more vivacious than Mabel, and who strove to meet Rose’s often unreasonable demands for a clean house. Not only that, but Dora worked in Rose’s art studio, building frames and stretching canvases. And often, Dora and Rose worked side-by-side, whether they were scrubbing floors or cleaning paint brushes.

In addition, Dora and Mabel were expected to make the beds, change the sheets, tidy the bedrooms, do the laundry, and dust the blinds. They also emptied the garbage cans, watered the plants, did the grocery shopping, and made school lunches. On most days, they also prepared dinner. The house was made to look completely anonymous, and Lethe and Mazzy, who were ten and six years old, had the recurring sense that they were staying in a hotel. Every day when they came home from school, their rooms were in perfect order—the only thing missing—a mint on their pillows. His sister had never known anything different because she was so young, but it bothered Lethe to find his room constantly rearranged. He longed for a trace of his own existence, a poster on the wall, or some other evidence of his own personality.



The Obsessive Artist

Lethe and Mazzy saw that their mother would escape downstairs into the basement and sometimes not return to the upper floor until the next morning. During Rose’s stints of oil-painting, the housekeepers, Dora and Mabel, would often take care of the children, preparing Macaroni and Cheese dinners, or helping Lethe and his sister with their homework.

Rose worked tirelessly in her art studio, making numerous sketches, arranging scenes for her models, and hovering anxiously around a large commercial easel. Night and day, the glare of extension lights reflected off the walls in a harsh, artificial brightness. An old wine box was overflowing with oil paints, and horsehair brushes soaked in turpentine. The peculiar objects Rose had collected over the years were scattered on the floor, African tribal mask, ceramic owl, mannequin, gas mask and snake cage.

“Sunday Afternoon # 1”: a box of Corn Flakes sits on the breakfast table, and a small white-haired lady stands beside the large, sedate body of her husband who eats his cereal and watches television. “Sunday Afternoon #2”: the husband indolently naps in a wingback chair, as the wife glances into a mirror to fix her hat, ready to leave the house. “Sunday Afternoon #3”: husband drinks beer and watches Sesame Street as wife knits baby clothing on the breakfast table, a toy telephone on the ground next a basket of dirty laundry and a six pack of beer. (The windows in the background of all three paintings reveal two ill-tempered geese that are fighting because in the gated subdivision where Rose lived, there was a central lake surrounded by mammoth weeping willow trees and flocked with Canadian geese that wandered from the perimeter of this lake into the resident’s lawns. Because Rose looked out on her backyard as she was painting, the geese made their way into this series of pictures.)

But the Doctor was concerned about his wife’s obsession with painting. Two months later, he found Rose dressed up in purple tights, a striped pullover, and a red silk opera hat. She had painted her face lily white with black tears underneath her eyes, and was using the mime’s costume to paint herself into a series of watercolors. Unlike the domestic dramas of Mabel and Ernie (the white haired lady and her husband), this series of watercolors was comprised entirely of the artist’s self-portraits, and Rose began the habit of walking around the house and wearing the mime’s costume long after she had finished painting for the day.

At dinner that night the Doctor exclaimed, “Honey, you look silly with that outfit on. Why don’t you go take it off?”

“After dinner—” she replied.

“But we’re eating as a family and you’re dressed like a clown.”

Rose dropped her silverware clamorously onto the tablemat and stood up in front of the family. Lethe and his sister were watching their mother closely. The Doctor looked alarmed. Rose pretended to be trapped inside an invisible box. Her gestures were piqued and deliberate. What was she trying to say to them? Brother and sister broke into a fit of giggles. The Doctor stared at his wife, blankly.

Mysty

Wow this is quite the escape..... escape into realism. Almost makes me wonder ..... is Rose mentally ill or .....just eccentric? I am sure you will let us know. Thank you for an interesting character read.

Mysty

nomadicrhymer

Wow ChrisA...this was a very entertaining read. A little quixotic, Rose is. Very interesting though...can't wait to read what her next move will be...seems like she is never taking time to be a mother though...very strange character.

Nice write...Nomad