Lesson number four: let Randall think think he has the upper hand. he has the upper hand.

Bobbie puffs on her cigarette. "As for Lulu..."

Lena holds her breath and waits for Bobbie to say she'll take care of Lulu, to say she'll come home and change light bulbs, lift the heavy packages from Lulu's car to the house, balance her checkbook, drag the trash to the curb, say she'll listen to Lulu's endless parables.

"You've got to live your life... that's what I'm doing. Lulu and I are fine on the phone," Bobbie says. "In person, that's a different story. She can't cope with my life... and I'm not going to keep trying to explain it away. Anyway this is about you, not Lulu."

Lena gets out of the bed and heads for the window. An airplane, well on its route to a faraway destination, blinks the only illumination in the dark sky. She presses her ear to the gla.s.s, straining to hear the engine's distant rumble. "I listened to Tina all evening long. I forgot how much I used to like her."

"It's like you're obsessed with an a.s.signment: write an essay on why you like Tina Turner," Bobbie says.

"We have intersecting emotional points. Her birthday is November twenty-sixth, too."

"Is this why you woke me up?"

Lena knows that it doesn't matter what time it is or what day, her sister will always stop, listen, and love.

"When you were eleven you thought you had something in common with aliens. You spent hours at the library researching life on Venus." Bobbie chuckles.

"This is not the same. She got past her fear, and this is what I know: there's a little Tina Turner in all of us. Call it pep, audacity, or a look that camouflages the pain. We do what we have to do-be on stage or be who everyone else wants us to be-and finally come to the conclusion that nothing will work, unless we're true to self." Lena stops, breathes in and out slowly. "I'm just searching for the Tina in me."

"Well, don't wear your hair like Tina's." Bobbie's wit is sharp even at this hour. "I don't think blond is your color."

Chapter 20.

The months since Lena walked out of that corporate apartment, the door refusing to close behind her, have flown much like summer does for a school-bound youngster-with speed and the inability to distinguish one day from the next. Mediation sessions. Body-numbing depression. Drizzling spring rain. Camille's graduation celebration; Lena entering through the front door feeling like a stranger in the house she made a home; mother and children like strangers until she gathered them both in her arms. Juicy peaches have given way to bushels of tart green apples at the farmers' market, where now she looks, but doesn't buy. Foggy mornings, the threat of drought. September breezes blow warm across Oakland and the Bay Area even as New England leaves redden and the Midwest prepares for winter's blanket of snow. Awake at six, Lena sports a light jacket this cool morning ready, like everyone else in the Bay Area, for Indian summer-another round of flip-flops, shorts, and weekends of sunshine.

This morning's exercise around the 3.5-mile perimeter of Lake Merritt is her march of tears: because Kendrick is back in Chicago and rarely responds to her emails or phone calls, because Camille lives with Randall and chooses to have him drop her off at Columbia-a decision made a day after her eighteenth birthday one month ago. When Camille visited two days after graduation-and what turned out to be a civil and joyous celebration-she slumped onto the couch and absentmindedly jangled the extra set of keys Lena gave her. "All my stuff is at home."

Lena sat, holding herself, and her tongue, in hopes that Camille would recognize her disappointment by her body language. Then Camille came up with what Lena supposed was a peace offering.

"Come to New York for Thanksgiving."

"Well, Camille," Lena said, not bothering to argue with her daughter's decision or fight back the tears at her offhanded dismissal. "That's not quite the holiday I envisioned, but Bobbie will be excited, and maybe I can get Lulu to come, too." Only four at the dinner table for Thanksgiving, not the twenty or so-cousins, Lulu, Randall's father, friends without local family-she always included. No days and days of planning, shopping, cooking. No thrill of turning disconnected items into mouthwatering dishes everyone stuffs themselves with. That thought hurt then. It hurts now past her heart, and if asked her, she could not describe the pain.

After today she will no longer cry.

Mr. Meyers prefaced each of their sessions with a rolling summary: credit card debt divided 70 percent him, 30 percent her; equal division of savings and stocks; Randall kept his beloved Raiders sky box; Lena the Berkeley Repertory Theater seats; fifty-fifty split of the SF Jazz season tickets.

At the end of the ninth, and final, session and with the help of their lawyers, they reached final agreement. Randall insisted-if Lena wanted Camille and Kendrick to stay with her-that she had to keep the house.

"Or else what?"

Elizabeth warned that Randall would more than likely use the house as a bargaining tool. Lena stopped his momentum with a deliberate bathroom break and collected herself in the cold lavatory. She stood in one of the three stalls and blew her nose, wiped her tears on the coa.r.s.e toilet paper, then returned to the conference room twenty minutes later as if nothing more than her biological urge had been taken care of. Randall picked up the conversation as if she never left the room.

"I've worked hard for what I have," he said.

"So now it's all yours, huh?" Lena leaned against her leather-backed chair, looked straight into Randall's tight, brown eyes, and reminded him: "I worked hard, too. For us us. You. Keep. The house." She gathered her papers and stuffed them into her portfolio. Her hands trembled. The papers shook, and she didn't hide them. She slipped her purse onto her shoulder, left it to the lawyers to balance the house's appreciation with Randall's retirement fund, bonuses, the TIDA stock options, and walked out of the office, into the elevator, and held her tears until she got to her car.

Her tears flow freely now and wash away all emotion, so that by the time she faces Randall later this morning to sign their finalized agreement, she will not cry at all. His face has been so stern, the crease in his forehead so deep through each of the mediation sessions and the nasty correspondence in between. She cannot help but question his motives when his behavior is so aloof. Which compartment has she been relegated to? Where did he put that man who could never remember the punch line to a joke but made up his own, who held her when John Henry died and worried about how Lulu would get along, who cradled each of their children on the day of their birth and marveled at the miracle of their perfect fingers and toes, who rode with her in that fancy new car as excited as she was?

Back in her apartment, Lena steps into the living room and beams. It has taken three months to make this apartment feel like home. Furniture and flowers, walls covered with her photographs-rusty wrought iron fences entwined with weeds, aged doors from the decaying West Oakland train station, junkyard capitals atop Corinthian columns, abandoned cars, and a homeless man preaching to a garbage can. She cannot deny that the absence of playful shouting, the smell of food in the oven, hugs, and no one to say good morning or good night makes her feel sad.

The phone rings as Lena strips off her sweaty clothes.

"That Randall. I'm so disappointed." Through the phone Lulu's noisy slurping rea.s.sures Lena that the world is normal.

Lena snickers. If only Lulu knew. If only Lena had a dollar for each time Randall has scratched a red marker across Mr. Meyers's drafts or told Lena she couldn't, couldn't, couldn't do one thing or another with his his money, money, his his kids, kids, his his house, house, his his season tickets, season tickets, his his schedule, schedule, his his job, job, his his friends, friends, his his life. life.

"Want me to come with you?"

The thought of Lulu at her side-outfitted in fuchsia or sunflower yellow, complete with coordinating fingernails and toenails- in the mediator's office with Randall and their very proper lawyers is enough to make her chuckle.

"I love you, Lulu." Outside the window and fourteen floors below, a single rowboat, its crewmembers tiny dots, skids across the lake's gla.s.sy surface. Sections of the path she walked this morning, will walk again for many days to come, are easy to see. "After all these weeks, I believe I can handle it on my own."

"I love you, Lena. You get your strength from my side of the family, you know." From the shallow sound of her sips, Lena can tell that Lulu's coffee cup is almost empty. "Dress s.e.xy, and do whatever it takes to soften him up."

"s.e.xy," Lena says, "won't do me any good anymore with this this man. I'm invisible to him; a parasitic harpy he believes wants to bleed him dry." She settles on the bed and laughs until more tears come into her eyes. Flick. man. I'm invisible to him; a parasitic harpy he believes wants to bleed him dry." She settles on the bed and laughs until more tears come into her eyes. Flick.

"That's my baby girl!" Lulu laughs, too. "Always the drama queen."

In the shower, the hard, hot water blends with the last of Lena's tears, sprays over her cheeks, back, and thighs. If, all those years ago, Randall could go back to his first ex, the gold digger, could he come back to her, and would she want him if he did? Could the lilt of her laugh make Randall regret this decision, make him change his mind? Months of sitting across from him at the mediator's table have changed hers. He no longer looks familiar. Lena is amazed at how callous Randall has been. Is he surprised by how tough and prepared she has been?

Lena takes her time to dress in a conservative, body-hugging, taupe pantsuit (that's just a bit s.e.xy) and admires herself in the mirror above the sink. The whites of her light brown eyes are clear, the stress acne is gone, the hair is growing back in the tiny worry-patch above her right temple.

The gla.s.s top of the small bottle of jasmine essence on the bathroom counter is shaped like a flower. Randall never told her how much it cost, preferring to keep her supplied himself, but the cut crystal bottle and the gold filigree hint at its price. This bottle is nearly full of the delicate perfume. She rubs jasmine on her neck and wrists and behind her knees, then turns the bottle upside down and lets the rest run into the sink and down the drain. In this new place there is no room for old memories.

She stuffs I, Tina I, Tina into her purse like she has before every other session. Out the door, down the elevator, and into the car. Ready. Set. Go. into her purse like she has before every other session. Out the door, down the elevator, and into the car. Ready. Set. Go.

Mr. Meyers pats the papers stacked before him and explains that both parties will sign this master doc.u.ment, copies to be distributed once it is filed with the court and finalized at the beginning of next year. The doc.u.ment is a half inch thick. For all the time, arguments, and concessions, the fluorescent light makes the black marks on the crisp white paper appear insignificant.

Across the table, Randall's broad face avoids hers. He is Kendrick Randall Spencer now. Businessman. Formal and distant. Some other woman will soon be the beneficiary of his attention. The grin she loved, loves, hides behind his tight lips, nevermore to expose itself to her. Randall's smile has been removed from community property, not included in the division of their a.s.sets.

"And so it is done," Lena says, her tone so formal it surprises her, and she glances around as if someone else speaks with her singsong voice. She wants to tell a joke, maybe a parable like Lulu would if she were here: A man and woman find each other again after many years apart, many loves in between. They get married and live in a lovely house with a picket fence and tulips that bloom in the spring. Their son is handsome, their daughter beautiful; both kids are smart. They are blessed. One day, they lose themselves in the fantasy of it all and let it go without really understanding why, without taking the time to make it work when the going got rough.

Punch line: life is too short. Ha. Ha.

"Page two sign and initial here." Mr. Meyers is gruff with them today, tired, Lena supposes, of their bickering. "This paragraph outlines the purpose of the agreement and commences the specifics of the division of property."

L. Harrison Spencer K. Randall Spencer "What G.o.d has joined together, let no man tear asunder," the diminutive, white minister said on their wedding day in that beautiful cathedral where candles twinkled and the scent of so many lilies made Lena sneeze just as she said, "I do."

Page 15 covers spousal support and stipulates the amount Randall will pay to Lena until her death, remarriage, or legal domestic partnership. Today, the thought of another man in her life makes Lena laugh out loud. None of these things matters as her Mont Blanc pen holds steadfast to its path across the papers. Randall slides each page to her side of the table after he signs them. covers spousal support and stipulates the amount Randall will pay to Lena until her death, remarriage, or legal domestic partnership. Today, the thought of another man in her life makes Lena laugh out loud. None of these things matters as her Mont Blanc pen holds steadfast to its path across the papers. Randall slides each page to her side of the table after he signs them.

L. Harrison Spencer K. Randall Spencer Funny, Lena thinks, what she will remember about this moment. The thin red stripes on Randall's black suit and matching tiny dots on his tie, how it skews ever so slightly to the right, the absence of his wedding ring. The feel of him pulsing inside her, her body close to his, the smell of their mingled sweat. Her pressing urge-psychological, not physical-to pee. The mediator's rubber-tipped finger flipping through fifty-two pages. Fifty-two sets of initials. Six signatures. Rows of legal code shelved around the room: dull brown books, gold horizontal stripes-California Family Law, Division of Property. Stipulation, pet.i.tioner, and irreconcilable differences. Dissolution of G.o.d's law. The piles. The piles. The piles.

Ain't nothing guaranteed but death, John Henry used to say. Divorce is a death. She wants a funeral, a farewell to what was. Where is the champagne to toast this freedom?

"By placing your final signatures here, you both agree to the terms and conditions of this Marital Support Agreement. This is a legally binding doc.u.ment and any diversion from it, without the written consent of both parties, is considered breach." Mr. Meyers glances from Lena to Randall to Lena, then pa.s.ses the last page to both of them.

Lena looks across the table to Randall's smile-less face and considers extending her hand to touch him one last time. Their eyes lock in one swift, never-to-be-forgotten millisecond, and Lena will never know if it was reality or imagination that his hand almost extends, too. That love is flat. Gone like a helium balloon slipped from a child's hand floating up to the atmosphere, to heaven, to G.o.d. Pop. Pop.

Before they married, Lena practiced signing versions of her new name, like most brides-to-be: Lena Harrison Spencer. Lena Spencer. L. H. Spencer. She decided on L. Harrison Spencer. Now, she uses that signature for the last time.

L. Harrison Spencer K. Randall Spencer "And so it is done," she says, knowing full well she is speaking.

"I know you're in bed," Bobbie says when Lena answers the phone. "You okay?"

"No." Lena yawns into the phone. Outside, the afternoon sun beams through the window and creates a crisp parallelogram of light on the rug. "It's been three days-I've broken the blue-funk rule, and I don't care."

The sisters created the blue-funk rule for themselves years ago to handle heartbreak or disappointment: one, and one day only, to cry, hibernate, stuff themselves with their favorite food-chocolate ice cream with nuts. An empty cardboard pint once full of chocolate ice cream with nuts and chunks of white and dark chocolate sits beside Tina's autobiography on the long table doubling as a nightstand.

"I have good days and bad ones, Bobbie. This is a bad day. A very bad day. The worst." Time to get back to the rule, and her time is overextended. "But, it's my last one. I start work at the Oakland Museum in two weeks, and I signed up for another photography cla.s.s in the winter quarter."

"The hardest part is over. I'm glad you're moving on. Compared to some people, you don't have anything to worry about."

More than once during the mediation process Lena has thought about other divorced women less fortunate than her with children to feed, no money, and a real fear of what comes next. She makes a double sign of the cross over her heart, thanks G.o.d for her blessings, and promises to donate a little extra to a shelter.

"Leave me alone."

"You don't need to be alone. You need to get your a.s.s out of the bed. Look at it this way. At least when the final divorce papers are filed you won't have to see him."

Bobbie talks tough. Lena is unsure if Bobbie could take her own medicine if the tables were turned, having kept most details of her love life confidential throughout the years. They were not born into a family p.r.o.ne to share their business with outsiders. Who, she wonders, not for the first time, does her sister talk to when her emotional life gets jumbled and messy? This will be the way she pays Bobbie back: she will pick up the little hints Bobbie infrequently drops and be a better listener.

"I'm hanging up."

"Time to get back to you. What about Tina Turner? Have you finalized your plans? Have you made made plans?" Bobbie's pen or fingernail taps against the phone, and Lena wonders when a little sister stops feeling like a little sister and begins to feel simply like a sister. She straightens, taps her fingernail against the phone, and tells her sister that she'll get around to finalizing the arrangements when she gets around to finalizing the arrangements. There is still time to buy a ticket. plans?" Bobbie's pen or fingernail taps against the phone, and Lena wonders when a little sister stops feeling like a little sister and begins to feel simply like a sister. She straightens, taps her fingernail against the phone, and tells her sister that she'll get around to finalizing the arrangements when she gets around to finalizing the arrangements. There is still time to buy a ticket.

"Get up right now."

Lena picks up the empty ice cream carton and licks the sides for what is left of the melted treat. "Let me have this last moment to sulk, please."

"Just do it. For me."

"That's what Randall used to say."

On the stereo Tina croons music meant for scrunching and slow dancing, for making love. A new loneliness tugs at Lena's insides in a way that makes her draw her body into a fetal pose atop her bed.

Two weeks ago a forwarded invitation showed up in the mailbox alongside invitations to open new credit card accounts. It was the first time she'd been out after sitting in the new apartment for six weeks. Two weeks ago, the effort to pull herself together had been great, but she did, and she looked good in a sleeveless blue dress she hadn't been able to wear in over a year. Lena left that party within twenty minutes of her arrival after a gentle-eyed, very short man caught her off guard with his oddball question: what kind of fool was the man who could leave someone as good-looking as you?

If Lulu is right-about Lena never following anyone's advice, maybe, she thinks after Bobbie's suggestion, she should start. Now. Cheryl would be delighted to get her out of the apartment, but Lena is not ready to take the plunge into her friend's frenzied social life. Too bad she didn't get Pink Slippers' phone number. Flipping through her address book, Lena finds the pickings slim in the names of women she once called friend. She understands the protocol: she is off-limits now, the almost-divorced woman Candace, if she holds true to her word, will spurn. Lena imagines Randall's social calendar is full: her old friends have probably paired him up already. Good catch. So is she.

Without brooding over her decision, Lena gathers her hair into a ponytail, dusts blush on the apples of her cheeks, layers mascara on her eyelashes. Jeans, heels, white blouse, orange leather jacket. Enough.

Vertigo, a neighborhood restaurant and bar, is within walking distance of her apartment and comfortable. In the old days, whenever Randall and Lena walked into a restaurant, she pitied the men and women seated alone at the bar and a.s.sumed they were single and sad. If someone cared enough to look closely, they would see that she is; but she doesn't want anyone's pity. Once the hostess establishes that she is alone, she points instead of escorts Lena in the direction of the bar. Couples dine at cozy marble-topped tables; singles eat at the bar, the hostess's taut finger seems to say.

When the muscular bartender glances her way, she asks twice for a seven and seven on the rocks with extra lime before the young man acknowledges her. The lime slips from the rim's edge and into the honey-colored drink when he sets the c.o.c.ktail down. Never one to sit at a bar, nurse a drink or two, and chat with a stranger, Lena's mind is a blank as she searches for small talk. "Thanks," slips from her lips as the bartender turns away. She examines the menu more to busy her mind than select a late-night snack.

On her right, several young women watch the door in antic.i.p.ation of a friend or perhaps their dates. They remind her of her single days, the first time around, and the occasional bar-hopping in packs; even on the infrequent business trip she avoided solo eating and drinking. On her left, a man, tie loosened from his unb.u.t.toned collar, preoccupies himself with the newspaper while shoving large forkfuls of linguini into his mouth.

A cool breeze blows down the bar when the restaurant's huge gla.s.s door automatically opens for an amorous couple. The man's wide hand rubs the woman's-the much younger woman's-firm hips, and she does not seem fl.u.s.tered by the contact. When she glances at their faces, Lena blanches at the sight of Candace's husband and the bimbette from her dinner party. s.n.a.t.c.hing a section of newspaper from the man one seat over, Lena hunkers behind the pages. That same fear and anxiety that took over her when she ran into Candace at the bookstore now runs through her body again. What if they saw her? Poor Lena: no husband, no family; she's all alone. Alternating her attention between the paper and the door, Lena forgets that Byron is the one who should hide.

From behind the paper, the bimbette's infantile voice is exactly as annoying as Lena remembers from the night of the party. The night she remembers, too, that Candace confirmed her friendship. Lena drops the newspaper as Byron and the bimbette pa.s.s in front of her and the polished wood bar. "Heyyy, Byron." She exaggerates her greeting, makes it sweet and syrupy like she would for a long-lost friend, and stares right into Byron's eyes. If Lena ever tells anyone about the scene before her, she will describe it as a moment from a slapstick movie: the bimbette's face lights up with recognition and dims just as quickly; Byron's head swivels from left to right searching the bar for the possibility that his wife is there with Lena.

"Be sure to tell Candace I say h.e.l.lo."

"I'll do that," he says, stepping an arm's length from the bimbette. "Good to see you, Lena." Lena is positive that even if Byron were fifteen, maybe ten pounds lighter, he could not move out of the restaurant any faster. As for Candace, all of those women who think that she might be a threat to them, ha. It's the bimbettes of the world, she thinks, they better watch out for.

"That just made my night." She turns to the man from whom she grabbed the paper and pushes it back down the bar. He shrugs as if he has seen it all. Lena drops a ten-dollar bill on the counter. The bar has become more crowded with couples. The man with the newspaper is still more interested in reading than conversation. Perhaps some other time, she thinks. Then she will find new friends or a prospective lover or even a stranger with whom she will talk and drink and joke.

By the time she gets back to her building, the night guard is making his hourly rounds and the front desk is empty. Lena heads for the wall of silver rectangular mailboxes. She likes to pick up her mail late at night. No one sees her. No one cares.

The mailbox door creaks. Lena pulls out a wad of mail and weekly grocery store advertis.e.m.e.nts for foods she no longer eats or cares about. It must be four days since she last checked the mailbox. The small box is so full that she is surprised the postman hasn't complained. Standing in front of the marble-topped counter where the trash can is tactfully concealed behind a maple veneer door, Lena separates catalogs, credit card solicitations, and postcards sent by real estate agents looking for new clients. There are eighteen catalogs. Eighteen businesses that want her to buy furniture, linens, stationery, luggage, and cosmetics. She tears off the back page of each catalog, flips to the middle, and tears out the order page where her name and address are printed: Lena I. Harrison. Ident.i.ty theft. Who cares?

A red envelope protrudes between bills and solicitations. Lena recognizes Bobbie's bold handwriting. She always uses a medium-blue felt pen. Royal blue. Inside the envelope, a black-and-white photograph is glued to the front of a note card: Lena and Bobbie, in matching dresses and ruffle-edged pinafores, sit atop the shiny hood of their uncle's pickup truck. Each of the sisters holds an ice cream cone in a gloved hand. Lena remembers the day the photograph was taken: Easter Sunday, 1956. Lena was almost seven and Bobbie ten. They'd begged to eat Auntie Big Talker's homemade ice cream before, not after, they changed their yellow and blue Sunday clothes, and for once, Lulu let them. Their grins are wide and toothy.

Lena recognizes the quote from one of Tina's songs written across the bottom of the photo in Bobbie's bold slanted hand: There's something special about you There's something special about you. Inside is a first-cla.s.s airline ticket from San Francisco to Nice, France, imprinted with Lena's name.

"Tina said it, and I know it. Use this," Bobbie's bold handwriting commands. "Now!"

Chapter 21.

Each stark white wall of this square room is covered with paintings from the baseboard along the cement floor to the top of the eighteen-foot ceiling. Red, bright turquoise, cerise, and purple. Bold strokes of gouache form thick paint waves. Black-and-white photographs-thick lips, kinky and straight hair, kneecaps, noses, crusty heels-are spread like collages between the canvases. Some of the paintings are words outlined underneath layers of color. None of the paintings clash; instead of creating a frenetic, jarring sensation, they are ordered in a way that imparts control.

"See, getting out is a good thing." Though Marcia is Cheryl's client and not a close friend, she hugs Lena warmly. "Make yourself comfortable, walk around, meet somebody, and take them home." Her invitation is throaty and s.e.xy.

Randall and Lena first met Marcia on the wooden bench in front of a Diane Arbus photograph, "A Young Negro Boy," at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Marcia squeezed onto the bench, uninvited, and talked about the photographer's work, her hands gesturing rapidly the whole time, without any signal from Randall or Lena.