Astrid Magnussen (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
white_oleander) wrote2019-12-12 06:44 am
white_oleander) wrote2019-12-12 06:44 am
Hollywood, California, 1993. Thursday [12/12 FT].
Their holiday in Mexico had been over for a few weeks now, but Astrid still hated that they ever had to return to L.A. Why couldn't they have just stayed out there, where they were happy...or at least could pretend to be? Now Claire had to share Ron with phone calls and faxes and too many people again. Their house was full of projects and options, scripts in turnaround, industry rumors, notes in Variety. Ron’s friends didn’t know how to talk to Astrid. The women ignored her and the men were too interested, they stood too close, they leaned in doorways and told her she was beautiful, was she thinking of acting?
She stayed close to Claire during these busy weeks where people ebbed and flowed out of the house like tides, but it made Astrid nervous, watching her wait on these people, these indifferent strangers. Chilling their white wine, making pesto, taking another trip to Chalet Gourmet. Ron said not to bother, they could order pizza, bring in El Pollo Loco, but Claire said she could never serve guests out of cardboard containers. She didn’t get it. They didn’t see themselves as her guests. To them she was just a wife, an out-of-work actress, a drudge. There were so many pretty women during those weeks. Astrid knew she was trying to figure out which one was Ron’s Circe.
Claire went on Prozac, but it gave her too much energy. She couldn’t sit down, and she started to drink to even out the effects. Ron didn’t like it because she said things that she thought were funny but nobody else laughed. She was like a woman in a film that was badly dubbed, either too fast or too slow. She bungled the punch lines.
Then Ron left again, went back to traveling for work, and Claire couldn’t find enough to do in the husbandless house after all that chaos. She scrubbed floors, cleaned windows, rearranged the furniture. One day she gave all her clothes away to Goodwill. Without sedatives, she was up all night, filing magazine clippings, dusting books. She had headaches, and believed someone was listening in on the phone.
She swore she could hear the click before she hung up. She made Astrid listen.
“Do you hear it?” she asked, her dark eyes glittering.
“Maybe,” Astrid said, not wanting her to be all alone in her night. “I can’t really tell.”
That Thursday, Astrid came home from school and found Claire staring at herself in her round vanity mirror in her room, her silver brush forgotten in her hand. “My face is uneven, have you noticed? My nose is off-center.” She turned her head to the side, examined the profile, puffed out her cheeks and pushed her imagined off-center nose to the right, mashed the tip down. “I hate pointed noses. Your mother has Garbo’s nose, did you ever notice that? If I had mine done, I’d want one like that.”
She wasn’t talking about noses. Claire was just tired of seeing her own face in the mirror, it was a code of her failings. There was something missing, but it wasn’t what she thought. She fretted that her hairline was receding, that she was going to end up looking like Edgar Allan Poe. Her fearful gaze magnified the incomplete tops of her ears, shrank her small lips.
“Small teeth mean bad luck,” she said, showing them to Astrid in the mirror. “Short life.” Her teeth were barley beads, pearllike and gleaming. But her eyes had grown increasingly deep. Astrid could hardly see the lids anymore, and her sharp bones once again made bridges in her face, a Rodin sculptured bronze head, merciless in its paring down.
But they were getting closer to Christmas, and Claire cheered up. She loved the holidays. She was reading magazines with pictures of Christmas in England, in Paris, in Taos, New Mexico. She wanted to do everything. “Let’s have a perfect Christmas,” she said.
They wired a wreath in eucalyptus and pomegranates that they'd dipped into melted wax. She bought boxes of Christmas cards, soft handmade paper with lace and golden stars. Swan Lake played on the classical station. They sewed garlands of tiny chili peppers, stuck cloves into tangerines, tied them with velvet the color of brandy. She bought Astrid a red velvet dress with a white lace collar and cuffs at Jessica McClintock in Beverly Hills.
Perfect, she said.
But it scared Astrid when she said perfect. Perfect was always too much to ask.
[[ taken and slightly modified from Chapter 20 of White Oleander by Janet Fitch. NFB, NFI, OOC welcome, as per uuuusual *builds dramatic tension via the mundane* ]]
She stayed close to Claire during these busy weeks where people ebbed and flowed out of the house like tides, but it made Astrid nervous, watching her wait on these people, these indifferent strangers. Chilling their white wine, making pesto, taking another trip to Chalet Gourmet. Ron said not to bother, they could order pizza, bring in El Pollo Loco, but Claire said she could never serve guests out of cardboard containers. She didn’t get it. They didn’t see themselves as her guests. To them she was just a wife, an out-of-work actress, a drudge. There were so many pretty women during those weeks. Astrid knew she was trying to figure out which one was Ron’s Circe.
Claire went on Prozac, but it gave her too much energy. She couldn’t sit down, and she started to drink to even out the effects. Ron didn’t like it because she said things that she thought were funny but nobody else laughed. She was like a woman in a film that was badly dubbed, either too fast or too slow. She bungled the punch lines.
Then Ron left again, went back to traveling for work, and Claire couldn’t find enough to do in the husbandless house after all that chaos. She scrubbed floors, cleaned windows, rearranged the furniture. One day she gave all her clothes away to Goodwill. Without sedatives, she was up all night, filing magazine clippings, dusting books. She had headaches, and believed someone was listening in on the phone.
She swore she could hear the click before she hung up. She made Astrid listen.
“Do you hear it?” she asked, her dark eyes glittering.
“Maybe,” Astrid said, not wanting her to be all alone in her night. “I can’t really tell.”
That Thursday, Astrid came home from school and found Claire staring at herself in her round vanity mirror in her room, her silver brush forgotten in her hand. “My face is uneven, have you noticed? My nose is off-center.” She turned her head to the side, examined the profile, puffed out her cheeks and pushed her imagined off-center nose to the right, mashed the tip down. “I hate pointed noses. Your mother has Garbo’s nose, did you ever notice that? If I had mine done, I’d want one like that.”
She wasn’t talking about noses. Claire was just tired of seeing her own face in the mirror, it was a code of her failings. There was something missing, but it wasn’t what she thought. She fretted that her hairline was receding, that she was going to end up looking like Edgar Allan Poe. Her fearful gaze magnified the incomplete tops of her ears, shrank her small lips.
“Small teeth mean bad luck,” she said, showing them to Astrid in the mirror. “Short life.” Her teeth were barley beads, pearllike and gleaming. But her eyes had grown increasingly deep. Astrid could hardly see the lids anymore, and her sharp bones once again made bridges in her face, a Rodin sculptured bronze head, merciless in its paring down.
But they were getting closer to Christmas, and Claire cheered up. She loved the holidays. She was reading magazines with pictures of Christmas in England, in Paris, in Taos, New Mexico. She wanted to do everything. “Let’s have a perfect Christmas,” she said.
They wired a wreath in eucalyptus and pomegranates that they'd dipped into melted wax. She bought boxes of Christmas cards, soft handmade paper with lace and golden stars. Swan Lake played on the classical station. They sewed garlands of tiny chili peppers, stuck cloves into tangerines, tied them with velvet the color of brandy. She bought Astrid a red velvet dress with a white lace collar and cuffs at Jessica McClintock in Beverly Hills.
Perfect, she said.
But it scared Astrid when she said perfect. Perfect was always too much to ask.
[[ taken and slightly modified from Chapter 20 of White Oleander by Janet Fitch. NFB, NFI, OOC welcome, as per uuuusual *builds dramatic tension via the mundane* ]]