Evelyn Jean Pine

“But a mermaid has no tears, and therefore she suffers so much more.” 

— Hans Christian Andersen

My lawyers warned me: “Say nothing.” “Keep quiet.” “Do not tell your story.” 

Fuck them.

My origins, I have to admit,  are—what’s the technical term?—“dullsville.”  So I will start after my daughter is gone, and my marriage, like so many others, collapses and my job, answering phones at a box factory—yes, this was back when people, okay, women—actually answered phones; I was, inexplicably, “let go.”

So I became a waitress. 

Briefly.

I sold knick-knacks from our old apartment on a faux-cashmere bath towel on the sidewalk.

I was a caregiver to an old woman with transparent skin and darting eyes until she drew her very last breath. Every morning I helped her screw in her delicate teardrop earrings. I would smile at her as she admired herself in the mirror. To this day, I still have one of those tears. 

I then entered that odd netherworld where the destruction of one’s life seems to unfold like a fatal car accident in ghostly slow motion. I’d walk down the center of Folsom Street, past the genteel Victorian houses, daring the cars to hit me.

This is the story of how I was saved from my Lost Years. 

        We’ve all had them.  By “Lost,” I don’t mean those anecdotes we tell to entertain or connect, but those stories that are truly lost because although they live deep inside us, they are never, ever shared. 

One day on Folsom Street, I saw below the curb a small, flat rectangle. Could it be a transit card? Or better yet, a credit card? I sidled over, not wanting to draw attention to my remarkable luck. When I got close, I pounced. Then recoiled in horror. It was a year’s pass to a yoga studio called The Changing Pose. I was about to throw it back into the street, but I stopped. After all, it was free

—

“Do you need a mat?” asked the receptionist. 

I did. 

“You may change in the restroom or sit in the meditation room.”  

I chose the meditation room—a perfect square, sky blue—and utterly empty and quiet except for the sound of a fountain at its center. I recommend the room to you if you are ever downtown and need a tranquil, quiet spot for a smoke. 

When I came out, class was in session. I smoothed out the mat, sat down and while the teacher spoke about the yogic virtues of humility, acceptance, and compassion, I noticed that the man whose mat was next to mine had disturbing feet and his trembling exhale registered as an obnoxious, high-pitched hum.  

I soon realized he was not popular with anyone in class. The other women in class would turn away ever so slightly when he approached. When he engaged them in updates about his life and art, they would roll their eyes. One woman, Marietta, a queen bee who always wore leopard-spotted leggings, referred to him, with an upper class flare as “a turd.”  

Despite my nemesis, I became attracted to yoga. I liked it for the same reason most people do—the props:  black and gold bolsters, elegant blocks, and blankets in a range of bright colors rechristened for maximum deliciousness: creamsicle, burgundy, chartreuse. 

I noticed that very first day that the women who attended class matched the blankets to their yoga outfits. I didn’t have a yoga outfit. Nevertheless, there was a plum blanket which I would grab before anyone else had a chance. All the others seemed shabby to me. 

Unfortunately, my nemesis also coveted the plum blanket. We each began arriving earlier and earlier to ensure we would get our hands on it. Whenever I had the blanket he wouldn’t look at me, but he would speak loudly to those around me. And then he would step on my mat. Casually. As if it was nothing. 

One day, he did a handstand, fell over, and landed—all tada!—standing on my mat, my only home. 

I pulled back my fist and punched him in the mouth. Not hard. My hand was fine. He grimaced and a small tear appeared in his eye.  

The women came down from their handstands and peered at him. As he tried to choke back his tears Marietta crawled towards him on her hands and knees and touched his thigh. Another woman took his hand. Another rubbed his neck. I could not believe they were all gathering about him, as if mesmerized, as he silently wept.  

 I folded the plum blanket, placed it under my arm and left, pondering if I might learn something from this strange occurrence which might provide me with a little money so I might find a place to live. Instead, a nonprofit employment agency found me a job cleaning houses. They linked me up with two other women:  Juliana, who when she wasn’t cleaning houses coordinated volunteers for her church, and Maggie, who didn’t say much but was compulsive. She was the one who made sure we went into a place, swiftly and scrupulously cleaned, and got out. 

I have to admit that cleaning houses was in many ways my ideal job. Where else can you wander from room to room in someone else’s home stroking a scarf slung over a doorknob? Or try on someone else’s shirt and shoes? Or sit down at someone else’s computer and put your fingers onto the keys and feel the grain and the stickiness? Or find someone’s razor and examine it for the tiniest of hairs?

One day I was standing in front of a mirror and juggling a pair of white gold cuff links, Maggie appeared. Reflexively, I stuffed my hands — with one cufflink in each — into my pockets. 

“What are you doing?” 

“I wasn’t going to take them,” I reassured her as I took my hands with the jewelry out of my pockets,

“Finish up,” Maggie said curtly.  “And then we’ll be done with you.” 

As I put one of the cuff-links back on the bureau, Maggie left. I slid the other back into my pocket. 

I thought she would rat me out to the agency. But she didn’t. 

Two days later, the agency reached out to me. There was a house where the owner had been called away for an unspecified amount of time. A housecleaner was needed. Juliana and Maggie had said that I had left their team. Was I available?

—

I could hear the voices of children playing in a nearby park as the armed, uniformed security guard generously provided me with a card with the door key-code. At the center of the house was a bucolic courtyard—trees, plantings—all natives, I was later assured. The house itself was glassy, metallic, sleek, like an iPhone. As I strolled through, I didn’t run into anyone, but I could hear faint voices and occasionally footsteps. 

Then I walked into the den and saw her. On the wall. A painting of a young girl, ten or eleven years old, sitting on the grass under a tree. In one hand a cell phone, in the other a popsicle. And she was wearing only white panties. 

I felt in my pocket for a lipstick I had pilfered from another gig. I colored, in brilliant red, the cleft between her legs. 

I had left my mark. 

So I sat, that night, and then a second night, and then a third, until I felt a man looming over me.

“Do you think the painter wanted her to seem erotic? Or comic?” 

  I put my fingers to my lips.  “SHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” 

  We stared at the painting in silence, until he couldn’t help himself.

“What are you doing here?” He asked.

“I live here.” I said.

Like one whose home is always filled with yes-men and hangers-on, he asked, “Who invited you?” 

“Who do you think?” 

“People say this house is like a laboratory during the Golden Age of Alchemy. They think they know who I am, but they don’t.” 

I’d seen his face in the newspapers on the society page at charity events.

“I’m simple,” he continued.  “I can only do one thing. Like Johnny Appleseed, I sow innovation.” 

“You took that old building downtown and turned it into a porn studio.”

He offered me his hand.

“Rory.”

I took it. “People pay you money to watch other people have sex. How remarkably 

innovative.” 

“Seventy million dollars is a lot of innovation.”

“But all she needs is that tree.” I said, and gestured at the girl.  

He stared at the picture and then walked up to it, putting his face very close. I followed. 

“What is that?” He said, and peered at her for a long time. 

Finally I figured I needed to explain it to him. “She’s menstruating,” I said. “In five days the spot will be gone. Three weeks later, back like the moon.”  

My explanation didn’t soothe him.  At last, he said, “Nah. She’s been deflowered. Some guy had her. She’s texting all her friends.”

“No,” I disagreed. “She’s a goddess. She devours all human experience — the popsicle. Then she sends her knowledge joyously out to all humankind through the cellphone.” 

     “I paid for this painting,” he said. “It’s by J. Yung.”

“Call him up and ask him.” I suggested. 

He laughed. “You girls are always the most sexist. J. Yung is a female.” 

“Call her and tell her to come over and explain it.” I demanded. 

As we waited for J. to appear, I convinced him to help me take the painting off the wall and lay it on the floor so we could have a closer look. We were both considering the girl when we heard the click, clack, click of high heels coming up the steps. 

“What happened?” J. asked breathlessly, when she saw the painting on the floor.  She wore a frilly short skirt, a black blazer, and a heavy metallic watch.  

“She thinks — ”  Rory began.

I interrupted.  “I love this painting. Tell me all about it.” 

“Well, it’s six feet by eight feet. I matched the colors to the room’s shadows. It looks wonderful with the chandelier.” 

“I see worlds in this girl,” I said. “Every time I look at her — a new universe.” 

“What’s the red stuff?” Rory asked. “If that’s menstrual blood I get my money back.”

“I’ll paint over it,” J. readily agreed.

“It’s not yours to paint,” I said. “Now it belongs to the world. The entire painting begins with that spot. That glorious spot, that transcendent red, that beginning of all human culture. All human art.”

J. stared at me and then at the painting, 

“She’s right, Rory.” J. had thrown her arm around my shoulder in a sign of aesthetic solidarity, as if by touching me, she could remain convinced of the painting’s power. “I always knew you commissioned this painting because you’re able to birth and maximize the deepest creative impulses within human beings – within women. It’s not always pretty, but it’s powerful.”

Rory looked at his picture. And he looked at us, two women, strangers to each other, yet suddenly allied as one. He blinked several times. 

Then he grabbed at his middle as if he was trying to literally hold himself together. But he failed — and began to cry.  

J. gasped. After a long moment, she walked towards him, putting her hands on his shoulders. They stared into each others’ eyes. She began to kiss him and pulled him down onto the painting and they began to make love.

It seemed it might be an appropriate time for me to leave. Let’s be honest, there are few things as tedious as watching other people have sex; but amid their limbs, I could see the girl — a knee cap, a hunched shoulder, a wide-eyed gaze. I decided to wait, staring at the wall where the painting once hung.

—

I felt sunlight on my back and I realized that what I had thought was the sound of the sea was actually Rory, snoring. 

J. stirred. Her eyes opened.
“What are you doing here?” 

“I live here.” I said. 

She stood up, stretched, and walked over to me. I noticed a spot of lipstick on her skirt. 

“Are you his new keeper?” She asked me in a low voice. “His minder? Because if you are, you deserve a medal. I mean it. You have done something nobody ever thought was possible. You have made Rory attractive. I mean, let’s face it, I always found him so oblivious, so self-satisfied, so utterly repulsive, but last night, I don’t know, he was so different…appealing…even sexy.”

“You weren’t concerned about…” and I gestured at the girl on the floor. 

“The painting? That piece of shit. Don’t tell. Rory called me up. He wanted a picture of a little girl in her undies. Don’t look at me like that. I’m an artist. If you wave money in my face I’m not going to say no. But — can you keep a secret? I’m a busy little bee. Of course, I paint, but my true passion is designing fitness wearables — you know, step trackers, clip on blood pressure monitors, brain-scan hoodies. So I called my friend, Avery. He’s a painter too, but always teetering at the edge of hard times. I offered him 10,000 dollars. The commission was for fifty thousand. That’s my spiritual path — no matter what the situation I always create a win-win.” 

J. stood up and kissed me on both cheeks. “Ooooh, I love your earring,” she said to me, touching the teardrop —and left. 

I peered at the painting. I could hear kids shouting and laughing in the park. Rory stirred.  Stretched. Saw me. 

“What are you doing here?” 

“I wanted to ask a favor,” I said.

For the briefest instant, cynicism flittered across his eyes. Then his face folded back into a smile. “Sure.”  

“Help me put her back.” I said. I offered my hand to steady him as he pulled up his pants.  

We both looked down at the painting. She was resilient. Barely worse for the wear.  We struggled to return her to her rightful place. Then I curled up on the couch.

“So. . .” He looked around the room. “Comfy?” 

The den, with the painting, became my perch. Although I was interrupted almost every day by a smiling woman, who would fling open the door and make her way once around the den, like a poodle marking its territory by peeing in every corner. I learned from Mr. Jennings, the Security guard, that she was Rory’s favorite: Sirena — a megastar in the galaxy of adult entertainment. I couldn’t decide: was she merely intrusive or Rory’s spy? 

One morning I woke up and found Rory sitting at the end of the couch where I slept, his legs crossed like a guru, his hands on his knees. “I don’t believe in much,” he said, “But I believe in dreams. Last night I had a dream. Let’s figure it out together. I dreamt that I was searching for the ocean and all I could find was the empty sea floor. But when I was about to walk across it, I realized the floor of the ocean wasn’t empty at all but covered with insects with bright green wings that fluttered and hummed. I couldn’t move so I listened to their hum and I realized: These insects need so little that we don’t even notice that they have taken over, that they’re here to stay.”

His message was obvious:  he wanted me out.

“I had a dream like that,” I responded. “The ocean floor was covered with roses, green and ivory-colored. I wanted to sleep so I lay down on them, but they were crinkly and stiff because they were paper roses made out of money, but once I closed my eyes, I slept like a baby.” 

“That’s not like my dream,” he said, and, in a single well-rehearsed move, he swung his legs around, stood up and left. 

That evening, I waved goodbye to Mr. Jennings and headed out. By this point it was a familiar ritual, whether I left to run an errand or simply to roam. Upon my return, Mr Jennings would offer me a piece of toffee in what was a bit like a secret handshake, a covenant between us of mutual understanding. 

On the subway, a woman sat across from a man, letting him have it. “You don’t answer texts. You insult my mother. You ass-kiss my father, but don’t you worry:  He’s on to you.” 

“Hey, hey, hey,” the man said, “I already dumped you.”

“You banged my sister.”

“That proves it. We’re splits,” he sneered.  

“She said the night she spent in bed with you was the most boring of her life.  She’s still yawning.”  

The train lurched to a stop, he toppled towards her, but she leapt out of his way and sprinted out the open doors.

“I dumped you first,” he yelled after her. 

A woman who was sitting next to me rolled her eyes and made a face of disgust. We both turned back to the man, who had been shaking his head back and forth. He put his hands over his eyes, and started sighing loudly. 

He had dark hair. He had bright red cheeks. He had a lumpy posture that conjured up long nights playing video games and hitting the bong. When he brought his hands from his eyes, they were wet, and tears slid down his cheeks.

  “Oh” said the woman next to me, and she leaned towards him, staring. “Oh,” she said again and put her hand to her mouth, transfixed.  

The driver announced the next stop. She stood up, fumbled in her backpack, pulled out a crumpled bill, and pressed it into his hand as she leaned down and whispered in his ear. Then she rushed out so as not to miss her stop. 

He cried for a few moments more, then he opened his hand, and stared at the twenty dollar bill and began, once again, to cry, mumbling, “Hey, hey—strangers are giving me bucks because they think I’m a bum.” 

I leaned towards him.  “May I ask what she said?” 

“‘I like it,’ she said,—just like that. ‘I like it.’”

“It doesn’t sound like she thought you were a bum.”

“Well I am. I was living in my girl’s place. Now I don’t even have a home.”  

I brought him back to Rory’s. His name was Kyle. A part-time gardener—and a veteran of the Battle of Faluja. Mr. Jennings gave us both a toffee. If Rory noticed the new arrival, he didn’t let on.

  Two days later when Sirena was making her silent perambulation through the den, she spoke. “This is our sanctuary, our place. Time for you and your pathetic side kick to go.” I leaned back and Kyle sat up, shaking his head. Sirena continued, “I will not tiptoe around as you make yourself at home so make like the dawn and fade.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Kyle said,  “kick someone in the teeth and pretend it’s poetry.” He began to cry,  his face softening as tears drifted down his cheeks and he rocked from side to side. My spine stiffened as I watched, eager to see Sirena’s response.

“You want a kick in the teeth?”  Sirena asked, “There are multitudes — outside —  who would love to kick you in the teeth.”  

Kyle’s sobs did not stop. There was something refreshing about the way Sirena was impervious to Kyle’s tears. After all the other women’s reactions to men crying — the yoga guy, Rory, Kyle on the subway,  — these tears landed as lint to be swept from Sirena’s shoulder.

“Gather him up,” Sirena ordered me, “and carry him out.” 

I sat frozen as Kyle wept. 

“Don’t make me call Mr. Jennings.” 

And through his tears, Kyle spoke. “When I was little, I was so lonesome when I’d think about the ducks flying south for the winter, but I never really looked at ducks except in cartoons.” And he sobbed.

What was I seeing in Sirena’s eyes? She looked at Kyle as if she was trying to get him into focus, like a scientist who perused hundreds of insect specimens, but then found a bug that was a new mutation. She tossed back her head and sank to the floor, and sat rocking from side to side, watching Kyle cry and listening to him until he said, “I’m done.” And he lay back, face to the wall.  

Sirena stood up, wild eyed, yelling Rory’s name.   

And then she turned to me. “This is like nothing I’ve ever — ?” 

Rory threw open the door to the den. “What happened?” 

“Kyle. It’s amazing, and I’m — ”  

She threw her arms around Rory and kissed him.  He looked down at Kyle who was playing a game on his phone. 

“Good to know you, man.” Rory said, “And thanks for what you did for Sirena.” 

Kyle popped in his earbuds. 

“Oh, my god,” Sirena said, looking up at the girl on the wall. “I’ve always hated that painting — but now — I’m her.” 

That night, it snowed — or that’s what it looked like when I peered out onto the inner courtyard. I threw open the window, stuck out my hand and felt the drifting grey ash and heard laughter below. Through the leaves of the bay laurel, I could barely make out a figure standing near a circle of orange flame. Enchanted, I watched until the fire was out. 

When I woke the next morning, Sirena was standing over me, naked. She kissed my forehead. Her hair smelt of smoke. 

 “Your fire?” I ask her.

She was laughing. “I dumped all my clothes in a pile,  put a match to the frill of the nylon dress I was wearing. Whoosh. I stripped so fast — threw it all down and watched everything burn. Now I’m only me. I invited a few of my girlfriends. I want them to see Kyle cry. I want them to know this. And there’s someone else I need to share it with.”  She stared at her phone, and said, “They told me they never wanted to speak to me again.” She reached out to me, “Hold my hand, hold my hand.” Then she breathed into the phone, “Surprise! Mom!” 

—

In those early days, friends of Sirena visited every afternoon, and Kyle cried for them. A few were bored or bemused, but most came back again and again, and they told their friends. Soon, I needed more men.  So I recruited Danson, the delivery guy.  He got bleary-eyed whenever he heard Tupac Shakur. Then, Lange, the defrocked priest, and Miguel. Sometimes I would schedule five men at a time on different floors of the house, all weeping. 

Sirena’s mother, who moved in, loved them all. “These guys,” she said, “They’re fearless.” 

“Do you think this is healing?” Sirena asked her mother.  “Or is it a spiritual path?”

“Oh, honey, it can’t be a religion,” her mother said, “Nobody’s asked me for money.” 

I had been waiting for a moment to change the game, and I realized it was time, but if it was a new world, I had to move slowly. I folded my hands and shook my head.

“I don’t ask,” I said, “Until you’re ready.” 

“I’m ready.” Sirena said, sitting up straighter. 

“Are you?” 

Twice she tried to give me money. First, a roll of bills bigger than Kyle’s fist, and then more money Venmo-ed with a note, reading: “This is my time. “ I told her I couldn’t accept it.   The third time she came to me with money, I told her finally she was ready. Her task: To determine who else was ready and ask them for a significant commitment—in cash—and bury it in the courtyard. 

Some of the  women didn’t want to “Tithe.” They thought they could get this — power — elsewhere: Fantasy, ex-boyfriends, Netflix, but as I predicted, most of them were soon disillusioned, and came back to the fold, and I kept recruiting men. 

One summer evening, you could hear little girls laughing and shouting in the park. I was surprised to find Rory in the den, sitting beneath the painting, an over-stuffed garbage bag at his feet. 

“I’m here to apologize” he said. “I’ve been selfish. Trying to please both you and me, Sirena is torn apart. Out of respect and love for her, it’s time for you to go.” 

“Torn apart?” I said. “She’s nuts about Kyle. She calls him the Weeping Warrior — like he’s a tarot card that doesn’t even exist yet.”  

As I was explaining, I glanced up at the painting. A small photograph, like a passport photo, was pinned to the girl’s breast. Rory’s eyes followed mine, then he stood, reached up, and slowly, very slowly, pulled the pushpin out of her heart. The photograph fluttered to the floor, but Rory leaned down and picked it up. And then he said,  “She’s like a younger you.” 

He held out the picture. I took it, studied it, then held out my hand to give it back. “She looks capable of anything,” I said, playing with my earring.

Rory smiles. “The police are searching for that woman.”

“What happened to her?” I ask.

Rory looked me straight in the eye: “They say that an old woman in her care died in mysterious circumstances.”   

Oh, please. I restrained myself from saying: All circumstances are mysterious.  

“About cops,” He said, “I’m a kindergartener: ‘The policeman is my friend.’ I like to keep the blue boys smiling.”  

He snatched the photo from my hand and placed it on the coffee table like a fortune teller.

“I lied,” he said. “I’m not saving Sirena. I’m saving you. I don’t know if I believe you could kill anyone, but I did have Jennings dislodge all eleven of your men. For your own safety, you need to go. I won’t insult you by offering you money, but as a memento, take the painting.”

I stare up at the girl. The canvas is so flat, her face so blank.  

“Go ahead,” he says. “Touch it.” 

  I reach up to stroke her cheek. I might cry.  

“Not the painting,” Rory says, opening the enormous garbage bag at his feet. “Touch the money. From the courtyard. Jennings dug it up. Look.” 

Inside, the money is dry, crinkly, dead.  

“Touch it.” He insists. I don’t want to, but I do. I run my fingers through the welter of bills — and I feel as  if I’m touching all the women’s glowing faces and the tears of men who happily spent themselves crying for free. Stroking that money was like reaching into a beehive  and then pulling out your hand — un-stung — sticky with honey celebrating the sweetness of all your efforts. 

“ A windfall.” Rory says. “Thank you.” And he jerks the bag away from me, but I won’t let go. 

I  push him down and race out, taking the stairs two at a time, like a crazy Santa Claus with a bag of cash on her back.

Mr. Jennings, as he opens the front door for me, presses a toffee into my palm.   

“Stop her,” Rory cries from the top of the stairs.  

Outside, I run towards the children’s laughter. In the park, there’s a confab of preteen girls, jumping double-dutch. They scream as I leap into their ropes, but they keep swinging.  I swoop and soar, hair flying. 

Mr. Jennings hops into the ropes. “Forgive me,”  he whispers as we jump in unison for an instant.   

The ropes fall as the girls squeal and scatter. Mr. Jennings grabs me. 

I wrestle, kick, drop the bag. Money tumbles out — lifts in the evening breeze — glides heavenward. Some girls chase the bills, others point and shriek, one has the giggles and cannot stop. 

I stumble and Mr. Jennings yanks me up. 

I spit in his face. 

Rory, watching Mr. Jennings do his dirty work, laughs:  “That slobber on your cheek looks like jiz.” 

But you and I  know that when those young girls relive that moment, my spit on his cheek will glisten — like tears.

#