For the past two days, Mildred Wong hadn’t been sleeping well. She’d awoken that morning in Amsterdam, her body consumed—by aches, fever, an unfamiliar weakness. She’d briefly—or it seemed briefly—been dreaming. This is how the dream always ends: her mother’s voice. The Japanese soldiers, coming for them. And they have to be quiet. But they must go as well. They are in a hurry. And then they are discovered, soldiers, already descending upon them, one after the next. She can hear the furious, unforgiving voices. Her mother’s voice too: “Wake up, wake up! Hurry child, you must wake up!” Then a phrase like, “We’re ruined.” And then, darkness.
It was the sounds of plucking, that was what roused her. She reached over Douglas’s side of the bed, and silenced the alarm—his phone, an incessant barrage of harp arpeggios that wasn’t exactly musical. Then quiet, once more. The room, dark as a night sky, too cool to be actually comfortable. But once more, Douglas managed to lay undisturbed. He was open-mouthed, and even snoring. The tension in his usual face of consternation now appeared diluted, and he was a rare figure of peace, completely absorbed by a delicious slice of that other, alternative realm of existence. Once they would have made love ravenously. Once they would have held each other tightly, in each other’s arms, gasping for a last bit of breath. The firmness of his body against the softness, warmth of her own. Now such moments had cooled. Mildred thought that if he could sleep through the alarm, then he must have desperately needed the rest as well. She bit down on her bottom lip. It felt chapped. But her mouth was dry, there was no denying it. In the near dark of the dawn light, she stumbled toward the mini fridge, careful not to wake him.
Amsterdam was colder than Mildred had expected. The temperatures of the week had been forecasted to be comparable to that of New York City. But throughout the day, the weather seemed to change at the drop of a hat. If not wind, then it was rain. And if not rain, then it was a dense fog that blanketed the uneven and narrowly built canal houses. “How can the afternoons feel colder than the evenings?” she had said the previous day by Dam Square. She wanted to say, “It’s like a chill piercing straight through your heart,” but refrained. After all, she had made a promise.
The sun set earlier this time of the year as well, like a warning of even shorter days to come, of things that one could no longer retrieve. It was January. It was damp and cloudy and gray. And it somehow did something to the spirit, to the soul—made it lessen in dimensions.
“It is a bleak time to be here, isn’t it?” Douglas said in his offhand manner. “Leave it up to us to manage that.”
Henrick, who’d checked them in at reception, had agreed. The young man informed them that it was always damp in the city this time of year, due to it being seven feet above sea level. For Mildred, this meant that the hand-in-hand walks along the canals, clinking champagne flutes over a romantic dinner cruise along the Amstel River—which she had envisioned while playing Sudoku on their KLM flight from JFK—was in actual danger of not materializing. The weather, being so against her. And now, her body was seemingly against her too, the incessant aching.
They were staying at the Ambassadre. It was in Sloterdijk, a little further away from the city center. Douglas had been the one to pick the hotel, what he assumed was a quieter neighborhood, though the modern-styled building was situated across the street from an elementary school and a bus station. In the mornings, they heard the lurch of buses, and children laughing, a bit too loudly.
Moments later, Mildred was at the window, tugging on the velvet curtains. Indeed, she saw the clusters of children, golden blonde hair. They were lined up across the street, all seemingly well-groomed, and well-behaved, and well-looked after by a string of doting parents. As a child herself, Mildred had been hopeful. In her teens, she had been vigilant and daring. Her twenties had been marked by apprehension and restraint. And her thirties, renewed carelessness and haste—and ultimately, disappointment and more heartbreak. Mildred had been the first in her family to graduate from university, to go on to earn her doctorate in chemistry. “The first Dr. Wong,” her father had remarked, and joked, “Just the wrong kind of doctor.” Still, it had been a milestone for her family.
Then she was on the cusp of forty. And she met Douglas, a dashing-enough man who dressed conservatively, and seemed of another decade, another place. Behind closed doors, it was another story. When it came to intimacy, he already had particular appetites, and did not shy away from the adventurous—he had a penchant for ropes and blindfolds, and an intrigue for exploration, pushing boundaries. That’s what she had found attractive in the first place, the contradictions in the man, the dionysian within the apollonian. Douglas was a psychologist, someone already overwhelmed by the responsibilities of his ever-growing private practice. Throughout the years, he’d cultivated a sort of name for himself, for those in the know. He gave lectures in Shanghai via Skype. It wasn’t unusual for his patients to refer others to him. Business was good. And Douglas would often remain late at the office which was actually his former apartment on the Upper West Side. If he was too exhausted to make the commute back downtown to their one-bedroom apartment in the Village, he’d stay overnight. And they’d had discussions, vaguely agreeing that since they were both professionals—workaholics even—for people like them, children were out of the question.
“That is not the answer,” Mildred’s mother snapped back, warning her. “Children fill the gaps of a marriage.” This was some years earlier. She was a serious woman, with dark brown eyes and an unrelaxed jaw and pronounced chin. A tragic face that had survived war, an invasion by the Japanese, a communist takeover, poverty and hunger, which at one time, was the only reality available. She wore a gold chain and a piece of jade in the shape of a coin pendant around her thick neck for luck; it had belonged to Mildred’s grandmother, and her great grandmother before that in Guangzhou. “Or else what was the point of going through all that trouble, of being such an old bride?” This was meant to be a critique, in the guise of a joke that no one found funny—nor interesting.
Mildred was thirty-nine when she married Douglas. He, only two years older. The wedding was in Douglas’s hometown of Greece. Thessaloniki. The evening—a blur of laughter and cheer, not to mention delicious food. Spanakopita, stuffed grape leaves, baklava. White wine from a local vineyard. A two-tiered cake, chocolate with buttercream frosting, Douglas’s choice. At the time, Mildred had allowed herself to indulge. This was supposed to be happiness, and finally, she thought. This was supposed to be bliss. And she deserved it, didn’t she? The wedding wasn’t exactly an extravagant affair: just family, close friends—mostly Douglas’s friends too; she didn’t think to invite her co-workers, for instance. All through the night, his mother, Francine, had played a kind of grande dame in her flowing turquoise gown, flitting about from one cluster of family and friends to another. Mildred’s own mother, in contrast, kept to herself, and watched on, her lips, pursed together in judgment.
When the festivities of the night came to its end, it was just after midnight. People were bidding their goodbyes. Mildred vaguely remembered having to pay the bill at the restaurant. This was while Douglas played chauffeur, driving one aunt or uncle or cousin home after the next. With the money from several of the wedding gifts, Mildred had paid in drachmas, which was the currency at the time, before the euro took its place. The wine had gotten to her head; she was not entirely sure if she’d even paid the correct amount to the restaurant and staff. It didn’t matter if she overpaid either; she just wanted to have it done and dealt with, off her hands. Their flight back to New York was the very next morning. Later, it would be her mother who would admonish her. It was as if she had held it in all night and could not do so any longer. “Now you will never know who had given what and how much.”
“Does it matter?” Mildred remarked. It was supposed to be her night. “It’s finished.”
“Of course it matters. You’re given favors in life and then you return them when the time is right.” Then later still, “You’re a silly girl. Where is your sense of duty to your elders?” Had her mother meant to say, “Filial piety?”
Years later, when her mother was hospitalized in Hong Kong, Mildred’s work at the office kept her stuck in New York. It had been the start of the semester, the fall. Classes needed to be organized. Instructors and students depended on her—planning, her ability to facilitate. Though Mildred had flown back to Hong Kong as often as she could, she always knew that she was expected to be more of a presence—to remain by her mother’s bedside. In truth, Mildred felt the weight of it all slightly lift when her mother “passed into the next life,” (as the woman herself would have put it). Though in some ways it was liberating, she still felt a blooming pain in the deepest parts of her abdomen when her thoughts would turn to her mother in those final years, as if Mildred had asked it of the universe, begged for it, and the universe—for once—more than answered.
When Douglas was up and about, his mood seemed to alter the air in the room. Mildred could feel it instantly, that morning of their third day. He quickly showered, and then he methodically changed into a blue shirt (more wrinkled than he would have liked) and slacks (also wrinkled). A sweater that she had gotten him one Christmas a few years back.
The night before, they had dined out late at an Indonesian restaurant; the array of dishes of a rijsttafel, a dozen or so delectable little plates. For dessert, apple pie at Winkel 43 in the Jewish Quarter. Douglas had wanted to beat the queue at the Rijksmuseum the next morning. One of the saving graces for them were perhaps the museums. The Van Gogh, the Hermitage. Surrounded by such masterpieces, the best that was on offer by mankind—the chronicle of human existence and the quest for a record, proof of a kind of civilization—though ever one-sided. And yet, Douglas managed to find clarity in such spaces. Now he muttered that it was almost impossible to make it into the recently remodeled building. He was particular about having the time and concentration needed to take in Vermeer’s “Milkmaid” or Jan Steen’s “Merry Family” or the Rembrandts (“The Night Watch” and “The Jewish Bride” and the self-portraits at different ages). For Douglas, crowds ruined this kind of personal undertaking, the holiness of the collaboration between the corporal and the spiritual—the seen and the unseen, the believable and what was only shrouded in doubt and make-believe. Mildred sometimes thought that it was an excuse and that he was really a bit of an agoraphobe.
“Why don’t we have an early lunch instead?” Mildred suggested. He didn’t answer. They were in the hallway, waiting for the elevator. “Or we could go on a walk by the market?”
“Mildred, why did you move the drinks from the refrigerator?”
“The drinks? What do you mean?”
“The mini-fridge in the hotel room. You left several of them out. Moved a bunch of others around. The hotel will charge us for it.”
“What’s a few euros here and there?”
“A few damn euros here and there add up.”
“Do you have to take that tone with me?”
“I’m not taking a tone.”
“You know what you’re doing.” Then, “You made a promise.”
He sighed, visibly. And then, he withheld.
They rode the elevator down in silence. As they passed through the lobby, Henrick glanced up from the front desk and smiled. Mildred smiled back, but wasn’t in the mood to engage the young man in further conversation. She was afraid that he’d see right through her clenched smile, and slightly imperfect teeth, slightly yellowing as well. Moreover, she was developing another headache. In fact, the pain had become so distracting that she couldn’t recall which way it was to the nearest tram stop.
By the time they reached the center of Amsterdam, the labyrinthine streets on the map all resembled each other, cobblestoned, glistening, winding this way and that, and not to mention the crowds.
“Over there,” Douglas called out, having proceeded ahead. And then, as if only now noticing her, “What’s wrong?”
“Oh, it’s my head, Douglas. I suppose I haven’t gotten used to Amsterdam time yet.”
“Do you want to go back to the hotel? I can go on without you.”
“No, don’t be ridiculous. We can keep going, together.”
“You’re sure?”
She gave him a look which equated to something like, “Don’t start now.” And then, this time she was the one who was withholding.
She reached into her pocket, and then her bag. It was then that she realized in their rush to leave, she had left her phone charging in the hotel room. What could she do? Now was certainly not the time to mention it to Douglas. They had established an equilibrium since they’d left New York. And it was of great importance that they both held up their ends of the agreement (wasn’t that what Dr. Liang, their marriage counselor, had prescribed?), to keep the peace, the promise of it.
They turned down a succession of blocks. And then she knew he was lost. He wouldn’t want to tell her though. That was Douglas, always somehow losing his way, no matter how sure. She peeked into the shop windows, even wanting to go in, lured by the light, the heat. A flower shop, tulips, perfectly arranged. (How was it even possible to get tulips so perfect this time of year?). A store of various clocks—heterogenous times ticking away like a multifaceted countdown. A shop that sold locks of various shapes and sizes, ranges of metals, golden and silvery and bronze-like. Then they were upon another busy street; a bustling crowd waited anxiously at a stop, determined to get to where they needed to go on time. Douglas pulled out the map again from his back pocket and unraveled it, what looked to be a blueprint of the city.
“I see now. I think we need to take it here,” he mumbled, more so to himself. The Dutch name, on his lips. He was likely butchering the language, like how he butchered the few Cantonese phrases he knew (唔好意思。你好嗎？對唔住。你叫咩名?), or thought he knew. “Rivierenbuurt, Rivierenbuurt, . . . Rivieren-buurt.”
Ahead of her, Mildred watched as a number of bicyclists whizzed by, a pair of white horses pulled a carriage. She was shivering, and she realized that her wool coat was actually unzipped, flapping open in the wind. Earlier on in their marriage, Douglas would have been the one to come around to zip up her coat for her, and maybe kiss her on the back of her neck, maybe more. Now he’d long given up on such acts of attentiveness. She could see that. How long had she allowed this kind of giving up to become acceptable? It felt like too long.
As she fumbled with the zipper, her hands felt numb, completely stricken by the cold, and she could barely move her fingers. A bicyclist zoomed past her, ringing a bell. Then another. “My goodness. These bicyclists . . .” Mildred said, “Why, they’re deranged.”
Douglas didn’t seem to hear her over the screech of the brakes. The tram was already approaching. He was also lost in thought. But she was accustomed to seeing him this way, rife with worry, anxiety—lost. Douglas could turn so inward at times. She wanted to say something about it, but then of course, she had promised.
At that moment, Mildred reached into her purse, searching for a tissue. She blew her nose, only to feel another sneeze coming on. Internally, she gasped, her body, braced for it, but this time, it failed to emerge. Before she could even get a hold of what was happening, she was gazing at the back of Douglas’s head, his complete gray hair—what was left of it, that is—in disarray, for the wind had done its work. And now the doors of the tram, indiscriminately closing in her face.
“Wait,” she called out. “Wait wait wait wait wait!”
She banged on the windows with the palm of her hand, frantically, and then found herself searching up and down the cars for a conductor or someone in charge, but unable to flag down the attention of anyone of import or of any real use. A few stragglers gazed at her with what appeared to be accusatory looks, as if it were her fault, as if she herself should have been more watchful.
Through the window, Douglas stared back. Though not quite alarmed, an expression of confusion overtook his face. He certainly looked surprised, or was he only faking it? She saw him mouth something at her. Of course, it was inaudible. And then he motioned intentionally with the wave of his hands. None of it, however, decipherable.
“What?” Mildred had called out. She shook her head at Douglas. “I can’t understand you!”
A woman from inside, holding on to the handle bar looked her in the eye, perturbed.
Finally, Douglas pointed to his watch and shrugged. Before Mildred could do anything else, the tram pulled away.
At one time, he would have kissed her. At one time, he would have held her closely. At one time, he would have caressed her. At one time, he would have been more convincing in his pursuit of her. At one time, he would have crossed boundaries, and she would have allowed him, given him permission. At one time, he would have pushed her, and she would have pushed him back. At one time, he would have surprised her. At one time, he would have been like a stranger to her, emerging out of the darkness. At one time, he would have cared about her fantasies, her self-medications, in order to silence the other noises of her life. At one time.
The next stop. Mildred was sure that she’d find Douglas waiting, though likely not ready to apologize. It wouldn’t go so unlike one of the conversations they’d previously had. “I thought you were behind me,” he’d say. “How was I supposed to know that you weren’t there?”
“You should have double checked.”
“Mildred, I really thought that you were right there. I’m sorry, I don’t have eyes in the back of my head. What more do you want me to say?”
“I want you to apologize.”
“I just did.”
“I want you to mean it.”
“You’re accusing me of not meaning my apology? For God’s sake.”
“I just want you to mean what you say for once. What’s wrong with that?”
“How long has it been since we’ve meant exactly what we said?”
“What did you promise? We agreed to keep our promise.”
A boy stared up at her. He had wide-set grayish eyes, disheveled dark hair. “Anil, don’t stare,” his mother chided him. He couldn’t have been more than six or seven, sitting slumped forward and wearing a bookbag stuffed to capacity. Mildred tried her best to smile.
By the time Mildred got off the following stop of the tram and most of the passengers had cleared, she could see that Douglas was nowhere to be found. She listened to the announcement. Dutch, followed by English. Still, none of it, of any help. She then searched the parting crowd. Was he somewhere out there, reaching for her? Everyone seemed to be in the way, severe, and unfriendly. And there were more bicyclists in the peripheries, swerving by in determined loops. She let the tram go. Had Douglas really gone ahead without her? They hadn’t even decided on where they were going yet, other than the Rijksmuseum. She wondered if she should just go ahead and meet him there. But then, where was she supposed to find him in that massive building? Her head was now throbbing again too. No, she wouldn’t go. She craved the warmth of a cafe instead, a cup of coffee, perhaps some toast to settle her stomach. Perhaps something stronger.
At the next stop, she got off and glanced around. Again—no Douglas. She stayed on the tram, riding it a few more stops until she realized that she was actually going in the opposite direction. She wasn’t exactly lost, but it would take some additional effort for her to find her way back to Sloterdijk.
Across the street, there was a hotel—boutique, not at all like where they were staying. For one, it was more decorative, more expensive-looking, and also in a more happening and thriving area of the city, full of young blood, good-looking people—people who seemed like the world would never think to ignore. People ignored her though. She knew because she saw them, ignoring her as if she were merely a decorative piece in the background. They made her feel prematurely aged. Indeed, in the wrong circumstances and hands and mindsets, there was an indignity in aging. But it was maybe one of the greatest of misconceptions. Moments actually became richer, more complex, for better or worse—and altogether all the more nuanced and full. Mildred was drawn by the red carpet, the greenish stone steps, the gold awning, its exquisite splendor that she wouldn’t have noticed at any other point in her life, she was sure of it. Inside, the receptionist, a girl in her twenties, who was incredibly thin, with flaxen hair tied in a ponytail and bright sea green eyes and with a sea change ready in her heart, greeted her with a formal sounding English.
“How can I help you?”
Mildred did her best to compose herself. “Excuse me, but can you tell me what museum the tram outside will take me to?” Now she couldn’t quite recall the name anymore.
“I’m sorry?”
“The tram outside.” Then, “I don’t have my phone on me.”
The young woman shook her head. “I don’t understand.” She leaned in, turning an ear toward Mildred, dangling ruby-like earrings in the shape of roses. Her name-tag read, Anneke. Mildred repeated what she said and still, she could see that Anneke didn’t truly understand, only pulling out a map from behind the counter and sliding it toward her. “I can give you this.”
It suddenly occurred to Mildred that she was slurring her words. “I seem to have lost my husband,” Mildred explained, more carefully this time. “I’m lost myself, actually.”
“Are you a guest at the hotel?”
“No. I’m staying at the . . .” She didn’t mean to draw a blank, another name, just on the tip of her tongue. From her purse, she pulled out the stationary where she’d scribbled down a number for a tour of a day-trip to the Hague. Douglas had wanted to visit the city of the International Court of Justice, to view the paintings at the Mauritshuis. Vermeer’s “The Girl with a Pearl Earring”; it had always been a dream of his to see the painting in person. But it was Mildred who had ultimately decided against the day-trip. It wasn’t exactly out of spite either. One could come all this way, and then realize that one didn’t have the capacity nor the strength in them to continue. Optimism was a trick of the mind, but not of the body.
“The Ambassadre,” Anneke read. “Yes, I know of this hotel.” She promptly picked up the phone. “I shall telephone and see if your husband left a message with the front desk. May I have your name?”
“It’s Mildred—Mildred Wong Jansen. We’re staying in room 608, or is it 618?” Then, “Anyway, you can try, but I doubt that there’s anything. My husband’s not the type to leave messages.”
But in fact, he had left a message. Anneke relayed it to her. “Your husband left word with the front desk that he will see you back at the hotel.”
“Oh, are you sure? That just doesn’t sound like him at all.”
“He promised.”
“What did you say?”
“I was told to tell you that he also said, ‘promised,’ or ‘promises,’ though I don’t quite understand, so I’m not sure what it means. Or if I am saying it correctly? I’m sorry, my English isn’t very good.”
Only Mildred understood; it was clear. Her eyes fell to the counter. She suddenly noticed a crack in the marble table that needed repairing. All she could say was, “I see.” She said, “I see,” again.
She glimpsed around the lobby, her vision, now a blur of blues and gold. She felt that something had become dislodged, unhinged, deep, deep inside of her. There was an impressive chandelier, a spiral staircase that led to what were the sounds of silverware clinking against porcelain plates. The aroma of late breakfasts, butter and jovial chatter, pleasant company, more silverware. All of the commotion somehow culminated, for Mildred, into the awareness of a feeling that she was missing out on the best of things, more extravagant, more marvelous than she could have ever imagined for herself. Indeed, her mother had missed out on the best of things; the woman’s tactic for survival, always refusing to make the most of life.
“Do you know how to find your way back?” Mildred could hear the voice breaking through the haze of her thoughts. It was Anneke. The young woman had an overt expression of concern over her pale face. In another life, she could have been a prima ballerina or a model of some sort. In another life, she wouldn’t be working the front desk of a hotel. Behind Mildred, a line was starting to form. In another life, she’d be elsewhere.
“Yes?”
“Actually, no. I don’t know my way back.” Mildred was hardly aware of what she was saying now. Her symptoms were becoming worse. Chills, sweaty palms.
Anneke smiled with professional sincerity. “If I may, I will explain to you.”
◆
This is what she had been thinking about: Mildred had always looked forward to going to Kingston. It was especially true on the weekends. The town was only eighty or so minutes from Grand Central by Metro-north. Even the ride was a kind of reprieve from the city, a scenic route, with striking views of the Hudson River. The house, walking distance from the station, though earlier on in their marriage, Douglas would have been there, waiting for her, the engine of the Mini Cooper whirring in the parking lot. There were four bedrooms, a grand living room, populated by rustic furniture that had taken decades to pick out by Douglas’s family. The front lawn descended all the way to the streets. In fact, Mildred had carefully decorated parts of the home herself too. She had chosen the Persian rugs, the scent of potpourri, and the long mahogany dining room table with the antique chandelier hanging above it. In the summers, Mildred gardened under a hot sun in the backyard. Lilies, cone flowers, forget-me-nots, lavender, Sweet Williams. There was a hammock tied to two small willow trees. Douglas was more of a homebody, remaining inside. He might be sitting at the upright piano, where he tinkered with Schubert Impromptus. Or read from the bookshelves filled with much of his literature on psychoanalysis and art history. He took great pleasure in disagreeing with Freud as a means of showing how much Freud he’d actually read.
Francine, Douglas’s mother, had been staying in Kingston for the past several months. She was a petite woman of eighty-five (or was it eighty-six?), with short feather white hair, and halfhearted smiles. One day, it crossed Mildred’s mind that Douglas must have inherited his penchant for introversion from his father, a man who she had never met, having died when Douglas was still in graduate school. Francine, on the other hand, was not this. She was a talker (A far cry from the woman in Greece all those years ago, making her rounds at the wedding, a glass of her family’s white wine in her soft hand). Francine could stay up late into the night and talk one’s ear off about what she heard on the radio, what she watched on daytime TV. Days of Our Lives. The Price is Right. She was repetitive too. Worse, she had no sense of recapitulation. Everything for her was exposition after exposition. And then she would start again, as if anew. Francine used to paint. She painted landscapes. Her medium of choice was watercolor. Farmsteads, forests, clouded skies—almost reminiscent of John Constable in its glorification of nature, according to Douglas, that is. Douglas had made an effort, hanging a few of his mother’s pieces around the house as a vehicle for encouragement, no matter how much they clashed with the decor. He had hoped that it would spark a renewed sense of inspiration. It didn’t. The most Francine would do was wallow about and talk of other things. “Do you know what I learned on Jeopardy today?”
“She’s depressed,” Douglas told Mildred when his mother was out of earshot. “I don’t know what else to do.”
Francine would try and help out around the house. She’d sweep the halls, or she’d rinse some of the dirty dishes in the sink. She tired easily, and oftentimes, would leave such tasks unfinished, abandoned.
“She’s forgetting more and more now,” Mildred had noticed. “Did you see how she had left the stove burning?”
“I saw,” Douglas said, turning to watch his mother sitting in the corner, half-reading a book, half-staring out the window.
“It isn’t safe.”
“No, I know.”
It was difficult to entertain guests at the house too. Francine could derail a conversation. Her lack of appetite at a four-course dinner (veggie dumplings, chickpea salad, steamed ginger fish, finishing off with Mildred’s special blueberry crumble), didn’t help either. When Francine wasn’t speaking about how lonely she was, or how there was nothing left for her to do, or what she learned once more on Jeopardy (“Did you know that walruses like to cuddle?”), Mildred knew that it would be time to call it a night. One just had to glance at the ancient face, visible from the dripping of the woman’s nose, to the squinting of her weary eyes (when she wasn’t wearing her glasses), the hunch of her back.
It took its toll, on Douglas, especially. He’d become impatient with Francine. He thought it didn’t show, but it would come out, in how he’d speak to Mildred too, the way he might correct her grammar or pronunciation of a word. “It’s . . . not . . .” His micromanaging, his too-much involvement with things for a false sense of control. He never used to intervene like that. What was it all leading to?
“You wait and see,” Francine had said to Mildred. “You’re not exactly a youngster yourself. You get to a point in your life where you realize that all of it’s for zilch—nothing.”
“Mother,” Douglas would call from the couch, while flipping through The New York Times. “You don’t have to go on saying things like that over and over again.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. But I’m only telling the truth. And the truth is the truth.”
“We’ll have to move her out,” Douglas had said, later on.
Mildred laughed. “She’ll go kicking and screaming.”
“She might. But it’s not sustainable for her here.”
“I suppose not.”
“Not anymore.”
“Yes.”
“And if we decide on it, we do it together.”
“Hm.”
“We make a promise.”
“A promise.”
Mildred had been preoccupied, perhaps playing a round of Sudoku. But she did think of the time when she had watched an injustice play out at her office—a colleague had been reprimanded under false pretenses, but Mildred was too afraid to speak up, figuring that she was already late enough in the game to wait the rest of it out. That was what it was—a waiting out. It was another countdown. A few more years, then she could retire, perhaps even to greener pastures.
“You mean six-feet under?” Francine later quipped, though she didn’t really mean it as a question. “I hear you want me outta here.”
“That’s not true.”
“Oh, it isn’t?”
“I’m terrible at my job,” Mildred found herself saying instead. “I actually hate my job.” It sounded like she was saying, “I actually hate my life.”
“Oh, dear.” Francine leaned forward, her face, all the more grave. “At least you have one.”
Mildred hadn’t told Douglas about her demotion. She didn’t have it in her yet. And he knew not to ask. They had made another promise to each other—such things were off limits, for the sake of rescuing their idea of themselves. One had to stay the course. Her knee was already bad. Even after several surgeries, visits to an acupuncture specialist, there was still pain, and it was getting worse by the day. It was another thing that she kept from Douglas. Was all this waiting around what was supposed to be her fate? Would she live as long as Francine only to become another Francine? Oblivious to the world around her? Entirely exhausted and spent? And cornered? And who would be there to take care of her if she became her mother in Hong Kong instead, in those final years, deteriorating from loneliness and resentment? Forever haunted by bad memories. Here on end, it could all just be a series of demotions. And then what next? Perhaps even nothing was actually next.
“Quit while you’re ahead then.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?
“Because, Douglas.”
“Because what?”
“I’ve come too far to turn back. Because, what else can I do?”
“You’ll find something else, you’ll see.”
“No I won’t. You know that.”
“You found Sudoku.”
“That’s not funny. And I can’t play Sudoku for the rest of my life.”
“No, you can’t—nor should you.”
“I haven’t been feeling myself.”
“Elaborate for me.” It was such a Douglas-thing to say, elaborate for me. She could have scoffed, had she not made a promise.
“For one, I feel under-appreciated.”
“Uh huh.”
“On top of that, I feel under the weather, like I’m gradually sinking, drowning in a pool of myself.”
“I see.”
“I used to think that if I just waited long enough, things would start to feel okay. That things would get better.”
“And?”
“Now it feels like I’m just running out of time.”
“Would you rather be happy or would you rather know everything?”
“I’m happy when I’m in the know.”
“Let’s dig deeper, let’s get to the root of the problem.”
“Don’t get clinical with me, Douglas. I’m not one of your patients. I’m your wife.”
“Did you think that I wouldn’t notice what was missing in the refrigerator of the hotel room? What was left of it?”
“I’m not going to lie to you. Me having a drink here and there is the least of our concerns.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I feel like you are overstepping here. You made a promise, Douglas.”
“As did you.”
“Can’t we just enjoy what we have left of this week? Before we have to go back? Can’t we even enjoy our time away before we start being miserable again? Everything back home somehow reaches us, penetrates our every being to the core. Even all the way here—in Amsterdam, of all places. Dammit Douglas, really.”
“Suit yourself. Have it your way.”
“Have it my way? My way?” Then, “You never even told me her name.”
“What?”
“Why don’t you tell me her damn name?”
“What’s gotten into you? Why do you want to know?”
“Because I want to know, Douglas.”
“So much for promises, I suppose.”
“To hell with the promises.”
“Stay the course, Mildred. If we want this to work, if we want us to work, we have to stay the course.”
“I want to know her fucking name.”
At first she thought he wouldn’t answer. Then he said, “But don’t you mean his name?”
She slammed her fist down on the table. The empty chair stood before her. Mildred caught the sideways glance of a passing waiter, the snickering of a young couple. And then the whiff of the savory bowl of beef soup. She was mortified. She had been doing this more and more. She thought of the time when she practically inhaled a salad at a restaurant on 96th street. This was after her acupuncture appointment. She only had one or two drinks. She had wanted to surprise Douglas at his office. It had been the mistake of all mistakes. Downing the last of her soup and coffee, she quickly paid the bill and left.
◆
By the time Mildred found her way back to Sloterdijk, back to the hotel, Henrick was still manning the front desk. The coffee had somewhat revived her, though now, the nausea was returning.
She found her room dark and empty, and newly remade, the bed, looking as though it had not been slept in, absent of desire. She ran her fingers through her hair, still slightly wet from the light drizzle. The thought of remaining in the room alone made her suddenly nauseous. Compared to American hotels, the room felt like a closet. It made her feel claustrophobic. The sink wasn’t even in the bathroom, but situated right outside the door (Douglas had said that he was going to mention it in the review, being the type who only felt compelled to leave a review when it was meant to be a critique). She glanced at the mini-fridge; indeed, she had left several of the bottles out. Two of them were empty. Would she have to wait long? Would she only lie in bed, wondering when Douglas would finally be back? Would she have to listen to the children laughing too loudly again, as if they were laughing at her alone? She picked up her phone and expected several messages, but there was nothing from Douglas. Only a colleague from the office texted her: “Discovered a mistake. Need you to clarify a file at the office ASAP.” She felt as though she could scream.
“How are you enjoying Amsterdam?” Henrick asked back down in the lobby.
Mildred was smiling, hard. “I’m enjoying the city very much. Although, I have to say, the bicyclists are very aggressive here.”
“Didn’t I tell you to be careful of the bike paths?”
“You did, but still.”
“Have you walked along the canals yet? Have you seen Vondelpark? The Jordaan?” Then, “The Red Light District?”
“No, it’s been too cold.”
“I recommend you try and see it before you leave.”
“Has another message arrived from my husband?”
“Let me check.” Henrick typed something into the computer before him. His fingers, moving deftly over the keys. Typing had never been her strong suit. She still typed with her index fingers like two knives, stabbing the keyboard. “I don’t see anything.” Noticing the frustration on her face, Henrick offered, “I’m sorry.”
“How kind of you. Thank you, anyway.”
“Is there anything else that I can do for you?”
“No, nothing. I just have this horrible headache.”
“I can call you a doctor.”
“Really, there’s no need.”
He made a face of pity, pouting his lips. It seemed an incongruous expression for a grown man. “I’m sorry to hear that. Shall I send some tea up to your room?”
“No, thank you. It’s just such a dreary day. I didn’t expect to spend it in my hotel room, at all. Well at least it’s warm here, so who am I to complain?”
Henrick leaned in, looking as if he were about to share some insider information. “Might I make a suggestion?”
“Try me.”
“You see the church across the street?”
“The church? No thanks, I’m not religious.”
“You misunderstand. I happen to know that there is a rehearsal for an upcoming concert, and it’s open to the public.”
Mildred glanced at the entrance, the door. For a moment, she couldn’t help but be mesmerized. Was it the brightness of the light? A family pushed through the revolving doors, smiles plastered across their faces. Two little girls with matching purple dresses and pigtails ran ahead, shouting. Outside, it seemed to have stopped raining.
“On second thought, I will go. It might clear my head.”
The church was luminous, with its high Mannerist ceilings, candles lined along the stone walls, at the feet of saints. She felt as if she were in an 18th century haze. Paintings and sculptures of holy figures in benevolent poses. The musicians of the orchestra were tuning their instruments at the base of the altar. A singer ran through certain sections. He was handsome and slim and wearing a black shirt and pants. He was French. Mildred looked around to see that a handful of people sat staggered in the pews, and at the conductor of the orchestra, perched on a high chair, informally dressed, wearing a dark sweater and jeans, looking as though he were a man of the people, when he was actually the center of attention. Mildred picked up a program and flipped through its glossy pages. The singer’s name was Philippe. She took a seat in the last row, which would allow her to sneak out if she wanted to.
The music was regal, ornamental, Baroque. The purity of the counter-tenor’s voice soared through the air. The last thing Mildred remembered reading on the program was the name Vivaldi. Antonio Vivaldi. “The Red-Haired Priest,” she remembered. She thought of how her piano teacher had once quipped that Vivaldi had composed a single concerto and copied it over several hundred times. Of course, this wasn’t the least bit true. This was the work of a craftsman, someone who thought deeply and conveyed originality, someone more than blessed. “Vedro con mio diletto.” Later she would find out that it meant, “I will see with my delight,” a longing to be with the person who brings you joy. It was one of the most beautiful pieces of music that she had heard in some time, sung by one of the most beautiful singers she had heard as well. And then the music was fading and fading, fading away. And then finally, silence.
At one time, her mother woke her. At one time, it was late in the evening. At one time, the woman was telling her, “Wake up, wake up! Hurry child, you must wake up!” This was in Hong Kong. The year was 1975. She could remember because it was the Year of the Rabbit. At school, her teacher had told her that people who were born in the Year of the Rabbit were believed to be quiet and kind. They were polite, restrained, thoughtful. Seeing her mother in such a state, she was trying to be restrained and thoughtful, though she wasn’t even born the Year of the Rabbit. “Do you hear me?” her mother was saying. The woman grabbed hold of her face, and said, “Listen carefully, child.” Her dark eyes were wide, dilated, alarmed. Only Mildred heard nothing, nothing at all, no matter how hard she was listening. Then her mother uttered in a lowered voice, “It’s the Japanese.” And then even lower, “They’re coming.” She must have asked what Japanese? But her mother had cut her off. “Quiet, girl! Do you want them to find us?” Then, “These people will do us no favors.” It wasn’t long before Mildred realized the truth: that the Japanese weren’t coming. Only she couldn’t say it. She couldn’t doubt the woman, not aloud. She had to play along with her mother, until the fever of her convictions subsided. So she waited, quietly, purposefully, listening to the silence, perhaps the loudest silence of her life.
“I think it’s over.” It was Douglas. She was being nudged gently at the side.
“What?”
“The rehearsal.”
“Oh.” She squinted her eyes ahead. The orchestra slowly returned into its own kind of focus. They were disbanding. “How long have I been out?”
“I only just got here about ten minutes ago. The front desk of the hotel told me you were here.”
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
“How could I? You looked so peaceful sleeping there.” Then, “It would have been a violation.”
“Was I snoring?”
“No.”
“Ah, good.”
“You’ve been exhausted, I didn’t realize how exhausted you’ve been.”
“I haven’t been sleeping well.” Then, “We’re both exhausted.”
“I know.”
He touched her hand. “You’re like ice.”
“Feel my head.”
He placed a hand over her forehead. “My God, you’re feverish too.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Then, “You’ve been holding back.”
“Weren’t the promises about just that? Holding back? You can only hold back for so long, you know. You want to enjoy something so much, and so fully, but then your body simply won’t let you.” She sounded as if she was talking about another matter. “For a moment back there, I thought that I had lost you for good.”
“Well now you found me again.”
“Yes.”
“You need rest.”
“I think you’re right.” She sneezed into a tissue and then blew her nose. “I think I just need some time to recover.”
“You’ll feel better once you’re back.”
“Oh, yes. I think so.” Then, “Only there isn’t anything to go back to is there? A lousy job. A lousy life. I messed up.”
“I was talking about the hotel.”
“Oh, that makes sense.” Then, “I was demoted.”
“What? You were? When?”
“It’s been a few months.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t know. I told Francine.”
“You told my mother and not me?” A pause. “Have you started drinking again?”
She didn’t answer. She didn’t need to.
He stared ahead. Then she did as well. And now the musicians were almost gone and there was an emptiness, its own kind of desert.
“We’re all flawed, Douglas.” Then she said, “At the risk of breaking my promise, I’ve been thinking that so much of this could be far worse.”
“Is that what you’ve really been thinking?”
“Yes.”
“Thanks.”
“We’re not moving Francine out of the house.”
“What are you talking about? But we already decided. We promised.”
“You decided.”
“We decided, remember? Anyway, I don’t want to argue. Now is not the time or place. We’re in Amsterdam for God’s sake. I’m not discussing this.”
“You’re given favors in life and then you return them when the time is right.”
“You’re not making any sense.”
“Am I not?”
“Is that what this is to you then? A favor?”
“I’m giving the situation the benefit of the doubt.”
“Mildred.”
“I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt.”
He sighed.
Finally, she said, “My mother, Douglas.”
“Yes.”
“I miss her. I miss her terribly.”
“Of course you do. I know.” Eventually, he put his arm around her. He held her closer. “I know that you do.”
“All I have are memories. It isn’t enough.”
The Mauritshuis museum, the next day, the fourth day. A last minute change in their itinerary. The windows overlook the water. The city of the Hague, quieter than Amsterdam. For one, there aren’t the crowds of tourists to contend with. It is a relief to be inside, sheltered from the cold. Paintings by Frans Hals. Dirck Hals—the brother; one particular painting of a festive gathering. Douglas spends some time looking over the Carel Fabritius painting which inspired the novel The Goldfinch. And then she loses him. Of course he’s only somewhere around. Of course she’s sure she will find him sooner or later. But for now, a peace. A thought occurs to her, how there are those in the rest of the city who don’t even know what a museum like this might house. And then there are those who are already inside, who are more or less like her, but don’t know the entirety of all the wealth that lay within such walls, just skimming the surface of things. She herself wouldn’t come back often enough to know it either. Perhaps once in a lifetime. Perhaps twice, at the very most. Perhaps.
There is a woman who catches Mildred’s attention. She is there with a guide. He is, in fact, giving her a personal tour. They go from painting to painting. There are the Dutch masters, but there are also paintings by the French. The woman wears sunglasses, even inside, though there is no sun. She wears a mink coat that is white. She is busy, vibrant, verbose. Someone plagued by plans—who seems to somehow win out over complacency. To swim against the current, and then to be without stagnation at every magnitude of her being. But also, somehow remaining at the surface of things, something that exists just outside of the realm of self-reflection and interiority.
They come to one of the main attractions of the museum. It is the painting by Vermeer. “Of course,” the woman says, nodding to herself. Indeed she recognizes it. (It had been the first painting that Douglas had gone to see too). “The Girl with the Pearl Earring.” And in fact, the figure isn’t even a real girl, the tour guide is explaining. “Only a figment of the artist’s imagination, you see.” He is dressed in a tweed jacket. He has long, gray hair. “Vermeer had intended to paint the portrait of a Turkish girl, did you know?”
The woman takes several photos of the painting. She zooms in on the imagined blue eyes. The imagined lips. The imagined expression, imagined smile. “A memory is a kind of imagination too,” something Francine might say. Mildred follows the woman. What about her holds Mildred’s attention? Her unabashed sense of entitlement? Her blatant unawareness? Devoid of any shame, even blasé?
Later, the woman is sitting on a bench in the hall. She is on the phone. One can hear her high voice, the extent of her conversation as it echoes through the galleries. It isn’t exactly unpleasant. “Oh, I’ll be there soon,” she keeps saying, looking down at her nails, painted blood red. “Very soon.” Though one gets the sense that she is going to be late.