Eau de Vie: chapter six
Eau-de-vie
Carl had gone away on a business trip, and in the days prior to his departure, Vie sensed his happy anticipation. A tax workshop was not something Carl ordinarily looked forward to, yet there he had been, enthusiastically planning out his wardrobe for the week, deciding which books to take and whether to hitch his road bike to the back of the car.
To be clear, Carl had never expressed verbally that he was looking forward to the trip; this was just Vie’s impression. Outside of his cheerful travel preparations, Carl had been tired as of late, stooped over his desk after dinner, his furrowed brow hinting at exasperation, this as he mouthed the words, “I’m doing great” whenever Vie asked how work was going. The inflection in Carl’s voice was strained, though so slightly that it might have been imperceptible to an outsider. But Vie was tuned in to the nuances of Carl, and she was not taken by his repeatedly calling her Darling and fussing over her breakfast and vitamin regimen, which he prepared daily. These gestures failed to mask the changes going on. Carl’s domestic endearments had become mechanical.
Nor did Carl’s peppering her with kisses and spoon-feeding her espresso ice cream before bed each night convince her things were normal. He had performed these tender routines for years, yet now, there was a subtle difference — it felt as though he was ever so quietly taking back and reclaiming some of what should have been his long ago. And he was doing this by disengaging emotionally, as fatigue from protecting and nurturing her had set it.
Vie understood Carl was not being withholding toward her when he offered smaller-than-usual bites from her favorite Häagen-Daz tub. Nor was he snubbing her choice of flavors when, from time to time, he chose a scoop of butter pecan instead of dark chocolate and espresso for their midnight snack. Carl, for the first time in their marriage, was taking what he wanted and desired, both in the quantity of things consumed and in the choice of what was being shared. He’d quietly quit compensating for Vie’s weaknesses. It was his turn to have his way, to do things as he liked, to choose what to put in his mouth, to decide when he wanted to do a thing.
For a brief moment, Vie thought him wrong in doing this; it was not gentlemanly. Then, one afternoon, during a long nap, Vie dreamt of Carl — of him walking into the wilderness alone. It was a sign — she could not continue blaming him for her unhappiness. He was not the cause. He was just the most gentle and forgiving target for her angst and anger. He understood her, and he never took her tirades personally, but it was wearing. If Vie continued on as she had for the last decade, and she didn’t make things right, and soon, Carl would be gone, as there was only so much any person could shoulder. Vie’s turn at being the victim needed to end, regardless of her current medical crisis. It was time to put her current travails in a different context — Carl had done all he could to make up for the bad turns in her life, none of which were his fault, and it was a steep emotional toll he paid. Now, these many years later, Carl was wrestling with his own demons and disappointments, and he needed to put himself first, to enjoy life without restraint and her rules — to be a joyful prankster, a homebody, someone who ate far too many sweets and who secretly avoided the farm chores and fixing things because he hated both. It was his turn to do as he pleased. Vie knew this day would come, and she accepted it.
That evening, Vie spread her strong potter’s hand across Carl’s furry chest, then buried her nose in that spot where his neck met his broad shoulders. It took her to that other place, the place she had discovered the first night they slept together. It was an ethereal place where there were no bad memories, and she was free, if but briefly, from her unending hypervigilance. She lost herself in Carl’s sweet smell of blackberries.
Regardless of Carl’s evolving feelings, what Vie felt for him remained steadfast. She recognized he might now be headed on a different course — especially as he’d become aware the drinking had been there the entirety of their marriage, hidden from view. The hard, cold truth: alcohol had colored every part of Vie’s life, and she would not, could not give it up. These revelations warranted a complete rewrite of their history as a couple — almost every life event, accident, argument, and trauma had a different origin than previously imagined.
The paradigm shift was already taking place. Instead of soft hands gingerly exploring Vie’s lithe body and a rough beard tickling her neck and breasts, Carl was offering up careless kisses, too rough and too many. Carl had also gotten in the habit of abruptly grabbing, then massaging every fat spot on her body, affectionately, yes, though it felt more like he was wishing her imperfections away. This made Vie furious, especially when Carl’s playful gestures failed to lead them back to the bedroom (or the couch, or the shower)—to enjoy that thing she most looked forward to, that filled her with joy and made her feel like a beautiful and worthy woman.
So where did Carl go, in his mind, when he had sexual hankerings? That was hard to know. But from what Vie could tell, he was not thinking of her. His expressions, his touch, now seemed distant, inaccessible.
As Vie and Carl navigated the changes in their bodies, Vie’s long-held shame began rearing its ugly head, finding a weak spot in her psyche — shame that she was not beautiful enough or intriguing and certainly not as witty and intelligent as the women with whom Carl worked or as educated as the spouses of his closest colleagues. Even worse – she worried the words she spoke and the thoughts she shared might be annoying him, that she was not at his level. And when it came to her sexual power, especially as it related to him, even that seemed to have vanished. Conversely, Carl marched on as he always had, in many ways growing more distinctive and appealing in his old age, his silver beard attracting more admiring looks than the thick black one of his youth.
Though Vie knew she shared these feelings of shame with other women her age, she still felt a sense of isolation. There was no comradery in these indignities older women endured, the feelings of rejection and powerlessness, of no longer being relevant or desirable, and thus unneeded. These feelings were overwhelming and smothering. And unlike men, who, at a minimum, left a legacy, their last name carried down, their wealth passed on, and the history of their prestige and accomplishments remembered in words — it was a rare woman who enjoyed this satisfaction and the tempering effect adulation and gratitude had in softening the grieving one experiences for an aging body — a grieving that rebelliously comes about even through what is every human’s natural and predestined decline. Vie knew she would never benefit from this balm that Carl enjoyed. Vie’s victories and accomplishments were cloistered behind the walls of their home, beautiful as it was, while Carl’s were in full view of their community and wider family.
Vie envisioned that at the holidays, after she was gone, the family’s memory of her, as Oma, would only be of her seed cake with the lemon glaze and that she set a beautiful and perfect holiday table, or that her crown pork roast was cooked to perfection. In her imagining, there would be nothing remembered of Vie the woman, a person who survived a difficult pregnancy to triumph in the birth of her daughter. Nor would she be remembered for the house she single-handedly rescued when the stove caught fire or for the hundreds of trips made down the mountain to deliver their daughter, then grandchildren, to school. All of this effort would be forgotten or, at best, glossed over — thousands of days of her life taken for granted. And she knew that even her grandchildren would be hard-pressed to remember her maiden name.
These thoughts and those of her shame were the huge stone she carried from Fulda. She poured much of this shame into her art — her shame at being German, though she was just a little girl during WWII, shame of never having gotten a university education, and shame for being a woman and not having made a career for herself. Vie did her damnedest to bury these insecurities in her creation of beautiful ceramics, but invariably the demons would surface, the more delicate pieces giving way to weighty and dark raku reminiscent of places and things seen from her youth: dwellings with bars on the windows, rippled abstract pieces with the coppery texture and drape of rotting flesh — imagery that was profoundly impactful to those who visited her art shows.
Vie saw in Carl a psychic conflict between what he truly and deeply desired and his loyalty to those with whom he had long ago made commitments. Carl followed the star of loyalty above all else, and its bright light often blinded him to those richly important other things — sexual passion, the attainment of beautiful objects, artistic, creative, and expressive outlets, intellectual meanderings, and more. Carl often thought of these pursuits but, in the end, left them quietly simmering on the back burner for another day, as his life was full to the brim with commitments.
The changes in Carl’s body never diminished Vie’s desire for him — his silvery beard and wiry chest hairs, his slightly waning sex drive and reduced stamina, man parts that periodically did not rise to the occasion, loose skin here and there, and his ever-so-slight paunch — she loved every bit of his fading patina. It was soft and beautiful, worn in all the right ways, and operated at a slower pace — a perfect fit for her. But Vie’s passionate feelings toward Carl put a fine point on his perhaps-not-reciprocated sentiments toward her. And that didn’t always feel fair, the way he recoiled ever so slightly to the inevitable changes she was going through, all the while oblivious to his own. Yes, Carl worked harder than most not to show disappointment, but it was there.
This repulsion men felt toward women as they age infuriated Vie, especially when coupled with the hypocrisy of how they perceived their own body changes as normal and expected. She wondered — did Carl perceive her age-related changes as an indication she was letting herself go? Vie worked hard to maintain her figure and dress stylishly. She took meticulous care of her skin, hair, and nails. Other than her drinking, Vie was, in no way, letting herself go. She surmised that it was the assessments men made, critically flawed in multiple ways, yet backed by pop culture, that led them to believe they were in better shape than their female counterparts and therefore deserving of younger women, women they deemed, stupidly, to be on their level physically. Many of these same men felt justified in tossing to the side women their own age, even lifelong partners. Though Carl did not seem to follow the herd on these issues, Vie could never be absolutely sure. And perhaps she was being grossly unfair to him in entertaining these thoughts.
As Vie’s frustration with her physical decline grew, Carl began retreating, returning home later and later, then planting himself in front of his computer and reluctantly coming to the dinner table, often arriving after the food had gone cold. Vie imagined this was a sign that he was no longer in love with her, and she began to panic. She imagined his feelings waning while hers, most certainly, were not. Watching him dress in the morning still brought roses to her cheeks, and in their home, where Vie was constantly bumping into Carl’s smells, the feel of his skin, his voice, his laugh and smile, the way he sat at the end of the couch reading —all of this got the blood coursing through her veins. Above all else, Vie loved Carl’s intellectual brilliance and his high standards at work, at home, and in his relationships. And while Vie did all she could to meet his expectations, or at least what she perceived those to be, she never felt she’d quite measured up, though certainly there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that Carl ever said or did that should have made her feel beneath him in intelligence or ability. Vie’s feelings of inferiority had deep roots that were well-established before she’d left Germany, caused by family and societal expectations and the influence of the toxic culture in which she’d grown up.
As Vie’s worsening health spread her thin emotionally, childhood scars resurfaced, causing irritation and reminding her of things she’d preferred to have forgotten. Constantly fighting off this inner turmoil was leaving Vie visibly exhausted and cranky, which she assumed, made her unappealing to her husband and everyone else around her. Memories of the war were becoming a regular occurrence in the form of nightmares and the only way she could find to turn them off was by imbibing her beloved sauvignon blanc.
Vie’s gut, though now compromised by copious amounts of booze, told her all she needed to know — Carl’s animation at meeting up, solo, with colleagues and constituents and quietly planning excursions and evenings out for dinner with cousins and colleagues without her — all of this was an indication he no longer wanted her by his side. Carl could not risk bringing an intoxicated spouse, and Vie’s drinking had become obvious to all, especially when the topic of politics arose. Invariably, someone ended up deeply offended.
After Carl headed off to Tahoe that evening, Vie sat at the dining room table alone, nursing a cup of coffee, which would no doubt keep her awake all night. She considered what to do with her time over the next few days. The thought of taking up a project or doing housework could not have been less appealing, especially in light of her medical prognosis. Every day counted at this point, and she was unwilling to take on anything whose completion would extend beyond her death.
Vie sat on the deck looking out onto the ranch, her eyes drawn to the rocks near the summit of the mountain. They were beautiful - striated layers of rose, gold, and terra cotta in the shape of totem poles. Over the years, Vie had spent many an evening watching the sunset on this formation, contemplating a way to reach the spires that rose straight up from the side of the cliff. It was on this unreachable spot that Vie wanted her ashes placed. But who could she tell when she’d not yet told anyone she was dying?
Vie sat alone with her fear and upset until Saturday morning before caving in and calling Kate. It felt so wrong to be calling her — they hardly knew one another, really, yet there was no one Vie wanted more to be with. There was a physical draw between the two of them — already, they had touched one another, held hands, and kissed. All of this — oddly innocent and spontaneous — something neither had anticipated. With Kate, Vie felt uninhibited. Their kiss in the shower had been sensual to the utmost. The sensation of Kate’s warm, wet lips took Vie outside of herself, disengaging her from the chronic hurt and fear in a way that the alcohol could not. When they kissed, there was no Kate and no Vie; it was just two women expressing their physicality without care or judgment, softly gliding into a space where all things were connected, expectations dissolving in the warm water.
Was Vie being unfaithful to Carl in all of this? Curiously, no. Carl was well aware of what was happening, and he not only accepted but welcomed it. He watched Vie’s transformation with rapt interest, admiring her ability to draw this beautiful younger woman into their orbit. All anyone could do, really, was to lay oneself bare — to gently receive the feelings, sounds, and scents that would be forthcoming. Anticipation had Vie vibrating from the top of her head to her fingertips. With eyes half-closed she feathered all that was in her mind with what was happening around her, chalky pastels blending the real and imagined to make all things bearable, if not pleasing.
Kate arrived at the ranch shortly after 5:00 p.m. bearing Chinese carryout and a bottle of pear Eau de Vie, a little gift to celebrate their four months as friends. The early fall air was deliciously cool and moist, so they bundled up in fleece jackets, stuck forks in each of their respective carryout containers, then headed out to the deck to enjoy their feast and the sunset. Once satiated, Vie went back into the kitchen to grab two grappa glasses and the beautiful bottle of Massenez Eau de Vie, with its “prisoner” pear in the bottle. Kate had boldly gone into the master bedroom to gather up the twin comforters from Vie and Carl’s beds, which she used to soften and warm the Adirondack chairs on the deck. Vie placed the Eau de Vie on the side table between the chairs and then filled their glasses. For a good hour, the women relaxed and sipped the delicate pear brandy, all the while enjoying the lights of the town below and the spectacle of bats swooping between the rafters on the deck. They talked at length about everything under the sun, including Carl, whom they both loved, Vie overtly, Kate secretly. He was very much on their mind as they stood to stretch, then embrace, each imagining his soft stomach and chest on their breasts, his heart-shaped lips gently sucking their nipples, his scratchy beard tickling their areoles. Even as they kissed one another, each thought of Carl’s welcoming mouth.
It was a beautiful night, the new moon and clear skies making it especially good for stargazing. Vie suggested they drag the mattress from the guest room out to the deck so they might comfortably lay on their backs while attempting to identify the constellations. As it turned out, neither woman knew anything about the night sky except to appreciate its beauty, so they turned their attention to one another, each slowly and gently removing the other’s clothing. With an index finger, Kate traced the curvature of Vie’s delicate breasts, stopping briefly to brush the back of her hand against nipples hardened by the cool night air. Vie reciprocated by delicately dipping a middle finger into Kate’s labia and holding it there, absorbing the warmth and moisture as she felt for the delicate nub of her clitoris.
The women were soon oblivious to the night sky and the bats and to the sounds of coyotes in the hills. They did, however, become very much aware of every path to pleasure on each other’s bodies. And for the better part of that dark night, Kate and Vie found themselves happily lost in the hills and valleys of each other’s tender, exquisite womanhood.