Let’s Call Her Barbie

Im-pul-siv-i-ty Strikes Again

Im-pul-siv-i-ty Strikes Again

1970

The new decade is off to a difficult start for Jack. His father died on Christmas Day, flooding Jack with a mixture of grief and guilty liberation. With his father gone, he’s free to begin divorce proceedings, despite his mother’s harping about marriage vows being sacred. It’s not that his mother’s opinions don’t matter, but they don’t have the heft of his late father’s expectations. Jack can deal with disappointing his mother. After all, he’s been doing that all his life. And so the day after the funeral, Barbara and the girls moved out of the Castle.

Between his father’s passing, his mother’s nagging and the divorce, Jack had all but forgotten about the interview he gave to Esquire magazine several months before. But now the issue is on the newsstands. Of course, he can’t read it himself, but he’s seen the pictures. Utterly ridiculous photographs. How could I have thought this was a good idea? There’s an absurd photo of him in a smoking jacket— a smoking jacket —lying beneath a fur blanket— a fur blanket —in his bed— in my goddamn bed —talking on the phone. Two university flags—Yale and Harvard—hang above his head. He looks like a pompous fool. A caricature of himself.

Despite the photos, he’s desperate to know if the article has properly lambasted Ruth. He calls Ginger into his office and hands her the magazine.

“Wow,” she says, opening to page eighty-three. “Look at you. This is so exciting.”

“Just”—he makes a circular hurry it up gesture—“just start reading, would you?”

She clears her throat and begins. “ Class in Our Time . And there’s a caption beneath the photo. It says”—she pitches her voice up an octave higher for effect—“ That’s Jack Ryan on one of his 140 telephones. Come on over for some corn on the cob. ”

“Ah, fuck!” He slaps the sides of his head. “Corn on the cob?” He moves from the couch to his bearskin rug, squirming as Ginger reads the full nine pages about Jack Ryan the playboy, the mad scientist, the man who throws orgies at his Bel Air castle . They hardly mention Barbie or the Couple at all. His plan to sabotage Ruth has backfired spectacularly. He’s a laughingstock. He is beside himself and would like to crawl into a hole and die. This issue is out in the world now, on every newsstand, in every drugstore, landing on people’s doorsteps. Everyone’s reading it and he’s mortified.

“Why are you so upset?” says Ginger. “You got a whole feature in a major magazine. You’re famous.”

“Or infamous.”

“Aw, no, don’t say that. That’s not so. You’re the life of the party, and they captured how brilliant and creative you are. And”—she smiles suggestively—“you’re one of Hollywood’s most eligible bachelors.”

“Except for the fact that I’m still technically married.”

“Well, you’re almost unmarried, which reminds me, your lawyer dropped off some papers for you to sign.”

More papers. More words. He stands up, rubs his eyes and squeezes the back of his neck. His body’s tense, and his blood feels thick, like it’s not even circulating anymore. Ginger is already standing behind him, massaging his shoulders and cooing in his ear, reminding him to breathe and relax. He feels her breasts pressing against him, smells her perfume, the one he gave her for Secretaries Day—L’Air du Temps, one of Barbara’s favorites. It used to drive him crazy. He dares to close his eyes and sink into Ginger’s touch when he’s bolted to attention.

“Am I interrupting something?” It’s Ruth, standing in his office, the Esquire magazine in her hand. “Ginger, I need to speak with Jack. Privately.”

Ginger retreats to the ladies’ room, where she sobs into a fistful of paper towels, yanked from the wall dispenser. Why did Ruth have to barge in and ruin the moment? Why doesn’t Jack ever make the first move? How many times can I throw myself at him?

She studies herself in the mirror, wondering what’s wrong with her. He’s said so himself: If Barbie were real, she’d be the perfect woman . Ginger’s trying her best. People say she looks like Barbie, but Jack only tells her she’s getting too thin. But she knows for a fact that Jack likes thin women, and if she could just break 110—the number on Barbie’s scale, a number she’s given magical powers to—then maybe he would look at her the way he looks at other women, the way she sees him looking at Patsy, at Stevie and at so many other women, but never her.

Meanwhile, Ruth is still in Jack’s office, berating him. “I hope you’re satisfied.” She shakes the magazine in his face. “You’ve made a mockery out of my company and Barbie. How dare you drag Barbie’s name into your disgusting, perverted lifestyle. If you hurt her sales, I swear to God, I’ll sue you for damages.”

“Jesus, Ruth, nobody’s going to hurt her sales.”

But they both know Barbie is under attack. Stevie reports back from her consciousness-raising groups and rap sessions, which she attends both to get a bead on Barbie and to air her own grievances. The National Organization for Women is looking for any excuse to blame Barbie for everything from gender inequality to low self-esteem. NOW has even gone so far as to attack Mattel for advertising smart toys to boys and frilly Barbies to girls.

Still, Ruth is in a rage, and for now, it’s all Jack’s fault. “I don’t want Barbie’s image tarnished because of your drugs and disgusting sex parties.”

“Sex parties?” He forces a laugh. “I wouldn’t exactly call them sex parties.”

“Obviously you don’t care about your reputation, but I care about Barbie’s. And mine. You look like a goddamn fool in this article.” She shakes the magazine like a pom-pom. “You’re a clown. An idiot…”

Each time Ruth opens her mouth with another insult, Jack shrinks more inside his skin. He covers his ears like a child and finds that he’s twelve years old again. He’s just been called into the principal’s office, where his mother stands, scolding him for designing a crystal radio set during English class. Like Ruth, Lily Ryan calls her son a clown, an idiot.

There’s little left of Jack by the time Ruth leaves his office. If he could take back the article, he would. But it’s out there now and he has to live with the consequences, another result of his im-pul-siv-i-ty. He reaches into his desk drawer and shakes a Valium tablet into his palm: the latest medication that Dr.Klemes has prescribed, and even though it’s not yet noon, he washes it down with a glass of scotch.