Chapter Twelve
twelve
DECEMBER 1976
VIVIAN’S husband wanted to give the house a name. All important houses had one, and he wanted to name it after her. Yin Manor. This place was hardly a manor, but still, it sounded like a proper, established estate that had been around for decades and would last for generations more. Vivian loved it. Now all that was left was to show it off.
This part Vivian was a bit more discerning about. She had young daughters, three now including the new baby, Renata. She knew, kids or not, some houses in Hollywood had parties that could last a full weekend, with people showing up at all hours and then sleeping it off in every corner. This house would first and foremost be a home for her family.
So they only hosted dinner parties every weekend. She and Richard approved the guest list together. Sometimes they hosted two guests, sometimes seven. Sometimes Vivian cooked and Richard made their drinks; sometimes they hired a chef who would construct a five-course meal with inventive appetizers and desserts, more things encased in gelatin than she knew was possible. But somehow the exclusivity made the invitations even more sought-after.
These dinners helped them both. They could talk to directors and invite producers and line up roles, all from their dining room. Vivian also wanted to show the house to her family.
Nearly ten months after they moved in, Vivian’s aunt and uncle from San Francisco came down by train. They practically fell over when they saw the house rise before them. “ 天啊 ,” her uncle said, his eyes gleaming. Inside, their eyes roved over the imported Ming-style vases and brush paintings, as Vivian swelled with pride. That night she made them all dumplings herself. They shared platters upon platters, all crowded around the kitchen to eat instead of at the long dining table, which made sharing impossible. Her uncle drank 二锅头 with Richard, and they both made funny faces at Lucille, who shrieked with joy, her lips streaked with vinegar from the dumplings. Her aunt cooed over her new seven-month-old daughter. Vivian translated effortlessly between them, and somehow, Richard’s jokes came through.
Her aunt and uncle stayed in one of the guest rooms on the first floor. The next day they were quieter. They ate breakfast quickly. Richard drove them to the train station, and before they boarded, her aunt clasped her hands.
“Come back,” Vivian said. “Whatever you need, let me know.”
Her aunt nodded and pulled Vivian close. “Be careful out here,” she said, words for Vivian only.
Vivian pulled away. “ 姑姑 , of course. What do you mean?”
Her aunt looked at her, mouth open as if to say something. But the train sounded and she simply turned away.
The following month, Richard finally convinced his mother to visit. Dishes were polished twice. A French cook was hired, who made a soup, braised veal with a wine sauce reduction, and perfectly tender potatoes. Cecilia Lowell arrived by taxi. Vivian could tell Richard was nervous by how much he adjusted his shirt collar, and it made her anxious, too. In Mandarin she told her daughters to be quiet.
Richard’s mother scrutinized the couple’s choices as she walked through the house’s halls. She was expressionless taking in the same Ming dishes Vivian’s aunt and uncle had gasped at. She evoked some warmth when Vivian and Richard showed her Renata, held the infant, even, and helped put her to bed, but otherwise remained indifferent.
During dinner, the conversation was quiet and controlled. They talked about Richard’s and Vivian’s recent roles, about a new tennis club that opened up near where Richard’s mother lived, the inauguration of the new president. Jazz played on the turntable. Forks and knives screeched against the dishware. Lucille’s face puckered as she chewed the veal, and Vivian felt her temperature rise. She drank her wine in small, rationed sips. Richard’s mother had never been openly disdainful of Vivian. But still, she had thoughts on politics that Vivian didn’t have the context to possess, mentioned names she didn’t know, and used words that she had never had any reason to learn, so that when her mother-in-law asked Vivian her opinion, she could add nothing. She felt childish and humiliated when Cecilia did this, like she had failed a test.
“So,” Richard asked his mother later on. They were still around the dining room table. Vivian had just put her daughters to bed. “What do you think of the house?”
His mother looked up, her gaze settling on Vivian. “What do you think, dear?”
Vivian swallowed. Her husband turned to look at her. “It’s beautiful,” she said. “Richard did a beautiful job with the renovation.” She winced at saying beautiful twice.
Cecilia nodded.
“You should move back out here,” Richard said. He fidgeted with his napkin, the only sign of his nervousness. “You could live with us. Have your pick of the rooms.”
Vivian shot her husband a look. They’d never discussed this. Did they really want this cold woman to reside in their house? To eat formal dinners like this every night?
“I wouldn’t want to intrude on the happy family,” Cecilia said, and Vivian felt at first a flash of relief that quickly soured into anxiety. Her mother-in-law hated her, she was now certain of it. And her children, too.
“You wouldn’t be,” her son reassured her. “Here, stay the night at least? We have guest rooms downstairs.”
His mother stood up. “I should call a taxi,” she said. “I’ll use the phone in the living room.” She gathered up her wool coat. Vivian watched her go with her stomach in knots.
Richard shut the door. “She won’t even spend a night here.”
“It’s me,” Vivian said, suddenly realizing she was exhausted. “She doesn’t like me.”
“That’s not it.” He shook his head, defeated. “It’s the house. She’s always been this way. I thought I could change her mind if we built it up the way we wanted. If we cleared out the old. But—” He grimaced. “She’s still superstitious.”
“Superstitious,” Vivian said slowly. “Of what?”
Richard didn’t answer her for a long time. “She’s convinced she saw a ghost in her parents’ bedroom when she was a child,” he said. “But she didn’t. That’s all.”
In May they hosted a late dinner for Eugene Lyman, a producer who was an old friend of Richard’s. He’d been three years above Richard at Yale Drama and had become a producer of action movies.
Vivian put the children to bed before she got dressed and greeted Eugene and his wife, Jeanette, a tall, imposing, woman who showed up in a mink-lined tapestry coat and bright jewelry.
They drank wine and looked out over the half-finished grounds behind the house as Vivian told them she’d been looking into hiring a gardener. At dinner Jeanette regaled them, in her low, raspy voice, about the producers who were booking trips to see mistresses, the substance habits of well-known actors, and the romantic trysts of a certain senator with an up-and-coming actress. They were rapt. Eugene dropped in with a joke from time to time. Vivian rubbed her husband’s shoulder when she placed a platter of fresh potstickers next to the salad, and he squeezed her hand. One thing she didn’t like about show business was how people gossiped. Surely if they were talking about other people this way, someone must be talking about her.
“These dumplings, Vivian,” Eugene admired. Vivian remembered coming in to audition for him once. He’d barely focused on her monologue and had dismissed her the moment she was done speaking. But now his eyes sparkled. “I might have to hire a Chinese cook myself.”
Vivian’s cheeks warmed.
“How you act and raise children and keep up this beautiful house, I have no clue,” Jeanette said. She had perfectly applied lipstick that matched her nails. She tapped her cigarette into the ashtray. Vivian winced inside, thinking of how the smoke would rise and stain the walls. “You must tell me your secrets.”
Vivian smiled gratefully. “Thank you. I try my best.”
Eugene drained his scotch and looked around. “It is a hell of a house, Richie.”
Jeanette nodded. “The classical influences are gorgeous. I see the Beaux Arts design on those windows. And the decorations, too. A flair of the Orient.”
Vivian was drunk to the point where the lights on the low chandelier were slightly expanding. Eugene rattled the ice around in his glass. “You know, I remember when you first told me about this house. It was a pipe dream, wasn’t it? But you really made it your own.”
“I remember,” Richard said. “You told me not to do it.”
“Well,” Jeanette said. “What with everything that happened with your family—”
Eugene set down his glass, hard. “Jennie.”
Everyone went silent.
What? Vivian wanted to ask. Her dinner guests were looking at one another. Her husband’s face was perfectly blank. She met Jeanette’s eyes, and the other woman quickly glanced away. Her drawn lips puckered. “Don’t mind me. I’m a nuisance when I’m drunk,” she said. “We just wanted to toast to this beautiful family.”
“Yes,” Eugene said. He tipped his glass up. “To this house of your dreams.”
Finally, Richard smiled. “It’s called Yin Manor,” he said, looking over to Vivian. “I named it for my wife.”
“Isn’t that grand. To the Yin Manor.” Jeanette raised her drink.
As they clinked glasses, Vivian thought back to Cecilia Lowell’s cold eyes, the warning in her aunt’s tone. The look exchanged between Eugene and Jeanette.
What had happened in this house? And why hadn’t her husband told her?
“Now, Richard.” Jeanette leaned forward. Her heavy pendant earrings clinked. “You must tell me. What was Gene like at Yale? I hear you two were quite the pranksters.”
“ That requires more drinks.” Eugene laughed, reaching for the decanter. Vivian watched her husband relax.
Vivian smiled. She was starting to feel a little queasy. A sharp, metallic taste filled her mouth. She excused herself and went to the bathroom. She held herself up over the sink. Why was she feeling so sick?
She felt almost feverish. The headaches were frequent these days, and another one was beginning to press behind her eyes. It smelled like rust, still, everywhere, tasted like it. Could it have been the wine?
Another wave of nausea brought her to her knees. Her mouth filled with spit, and she vomited into the toilet. The vile taste of her stomach acid almost made her vomit again. Shakily, she pushed herself up and studied her pallid reflection. For a moment, someone appeared behind her. A man with mottled skin, his eye sockets filled with crumbling dirt. The skin rotting away to show the cheekbones underneath. He opened his mouth and bared his blackened teeth.
This time she lurched forward and vomited into the sink. Again, she forced herself to lift her eyes to the mirror.
The figure was gone. Am I hallucinating? She took shaky breaths and turned on the faucet, which sputtered. Water ran brown for a moment, then clear.
Vivian was dizzy. She needed to get out of here. She washed her hands and left, only to stop short.
Her daughter stood in the foyer.
“Lucille,” she whispered. “What are you doing here?” Her daughter blinked at her, her thumb in her mouth. “Let me get you back into bed.” She scooped the girl up, feeling her solid weight. Lucille was four. Almost too old to be carried, but Vivian did it anyway. She heard voices rising and falling from the dining room as she kissed her daughter’s head and hummed softly to her. She was glad to not have to return to the dinner just yet. To have an excuse to take this moment to collect her nerves. Drink some water.
She set Lucille in bed and went back downstairs. By the time she reentered the dining room, she was smiling at her husband and her guests.
“Sorry,” she said. “I was just checking on my daughter. Where were we?”
They clinked glasses again, and the conversation once more began to flow. Jeanette offered Vivian tips on hiring nannies; Vivian said that there was already a woman named Edith Fan, who took care of her daughters. Edith was married to Josiah Deng, whom she’d thought about hiring as the gardener; he would be coming over to the house that following Monday, and Vivian would meet him. The conversation circled back to Hollywood. “It’s a small world, you know,” Jeanette said. “Don’t piss anyone off, smile more than you think you need to, and you’ll do just fine.”
What happened in the house? Vivian wanted to stand up and shout. She couldn’t stop thinking about the man with mottled skin. Richard reached for her hand. When she looked at him, her stomach lurched again. The figure in the mirror had looked too much like her husband.
“You all right?” he asked, staring up at her with wide eyes.
She couldn’t make sense of what she wanted to say, so eventually she just nodded and squeezed Richard’s hand. “Of course.” She rose to pour more wine, skipping her own glass. Eugene told another story, and they all laughed.
The next morning Vivian woke up and saw Richard leaning over the bathroom sink, a towel around his waist. He glanced up at her in the mirror. His wet, tousled hair fell in front of his eyes. “Did you feel the house shaking last night?”
She looked at him in alarm. “What? Did something happen?”
He straightened up. Something—relief?—seemed to come over him. “Never mind.”
“What do you mean, shaking? Is something else wrong with the house?”
“It’s nothing,” he said lightly. “Just a dream.”
She stood at the sink and deliberately washed her hands and then her face. She still felt nauseated, especially so this morning. Was it the wine? Had she eaten something bad? “Qīn ài de,” she said.
“Hm?”
“What did Eugene’s wife mean? Did something happen with your family here?”
He looked at her straight in the mirror. “Just a… it’s complicated. There’s been a couple of family tragedies. It’s all too sad, really.”
“Is that why your mother doesn’t like to stay out here?” Family tragedies. When she blinked, she saw the figure from the mirror the night before burned into the backs of her eyelids. Where could such an awful vision come from? Could Richard’s mother have seen something similar when she was a girl?
“For many reasons. But I think she didn’t have an easy time growing up. The family stuff really got to her. I don’t like to dwell on it.” His tone became irritated. “I don’t know why Eugene would tell Jennie that in the first place. At least now we know she’s a gossip.” He finished at the sink and went into the bedroom. “Are the girls awake? We should make them breakfast.”
The mood had turned. Vivian’s questions had upset him. She got the sense he did not want to be pressed further.