Chapter Twenty-Three
twenty-three
MAY 1990
VIVIAN thought she deserved it, that first time he’d hurt her. That was what he made her believe. They’d gone out to dinner with a producer who was Richard’s new friend, Elliot Sargent. Vivian had just been interviewed over drinks that afternoon for a profile in a local paper. The journalist wanted to talk to her about her Academy Award, but then they had gotten to chatting, and she’d shown up to dinner a little tipsy. She had laughed loudly at Elliot’s jokes, and accidentally spilled a bit of red wine on the table. The producer waved her off good-naturedly. “So,” he’d said at one point with a small smile. “Congratulations. What’s next for our star actress?” She’d smiled at the tablecloth and told him that she just wanted to keep getting roles. “And try screenwriting, maybe.”
“Well, the first, I’d imagine you’d have no problem with. And as for the second, if you ever have something, I’d happily take a look.”
She’d nodded at the tablecloth again, unable to hide her smile. When she glanced over at her husband, he was nodding too. But she also noticed his hand was wrapped so tightly around his glass that she could see the white of his knuckles.
He had said nothing then. He drove them home, racing over ninety miles an hour on the highway. When Vivian told him to slow down, he shot across two lanes of traffic and screeched to a halt so abruptly her head smashed into the window. She screamed, and before she knew it, he’d grabbed her by the front of the dress, her pearl buttons tearing. He’d pulled her toward him and seethed, “Don’t ever embarrass me like that again.” She’d stared into his livid eyes and gone still.
The next morning he’d cried. It was the first time she’d seen him really weep. He didn’t know what came over him, he said. He was more sorry than anything. She apologized for being drunk at the dinner. She hadn’t just embarrassed him. She’d embarrassed herself.
For a while things went back to normal. But at the same time, everything became her fault. If she was twenty minutes late to pick up the kids, she was a bad mother. If she spoke up during dinners with other film stars, she was seeking attention. Vivian had auditioned for a role in an action movie and had forgotten to tell him until she’d made it to the final round. It would be her first big role since Fortune’s Eye . When she mentioned it to him, his expression darkened. “You’re keeping secrets from me,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why would I? You aren’t my agent, are you?” Vivian laughed, half-mocking. She’d tried to shove past him on her way to the door, but he pulled her back by the shoulder and threw her against the wall of their bedroom. Her head knocked into the wall. “Do not speak to me like that,” he said, his voice low. The next morning, she woke up to a headache and a bouquet of flowers on her nightstand.
It didn’t matter. In the end, she didn’t get the role. She auditioned for others and got a smaller part, a hostess in a restaurant in a gritty crime movie. When she told her husband he was happy for her. When they wrapped filming, he’d taken her out to dinner and bought her favorite red wine for the table, a cabernet. They’d stumbled back to his car and he helped her in gently, kissing her forehead before he closed her door.
He was a good husband, Vivian thought. And a good father. He never so much as raised his voice at her in front of the kids. He still made them breakfast on the weekends. He loved her so much, he couldn’t always control how he expressed it. That was all.
She went to audition after audition. She got dinner with producers. She saw eyes light up when they recognized her name, but then she wouldn’t get hired. Meanwhile, Richard kept getting parts. The lead detective in a thriller, a side part in a war drama, dashing in one role, meek and conniving in the next. He got to direct one movie, and then another. Nothing brought either of them award consideration again, but still, he was steadily employed. Her roles were spotty. Her screenplay had brought nothing but rejections. She kept waiting for something like Fortune’s Eye to come again, a project written for a Chinese actress, but when it didn’t happen, she started to audition for more general roles. Maybe the right director would see something in her and make some revisions just to cast her. But they always said she wasn’t a good fit.
Richard started getting restless. He spent more and more nights out with his friends. He had sunk nearly half their savings into the production company he’d started with his mentor, Elliot Sargent. Except the films they were producing weren’t doing well. They’d been bleeding money for months, and Vivian hadn’t known about any of it until he’d asked her if they could cut back on paying for Elaine Deng’s tuition. Then she came across a statement from the bank. She waited all night for him to come home. When he stumbled through the door at three in the morning, reeking of alcohol, she followed him to their bedroom.
“We need to talk. We can’t be spending our money like this. We are sending the twins to college soon.”
“ Our money? I’m the one who’s booking everything, sweetheart.”
“Look at you right now,” she said, gritting her teeth. “You’re a mess. What are you on?”
“We’ll talk about this in the morning.”
“Tell me.” She went after him. “You’re not going to bed until you do.”
He whirled around, clamping his fingers around her throat. “Stop— talking ,” he spat. There was a horrifying, blank look in his bloodshot eyes. He shoved her, and she staggered against their dresser. The sharp corner struck her side. Her knees buckled and she cried out. She steadied herself on the dresser and raised her shaking fingers to her throat. He’d never done this before.
“He’s been different lately,” she said on the phone later that week with Daisy, trying to keep her tone neutral. Her rib still throbbed dully when she took a deep breath. “I don’t know what to make of it.”
“Oh? How so?”
“He’s more…” Vivian searched for a word. “Agitated.”
“Aw, Vivi, you know he’s just jealous, right?”
“Of me?” Vivian asked in disbelief, even though she knew that Daisy was right. Vivian understood. After all, she felt envious of him, too. But after telling herself for so long that she had mishandled her career in every possible way, she struggled to fathom what there was for her husband to be jealous of. “I don’t know,” she said faintly. “I mean, I’m the one who can’t book roles.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line. “You’re just being selective,” Daisy said. “Which, good for you! Means you get to spend more time with family.” Daisy laughed. “Now, before I go to my pool’s happy hour. How are the kids?”
And Vivian felt herself relax then. “Oh, just great. The twins are juniors and Rennie is just about to enter high school. She’s going to theater camp this summer.…”
She had sustained herself on the glow of that conversation for a while. Everyone wants to be you. They saw the woman profiled in the magazines, this house, her family. She was successful to them. Her children were happy. She remembered the raucous nights with Daisy—fifteen years ago now, wasn’t it? She remembered the drive that Richard took her on when he proposed marriage; how Los Angeles seemed like a secret she’d stumbled upon, a treasure she’d discovered. The place that held her future and everything she could ever want.
She’d done what no one else had. Couldn’t that be enough?
The next time they fought, it was in an underground parking lot. She’d accused him of being on cocaine and threatened to call a taxi and report him to the police. He dragged her into the car by her hair. That night, she leaned over the bathroom counter and carefully washed the blood from her roots.
She got up the next morning and went to her audition. Afterward she called her aunt in San Francisco from a pay phone. She realized she had missed some hair matted with blood at the back of her head. She cradled the phone to the side of her jaw that wasn’t bruised. She hadn’t called her aunt in ages, ever since her husband told her not to, that her family no longer cared about her, only her money. She’d listened to him then, but she regretted it now. What if her aunt didn’t want to see her?
Her aunt picked up the phone. When Vivian heard the Mandarin, she was so relieved she almost wanted to cry. “ 姑姑 ,” she’d said. “I’m not happy at home.”
“Is it him?” her aunt asked bluntly. There was a pause. “I knew he wasn’t good for you. What happened?”
Even after all this time the words caught in her throat. “We had a—a fight.”
“What happened ?” her aunt asked again. “Did he do something to you?”
“I—” Her voice dried up.
“Come here. Bring the children.”
Oh God , the children. “I can’t bring them. They have school. It’s March.” She paused. “But maybe… I can come up for a—week or something.”
“Yes. I will come get you at the airport. Just call and tell me what flight you’ll be on.”
She packed a small bag. That evening, she told her husband.
“I’m going to visit my family in San Francisco.”
“You’re leaving.”
“Just for a week.”
“Why?” His brow furrowed. He stood from the bed.
“I need to get away from this house. For a bit.” She straightened up. “Maybe that’s the best for both of us right now.”
His face fell. “What does that mean?”
“You know what I mean, Richard.” Her fingers were trembling as she tried to fold a blouse. She just threw it in. The twins and Rennie were home. He wouldn’t do anything to her now. “We’re so angry with each other. It’s not good.”
“You want to leave me.” It wasn’t a question.
Finally one of them had said it. Vivian said in defeat, “So what if I do?”
“Say what you mean.”
“What if we made it easy? We could sit down with an attorney and figure it out. Custody. Everything.” She stared at him for a moment. His eyes glimmered green in the low light. Then his shoulders folded. He crumpled on the bed and buried his head in his hands.
“I gave you everything I had,” he whispered. “I loved you, Vivian. And now you’re going to run away from it all.”
Blood rose to Vivian’s cheeks. “I’m not —”
“You’re going to abandon this life we built together. Our family .”
Vivian stopped packing. Abandon?
“The girls are so happy. The Dengs are happy. Why would you take that away from them?” He sat up, held out a hand toward her, and she automatically reached out. He twined his fingers with hers and pulled her to him, then he slipped off the bed and onto his knees. From the floor, he held on to her legs like a child. Vivian stood over him. He said, “Double happiness, remember?” 囍 ； that was the phrase she’d always used, the phrase that came painted on their ceramic bowls. How lucky that two happy families could live under one roof. It was such a radical notion to so many, that she could be loved by Richard as a Chinese divorcée; that her children could be loved by him. But when her husband invoked the phrase, it sounded like a threat. Their two families lived in fortune because of him. She’d signed a prenuptial agreement; his mother had made them. Richard had brought Vivian into this world, and he could take her out of it, too. Everything hinged on him: the money, the happiness of her girls, their access to a better future. The livelihood of the Dengs. Without him she was the sum of a few meager roles. She was nothing.
“You’re right, qīn ài de.”
His voice was plaintive. “Don’t leave me.”
“I won’t.”
“Please don’t go.”
“I won’t. We can go to San Francisco together sometime.”
She’d knelt on the ground with him. They wept in each others’ arms. He in relief, she in despair. He kissed her gently. In the morning she called to cancel her flight. And then she called her aunt and told her she wouldn’t be coming, that everything was fine, that it was just a fight.
In Cannes the day after the festival ended, Vivian lay back with Richard on a pile of cushions in a private cabana overlooking the beach. Over the course of the afternoon, they emptied a bottle of wine and dozed in the shade. Vivian tucked her head into the crook of Richard’s shoulder and pulled her loose linen dress around her. Her permed hair fanned out on the pillow.
A younger version of herself could never have imagined being here, lounging on a beach chair with her striking, tanned husband, ordering lavish food and drinks without thinking of the cost, and having it appear in front of her. She was surrounded by so much blue on all sides. The sand was softer than silk. The sun touched everything: the wine, their shoulders, the water. Still, she felt so empty inside. She thought of what it would be like to float into the ocean; to sink into it and dissolve like seafoam. She closed her eyes. Light filtered through her eyelids and she saw only a muted shade of red.