Rebecca Handler

o n e w o m a n p a r t y

coronavirus

The Could-Haves

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Living through a pandemic means endless hours of evaluating risk and erring on the side of caution. The enemy is invisible and highly contagious. Friends could be poisonous, and a neighborhood walk feels like a spin of the roulette wheel. We’re out of eggs but is it worth killing Grandma? When isolation frustration kicks in, I try to feel grateful for all I have. When that fails, I consume stories about people on ventilators, and watch videos of families saying goodbye to dying, isolated relatives. I remind myself of the horror of Covid. We do not want this. We miss our friends, but we do not want this. I repeat my mantra: This is all we need to do.  I think about how I want to look back on this year. I want my children to feel proud of themselves, sacrificing for the greater good. 

Over the summer, my family and I were heading south on the 101 towards the Golden Gate Bridge, returning home after an outdoor, distanced dinner with friends in Marin. I was driving, my husband in the passenger seat, kids in the back. We were listening to the band Khruangbin and were nearly giddy from the rare event of socializing with non-family members.  

Let me pause to mention that I am a nervous driver. In 2009, I was in a head-on car crash, one that left me – with the exception of a bruised nose from the airbag – miraculously, physically unharmed. But I carry that crash with me. I see the other driver’s face through the windshield and remember “Losing My Religion” was on the radio. I recall stepping carefully out of my red Honda Civic to examine the wreckage. A stranger took my arm and led me to the sidewalk. He said, “I saw it happen. I can’t believe you’re ok.” I remember the smell of his deodorant and the way his voice cracked when he said, “You’re ok.” My husband arrived and brought me to the hospital where I was placed under observation. Natasha Richardson had died earlier that year, two days after sustaining a head injury. No one was taking chances.  

Back to the bridge and Khruangbin. As sometimes happens when I drive at night, a sense of dread came over me. I imagined flipping the car and catapulting off the side of the bridge, slamming into the dark water. I reviewed my alcohol intake, wondering if that was a factor. Two glasses of wine over four hours. Intellectually I knew I was sober, but my body wouldn’t cooperate. My hands turned sweaty and my legs trembled. I asked my husband to drive, and pulled off the highway into a mall parking lot. Later, after the kids had gone to bed, my only explanation was, “I thought something bad might happen.” 

Recently I have found myself replaying that night. I made a choice, and all I have to show for it is what didn’t occur. I’ll never know what could have happened on the bridge. All the could-have-beens drowned in the cold dark water. 

And now, during Covid, we make similar calculations without a spare driver. We are parked in our masks, on our Zooms, exhausted every night from assessing and quantifying everyday life. Tomorrow we will do the same. Make choices and wait.  

The Man In The Water

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We’re all learning lessons about resilience and gratitude and isn’t that great. Last week my 15-year-old flopped on the couch and said, “Remember when we called it sheltering in place, and now it’s just life?” I squeezed her knee and closed my eyes. Later that afternoon we drove to her high school to pick up last year’s yearbook. A school with 3,000 students and famously crowded, chaotic hallways, the stained gray building is now deserted with a red digital sign flickering, “Congratulations Class of 2020.” On the ride home, my daughter quietly turned the pages looking for friends. A pop song about a sweater was on the radio. At a stoplight, she raised the book so I could see. There she was at a school dance with her arms around two girls. 

The next morning, a man swam into me in the Bay. I had been sighting every four strokes, looking for buoys and seals, but he came out of nowhere. Bam, his fist into my side. Wearing a black cap and red swim trunks, he kept swimming, as if through me. “Hey!” I yelled after him. “Hey!” Nothing. I treaded water for a while, adjusted my goggles, and glared at the man’s shiny back heading towards the beach. I fantasized about chasing him, throwing myself on top of him like a rodeo champion and demanding an apology. But of course, I just swam.

That night I called a friend in Australia whose children are playing field hockey and spending the night with friends. I told her our flights to Perth had been canceled. She sighed and said I would have had to spend two weeks quarantining in a hotel room. “By then I reckon you’d have to go home.”

Frustrating moments are piling up like dirty dishes. Some days I ignore them. Other days I look around for someone to blame. Like the man in the water. That’s why he fled. If he had started to apologize, he wouldn’t have been able to stop. I’m sorry for the President. I’m sorry for the racism. I’m sorry for the pandemic, the deaths, and the ignorance. I’m sorry you can’t go to work. I’m sorry pop stars are writing songs about cardigans. I’m sorry your children can only see their friends in old photographs. I’m sorry I swam into you. I didn’t see you.   

Funny Things Don’t Happen Anymore

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I thought the era of funny things was over. This is the age of fear, sorrow, and fed-up-ness. This is a pandemic.

I was walking home up the hill, just past the yard with the artichoke plant, across from the hoarder’s house. My neighborhood is pin-droppingly quiet which is why, at this particular moment, my cloth mask was hanging from my wrist and not strapped to my face. I was alone. 

A black car drove past, then turned around and pulled over beside me. 

The window opened and a man called out, “Is your name Denise, by any chance?” He had a bushy moustache and thick black glasses. He was smiling at me. 

“No,” I said, and kept walking.

“You’re not Denise?”

I paused. I hadn’t slept well in several nights. Could my name be Denise? Had we all been renamed?

“No,” I repeated, moving my bag to my other shoulder. 

The man asked if I used to live near SF State. He seemed happy and hopeful. 

“Nope.”

“Really?” He stared at me and shook his head. “You are the spitting image of Denise.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I hope she’s a nice person.” 

He laughed. “Oh, she’s the best,” he said reassuringly. “I haven’t seen her in twenty years though. Funny thing, because I’ve been thinking about her recently and then – I drove by you, and I swear – ” As his voice trailed off, he kept staring at me, head cocked.

I put down my bag. “Maybe that’s why you thought you saw her?” I was no longer in a rush to get home. This was my first spontaneous chitchat with a stranger in five months, and it had nothing to do with the virus.  

He asked what I meant. I explained that when someone is on my mind, particularly someone I miss, I see them everywhere. For example, in every older man who smokes a cigar, for a split second I see my dad. 

Moustache ran his hand across the steering wheel and looked wistful. “Denise had a great sense of humor. Really funny girl. I always wondered what happened to her.”

“I hope you find her someday,” I said, meaning it.

“Thanks. You too. I mean – ” He laughed and shook his head before driving away.

Back at home, I told my husband about the encounter. He questioned the plausibility of Moustache’s story while adding I look different from twenty years ago, which I found both rude and beside-the-point. But everyone’s sensitive right now. It’s a pandemic. 

Maybe this isn’t a funny story after all. Denise is nowhere to be found, and my husband thinks I look like an old lady. Maybe it would have been funnier if I had told the man that, yes, I was Denise, and hopped in the car with him. We would have had a lot to catch up on.  

Ideas For A Pandemic

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We could chart our panic attacks and name new star formations. We could make cup and string telephones, or eat black olives off our fingertips. We could secretly meet in the woods and take off all our clothes. 

We could slowly burn something like a brisket or a new relationship. We could throw quarters off a cliff, four at a time. We could scream, “Edith Piaf!” at the top of our lungs. 

We could make clothing out of postage stamps. We could change religions.

What have you done?

What have you done?

Darling Dearest

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Darling Dearest was very good at taking care of herself, which is how she ended up living all alone on a houseboat. She used to live in an ordinary house with her parents, until the government told everyone to Stay Where You Are. The night of the announcement, Darling Dearest packed a small bag filled with only the essentials, crawled out her window, and walked down to the dock.

Darling Dearest loved many things about her houseboat. It had wooden floors that she liked to polish until they smelled like lemon. The kitchen had the most delicious smoothie ingredients like bananas, frozen raspberries, and hemp seeds. On the counter was a magical blender that cleaned itself. 

A rope ladder connected the kitchen to the upstairs room, which was filled with books, toys, and beanbags. When sat upon, each beanbag made a different sound. The red one whistled, the one with yellow polka dots sighed, and the blue one farted. Brightly colored lightbulbs were strung from one corner of the ceiling to the other. The lights responded to Darling Dearest’s moods, and, to cheer her up, turned brighter on the days she felt sad. The only time she ever felt sad, however, was when she finished a really good book or took the last bite of chocolate cake. The rest of the time, Darling Dearest was happy.

Her houseboat had a green, checkered couch that turned into a waterbed when Darling Dearest squeezed a fuzzy pom-pom attached to the side. She had a TV with many channels including one that only showed episodes of Adventure Time and Full House. The TV was voice-activated, and when Darling Dearest came back from a swim, she could call out, “Play the one where Stephanie starts kindergarten.” 

Most of all, Darling Dearest loved her balcony that circled the top level of the houseboat. She liked to recline on her lounge chair with an orange popsicle and feel the sun on her belly. When she got too hot, she’d spray herself with cucumber water from her glittery spray bottle, and when that wasn’t enough, she jumped from the balcony into the cool water below. Darling Dearest read many books on her balcony, and often had dinner there while watching the sun set. She always made a wish on the first star. Sometimes it was hard to think of a wish, when she felt that she had everything she ever wanted. At those times, she’d make a wish for the world. 

One day after her swim, Darling Dearest was on her balcony enjoying a quesadilla with extra jalapenos and a cup of black coffee, when something flew out of the sky and hit her on the head. “Ouch,” she exclaimed, “What was that?” She put down her quesadilla and licked her fingers. She looked down, and there, next to her white plastic chair was a large, brown, hairy coconut. “Where did that come from?” Darling Dearest said to no one in particular. She often spoke aloud, but not because she wished for someone to answer her, but because she enjoyed hearing her voice, which was medium-pitched and singsongy. She reached down and picked up the coconut. It was heavy, like a small bag of groceries. She plopped it down on the table next to her plate. 

Darling Dearest had never seen a coconut in person, but she had read about them in The Encyclopedia of Fruit.

She took a bite of quesadilla, and stared at the coconut. She took a sip of coffee and stared at the coconut. Finally, it began to roll from side to side. Darling Dearest was not scared. She knew that the best surprises often came in the form of interruptions. 

The coconut began to speak. “Hello!” it said. “Nice to see you.” The voice was low-pitched and friendly sounding. 

Darling Dearest adjusted her sunflower hair clip and leaned down to speak to the coconut. “Hello!”

“Would you mind letting me out of here?” 

“Do you want me to cut you open?” Darling Dearest asked.

“Yes please. I’ll stay to one side.”

Darling Dearest told the coconut that she’ll just be a minute, and went to the upstairs room where she kept her machete in a leather case hanging on a wall hook. 

“I’m back. Are you on the right side or the left side?”

“If you’re looking at the coconut, I’m on the left.”

Darling Dearest gave the coconut one strong whack and it split right down the middle. There, standing on the left half was a tiny man wearing a brown three-piece suit and a red necktie. He smiled and waved. “Well isn’t this a glorious view?” he said. “Would you mind helping me out so I can get a better look?” 

The tiny man gracefully leapt into Darling Dearest’s open palm. He dusted himself off and small white flakes blew off his body into the warm air. He stood on his tiptoes and looked around. “It really is spectacular,” he said. “I can see why you love it here.” His voice was loud, given the size of his body. “Are you drinking coffee, Darling Dearest?” he asked, craning his head over his shoulder, staring at the table. 

“How do you know my name?”

The tiny man took a deep breath and said, “I am your grandfather.” 

She leaned over and stared at his miniscule bushy eyebrows and chin dimple. “Grandpa! Why are you so small and how did you get inside of a coconut?”

Her grandfather rested his hands on the tops of his thighs, took another deep breath, began speaking and did not stop until the coffee was cold and the sun had set. He told his granddaughter what happened after the government told everyone to Stay Where You Are. Many people got sick from the virus and some people died. Darling Dearest’s parents had both gotten sick, but thankfully recovered. He spoke of Darling Dearest’s grandmother, who smoked clove cigarettes and wrote rhyming poems about nature. He said their love was like a pavlova, sweet and filling without ever feeling like you’d had too much. The tiny man’s tiny eyes filled with tears when he described the moment of his wife’s death, when he held her hand and promised he would always love her. 

“And that’s when the shrinking began.”

Darling Dearest wiped her tears and said quietly, “The shrinking?”

“Soon after your grandmother died, I began to shrink. Slowly at first, but then very quickly. Soon my wedding ring fit my wrist.”

Darling Dearest had read many books but never one about a shrinking disease. “Were you scared?”

“Yes.” The tiny man held his index finger up towards the sky. “Until I remembered my coconut collection.” He smiled. “Do you collect anything?”

“Shells,” she said softly, “And duck figurines.”

“Did you know that coconuts stop people from shrinking?” Darling Dearest had not read this in The Encyclopedia of Fruit.

Darling Dearest looked around at her balcony and inside to the upstairs room with the rainbow lights and the farting beanbag. She could not imagine living inside of a coconut. 

“But you’re ok? You don’t have the virus?”

“I’m more than ok, Darling Dearest. Never been healthier. And you. Look at you. You have taken good care of yourself, being alone on this houseboat. I am proud of you.”

She was happy her grandfather was here. At night, he slept next to her on the couch, curled up on a bamboo coaster.

In the morning, they both noticed his feet were hanging off the coaster and his vest was tight around the middle. After a breakfast of coffee and scones, followed by a refreshing swim, Darling Dearest stared at her grandfather. Crouching down to look into his eyes, she declared, “I think you’ve grown, Grandpa.”

He smiled. “I also noticed this, Darling Dearest, but I didn’t want to say anything until after our swim. Indeed, I have grown nearly one inch since I arrived yesterday. I think it is because I am no longer sad.”

The next several days were filled with storytelling and smoothie making. And all the while, Darling Dearest’s grandfather kept growing. 

“I don’t think I need to live in a coconut anymore Darling Dearest,” her grandfather announced one afternoon, after an episode of Adventure Time.

“You wouldn’t fit in one, Grandpa!” They both laughed. 

Darling Dearest had also noticed something changing within herself. She had really enjoyed living on her own for quite some time, but her grandfather’s arrival had made her realize there was nothing quite like the company of someone you love.

“Grandpa?” Darling Dearest said, placing her hand on his. “Would you like to stay here with me?”

“I would like that very much,” he replied.

Darling Dearest sighed with happiness. And then the two of them played backgammon. They didn’t even notice when the first star appeared.