Viridian

Around the time Avi turned nine, his parents began throwing karaoke parties in their little bungalow at the end of a cul-de-sac in a suburb of New Jersey. Although they were far from wealthy, Avi’s mother and father steadily climbed their way to becoming solidly middle-class. Over the past year, Avi’s father began saving for a state-of-the-art karaoke machine and a small but mighty collection of laser discs, many of which featured medleys of the latest hits. Guests would come over one-by-one, shucking their coats in the spare room, once his bubbe’s bedroom, and make their way downstairs for the festivities.

His father would bring out a bulbous glass bottle of cognac, which he still stored in its original box in the liquor cabinet. His mother would brew coffee and place raspberry Linzer cookies on a glass dish along with dried figs and slices of melon. 

Boisterous cheers echoed throughout the house, the sound of adults hooting and hollering, egging each other on to sing next. Deep baritone renditions of Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” bellowed beneath the floorboards, making the ground shake with each prolonged “waaaaay…”. Off-key variations of Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” screamed into the microphone so loudly the speaker’s feedback crunched, making Avi think his ears had erupted.  Along with the usual English favourites, there were a mix of Yiddish folk songs Avi did not understand but had heard so many times he could recite the lyrics verbatim.

Sound filled the house, a flood of raucous laughter and song. Beneath it all lingered a particular smell: burned candlewax, tepid coffee, warmed perfume, and spicy brown liquor. The scent seeped into the carpets and couch cushions, an aroma that lingered for days, sometimes weeks after the party ended.

The morning after while playing video games Avi’s nose might catch the corner of a cushion, and he’d recognize the faint but distinct aroma of Pete Kaplan’s Marboro Milds. He may go to open a window, only to be hit with a sharp waft of menthol in the curtains; Sal Stuart’s calling card – a mix of pomade and Bengay.  He might be dozing, leaning his head just so against an armrest, only to fall suddenly and arrestingly into a smudge of Mrs. Cooperman’s Chanel No. 5 – which to Avi, was the olfactory equivalent of diving face-first into her cleavage.

For Avi however, these karaoke parties were special in another way. While the adults revelled in the basement, Avi spent his evening holed up in the guest room, among the mountain of coats piled on the bed. Propping open the closet door, he stood before the full-length mirror, trying on each coat one after the other, admiring the person who appeared.

Although each coat had its appeal his favourites were the furs. Draped in Jan Peterson’s chocolate mink coat, Avi ran his fingers along the arms, gently tracing the quilted stitching.

He was small for his age and the coats hung off him like clothes on a line. Using his belt, he cinched them at the waist, turning them into dresses.

Although Avi desperately wanted to, he couldn’t pair these outfits with a handbag. Not many of the women left their purse in the guestroom, preferring to keep it with them. “Likely more out of convenience for their lipsticks than fear of theft” he’d overheard his mother say, assuring no one but herself. Avi looped a piece of shoelace along the inside spine of a hardcover book, with the book sandwiched shut, he looped the other end around his shoulder and tied a knot – this way the book resembled a red leather clutch.

Trying on the coats was only one part of the thrill, going through the pockets was another. In women’s pockets, Avi found old receipts, parking vouchers, tins of mints. In men’s pockets, he found hardened nuggets of tissue, shells of gum wrappers, shopping lists from their wives – their edges stained blue from the denim’s dye.

Once when he was trying on a Hunter green overcoat, admiring how the green of the thread brought out the flecks of viridian in his own eyes, he felt something small and round in the breast pocket - a pair of jade earrings. Mrs. Kestembaum’s maybe? She was a widow and always had shiny things. Mrs. Kestembaum had a thick thatch of red hair, turning gray at the sides, and his mother made him call her “auntie.” Tonight, Avi noticed she had on a gold hairpin which looked like a harp and a brooch shaped like a macaw with ruby eyes.

Avi carefully tucked the earrings into the back of his shorts. He knew what he was doing was wrong, but in that moment, he did not feel guilty. Quite the opposite, taking the earrings felt right – inevitable even, like they had returned to him - something he had misplaced long ago. How silly of him, he thought, they were here all along.

_ _ _

Six months later his father would discover the earrings in a matchbox in the back of his drawer. His father, who had never laid a hand on him before, would beat him so relentlessly that the welts on his back never truly went away - nor did the ones on his father’s fist where he punched the wall above Avi’s Gremlins poster.

He had assumed his father was angry about the thievery, about how he’d stolen the earrings. Only later, would Avi come to understand it was out of fear. A fear that began as a seed and festered, swelling into an invasive plant that rooted itself in every corner of his mind. A fear that Avi took the earrings to wear them.

His parents stopped having karaoke parties after that, and the house went back to smelling the same as it always had – singular and ordinary.

Years later, while clearing out his parent’s home, Avi found the earrings in a small tackle box among rusted hooks, feathers and fly ties in his father’s shed. He had expected his father would have returned them to Mrs. Kestembaum, coming up with some weak but passable excuse like they had fallen beneath the bed. But there they were, wrapped in a single sheet of magazine paper, paper from what looked like an old weightlifting magazine. The sun-faded imagery showed shirtless men in spandex shorts, their muscles glistening as they flexed toward the camera.

Avi put the jade earrings back into the tackle box and thought, with sadness, at how much they would have brought out the viridian green in his father’s eyes.