When Vivian steps into her childhood home, it feels like she is stepping into another dimension.
It’s been a while since she’s been here; she and her mother usually meet out at restaurants. Or at least they did, before her mother got sick. She knew her mother was doing a “modern renovation” but hadn’t expectedthis.The walls are still there, the layout the same, but it’s no longer a New England colonial-style. Now it has a bizarre, modern feel: stark white walls, acrylic chairs, neon abstract art. The large overhead light pendant looks like Medusa’s head.
Vivian runs her fingers over the wall, half hoping she leaves a smudge. She recalls her late father standing there in his blue plaid button-down shirt, his hearty laugh filling the space, bridging the gap between her and her mother.
He always knew how to handle her mother.
“She’s wandering,” the nurse recently called to tell Vivian, to which Vivian had dryly replied, “Well, good thing she can’t really walk so she can’t gettoofar.” The pause on the nurse’s end toldVivian that she had not responded appropriately. Not compassionate enough, perhaps. But she and her mother have always had a complicated relationship. Besides, Vivian feels she has already mourned her mom. The creature now inhabiting her mom’s body is an unfamiliar one. And right now, due to the mounting nursing home bill, that creature is greedily gobbling up Vivian’s savings.
“Well, lucky for us, your father made some good investments,” her mom used to reluctantly reply, when Vivian would inquire about her mom’s latest Birkin bag, or Paris trip, or Cartier diamond necklace—and Vivian foolishly believed her. Her mom was notoriously private when it came to financial matters and reverted to using grand, sweeping statements. “You’ll get this all when I’m gone,” she’d say, waving her hand over her dressed-to-the-nines outfit, “so I suppose it’s okay you didn’t want to get married.”
It’s safe to say that anger—and a growing resilience—is occupying more of Vivian’s mental space these days than grief. She sure hopes her mom spent as much on that Medusa head and neon paintings as she spent on her wardrobe and jewelry collection the past few years; Vivian needs to recoup as much money as possible. She still cannot believe the massive debt that her mother incurred. And those “good investments” her father had made? All gone, along with what remained of the old family wealth. Her mother had been playing the stock market like it was Monopoly money.
There’s a swift rap on the door, and Vivian lets in Rachel. On her hip is her baby, Crimson, who’s not such a baby anymore. Vivian’s slightly irritated; she hadn’t realized that the baby would be coming. She manages a smile at Crimson when she feels her friend watching.
“Wow, this place looks different,” Rachel remarks, after stepping inside. “I think the last time I was here was for your dad’s funeral. When was that? Four years ago?”
“Five.”
“Your mom was definitely going for…alook.”
Rachel sets down her daughter, who immediately begins toddling through the house. Vivian’s still not used to seeing Rachel with a kid in tow. She’s also not used to seeing her friend look so flustered; Rachel’s normally chic bob is messily pulled halfway up into a high ponytail; there is some red lipstick smeared on her front teeth.
“Is there a problem?” Rachel asks, arms crossed. Either she knows Vivian too well or Vivian was too late to mask her annoyance.
“This place isn’t exactly babyproof.” Vivian gestures around.
“Do you want my help or not?” Rachel says.
Vivian has asked Rachel to help her sort through her mother’s stuff, to clear it out so that the house can be put on the market, but really, she has an ulterior motive. Rachel knows her stuff as a genealogist, and Vivian needs assistance tracking down her family link to the Knox. There’s a trove of boxes with old family documents in the basement. Luckily her mom never went down there, so the boxes remain intact and untouched—unlike many of the house antiques she apparently offloaded without consulting Vivian. The last time the boxes in the basement were cracked open might have been when Vivian was in sixth grade and scouring for information for her family tree project. But she can still recall the stacks of yellowed, frail letters and faded photos. Old journals and scrapbooks with miscellaneous letters tucked inside. The house has been in her mother’s family for generations, after all. It’s a shame Vivian is now being forced to sell it.
Just then, Crimson trips and lets out a loud howl that makes Vivian wince.
Steeling herself, she says, “I want your help—Ineedyour help—but I haven’t told you the full story.”
Vivian and Rachel sit in the living room amid strewn papers and boxes, a few of which Rachel has emptied to create a makeshift fort for Crimson. A bottle of wine, an expensive Barolo, has been opened.
Rachel begins organizing the loose documents into piles. “Um, so why haven’t you ever told me about your Knox connection before, Viv? I mean, it’s not every day you realize you know someone who’s linked to a centuries-old secret society.”
Vivian shrugs, running her red nail over the rim of her wineglass. “We never talked about it, not really. My mom preferred to pretend that the Knox didn’t exist. I might never have even known about our family connection if my grandmother—her mother—hadn’t spilled the beans when I was young.” Vivian tilts her head. “I remember her exact words, how she started the conversation. She said, ‘Do you like secrets, Vivian?’ And then she said, ‘My great-grandmother once owned Boston.’ ”
Rachel snorts, and it startles Crimson, who lets out an annoying wail. “Well, that’s one way to have put it.”
“It’s somewhat true. Her family—her great-grandmother’s father, really—was one of the Boston Brahmins who made a fortune as a sea merchant in the early 1800s. His name was William Knox.”
“Like, one ofthosesea merchants who made their fortune smuggling opium?” Rachel asks, raising her eyebrow. She knows her history.
“Yes, and I think he was perhaps one of the ‘most successful.’ ” Vivian uses air quotes and winces. She recalls, with a tug of shame, how she’d admired the antique silver Chinese tea set she and Peter used.
Rachel tsks. “You know, I was just thinking the other day about how the Sackler family and the whole opioid crisis of today mirrors Boston’s opium history. The Sackler family were also big donors, like to the Guggenheim and the Met. Mostly the New York scene. It’s disgusting.”
“History repeats,” Vivian dryly adds, taking a long pull from her wineglass. She suspects that her mother’s own reluctance to embrace their family’s ancestry—and Knox link—has less to do with some sort of moral opposition and more to do with, well, being a snob. Because not only are they descendants of the Knox founder, but her mother is also, according to family lore, a descendant of a baby bornout of wedlock.Andthather mother certainly would have worked hard to distance herself from.
Boston socialites simply do not associate themselves with scandalous affairs.
Vivian recalls the delight on her late grandmother’s face when she’d shared that little indecent tidbit. This reveal had come later, once Vivian was an adult.
It must have bothered Vivian’s mom to no end to have this as part of her family history. She had always avoided anything she deemed remotely distasteful or upsetting, even her own illness. Vivian recalled how her mom kept playing ostrich about her early symptoms, blaming her forgetfulness on the hardness of her pillow, which she said prohibited good sleep, and attributing her unsteadiness to the fact that her favorite Italian shoe designers had begun more cheaply manufacturing their footwear in Asia.
