Introduction

In Split-Level, set as the nation recoils from Nixon, Alex Pearl is about to commit the first major transgression of her life. But why shouldn’t she remain an officially contented, soon-to-turn-thirty wife? She’s got a lovely home in an upscale Jersey suburb, two precocious daughters, and a charming husband, Donny. But Alex can no longer deny she craves more?some infusion of passion into the cul-de-sac world she inhabits.

After she receives a phone call from her babysitter’s mother reporting that Donny took the teen for a midnight ride, promising he’d teach her how to drive, Alex insists they attend Marriage Mountain, the quintessential 1970s “healing couples sanctuary.” Donny accedes?but soon becomes obsessed with the manifesto A Different Proposition and its vision of how multiple couples can live together in spouse-swapping bliss. At first Alex scoffs, but soon she gives Donny much more than he bargained for. After he targets the perfect couple to collude in his fantasy, Alex discovers her desire for love escalating to new heights?along with a willingness to risk everything. Split-Level evokes a pivotal moment in the story of American matrimony, a time when it seemed as if an open marriage might open hearts as well.

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Excerpt

August 1975

I am breathless from a morning of tedious phone chatter. Long conversations about how the wallpaper is starting to lift in my powder room—a bathroom with a small pedestal sink shaped like a clam-shell and a very low commode. No one will ever powder there; it’s hard enough to maneuver your body, let alone relieve yourself in the miniscule space. Still, I like the way “powder room” sounds, and Rona Karl has taught me a great deal about home décor since I moved to Wheatley Heights, a small suburban community that boasts nothing taller than an intrusive water tower standing guard as you enter town.

The phone receiver is crushed between my ear and shoulder while I paprika a rump roast slumped in a square Pyrex dish. Struggling to stay tuned to the daily Listen to Rona Show, I chop an onion then mistakenly blot my stinging eyes with a wet dish-towel.

“Damn, that hurts. I can barely see!” But Rona has pumped up the volume, grumbling now over the “outrageous” price of her imported porcelain tile. Though my focus is blurred, I can see myself dividing. One of me, confident and cocky, is propped on the kitchen counter? sleek legs dangling, shaking a head of wavy blonde hair while hissing at the other me, who, appearing embarrassed, tries to continue a conversation.

“So, Rona, I was thinking, I might patch the wallpaper myself, with some Elmer’s.” This is how I often pose a question when speaking with Rona, whose response is usually predictable.

“Are you nuts, AL-EX? Do you want to ruin everything you’ve done?”

“Of course not, you know much better about these things.”

“Hold on,” Rona says without curbing her exasperation.

I slide the rusty roast into the brown Magic Chef and slam the oven door. Stretching the phone cord to its uncoiled limits, I move to the den and begin dusting the bookshelves, my feather duster held high like a magic wand. Poof! Make just one wish, Alex. Remember when you had fistfuls of wishes?

My shoulder bumps an ancient edition of Monopoly, which sends a slew of frayed, yet dependable, cookbooks cascading to the floor. I rearrange the wobbly shelf and rub grease off the cover of The Fifteen-Minute Quiche. Above the culinary section sits another shelf wholly dedicated to the fine art of gardening, and how I’ve learned to rescue our roses from the cruelty of mealy bugs and aphids. On the bottom shelf is a tower of decorating magazines, which have replaced my fine art books, now in storage, and boast effortless projects like silk flower arranging, and chic decorating with sheets. But shoved in the back of this flimsy teakwood wall unit, wrapped in a Wonder Bread bag, is my one little secret?an often-scanned, ear-marked copy of A Sensuous Life in 30 Days, which offers a woman’s-eye view with detailed information on how to set off fireworks in the bedroom with tantalizing chapters like “The Whipped Cream Wiggle” and “The Butterfly Flick.” I’d bought the book after Becky’s first birthday not realizing I was already pregnant with Lana. So, for now, I’m sticking to decorating with sheets, giving much less thought to what I could be doing on top of them.

“Got a pencil?” Rona’s voice blasts through the receiver, and I quickly stuff the book back in its hiding place.

In the kitchen I fumble through the junk drawer ripping sales receipts for items purchased well over a year ago. A blonde Barbie head topples out and lands at my feet. Rona’s breathing turns huffy. She has important things on her agenda like removing fingermarks from her white, wooden railings. Still, I think she enjoys being my personal, household hint hotline, sharing her unique bible laden with numbers of service people in a ten-mile radius. Rona never fails to toss out extra tidbits of information and local gossip: like who was last spotted slinking out of the Maplewood Motor Inn with Bernie Salter, the bald, yet incredibly handsome, kosher butcher.

“My Maybelline eye pencil will have to do,” I say.

“The number is 377-Pari…you mustn’t fool around. Call them now, ALEX!”

I love how Rona alternates between her London and Brooklyn dialects—a vernacular that conveniently distances her from her Eastern European heritage. “They must come and repair the wallpaper before your girls discover the open seam. Then you’ll be sorry!” For a second, I ponder the tragedy facing the Mylar wallpaper dotted with silver swans curling up the bathroom wall, but remarkably my pulse remains steady.

“Okay, okay, I'll call right now.” I’ve learned it’s easier to just go along, even though our banter has me exhausted. To keep Rona as my friend, I dare not scare her by reciting passages that pop into my head at inappropriate moments, like now: This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper. Lately I fear my world might end precisely like this? talking about nothing consequential on a lemony yellow wall phone.

“Promise?”

“I promise.” A girlish giggle escapes my throat.

Instead of hanging up, I push down the peg to get a dial tone. What I hear is silence and a few seconds of bumpy breathing. I think of slamming the phone down on the dirty caller.

“Hello? Hello?”

“Mrs. Pearl?” I am startled by a strange voice and the coincidence of a connection without the phone having rung.

“Yes, it’s Alex, who's this please?”

“You don't know me, Mrs. Pearl. I'm Colleen's mother? Colleen Byrnes, your babysitter?”

“Oh, is everything all right? Is Colleen sick?” My eyes catch the large calendar taped to the pantry door. I've already inked in Colleen for next Saturday night.

“Mrs. Pearl, this is not a pleasant call for me to make. I'm afraid my daughter will no longer be able to baby-sit your little girls.”

Damn. I bet Donny forgot to pay her last night. It’s happened twice before. I am already steaming at him when she continues:

“Colleen came home last night hysterically crying.”

Something in her slow deliberate tone irritates me, but I let her continue while my heart revs up like a new Corvette.

“Please tell me what happened.”

“It seems your husband? ah, Mr. Pearl, took my daughter for a little unexpected ride.”

“A ride? But where?”

“Well… he drove to the high school parking lot and then he got out of his car, and came around to the passenger seat...”

My knees start to shake and beads of perspiration pop across my lip. I drag the stretched-out, soiled phone cord over to the sink, fill a Bert and Ernie plastic cup with water and take a sip. Mrs. Byrnes continues to measure out each word, as if she were baking a cake, as if she's rehearsed this phone call a hundred times. I look out the kitchen bay window toward the red swing set. Becky and Lana are in day camp; they won't be home until three, but I swear I hear their squeaky laughter and the familiar rattle of aluminum chains.

I wrap my fingers around the phone cord and dip it in some pink liquid soap. Grime separates from the rubber, and I hear her say: “Then he popped in a cassette, some piano concerto and asked Colleen to slide over to the driver's side.”

“What are you insinuating?” I interject.

“Mrs. Pearl, Colleen is only sixteen, and your husband decided to conduct a driver's education class at one o’clock in the morning. He insisted he keep his arm around her shoulder while they continually circled the parking lot.”

I picture Colleen Byrnes’s perfect apple-shaped Irish face, freckles dotting her cheeks like sheer netting. Wisps of her hair blow in the sultry breeze of a warm night. Its fiery hue reminds me of the approaching autumn. She is small-boned and flat-chested, exactly the way I was at sixteen and hated being.

August 1975

I am breathless from a morning of tedious phone chatter. Long conversations about how the wallpaper is starting to lift in my powder room—a bathroom with a small pedestal sink shaped like a clam-shell and a very low commode. No one will ever powder there; it’s hard enough to maneuver your body, let alone relieve yourself in the miniscule space. Still, I like the way “powder room” sounds, and Rona Karl has taught me a great deal about home décor since I moved to Wheatley Heights, a small suburban community that boasts nothing taller than an intrusive water tower standing guard as you enter town.

The phone receiver is crushed between my ear and shoulder while I paprika a rump roast slumped in a square Pyrex dish. Struggling to stay tuned to the daily Listen to Rona Show, I chop an onion then mistakenly blot my stinging eyes with a wet dish-towel.

“Damn, that hurts. I can barely see!” But Rona has pumped up the volume, grumbling now over the “outrageous” price of her imported porcelain tile. Though my focus is blurred, I can see myself dividing. One of me, confident and cocky, is propped on the kitchen counter? sleek legs dangling, shaking a head of wavy blonde hair while hissing at the other me, who, appearing embarrassed, tries to continue a conversation.

“So, Rona, I was thinking, I might patch the wallpaper myself, with some Elmer’s.” This is how I often pose a question when speaking with Rona, whose response is usually predictable.

“Are you nuts, AL-EX? Do you want to ruin everything you’ve done?”

“Of course not, you know much better about these things.”

“Hold on,” Rona says without curbing her exasperation.

I slide the rusty roast into the brown Magic Chef and slam the oven door. Stretching the phone cord to its uncoiled limits, I move to the den and begin dusting the bookshelves, my feather duster held high like a magic wand. Poof! Make just one wish, Alex. Remember when you had fistfuls of wishes?

My shoulder bumps an ancient edition of Monopoly, which sends a slew of frayed, yet dependable, cookbooks cascading to the floor. I rearrange the wobbly shelf and rub grease off the cover of The Fifteen-Minute Quiche. Above the culinary section sits another shelf wholly dedicated to the fine art of gardening, and how I’ve learned to rescue our roses from the cruelty of mealy bugs and aphids. On the bottom shelf is a tower of decorating magazines, which have replaced my fine art books, now in storage, and boast effortless projects like silk flower arranging, and chic decorating with sheets. But shoved in the back of this flimsy teakwood wall unit, wrapped in a Wonder Bread bag, is my one little secret?an often-scanned, ear-marked copy of A Sensuous Life in 30 Days, which offers a woman’s-eye view with detailed information on how to set off fireworks in the bedroom with tantalizing chapters like “The Whipped Cream Wiggle” and “The Butterfly Flick.” I’d bought the book after Becky’s first birthday not realizing I was already pregnant with Lana. So, for now, I’m sticking to decorating with sheets, giving much less thought to what I could be doing on top of them.

“Got a pencil?” Rona’s voice blasts through the receiver, and I quickly stuff the book back in its hiding place.

In the kitchen I fumble through the junk drawer ripping sales receipts for items purchased well over a year ago. A blonde Barbie head topples out and lands at my feet. Rona’s breathing turns huffy. She has important things on her agenda like removing fingermarks from her white, wooden railings. Still, I think she enjoys being my personal, household hint hotline, sharing her unique bible laden with numbers of service people in a ten-mile radius. Rona never fails to toss out extra tidbits of information and local gossip: like who was last spotted slinking out of the Maplewood Motor Inn with Bernie Salter, the bald, yet incredibly handsome, kosher butcher.

“My Maybelline eye pencil will have to do,” I say.

“The number is 377-Pari…you mustn’t fool around. Call them now, ALEX!”

I love how Rona alternates between her London and Brooklyn dialects—a vernacular that conveniently distances her from her Eastern European heritage. “They must come and repair the wallpaper before your girls discover the open seam. Then you’ll be sorry!” For a second, I ponder the tragedy facing the Mylar wallpaper dotted with silver swans curling up the bathroom wall, but remarkably my pulse remains steady.

“Okay, okay, I'll call right now.” I’ve learned it’s easier to just go along, even though our banter has me exhausted. To keep Rona as my friend, I dare not scare her by reciting passages that pop into my head at inappropriate moments, like now: This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper. Lately I fear my world might end precisely like this? talking about nothing consequential on a lemony yellow wall phone.

“Promise?”

“I promise.” A girlish giggle escapes my throat.

Instead of hanging up, I push down the peg to get a dial tone. What I hear is silence and a few seconds of bumpy breathing. I think of slamming the phone down on the dirty caller.

“Hello? Hello?”

“Mrs. Pearl?” I am startled by a strange voice and the coincidence of a connection without the phone having rung.

“Yes, it’s Alex, who's this please?”

“You don't know me, Mrs. Pearl. I'm Colleen's mother? Colleen Byrnes, your babysitter?”

“Oh, is everything all right? Is Colleen sick?” My eyes catch the large calendar taped to the pantry door. I've already inked in Colleen for next Saturday night.

“Mrs. Pearl, this is not a pleasant call for me to make. I'm afraid my daughter will no longer be able to baby-sit your little girls.”

Damn. I bet Donny forgot to pay her last night. It’s happened twice before. I am already steaming at him when she continues:

“Colleen came home last night hysterically crying.”

Something in her slow deliberate tone irritates me, but I let her continue while my heart revs up like a new Corvette.

“Please tell me what happened.”

“It seems your husband? ah, Mr. Pearl, took my daughter for a little unexpected ride.”

“A ride? But where?”

“Well… he drove to the high school parking lot and then he got out of his car, and came around to the passenger seat...”

My knees start to shake and beads of perspiration pop across my lip. I drag the stretched-out, soiled phone cord over to the sink, fill a Bert and Ernie plastic cup with water and take a sip. Mrs. Byrnes continues to measure out each word, as if she were baking a cake, as if she's rehearsed this phone call a hundred times. I look out the kitchen bay window toward the red swing set. Becky and Lana are in day camp; they won't be home until three, but I swear I hear their squeaky laughter and the familiar rattle of aluminum chains.

I wrap my fingers around the phone cord and dip it in some pink liquid soap. Grime separates from the rubber, and I hear her say: “Then he popped in a cassette, some piano concerto and asked Colleen to slide over to the driver's side.”

“What are you insinuating?” I interject.

“Mrs. Pearl, Colleen is only sixteen, and your husband decided to conduct a driver's education class at one o’clock in the morning. He insisted he keep his arm around her shoulder while they continually circled the parking lot.”

I picture Colleen Byrnes’s perfect apple-shaped Irish face, freckles dotting her cheeks like sheer netting. Wisps of her hair blow in the sultry breeze of a warm night. Its fiery hue reminds me of the approaching autumn. She is small-boned and flat-chested, exactly the way I was at sixteen and hated being.

“Could it be your daughter is exaggerating Mrs. Byrnes? Everyone cuts through that parking lot to avoid the traffic.”

“Not at that hour, Mrs. Pearl!”

I walk the phone cord like a dog leash into the powder room. My eyes dart around; my fingers trace the wall. I find the piece of wallpaper that has begun to lift. A dark vacuum sucks up space in my mind. I tug hard, harder. With one quick motion I’ve managed to expose a large pasty patch of wall. The relief is thrilling.

Last night I’d fallen asleep before Donny? a rare occurrence. I had the beginnings of a migraine from the cheap sangria served at Wheatley Heights’ end-of- season bowling party.

I have a vague recollection of opening my eyes, just once, briefly. Donny was standing beside the bed staring at me.

“What?” I mumbled, startled.

“Nothing, I’m sorry,” he whispered, “Go back to sleep.”

I gaze blankly at the receiver. “My husband would never do anything like you're describing. Perhaps you should sit Colleen down and make her tell the truth. Why not put her on the phone?” I try to say evenly.

“Sorry, but I do know my own child, Mrs. Pearl. She'd never make anything like this up.”

“And I know my husband!” I shriek, before slamming the receiver against the wall, instantly filled with remorse. A slide-show of our oldest, Becky, pops in my head. It is as bright and neon as a Warhol poster. She’s maybe fourteen and being driven home from her first babysitting job by somebody’s handsome dad, a man who has leaned in extremely close to offer her a joint.

My body is in tremor, like a covered soup pot without the vent. Acid from my morning juice rises like a geyser in my throat. I gulp more water, and then with a jumbo sponge, I wipe the already spotless Formica counter, move on to the refrigerator doors, attacking chocolate and ketchup stains made by tiny fingertips. Still, I can’t wipe away the words and bold images tattooed inside my skull. They have magnified, reaching billboard proportion.

I pace and pace then mop the kitchen floor twice and must rest to catch my breath. My red vinyl beach bag is propped on the chair next to me. I empty it upside down and find, among loose change and lollipops, a plastic bottle containing a mixture of baby oil and iodine, along with Donny’s makeshift sun reflector?a Bee Gees album covered in aluminum foil. Stepping over the mound of white sand I’ve dumped on the freshly mopped floor, I head for the patio.

Once outside, I ease myself onto the burning cushions of the chaise, and within minutes, the shivering stops. The gardeners have come and gone, so I unbutton my blouse to dot my face and chest with the soothing pink oil. Salty tears slide down my cheeks and linger on my lip. If Donny were here, I wonder if he’d kiss me and lick my tears the way he did when we were first married. I can see his youthful face; I know he’d be furious I had to listen to Mrs. Byrnes’s ridiculous accusations. I bet I’d have to restrain him from going over to Colleen’s house, to force her to admit how she made this whole thing up. But what if…what if she’s telling the truth?

The phone rings and I don’t budge. I try to block out ghoulish thoughts about the girls: Did they have some catastrophe at camp?get hit in the eye with an airborne rock, choke on a wad of Bazooka during afternoon swim? Or were they kidnapped at gunpoint while their stunned counselors looked on helplessly? No! It’s probably Rona calling to check whether I've contacted the folks at Parisian Home Décor. If not her, then Donny asking what’s for dinner. I’ll tell you what’s for dinner Donny.

(Excerpt from Chapter One) *

*This chapter, in its entirety, which was about 17 pages and not yet a novel was published in Tri-Quarterly Magazine of Northwestern University. view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

1. When we first meet Alex Pearl, she is having a phone conversation with her new best friend, Rona, who seems to have adjusted to suburbia successfully. What are the clues that Alex might be having a more difficult time?

2. Early on, Alex receives a phone call, which sends shockwaves into her essentially happy and organized domestic life. Do you think she handles the incident in the best possible way? How might you react in the same situation?

3. During the 1970’s, many couples attended retreats hoping to improve communication in their marriages. Describe Alex and Donny’s experience at Marriage Mountain. What aspects did you find revealing? Sad or touching? Humorous? Have you ever attended a similar retreat?

4. Alex’s trip to Florida alone with her girls brings a few new surprises. What are some of the triggers that cause both malaise and mistrust in her marriage? How is she affected by her own parent’s relationship?

5. Meeting Charlie Bell and his wife initially serves Alex as a way of comparing her own marital relationship. How are they different as couples? What are some of the early danger signs in each marriage?

6. What is the pivotal point in the relationship between the two couples? How does that change Alex? Does her focus shift or remain the same? What does she hope for in the end? What might you see in her future?

7. It’s been said that many who marry in their twenties often go through transitions that may cause them to desire more in their thirties. Discuss.
8. Please share the parts of Split-Level you thought the most insightful.

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