Free Dorothy Parker Drank Here by Ellen Meister Page A

shortened to Chubs
,
a nickname he would never tire of
.
Everything she put on her plate was subject to his scrutiny andderision, and her parents were too genteel to intervene. The strongest thing her father ever said was “Mind your manners, Gavin.” And of course, that only made him angrier.
    Eventually, she stopped eating dinner with the family, preferring to take food up to her room to eat in private. This suited everyone well. Her brother was glad to be rid of her. Her parents were grateful for the mealtime peace. And Edie found exquisite solace in being able to indulge without judgment. Soon enough, his nickname for her was not an exaggeration.
    They lived in an old house that had belonged to her father’s uncle, Percy Coates, an eccentric hotelier who had an odd obsession with death. The house had been filled with such strange relics—including several ghoulish taxidermy specimens—that the neighborhood kids called them the Addams Family.
    As adults, Edie and Gavin reached an uneasy truce. They were cordial to each other at family gatherings, but she tried to keep a safe distance, as the danger of ridicule was never far off.
    When her mother got sick, Edie moved back into the house to take care of her. Gavin couldn’t imagine that she had done it out of any sense of obligation and accused her of trying to steal the house out from under him. Then, when her mother died and bequeathed the house to Edie, he brought his fury down like a storm. He called again and again, screaming in rage, until she stopped answering the phone. Then he wrote letters, threatening to sue if she didn’t sell the house and split the profits with him. She ignored him, and made modest changes to the home. Notably, she packed up all the preserved dead animals and brought them to a storage unit, where she arranged them facing the door as if ready to attack whomever entered. For good measure, she draped the largest of the beasts—an open-mouthed leopard—with the silk kimono her parents had always warned her not to touch. It was said to possess secret powers that would bring the dead back to life, and had been one of hergreat-uncle’s favorite acquisitions. She didn’t believe it would awaken the long-dead cat, but she got a charge out of the gesture.
    She mailed the locker key to Gavin, along with a note saying she had only paid for three months’ worth of storage, and he was free to do with it whatever he wished. A few weeks later, he left a message on her answering machine saying she had “no fucking right” to remove the animals from the house, and that his lawyer would hear about it. She hired her own counsel at that point, and he sent Gavin a cease and desist letter.
    He paid her one visit after that, demanding the antique train sets in the basement.
    â€œI’ll leave you alone after that,” he said. “I promise.”
    She wasn’t inclined to trust him, but she was so eager for peace she risked letting him into the house. She made sure he went straight to the basement, as there was nothing down there of value except for the trains. As he rummaged around, she went into the kitchen to finish eating her lunch. Edie had made herself a big bowl of mushroom soup, her favorite, and didn’t want it to get cold.
    When she came out, he was standing in the living room, holding two bags filled with trains and related paraphernalia. She wiped a bit of soup from the corner of her mouth and glanced at him to see if he’d noticed, but he looked wary himself. She scanned the room to make sure he hadn’t taken anything. It was so jam-packed with generations of collectibles it was hard to tell if something was missing.
    â€œDid you take anything from here?” she asked.
    â€œWho would want any of this old crap?”
    â€œGood-bye, Gavin. Have a nice life.”
    â€œYou have soup on your chin, Chubs. And the place smells like dog shit.”
    He stopped contacting her