The Fall of the House of Dorothy Lynch
by Astrid Munn
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Table of Contents parts 1, 2, 3 |
part 1
Beatriz second-guessed whether she was at the right address; she had only ever been there at night, and briefly. She flipped her phone open to check Leslie’s text: 5340 Boyd. She found it, but a white-haired man and children occupied the porch.
“Hi? I’m here for Leslie?”
“Who are you?” a boy of about eight asked. He and a smaller boy had SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star figures in their hands.
“I’m Beatriz,” she started, looking to the man for approval. “I do theater stuff with Leslie. She invited me?”
“Well?” the old man asked the boy, “aren’t you going to let her in?”
“Ugh. OK.”
Still clutching his SpongeBob, the barefoot child led Beatriz past a breezeway full of Crocs and tennis racquets and through a living room strewn with magazines. Slung over a dining room chair was a blue track jacket, and Beatriz’s heart skipped a beat. That was Leslie’s brother’s jacket. Beatriz said nothing and followed the boy through the kitchen into the backyard.
Outside, Leslie’s father and another man slowed their grillside chat ever so briefly to look in Beatriz’s direction. She could feel them assessing her ensemble: a thrift store tee two sizes too small, jeans, and Birkenstocks. And, deep in this neighborhood, so far away from campus, Beatriz worried the men might assess other things, like how the puffiness of her hair and the width of her nose seemed to contradict the lightness of her skin and said Birkenstocks.
Beatriz tried to unclench her stomach and looked for her friend. Leslie was sitting under a deck set, her freckled face hidden behind white-framed sunglasses. She was cradling a drink in her lap and seemed zoned out while her mother — a towering, voluptuous force — bickered playfully with a woman whose blonde mane and lanky figure resembled Leslie’s.
“Leslie!” the boy yelled. “Some Spanish lady’s here for you!”
With that, the boy marched back inside
“Beatriz! Oh my gosh! You made it!”
“Well, you invited me. Is this a family reunion or something?”
“This? This is just a little get-together,” Leslie laughed. “If you got past the porch, then you already met Grandpa Leroy and my baby cousins. Out here we’ve got Uncle Mitch, Scout, and Aunt Didi. And of course, you know Mom and Dad already.” She paused. “Harry’ll be back later; he’s at roller derby.”
Wanting to seem casual despite the mention of Harry, Beatriz dove into niceties with Leslie’s aunt, whom she recognized from a First Friday months prior.
“It’s nice to finally meet you, Ms. Didi,” Beatriz began. “I saw some of your paintings at The Delaney.”
Leslie rattled the ice in her drink as if she were trying to startle a bad dog.
“Oh my God, Beatriz,” Leslie muttered, smiling but talking through gritted teeth. “Do you have to be such a nerdy little scholar with everyone you meet?”
Beatriz flashed Leslie a frown and big, wounded eyes before returning her attention to Didi.
“I liked your artist’s statement. The part about finding splendor in dryer lint and gas puddles? Very, uh, ‘American Beauty’-y.”
Aunt Didi looked at Beatriz wryly while exhaling her Parliament cigarette. “I didn’t write that. My agent did. Or her intern Françoise did. All artists’ statements are B.S. You’re friends with Leslie, you ought to know that by now.”
“But without an artist statement,” Beatriz countered, “maybe I wouldn’t have known how to take in your triptych of mid-century toilets? Or that dead magpie?”
Aunt Didi blinked slowly, as if to better absorb the 19-year old’s words. She took another hit off her Parliament. “You’re funny, Beatriz.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s a good thing.”
Right then, a Jeep pulled into the driveway. It was Leslie’s brother, Harry. Before Beatriz could decide how to pose her legs or her chin or her arms — she never knew what to do with her arms — her train of thought was interrupted by Leslie’s dad, the Dr. Paul Hagen, D.O., and the clicking of metal tongs.
“Supper’s ready,” the doctor said. “Hope you brought your appetite.”
* * *
After several minutes of everyone milling about and hesitating in the kitchen, Uncle Mitch took it upon himself to start the buffet line. At every stage, he turned to his daughter Scout and her plate. “Are you going to have a hot dog, Pumpkin?” he asked.
“No,” Scout pouted.
“How about some tater salad?”
“No,” Scout said. At this point, she was twirling the empty plate between her fingers like a baton, like it was never meant to hold food.
“Tossed salad?” her father offered.
“It has Dorothy Lynch all over it!”
Uncle Mitch pursed his lips as he squeezed a line of mustard onto a bratwurst. He looked to the track lighting on the ceiling, as if to ask God to give him a daughter that would not embarrass him so much with her pickiness. “I think your Aunt Lindy made deviled eggs because she knows you like them,” he murmured.
“I’ll have a couple,” Scout sighed, “but just the whites!”
Beatriz eavesdropped on Uncle Mitch and Scout as she followed behind them. Although she, too, felt embarrassed for the girl’s pickiness, she had also sported an awkward muffin top over her low-rise Levi’s at 15, so she understood the girl’s aversion to anything too carby or salty. Or, for that matter, anything needlessly vomit-orange, like Dorothy Lynch.
After completing the line, Beatriz’s plate held a generous spoonful of potato salad, a puddle of coleslaw, and a cheeseburger sans bun. She seated herself at the long dining-room table next to Leslie, whose plate held nothing but baby carrots, cauliflower, and a dollop of ranch dressing from the relish tray. Dr. Hagen seated himself at the head of the table, with Lindy on one side and Harry on the other. After a perfunctory saying of grace by Grandpa Leroy, the family dug in.
“So, uh, Beatriz,” Harry began, “I bet these mayonnaise-laden salads are a stark departure from your usual spicy fare.”
Beatriz’s nostrils flared. She leaned across her plate to address Lindy.
“First of all, I love potato salad and coleslaw,” Beatriz declared, anxious to quell any perceived slights to Lindy’s spread. “Secondly,” Beatriz continued, turning to Harry, “mayonnaise was developed in Spain, so maybe you’re the one eating the condiment of my people.”
“Uh, OK,” Harry uttered, “touché, señorita.”
Beatriz and Harry both looked down at their plates and smiled. Lindy clocked the entire thing. She looked ready to strangle both of them. Leslie noticed and laughed nervously.
“Again, Beatriz!” Leslie exclaimed. “Can you maybe, like, for one moment, not channel the entire Encyclopedia Brittanica when we’re in a casual setting?”
Some chuckles escaped the diners’ mouths. Throughout the dinner, Uncle Mitch and Grandpa Leroy had been searching Dr. Hagen’s face for guidance on how to take in this guest, but the doctor had been staring straight ahead, deep in mastication.
“I’m sorry!” Beatriz gasped. She looked around, searching everyone’s faces for forgiveness. “This is just how I talk. And, Leslie, I can’t tell if you’re teasing and being funny or if you’re actually mad at me.”
Beatriz looked wounded again and the table grew quiet. Leslie smashed the top of a cauliflower floret into ranch and collected herself.
“She’s cool, everyone,” Leslie explained, dabbing some excess dressing onto her plate. “She’s minoring in Spanish and learning about Spain. She says stuff like this all the time. In the green room, we have a whole board with funny quotes. A lot of them are hers.”
Uncle Mitch looked Beatriz up and down, not like a woman to undress but a tree needing pruned.
“So besides ‘Rocky Horror,’ what else do you do?” he asked. “Do you go to school?”
Beatriz nodded. “I’m going to be a sophomore this fall. Until then I’m helping with research.”
“A researcher, huh? Are you gonna invent the next pink slime? New and improved tater tots?”
“Not quite. I’m helping a poli-sci prof reframe John Stuart Mill.”
Beatriz thought that was a sufficient answer, but everyone kept looking at her.
“Oh, right. Mill...” Dr. Hagen said after much chewing, “gave us some good stuff. Couldn’t name you the hits, though.”
“‘The Subjugation of Women,’” Harry offered.
“Hey, Beatriz,” Leslie said through a mouthful of carrot, “looks like you’re not the only one who wants to geek out at the dinner table.”
Harry flashed a sneer at Leslie and a wink at Beatriz before returning to his puddles of salad, none of which he touched.
“What’s wrong with Mill, Beatriz?” Uncle Mitch asked, “Was he a pervert all along?”
“No, but some scholars — women scholars, queer scholars, scholars of color — are beginning to ask whether his ideas on liberty and individualism were myopic.” Beatriz explained. “Like, he talks about fulfilling our highest potential if we just tried, but he kind of forgot that he was saying this as a pretty rich, pretty unencumbered guy.”
“What’s ‘myopic’?” Scout asked.
“Narrow. You fail to see the whole picture,” Aunt Didi explained. “And you’re onto something, Bea. He and his friends were all bohemians, keeping to themselves, writing their little essays while Ireland starved.”
“That kinda sounds like you, Harry!” Uncle Mitch teased.
“Hey,” Harry began, a little hurt, “I’m still between jobs since the record store closed. But I’m calling Noah at IntaVideo tomorrow.”
“I’m teasin’,” Uncle Mitch reassured. “What are you working on, anyway?”
Harry perked up from his usual slouch. “Actually, I just finished something for a competition. I was hoping I could read it to you guys tonight. To see if it scans.”
For a moment, everyone sat and chewed. Beatriz felt something under the table. It was Leslie, jabbing her calf with a bare toe.
“Uhh... of course!” Uncle Mitch said. “We’ll make a boys’ night out of it!” He winked at Dr. Hagen. Grandpa Leroy sighed and pushed his coleslaw around.
“I’d love to hear your story!” Beatriz added. Her enthusiasm was met with more chewing.
“Harry’s stuff is a little blue,” Lindy explained.
“Like sad?” Scout asked.
“Like Rated R,” Uncle Mitch answered.
A quiet “oh” escaped Beatriz when she realized she was not welcome at the reading.
Leslie leaned over. “You don’t want to sit in on that,” Leslie whispered. “I have something way cooler planned for us, anyway.”
“Leslie,” Lindy chided, “you know it’s not polite to tell secrets at the table.”
“Mom, it’s nothing. I was just reminding Beatriz that we had plans to practice at the park tonight.”
“Practice? For ‘Rocky Horror’?” Lindy asked. “Aren’t you just copying what’s on the screen?”
“Still!” Beatriz interjected, thrilled to join Leslie’s little lie, “I’m second understudy for Janet, so, you know, I don’t want to get rusty!”
* * *
Copyright © 2025 by Astrid Munn
