Dear Emily (18 page)

“Thank you for dinner. I’m sorry you have to do the dishes. I called a cab; it will be here any minute now. I’ll wait outside.”

“Emily…”

“I think it best if I withdraw my offer to you to work in the clinics. I don’t think I’ll be needing a personal trainer any longer. If I owe you any money, send me a bill. Good-by, Ben.”

“Emily…”

Emily closed the door before she realized the little porch didn’t have a roof. It really wasn’t a porch at all; it was a concrete slab with a rail around it but no roof overhead. She was drenched in seconds. Twice in one night. “Who gives a good rat’s ass?” she muttered.

The taxi arrived just as Ben opened the door. “Goddamn it, Emily, get in here. We need to talk.”

“You already did that,” Emily shouted to be heard over the pouring rain as she sprinted to the cab. She was shivering violently when she settled herself in the backseat. Her teeth were chattering when she gave the driver the address of the clinic. She did her best to scrunch herself into the corner. Shame rivered through her. She wanted to cry, needed to cry. You always cry, Emily. Crying doesn’t solve anything. You should have listened to what he had to say. You never listen; you act and then you’re sorry. It’s that same stubborn streak that made you sign away your share of the clinics. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Emily thrust a five-dollar bill at the driver, keys in hand, as she jumped out of the cab. She had the door to the clinic opened in seconds, the blind pulled, the door locked. She ran through the room in the dark, skirting the machines, to the back and into the bathroom. She slammed the door shut, locked it before she turned on the light. She peeled off her clothes for the second time, turned on the shower and stepped in. Maybe she could wash away Ben’s words, her shame, her rejection. She lathered and scrubbed, lathered again and again. The bathroom was so steamy she couldn’t see her reflection in the mirror. That was good. She had no desire to see Emily Thorn. Seeing her and being her were two different things. “I liked him. I really liked him,” she blubbered.

She was pulling on her sweat pants when she heard someone bang on the front door. Ben! She turned off the light in the bathroom, crept out into the little hallway. She could see his shadow outlined on the blinds by the front door, heard him call her name, heard him say he was going to stand there all night until she was ready to come out and talk to him. “So stand there, be a jerk, see if I care.” She inched her way into the cool-down room and dialed the house on Sleepy Hollow Road. “Lena, it’s me, just listen and do what I tell you. Come to the clinic, drive around by the back and pick me up. Please. Ben’s banging on the front door and he says he won’t leave. I’ll tell you about it when we get home. I’m sorry to ask you to come out on a night like this. I’ll be ready when you get here. Thank you, Lena,” Emily said, her voice breaking.

Ben was still banging on the front door when Emily opened the back door a crack when she heard the sound of a car’s engine. It was the Demster twins with their van, all of her roommates inside. She was so overwhelmed with relief she collapsed against Martina, who held her close, crooning soothing words of comfort. “Don’t put your lights on; drive to the end and leave by the back entrance,” Emily croaked.

“Here, take a slug of this,” Lena said, holding up a pint bottle of brandy. Emily obediently took a healthy pull and sputtered, her eyes watering.

“Should I burn rubber, Emily?” Rose Demster asked, her shoulders squaring over the wheel, her grip firm.

“Go for it,” her twin ordered.

They roared into the driveway sixteen minutes later. Nancy raced ahead to open the back door. She stood aside as the mad rush for warmth and light tracked her. Lena shot the bolt on the door and punched in the alarm’s code. “Safe!”

“If we think Mr. Jackson is going to come here, I suggest we relocate to my rooms in the basement,” Martha said. “We can make coffee and tea down there. Bring that brandy bottle and another one if we have it.”

“All we need is a fire and we could pose as the Campfire Girls,” Lena said solemnly as she took her place in the circle on the floor. “This is warm and cozy. It really is warm down here. I just love the sound of coffee dripping and perking, whatever it’s doing. I like that tray in the middle of the circle. It kind of makes things official, that this is an important…pow-wow.” Lena passed the brandy bottle around the circle. Each woman took a stinging gulp before she passed it on.

“Did he try to rape you?” Martina asked. Her eyes were murderous.

“No. No, nothing like that. I’m sorry if you all thought…let me tell you what happened. It’s the end I can’t…just listen, okay.”

Emily looked around the circle. They were her friends. They would understand; she was sure of it. They would be objective, possibly see something she didn’t see, help her to understand. She started to speak, haltingly at first, and then the words tumbled out, faster than she thought possible. “It’s the shame. I’ve never been with a man other than Ian. I thought…how was I supposed to know…I’m middle-aged, I’m not up on all the…I ran. I panicked and ran. He wanted to talk to me, but I was so ashamed and I don’t know why I’m ashamed. There we were, doing what I thought we were supposed to do, and suddenly, wham…You can be objective—what did I do? What should I have done?”

The faces staring back at her were nonplussed. One by one the women ventured an opinion, their talk graphic, supportive.

“How much foreplay was there?” Martina asked.

“Actually, there wasn’t any. I said something earlier about not committing—whatever happened would be whatever it was, something like that.”

“Are you saying you just…went at it?” Martha asked.

“Well, he kissed me. I liked it. He’s a real good kisser. I said I liked it and he said he could do it again and he did. I liked it even better. I took that as a…that we were going to have sex so I did what I always…I did what Ian and I always did…”

“But you weren’t with lan, you were with Ben. Apples and oranges, Emily,” Kelly said.

“Who was the aggressor?” Zoë asked.

“Me. My God, I was all over him. I attacked him; I honest to God attacked him. He…ah…he didn’t seem to be responding so I got more…aggressive. Ian liked…oh shit!”

“What were his exact words?” The Demster twins asked in unison.

“He said no first. It wasn’t just no, it was
no
! I said, ‘This is what you want and I’m going to give it to you.’ That’s when he said
no
! Then he said he didn’t want to rape me and he didn’t want me to rape him, something like that. He said some other things too, but the last thing he said was there was one person too many in the room, and if that person didn’t leave, we didn’t stand a chance. All I felt was such shame, that this man I was prepared to make love with was telling me I was doing it all wrong. I took it as rejection. Shame and guilt are so awful. I had years of it. That’s how I know exactly what I feel now. It’s the same now as it was with Ian. A no from Ian was a cringing slap in the face. I’d run and hide. Sometimes for days I’d avoid looking at him, speaking to him. That’s what the word
no
meant to me. To hear it from another man was all I needed…”

Lena put her arm around Emily’s shoulders. “It’s okay to cry, Emily. All of us understand. Look around. Do you see anyone judging you? Do you see anything but compassion in any of us? Well, do you?”

“No. No, I don’t. Years ago I wouldn’t have been able to open up to anyone. I kept it all inside. I don’t mind any of you knowing I do stupid things. I’m not a perfect person. I have feelings and I hurt like everyone else. What should I do?”

“What do you want to do?” Lena asked.

“Hide in a corner and suck my thumb. It wasn’t Ben, it was me. It was, wasn’t it?” As one, they nodded.

“I don’t think you’ve let go of Ian yet, Emily,” Lena said.

“But I have. I hardly ever think of him anymore.”

“He’s still a part of your life. You aren’t divorced; you’re still married. File, Emily, get it over with.”

“He left me; he should file. He’s probably with some…some bimbo and he’s using me as an excuse not to marry her.”

“Men have been known to do that, but then so have women. You need to cut him out of your life. Until you do, he’s going to haunt you. Like tonight, you slipped back into the old way. You’ve come a long way, Emily, and you can go further if you want. How am I doing so far, girls?”

“Great,” they chorused.

“Emily?”

“Okay, I’ll make an appointment and file for divorce. It will be quick, since Ian and I have been apart a few years. I think it’s eighteen months. Should I charge him with desertion?”

“Whatever you can get away with. Ask for alimony. Do you want alimony, Emily?”

“Not if it comes from abortion clinics. Actually, no, I don’t want it. I’d rather make it on my own. I can. I know I can.
We
can. All of us can as long as we stick together. Like now, I came home like a scalded cat and together we talked it over and things don’t seem so bad.”

The brandy bottle made its way around the circle again. Emily was just bringing it to her lips when she jerked around. “Did you hear something?”

“Someone’s at the back door,” Lena said. “Off the top of my head, I’d say it’s probably Ben Jackson.”

“Well, we aren’t going to answer it,” Emily said firmly.

“Why not, Emily?” the Demster twins asked at the same time.

“Because I don’t want to deal with Ben Jackson right now, that’s why.”

“He must care about you to follow you to the clinic and then here,” Zoë said.

“I bet he’s cold and wet and he’s going to get sick,” Martina said quietly. “It’s a cold rain out there.”

“I got cold and wet too.”

“Because you were stubborn and wanted to get cold and wet to punish yourself,” Kelly said.

“You’re going to have to talk to him sometime, Emily. Why not do it now, clear the air, and then if you want to sever your friendship with him, do so. Don’t be a pisspot about this,” one of the Demster twins said, but Emily wasn’t sure which one had said it.

“It’s easier to talk with your clothes on,” Lena said. “Emily, you didn’t do anything wrong. You simply reacted the only way you knew how. No one can fault you for that. I think the man likes you. A lot. You’ll sleep better tonight if you talk this out. Remember what you told us when we opened the clinics. Get to the business at hand, deal with it, and move on. Business, financial, emotional, it’s all the same. You can’t keep on carrying baggage around. It gets in the way. We all found that out, thanks to you. Now it’s your turn to practice what you’ve been saying for months and months.”

“I say we all go to bed, think about the waffles I’m going to make us for breakfast, and let Emily handle her business,” Zoë advised. “We’re a shout away if you need us. He’s still banging on the door.”

They scattered. Emily was the last one up the stairs. She waited until she was sure Rose and Helen were on the front porch before she opened the back door.

“I should kill you, Emily Thorn. I should whip your butt for pulling this stunt on me. I already feel a cold coming on and I’ve been sneezing for the past twenty minutes. Do you care? Hell no, you don’t, or you would have opened the door twenty minutes ago. You damn well sneaked out the back door of the clinic. It took me almost an hour to figure that one out.”

“Come in, Ben. I’ll make you some hot tea and brandy. Go into the laundry room and put your clothes in the dryer. I’ll get you a robe. I was too ashamed, Ben. I’m sorry.”

“Be sure you don’t give me some damn old robe that belonged to your husband,” Ben said, sneezing three times in a row.

“What’s your feeling about flowered terry cloth?”

“I’ll take it,” Ben said, slamming the door of the laundry room.

In spite of herself, Emily smiled as she made her way to her room and the flowered terry-cloth robe. At the last minute she pulled out a pair of wool socks from her drawer. When she returned to the kitchen, the tea kettle was whistling. She turned it off, knocked on the door to the laundry room, and handed the flowered robe through the small crack in the door. “Don’t be shy; I saw many naked men when I worked at the clinic. And if you care to remember, I’ve seen you naked too.”

“Shut up, Emily. I’m pissed and I deserve to be pissed so don’t try and be nice to me now.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Because I know how you feel. At least I think I do. I needed to know you were all right. You’re a nice person. I care about you.” He sneezed again, four times.

Emily opened the Tylenol bottle sitting on the windowsill, shook out three, and placed them on the table. A heavy mug of tea was steeping on a colorful braided mat. She removed the tea bag and poured generously from the brandy bottle.

“Flowers become you. Is it warm enough?” Emily asked when Ben sat down at the table. He reached for a tissue from the box Emily set in front of him.

“I just want to know one thing, Emily. Do you read romance novels? I’m talking about ravage and plunder here, or was I right about there being a third person in the room?”

“No, I do not read romance novels, and yes, you were right.” She looked away, at the clock on the wall and then at the array of cereal boxes on top of the refrigerator. “This is none of your business, but I’m going to tell you anyway. I’ve never been with a man other than my husband. I didn’t know, and I am ashamed to admit this, but I didn’t know there were new rules. I should have known that, maybe I did, but didn’t want to act on it. When you said
no
the way you did, it triggered something in me and I reacted. I am sorry.”

“Emily, when a couple decides to…to make love, the couple flounders a bit until they get comfortable with each other. Sometimes the first time is a real flop. If there’s a second time, it usually goes a little better. Do you understand what I’m trying to say? I’ve been known to do some heavy-duty bellowing, so much so you can hear me in the next county. That’s good. That’s uninhibited. I’m not your husband and you aren’t my ex-wife. I can sound like this because I did just about the same thing you did my first time out. I’m not judging you; I would never do that. Do you have slippers to match this robe?”