Leap Year (21 page)

“Who do you want to sleep with?”

“Heath,” said Lillian.

“Heath? Why?”

“You’ll laugh.”

“I’m already laughing,” said Loren. “Why?”

“I think he’s the father of my child.”

Loren stopped laughing when she saw Lillian’s face. She came and sat beside Lillian on the bed. “Lillian,” she said, “why would you ever think that?”

“He told me he donated sperm. And he matches my donor profile exactly.”

“But, Lillian, thousands of men in New York must match that profile. Did he donate the same place you were inseminated?”

“Yes,” said Lillian.

“I still think…I mean, it’s absurd! You must see that. And even so, I mean, even if it were true—which it’s probably not—why do you want to seduce him?”

“It’s just that.…” Lillian said. “I know it’s stupid. It’s hard for me to explain. I feel…not, you know, well, perfect about this pregnancy. I mean, how it was brought about. How it happened. And I thought, well, if Heath was the father—which I think he is, I really do, and I know that may sound insane, but I do have this feeling—but if he is, or was, and if I slept with him, then, well, then, even if my baby wasn’t conceived in love, if there was that union between us, it would be…oh, God, you know: closer than what.…” Lillian seemed to be crying.

Loren held her. “Lillian,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with how your baby was conceived. In fact, it was conceived in love: yours. And anyway, what matters is not how babies are conceived but how they’re raised. You know that, don’t you?”

“I suppose,” said Lillian.

“Don’t suppose,” said Loren. “Know.”

***

Margot Geiger, Class of ’88, is now the Director of The Gallery Shawangunk, one of SoHo’s most prestigious institutions. She joined the gallery last June as Administrative Assistant, and was promoted to her present position of Director in October. Margot, who pursued a self-designed course of study exploring the Cultural Evolution of Latin American Women welcomes the opportunity to consider the work of Sarah Lawrence artists. Please send your slides to her, care of The Gallery Shawangunk.

That’ll fix the bastards, thought Margot, gleefully extracting the alumni news form from the typewriter. All those ugly girls in the Intro Painting Crits who said nasty things about her work, and especially Magda Bish, that commie lesbo teacher who called her series of one hundred self-portraits “decadent.” She could hardly wait till Bish came groveling:

Dear Magda,

Thank you so much for sending in your slides. Unfortunately I felt these new paintings lacked a certain—

“Excuse me.”

Margot looked up to see a short man in a business suit standing behind the velvet rope. She waited a delicious moment before acknowledging him. “Yes?”

“I was wondering…are there any Heath Jackson photographs available?”

Margot looked at the man again. He seemed vaguely familiar. “As you can see, that show’s come down.”

“Yes,” said the man, “I can see. I just wondered if there are any photographs that haven’t sold…that I might look at.”

“We close at eight,” said Margot. It was seven-thirty.

The man looked at his watch and shrugged. “Is it too late? I could come back.”

Margot roused herself with apparent great effort. “No,” she sighed. “I think there are a few dupes that we’re holding for MOMA. They haven’t made a decision yet. I could maybe show you those.”

“Please,” said the man. “If you would.”

“Wait there,” Margot said, and disappeared into the back room. She returned moments later with a large black portfolio, which she lay on a table. “Okay,” she said, “you can come back now.”

The man unhooked the rope and entered the sanctum. “You look familiar,” she said. “Have you been in before?”

“No.”

She unzipped the portfolio and flipped it open. The first photograph was the cat/man/noodle. The man in the photograph was the man standing beside her. He gazed down at himself, and something in the way he looked at the photograph made Margot Geiger’s tiny, prunish heart swell.

Lillian and Loren walked by the Gallery Shawangunk on their way to the Cafe Wisteria. They looked in the big windows at sculptures assembled from tree trunks and shopping carts, and walked on.

An Italian woman in a black lace bra and purple leather miniskirt checked their coats. She stood in a little foyer at the top of the basement stairs. “Good evening,” she said. Loren and Lillian handed over their coats. She put them on a table behind her and handed them a chit. “Enjoy your deener,” she said.

“Is Heath Jackson here?” Lillian asked.

“Heath ese downstairs,” the woman said. “He brings the coats oop and down for me. You know heem?”

“Ah, no,” said Lillian. “We just wondered…”

“I spleet my teeps with heem,” the woman said.

Anita, the hostess, approached. “Welcome to Cafe Wisteria,” she said, shepherding them away.

Heath overheard this exchange from his post behind a little curtain at the top of the stairs. When he wasn’t lugging coats up or down, he stood there, intoxicated by that lovely amalgam of music, talk, and laughter. Sometimes he longed to pull the curtain aside and walk toward the euphoria, take his proper place at the bar, and resume his life. But this reverie was invariably interrupted by Gina’s slender naked arms, thrusting either chits or coats back through the chink in the curtain.

leap 1:
to spring free from or as if from the ground
2 a:
to pass abruptly from one state or topic to another
b:
to act precipitately

Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary

“T
HIS IS A VOICE FROM
your past,” said Solange. She waited, but there was no response. “Anton?” she said.

“Solange?”

“
Oui
,” she said. “
C’est moi
.”

There was another, shorter pause. Then Anton said, “I’m not totally surprised. I had a feeling you weren’t dead.”

“That’s odd,” said Solange. “Considering you killed me.”

“But I didn’t kill you. Amanda did.”

“In fact she didn’t, but I find that beside the point. I find rather a lot beside the point nowadays. I suppose being dead has that effect on one.”

Anton was silent.

“Darling,” said Solange, “ask me how I am.”

“How are you?”

“I’ve never been better. Now ask me what I want.”

“What do you want?”

“Many things. But I think it’s only polite to make one’s demands in person.”

“Well,” said Anton. “I’m at your disposal.”

“I’m glad you see it that way,” said Solange.

For a while after David and Ms. Mouse had returned to the Upper West Side, Loren had considered calling Gregory. She wanted to talk with him, but she felt a little ashamed, and this shame, combined with her pride, made her mute. His unexpected telephone message empowered her.

“I’m sorry,” she said when she finally reached him. “I should have called sooner.”

“Why didn’t you?” Gregory asked in his wonderfully familiar voice.

“I don’t know. I was trying to figure out what to say. And I felt bad.”

“I told you not to feel bad. Remember, in my letter?”

Loren smiled. “How are you?” she asked. “How’s L.A.?”

“It’s okay. Living here is just like what you’d imagine. Actually, it’s a bit more like what you’d imagine than you’d imagine, if that makes any sense. How’s New York?”

“Fine,” said Loren. “Cold.”

“How’s Kate?”

“Kate’s fine. I’ve just put her to bed. She misses you.”

“And David?”

Loren paused. She didn’t know what to say about David.

“I heard a rumor about you and David,” Gregory said.

“What?”

“That you split up. Is it true?”

“Who did you hear that from?”

“Lyle Wallace.”

“Since when do you associate with kidnappers?”

“He’s starring in the show I’m producing.”

“Is he? What kind of show is that?”

“It’s a pilot about an ex-football player who inherits his brother’s Italian restaurant and falls in love with his brother’s widow. It’s kind of a cross between
Moonlighting
and
Moonstruck
.”

“It sounds awful,” said Loren.

“It’s actually not bad. Lyle can act, believe it or not. He’s a nice guy”

“What did he say?”

“He said he heard from Charlotte that you and David had split up. Is it true?”

“Yes.”

Neither of them spoke. They both held their phones more tightly to their ears, as if the feeling that was flowing between them might leak.

“Let’s walk,” said Judith. “We can bring the dog.”

She and Leonard were going down to the high school to vote. After their oral confrontation in New York, Leonard had returned home to Ackerly, Pennsylvania, and bought a dog. In the interim, he and Judith had shared several inconclusive telephone conversations. Judith had decided that voting was a good ulterior motive for spending some time with him.

The charm of animals had always eluded Judith, and she found this puppy a particularly obstreperous creature. But under the circumstances she was trying to fake some enthusiasm.

“He’s not very good on a leash,” Leonard admitted.

“I’m sure it’s just a matter of time,” said Judith. “A little practice will do him good.”

After a brief skirmish in the foyer, Leonard managed to snare the prancing beast, and the three of them set off. They rounded the corner and walked a ways in silence. “Heel, Agra,” Leonard commanded, to no visible effect.

“I was thinking,” Judith said, “that this is the eleventh presidential election I’ve voted in.”

Leonard, who hated idle observations, ignored this comment.

“I must say it seems to get more and more pointless, doesn’t it? I don’t understand this country anymore. Do you?”

“No,” Leonard mumbled, his eyes dogward.

“It’s bewildering,” said Judith, “not to mention depressing.”

“I have other things to be bewildered and depressed about,” said Leonard.

“Such as?”

Leonard attempted to pause and strike a pose of utter defeat, but Agra would not cooperate. “I’m disappointed,” said Leonard, “in you.”

“Why are you disappointed in me?”

“Isn’t it obvious? The moment I got your letter I made plans to return. I kept thinking, oh, this letter is a joke of some sort, because this cannot be true. And I arrived home to find that it was true. And you ask me why I’m disappointed.”

It was Judith’s turn to study the dog. For a moment she said nothing. “I still don’t understand,” she finally said.

“You have fallen in love with somebody else.”

“But I still love you. I thought I made that clear in my letter.”

“I don’t feel loved,” said Leonard. “I feel excluded.”

“Then you don’t understand. What I did …it was something that was separate from our love. You went away, Leonard. That didn’t include me, but I don’t resent that.”

“My going away was a neutral act that was mutually agreed upon. What you’ve done is neither.”

“How can you say that? Who are you to decide what is neutral and what is mutual? I’m the one who should know. It’s my heart, after all.”

“But I never thought of it as your heart. Or
my
heart. I thought it was a heart we shared.”

“I think you’ve been in India too long: ‘a heart we shared.’ That’s mush, darling. That’s
West Side Story
.”

“Please don’t be sarcastic,” said Leonard.

“I’m sorry,” said Judith. “I’m just trying to be realistic.”

They arrived at the high school and performed their civic duties in silence. It began to rain as they walked home. Judith wondered if it was raining in New York.

“So what are your plans?” Leonard asked. “Are you home for good?”

Oh, Judith thought, why isn’t life simpler? Of course it’s a matter of choice: I could say, Of course I’m home for good, I’m never leaving.

“No,” she said.

Leonard shrugged. They both watched the rain accumulate in a soggy stripe along the dog’s spine. “I just want things to be normal again,” Leonard said.

Judith touched his arm. “Darling,” she said, “don’t you remember? You were the one who was so restless…who hated how things had become. It was you who said we had to get away from here, and each other, or we would die. You were very unhappy when things were normal.”

“But that’s the whole point,” said Leonard. “You see, I’ve found out I wasn’t really. I
was
happy. It’s what I want. I want to be home with you.”

“I want that too, but there are things…my job, and my apartment, and being near Loren and Kate…things I want to finish in New York.”

“What about your Chinese friend?” Leonard asked.

“He’s Vietnamese,” said Judith. “I have to finish that, too.”

“Then go to New York,” said Leonard.

“You’ll be all right here?”

“Of course,” said Leonard.

“I’m glad you understand,” said Judith, knowing he didn’t really understand.

“Just promise me you’ll come back,” Leonard said.

“Death becomes you,” said Anton, when his eyes had adjusted to the dim light. The bedroom of Solange’s suite was illuminated by an altarlike arrangement of flickering candles. Solange lay in bed. Anton stood at the foot, looking down at her.

“And I rather like you as a redhead,” he continued, a little desperately. “It’s sexy.”

Solange ignored these compliments. She gazed up at the wavering shadows on the ceiling.

“May I sit down?” asked Anton.

Solange nodded. He drew a chair up to the bed and sat. “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment, when he realized she was waiting for him to speak. “I suppose that sounds absurd, but nevertheless…it’s the truth.”

Solange looked at him. “Do you love Amanda Paine?” she asked.

“No,” said Anton.

“You told me that once before. In Aix. Remember?”

Anton nodded.

“Were you lying then?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think I ever really loved her, but, well…I got carried away.”

“That is true,” said Solange.

“I’m not carried away anymore,” said Anton.

“What are you now?”

“I’m penitent,” said Anton. “I’m devoted to you.” He got out of the chair and knelt beside the bed. He looked up at her.