Monday, Monday: A Novel (31 page)

“I just—talking to them about this is going to be hard, you know?” Carlotta paused. “What are your thoughts on artificial insemination?”

“You mean … for yourself?”

“I’ve been reading about it. Mom wouldn’t like the idea because the Church doesn’t approve, but I’m thirty-six, and I don’t know when I’ll get married. And if I were to consider artificial insemination, there are things it would be good to know about my biological parents. I can tell by the look on your face you think it’s a bad idea.”

Across the street, the tower bells had started to chime. They were halfway into chiming eleven o’clock before Shelly was even aware of them, as if the sound had been muted and suddenly turned on. “Would the medical information be all that useful?”

“It depends on what it is. But that isn’t the main reason I want to do this—to look for them. I want to know who they are. Nobody ever knows where their life is going, but most people know where it started. For me that’s a big blank. So I want to know who my mother is. Short of that, I just want to try to find out. I don’t even have to meet her. Even just searching will feel like something. There are a lot of things I wasn’t so puzzled about until the miscarriage. You know?” She frowned. Her voice fell. “How could someone give a baby away?”

For a confused moment, Shelly wanted to tell her—to cross the aching distance and connect with the daughter she might have kept and explain all the things she had held back all these years. She wanted to pretend there were no obstacles and to ignore everything but this secret bond and this beautiful girl who had been hers for a few brief days in the hospital.

“When I was miscarrying,” Carlotta said, “when the baby was dying, I felt what was happening. I felt it was dying. I was that connected. And maybe my mother felt that way about me. Maybe she’s hoping I’ll look for her.”

“But you need to involve your parents.” This seemed like the most imperative thing to Shelly at the moment: She and Carlotta could not be in this alone, no matter how tempting or possible.

“I don’t see why they should be involved, and I can’t talk to Mom as easily as I talk to you. She and I are close, but we’re different. And I’m not sure how she would feel about my looking. We never talk about the adoption. I don’t see what’s to be gained by talking to her about this. She and Dad have given me everything and been wonderful, so why should I give the impression I feel like something’s missing, when nothing is?”

“Because it would be a breach of their trust not to talk to them first.”

Carlotta shook her head. “When I was little, I used to think I was special because they chose me. Of course, the reality is that I was only available because someone else wanted to give me away. But Mom and Dad always made me feel like the only thing that mattered was how much they loved me. I’m not going to make them feel like that wasn’t enough.”

“But it’s too big of a thing to do on your own, Carlotta.”

“Which is why I’m coming to you. I’m hoping you’ll help me with it.”

“I’m glad you’ve come to me, but it’s important for you to talk to your parents about it first.”

Carlotta rearranged the jewelry spread on the table before her, matching the colors of stones, placing the blues with the greens, the oranges with the reds.

“I’m sorry if my reaction isn’t what you expected,” Shelly told her. “But I feel strongly about this. How long are you going to be in Austin?”

“I’m actually driving back tonight. The real reason I came was just to talk to you.”

“Could we continue the conversation in Alpine? I have to work this afternoon, but I can drive to Alpine tomorrow for the weekend. And then if you decide to talk to your parents—”

“I’m not going to talk to my parents. I appreciate that you’re honest, and I trust your opinion—I always have. But it’s
my
past, not yours, that I’m looking into; it’s mine. You’re welcome to come to Alpine and we can talk all you want, but you’re not going to be able to convince me to talk to my parents about all these complicated feelings I have about the adoption.”

Carlotta was done with the conversation. For a moment or two, they made small talk to try to dispel a feeling of strain between them. Shelly’s response had made Carlotta feel lonely, and empty, and indecisive about the dream that she had set her heart on. And she didn’t think Shelly was right. She wouldn’t consider taking the chance of hurting her parents, especially when her biological mother—if she were ever even to find her—might not want to be in her life. What would be the benefit?

Finally Shelly gave up trying to act as if there were nothing wrong. She patted Carlotta’s hand, said, “I love you; we’ll talk through this. I’ll come to Alpine.” Then she walked to her car, feeling as if her life had just turned over. She pulled her phone from her purse and called Jack’s mobile. In front of a shop window with a display of retro clothing—go-go boots and top hats—she closed herself in her car.

“Jack? It’s me.” She was betraying Carlotta, but didn’t feel she had much choice.

“Oh, hey.”

“Are you where you can talk?”

“In the bookstore. Front Street.”

“Can you go outside?”

“Is Carlotta all right?”

“She’s fine. I just need you to be where you can talk.”

“One second.” A moment later, he said, “Okay. I’m outside. What’s up?”

“Carlotta just told me she wants to look for her biological parents.” She waited for his response. “Jack? Are you there?”

“I’m here.”

“I tried to convince her she needed to talk to you and Delia about it, but she’s worried you’ll take it wrong and think she feels there’s something missing in your relationship. I told her I’m coming to Alpine tomorrow. I hope that’s all right. I think she needs to be told the truth.”

He was quiet, and then he said, “Of course she does.”

“Will you talk to Delia and see if she thinks it’s right for me to be there? That should be her call.”

“She’s going to want you to be here.”

Shelly stared at the go-go boots in the window and opened the car door for air. A run-down Mazda covered in bumper stickers pulled into the place beside her, so she closed the door to make room.

“And I’ll call Wyatt,” Jack said.

Wyatt. How strange—she had not even thought of Wyatt.

35

THE SALT AIR

He had just flown back to Bar Harbor after six months in New York and was hauling bags of art supplies out of the trunk of a taxi, wondering if he should have stayed in New York with Elaine. She had remained behind to attend a party for colleagues in the public-relations firm where she was now working, and she would close the apartment in a few days and follow him here to Bar Harbor.

He had offered to stay and wait for her, but she had wanted the time alone to reflect on things. It was nine months since she had been diagnosed with endometrial cancer, and she was finished with treatment now—the surgery and grueling weeks of radiation and chemotherapy, in which her optimism had been squarely tested. There was still a chance of recurrence, and having endured the treatment, she was now trying to come to terms with the uncertainties in her future.

It was surprising to Wyatt how deeply he feared losing her. Given the length of time he and Elaine had been at odds with each other—the number of times he had actually wished himself to be free of her—he would have expected less torment. They had battled each other so habitually over such a range of marital issues that when Elaine had told him of her diagnosis, and they had found themselves suddenly on the same side, facing the chance that she would die, the sincerity of his affection for her, and the fierceness of her need for him, had come as a shock to them both. He realized he had grown to love Elaine’s willfulness, which in the early years had dogged and irritated and frustrated him. Her tenacity and emotional fortitude had appeared in stark relief against her physical weakness during those months of treatment. As a man devoted to seeing things exactly as they were, for whom background and juxtaposition were basic and studied and valued, Wyatt was surprised to see his wife in this new light. She had assumed a stunning radiance in his eyes. He realized how different his marriage might have been had he not continued to be in love with another woman for all these forty years. The marriage had had its problems from the beginning, but his infidelity with Shelly—in spite of the fact that Elaine never knew about it—had depleted its reserves.

He now believed his marriage to Elaine held everything that mattered—even, strangely, his love for Shelly, simply because it had weathered it. The two children he had raised with Elaine—Nate and Maggie—had grown into kind, generous people with children of their own. They had been a constant presence during their mother’s illness.

What if, back then, he had left their mother for Shelly? Maggie would not have been born. Nate might have carried some lasting grudge against his father, or a loss of respect—neither of which Wyatt could have tolerated. After all, it wasn’t as if Wyatt had any reason to leave their mother other than to chase after his own satisfaction—which it now turned out he had caught up with anyway. He loved Shelly all the more because she had told him to stay with Elaine when he had been too weak to make that decision on his own.

Slamming the trunk, he paid and thanked the driver and turned to look at the farmhouse he and Elaine had renovated many years ago. Down a path streaked with sunlight he could see the barn he had remodeled into a studio, nestled under towering birch and aspens, the tall plate-glass windows reflecting a jewel-like green from the branches.

He looked forward to settling his things into the house and then unpacking his porcelain tray and sable brushes and jars of pigment in the studio. Then he would go for a run and maybe call up friends to meet for dinner.

Breathing the salt air, he looked at the blue sky overhead and wondered if it might be time to retire from teaching at Columbia and move here permanently. Years ago he had craved his time in New York; it had motivated and energized him. But the older he got, the less patience he had with the frantic art scene. He no longer knew, or cared very much, where he ranked as an artist—whether in any objective sense his paintings were better or worse than the others on walls in the upscale galleries. But he liked his work and got paid large sums for even the simple paintings, and because he had made a name for himself he could paint what he pleased. If Elaine were not so attached to New York, he would move back here year-round and paint in restful surroundings. He loved the weather. The sea.

With a suitcase and a box of books, he made his way into the house and saw in a glance that the renter had left the place a mess, the pillows bunched on one end of the sofa and the rug scooted to one side, giving the room an off-kilter appearance. The air conditioning had been turned off, so the place smelled musty. He went through the rooms, inspecting the disarray, which he decided wasn’t extreme enough to complain about, only thoughtless enough to convince him he was past the stage in life when he should be renting the house. He wouldn’t have done it this time if the renter had not been a friend of Nate’s and been going through a divorce and needed a six-month lease with a landlord who would cut the rate to a nominal fee.

In the kitchen, he inspected the cabinets and drawers. Nothing was where he and Elaine had left it. Boxes of unfamiliar cookies and cereals in the pantry were open and half-consumed. “What is all this stuff?” he grumbled. Discovering a box of granola, he ate a handful and looked for milk in the refrigerator but found only various manhandled chunks of gourmet cheeses sloppily wrapped in plastic.

Maybe he was too set in his ways. When he was young on bright summer days like this, he had felt exhilarated. With Shelly Maddox, he had felt euphoric for two whole years. Even with all his guilt about the love affair and all the devastation that he must have known was coming, he had been happy. Where did that elated feeling go? His self-respect, as glad as he was to have it now, had cost him some of his passion.

But these thoughts were certainly not improving his mood. And he had left his pigments out in the driveway. He should get them into the studio before they overheated. Hopefully, Nate’s friend had not been mucking around in the studio after Wyatt had asked him not to go in there.

He was walking out of the house to check on the studio when he heard his cell phone ringing from inside one of the bags piled in the driveway. By the time he got to it, it had quit ringing, but Jack’s number was on the screen, so he called him back.

“You called?”

“Yeah. What are you doing?”

“I’m in Bar Harbor. I just got in from New York.”

“Is Elaine with you?”

“No, she’s coming next week. Why?”

“Is she doing all right?”

“Better every day. What’s up?”

“Carlotta wants to look for her biological parents.”

Jack had spoken so calmly that for a second Wyatt suspected he hadn’t heard right. “What?”

“Just what I said.”

“Since when?”

“She told Shelly this an hour ago.”

“She told Shelly?”

“That’s right. She went to Austin and told Shelly she was planning to look for her biological parents.”

“And how did Shelly respond?”

“She told her to talk to Delia and me. Which Carlotta apparently doesn’t intend to do.”

For a moment Wyatt scrambled in his mind for a way to handle this so that Elaine would not find out about it. He had been lying to her by omission for so many years. But none of his thoughts would settle into anything that made any sense. “How is Delia taking this?”

“She’s worried how Carlotta will take it. Also I think she wishes Carlotta had come to her instead of going to Shelly—I think that hurt her a little, though she’ll never admit it.”

“God, this is unexpected,” Wyatt said. “I guess I thought … I don’t know what I thought.”

“You thought we had dodged this bullet.”

“I guess I did. Though I knew we probably couldn’t forever. What happens now?” What would he tell Nate and Maggie? What would they think of him once they knew? Nate was older than Carlotta, and Maggie younger. It would be obvious when their father had been unfaithful to their mother.