My Husband's Sweethearts (16 page)

But I do not feel much better. My state of
mind is troubled, maybe the most troubled
it's been since this whole thing began, and I
can't envision this family-style road trip helping in any
way. It doesn't matter how I feel, however. Elspa, infused
with this new strange confidence that I don't fully comprehend,
calls her parents and gets all of us invited to their
weekly family Sunday brunch in Baltimore.

I walk into the kitchen early that Sunday morning
only two days later, carrying my overnight bag. Hopefully
we'll only spend one night—and how will that work?
Will I share a room with all the ladies? Or only my
mother—and Bogie, whom she's insisted on bringing
along? Will we all fit into the car? That fear pops up when
my mother emerges from the bathroom wearing an enormous
hat, as if she's off to the horse races, and when I
spot Eleanor, who's sipping coffee in the breakfast nook
with an enormous suitcase and an oversized handbag sitting
at her feet.

John walks into the kitchen and pours himself a cup of
coffee.

"So, ladies," he says. "We're about ready?"

My mother rearranges her hat. "Of course we are."

Then Elspa enters. She's wearing what she always
wears—jeans and a black T-shirt, tattoos showing. The lip
ring is even a little bigger and eyeliner darker—as if she
dressed up for the special occasion. I look at John. He
looks at me and back at Elspa. My mother sighs and
Eleanor coughs—code for
we have a problem.
No one
mentioned anything to her about sprucing up for the trip
to reclaim her daughter, but obviously it was something
that was understood—by everyone except Elspa.

"What?" Elspa says.

I say, "We'll just be a minute."

"What?" Elspa says to me.

"You have to look the part." I take her by the hand
and lead her to the spare bedroom.

Once inside, I pull out some clean-cut business casual
clothes. A button-down, a cardigan, khakis.

"Khakis? Isn't that a little cruel?" Elspa asks.

"What's wrong with khakis?"

"She'll know. My mother. There's no fooling her."

I wipe off some of the eyeliner, brush down her spiky
hair, give her a pair of rectangular sunglasses. I tell her to
take out the lip ring. She huffs but follows orders and puts
it in her pocket.

I stand back to look at my creation. "Not bad."

Elspa looks at herself in the mirror. She isn't impressed.
"I look constipated."

"You look dependable. That's what we're going for
here."

Moments later, we're back in the kitchen, standing in
front of John, Eleanor, and my mother. But there's no moment
of transformation and awe, which I realize I was expecting.
My mother and Eleanor are appeased, but John's
a little confused. He's staring at Elspa when he asks,
"Where's Elspa?"

"She's in there," I say. "We're going to be late if we
don't hurry up."

We head to the front door—Eleanor struggling with
her overstuffed bags.

"I think she got eaten by the Gap," John says.

"Not funny," I say.

"Don't I look constipated?" Elspa asks.

*

We all move to the car quickly. Elspa takes her spot in the
middle backseat, slumping a bit, but ready to go.
Somehow Bogie has landed on her lap, wearing a green
jockstrap today with crocheted trim on the back. Petting
Bogie gives Elspa something to do. John hoists our bags
into the trunk of my car. When I admitted that I had no
sense of direction, he offered to drive and I've already
thrown him my set of keys.

Eleanor and my mother are discussing who will take
the front passenger's seat, a heated discussion that, in my
mother's passive-aggressive style, never makes mention of
the seating arrangements, but includes my mother elaborating
on some bladder discomfort.

I'm the only one who's stalled in the yard. I'm the only
one who hasn't said good-bye to Artie. I know that he
wants me to go, that he's made me promise, but still I
found I couldn't bear saying good-bye in person.

One of the nurses will be with him around the clock,
just in case. (And, frankly, he never liked to be alone—
no surprise there.) I look up at the house and see the
nurse through the window in Artie's room. I know I
should have stuck my head into his bedroom to say a
quick see-you-later, but I couldn't. Every time I see him,
I feel like I can barely breathe. But I have to talk to him
before I go. I flip open my cell phone and call the house
number.

The nurse answers. "The Shoreman residence."

"I want to speak to Artie. It's me. Lucy."

"Have you even left yet?" The nurse appears at the
window, looks at me, and then waves.

I wave back. "Can you put Artie on?"

I hear the nurse explaining who it is.

Artie picks up. "You couldn't leave without saying
good-bye."

"Don't die in the next two days," I tell him.

"I won't. Cross my failing heart." He's at the window
now, one hand drawing back the curtain. It's been so long
since I've seen him out of bed. "I'm too much of an awful
person to die at this point."

"Too awful?"

"Have you been around lately? Have you noticed the
outpouring of hate for me?"

"Did you dump Eleanor when you started seeing me?"

"I fell in love with you completely!" he says a little defensively.
"That was actually a good move. I mean, it would
have been worse to continue to see her, wouldn't it?"

I feel protective of Eleanor—even though I was the
other woman in this case. I hate that he hurt her. I hate
that his capacity to hurt her was part of his capacity to
hurt me. "Let's go back to how awful you feel. I prefer
that."

"Well, it's true. But I don't want to talk about it," he
says. There's a long pause. "I feel pretty worthless."

I think of Eleanor's clipboard—the charting of Artie's
seven stages of grief for his infidelities. "Are you feeling
despair?"

The phone line is quiet. I watch Artie in the window.
He covers his eyes with one hand. Is he crying? I wonder.
And then there's an unmistakable sob. "I'm despairing,"
he says. "I'm not good at despair. It goes against my
nature."

I can't look at him. I turn around and stare at the
neighbor's well-trimmed hedgerow. "I think that may be
good."

He clears his throat. "I know, I know," he says. "I
think you may be right."

"And maybe it's better this way."

"What way?"

"Talking on the phone. I haven't done very well dealing
with all of this in person. Maybe this way would work.
We need to talk."

"I'll do it any way you want."

"I'll call you."

"That sounds good."

It strikes me that I'm leaving Artie again. It's different
this time, but still I can't deny the fact of it and that it feels
good, in a strange way, to be leaving, as if it's imprinted on
my genes, the desire to leave. It is, of course. "Maybe I'm
my father," I say.

"I don't think I would have married your father,"
Artie says. He's used to my occasionally abrupt changes in
conversation.

"I'm leaving again." Maybe Artie isn't so much the
Freudian version of my father, but I am. Maybe my subconscious
didn't dupe me at all. "I'm leaving like my
father."

"No," Artie says. "Not like your father. Because
you're going to come back. Right?" There's a vulnerability
in his voice that I've heard a few times since I've been
home. It's new, having snuck in with the sickness.

"That's right," I tell him. "I'm coming back. Soon."

He pauses. "I love you."

"I don't know why I still love you. I guess I'm an absurdist
on some level," I say, and I don't wait for a response.
I'm shocked that I said that much. I snap the
phone shut and walk to the car, get in, slam the door.
Eleanor, my mother, and John follow suit, shutting the remaining
three doors.

"Are you ready?" John asks.

For a moment, I'm disoriented. "For what?" I ask.

"To go," he says.

"We don't have to do this," Elspa says quietly. Perhaps
she's having second thoughts.

"Let's go," I say. "We
need
to go."

The trip from the outskirts of Philly to
Baltimore should take two hours at the
very most, but we hit traffic. Without the
whir of tires, it seems like the air in the car has gone dead.
John flips on the air-conditioning. I watch him surreptitiously.
Does he think about the kiss? Has he wondered
what it meant? Has he tried to reduce it to a dustpan in
the corner of his brain?

He's the one to break the silence. "The car is full of
Artie-ologists," John says. "You all should give me a crash
course."

Eleanor grunts, but doesn't oppose the idea. She's
won the front seat, a testament to her will and masterful
ability to haggle in my mother's native tongue—the language
of passive aggression. I'm sitting in the backseat
with Elspa and my mother, who's been sulking.

Trying to keep things light, I put it this way—a challenge.
"Okay," I say. "Let's see who can tell the best Artie
story. John can judge."

"Okay," Elspa says.

"Turn up the air," my mother says, pulling off her hat
and fanning her dolled-up face with it.

I go first, telling a story of Artie's great-great-great-grandfather,
who came to this country as a prisoner, stole
barrels of liquor, got caught, and didn't like his other option:
getting hanged in England. "You come from thieving
stock," I tell John.

"Thank God my mother's side is made up of
Puritans," he says sarcastically.

"What is your mother like?" my mother asks, leaning
forward between the seats.

"She's a character," John says with a sigh of resignation.

"What about the dog that bit him in the ass when he was
a kid?" Elspa says. "Do you know that one?" she asks me.

"I do," I say. I should be over it by now, that Artie told
Elspa stories, that they were close, even that they slept together.
The only reason Artie would tell that story would
be because of the scar. It's certain Elspa and I have both
uttered the question, "How'd you get that scar?" I'm not
over it, and Elspa can sense it. She catches herself. "You
tell that one," she defers.

"No, it's your turn."

"That's it really. He was bit on the ass, and the dog was
a terrier. It wouldn't let go. Artie spun around in circles,
the dog swinging around behind him. He still has a fear of
dogs because of it."

"I come from dog-spinning thieves," John says. "I'm
taking mental notes."

"Eleanor?" I say, a little afraid of what story she might
tell, but wanting to hear it, too. "Do you have a story?"

"Nothing anyone wants to hear," she says, fiddling
with the silver clip holding back her hair.

"He needs to know the good and the bad," I say.

She pauses. "He took me dancing."

We all pause a moment. That isn't much of a story—
good or bad. I look over at her, hoping there's more.

She says, "I don't dance. I've never danced." We're
still waiting for more. She unfastens the silver clip as if it's
been pinching her and rubs the back of her neck and goes
on. "My leg, you know. I was born this way. So there
weren't ever any ballet lessons. I sat through all my homecoming
dances and proms. I should have danced, of
course, but my mother had simply ruled it out. It never
occurred to me. Artie took me dancing." She is staring out
the window. Her hair is loose and full, cupping her face.
"It was terrific."

"That's a beautiful story," Elspa says, and I'm glad she
does, because I can't speak. The story is so simple but
moving that my throat is cinched tight.

"But the beauty of it," Eleanor says, "well, that's how a
beautiful moment comes to pain you later." She stiffens,
draws herself up straight. "It's your turn, Joan," she says
to my mother.

My mother says, without any real emotion, "I tried to
bribe Artie not to marry Lucy."

"What?" I shout, swiveling sharply in my seat.

John, who's been inching along, slams on the brakes—
a reaction to the news or my outburst or some actual driving
issue; it's impossible to say. We all jerk forward and
back again.

"Sorry, my fault," John says.

"He didn't take the bribe," my mother says, as if she's
just announced delightful news.

"I can't imagine Artie taking a bribe for anything,"
Elspa says.

"Actually, I was married to someone very well off at
the time," my mother explains, "and it was a very generous
bribe as bribes go." We're all staring at her, even John,
who's looking at her through the rearview mirror. My
mother adds a little defensively, "This is a nice-Artie
story," she says. "What are you all looking at?"

"It may go into the nice-Artie-story category, technically,
but it isn't a nice-mother story," I explain, trying to
be patient.

"Well," my mother says angrily, "I'm just trying to play
the game. I didn't know there were such intricate rules!"

And then Eleanor starts laughing—just lightly at
first—mumbling, " '. . . a very generous bribe as bribes
go.' " She then becomes hysterical, her upper body shaking
uncontrollably. Elspa laughs next, then John. And
now my mother is smiling, like she's told a joke that people
are finally getting. My mother tried to bribe Artie—
a
very generous bribe, as bribes go.
Finally I'm laughing, too.
The whole car is loud, rattling with laughter.

Once we're on the other side of the Delaware Memorial
Bridge, traffic lightens and we're making up some lost
time. This is the moment my mother announces that she
has to use the bathroom. We stop at a gas station off the
highway. My mother takes out her cell phone as she
swishes quickly to the restrooms, carrying Bogie. "I'll just
call to check in with the nurse. Make sure all's well."

Before I can tell her that I'll call, she's already started
dialing. And I feel like it's for the best. I've promised Artie
a real conversation. As my mother and Eleanor head off to
the restrooms, I load up on all things road-trip out of
habit—tubes of chips, Lucky Stripe gum, Gatorade—and
when I walk back toward the car, John is manning the
pump. He's sweaty and squinting. He's put on a Red Sox
baseball cap that's pulled down low on his head. I look for
some bit of Artie in his posture, his face, his gaze, but I
only see him, one hand in his pocket, his slightly wrinkled
pants, his soft way of taking the world in. His nose is a little
crooked, but that only seems to make him seem more
genuine.

Elspa appears beside me. She says, "He isn't Artie,
you know."

I'm surprised by the comment even though there isn't
a mean edge to it, and I'm trying to figure out where it's
coming from. "I know," I say, a little defensively.

"You can't make him into Artie."

"I wasn't planning to. Why would you even say that?"

"No reason," Elspa says. "I've been thinking. Artie
has been a father figure for me in some ways, but maybe
for both of us."

"He was a bad father figure for me. Like I needed to
get betrayed by my real father and then again by a father
figure of my own choosing." This is the first time I've put
words to this feeling—exactly one of the reasons why
Artie's betrayal hurts so much and so familiarly. "My
father opted for another family. Like the board game
Life—he just picked up his little blue plastic self and put
it in another plastic car." I'm trying to sound joke-y, but
there's still some emotion in my voice, some anger underneath
that surprises me. I stop myself a moment. Elspa
scares me sometimes—the way she can open things up so
wide.

"What did Joan do?" Elspa asks.

"She replaced him with another little blue plastic figure
and then another and then another. I'm not going to
repeat her mistakes."

She looks at John, wiping down the windshield with a
squeegee. "Artie was a good father figure for me. John's
more like—he has the wonder of a little kid, I think."

"Is that good or bad?" I ask.

"Both, I guess. Our good sides are just the flip side of
our bad sides. Like you."

"Like me?" I ask.

"You were sensitive. You felt too much. That was your
strength and your weakness. You loved the bird."

"What bird?" I say, irritated.

"The one you opened the window for. You loved the
bird and you loved Artie for being afraid of the bird. That
made him real."

"What are Artie's flip sides?"

"He loves too much. He doesn't know how not to."
She walks on to the car and gets in the backseat. I'm still
standing there, confounded. For some reason I want to remind
her that Artie's still alive, and I'm still his wife. But
this would only come across like something I'm trying to
convince myself of, not her.

Eleanor and my mother waltz past me, the wind flapping
Bogie's ears.

"Artie's doing fine," my mother reports.

"Are you coming?" Eleanor asks.

"What's wrong?" my mother asks me.

"Nothing," I say. I don't know whether to be angry
with Elspa or not.

John is finishing up at the pump. We're all gathering
around the car, but don't want to pile in yet because Elspa
is in the backseat, the door open, talking on her cell phone
to her parents. "Right. It'll be nice," she says. "I don't
know. A little. It's important. We'll be at the Radisson. I'll
call when we get close." She's hunched into the phone and
then she sits back. She can't get comfortable. "Yes, like I
already told you, they're clean and sober." She looks up at
me and rolls her eyes, but then smiles at me softly. Her
eyes get a little teary. Her voice is different on the phone
talking to her family, though. Smaller, more unsure and
childlike. "They're good people. The best I've ever been
friends with." She says this loudly enough so that all of us
can hear it. Of course none of us mention the good people
stuff, but when she hangs up, there's a new camaraderie.
All the windows are cracked a bit. Bogie is on my mother's
lap, nosing the crack. There's a breeze whipping around,
ruffling our hair. These may be the best people I've ever
been friends with, too—and it dawns on me that maybe
I'm the best version of myself I've been in a while. And I
want it to last.