Odds : A Love Story (9781101554357) (7 page)

“How is it?” he asked, pointing his fork at her coffee. She
hadn’t touched her bagel, and wouldn’t. She already regretted the waste.

“Awful. How’s yours?”

“Remind me to order breakfast tonight.”

He’d brought a stack of brochures from the lobby and shuffled through them between bites. She was fine with the horse-and-buggy ride, but the helicopter was out.

“We have to go to Ripley’s.”

“Do we have to?”

“Yes.” He put it aside. “And definitely Madame Tussaud’s.”

“Didn’t we see that last time?”

“It was good, as I remember.”

“You remember that?”

“You don’t? I’m sure it’s all changed by now anyway. The House of Frankenstein?”

“Pass.”

“Rock Legends Wax Museum?”

“I thought that was tonight.”

“Well played. Ride Over the Falls? Mystery Maze?”

His enthusiasm wearied her, but after the twin disasters of last night and this morning, she was determined, out of fairness—if these truly were their last hours together—to be good company. At the end, she and Karen barely spoke, each of them disappointed with the other, and in Marion’s case, herself. This was different. Art was reasonable to a fault, and she, as Celia liked to remind her, was too accommodating. Of all the couples they knew, she thought they had the best chance of making an amicable separation. Between the two of them they’d find a way to
explain it to the children. They’d sit down and calmly lay out their plan as the best for everyone, just as they’d have to explain the bankruptcy and its residual effects. She expected tears from Emma, while Jeremy would be silently angry, as if they’d lied to him all these years instead of each other. It wouldn’t be easy by any means, but other people had done it. Holidays would be awkward, with the house gone—but there, she was being silly, it was already gone, their rooms with their childhoods gathering dust, their books and toys and skates and games. They would give the children the pick of the furniture, except they were both living in apartments. It made no sense to pay for storage for things no one wanted. Art had gone over this with her months ago; only now did its full meaning sink in. She resisted it. She’d make room in her new place, even if it meant sleeping in Emma’s old bed, though that might be strange when she had overnight guests—Art, for starters, since that had been the plan.

She shook her head to banish the image and took another sip of watery coffee.

“What?” Art asked.

“Nothing you want to hear.”

“Try me.”

“Trust me,” she said. “You don’t.”

“I trust you.”

That he could be so earnest—still—spurred her.

“I was trying to imagine what’s going to happen to us.”

“Good things.”

“I was thinking I might take Emma’s bed if she doesn’t want it.”

“It’s not very big.” Meaning he disagreed.

“I’m not going to have a lot of room.”

“You’ll have more than I will. I could take it.”

“That makes no sense. You’re too tall for it. The only bed that fits you is our bed.” Which was what he wanted her to take, charging her with being the keeper of their marriage bed. She’d had the job far too long already.

“Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it. If we come to it.”

“I think we’ve come to it.” She gestured to the room at large.

He had no answer for her.

“I told you you didn’t want to hear it.”

“No, it’s fine. I mean, we have to be prepared.”

“Like the Boy Scouts,” she said, saving him.

“That’s us.” He did the salute.

He pushed his tray aside and laid out the brochures in a line facing her, like tarot cards. “Okay,” he said, as if the question was settled. “Not everything is open, so this is what we’re looking at. I was thinking we’d do the horse-and-buggy ride first, then Journey Behind the Falls, since they’re in the same place, then lunch in the Skylon Tower for the big view, then go over to Clifton Hill for the cheesy stuff. That way if we’re running late we can cut that short. It’s all open tomorrow.”

“I was worried.”

“I don’t know if you’re interested in the Bird Conservatory. It’s like an indoor rain forest you walk through. I thought it looked interesting.”

“Sure,” she said with chipper conviction, to show she was game. Why did it feel like a lie?

First he had to go to the casino across the street to exchange some money, which led to the vision of him standing in the corner by the safe, stuffing the pockets of his barn coat with packets of bills like a bank robber. She waited for him in the sitting room, checking her Facebook, boasting to old high school friends that she was going to see Heart tonight. Emma had posted pictures of her and Mark from their trip to Winter Carnival in Montreal—Emma skating, Mark eating a cone of maple snow, the two of them kissing in the ice hotel. At Christmas Emma had been coy about their plans for the spring, when both of their leases were up. Marion had asked if getting a place together wouldn’t make sense, given their rents, and thought Emma had been close to telling her they were. They looked happy, and rather than feel envious, Marion thought it was right. It was their time. She’d had hers.

She clicked through the pictures, occasionally glancing at the view, not minding the time alone, though after half an hour she wondered what was taking him so long. The thought that he’d been robbed was absurd, the way it made her feel sorry for him, as if he were a victim, and she squashed it. He was probably just running another errand crucial to his scheme. Despite his protestations of openness, she knew he didn’t tell her everything, just as she knew they wouldn’t have been there for a romantic weekend if not for the casino. As living, breathing proof, here she sat with the roses and unopened champagne while he was off somewhere chasing money.

“Sorry,” he said when he came back in. The hotel next door was owned by the same resort, so he had to go to a currency
exchange where the rate was so bad that he decided to find an actual bank, and then he figured while he was at it he might as well turn the money into chips, which he showed her, dipping into his pocket and opening his hand.

In his palm sat five orange chips, a purple and a black.

“How much is that?” she asked.

“Six thousand American.”

“You’re like Jack with his magic beans.”

“Let’s hope so,” he said.

He put them in the safe, apologizing again. They’d only have to do it once more, tomorrow night, right before they played.

“I’m going to need you to do that,” he said, as if she might refuse.

“I can’t imagine it’s that hard. You just walk up and ask for some chips.”

“They’ll make you sign for it, but it’s completely legal.”

“Unlike what you just did.”

“That’s right, I’m an international criminal.”

“With a handful of magic beans.”

“I also have to pee.”

“I should too, before we go. How cold is it?”

“It’s not bad,” he said. “Maybe twenty?”

He’d thought they could take the scenic incline down to Table Rock, as they had on their honeymoon, but it was closed for the winter, and they had to retrace their steps and wait for a shuttle bus, which was so packed they gave their seats to an old Japanese couple. The driver had the heat blasting, and with nothing in her stomach, she felt clammy and feverish. It didn’t help
that someone smelled like a cigar. She held on to the pole, bracing her legs every time they braked.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Well,” she said, “I like this bus better than the last one.”

Outside, in the parking lot at the bottom of the incline, the cold spray revived her, needling her cheeks, and the Falls’ monolithic roar, all around them now. As they crossed the strip of park, the noise mounted. “You can really feel it,” Art said, patting his heart, and took her gloved hand in his. A clear skin of ice encased the tree branches and gas lamps and railings, the snow glazed to a shine. Only a crunchy scattering of salt kept the walkways clear.

They’d been here before, on this exact same path. Except for the weather, nothing had changed. Behind them rose the boxy seventies hotels and spiky observation towers. Ahead loomed the dour granite mock-Victorian welcome center like a museum, and the plaza overlooking the brink, teeming with drenched and happy tourists snapping away. The scene had the strange familiarity of a dream or fairy tale, as if the place had waited thirty years for them to return to learn their fate, the time in between a blink in the face of eternity.

What had she done with her life? For a moment she couldn’t think of anything. Become a wife and a mother. A lover, briefly, badly. Made a home, worked, saved, traveled. All with him. For him, because of him, despite him. From the start, because she was just a girl then, she’d thought they were soul mates, that it made them special, better than the other couples they knew. She’d learned her lesson. She swore she’d never be fooled again,
not by anyone, and yet she’d fought for him as if he were hers, and then, having won, didn’t know what to do with him. Still didn’t. That was her fault, she freely admitted it, but after all, wasn’t the whole world held together by inertia?

They picked their way through the plaza, careful not to intrude on anyone’s pictures, and found an open spot at the rail. When the wind kicked up, the spray billowed over them, musty as lake water. She dried her sunglasses and put them back on, their lenses improving on nature, deepening the rainbow that rose from the lip of the Falls and dropped to the gorge below. Here, hard by the rushing current, with a view of the rapids upstream, she could appreciate this wasn’t just a river but a whole great lake pouring over a cliff. Feet from the edge, gulls stood on rocks as whitecaps surged past. The blue water turned a sea-green like the curl of a wave, broke and flew, foaming in overlapping sheets as it fell away, constantly, endlessly. She’d forgotten the raw force of it—the exhilarating danger the reason they were all there.

Opposite, on Goat Island, a quarter mile across the invisible border, their American compatriots waved. Sun sparkled off the relentless water. At her feet, beyond the railing, clinging to the badly patched concrete wall, rested pennies people had tossed for luck. A paper cup slalomed between the rocks like a toy boat, dipped out of sight at the last second, then rose, flipped into the air as if thrown and went over. How soothing it must be to the suicidal, she thought, knowing all you had to do was jump the railing. But you still had to jump. People came from all over the world to do it. She wondered how many had stood right here, unable to take that last step.

He squeezed her hand. “Don’t move,” he said, and vanished into the crowd.

She was surprised at the number of Indian families, the women’s saris flowing below their winter coats. The men circled, concentrating like cinematographers on their video cameras, intent on capturing every moment. She remembered Art doing the same thing at Gettysburg or SeaWorld, and missed the children, if not those strained and shrill years. From bitter experience, Celia had told her not to stay for their sake, and while Marion believed she hadn’t, if she and Art had accomplished nothing else, she was grateful they’d been able to provide them with a stable home.

As she reflected on what this meant now that they were breaking up the house, he returned holding a red rose in a cellophane cone like the street vendors sold at stoplights. She thought of tossing it over the railing and immediately disowned the gesture as mad. He was sweet, he was devoted to her. Wasn’t that enough?

“You know we already have roses.”

“I can take it back.”

“Yeah, just try.”

He took a shot of her sniffing it, prompting a German woman to offer to shoot them together. He hugged her from behind, his arms crossed over hers as if to keep her warm. When he kissed her neck, a drop of water snuck under her collar, making her squirm.

“Sorry.”

“That’s all right, I’m already soaked. Where’s this horse-and-buggy ride you keep promising? And more important, is it dry?”

It was the wrong weekend for a carriage ride. The line snaked halfway around the welcome center. She didn’t think she could make it without something to eat, so they compromised, wandering the food gallery on the ground floor until they found a sushi place for a fortifying bowl of udon noodles, the Japanese equivalent of grandma’s chicken soup. The windows were steamed, and the hot broth made her want to stay there and people-watch, but he was determined to romance her.

There were only five carriages. For more than an hour they waited in the cold as the line shuffled by the great floral clock, its blooms browned and iced over, its hands stilled for the winter. They huddled for warmth, groaned with everyone else when the wind pushed the spray their way. A number of the couples were newlyweds, including a bridal party that must have had a reservation, because they went directly to the head of the line, their own photographer taking shots of the bride and groom in a gilded white carriage with the Falls and its ever-present rainbow behind them, first alone, then attended by their bridesmaids and groomsmen, with their respective families, and finally all together. It took a while, the other carriages loading and unloading to one side as the photographer and the bride’s mother fussed with the bride’s dress. Marion watched the lucky couple leaning in and whispering, laughing and touching, kissing for the camera. How young they were, how new. Today they were celebrities, set apart like royalty. She remembered the feeling and felt sorry for them, knowing it wouldn’t last, and yet, when they left without taking a ride, waving to everyone, she applauded along with the rest of the line, wishing them luck. Impossibly, she wanted
to go back and start over, as if, this time, they might find a way not to ruin things.

She hoped she and Art would get the same carriage, and thought it was a sign when they did, though he didn’t seem to notice. The horse was a fat dapple gray with a floppy red bow on her tail that didn’t quite hide the poop bag. The blankets were still warm from the last couple. They snuggled under them, holding hands as the driver recited his monologue in what she first suspected was a put‑on Irish brogue but soon conceded was the real thing.