Once Upon a Project (9 page)

Chapter 12

G
race downed half her Coca-Cola in one gulp. She was glad she'd asked Eric to get her a Coke in addition to her wine, which was for sipping. Maybe some cold liquid would help her stop sweating. When no one was looking she'd wipe her face, neck, and hairline. “That hit the spot,” she remarked.

“Good. So, Grace, where do you work?”

She tensed. She'd known this question was coming. Instinct told her to say as little as possible. For all she knew, Eric might hold a position on a par with hers.

But even as she had the thought, she knew she was just kidding herself. Just from getting a little closer to him, she'd noticed that while undeniably good-looking, he wasn't quite as flawlessly handsome as she'd first thought. When he laughed a missing upper incisor showed. And he had a little potbelly. Plus his face held hints of that hard look of a man who liked to drink . . . a lot. His physical appeal had probably hit its peak ten years ago, and ten years from now she probably wouldn't look at him twice. Still, here and now he was reasonably good-looking, so reluctantly she named her employer.

“Oh, yeah? What shift you work?”

Grace blinked. What shift? He thought she worked in the
plant?

At that moment any remote hopes of his being a professional faded away like General MacArthur. If Eric was accustomed to dating women who held blue-collar jobs, maybe she should cut him loose now and save herself from disappointment. She'd been through that before. The men whose eyes widened when they saw her floor-through condo, decorated with sculptures she'd picked up from her travels to Europe, Asia, and Africa, and her Mercedes parked out front. Next thing she knew, they'd ask to borrow her car, or to loan them two hundred dollars “just until payday.”

Still, she abandoned the idea of excusing herself like a burning building. It had been too long since anyone who looked as good as Eric Wade had paid attention to her, even with his flaws.

“Actually, I work in their offices,” she said. “I work standard daytime hours.”

“Oh. Secretary, huh?”

Oh, God. She wished he'd stop asking so many questions. What difference did it make what she did? She was beginning to think he wouldn't understand it, anyway. “I work in the global relations office. I kind of . . . run things.”

He winked at her. “Ah, one of those career women.”

Grace made a face, her lower lip protruding slightly in a reaction that came naturally. She'd always hated that term. In her opinion it ought to be relegated to history, along with other outdated words and phrases that had no place in the vocabulary of the twenty-first century:
stewardess
,
record player
,
Betamax
,
dungarees
. The notion that any woman who didn't work behind the counter at McDonald's was consumed by her profession struck her as utter nonsense.

“The way I see it, if a woman expects to support herself nowadays and not live in abject poverty, she'd better be qualified to contribute something positive to the workplace. The days when women relied on husbands to take care of them ended forty years ago. I'd like to do something besides ring up sales at Target.” Her eyes dared him to object.

Eric shrugged. “So you went to college, huh?”

“Yes.” She wasn't about to volunteer that she had a master's degree.

“Where'd you go, Malcolm X?”

“No. I had a scholarship to U of I.” Every muscle in her body plus every instinct in her brain told her to forget about Eric Wade, but she couldn't bring herself to do it. After all, there was nothing wrong with attending a community college. They'd grown up in the projects, not the Gold Coast. For every Deval Patrick, the gifted South Side student who earned a law degree from Harvard and ultimately became governor of Massachusetts, there were twenty who attended one of the City Colleges of Chicago.

Instead she changed the subject.

“What about you, Eric? What do you do for a living?”

“I'm a supervisor at a moving and storage outfit.” He met her eyes defiantly. “I guess that sounds lame to a big shot like you.”

“It sounds just fine.” She raised her wineglass to her lips and took a sip.

He broke into a grin, his face softening and, under the flattering dim lights of the bar, looking more handsome than ever.

Grace began to relax. Maybe there was a chance of things working out after all.

 

 

Pat, Grace, Elyse, and Susan left Junior's at the same time, a little after one. The bar still thrived with patrons, but the four women were all tired. Charles saw them each to their car, beginning with Pat, who had parked just a few doors down from the door, and then Grace, who was the farthest away. Susan and Elyse walked with him, and after Grace drove off with a wave they turned around and walked to the opposite corner.

Elyse buttoned her checkered blazer and turned the collar up. “I think the wine I drank must be wearing off. I'm frozen.”

Charles offered an arm to each of them. “It's not a bad thing about the alcohol wearing off. Are you sure you're able to drive?”

“Oh, yes, I'll be fine. There's not much traffic out at this hour, except the trucks.”

He turned to Susan. “What about you? Wisconsin is a long ways away.”

“Oh, I'm going to stay at Elyse's house tonight. I knew I'd be too tired to go all the way home, plus it means having to wake up my kids, who I know are asleep by now. We'll go home in the morning.”

Elyse unlocked her car doors with a remote control. Charles, ever the gentleman, seated her first behind the wheel, then came around to the passenger side and did the same for Susan. As he had done with Elyse, he kissed her cheek. But he also discreetly slipped a piece of paper into her hand, saying softly, “Put this in your purse. Look at it when you're alone.”

 

 

“Well, that was a heck of an evening,” Elyse commented after waving good-bye to Charles.

“I'm glad we came. It was good to see Charles again, real good.”

“I think it's safe to say he feels the same way.”

Susan turned a suspicious eye on her friend. “Do you have something you want to say, Elyse?”

“No, Susan,” she replied calmly. “I'm just making an observation. No need to get all touchy.”

“I'm not touchy,” Susan retorted. “I just recognize when someone's on a fishing expedition.”

Elyse paused before admitting, “Okay, I'm curious about why you broke up with him. So shoot me.”

“I won't shoot you, but I'm still not going to talk about it.”

“Hey, can't blame me for trying.”

Susan chuckled. She was glad Elyse didn't take offense at her statement. She didn't want to get into a snit with one of her oldest friends. She'd always been sketchy about her breakup with Charles. One of the important life lessons she'd learned was that the only true way to keep a secret was to not tell anyone. That was why none of her friends knew about her cancer. She didn't want them planning her funeral or even wondering about her sex life.

Which had, of course, become nonexistent.

As far as the reasons for her breakup with Charles, the truth would probably be disappointing to anyone expecting a juicy follow-up to the brothers' fistfight. Susan had told no one that Charles had proposed to her a few days before that fateful altercation, and that she'd accepted. She wanted to first make sure all was clear with Douglas, who tended to have a possessive nature, before announcing her engagement publicly. Then came the brothers' fight, which Charles won. He and Susan left the bar, with Douglas being helped up by several men who shouted epithets at their retreating backs.

That alone gave Susan second thoughts about the wisdom of marrying Charles. A few days later Ann Valentine read her the riot act for disrupting her family, and even though both Charles and his father intercepted, Susan decided she couldn't live with the shadow hovering over her of a shattered relationship between two brothers.

Charles had valiantly tried to change her mind, but she had held her guns. Blood was thicker than water, her mother always used to say. And Ann Valentine's open dislike of her would eventually lead to a showdown. She didn't want to force Charles to choose between her and his mother. Look what happened to Pat when
she
had to choose.

“I saw you talking with Kevin Nash,” Susan said to Elyse. “What's he up to these days?”

“Oh, he lives up in Rogers Park. He . . . he works for a pest control company.”

“Good business. People will always have bugs. What does he do?”

“Actually . . . He goes around spraying people's houses.”

“Oh.” Susan was taken aback. There was nothing wrong with servicing homes for pest control, but she expected Kevin would have done more with himself. His family didn't live in the projects; his father had been a policeman who owned his own home. From the viewpoint of Dreiser residents, the Nashes were well-off. In spite of that, Kevin earned a living doing something anyone coming off the street could do. And it couldn't be much of a living.

“I was surprised to hear that myself,” Elyse said. “I guess he didn't exactly set the world on fire, did he?”

“No, he didn't. But he does provide a vital service.” Susan felt she should say something nice.

“At least he's not without ambition. He plans on opening a Laundromat in the old neighborhood. As he said, a nice, shiny, clean place to make for a pleasant laundry experience.”

“I see.” But Susan
didn't
see. She had nothing against a self-made man. Bruce worked as a stockbroker for a dozen years, socking away every penny he could until he saved enough to start the credit card–processing service that made him wealthy. But he was her husband. Naturally she would defend his motives. But Elyse sounded too defensive of Kevin. Susan couldn't imagine why. Sure, Kevin had always been a nice guy, but Elyse hadn't seen him in years, and it was doubtful she'd ever see him again. She didn't understand why Elyse would want to stick up for someone she had no connection to.

Chapter 13

 

S
usan tooted the horn as she drove off, and she and the children all waved to Elyse and Brontë. She glanced at Quentin and Alyssa in the rearview mirror. Their good-bye waves seemed genuinely affectionate. “Did you have fun, kids?” she asked.

“Yeah. Brontë's fun. She's got neat stuff, too,” Quentin answered.

“Glad to hear it.”

“Mom, why did we have to go home so soon?” Alyssa asked. “I'm hungry.”

“And Miss Elyse invited us to stay for breakfast,” Quentin added.

“Oh, I just felt that, since our staying overnight was so last minute, it would be best if we left first thing in the morning.”

In truth, she wouldn't have minded lingering if it would have made Bruce worry a bit, but Franklin Reavis's demeanor, while not outright rude, wasn't exactly welcoming, either. She had the distinct impression that he was anxious for them to leave, probably so he could question—no, make that interrogate—Elyse about every detail of last night. Franklin looked pretty good for his age, still handsome and fit, with only a smattering of gray in his hair. She wondered if the old boy was having performance anxiety and feared Elyse would step out on him if she got the chance. And Elyse had spent an awful lot of time with Kevin Nash. . . .

Susan told herself that was silly. Elyse talked to Kevin because if she hadn't, she would have been sitting by herself. Grace had been off with one of the Wade brothers, Pat had circulated most of the night, and of course she'd been with Charles. She entertained that awful thought about Elyse only because of her own bad behavior. All during the ride home early this morning she allowed herself to relive the feel of Charles's warm lips against her cheek, savored what he'd said to her about his reasons for never marrying. Worst of all, she remembered how they used to burn up the sheets so many years before. She'd fallen asleep last night with the thought of his arms holding her close, of her shuddering in ecstasy and crying out in release. She scolded herself for allowing herself to dream of another man when she had a husband, but she couldn't deny that the memories made her happy.

As with any marriage, no one outside the household really knows what kind of problems a married couple has. Anyone who looked at her and Bruce would swear they were the ideal pair. The truth was, of course, quite different.

She looked forward to hearing what Bruce would have to say about her little impromptu outing when she got home.

 

 

“We're back,” she called out as she followed the kids inside the house.

No one answered. “Daddy's not up yet,” Quentin reported from the upstairs landing. “Your bedroom door is still closed.”

For a wild moment she considered the possibility that Bruce had a woman up there with him. No, she decided, he'd never do that. If he was cheating—and there seemed little question that he was—he'd do everything possible to keep her from finding out. Besides, she'd told him they'd be back first thing in the morning.

“I'll go in and see if he's up,” she said. “You guys go wash up and change your clothes. We'll go out to breakfast as soon as Daddy and I get ready.”

She watched in amusement as her son and daughter raced each other to the bathroom they shared. She waited until they were safely out of the way before slipping into her bedroom.

Bruce was stretched out in the center of their king-sized bed, snoring loudly.

He looked so sweet and innocent, and Susan couldn't help smiling at him. Memories of good times they'd spent together rushed at her like an ocean wave, wiping out the thoughts she'd had of Charles Valentine like so much sand. There were so many good things to remember about Bruce.

They met on a short flight from Detroit to Milwaukee, eight years after she broke it off with Charles and moved in with her mother and stepfather in Kenosha, Wisconsin. At first they chatted across the aisle, and then they changed seats when it became apparent the flight would not be full. After deplaning, they found an airport lounge and stopped in for a couple of drinks and some chicken wings.

They went on their first date that Saturday, and from then on they were inseparable. It amazed Susan how quickly their relationship progressed. Love had eluded her since her breakup with Charles so many years before, and she was now thirty-two. Her younger sister Sherry was already married with children, and Susan spent more and more time fearing that she'd walked away from her only shot at love and happiness, that giving up Charles Valentine meant she'd never get another chance; and then suddenly she and Bruce were madly in love.

She finally walked down the aisle at the somewhat advanced age of thirty-six, flanked by both her parents, who managed to put aside their animosity for the day and unite in pride for their firstborn. Susan felt she was too old to have a traditional bridal party and opted to have Sherry as her matron of honor, with Sherry's two daughters as her flower girls. She and Sherry, three years younger, had never gotten along particularly well—Susan disapproved of Sherry's choice to associate exclusively with white people, plus she suspected that Sherry hid her racial background. Susan tended to be a loner and hadn't formed any close friendships since her childhood. She still kept in contact with the three girls she'd grown up with, but after leaving Chicago she spoke to them only sporadically. If she had to choose just one of them to be in her wedding it would be Pat, but she didn't want to hurt Elyse or Grace's feelings, nor did she want a large number of attendants. Besides, choosing Sherry made her mother happy. She'd always wanted her two girls to be close.

Susan prayed her father would stay off the bottle long enough to come and thus make her bridal party a true family affair, and to her relief he did.

Frances and David Bennett had bravely defied the norm by getting married, a move white men rarely did with black women in the mid-1950s. They met on the job at the hospital where he worked as an X-ray technician and she as a nurse. David Bennett was about the only white man who lived in Dreiser, as Chicago's public housing was strictly segregated. Dreiser had been built specifically for blacks, although a smattering of Hispanics got in as well.

But David's drinking began to get out of hand when his two daughters were still small, and their home life consisted of loud late-night arguments between husband and wife. Eventually Frances threw him out, and life quieted down. Frances moved out of the projects after Sherry graduated from high school, settling in Kenosha, across the Wisconsin state line. A few years later she remarried, this time to a black man, Sam McMillan. David, who'd never remarried, always stayed in their lives, and even now Susan checked on him weekly and went to see him at his apartment in Libertyville every so often. Sherry, who lived closer, saw him more frequently. He still drank occasionally, but kept reasonably busy in his retirement and even had a girlfriend, a white woman in her late sixties who didn't seem fazed by his marriage to a black woman and his racially mixed offspring.

For a long time Susan and Bruce had a good marriage. A strong one, too, she believed. Then came her cancer diagnosis, her lumpectomy, and radiation treatment. It had been her plan to have plastic surgery to correct the shape of her right breast, but she was tired of doctors' offices and medications, the whole thing. She also feared that further intervention, even a fairly minor one, might spur aggressive growth of a still-hidden offshoot of her tumor. Besides, surely a little cone-shaped protrusion on the outer side of her breast couldn't come between her and Bruce.

When Susan realized the truth, she felt like she'd been floored by a punch to the belly. As she lay in bed night after night with a foot and a half between her and Bruce, she remembered newly married female celebrities who'd released interviews with statements like, “Nothing can ever break us apart,” and “I've finally found my soul mate, and we'll be together forever.” How embarrassing it must have been for them to have to eat their words after their marriage collapsed, admitting that they were in trouble almost from the beginning, and that their husband cheated, refused to work, or spent all their money. But those marriages usually lasted only a few years. She and Bruce had just celebrated their thirteenth anniversary last September when a routine mammogram revealed an abnormality. Thirteen years. If her husband had been so superficial all along, surely she would have noticed it before then. Maybe it was something psychological?

Susan confided in her doctor, who told her that Bruce's reaction wasn't all that uncommon, that many men had difficulty when their wives were diagnosed with female cancers. She suggested a counselor for them to see together, but Bruce refused to go. There was no need, he insisted.

“Bruce, you don't touch me anymore,” Susan objected. “Of
course
there's a need. Our marriage is in trouble. We have to
do
something.”

He continued to refuse, but after that he made more of an effort to resume their sex life. Every seven or ten days, and only when she was covered from the waist up.

On the surface everything seemed normal. There was no shouting, like what had gone on between her own parents. Bruce steadfastly denied having another woman in his life. He said he was merely getting older, and it was natural for their sex life to slow down a bit. He went off to work every day, she stayed home, drove the children to school and picked them up, using the hours in between to keep the house clean and well-stocked and the bills paid. But a vital part of her life was missing, and she wasn't happy.

Seeing Charles Valentine again made her more aware of that than ever.

Susan still loved Bruce, but she wasn't blind. She didn't believe his repeated claims that he wasn't having an affair. Her husband enjoyed sex too much to be satisfied with three or four times a month.

She knelt on the bed and gently shook him awake. His eyes flew open, and his handsome face looked almost comical with its wide-eyed, startled expression.

“Relax. It's not a stickup.” It occurred to her that he might have been dreaming of some woman with perfectly formed breasts, and she added with a touch of sarcasm, “It's just your wife and kids.”

He broke into a grin. “Hey! You're back early.”

He looked and sounded glad to see her. She forced herself to keep her optimism in check; she'd been fooled too many times before by what turned out to be false hope. “I thought I'd treat everyone to breakfast. I feel I owe the kids something special for being such good sports. I had no idea when I left here yesterday that we'd be spending the night at Elyse's.”

“That must have been rough for them, with no kids their age there. But I guess there's always TV.”

“Actually, they both said they had a good time with Elyse's daughter, even though she's nineteen. I told them to go get washed up, but I'm going to take a quick shower. Would you—” She broke off once she realized she'd been about to ask if he wanted to join her. His being glad to see her was one thing. Taking a shower required her to be naked, and Bruce initiated sex only if her torso was covered. His actions made it abundantly clear that he had no interest in her from the waist up.

Acting on a sudden instinct, she swiftly reached below the covers for his groin. Her fingers closed around his erect penis. The muscle surged against her palm, like it had a life of its own. It hardly felt like the sex organ of a man over the hill. Hell. The way it twitched, it felt like it was about to start dancing. And why not? She and Bruce used to make love in the morning all the time....

“Go on and take your shower,” he murmured, his eyes closed.

She snatched her hand away like he'd slapped it.

Tears ran down her face as she washed her body in the shower. Her own husband couldn't bear for her to touch him. How pitiful was that?

She washed her face, scrubbing away all traces of tears and patting it dry. She had to put up a brave front for the sake of Quentin and Alyssa. If this is the way Bruce wanted it, then that was the way it had to be. But she did have, if not an out, at least a diversion.

She had Charles Valentine's cell phone number tucked in her wallet, behind her credit cards.

 

 

Elyse didn't have to wait long for Franklin to begin his inquisition. She had just come back into the house after waving good-bye to Susan when he said, “So, was it really worth it to drive into Chicago twice and risk your life for those people?”

“Stop exaggerating, Franklin. I hardly risked my life. You make it sound like the South Side is a war zone.”

“It's a high-crime area, Elyse.”

“And I'm a product of that high-crime area. I don't think it would be right for me to forget about that, just because we live in this lily-white suburb. It's part of me. That's why Susan brought her kids. She wanted them to see that plenty of kids out there don't live in mansions on the banks of Lake Michigan.”

“You and your friends all did well, but it's been forty years since you lived there. I doubt that the people living in those projects now will do anything with their lives.”

“That's the image Pat is trying so hard to fight. She says that the middle class and upper-middle class, and even the wealthy, view people living in the projects as caught in a hopeless web of poverty, drug use, and crime. Years ago, the projects were just a stepping stone to better things, even if you had to live there for fifteen or twenty years. You didn't stay there forever. We all made it out, but Pat lost both her brothers to the streets, Clarence to drugs and Melvin to gun crossfire.”