Reunion (27 page)

“That’s money,” Blue had said. “It’s different.”

“I heard how you described that place. It was love, and so is this.
Embrace
happiness, don’t resist it. You might not live longer, but you’ll live better.”

Embrace happiness. That’s what she was trying to do, and everything was getting all muddied up.

She arrived in the studio’s lobby as Marcy was on her way out. Marcy
stopped and set her shoulder bag on an armchair. “I was just about to call you. Julian says Mitch is stuck at the airport—his airport, that is. His plane’s been sitting on the tarmac for two hours and now they’re going back to the terminal. He may not be able to get here tonight. Meantime, Julian’s in the lab. I said I’d send you in.”

“Why did you do that?”

Marcy frowned at her. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“Never mind. Where are you off to?”

“Dinner and dancing.” She did a twirl with an imaginary partner. “It’s unbelievable, I feel like I’m twenty-five again. If your man gets here tonight, give me a call. You can come join us.”

Blue said, “My man? Let’s not jump the gun, here.”

“Oh, let’s.”

“He’s in a relationship I’m not certain he wants to be out of, and I’m—I just feel so …”

“So …?”

Blue set her bag down and unbuttoned her suede jacket. “I love the idea of reconnecting with him. He looks good, he’s kind, he’s smart. There’s not a single thing about him I dislike … Maybe I’ve forgotten how to be eager about a man.” Whereas she was perfecting the practice of being anxious.

“I doubt you’ve forgotten. You’ll see.”

“It used to be so easy—didn’t it? Remember how it was when we were living in the rental house?”

“And where that got you,” Marcy said.

“Besides that. Guys were always coming by, we were always laughing—”

“We were always stoned.”

“We were having fun. I need to find that groove you were talking about that night in Key West.”

Marcy kissed her on the cheek. “Step One is admitting you have a problem.”

“What’s Step Two?”

“Umm …”

“Believe in a greater power,” Julian said from the hallway behind the reception desk, where he was walking toward them.

“Right,” Blue said. How much had he heard? She began to ad-lib, “So, Marcy, tell Peter to go ahead and, er, book Britney for that week. In November. Fall sweeps, you know.” She smiled at Julian, praying Marcy had caught on.

Marcy said, “Gotcha.” She headed for the door. “Blue, don’t forget you have that museum thing tomorrow. Your dress is already done—did you see it? It should have been delivered yesterday.”

“Which dress is it?” She could barely recall that she had an event the next day, let alone what she was wearing to it.

“The black Balenciaga. With the fringe and the sequins—it’s that sexy above-the-knee look you do so well.”

“Not if what Jeremy says is true.”

“Which is—?”

“That I’m liable to start mooing at any moment.”

“Cut back on the grass,” Marcy said with a wink. “Okay, I’m off.”

They watched Marcy leave, watched the security guard lock the doors behind her.

“Jeremy?” Julian asked.

“My personal trainer.” Why did saying it that way sound so pretentious?

“He’s an idiot. You look healthy and beautiful.”

Though he’d said it plainly, a statement of fact, she felt herself blush. “Thanks. Any further word from your dad?”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t look promising, though.”

Which left her here with Julian, who looked as intense as usual and as appealing as ever in blue jeans and a white button-down shirt, un-tucked. Except for security, the lobby was empty around them. She picked up her bag and held it in front of her like a shield. “Think he’ll be happy with the finished pilot?”

“I think so.” He didn’t offer to screen it for her, and she didn’t ask if he would.

“Good.”

“Yeah.” He pushed his hands into his pockets and began to say, “So I guess I’m going to—” just as Blue was saying, “I have some work I’d better—”

“Oh—My phone’s buzzing, hang on.” He took it from his pocket and answered. “Hello?”

She listened, knew it was Mitch when Julian said, “Not at all, huh? What about tomorrow? Well, even if not, it’s a digital file; I can send it to you electronically and we can talk while you watch.” A long pause, then, “Actually, she’s right here. Sure, hold on.” He handed the Black-Berry to her, saying, “He wants to talk to you.”

“Hi,” she said to Mitch. “The luck’s all bad tonight, huh?”

“My plane’s grounded and I can’t find another flight. Strictly speaking, I guess I don’t
have
to get there at all. But,” she heard him draw a deep breath, “I thought it might be nice to get together,” he said in a rush. “So if you have time tomorrow evening—”

This was a surprise. “I wish I did. I have some benefit gala for one of the museums, Marcy just reminded me.”

“Ah. Well, I own a tux—as you may recall.”

“In fact I do.” She turned away from Julian and began walking toward the reception desk. “I didn’t tell them I’d be bringing a guest, but—”

“I was kidding; I’d never foist myself on you that way.”

“No, I know that… but, if you think you’d like to join me, why don’t we plan on it?” Dinner and dancing. A pretty dress, a tux … The association with that long-ago New Year’s party was irresistible. “Let me call you later with the details, all right? Will you be home?” A coded question for, Will you be with Brenda?

“Call me at home, that’d be great.”

“I will.” She turned around, saying, “I have a few things I need to do while I’m here, so let me give you back to Julian.” She handed off the phone with a quick wave to Julian, and walked away without looking back.

When she got to her office, she closed the door and leaned against it. The wall of windows displayed Chicago’s skyline, lights glowing
against the darkening sky. It was a wonderful view, and familiar. There was safety in what was familiar. Comfort, too. Though she may not have spent time with Mitch over the past two decades, he’d existed for her, he’d lived inside that soft space of memory reserved for first loves. The way he’d sounded on the phone suggested she occupied a similar sort of space for him.

She had not been his very first; that was one of his high school girlfriends. The one before Renee, who’d broken his heart and left him vulnerable to Renee’s more insidious affections. Heartbreak. It was a catapult, launching people into ill-advised actions and unfortunate outcomes; didn’t she know that too well?

With the perspective of distance and time, she understood better why Mitch had rejected her—the timing was all wrong. If the past two weeks had shown her anything, it was that the timing was now all right—or nearly. For all her doubts, fate seemed to be persistently lining them up.

Step Two: Believe in a greater power.

She had not been a believer. Maybe it was time to put her faith in that force and let go.

itch was out of bed at four thirty am for his rescheduled-for-noon flight. It had taken him forever to get to sleep last night, then when he did finally sleep, it was fitfully and for too few hours.

He’d had no business suggesting he go with Blue to the fund-raiser tonight. The words had jumped out of his mouth like oil from a fry pan—and Brenda was none too happy about the resulting burn. He’d done the right thing, confessing to her when he’d called to say his flight was canceled. “I have to tell you,” he said, “I think maybe something is going on with Blue and me.” He told her about the date he’d made and she said, “How am I supposed to compete with that?”

In his mind, no contest existed. There was Blue, distinct and luminous, and there was Brenda, as lively and engaging a presence in his life as the books he loved. To compare the two women was like comparing Hemingway to Nabokov; he admired them both, differently. He told Brenda this, and she’d said, “Good luck sleeping with either one of them.”

Then there was Julian, whose terseness on the phone last night after hearing Mitch’s plans made it clear he was no fan of Blue’s, and didn’t think Mitch should be, either. He’d said, “This whole situation is out of hand. You shouldn’t have taken her offer to help with
Lions
, and you shouldn’t be going with her to that party.”

Mitch wasn’t entirely surprised—this was Julian, after all. “Look, J, I appreciate your concern, but I disagree.”

“Suppose for whatever reason no
Lions
deal works out,” Julian said.
“You get resentful, she thinks you used her, she blackballs you—there are any number of scenarios. I don’t like it.”

Julian’s displeasure was like storm clouds gathered and waiting along the horizon. Mitch was keeping an eye on the horizon. Watching it with his peripheral vision. Glancing at it, from time to time, over his shoulder while running headlong into things like altered filming schedules, options possibilities, and museum benefit galas. You didn’t have to hide from iffy weather, you just had to keep tabs on it.

Today’s flight departed on schedule. Smooth air in a clear sky, the Carolina foothills falling away beneath him. He spent the two-hour trip reading
Newsweek
and
Forbes
so that tonight he would be informed and articulate on more than the matter of symbolism in “Hills Like White Elephants.”

By three o’clock central time, he was sitting on Julian’s ancient, dusty sofa watching himself on a thirteen-inch laptop computer monitor. It had gotten damaged when Julian was traveling and no longer displayed any red tones. He looked like Martian Mitch in the jungle; the effect was sobering.

“Don’t worry. It’ll play fine on any functional monitor,” Julian was saying. “The LCD and plasmas will make you look more life-like even than life. Focus on the content. I can always go back and cut or add, or rearrange. I think, though, that it’s pretty solid.”

Mitch agreed. Julian had taken the basic footage of him in the Hemingway Home and woven in Key West images, interview footage, archival audio and video, anything he could find that they could use without having to pay.

“It’s brilliant,” Mitch said when it was over. “Forget still photography—you should focus on this, you’re a genius at it.”

Julian closed the laptop and stood up. “Thanks—I think.” He was barefoot and unshaven and wore a clay-toned T-shirt with a Hebrew phrase on the front.
Kol tuv
, it read, which he’d said meant
Everything Good.

“I didn’t mean that like it sounded. I was trying to say how impressed
I am with your work. I can’t think of a thing I want to change.” Except how difficult it still sometimes was to communicate with Julian; he was so literal. “What time is it now?” He squinted at his watch. “Almost four …” Blue’s driver would be there at six. “I need to shower, and I’ve got some spiffing up to do if I want to look like a suitable date for Blue.”

Julian looked tired, or just moody, maybe, standing there picking at a callous on his palm. “She’s mortal like the rest of us, you know.”

“It’s not that. Well—it
is
that, a little, but it’s more about how we haven’t spent any real time together in twenty-plus years. I feel like I know her, and yet I also feel like I don’t.” They’d each led very full, very different lives after all. “And,” he laughed, “it’s been forever since I’ve attended any kind of a dance.”

Julian went into the kitchen, saying, “Did you remember to buy her a corsage?”

“Oh, damn, am I supposed to?” He had no idea what the social protocols were these days. Literary gatherings, or the ones he attended at any rate, demanded little more than a sports jacket, a bottle of red wine, and familiarity with the most current issue of
Southern Literary Journal.

“Dad,” Julian said from the kitchen doorway, “that was a joke. I highly doubt this is a corsage-type event.”

“No, you’re probably right. Still, flowers would be good, don’t you think?”

His son shrugged and turned back to his task. “I’ve got some Chivas. Want a shot?”

Mitch shook his head. “But I’d be eternally grateful if you’d hunt down a little bouquet while I get ready.”

Julian poured whisky into a tumbler and took a sip before answering. “There’s no place to buy flowers around here, sorry.”

“Are you sure? I mean, you’ve been gone awhile. Maybe there’s—”

“Nope.”

“Not even a grocery store? All my local stores have floral departments.”

“We’re in urban South Chicago.”

“Well, even so, there must be a florist near here.”

Julian shook his head.

“You’re certain? What about, I don’t know, one of those little sidewalk vendors?”

Julian’s expression was unreadable. His tone, when he spoke, was careful and cool. “Why are you so desperate to bring her flowers? Not only do you already have a great girlfriend, you’re here getting all worked up about trying to impress a woman who has seen it all. Who
has
it all. You could give her flowers every hour all day long for a year and she’d only find it quaint. You’re an English professor, you earn eighty thousand a year. Nothing you can bring her, nothing you can
do
for her, is going to make any serious impression.”