Sweet Love (32 page)

Aunt Charlotte is such a presence these days, even I’m beginning to think of her as flesh and blood.

“Don’t you wish you could push me down those and be done with it?” she says when we pass the stairs. “One push and all our problems solved.”

“Oh, come on, Mom. Stop talking like that. You’re not a problem.”

“Yes, I am.”

But then she has to ride the elevator with a fat man’s butt at eye level. This is no way for her to live, I think. She shouldn’t have to put up with this or being wheeled everywhere, eating puréed food, unable to read or even take care of herself in the bathroom. Not her.

Just the other day she was weeding the garden and making peach cobblers. Where is that woman? Where did she go?

There is a tapping on my left hand. It’s Mom.

“Don’t worry, Julie. This, too, shall pass.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

...
good night, sweet friend: Thy love ne’er alter till thy sweet life end!

—A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM, ACT II, SCENE 2

For the sake of Mom (and Aunt Charlotte) I set up Paul and Liza by offering to take Paul out for a farewell beer at Bukowski’s Tavern in Inman Square. Bukowski’s is a dive that works at being a dive and hardly the place to meet a blind date. He’ll never suspect.

But I’m wrong. As it turns out, wrong on a couple of levels.

“How’s this? Is the white shirt, pressed jeans good enough?” he asks as we approach Bukowski’s flaming dark door.

“Good enough for what?”

“Your old pal Liza Librecz. I know that’s what you’re up to. Mom’s been after me about her, too, and with this being my last night in town it had to be a setup.”

“Then why did you come?”

He shrugs. “It’s for Mom and, hell, ninety-nine beers. With that kind of selection, I could be happy sitting across from Rosie O’Donnell.”

Something about Paul’s adolescent shrug, his lanky walk, and the youthful way he pushes back his graying hair reminds me of Michael. Two men who were playmates now grown up and single. I guess being a boy was so great, neither of them wanted to quit it.

Inside, the music is way too loud as we search for three empty stools at the bar. Murals of Charles Bukowski and Anaïs Nin line the walls to emphasize that this is a writer’s bar for hard-drinking (not necessarily hard-working) writers.

Liza has happily claimed four. Two with her shoes. One with her scarf.

Four?

“Fancy meeting you here,” she says, twirling around, playing innocent. “My what a surprise. And who is this handsome man?”

“And who is this stunning beauty? Wait. I know you. You’re Julie’s little friend all grown up,” Paul exclaims, kissing her on either cheek.

What’s up with these two? They’re acting like old friends and yet it’s been years since they’ve seen each other.

“Have a seat, Julie.” Liza pushes Paul down on one and pats the other for me. “You make a decision about that Parisian snob’s offer yet?”

“Not quite. I’m still thinking about it,” I say. “Who are you saving the other seat for?”

“Because if you work for him, I swear to God our friendship is over. Unless he calls and asks me out. Then it’s fine.”

“He’ll ask you out,” I tell her. “He said he would. I think you really flipped his switch.”

“That’s not the question. The question is can he flip mine. And I think we both know what switch I’m talking about.”

Paul taps her on the shoulder. “Excuse me. I hope you’re not discussing another man in front of me, your so-called blind date. Who is this interloper?”

“My potential future boss, Rene D’Ours.”

“Him?” Paul acts disgusted. “But he’s all French and hairy—at least according to his cookbook photo.”

“So are bichons frises and they’re sorta cute in a furry football kind of way.” Liza leans forward, trying to get the bartender’s attention with a wave.

Again, I ask, “Who’s the other seat for?”

The bartender slides down, cracks a couple of jokes, and asks us what we’ll have. Paul asks Liza what she’s drinking.

“Czechva,” she shouts because, amazingly, the music’s gotten even louder. “It’s pretty good. I drank it when I was in Romania, the land of my people.”

“That’s right. You’re a Gyspy, aren’t you?” Paul sticks out his hand. “Read my palm, Gypsy.”

Liza squints and holds it up to what little light there is. “It says you’re going to meet a tall, dark, and handsome man.”

“Oh. But I like the other kind.”

What is going on with these two? It’s as if I’ve stepped into a play and everyone has the script but me.

“And . . . ,” Paul nudges.

“And,” Liza says, “he’s standing right behind your sister.”

I’ve been set up.

Even before I turn or feel his hand on my shoulder, I know he’s there.

“Hey!” Paul exclaims, hopping off the stool to give Michael’s hand a vigorous shake and pat on the back. “How are you, man? Long time no see.”

I glance sideways at Liza, who ever so slightly arches a brow. “You fink,” I mouth.

“Never forget. I’m always one step ahead of you,” she says.

Behind me, Paul is introducing Liza, though she needs no introduction. I’m being rude, keeping my back to him, but I don’t dare turn around. Oh, cripes. This is so typical of Liza. Always a surprise. Always a scheme.

“And last, but certainly not least,” Paul says, “Julie.”

“Hi, Julie,” Michael says.

Twirling around, I say levelly, “Hi.”

He’s let his hair go, just like he did at the Cape, and he’s wearing a navy T-shirt that I complimented him on because it brought out the muscles in his shoulders. But it’s that intense look of his, those dark brown eyes, that get me every time.

As much as I don’t want to admit it, as much as I never wanted to admit it, I’m still in love.

“Say!” Paul holds up his watch. “Look at the time. Have you had dinner, Liza?”

“Why, no, I haven’t,” she replies with exaggerated enthusiasm. “Would you like to accompany me to the nearest quiet bistro before our eardrums explode?”

“That sounds grand. I assume, Michael, that you can take my sister home. Liza and I need to take separate cars since I have to get up in the morning for a very early flight.”

Michael, never lifting his gaze, says, “That’s fine.”

“No problem,” I add. “I’ll take the bus.”

“Do you want to tell me what I did wrong? Or are you going to leave me to guess for another thirty years?” Michael follows me outside to the humid August night. “Why haven’t you returned my calls?”

I keep walking, confused and unsure what to do. Here, I’d gotten my life in order by squaring my mother away at a nursing home and arranging for Donald to take Em two weeks out of the month if necessary. I was this close to officially quitting my job at WBOS and saying yes to D’Ours now that there was no other reason to stay here because Michael was marrying Carol. I was about to take a huge risk for a new adventure . . .

. . . and suddenly he comes back.

“Please, Julie. At least give me a clue, because the last I knew we were on the Cape having a great time with great sex and then, yes, I know your mother fell ill, but it’s something else since then. I can’t understand it.”

We’ve arrived at his BMW convertible, top down. “Can you take me home? ’Cause the bus sucks.”

“I’d be glad to. But . . . let’s go someplace. I’d really like to talk, just the two of us.”

He means no Em. “Em’s at a friend’s house. We can talk there.”

The drive home is excruciatingly tense until, unable to stand it anymore, I say, “I turned down Kirk’s offer to join the national election team, you know.”

Michael nods. “I gathered as much with your mother falling . . .”

“My decision had nothing to do with my mother.” We’re parked at a light on Mass. Ave. Students stroll the night sidewalks of Harvard Square, young and unencumbered, never realizing that the choices they take for granted—whom to sleep with, what to do with their days, even what to eat—will narrow and narrow until there’s no choice at all. Only obligation.

“I didn’t accept Kirk’s offer,” I say, “because of you.”

The light changes and Michael idles for a second before accelerating. “Why me?”

“Exactly. I shouldn’t have expected you’d understand, considering you’re satisfied to be a loner. Though I guess that’s changing, isn’t it?”

He must not have heard that last jab, because he says, “Do you mean you turned down that incredible opportunity just because you thought we had a future?”

“Would you like for me to hammer it in granite?” I throw up my hands, as if I could throw off the feelings of embarrassment and anger. “Yes. There it is. After all those conversations we had about me having a crush on you when I was a kid and you searching for your true fucking love followed by your bursting into dessert class with an impulsive invitation to the Cape and then our weekend of wild, passionate sex, forgive me for thinking that maybe, just maybe, we had a future together.”

Michael says, “But I . . .”

“And then,” I add, almost hysterically, “we’re driving back from the Cape and you pick up your messages and there’s Carol—gorgeous Carol— murmuring in her sexy murmur.”

“How did you hear . . .”

“So you don’t deny it! You’re just a lothario or a gigolo or one of those Os, aren’t you, Michael? Good looks. Big Ivy League degree. Fancy German car. Slick job as a consultant.”

I’m on a roll, a train thundering down the track that cannot be stopped.

“And now, I hear you and Carol are engaged. Engaged! What’s wrong, did I fail the Cape Cod test? Was I so lousy in bed you decided, eh, Carol’s better and you passed on curtain number two and went with curtain number one?”

“Geesh, Julie. Will you shut up! You’re acting crazy. I am not engaged to Carol. Not even close.”

He swings up our road speeding so fast I fear for the Hatchett twins next door, who might be out hopscotching, and zips it into a space in front of my house.

“You’re not?” I say. “But you two did go out last Friday night, right?”

He bangs his head against the steering wheel. “Are you always this insanely jealous?”

“When a man I’ve been sleeping with goes out with another woman the next weekend? Yeah. I get mildly upset.”

“Here’s the thing with Carol. She’s nothing. She’s barely a friend. I feel sorry for her, okay? She’s a lonely woman with a lot of personal problems and I’ve been trying to protect her privacy by not announcing them to the whole world.”

“So, let me get this straight. No Carol.”

“Right. No Carol.” He smiles. “Feel better?”

I think about this. “Not exactly. Because you were still willing to let me go to D.C., as if you didn’t care.”

“What the hell do you want from me?” he says. “Did you want me to say, no, Julie, you may not fulfill your life’s goals just because we had sex for twenty-four hours?”

“Yeah. Something along those lines.”

“Then what was all that grief you gave me for telling Bledsoe to fuck himself? You looked like you were about to cry when you were recounting that. As if I ruined your whole life because I refused to answer some nosy corporate question Bledsoe had no business asking.”

“That was different.”

He shakes his head like this is a complicated mystery. “I don’t get it. I try to go out of my way to be supportive of your career and then I’m shot down.”

“Look, this is not Zeno’s paradox, Michael. It’s—”

“That’s exactly what it is,” he interjects. “During this entire argument, it’s as if I’ve been running to keep up with you, but to do that I need to run a half more than I did before and then run half of that, etcetera, until I’m back where I started.”

So
that’s
Zeno’s paradox. I never quite knew. “I was going to say, it’s not a puzzle. It’s love.”

Michael says, “Love.”

“Yes.” Might as well get it out and over with. “I love you. I always have and I always will and if you didn’t get the hint over our lobster dinner, you lunkhead, I am your true love. Not some little pixie you’re going to meet down the road. Big ol’ me.”

With a quizzical expression, he says, “How do you know?”

“I just do. Sorry, there’s no formula or a text you can consult for the exact specifications of a soul mate, but I’m it. And now I’m going to get out of the car and go upstairs and make a phone call I should have made days ago. Thanks for the lift.”

With that, I get out and march across the street to my house, where I pick up the phone and call the number of Rene D’Ours.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Lois and Teenie and Em promise to keep vigil over Mom while I’m in L.A. Still, I don’t sleep well the night before. I’m too worried about all the responsibility I’m leaving behind and about the next crisis. Mom used to say once you had children you were never free, but this is worse than two a.m. feedings or staying up to make sure Em gets home.

This is my mother here. The only mother I’ll ever have.

Therefore, on my way to the airport I make a last-minute decision to stop by Mt. Olive—a risky move since my flight leaves at nine-thirty and, considering Boston traffic, I’m cutting it close by slipping in right before visiting hours are over.

Dad has left and the nurses tell me they’ve changed Mom’s sheets and given her a bath. “Nice and fresh,” says Amy, a young LPN with a bouncy step and a bouncy brown ponytail as we head down the hall. “Your mom told me it reminded her of being a baby, all clean and fed and put to bed. Isn’t that sweet?”

I feel a prickle and brush it off as nerves. Among other problems, I’m not a very good flier.

“Hi, Julie! How nice of you to wish me good night,” Mom singsongs as I tiptoe into the room to find her nestled amid sparkling white sheets tucked in good. She’s sounding better than I’ve heard her since the stroke. Light and airy. Even her slurring has cleared up to some degree.