The Carlton Club (50 page)

Eric told her, slowly, painfully, his voice full of loss and regret.

“Victoria is such a shrew!” Charlie exclaimed as Eric told her.

“No she isn’t. She never was. This was all my fault. My own stupidity.”

“Were you going to tell her?”

“Of course. Sometime. Sometime when she was rested and I was rested and we had some time together.”

“That sounds like never.”

“I was going to tell her, Charlie,” Eric repeated firmly.

“Well, anyway, now she knows. Is she angry?” Charlie still hadn’t learned anything that could explain the look on his face or the tone in his voice.

“She’s hurt and angry. She won’t see me. She says it’s over.”

“It doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes sense to Leslie. And she’s the only one who counts.”

“Why?”

“She says she can’t trust me. She says that by not sharing something so important I made my relationship with her unimportant. She says that she doesn’t know me.”

Charlie thought about the blood-framed blue eyes that glowered at a prying television camera. Proud, astonished, indignant eyes. Leslie had her own standards, her own rules.

“What are you going to do?” Charlie asked carefully.

“There is absolutely nothing I can do,” Eric said, his voice empty, defeated. “Except to hope that some day she changes her mind.”

Charlie waited for three weeks before telling Robert. Charlie was waiting to see if Leslie came back. She didn’t.

She isn’t going to, Charlie thought. How do I feel about it?

When she knew the answer to that question she told Robert.

Charlie telephoned him at his home in Philadelphia on a Wednesday evening in February.

“What are you doing?” she asked as she always asked. She loved his answers. He usually said he was thinking about her. Or them. Together.

“I was wondering if I could pass the California Bar.”

“Really?”

“Really. What are you doing?”

“Calling to tell you that I miss you. And to tell you about Eric and Leslie.”

Robert knew from her tone that the news about Eric and Leslie wasn’t good. He listened, without interrupting, until she had finished.

“How long ago did Victoria tell Leslie?”

“Four weeks,” Charlie said. Then she added carefully, because he had to know, “I’ve known about it for about three weeks.”

Charlie waited for him to ask the question: Why didn’t you tell me, Charlie? There had been plenty of opportunities in the past three weeks for Charlie to tell Robert. They had spent all three weekends together and talked to each other almost daily.

The silence was so long that Charlie finally answered the unspoken question.

“I didn’t tell you right away because I didn’t want to worry you. I thought Leslie might come back.”

“I wouldn’t have worried about Leslie and Eric,” Robert said firmly.
Not nearly as much as I would
have worried about you and Eric
. Would Charlie want to try one more time with Eric?

Charlie knew what Robert meant. And she knew that the fact that she hadn’t told him right away meant that she was uncertain herself.

Charlie knew that she had to be certain before she told Robert, and she was telling him now.

“Do you know what I was wondering?” she asked softly, finally, after several moments of silence.

“No,” he said sharply.

“I was wondering if I could pass the Pennsylvania Bar.”

“You have to be very sure, Charlie,” Robert said. “I will not compete with my son.”

“I am very sure. I love you, Robert. I love
you.”

“Where are you, Mrs. MacMillan?” Ross asked, relieved to hear Janet’s voice. It was six-thirty in the evening on the last Saturday in March. He had been at the theater all day. She called fifteen minutes after he returned to their condominium on Sacramento Street.

“At the house,” Janet said quietly.

“The
house?”
Two hours away. Why was she there? “Is Leslie with you?”

Ross knew that Janet had planned to spend part of the day with Leslie.

“No. I only saw her for a couple of hours.”

“How is she?” Ross asked. How are
you?
Why are you so far away?

“She’s terrible,” Janet said with a sigh. “But she won’t admit it. When the going gets tough, I guess Leslie turns into solid steel. She won’t talk about it. She says she’s fine.”

“But?” Ross asked gently. Leslie’s not fine, he thought. And neither are you. Why?

“She’s devastated. And so restless. She’s like a hummingbird. She has to keep moving.”

“She needs to talk to Eric.”

“I know,” Janet said. Then she added, “But I don’t think she ever will.”

Ross waited. There had to be more. There had to be something to explain why Janet had gone to the house by herself. The house, the green hills, the blue ocean. Janet’s retreat. It was where she went when she needed to be alone.

“Janet?”

“Did you know about Mark?” she asked bluntly.

“Mark?” Ross hadn’t spoken to Kathleen since October. “No. What?”

“He quit medicine,” Janet said flatly.

“Oh,” Ross said. Then he asked sharply, “Don’t you think that if I knew I would have told you?”

“I wasn’t sure.”

“You should be.”

I know I should be, Janet thought. But I’m not sure of anything right now. Too many changes.

“When did he quit?” Ross asked, feigning interest. He wasn’t really interested. Especially if this was what had separated him from his wife.

“Over two months ago. Leslie has known, but she didn’t want to tell me until—”

“Until what?”

“Until she was sure he was OK, I guess. Until she was certain he would make it,” Janet said. Leslie had sounded certain.

“Why wouldn’t he?”

“I don’t know. Anyway, she says he’s fine. Happy.”

A long silence followed.

“What’s wrong, Janet?” Ross asked finally.

He heard her sigh. A long heavy sigh.

“Life just feels so precarious to me at the moment. Too disrupted. Too many changes.”

“Such as?”

“Leslie and Eric. It seems so senseless that this has happened to them,” she said. “And Mark. Even though he’s finally done what will make him happy, I’m sure it’s painful for him. Just thinking about those wasted years, those years of torment.”

“But
we’re
happy, Janet,” Ross interjected confidently.
There is nothing precarious about us, is there?
“Aren’t we?”

“Yes,” Janet said, her voice soft but distant. “Ross?”

“Yes? Tell me, Janet.”

“Do you think we’ll ever have children?” she asked quietly.

“We’ve never talked about it, have we?” he asked gently.

“No. Do you want to have them?”

“Do you?”

“I think so.”

“There’s no hurry, is there?” Ross asked carefully. He sensed that this was an impulsive reaction to the precariousness Janet felt, a need to create something constant and lasting, but she had something constant and lasting already. She had his love.

“No. No hurry. I just wondered,” she said softly. Then she repeated the question she had asked before. “Do you want children, Ross?”

“All I want is you,” Ross said. “I want you now and you’re two hours away. So I’m on my way to be with you.”

“No, Ross. I know that you have script rewrites to do, and I’m exhausted. I need a good night’s sleep starting about now.”

“Janet?”

“Really. I’ll stay here tonight and drive down in the morning. I’ll probably be there before you wake up.”

“Are you OK?”

“Yes. Just a little sentimental or maudlin or something theatrical,” she said, trying to sound amused at her own silliness. “I’ll be fine in the morning. And you’re looking at the stack of script pages you brought home, aren’t you?”

“You know me so well.”

“I’ll see you in the morning,” she whispered. “Goodnight, Ross.”

“Sleep well, my love,” Ross said.

This isn’t right, he thought. This isn’t right at all.

Janet closed her eyes and thought about the events of the day. Seeing Leslie, watching Leslie suffer, made her sad. And hearing about Mark, even though the news was wonderful, made her nostalgic. But it was her own news that made her drive to the house in the country. To think.

At ten in the morning she had called the doctor’s office to get the result of the blood test that had been drawn the afternoon before. It only confirmed what she already knew, what she had known for the past three months. She was pregnant.

How had she known? It wasn’t because she felt ill or missed a period or noticed her breasts enlarging. There were no external signs at all.

But she had known, almost immediately. She had known almost the moment the tiny being inside her had been conceived. She felt its presence, a new and wonderful part of her.

Janet wondered if most women felt the presence of the new life as early as she had. Or was it because this baby was so special?

Janet had come to the house in the country to think about the new life that was growing inside her. What would its life be like? Janet wanted her child to be happy, free of pain, always. But how could she guarantee that? Would all her love really protect her child against life’s sadnesses?

What if her baby was like Leslie? A beautiful happy girl with sapphire-blue eyes and shiny dark hair and a loving heart? Loving and trusting until, one day, her dreams were destroyed and she was forced to suffer. Needlessly. Endlessly.

Or what if her baby was a little boy who, like Mark, believed that he had to be the best? A little boy whose father, Ross, believed in being the best, and whose mother was the best even though she didn’t care. How could the child escape the pressure?

What if his life was almost destroyed, as Mark’s almost had been, by that pressure?

Janet sighed. Oh, little one, she thought, I will do everything I can to make your life happy. I will give you all my love, but you know that, don’t you? You already feel it. Just as I feel you.

What about Ross? All I want is you, he had said. What if Ross didn’t want the baby? Why hadn’t she told him? When was she going to tell him?

I have to tell him, she thought. I have to tell him now.

Ross arrived at the house in the country at nine
P.M.
The house was dark. Janet’s car was gone. He drove to the cottage, but she wasn’t there, either. He returned to the house to wait.

Where is she? he wondered. The worry that had made him—within moments of ending their conversation—grab his car keys and drive, too fast, to their country home increased as he waited in the empty house. Where is she?

At nine-forty-five the telephone rang, startling him.

“Hello?” he answered quickly.

“Ross,” she said. Her voice was soft, loving, distant.

“Where are you?” he asked as relief pulsed through him. “Are you at the condo?”

“It’s sort of
Gift of the Magi
esque, isn’t it?” she asked.

He could hear the smile in her voice.

“I think we’re making progress,” he said gently. He had known it was wrong for them to be apart, and he had gone to her. She had known it and gone to him. The signals weren’t crossed; they were intertwined. The way they should be.

“I know we are,” she said. “Except that you’re there and I’m here.”

“Because we love each other. Because even when something is wrong we need to be together,” Ross said. He was so happy, elated, that Janet had decided to go to him.

“I love you,” she said. Come to me so I can tell you about our baby, she thought.

“I love you, too. Now you stay put and I’ll be there in two hours,” he said amiably. He wasn’t tired, just happy. He added carefully, it was only a guess, “You both stay put.”

“Both?”

“Am I right?”

“Yes,” she breathed. “Is it all right?”

“Yes. Of course. I love you both,” he said tenderly. “I love you both.”

“Are you sure you don’t mind?” Mark asked.

“You know I don’t,” Kathleen answered lovingly.

He did know that she didn’t mind because he knew how much she loved him. Just as Kathleen knew how much Mark loved her.

It was Saturday, May seventh. Friday’s mail had brought an acceptance letter for Mark from Harvard University into the graduate program in English. For the past three months, Mark had been auditing graduate seminars in English literature at Harvard. In that time, Kathleen had watched his wariness and uncertainty about quitting medicine transform into joy and enthusiasm for his new life.

Now he had been admitted into the program at Harvard, and he wondered if Kathleen minded if they stayed in Boston a little longer.

Of course she didn’t mind. Despite the lingering worries, despite the uneasy memory of the epilogue of Mark’s short story, the past few months had been the happiest in Kathleen’s life. She and Mark had fallen in love. Again. Better.

More deeply. More securely, because Mark’s life, his dreams, were more secure.

“You think you can stand three more years in Boston?” he asked as he kissed her neck. They were in bed. It was ten in the morning. It was something else that Kathleen loved about the past few months, the luxury of having him with her.

“I’ll love it,” she said enthusiastically. “This year I’m going to learn how to drive in the snow.”

Kathleen’s energy and vitality had blossomed again, nourished by Mark’s love and his happiness.

“I’ll teach you,” he said.

“Do you think you could tell Harvard that you’ll accept their offer contingent on an agreement that your earliest class of the day is noon?”

“What?” Mark asked, laughing. “I don’t think Harvard sends negotiable offers. Why?”

“Tell them that your wife needs you in bed in the morning,” Kathleen said. “Tell them you have to make love with your wife every day before you can even begin to think about Shakespeare.”

“Every day?”

“Every day,” Kathleen said dreamily. She was getting used to—addicted to—the long wonderful hours in bed with her sensual, romantic husband.

“I
will
tell them that you are my inspiration,” Mark said seriously. “Because you are.”

“Do you know what I would like you to do?” Kathleen asked, suddenly turning to face him, her expression thoughtful.

“Yes,” he teased gently. “I thought I just did it.”

Kathleen was silent, thinking. Maybe she shouldn’t mention it. Everything had been so perfect.

“What, Kathleen?” he asked, concerned by the sudden seriousness in her eyes.

“I’d like you to learn how to swim,” she said quickly, before she lost her courage.
So you can’t ever fall off a boat and drown.

“Oh, Kathleen. I wish you had never read that damned epilogue,” he said. He wasn’t angry, just concerned. “I wrote that part for myself. I needed to. It was part of the process. I had to think about all the possibilities.”

“I know,” she said.

“I am so happy now. I have never been this happy. I never thought I could be this happy. Don’t you know that?”

“Yes.”

“But you want me to learn how to swim,” he said amiably, kissing the tip of her nose.

Kathleen nodded then smiled seductively.

“So when we vacation in Martinique next month you can make love to me in the turquoise blue water.”

“That’s the reason?” he teased. He would take swimming lessons, starting Monday, because he didn’t want her to worry ever again.

Kathleen started to nod, then slowly shook her head. They both knew the real reason.

“But it’s a wonderful dividend, isn’t it?”

Mark nodded. Then he frowned, wondering if he should tell her what he had been thinking about, worrying about.

He should, he decided. It was the way they were going to spend the rest of their lives. Together. Including each other in their dreams and sharing their worries. For better, for worse.

“What, Mark?”

“I’ve been thinking about writing to my father,” he said.

There had been no communication since the snowy night in January four months before when Mark’s father told him it would be better if he were dead.

“Why?” Kathleen asked. But she knew the answer. Mark’s unresolved relationship with his father was a long, troublesome, loose thread.

“Because it still feels awful. It’s probably worse for him than for me. I’ve made it. I’ve escaped and I’m happy.”