The Comfort of Lies (3 page)

juliette&gwynne had a place in the world, she and Gwynne assured each other, even writing lists of the ways they helped women:

• 
Bought shea butter (only grade-A) from women’s collective in Ghana.

• 
Packaging made by a women’s collective in Appalachia.

• 
Donated products to a battered women’s shelter.

Gwynne took an extra long pull from her beer last week, when they’d added that last one, and then said, “Are we really comforting ourselves with this? Providing moisturizer and lipstick to battered women? Jesus, Jules, wouldn’t they rather have a check?”

“I know, I know.” Juliette had leaned back in the cracked leather chair donated from Gwynne’s husband’s law office. Two rooms in Juliette’s falling-apart Waltham house served as the offices for
juliette&gwynne//flush de la beauté. “When we make a ton of money, we’ll give a ton away.”

Maybe someday they’d be rich. She never told anyone, not even Nathan, how she hungered for money. It made her seem like her mother. God save her, Juliette loved things. Well-cut clothes. Thin china. Fat comforters.

All this and healthy, happy children.

First, always first, please, healthy, happy children.

In reaction against her own childhood, Juliette guarded against showing pride. Her mother’s devotion to the sheen of one’s skin and the drape of one’s clothes had resulted in Juliette’s impersonating a woman without narcissism. In truth, it was the opposite. Juliette lacked her mother’s self-confidence, and a shameful amount of her mind was preoccupied with her appearance.

At least, in the case of juliette&gwynne, her secret vice had value. The business was borne of Juliette’s vanity. After giving up her Looks column at
Boston
magazine to stay home with Lucas, and then Max, her addiction to high-end products became impossible to sustain. Nathan’s professor’s salary covered only the basics. She experimented at home, mixing moisturizers from ingredients ranging from frankincense to chamomile, and inventing body scrubs made from sugar, oats, and even coffee grounds.

“Mommy!” Five-year-old Max flew in and leapt on the battered sofa, dislodging papers and product samples. “I’m hungry!” He nestled close to Juliette.

Lucas appeared at the door. “I told you to stay in the playroom.” He grabbed his brother by the shirt collar. “Come on. I’ll get you a granola bar.”

Babysitting money fueled her older son’s enthusiasm, but his attention to the job impressed Juliette, even as she feared that in his zeal he might detach Max’s head from his body. She uncurled Lucas’s fingers from Max’s shirt and smiled. “It’s okay. Let’s all go downstairs. Daddy will be home soon. You guys can draw in the dining room while I make supper.”

Juliette took out the chopped onions, sliced mushrooms, and
diced carrots and cauliflower she’d prepared at seven that morning while Nathan and the kids slept, in anticipation of making mushroom barley soup for dinner. With chicken. Now she took out the plastic containers and lined them up in the order in which she’d sauté them before she added chicken stock.

She cut up chicken breasts, leaving on just enough skin to add depth to the soup without overwhelming Nathan’s heart.

He’d had her heart from the first moment they’d met, when Nathan moved from Brooklyn to the Hudson Valley in upstate New York, where Juliette grew up. He’d come for his first teaching job, working in the sociology department at Bard College. Her father headed the Political Science department.

They’d met at her parents’ annual holiday party at their house in Rhinebeck, a Hudson Valley town that attracted former New Yorkers. Musky men’s cologne vied with the heavy scents of Chanel and Joy. The women either sparkled or were romantic in dusty velvet. Their men wore suits or reindeer sweaters. Juliette stood out in her midthigh-length sapphire dress.

Nathan walked up to her as she stood drinking eggnog and watching her mother work the room. His tie, which from afar looked like blended tones of blue, had Stars of David woven into the cloth.

She reached out and traced one. “Pronouncement?”

“Chanukah gift from my parents.”

“Are they marking you?”

“I’m too far from Brooklyn: they’re warding off
shiksas
bearing tiny gold crucifixes.”

Juliette touched the empty hollow of her throat in some odd reflex. “Lucky me. I’m only half.
Shiksa
, that is.”

He swept his arm toward her parents’ light-crusted tree, so tall that it brushed the ceiling. Garlands laced with red ribbons and crystal snowflakes were intertwined with evergreen on the staircase, visible from where they stood. He touched a soft blonde wave framing her face. “Where in God’s name does your family hide the other half?”

Juliette took his hand. “Come. I’ll show you.”

She took his hand and led him to the quiet library, mercifully free of glitter.

“See?” She pointed to the library mantel where a cobalt glass menorah sat between matching dreidels.

“I don’t imagine you ever played with those.”

Juliette placed a careful finger on the glass. “No.”

She’d rarely played with anything outside her room as a child. Her parents’ home, cared for as though it were a sacred object, was her rival for her parents’ affection, and to Juliette it usually seemed as though the house won. Juliette’s parents seemed to think the house represented them more than their daughter. Why else would she get only benign neglect, while every corner of the house received unremitting attention?

“Do you live here with your parents?” he asked.

“Not since I came home on college vacations.”

“You don’t like Rhinebeck?” he asked.

“There’s not much here, unless you’re involved with Bard.” His hair was thick and straight. Hollywood black.

She slept with him that night.

“You’re besotted,” her mother said the next day when Juliette returned from Nathan’s apartment.

Besotted
. Her mother had found the perfect word. The night with Nathan had been explosive before slowing to billowing softness. She’d been struck and so had he, the two of them barely able to separate that afternoon. The moment Nathan dropped her off, she’d wanted to be back with him.

Juliette smoothed her rumpled party dress. “You’re right.”

Her mother removed lint from Juliette’s hem. “Don’t let him see that—not now. It gives them too much power when they see how much you care.”

Juliette thought how sad those words were as she poured olive oil in the pan. How could you hide your love? Did her mother still do that, even as she closed in on forty years married? Her parents were knotted to a degree Juliette envied and hated, but she refused to believe it was built on tricks. Her father and mother loved each other
so completely and unreservedly—except for Dad loving a bit more, just as Mom wanted—that Juliette never had a chance. Growing up, their marriage had seemed a two plus one to her, with Juliette the plus to their tight couple. All her life, she’d danced on the outskirts of her parents’ love.

 • • • 

Oil sizzled. She threw in the onions. Nathan walked in. Juliette grinned wide, as she did each time he appeared. She still loved him to distraction. Maybe even more. Having children together struck her as the sexiest possible thing you could do with another person.

They kissed. He touched her back with a light hand. His fingers rested on her shoulders in a way that years of marriage told her bore no good. Something troubled him.

“Where are the boys?” he asked.

“Arts and crafts in the dining room.” She threw in the garlic and mushrooms when the onions reached peak translucency. “I think I heard Lucas sneak on the TV, but I’m being a bad mother and not noticing until I finish making supper. Now that you’re home, feel free to go in and chastise him.”

After wiping her hands on the towel tucked in her waistband, she turned and hugged him. The rigidity of his muscles under her hands frightened her.

“What’s wrong?” She pushed him away, so she could look at his face. His eyes held emotions she couldn’t read, except for the fear. “Your parents? Is your father okay?” Had his father suffered another heart attack? Worse?

Nathan shook his head.

“Work? Did something happen?”

“No.” Nathan took a deep breath.

“What then? You look awful. Are you sick?”

He went to the cabinet and pulled out a bottle of brandy. Nathan, never the type to drink when he got home, poured a double shot.

Juliette put down her long wooden spoon. Her parents? Her father? Had her mother called Nathan so that he could break some
awful news to Juliette? Bubbles of dread flipped around her stomach. He dropped into a kitchen chair. She sat facing him, so close their knees touched.

When she took his hands, they were cold. She lifted one to her cheek and ran it over her warm skin. “Honey, what’s wrong?”

He lowered his face, his hands covering hers. His shoulders shook as he began to cry. Everything inside Juliette froze.

“Tell me.”

“I had an affair, Jules. Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”

CHAPTER 3

Caroline

After five years of marriage, Peter still made love to Caroline as though realizing his life’s dream. Being the object of his lust never failed to rouse her own. Exercising on the treadmill, Caroline labored through work problems, scratching ideas in tiny journals she kept in her pockets. Riding the train to work, she caught up with medical journals; driving to visit her parents, she listened to audiobooks. Only with her husband did she remember her corporeal being. There was no other time she left her mind and lived inside her body.

Peter thought her beautiful, he thought her sexy, and he made her believe it, if only for the moments she lay with him. She didn’t live under illusions. Much of her belief system boiled down to “What it is, is.” Caroline knew she was more wholesome than bombshell. Before Peter, she’d limited her relationships to men who marched to the same beat as she did: quiet songs, gentle dances. Peter unlocked her fervor.

“Come on, you’re incredible,” Peter declared when she scoffed at his compliments. Where her honest doctor eyes saw wheat-colored hair not dramatic enough to call blonde, an easy-to-forget face, and a slat-like build, Peter declared her graceful and pure, and then delineated how those qualities turned him on. She knew it was her difference
from every woman he’d grown up with that excited him: she was his upper-class unattainable woman—just as his unrestrained fervor, so different from the boys she grew up with, provided the same thrill for her.

After, they lingered in the bedroom, as they did every Sunday. Coffee cups, plates covered with crumbs, and orange rinds littered their bedside tables.

“Listen to this, Caro.” Peter cleared his throat and, using his public voice—the one he used at investor meetings—read aloud from his laptop:

“Forecasters believe the strongest economic growth in two decades is in front of us. Businesses are investing in new plants and equipment and rehiring laid-off workers. Most economists predict 2004 should be an excellent year, and that this should be a predictor for years to come.”

“Mmm,” Caroline responded, the words not really registering. Peter grasped financial concepts instantly, while she found economic analysis so dry that it crumbled before it traveled from her ears to her brain. “Online news?” She pulled up the covers a bit.

“Yes, but it’s a well-regarded site. Do you know what this means?”

“Not a clue, actually, beyond the facts as presented. But I’m sure you do.” Caroline smiled, waiting for Peter to spill his theories. He shared his thoughts as they occurred to him. Peter tended to think out loud, while Caroline let ideas percolate for days, weeks, or longer before opening them to question.

“It means folks will be investing like crazy,” Peter said. “They’ll think they’re hopping on the money train. Do you know what
that
means?”

She leaned her head on his shoulder. They were close to a match in height. “No.” He did their accounting; she kept their space in perfect order. Having disparate interests freed each of the boring and baffling portions of life. “Do you want to watch the fireworks tomorrow night?”

“Yes, and don’t change the subject. Listen, we’re in a perfect-storm place. The naïve of the world—meaning most—will believe,
once again, that uptrends in stocks and real estate will continue forever—exactly the mythology which leads to insanity in the market.”

“Ah. Interesting. The masses moving in lockstep.” She picked up
Pediatric Blood & Cancer.

Peter pushed down the journal. “Caro, I’m not just commenting. This could be important to us.”

Like the obedient student she’d always been, Caroline let the magazine drop in her lap and turned to her husband. “Okay. I’m listening.”

“If we time this right, we’ll have an opportunity.”

She nodded as though she’d have some part in
this
, when in reality,
we
meant Peter, who meshed with money. Building a pile of cash excited him beyond the security and buying power it represented.

“When the business goes public next year, I’m betting our company stock prices will soar. Everyone wants . . . ”

Her attention wandered a little, knowing what she was going to hear: Sound & Sight Software, Peter’s company, would provide a platform for
X
and integrate
Y
, etc., etc.

She nodded and picked up her coffee cup, trying to read the journal lying in her lap.

“That’s why we should start looking for a baby now,” Peter said. “Do you see what I’m saying?”

Now Caroline looked up. She clutched the handle of her mug. “What?”

Peter put a firm hand on her knee. “Were you listening?”

She shook her head. “Not closely enough,” she said. “Say it again. The part about the baby, not the money.”

“But they’re very related, hon. Look: soon I’ll need to focus on business in a different way. I feel it. Now’s the time to concentrate on getting our baby. Before work explodes, before everything crashes, when I can be the one to pick up all the work left from guys who got lost in the wreckage.”