The Suite Life (38 page)

What wasn't different was that he continued to pack on the pounds as he ramped up his use of recreational and prescription drugs, which Franco would supply when “fill-in” prescriptions were needed.

In mid-June, when he was called to testify before Congress about the use of performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball, I thought that might be the source of his bad mood, but he went down to Washington as if he were on just another business trip. He was a legitimate, upstanding citizen, and a good Republican to boot, and he told the truth about what he knew, which had nothing to do with PED use by Presley Warren or Calvin Ransom or any of the rest of the Yankees. Alec just told the committee that he was under a physician's care for his health and training needs, and that was that.

All I knew was that Alec was committed to everything but me. But for the first time in a long time, that was okay, because
I
was committed to me.

I kept on seeing Spiro but always in the company of other people. It was only when reading his emails—like the one he wrote about
The Blessed Bridge
—that I truly felt alone with him.

Forgive me for not getting back to you sooner, but I wanted to read it twice. It was as if the angels themselves were whispering in my ears, and there is no doubt in my mind that young girls and grown women would learn from your story and be inspired by your words.

You've had to fend for yourself for most of your years, Samantha. If only one person changes the direction of her life because of the story you tell, its value would be
immeasurable. Stop all you are doing and publish this book. It will be your ticket to freedom.

As I read those words, my commitment to my novel reached a new high. His praise made me realize that I hadn't written much of anything for too many years. I'd put my manuscript in a box for safekeeping, just as I'd put aside my visits to Our Lady of Victory, and went on trying to be what someone else wanted me to be, even though I doubted that I'd ever live up to Alec's expectations of what a perfect wife or a perfect mother should be. It was finally time for that to stop. I had to do more than sign up for a single writing seminar. I also had to let the Blessed Mother out of the box I'd kept her in.

I dashed off a fast thank-you to Spiro for both his compliment and his inspiration, and he replied almost as soon as I'd hit “Send.”

Taking this journey with you is an inspiration to me.

And his words continued to come as we led our separate lives.

You're tough, you're strong, you're resilient. Stay focused—don't let anyone take you off your path.

Easier said than done, but I get it.

Go to church. Light a candle. Sit down and relax.

Thanks for the reminder.

You have your health, a wonderful daughter, your writing, and . . .

Me  . . . whenever you need me.

Since life with Alec was as frightful as ever, I had never needed anything more.

Stop everything you're doing. Stop producing other people's plays, stop writing any other stuff, and just focus on
The Blessed Bridge
. That's your ticket, that's who you are. Take it out and get it published.

Alec remained in his own world and I stayed in mine. The more I saw of his, the more I wanted to go in the direction my heart was taking me. I had no idea how my relationship with Spiro would go in the long term, but I knew that I wanted to be with someone who wanted me to be me, even if we were just flirting friends.

When Doris's invitation to a swank reception showed up in the mail late in August, and I knew that Alec would be out of town, I jumped at the opportunity to shed my identity as Mrs. DeMarco and just be Samantha.

In a drawing room high above Central Park, I circulated among the black-tie guests for a polite fifteen minutes and then made my way out to the terrace to soak up the energy of the majestic city.

“I was simply dying until you showed up,” Spiro said, his silvery gray eyes smiling.

I've come alive a bit myself recently.
“I'm all about life,” I said softly.

After hesitating for a moment in the stillness of a humid summer evening, he raised one eyebrow toward the double glass doors behind us and pulled me into his arms.

“I'm all about life, too,” he said, and kissed me as every girl should be kissed.

Finally, he tilted his head back and drank me in with his eyes. As his mouth took mine again, I heard Rhett Butler's words to Scarlett in her well-appointed dressing room:
You should be kissed, and often.

As summer turned to fall, I fretted constantly over all the reasons I shouldn't be involved in a relationship that was no longer platonic. Even though my marriage was falling apart, I'd still taken an oath before God that I should keep unless it ended in His eyes. Also, there was Isabella to think about. The consequences for both Spiro and me would be dire if our friendship became public, and I'd have the frightful prospect of dealing with Alec, who had a black book filled with high-priced lawyers at his disposal. It just wasn't worth it . . . but I needed love now more than ever.

Still, what it always came back to was how good—how
right
—it felt. Spiro was in my life, and for all I knew, Grandma, or even the Blessed Mother, had sent him to me. I wasn't trying to complicate my life, but I also wasn't going to stop being me. If someone couldn't stand not being around me, Lord knew I deserved something better. God works in strange ways—and who could blame me for injecting some normalcy into my life? Truth be told, I wasn't being given any glaring stop signs to halt the progress I was making in my life. Quite the contrary, all I saw was repeated encouragement to keep going.

As Spiro had told me,
No person can keep you from your God-given destiny.

My destiny was
The Blessed Bridge
and I intended to get it out there.

Alec's self-abuse was growing harder to watch. When his weight got to the point where even he was concerned about his health, he decided to go on a crash weight-loss program. After a course of laxatives and enemas failed to do the trick, he came
up with the idea of gaining twenty more pounds so he'd qualify for lap band surgery, another luxury available for only forty thousand cash.

One day Isabella found a half-smoked joint that Alec had left on his desk. When she asked me about the “funny-looking cigarette,” I had to do some quick thinking and creative lying, but that was nothing compared to the morning when he had a shot of twenty-year-old scotch with his Cheerios—his “breakfast of champions”—before leaving for work. We were all sitting at the table in the kitchen when his mood turned suddenly darker for no apparent reason. He rose with palpable menace, lunged over our daughter and toward where I was sitting, and swiped at my laptop, nearly knocking it to the white Italian tile, all the while letting out a stream of invective about what a “shitty” mother I was.

Try explaining to a nine-year-old that parenting is more than securing a fifty-thousand-dollar trip to Disney World to meet Cinderella herself and that her mother was trying to be her own Cinderella in the face of all that. When Alec returned home from work that night, he tested my sanity once again when he shocked me with an attempt at lovemaking. For a change, I had fallen asleep first, so I kept my eyelids shut, which seemed only natural since every other part of my body was suddenly paralyzed. I thought of the Blessed Mother hanging in my dressing room, and I was thankful she wasn't above my bed, as she had been when Tony Kroon took my virginity in his parents' bed.

God, please
 . . .
I don't want to do this.

I stirred when feigned sleep would have been far too obvious to the three-hundred-plus-pound behemoth who kept jostling me.

Alec didn't say a word about how long it had been.

Probably more than a year.

And he said nothing about my mechanical submission
to his sudden appetite, as he did what he wanted to do, and I vowed that it would be the last time.

Alec barely acknowledged our anniversary that fall, which was fine by me. And then Doris Bernstein came through with an agent who wanted to talk to me about
The Blessed Bridge
. Shortly after I gave her the manuscript she'd told me how much she liked the book, which meant the world to me coming from her. And she'd promised to “talk to a few people” about it. But then months had gone by and I was beginning to think I'd hit another dead end. So hearing that someone was actually interested enough to meet with me was the greatest anniversary gift I could have received.

Alec waltzed through the year-end holidays, as ebullient as ever about the festivities he both attended and arranged, but the fact that something was bothering him was still evident beneath the surface. In fact, it was bothering him so much that he barely uttered a word when I said that I thought it would be better if I moved into the same room with Isabella. I knew I could have claimed one of the many empty rooms, but, truthfully, I wanted to be near my daughter.

I told him my plan right after I cleaned up his bloody sheets one morning. Self-preservation always being at the top of my list, I left unsaid that I had hated waking up next to him every day for too long. I did say, however, that it would be the last time I'd be picking up his soiled sheets. I moved to the couch in Isabella's room, telling her that Daddy snored a lot, which he did, and that it would be easier if he had the bed to himself.

My daughter's eyes revealed that she knew the truth—that Mommy would sleep better this way—as well as the relief she felt knowing that she wouldn't be alone when Daddy's next temper tantrum erupted, which I sadly realized was not unlike the way I'd felt when I was with Grandma in our room while Mom was
having one of her intoxicated explosions. Though I said a prayer that she and I would support each other as Grandma and I had, it was with a heavy heart that it dawned on me I hadn't been able to spare my daughter from the heartache I'd been suffering for years.

More and more frequently, Alec's explosive tantrums risked turning into trips to the ER. One night, I heard him screaming my name at 2 a.m. and found him sweat-soaked and on his knees at the double sink in the master bathroom, his breathing labored. He tried to get up but almost passed out. I grabbed a couple of towels and wrapped them around him, biting my lip the whole time, as images of my mother crashed out on her chipped-tile bathroom floor flashed through my mind. Less than a minute later, however, he calmed down and his breathing stabilized. Remembering Mom's two ambulance trips, I asked him if he should go to the hospital.

He shook his head slowly. “No way,” he muttered. “Just give me a minute and I'll be fine.”

I pivoted on my bare feet and headed out.

“I'm just getting old,” Alec called after me.

I didn't care to know if he was trying to smile when he said that.

From then on Alec and I communicated mostly via BlackBerry, even from room to room in the house. For him, it was the easiest way yet to keep communication going from the box he kept me in. For me, it was the easiest way to keep his tantrums at arm's length. But that didn't mean I wasn't worried about him.