When We Were Friends (36 page)

And then with a choked sound he tore off my nightshirt and then his own shirt, nuzzling his face between my breasts. I pressed against the back of his head, my eyes stinging with tears, my fingers tangled in his hair.

He was shaking, his breath heavy, and I wrapped my legs around his waist to steady him, pressed my hands against his back. So focused on the feel of him against me, his skin against mine, his weight and the tight muscles in his back, that it took me a good two minutes to realize he was shaking not from desire, but from tears. He was sobbing against my chest, tears wetting my skin, and I froze,
then gradually brought my hands back to his hair. Smoothed it in the way I comforted Molly when she cried, while I stared wide-eyed at the ceiling of my closet, suddenly feeling the sneaker under my shoulder, the suitcase buckle digging against my skull. I just held him there, stroking his hair. Having not the slightest idea how I was supposed to feel.

I woke to the sound of Molly whimpering and sat up slowly, wincing at the pain in my spine, staring confusedly at the hanging robe blocking my vision before I thought to swipe it away. Alex was gone. I ran a finger along my bare cleavage, felt the dried salt from his tears. Yes, last night was real.

I stood slowly, testing my spine, then pulled on my robe and went to Molly. She’d soiled her diaper. Not just her diaper but her entire body. I lifted her carefully and brought her to the bathroom, then filled the tub and stripped off her clothes, leaving them to soak in the sink while I washed her, smoothing baby shampoo over her body and through her hair, letting her splash the water with her palms. Not allowing myself to think, or feel, anything.

Until I heard a knock on the door, and my heart jumped. I took a deep breath before I turned. It was Star.

“Did you see he’s back?” she said, then walked in to sit on the closed toilet lid. “I guess he came while we were asleep.”

I willed her to go away; I wasn’t ready to talk about him, to interpret anything. I wrung out the washcloth and draped it over the side of the tub. “Yeah,” I said.

“You talk to him yet?”

“No,” I said, then, “I mean yes. Last night.”

“Did you find out where he’s been?”

“Not exactly.” I pulled Molly from the tub and reached for a towel. “Can we talk about this later, Ma? I have a headache.” And a body-ache and a heartache, and I needed to talk to Alex.

She studied my face and then her eyes widened, her mouth slowly
forming an O. I looked quickly away, wrapping the towel around Molly. “And I didn’t sleep well last night,” I said.

“You slept with him, didn’t you,” she said.

The words felt like a slap. “No! Jesus, Ma!”

“Or at least came close to it. Look how you’re blushing.” She pressed a palm to her cheek, and suddenly her eyes filled. “Lainey,” she said.

“I didn’t sleep with him!” I felt my own eyes start to sting, and held Molly’s warm, damp body against me. “We … kissed. And then, I don’t know what happened. He started to cry.”

She watched me silently.

“And then he left the room, and I don’t know what any of it means.”

“It means you need to talk,” she said softly, “You’ve been so focused on your secrets that you haven’t worried enough about his.” She touched my hand. “You want me to take her? His door’s still closed, but he’ll probably be up soon.”

“No, I’ll get her dressed and make some breakfast. Just … try not to come downstairs if you hear us talking, okay?” I turned away.

In the bedroom I dressed Molly quickly and then, without really registering what I was doing, I pulled on my most flattering blouse, blue to match my eyes. I went to the mirror and brushed my hair until it shone, then smoothed on a careful application of blusher and mascara, even lipstick which I almost never wore. I hadn’t taken a shower, partly because I felt too frenzied to be able to stand in one place for more than a minute, but also … because. Because I could still smell him on me, that sweet muskiness; I wanted to smell it on my skin and remember. Or no, not remember. I couldn’t think about it. Not until we talked.

I brought Molly downstairs and fed her rice cereal and peach mush, making airplane noises as I brought the spoon to her mouth, slotting myself back into the role of mother. “My name is Mr. Fruit,” I said in a scratchy voice. Molly laughed at me as I circled the spoon toward her. “And I’m here to visit Miss Molly’s mouth. Anybody there?”

“Nada!”
Molly said, raising an arm to the door, and I turned to see Alex in the doorway, watching me. Mr. Fruit stopped mid-flight and fell to the floor. “Morning,” he said.

My face flushed and I gave a quick nod and bent to swipe a dish-towel over the slop of peaches on the tile. Molly banged her palms against her high chair tray, laughing and straining toward him, and he pulled her from the chair and nuzzled against her. “Oh I missed you!” he said softly. She pulled her head back to look into his face, then turned to me, beaming as if to say,
Look what I found!

“So how are you this morning?” I said slowly.

He kept his eyes on Molly. “Good,” he said, then, “Tired.”

“You must be. I’ll start your chicory.” I rose and went to the coffee-maker, my mind racing as I scooped grounds into the filter. “So before I forget, Posy asked you to call back this morning. She’s thinking of coming to visit.”

“Seriously? Interesting. She’s never wanted to come up north before.” He rubbed Molly’s back, eyes on the coffeepot, then bent to whisper something unintelligible into her ear.

I steeled my shoulders, waiting. Was that it? End of conversation? Would he just hand Molly back to me, pour himself a mug and walk away? No. No. “We going to talk about it?” I said, surprising myself. Was I really this strong?

“Yes,” he said.

I continued waiting. Finally he handed Molly to me and poured his chicory, just as Star appeared in the doorway. I shot her a look that was clearly hostile but she ignored it, reaching for a box of Wheaties. Her hands were shaking, her jaw set. She wouldn’t meet my eye. Had something happened?

Alex turned from me to her and back, then sat down at the table across from me. “Yes, I was with Erin,” he said.

I watched Star pour her cereal, spilling much of it in the process. “Okay,” I said. “So what’s with all the secrecy?”

“I have no idea where to even start.” He shook his head. “You want me to tell you about her?”

No
. “Yeah,” I said, “I guess.”

He stared fixedly into his mug, then gave a short nod. “Right. Okay. So I met her back in the days I was catering in New York. She hired me for a family party, a fiftieth anniversary, one of those French truffle, Kobe beef extravaganzas that used to drive me insane. I always get turned off by money, which was one of my failings as a caterer, but she was different. She cared about things, you know?”

I nodded, as if this weren’t a rhetorical question. Yes, I know what it’s like to care about things.

“Or at least I thought she did, and she seemed so compassionate and passionate about wanting to make a difference in the world, which made her feel human to me, not like a Gucci-wearing mannequin. The first day that we met to go over the party menu we ended up talking for hours, and here she was treating me like a best friend when I was so used to being treated like an indentured servant. She just spilled out all her sadnesses and disappointments, and it was intoxicating. Plus she was beautiful, I mean stunningly beautiful, but she also seemed so vulnerable and so real.” He shook his head. “Except the thing was …” He glanced at Star. “She was married.”

“Ah,” Star said, as if she was suddenly slotting all the pieces of Alex’s mystery into place. But I shook my head. That was all? That was his big secret, that he was having an affair with a married woman?

“I was thinking you’d killed somebody,” I said. “Or, I don’t know, become a drug runner.”

He squared his shoulders. “That’s not all of it. I mean I’m not exactly proud of sleeping with a married woman, and I ended up moving to New Hampshire partly to give her a chance to set things straight with her husband. But in the end, she wasn’t happily married. She was completely unhappy, so I guess I ended up justifying it. I actually thought I was helping her gain the confidence to leave him, so she could get on with the rest of her life.” He shoved his mug away. “Which in the end made me agree to do some things. Illegal things.”

Star set her cereal spoon down slowly, her eyes fixed on his.

“Okay,” I said. “Tell us.” Had he killed her husband? What else could it possibly be?

“She was in trouble and she asked me for help. She convinced me it was the law that was wrong, that she was innocent and this was the only way to set things right. So … I did something; something bad. Just this one thing, she said, but it turned into another thing and another thing, and now I don’t know how to end it.”

“You killed her husband,” I said.

He didn’t respond, didn’t even look at me so I repeated, “You killed her husband?” Part of me wanted to cover Molly’s ears.

“Of course not, Leah.” He squeezed his eyes shut, like he was suddenly in great pain. “I wish I could explain everything, but it’s not really up to me anymore. I hate the things she’s made me do, but I don’t want to hurt her. And if you found out what we’d done … well I’m pretty sure neither of you would let us get away with it. That’s how bad it all is.”

I tried to process this but there was nothing to hold on to, no foothold to base the processing on. So I said, “Are you still doing these illegal things?”

He didn’t answer.

“Why? Is it because you still want to be with her?” The words were out before I could swallow them back, their implicit meaning obvious. If you love her, then what happened last night? And what exactly did it mean?

“No.” He looked into my eyes. “I don’t think I ever did love her really, not in the right way. And now I’m finally realizing I never had any idea who she was. I just have to figure out how to get out of this without hurting anybody, including all of you.”

These weren’t the turns I’d expected this conversation to take. I wasn’t naïve enough to expect him to say he’d stopped loving her because of me; that kind of thing only happened on daytime TV. But I’d wanted
something
, at least an “I made a mistake last night,” or “I was tired” or “drunk” or “emotionally exhausted” or, “I think that maybe, perhaps, there’s a chance that I want to kiss you again.” But
now, now I was almost afraid of him. “What did you mean when you said I should maybe be scared of you?”

Star’s face washed pale, and she started hitting her fingertips in a strange, stuttering rhythm against the tabletop. But her voice when she spoke was surprisingly firm. “You’re a good man,” she said, “I know that. And if you hurt us you’d hurt yourself more, so I won’t be scared.”

I shot her a fierce look, but Alex was watching her with a question in his eyes I didn’t understand.

“You know I have to be careful,” I said, “because of the baby.”

“I know. You’re right, I owe you both the truth, and of course you’re right to be worried, because if Erin—or I—screw up, there’s a chance it could lead the police here. With everything you’ve been through I completely understand why you wouldn’t trust me.”

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” I started, then fitfully smoothed the back of Molly’s shirt before I said, “Okay, here’s the thing, it scares me how little I know about you. Like you almost never talk about your past, and then Susie told me Thursday what happened to your dad and your sister. Which is so huge, such a huge part of your life, and it’s a sign how much of yourself you’ve been keeping from us. And I
need
to be able to trust you. You’re the only stable thing I have in my life right now.”

He gripped his mug tighter, spoke in a stiff monotone. “I don’t talk about my family. You must’ve known there was a reason why.”

“I know. It was none of my business, I realize that and I’m sorry, it’s just I was looking for some kind of clue to where you’d gone.”

His face twitched and I touched his hand, but he pulled away. “So you know the grim secrets of my past, and now you think you know me better. Well fine, I guess if my past has anything to do with what’s going on in my life now, it’s that my thought patterns and the way I reason things out can sometimes be completely screwed up. Which made me get involved with someone I never should’ve trusted, and in a situation I have no idea how to get out of.” He shoved his mug away. “Which is what I mean when I tell you I’m dangerous. Because even if I don’t mean to hurt people, I almost inevitably do.”

“Do you want us to leave?” I said. “Would that make it any easier for you to work all this out?”

For a minute he didn’t answer, and I rested my cheek against Molly’s head so I wouldn’t have to look at him. He was going to say yes, and then what would I do?

“Do you want to leave?” he said finally. “Because if you do, I’d understand.”

“What?” I looked back at him, startled. “No, of course not.”

“Then don’t even think about it. I’m going to figure this out, how to get out of this without hurting Erin or anyone, and then I’ll be able to tell you both everything. But if you ever decide this isn’t working, I can give you some money to get back on your feet, which … in retrospect is probably what I should’ve done in the first place. But I want you to consider it hard, because the truth is the three of you might be better off.”

It felt like he’d punched me, that same physical pain at my ribs. Like his fist had been absorbed into my chest. “You
do
think we should leave.”

“I just don’t want anybody to get hurt. I couldn’t forgive myself.”

“Alex …” I said.
Alex, tell me if I leave you’ll want to throw yourself under a bus!
“This is the first time in a long time, in maybe forever that I haven’t felt hurt. I love being here. With you. I love … it.” I shook my head quickly. “All of us do.”

He held my eyes a moment, then rose. “Me too,” he said, and then he turned and left the room.

We listened to the sound of his footsteps up the stairs, and then Star turned to me, her eyes narrowed, intense. “I did a reading on him. Just before I came in here, I did a reading.”