After the Fall (25 page)

CARY
•

We made it to France and ended up staying, extending the trip a further six weeks. Things between us weren’t brilliant but they were improving, certainly enough to make continuing worthwhile. Kate still had moments of impenetrable silence, and I still found myself worrying about where she was or what she was thinking while she sat opposite me on trains or at breakfast, staring into the distance, opal eyes blank. But she was also laughing more often, and as we left our hotel on our first night in Paris I’m sure she was humming softly as we crossed the Seine.

Nonetheless, I was nervous about suggesting the extra time, fearful of her rejection or disinterest. I agonized over it for an entire evening through dinner, managing to dredge up the courage to ask only minutes before she fell asleep. For a moment Kate didn’t reply and I feared the chance had been lost. Then out of the warm darkness next to me I heard her sleepy voice.

“Sure. Why not?”

I suppose her response could have been more animated but I didn’t care. She’d said yes—I lay awake all that night too excited to sleep, plotting where we might go, what we might do. Beside me Kate slept on. Asleep, probably uncaring. But there.

“So where do you want to go?” I asked her over breakfast the next morning.

“Today?” she asked, pouring a cup of the
chocolat chaud
that had appeared at her elbow as soon as she had sat down. We’d been at the same hotel for four days. The waiter was obviously paying attention. “I thought we agreed on the Louvre?”

“Not today. I mean in the next six weeks.” Six weeks! Forty-odd days, a month and a half. I felt almost giddy with delight, and something else. Relief. It was as if I were inhaling again after months of holding my breath.

“Oh,” she said, looking up almost shyly. “I wasn’t sure if you were serious.” For a second I panicked, but she hadn’t finished. “I haven’t thought about it. Do you have any ideas?”

I’d focused so completely on convincing her to say yes that I hadn’t dared settle on a destination. We could go to the moon for all I cared.

“What about Egypt?” I asked, thinking on my feet. “You could see all the clay pots you like there.”

“Too many terrorists, and I’m over clay pots. Besides, there’s more of that sort of thing in the British Museum than Cairo and Rome put together.”

“London then?”

“Too cold. And too expensive. God, I’m starving,” she said, reaching for a plate of croissants almost before they had been placed on the table.

“Somewhere warm then. Turkey?”

“Maybe.” She shrugged, dismembering the pastry in a spray of buttery flakes. “But wouldn’t I have to wear a veil there?”

I thought again.

“Somewhere warm and licentious then. Greece. Temples for me, beaches for you. And judging by their statuary you could probably walk around topless if you wanted to.”

She looked up and smiled, then went back to licking her fingers. “No temples. We’ll see what you want to in Paris, but after that we’re having a vacation. God knows we need one. No churches, no museums, no galleries. I just want to lie in the sun for a very long time.” Kate looked suddenly tired. Exhausted even, her face collapsing into a series of lines and shadows. For a moment I thought she might cry, but as soon as I noticed the slump it was gone, features pulled back into line with an effort. She was quiet for a moment, as if concentrating on the transformation, then finally spoke.

“Spain.”

“Spain?”

She nodded. “Maybe I could work up the energy to go out for tapas now and then.”

“¡Olé!”
I replied, and we both laughed like drains, though it wasn’t the slightest bit funny.

I faxed the hospital as soon as we had finished breakfast. They weren’t thrilled at my request for extra leave, but it was owed, so what could they do? Theoretically I knew I was supposed to take no more than four weeks at a time; realistically I was sure that my department respected my work too much to fire me. Still, I wouldn’t have bent the rules a year ago. I managed to find a conference to attend to give my request some validity, but though I registered and paid the fee I never showed up. I don’t think we even got to that city. Luckily Kate had thrown in her own job when we’d left, citing personal reasons as an excuse to evade the required month’s notice. I think she told them her mother was ill or something; I didn’t get involved. Let her put her duplicity to good use for once.

CRESSIDA
•

Instead of settling into Michigan, I spent October watching Father die. It seems I do a lot of that: watch people die, and always from cancer. It’s so often the same … the drawn-out suffering and gently graying skin, the panic in the eyes, the putrefying breath. I found myself beginning to long for a stroke or an aneurysm, a car crash even. Anything but this prolonged decline.

I grieved for my father; of course I did. But he wasn’t all I was grieving for, and the endless days of turning and toileting him, administering morphine and adjusting drips, left too much time to think. My mother hovered outside the door to what was once their bedroom as if waiting for an invitation. At least five times a day she would ask me, “How is he?” and my response was always the same: “The same.”
He’s dying
, I wanted to scream;
how do you think he is?
Frightened, I imagined, angry and penitent and defiant. But she was frightened too, so I held my tongue. I suppose this was the first death she’d seen.

Then one day something changed. Father was deteriorating quickly and his oncologist suggested that he be moved to a hospice. I could give him drugs, but I couldn’t lift him or propel him back to bed when he was agitated. He was becoming incontinent, and occasionally delirious. We tried hiring a nurse, but Father, a doctor to the end, was so contemptuous of her skills that she soon resigned. After that, Mother and I alternated nights getting up to take care of him, though at the end of the first week it was obvious to all that she wasn’t up to the task either physically or psychologically. A family conference was called. Cordelia made the decision and no one dared argue.

The first time I went to the hospice to visit there was a middle-aged man bending over Father, dressed only in jeans and a T-shirt. Mother asked him sharply what he was doing, then was immediately apologetic when he introduced himself as the chief physician.

“It’s designed to make the place more like home,” he said, holding out his hand to her. “I’m Paul, Dr. Paul Mahoney. We’ve found that too many white coats can be a bit intimidating for both the patients and their families. Besides, it’s not as if they’re really necessary.”

Mother twittered something about maintaining standards and hospitals being different in her day.

“Yes,” he said placatingly, not at all ruffled by the criticism. “I’m sorry to have confused you, but you’ll soon get to know us all.”

“I wanted to introduce something similar on my own ward,” I said, “so the children wouldn’t be scared of the staff. But the hospital authorities wouldn’t have it—said it was a security risk.”

Dr. Mahoney looked at me for the first time then.

“Oh, so you’re a doctor too?”

I nodded, foolishly pleased. When I mention working at a hospital most people assume I’m a nurse.

“Where are you based?”

“At the Royal Children’s normally, in pediatric oncology. I’m on leave at the moment, though.”

“She’s been nursing her father,” my mother interjected. “Heaven knows what I would have done without her. We would have ended up here a lot earlier, I suppose.”

I was so stunned by this public display of gratitude that I could only stare at the floor. Too many kind words might reduce me to tears.

“Good on you,” said Dr. Mahoney with quiet approbation. “It’s very hard to tend to someone you love, to watch them deteriorate while you stay well. Guilt, pain, anger and all that.” Then he added, “I cared for my wife when she was dying of breast cancer. Luckily we didn’t have children. As you’d know, it’s a full-time job.”

I caught him looking at my hands. My left hand specifically, the empty fourth finger. He saw me notice and smiled unapologetically. I found myself smiling back, amazed that my face still remembered how to do so.

LUKE
•

Our date began with dinner at a small Italian place on Long Wharf, followed by a jazz club nearby. But really, who cares? She was sending out all the signals, and from the moment we met at the restaurant I knew where we were ultimately headed. The only question was whose place we’d end up at.

Hers, it turned out. From what I could see, it was barely a rung above student accommodation, all sticky-tape-marked walls and bikes in the hallway. For an instant I couldn’t help but compare her apartment to the house I’d shared with Cressida: classically neutral furnishings always arranged just so, the towels in the bathrooms replaced as soon as they were damp. Then the lights went out and any further interior design evaluations fled my mind. She was as ready for it as any woman I’ve slept with, almost pushy in the way she hauled me into her bedroom. I was more than ready too, pent-up and aching after six months’ enforced celibacy. My only initial concern as her hands roamed smoothly from my chest to my groin and her impatient nipples dug into my rib cage was to make sure I lasted. Usually I’d try to spin things out, to savor the experience rather than bolting from start to finish, but it was a battle I was losing. Her fingers were on my belt, then beneath it; her mouth followed suit. As it did she guided my hand beneath her own clothes, where instead of underwear all I felt was skin, soft and damp and drawing me in like a siren. I lowered her to the carpet, pushed up her skirt and went suddenly soft.

I was mortified. This had never happened before; I had never even dreamed of it happening. I stalled for time, suddenly diverting to other techniques that I usually couldn’t be less interested in with a woman spread like warm butter on the floor in front of me, praying desperately as I did that it would all be okay. Never before had I realized that there was such a disadvantage to being a man. If a similar thing had happened to my partner—complete and catastrophic loss of desire, along with all anatomical correlates—she could have just carried on as before and no one would be the wiser. But I licked and I probed and I manipulated and nothing happened, just a question mark where there should have been an exclamation point.

Eventually I had to give up. We were both getting cold, and I was hideously embarrassed. She said all the right things—that it didn’t matter, it meant nothing, we could wait awhile and try again—but it didn’t help. I knew I couldn’t do it. She invited me to stay the night, no doubt hoping she’d get lucky in the morning. I waited until she was asleep, then got out of there as quickly as I could. Our agency lost the campaign two weeks later and I never had to speak to her again.

The worst bit was that I didn’t know why it had happened. I didn’t have too much to drink; I hadn’t taken drugs; I swear I wasn’t thinking of my twin regrets ten thousand miles away. Maybe it was her peculiarly raised vowels or those winter-upholstered thighs, just a little too heavy for someone her age. But afterward the episode did make me think of home, and specifically Kate. I felt stupid and anxious and furious at her. What had gone on in that Boston high-rise only underlined to me how well Kate and I had been matched, how right things were between us. Yet she’d forced me into some artificial decision, refused to hold on with both hands to something unique. A year, that’s all I’d asked. What’s a year in the scheme of things? Worse, she’d assured me she would leave Cary, but had ended up staying with him. I wondered if she’d even told him the truth, that she chose
me
, that he was just the default. She’d gotten off scot-free, the coward, while I’d paid the price for us both: impotence and exile.

Seven months of rising as reliably as yeast whenever I saw Kate, and now this. She was still comfortably ensconced in her marriage bed, while I couldn’t even service a teenager. Alone that night back in my apartment I cursed both her and Cary. I hoped my ghost was with them every time they lay down together for the rest of their lives.

KATE
•

We went to Spain and gradually I fell in love again. No, that’s too strong. Returned to love? Accepted love? Settled for love?

The thing is, I fell in love with Luke, not Cary. Fell for the sheen and the sweat, the adrenaline of the hunt. Faltered, reeled, collapsed. There was no falling with Cary. Loving him was gradual and logical, inevitable as the path of a glacier. But Luke was a thunderclap, appearing out of a clear blue sky, soaking me to my skin, then moving on, leaving everything looking different. And post-Luke nothing was the same.

Not a day went by that I didn’t think of Luke. Had the cards fallen differently, however, who’s to say I wouldn’t be pining for Cary in the same way? I knew now what I’d miss: his patience, his enthusiasm and easy smile. His forgiveness.

Despite my initial misgivings, I adored those months in Europe. No,
adored
is also too strong…. I enjoyed them, more with each passing week. Cary and I stayed in some beautiful places, saw some wonderful things. Yet once we had made our peace with each other my thoughts started turning to home. I found that I longed for Melbourne’s vast sky, clear blue and lucid, uncluttered by souvenirs or cathedrals. I missed our clean, straight streets, the logic of our planning. I missed Sarah. I missed understanding what people were saying; the tacit empathy that came from speaking the same language. Europe was glamorous and fascinating and exotic, and it had been good to us. But it wasn’t home, and I was ready to go home.

CARY
•

We arrived home in early December, six weeks having turned into just over three months. All my leave and most of my savings had run out, but it had been a more than worthwhile investment of both. Things weren’t back to normal, but they were approaching a new kind of normal. We talked; we laughed; we made love on occasion: a future had been salvaged. Admittedly, I still hadn’t spoken to Kate about her affair. Somehow there had always been a reason for putting it off, though I had planned to discuss it.
Why?
I wanted to ask her.
What was missing that you had to get from him? Was it just better or different sex
—I could live with that—
or something more fundamental? What did he give you that I don’t? And how can I be sure it won’t ever happen again?
The last one occupied my thoughts particularly. At the end of the day, why had she stayed with me? I hoped it was love, though neither of us had dared utter the word the whole time we were away. Had she loved Luke? I didn’t even really know why they had broken up. Cressida had seen them kissing and confronted Luke, but how much longer would it have gone on if she hadn’t been a witness? And where would it all have ended?

The questions formed themselves hourly to start with, then perhaps a little less frequently as our trip wore on. Yet still I didn’t ask them—fearing the answers, perhaps, or reluctant to upset our fragile truce. Kate certainly didn’t volunteer any information—acting, in fact, as if the whole thing had never happened. Perhaps that was the best approach. It was certainly the one I seemed to be taking.

But the strategy was shot as soon as we got home. There, amid the pile of bills and junk mail that had accumulated during our absence, was a wedding invitation from Joan and Tim. Kate glanced over my shoulder as I opened it.

“I didn’t even know they were engaged,” she exclaimed, then flushed. Of course she didn’t. We’d been away. Why should she?

“Mmm,” I replied, staring at the card, unable to meet her eyes. My heart thudded in my throat. Even seeing Tim’s name rattled me. How much had he known?

“Here’s the phone bill. And oh, we missed the council elections. I suppose they’ll be after us now for failing to vote. Remember when Simon next door didn’t vote and he had to do community service? I think he had to spend a day planting trees with people who’d held up shops and stuff. It seems a bit ridiculous, doesn’t it? He said—”

“Kate,” I interjected across her prattle. I recognized the symptoms—a patina of chatter to mask her unease. “Should we go?”

“I don’t want to go,” she said quickly. “I haven’t seen Joan since … since the trivia night, and …” She was blushing again and winding up to talk some more. I held up my hand to stop the flow.

“I didn’t ask you if you
wanted
to go. Do you think we
should
go?”

Kate sagged; her eyes lowered. We both realized that Luke would be there and probably Cressida as well, assuming she could get back from Michigan. Of course she would be invited; Tim had always adored Cressida.

“It’s up to you,” she muttered, my forthright, opinionated wife, the one who had made all of our decisions with little more than a nod in my direction. Things change.

My initial reaction was to decline. Kate and Joan weren’t that close anymore, so why on earth would I put myself in the situation of being in the same room as my faithless wife and her relatively recent ex-lover? Yet the more I thought about it—and I thought about it a lot, at work, in traffic, while Kate slept beside me at night—it seemed that maybe here was the answer to my questions. If she still loved Luke, if she had ever loved Luke, it would be obvious. Kate was emotionally transparent: grief, joy and anger showed up on her features like makeup. The whole time she was having the affair I’d known something was wrong, just not what. If she still wanted him it would be apparent, and I knew she wouldn’t be able to resist speaking to him if there was anything left to say. I sent our acceptance.

Did I do the right thing? The wedding was slated for February, another three months away. There was still time to pull out if necessary. Did I really want to put myself through such a reminder? But reminders were evident everywhere anyway. The fault lines in the relationship were there for good now, acutely visible, though I hoped in time they’d fade. For a while it seemed that every time I turned on the TV or opened a book adultery was featured. Songs on the radio fantasized about it, denied it, celebrated it. The subject came up in jokes or conversation, the evening news. Not long after we returned a prominent athlete was found to have had a fling with a teammate’s wife and was subsequently forced to resign. The ensuing scandal led to a whole new slew of e-mailed gags—more uncomfortable reminders. Had it always been like this? Was the whole world so obsessed with sex, and forbidden sex in particular, yet I had somehow failed to notice? There seemed nothing more powerful, even when meaningless.

For all we could pretend the affair hadn’t happened, things, it seemed, would never be the same. Still, the baby would have changed them anyway.