Best Intentions (16 page)

I flinch at the sudden twist. “That depends.”

“On what?”

“On how much of it is true.”

“Does that matter?”

“I'd like to think it does.”

“Fair enough,” he replies. “Now you owe me.”

“Owe you what?”

“A deeply personal story that explains who you are to me.”

“In fifty words or less?”

“In as many words as you like. I've got time.”

“Can I get back to you on that one?”

“I'm counting on it.”

I can feel David watching me, how I sit, how I move my hands. It
is the first time in so long that I am not an employee, a wife or a mother, that I am at least in part still undefined to someone. I feel the brief thrilling rush of being alone in a distant land, open to possibilities, free from responsibilities, far away from real life.

“There's something else,” I say quietly. “About Favata.”

“What about him?”

“I don't know exactly. He did something in London. I can't seem to nail down anything specific. All I know is that it had to do with sexual harassment. I got the name of someone who was there, Susanna Carter, and e-mailed her for information. I'm not sure if she's the one he supposedly harassed or if she knows who is.”

“What did you learn?”

“Nothing. She never wrote back. The creepy part is that Favata came up to me at the party and told me she had been fired. How did he know I'd even tried to contact her?”

“He's probably reading your e-mail.”

“That's disgusting.”

“Yes, but it's perfectly legal and more common than you think. From now on don't use company e-mail for anything you don't want read. In the meantime, let me see what I can find out about this London business for you, okay?”

Maybe it is the wine, maybe it is David's self-assurance when I have been so barren of it lately, but the idea that someone might actually be able to help me is balm to a wound I did not know the depths of until this moment.

“Okay, yes,” I agree. “Thank you.”

“That's settled then.” The chiseled waiter with the lovestruck eyes is watching us expectantly. “Do you have time for another drink?” David asks.

I look at my watch and shake my head. “I should get home.”

“To your husband?”

“Yes.”

“Lucky you. Or I should say, lucky him.”

I feel my cheeks grow warm once more as I nervously shred the
wet, disintegrating corners of my paper cocktail napkin. “What about you?”

“You probably know this—Google has pretty much obfuscated the need for the biographical getting-to-know-you moment—though I suppose it's polite these days to pretend you know less than you do. Anyway, I'm divorced. It was just last year. I'm still getting used to it.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Thank you. I am, too. It was inevitable, I guess. We fell victim to the great marital Catch-22 of Wall Street. She married me because I made a lot of money and then she resented me because making all that money meant I was never home. Now I can be home more—and she's gone. Funny how that works.”

The couple next to us have stopped kissing and are now sitting with their fingers entwined, their heads bent, staring in erotic fascination at their own hands.

“I really should get going,” I say again.

“Should or want to?” David asks.

I laugh lightly. “You assume there's a difference.”

“I've learned the hard way what a mistake it is to assume anything,” he assures me.

David pays the bill and we walk out to the street together. While I wait beneath the awning, he steps out and hails a cab. He holds the door open for me and leans in before closing it. “The story about the teacher? It is true, for what it's worth.”

I smile.

“I'll let you know what I find out about Favata's escapades in London,” he promises, and taps the cab's roof to signal to the driver to go. There is something in that simple gesture, effortlessly in control, masculine, that makes me feel taken care of, protected. I sink into the backseat and shut my eyes, riding most of the way home in darkness.

It is exactly seven o'clock when I walk in the front door and find Sam in the kitchen pouring pumpkin ravioli from a pot of boiling water into a colander. I hang up my coat and kiss him hello.

“How'd the party go?” he asks as steam pours up onto his face.

“Merdale claims it was a wedding but it was really more of a wake. At least as far as my career is concerned.”

“I'm sure it's not that bad.”

I look at him and let it go. “Shall I dress the salad?”

He nods and we work quietly side by side.

I do not tell him about my drink with David Forrester, not during dinner, not later when he sits beside me in the living room and we stare at CNN pretending to follow the news out of the Middle East, not as we climb into bed and kiss each other good night.

I'm not sure why, but I don't.

I
f I thought Jack would be checking in regularly for emotional weather reports, spurred on by the anxious imperatives of the newly infatuated, or at the very least by the desire to say Deirdre's name out loud, I was mistaken.

I have not heard from him in the past two weeks.

Though part of me is relieved—the less I speak with him, the less I have to dissemble with Deirdre—I can't help but feel vaguely put out. From the uncomfortable but undeniable exhilaration of being his emissary, I have been relegated to—nothing.

I have no idea of Jack's progress.

I have no idea what is happening.

I can only assume Jack is following my “move quickly” directive. He is not a man of inaction. Then again, either or both of them could very well have thought better of the whole idea, chalked their desire up to the fleeting urges of a sodden night, to an atavistic longing for a time when navigating the gray areas was not the only approach to life. They could have decided that their union was better left in the past and should not be forced, could not be made, to traverse the intervening years or erase the missteps and disappointments that followed.

Deirdre has canceled our weekly breakfast—twice. She has answered my messages, but only when she knows I'll be out or too
busy to speak for more than a minute or two, surrounded by children or co-workers. If someone calls during dinnertime once, it's a mistake; repeatedly, it's a strategy.

The last time we spoke was when I phoned earlier in the week to tell her that Claire would not be able to work for her at the store Saturday.

“Is she sick?” Deirdre asked.

“No, she is being grounded for cutting class and leaving school against the rules.”

“As I remember, we cut our fair share of classes, too.”

“First of all, we were in college. Second of all, I'm not paying thirty-three thousand dollars a year for Claire to sit in Starbucks and text the girls at the next table.”

I realize how stodgy I sound. It is not just to Deirdre that I quote the astronomical tuition on a regular basis. I have become that nightmare parent who reminds her children at every opportunity what their education is costing and warn that they damn well better make the most of it. I am the one who becomes irate when I hear that the teacher showed a movie in class that seemed totally unrelated to any topic they were studying. I grumble that they have far too many vacations. Last year, when they had a day of silence in support of gay and lesbian rights and not one of their teachers said a word in class, it was all I could do to keep from hitting the oh-so-politically-correct roof. I mean, couldn't they at least have talked about the issue at hand? (Sam accused me of being reactionary but I reminded him that I am in full support of gay rights. An entire day of the kids doodling in the margins of their notebooks and learning nothing was what I objected to. We remain divided on this one.) In particularly masochistic moments, I have contemplated figuring out Weston's per diem but have so far refrained. There are some things it is better not to know.

“Can't you find some other way to punish her?” Deirdre asked. “I really could use the help. Janine, my usually brilliant store manager, seems to have made the deadly mistake of falling in love in the last week or so. Every time she hooks up with someone new she's so
damn distracted sales take a nosedive. The only thing worse is when they break up. Besides, I love having Claire here.”

“There's nothing I'd like more,” I replied. “Among other things, if she's grounded, it means I am, too. They don't really tell you that in Parenting 101. But the only discipline that works with Claire is finding out what she wants most and taking it away from her. What Claire happens to want most is you.”

“Would that were true for everyone.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind.”

“Trust me, I wish there was another way,” I tell her. “I was hoping we'd have a chance to catch up.”

“I know. Me, too. I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.”

Now, at two p.m. on Saturday afternoon, I watch with no small degree of envy as Sam and Phoebe get ready to leave the house.

“Why don't you just go out for a walk,” Sam suggests. “You can leave Claire alone for a few minutes.”

“Because she's proven to be so responsible lately?”

He shrugs. “Suit yourself, but I think you are completely overreacting.” His impressive ability to avoid getting his hands dirty with the mechanics of discipline is an ongoing source of friction in our marriage. Just once I'd like to be able to reverse roles. There is not the slightest indication that this will ever happen.

After he and Phoebe leave I wander aimlessly around the apartment, straightening up the living room, creating new and somewhat neater piles without actually putting anything away. I glance at some magazines and contemplate giving myself a manicure before deciding that it is a job better left to professionals, a particularly easy task these days as there seems to be one on every street corner.

I check my BlackBerry, which now, on David's advice, has a personal e-mail account as well as my Merdale one, and see that there is a new message from him. “I doubt you'll need my advice over the weekend, though I'm always happy to offer it on matters big and small. For instance, you have yet to ask me where you can get the
best thin-crust pizza in New York, a topic I have rather strong opinions on. Should the burning desire strike you, here's my number in the country. Have a good weekend, D.”

Pizza is just about the only thing I haven't asked for David's guidance on lately. Favata has been finding new ways to try to trip me up and humiliate me on a daily basis. There was the meeting with the CFO in from Philadelphia that he told me started a half hour later than it actually did, the beauty exec he asked me to take to the theater knowing full well she would send her secretary instead, there is the ongoing sense of insecurity he has fostered. Whenever a shadow passes by my office door, I am convinced it is HR coming to escort me from the building.

With each fresh assault I have turned to David, who bucks me up and strategizes as if he has nothing else to do in the world. When we are not planning counterattacks to Favata's every move, we trade snippets about our lives, the emotional weather reports that cyberspace makes so easy, too easy perhaps, speeding up, changing the very nature of intimacy. Our e-mail goes in flurries, two, three a day and then nothing, leaving me with a vaguely empty feeling, a flatness that had not existed before. Sometimes I purposefully do not answer right away to put off the agitation that comes with waiting for his reply.

Already, he has become a habit.

In the meantime, if he has discovered anything more concrete about Favata, he hasn't shared it with me.

I read his message again and put the BlackBerry away.

Claire is in her room sulking. Along with the low-level throbbing of music seeping out, there is a pointed banging around of drawers that I am determined to ignore. Earlier, she spent half an hour petulantly rummaging through the front hall closet looking for her favorite scarf, leaving half the coats on the floor before I yelled at her to pick them up.

I am standing in front of the freezer surveying the ice cream options—I have tried everything from knitting (which lasted less than half a day) to hot baths to get a handle on my unfortunate habit of
eating out of boredom, with depressingly little success—when the intercom goes off, making me jump. Looking into the little video monitor—the closest our building will ever get to a doorman—I see Deirdre smiling into the camera.

“What are you doing here?” I say into the speaker.

“I'm happy to see you, too. Will you buzz me in?”

I nod, though of course she cannot see me, press the button to let her in and go to wait by the front door.

Deirdre walks in carrying a bag of Tate's chocolate chip cookies, Claire's favorite before she swore off sugar, butter and various edible evils, though I doubt she will inform Deirdre of this. The cookies are obviously a bribe. Deirdre can't stand the idea of anyone being mad at her and wants to make evident that she had nothing to do with Claire being banished from the store. I could have spared her the effort. She has long since won any popularity contest by default when it comes to Claire.

“I come bearing supplies,” she announces. “I assume my presence isn't against the rules?”

“Not if I get to keep you to myself. Why aren't you at the store? Is everything okay?”

“Everything's fine. Are we so old that spontaneity isn't even an option anymore?”

I look at her suspiciously.

“Okay, ‘fine' might be the wrong word,” she admits. “Let's just say things are transitional.”

At the sound of Deirdre's voice, Claire comes dashing out of her room. “Hi,” she exclaims with a surfeit of relief and pleasure. Like all teenagers, she is certain the visit has something to do with her, though she can't quite figure out what.

“How is my favorite prisoner?” Deirdre asks, ignoring my scowl. “I hear the food they serve here is wretched. I brought you a care package from the outside world.”

“I love these!” Claire exclaims, taking the proffered cookies and biting into one as if she has been on a hunger strike.

“I thought you didn't eat those anymore,” I remark petulantly.

Claire glances at me as if I'm demented and returns her full attention to Deirdre.

“I shut the store for the day in your honor,” Deirdre tells her.

“Really?”

Deirdre smiles. “No, not really. But it wasn't as much fun without you.”

Claire positively glows.

I glare at Deirdre—talk about undermining me—and she relents to my parental authority. “Let me be clear, I am in full support of your mother. You must not cut classes, smoke, drink or cheat on tests. Are you taking notes on this?”

Claire laughs, flattered that Deirdre would even consider such glamorous sins in the realm of possibility.

She hovers around for a few more minutes—adamantly, stubbornly—while Deirdre probes her about
Teen Vogue,
Claire's Bible. I listen with growing impatience as they dissect each page of the current issue from memory, culminating in a debate on whether or not it is acceptable to tuck jeans into slouchy boots or if that is so last year. Three minor celebrities have been photographed sporting the look but they are West Coast and it seems a little dubious.

“Don't you have homework?” I finally interrupt.

“I finished it,” Claire replies sulkily.

“Then go find something else to do. In your room, please.”

Claire finally slinks off, adding the enforced banishment to the growing ledger of crimes I have committed against her dignity.

“She is supposedly being punished, not courted today,” I admonish Deirdre.

“Sorry. I was about to add that blow jobs really do count as sex to the list of no-no's but I figured I'd wait until next year for that.”

“Thanks, you're a real champ.”

“I aim to please.”

“I'll be sure to send you the bill for her stay in the juvenile delinquent home.”

“I believe it's called rehab these days.”

“Same difference. So, what's up?” I ask as we settle into the living room.

Deirdre kicks off her shoes and curls her feet beneath her on the couch. Slowly, she steadies her gaze on me. “Have you talked to Jack recently?” she asks hesitantly.

“Not in the last couple of weeks. Why?”

“Promise me you'll just listen without judging?”

“Is that what you think I do?”

“Sometimes.”

“All right.”

“I should have told you all this before. I wanted to. But I didn't want a lecture. I couldn't have handled it.”

“You still haven't told me anything,” I remind her.

She sighs and finally begins. “That night, the night the four of us went out to dinner? After you and Sam left, Jack and I went out for a drink. It was so good to see him again. I don't know how to explain it. It was like everything else just fell away. The connection was still there.” She pauses, looks at me. “We couldn't stop talking. For the first time in so long I didn't feel like I had to hide who I really am. We recognize each other. I think someplace along the way I forgot that two people may actually want the same things, that it doesn't always have to be a contest.”

“Go on.”

“When the bar closed, we weren't ready to end it. We went back to his hotel room.” She says this quickly, with a touch of defiance, and waits for my reaction, but I am careful to betray none. “It was good,” she continues. “More than good.”

“I'm not sure I need the details.”

She ignores this. “There was the familiarity of rediscovering each other but it was also new, which is a pretty goddamned amazing combination.” Deirdre shakes her head, laughing slightly. “Of course, true to form, I completely freaked out.”

“What do you mean?”

“I left at four a.m. Tore out is more like it.”

“Why?”

“I'm not really sure. Maybe waking up together would have made it seem too real. Or maybe I was scared it wouldn't feel real in the morning. If Jack was going to get a sudden attack of guilt or regret, I didn't want to be there to witness it. But the thing is, it is real.”

“How can you be sure? It was just one night. And there was a lot of alcohol involved.”

“No, it was more than that. I thought that's what it might be. Just a onetime thing. A trip back. You know, tying up loose ends. I thought it would be…contained.”

“But?”

“We've seen each other since. He's been called back to Manhattan three times for the job. And it's been just as good each time. Better.” She smiles at a private memory and then turns back to me. “He's going to leave Alice,” she says definitively.