The One in My Heart (27 page)

I led him to Zelda, for him to wish her a very happy birthday. She happened to be talking to Mrs. Vanderwoude, who lived three doors down from us, and introduced him as my date.

Mrs. Vanderwoude gasped. “I just came back from the Moira McAllister exhibit at MoMA. That’s you, isn’t it, all over that room?”

And so it begins.

Mrs. Vanderwoude was old and deaf and spoke at the top of her lungs. Half the guests glanced our way. But not the Somersets, who stood with their backs to the room, seemingly absorbed in a bright yellow-and-blue pop-art painting.

“I did some modeling when I was younger,” Bennett answered. “It took a lot of odd jobs to get me through college.”

Mrs. Vanderwoude turned her face rather coquettishly. “Must have been
something
, working with a great artist like that.”

“Yes, it was. A memorable experience.”

It was a you-are-getting-this-much-and-not-a-bit-more answer. Perfect civility, delivered with a smile, no less. But the underlying severity was not lost on Mrs. Vanderwoude. She put away her coy expression and ate a Brie puff from her plate before she asked, “So, how long have you and Evangeline been going out?”

Bennett glanced at me. “Not long enough. I hate to think of all the years I wasted without her.”

“Cool it, lover boy,” I murmured, even as I prayed for his words to be true. “There’s a reason my friends think you’re in an off-Broadway show.”

“But Bennett is actually a surgeon,” Zelda hastened to add.

“Beauty
and
brains—just what Evangeline has been waiting for all these years,” said Bennett.

I shook my head and took his hand in mine. “Come on. Let me introduce this pinnacle of modern manhood to some more people.”

The general public often had a mistaken idea of the lonesome scientist toiling away in a lab. Modern science not only required a great deal of teamwork, but also a lot of glad-handing in the never-ending search for funding. So I was no stranger to negotiating a crowd.

Still, this party was real work.

Within a short time, thanks to Mrs. Vanderwoude, news of Bennett’s notoriety had spread. Some of the guests moved around surreptitiously to get a good look at him. Others were first shown his pictures by a phone passed around, and then they too craned their necks in his direction.

We the happy couple shouldered on against this high tide of curiosity. Nobody was openly rude. Nobody, after Mrs. Vanderwoude, even brought up MoMA. Which somehow made the atmosphere more oppressive, and the interactions more tiring.

I could only imagine how trying it must be for Bennett to know that not only had everyone in the room seen the pictures, but that they were likely speculating on his relationship with Moira and making all the shallower assumptions.

Not to mention being keenly aware, at the same time, that his parents were in the room and undoubtedly hating every second of it.

At last, our paths crossed before the appetizers.

“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad,” said Bennett, his voice even, friendly.

They nodded, Mr. Somerset coolly, Mrs. Somerset with undeniable anxiety.

“Sorry about MoMA, by the way.”

“That’s all right,” his mother said immediately.

“We got a call from
Vanity Fair
this morning,” said Mr. Somerset. “They want to do a feature story about you and Ms. McAllister.”

I might have grimaced openly.

Bennett was unmoved. “This is right in their wheelhouse, so
Vanity Fair
will do what
Vanity Fair
will do. I just hope it won’t bring negative attention on you, Professor,” he said to me.

I was surprised and touched by his concern. “I’m okay. I’m more worried about what happens tonight when
you
go to work.”

He smiled slightly. “At least most of my patients will be under anesthesia.”

Mrs. Somerset turned a caprese salad skewer round and round on her plate. “Too bad the same can’t be said of your colleagues.”

“They can have some fun at my expense if they want to.”

“And I’m sure they will,” I said. “But in a week or two they’ll get bored with catcalling you. Which reminds me”—I turned to Bennett’s parents—”why don’t we plan a get-together for once this blows over? There are tons of places in town that Bennett hasn’t tried yet.”

“Yes, that sounds wonderful,” gushed Mrs. Somerset.

“Bennett, mind coming over here a second?” called Zelda. “I have someone I want you to meet. He’s your attending physician’s brother.”

“Excuse me,” said Bennett.

After he departed in Zelda’s direction, Mrs. Somerset and I exchanged contact information. Mr. Somerset, who’d been silent since the statement about
Vanity Fair
, spoke again at last. “Have you seen the exhibit, Evangeline?”

“Bennett and I were there yesterday.”

“Is it as sensational as the media has made it out to be?”

“Oh, it was sensational, all right. But…” I hesitated only a moment. “But I think you should go see the exhibit. There are thousands of images, and the vast majority of them aren’t the least bit objectionable. They’re more like a photojournal. If you’ve ever wondered about those years of your son’s life, you won’t find a better record anywhere.”

“You’re right,” said Frances Somerset. “I’ll go tomorrow.”

Rowland Somerset wasn’t so easily swayed. “But it isn’t just a record of his life in pictures—it’s also a record of a relationship. That doesn’t bother you, Evangeline?”

I looked him in the eye. “It was uncomfortable for me—this was the private life of someone I know and respect. Not to mention, no one who sees the exhibit can miss the sexual angle of that relationship, and I’ll never be one hundred percent okay with the fact that he was a minor when it all started.

“But after I left, it wasn’t the nudity—and everything it implied—that I remembered. I was…saddened by what the young man in those pictures didn’t know yet. That his forever wouldn’t be forever after all. That he’d have his heart broken. That it would be a long time before he looked so trustingly at anyone again.”

If ever.

Bennett’s father studied me. A long beat of silence passed. “You are a romantic, Evangeline.”

“And so are you, I believe,” I told him.

One of Zelda’s musician friends came up to the appetizers table. “Hey, Evangeline, who did your catering today? Great food.”

“Thanks.” I set down my wineglass and pulled out my phone. “Hmm, I don’t have it on here. Put in your number and I’ll text you their contact info—we have it on the fridge somewhere.”

Once she’d entered her number, I excused myself and went to the kitchen. After I sent her the text, I turned around and was half startled to see Frances Somerset in the kitchen with me. “You need something, ma’am?”

A word, most probably.

“I hope you won’t think me terribly nosy, Evangeline,” said Mrs. Somerset, “but would you mind telling me the provenance of your ring?”

A frisson of excitement shot up my spine. Even though I had mixed feelings about the ring, I’d put it on my right index finger as a sign of solidarity. But since I’d had a glass of wine in that hand most of the time, she probably saw it only a minute ago, when I finally set down the wineglass.

“This? It’s a present from Bennett.”

She inhaled audibly.

“But it’s not an engagement ring,” I hurried to reassure her. “He just wanted me to have it.”

“Right. Of course.”

“Is it a family heirloom? If it’s meant to stay in the family I’ll be happy to return it. I don’t wear jewelry in any case—lab protocols and all that.”

“Oh, no, absolutely not. Please keep it.”

Before I could ask more questions, Mrs. Somerset patted me on the hand and left the kitchen. I looked at the ring for some time. When I returned to the living room, she had disappeared, though her husband was still there, talking to a musician.

Zelda, too, was nowhere to be seen.

The next time I saw Mrs. Somerset was twenty minutes later, right before she and her husband said their good-byes. Bennett not only remained to the end of the party, but stayed on afterward to help us tidy up. Zelda kept glancing at him—and then to my ring—Zelda, who didn’t normally pay much attention to accessories. When we’d put everything away she invited Bennett to stay for dinner, but he declined, saying he had to get ready for his shift.

“I’ll walk you out,” I said.

“What do you think?” he asked, buttoning his coat outside the door.

It was late in the afternoon. A few flakes of snow were again drifting down. One caught in the palm of the glove he was pulling on.

“Your mom doesn’t care. You could release a sex tape at this point and it wouldn’t faze her.”

“I don’t have a sex tape—shocking, I know.”

“Color me staggered. As for your dad, he might be all right too if he took my advice and saw the exhibit.”

Bennett arched a brow. “You recommended that they go see my bare ass?”

“I recommended that they ignore your bare ass and look at the other pictures.”

“You were looking at other pictures? My ass couldn’t hold your attention?”

I flicked him on the front of his coat. “You’ve always known that deep down I’m a pervert who would rather look at your face than your ass.”

His expression was one of mock horror. “My God, are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse already running loose in Times Square?”

“Would you notice if they were?”

He smiled, kissed me on the cheek, and started down the front steps. But then he turned around. “There’s something you want to say to me?”

There were indeed things I wanted to say to him—Bennett was ever perceptive this way. “I worry that you and your dad have come to an impasse. The pattern is becoming clear. Your mom and I arrange these meetings. You and your dad show up—and proceed to make absolutely no progress.”

But his making no progress with his father was what kept
us
going, said a part of me. What if he actually took my advice and succeeded? What would happen to us then?

I pressed on. “You can keep meeting like this, but unless one of you comes right out and says those words—’I missed you. I’m sorry. Can we be a family again?’—I’m afraid nothing more will happen.”

His scarf whipped in a gust of wind. “And you don’t think he’ll ever say those words.”

“I don’t know. I’m not in his confidence. In fact, I can’t even be sure whether he meets us because he wants to or because your mom drags him along. I only know that you want this reconciliation. A lot. So you need to ask yourself, if you can’t have it on your terms, do you still want it?”

He was silent a long moment, and then he raised the collar of his coat. “Let me think about it.”

“
I GAVE BENNETT
THE FELLOWSHIP
of the Ring
to read,” Zelda told me when I came back into the living room.

“Peddling your drug of choice again, I see.” I gave her a rub on the shoulder as I passed her on the way to our fireplace. The chill outside had been arctic and I was in need of warmth.

“I told him once he’s done with all three books, he can join us for the marathon.”

Our annual
The Lord of the Rings
movie marathon fell on Black Friday. We didn’t really do Thanksgiving—it wasn’t a holiday that Zelda had grown up with. But for the movie marathon we pulled out all the stops: breakfast, second breakfast, elevenses, and so on, in honor of the food-mad hobbits.

“That’s planning really far ahead,” I said. “Black Friday is nine months away. How do you know Bennett and I will still be going out by then?”

“Well, he gave you a ring.”

So she
had
been talking to Frances Somerset, as I’d suspected. I gave the ring a turn. “It’s not an engagement ring.”

“But it’s an important ring—Frances told me a good bit. In the family, it’s referred to as the Tremaine ring. Bennett’s great-great-grandfather, who was the Marquess of Tremaine before he became the Duke of Fairford, gave it to his fiancée. The marriage didn’t begin well—they were separated for ten years. But eventually they reconciled and had a long and happy life together, so the ring is considered lucky.

“For years, Bennett’s grandmother had the ring. But after she died, nobody knew where it was. Until now.”

“Still, it’s just a ring.”

But even as I spoke those dismissive words, my heart, which had been everywhere this weekend—blocking my airway, down in my toes, or just plain careening about—settled back in place.

My hypothesis was not wrong. And while Bennett might not have proposed, this was nevertheless a significant pledge on his part.

We were together and we would continue to be together.

“And I still have doubts about the movie marathon.” I smiled at Zelda, my heart as light and airy as the world’s most perfect soufflé. “After all, you told him he had to finish the books first. That could take him years.”

Chapter 15

THE MEDIA STORM STARTED TO
taper off a few days into the week—Moira was already dead, Bennett wasn’t himself a celebrity, and these days nude pictures were a penny a gross. Bennett reported that his colleagues mostly took it easy on him—it helped that he’d already been at the hospital eight months and proved that he wasn’t a flake. He also reported some wackier outcomes, like getting offers to show his junk, to star in actual porn, and to peddle a line of high-end dildos—though not at the same time.