Homecoming Page 8

  Another Wednesday arrived. It was very hot, the kind of day when you think of doing nothing but being near water or, if that is not possible, of reading somewhere in the shade. The perfect spot in the park was the place where the walk forked toward the West Side. It was even breezy there, and very quiet.

  From time to time, as people passed, Ellen glanced up over the book. Some boys came by on Rollerblades. Two nursemaids pushed baby carriages. An old man scattered crumbs for birds as he walked. Then suddenly, there was Mark Sachs.

  He sat down beside her and looked at her book. “French. You’re preparing yourself. Are you leaving pretty soon?”

  “The date’s not been set, but soon. He—we have to find an apartment.”

  “My favorite place is the Place des Vosges.”

  “Expensive tastes!”

  “Just idle talk. What’s your choice?”

  “That depends on how soon and how far Kevin moves up in the firm.” And suddenly, conscious of an obligation, she said loyally, “He’s very bright. Someone told me he’s shot up like a rocket.”

  “So eventually you will afford the snowy brook, or something like it.”

  “I told you I’m going to paint one of my own.”

  “Are you really any good? Seriously?”

  Ellen shook her head. “I don’t believe so, although once they hung something of mine in our church hall in the country.”

  He nodded, then said abruptly, “I’m Jewish. Orthodox. That is, my parents are.”

  “So? I’m an Episcopalian. What about it?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just like to set things straight, I suppose.”

  She wondered why he wanted to set things straight.…

  Now she pursued the subject. “That sounds interesting. Tell me about yourself”—adding quickly—“if you want to.”

  “There’s nothing much to tell.”

  “Oh, no. There always is. For instance, why aren’t you Orthodox, like your parents?”

  “Just never rubbed off on me. My father’s a good man, sometimes hard to live with if you don’t agree with him on certain things. He wanted me to be a surgeon too. He wanted it badly, so that’s been a big disappointment to him, although he never says so anymore, so he’s evidently forced himself to accept me as I am. Mother accepts things more easily.” Mark smiled. “Or at least she pretends to. She’s a social worker, trained to unravel the knots and make peace. Anyway, her background is very different from Dad’s. She’s never had to struggle, and that’s a big part of the difference.”

  This candor touched Ellen. It was not that he had revealed anything very intimate, but rather that he had responded so easily, so confidently, to a stranger. And suddenly, without plan, words came out of her mouth.

  “I waited for you here today. I remembered you said you pass here on Wednesdays.”

  “I thought you did,” he said.

  This was not making any sense. Why had she admitted such a thing? The man would think she was pursuing him. In the first place it was only half true.

  “I meant,” she said to correct herself, “I come here anyway. It’s a favorite spot of mine. And then it crossed my mind that it would be such a funny coincidence if we were to meet here again.”

  He was looking at her lips, which today were coral, to match her summer dress. Then he looked up straight into her eyes. His own were smiling.

  “Can we perhaps have dinner one evening?” he asked. “If that’s an inappropriate question, please say so.”

  “Inappropriate?” she repeated.

  “Yes, because you are engaged.”

  “I go out with friends. Kevin doesn’t mind. What does a dinner mean?”

  “Well then, I’ll call you. But I want you to do something first. Look in the telephone book for my father’s name and office address. Dr. Aaron Sachs. You will see where I come from and that I have a respectable past, at least.”

  “Don’t you think I can see for myself that you’re respectable?”

  “No, I could be Jack the Ripper in a good suit. You should be more careful.”

  She laughed. “All right, Jack. I will be.”

  When he left her, she sat looking after him. At the turn in the path he looked back at her, did not wave, and went on.

  The sun had gone in and the air was sultry. It was an effort to lift her feet as she walked home. And a heavy tiredness overcame her. At home on the answering machine there was a message from her father.

  “Your mother’s not feeling well. It’s nothing acute, but we both think she’ll be better off at home. We’re driving back tomorrow.”

  The subliminal message was clear: her mother’s time was approaching. It had been long in coming and was no longer a shock, but perhaps a mercy. And yet, when she passed her mother’s photograph on the piano, she had to turn away.

  The telephone rang, making an alien noise in the silent room. “Where’ve you been?” Kevin asked. “I’ve made three tries in the last hour.”

  “In the park, reading.”

  “Poor girl. I know it’s an awfully lonely time for you.”

  “Well, I have the job, and I read a lot.” There seemed to be nothing else to say.

  “You sound so distant, Ellen. What is it?”

  “Mom’s troubles have come back. Dad’s bringing her home tomorrow.”

  “Oh, Lord, I’m sorry. But you knew that it was coming. You’ll be brave. I’ll help you any way I can.”

  “I know you will, Kevin.”

  “Now I have a bit of good news for you. I’m coming home for Thanksgiving, and I’ll be in the U.S. for two months, so we can be married and return to France together about the first of February.”

  “Yes, but if something happens to Mom?”

  “We’ll plan a quiet wedding whatever way things go. Just the family. Very simple. Actually, I like that better than a lot of fuss.”

  When they hung up, she began to cry. It wasn’t only because of Mom. What was it? It was confusion. It was everything.

  Mark and Ellen had dinner together. They went to a concert in the park, and then to another. One rainy night they saw a movie, took a taxi to her door, and talked very seriously all the way about the movie. He seemed to have lost his humor and wit.

  Her father was cheerful when she came in. Everybody was cheerful in Mom’s presence these days.

  “How was the picture?”

  “Interesting. Very well done, I thought.”

  “Did your friend like it? Your friend—what’s her name again?”

  “Fran. She was in my class.”

  “Kevin phoned,” her mother said. “I think he was a little annoyed when I told him you had gone to the movies. He had told you to expect his call.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry! I must have misunderstood.” But she had not misunderstood; she had forgotten.

  After her father left the room, her mother asked a strange question. “Are you happy, Ellen?”

  “I’m fine, Mom. Or almost fine. I’ll be really perfect when I see you feeling better again.”

  Her mother smiled faintly and was silent.

  She went to her room and got ready for bed. When she had removed her ring, she laid it on the night table and stood looking at it. Her heart seemed to be shaking in her chest.

  One day her mother said, “Our dentist saw you at the concert with a young man.”

  “Really? Yes, I was there with one of the women at the shop and her boyfriend. The three of us.”

  By October it was almost too chilly to meet in the park. When Mark came uptown on a Sunday afternoon, he was prepared with a heavy sweater and heavy shoes for a walk in the woods. Ellen was dressed the same way. This was the first time they had seen each other wearing anything but office clothes.

  “You look so different,” she cried.

  “And so do you. More real. No, that’s not quite what I meant. More natural, maybe? Except for the ring.”

  She flexed her hand and stared at it, saying slowly, “It’s very b
eautiful … but I’d just as soon not have it.”

  “Then why have it?”

  “Things happen. Sometimes you don’t know why they happen.”

  He was looking over her shoulder into the trees when he spoke. “Your parents like him.”

  “Very much.”

  “It isn’t fair for you to be here.” And when she failed to answer, he said angrily, “If I were engaged to marry a girl, I wouldn’t want to know that she was meeting another man this Sunday afternoon in Central Park.”

  She only looked at him.

  “Come here,” he said, pulling her by the arm.

  In the thicket that might have been miles away instead of a mere few yards from Fifth Avenue, they had their first kiss, a kiss that did not want to end.

  “Oh, God,” she said. “Oh, God.” And cried.

  They had to go somewhere, so the following week Mark took a room in a luxurious hotel, where, like any pair of tourists, they entered with their luggage.

  “It’s too expensive,” Ellen protested. “You can’t afford it.”

  “No, we deserve a beautiful place. You,” he said, “you. I would die for you. Do you know that?”

  They lay awake in each other’s arms, not wanting to sleep, not wanting the night to end.

  “God, I love you,” he said.

  There were tears in his eyes. Kevin had never been so moved, nor had she. This love and this lovemaking were entirely new. Different people, she thought, and I never had any idea how different it might be. How could I have known? This man is like me in every way. We are the same.

  Each week they changed hotels, and Ellen made excuses for her nights away from home.

  “This won’t do,” Mark said. “I should go to your house and tell the truth.”

  “You can’t do that. I’m still engaged. Anyway, my mother’s too sick to go through what she’d have to go through with Dad. And what of your people? Will your father tear his clothes when he hears this? I’ve heard that they do.”

  “No,” Mark said grimly, “but he’ll feel like doing it.”

  “We couldn’t help it, could we? When you’re growing up, you always ask how people can tell whether it’s the real thing or not. And no one is ever able to give you a satisfying answer. ‘Oh, you’ll know,’ is all they say. But it’s true. You do know.”

  On the first of November the shops put pumpkins on display, real ones, or chocolate, or paper. And Mark commented as they were walking that Thanksgiving was around the corner.

  “Yes, I can’t sleep for dreading it.”

  That evening her mother asked again, “Are you happy, Ellen?”

  “You’ve asked me that before,” she said gently.

  “You wouldn’t tell me if you weren’t.”

  That’s right, I wouldn’t, Ellen thought. These are your last weeks, the doctors warned, perhaps your last days. I wonder whether you know it. If you do, you don’t tell us either. We all want to spare one another.

  When Susan died, Kevin flew home for the funeral. Afterward and for the next few days the house was besieged with visitors and telephone calls. Toward the end of that hard week Kevin decided that Ellen needed some respite and must come with him to his apartment for a few hours’ peace.

  She thought, as he turned the key in the lock, that this was going to be the worst hour of her life. Often as she had rehearsed this scene in every possible variation, she had still no clear idea of what she could possibly tell him that would not hurt him too much.

  When he put his arms around her, she did not resist, but stood stiffly with her own arms at her sides. She had clearly intended to be very, very kind, yet it had suddenly become impossible for her to respond to the pressure of his body.

  Drawing a step back and with a puzzled, anxious frown, he said, “I don’t understand. Aren’t you happy to see me?”

  “Yes, but—but there’s been so much,” she stammered. “It’s so hard for me to talk, I—”

  “I know. Your mother,” he said gently.

  There was a choking lump in her throat. Her glance went toward the window, toward black night and a scattering of lights.

  “Not only that. I—oh, Kevin, I don’t know how to say it. I feel like a thief, a betrayer, a liar.… This is nothing I ever dreamed would happen. But it did. It just did. I never wanted—”

  He was staring at her. She saw him reach out and hold onto the back of a chair. And for a few moments they both stood facing each other in disbelief.

  “Who is he, Ellen?”

  “It doesn’t matter, does it?” she pleaded.

  “I’m not going to kill him. Tell me.”

  “I met him one day this summer. He’s a decent, good man, as you are. Neither one of us wanted to deceive or to hurt. We couldn’t help it. That’s the truth, the whole truth, I swear.”

  “And of course you have been sleeping with him while I was away, missing you.”

  She saw his hand grip the chair. White knuckles, that was the expression, and they really were white.

  “I could call you names. I could say plenty of things, but I won’t. You aren’t worth the effort.”

  Now, so many years later, that scene was still alive, its colors, its sounds and silence, still fresh, that scene and the others that followed it.

  Kevin went back to France with the ring in his pocket. Through mutual friends she learned that he had taken the break very hard, yet no harder than her father had done.

  “Where’s truth and honor, Ellen? My daughter, hiding away, lying, cheating on a good man. It’s an incredible outrage.”

  “If you would only see Mark. It’s not fair to condemn without seeing him,” she said, not pleading, but with effort keeping her head high.

  “I know enough without seeing him. You don’t belong with him. That’s all. For your own good I’ve asked you to reconsider, and you won’t. You are a fool, a willful little fool, and I have no more to say to you.”

  The same drama had been played out at Mark’s house. So Ellen packed her belongings, left a loving note for her father, and married Mark at City Hall.

  Eventually, they all had to meet. It was Gran who, more than half a year later, had engineered the meeting in the guise of a wedding reception. A few elderly relatives and some of Gran’s neighbors had been the buffers on the great lawn, which was so great that certain people—the two fathers—needed to have no contact with each other.

  “Contact at glaring distance,” Mark said.

  Despite the summer day, the roses and garden party punch, it had been really horrible. Only the elderly ladies, enthralled by the Romeo-and-Juliet occasion, had valiantly kept the conversational balloon from leaking all its air and shriveling onto the ground.

  Brenda had been the first to soften, and for that Ellen would thank her forever. It was the birth of Lucy that finally had softened the two fathers enough to accept the marriage as long as they never had to see each other.

  By this time, Ellen thought as she put the ironing board away and got ready for dinner, the hatred can only be called pathological. Well, so be it, she was thinking when Mark came in.

  “I’m starved,” he said after he had put his briefcase down, kissed first Ellen and then the children. “What’s this here?”

  “An invitation from Gran. She wants us to come up next week and stay overnight.”

  Mark read aloud, “Don’t mention this to your father, Ellen. I’m inviting Mark’s parents too. Next time it will be your father’s turn.”

  “Are my parents going?” he asked.

  “Yes, we’re to ride up together.”

  “We really should see your gran more often. She’s a sweet old soul. I always think she must have been like you when she was young.”

  “When Freddie is just a bit older, it will be easier and we’ll do it.”

  “Remember that wedding reception? What an ordeal! I came home in a sweat because of those two men. Nine years ago! I’ll tell you right now, I couldn’t go through it again.” And he laugh
ed at the recollection.

  Chapter 7

  Annette had a habit that had taken root as long ago as her childhood. It was her custom, no matter what might have occurred during the day, to look ahead each night before falling asleep to something happy in the next day. More often than not the something was simple, such as a trip to browse in the local bookstore, or an afternoon with an old friend. It might even be something quite trivial, like having pancakes and sausage for breakfast on a winter morning. Small comforts, she often thought, do help to soften large griefs, no matter what anyone says. Not, she would mentally add, that I am any great authority on grief. I have had very few of them: my husband’s death, and the deaths of poor Cynthia’s twins.

  This present sorrow could not possibly compare with those. Nevertheless, the breach between her sons had gone on far too long, and it hurt. Consider all those expressions fixed in the language, like blood brothers, and brotherly love; those two men were too old and too intelligent to cast such precious bonds away.

  Then there were other things that offended her sense of rightness: the impending and, in her opinion, entirely unnecessary divorce between Cynthia and her nice young husband was one. The in-laws’ feud that burdened Ellen’s household was another. What on earth was happening to people who should know better? Why couldn’t they just behave themselves like adults? Act your age! she wanted to say to them.

  But that was not so easy. In a brief, inspired moment she had believed it might be, and so had written those tricky invitations. Now, tomorrow morning, her chickens would be coming home to roost. And she was scared to death.

  She stood now in the library, talking to the portrait of Lewis. His keen brown eyes paid attention; on his left hand, resting upon an open book, the wedding band gleamed. For a moment she had an old, familiar impression that he was teasing her: Oh, Annette, what a meddler and busybody you are.

  “No, I’m not,” she replied aloud. “If you were still here, you yourself would give your sons what-for.”

  Two boys who played in the bathtub together. And she almost had to laugh at the memory of the day when, half grown and old enough to bathe themselves, they had let the water overflow.