“She was sitting next to a young Army private,” Richard would continue, winking at me. “And suddenly I felt quite patriotic.”
The attendant approached to say a first-class passenger had offered to trade seats with the soldier sitting next to me. “Awesome!” the soldier had said.
Somehow I’d known it was him.
When the plane lumbered into the sky, I gripped the armrest and swallowed hard.
He offered me his drink. His ring finger was bare. I was surprised he wasn’t married—he was thirty-six—but later I’d learn he had an ex, a dark-haired woman he’d lived with. She’d been upset when they broke up.
After Richard proposed, her existence haunted me. I felt her presence everywhere. And I was right—someone was following me. It just wasn’t Richard’s ex.
* * *
“I got her tipsy,” Richard would tell his enthralled listener. “Figured that way I’d have a better chance of getting her number.”
I’d sipped the vodka tonic he’d passed me, very aware of the heat of his body.
“I’m Richard.”
“Vanessa.”
Here was the part of the story where Richard would turn away from our audience and glance at me tenderly. “She doesn’t look like a Vanessa, does she?”
Richard had smiled at me that day on the plane. “You’re much too sweet and soft for such a serious name.”
“What sort of name should I have, then?”
The plane bumped through another air pocket and I gasped.
“It’s just like going over a pothole. You’re perfectly safe.”
I took a big gulp of his drink and he laughed.
“You’re a nervous Nellie.” His voice was unexpectedly gentle. “That’s what I’m going to call you: Nellie.”
The truth is I always disliked the nickname. I thought it sounded old-fashioned. But I never told that to Richard. He was the only one who ever called me Nellie.
We talked for the rest of the flight.
I couldn’t believe someone like Richard was so interested in me. When he took off his jacket, I caught a citrus scent that I’d forever associate with him. As we began our descent, he asked for my phone number. While I jotted it down, he reached out to stroke the length of my hair. A shiver ran down my spine. The gesture felt as intimate as a kiss.
“So beautiful,” he said. “Don’t ever cut it.”
From that day on—all through our whirlwind courtship in New York City, our wedding at the resort in Florida, and our years spent living in the new house Richard had bought for us in Westchester—I was always his Nellie.
I’d expected my life to unfurl gracefully. I thought he would always keep me safe. I’d become a mother and would resume teaching when our children were grown. I dreamed of dancing at our silver wedding anniversary.
But of course, none of that happened.
And now Nellie is gone forever.
I am only Vanessa.
* * *
“Why are you here?” my replacement asks.
I can tell she is gauging whether she can be quick enough to duck around me and run down the street.
But she is wearing strappy high-heeled sandals and a fitted skirt. I know she is heading to her bridal fitting today; her schedule was easy to obtain.
“All I want is two minutes.” I spread open my empty hands to convince her I mean no physical harm.
She hesitates and looks up and down the block again. A few people mill past, but no one stops. What is there to see? We’re just two well-dressed women standing in front of an apartment building on a busy street, near a deli and down the block from a bus stop.
“Richard will be here any second. He’s just locking up my apartment.”
“Richard left twenty minutes ago.” I was worried he might drop her off at the fitting, but I watched him flag down a cab.
“Please just listen,” I say to the beautiful young woman with the heart-shaped face and lush body that Richard left me for. She needs to know the story of how I transformed from buoyant, chatty Nellie into the shattered woman I am today. “I need to tell you the truth about him.”
PART
TWO
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
HER NAME IS EMMA.
“I used to be you,” I begin as I look at the young woman before me.
Her blue eyes widen as she takes in my appearance. She examines my changed hair, then the dress draped over my too-thin frame. It is clear my reflection is not an image she can imagine superimposed on herself.
I’ve lain in bed so many nights rehearsing what I’ll say to her. She was Richard’s assistant; that is how they met. Less than a year after she was hired to replace his secretary Diane, he left me for her.
I don’t need to reach for the printed copy of my speech in my bag, my backup in case words failed me. “If you marry Richard, you will regret it. He will hurt you.”
Emma frowns. “Vanessa.” Her voice is even and measured. It’s as if she is talking to a small child. It’s the tone I used when I told my Cubs it was time to put away their toys or finish up their snacks. “I realize the divorce was hard on you. It was hard on Richard, too. I saw him every day; he really tried to make it work. I know you’ve had your troubles, but he did everything he could.” I sense some accusation in her gaze; she believes I’m to blame.
“You think you know him,” I interrupt. I’m going off script, but I press on. “But what did you see? The Richard you work for isn’t the real man. He’s careful, Emma. He doesn’t let people in. If you go through with the wedding—”
She interrupts me now. “I feel horribly about everything. I want you to know he started opening up to me as a colleague, as a friend. I’m not the kind of woman who ever thought she’d have an affair with a married man. We didn’t expect to fall in love.”
I believe this. I saw their attraction spark shortly after Richard hired Emma to manage his calls, proofread his correspondence, and keep his schedule.
“It just happened. I’m sorry.” Emma’s round eyes are earnest. She reaches out and touches my arm gently. I flinch as her fingertips gently graze my skin. “I do know him. I’m with him ten hours a day, five days a week. I’ve seen him with his clients and our coworkers. I’ve seen him with the other assistants, and I saw him with you back when you were married. He’s a good man.”
Emma pauses for a moment, as if debating whether to go on. She is still staring at my lighter hair color. My naturally blond roots finally blend in well. “Maybe it’s you who never knew him.” Her tone has an edge.
“You have to listen to me!” I am shaking now, desperate to convince her. “Richard does this! He confuses things so we can’t see the truth!”
“He said you might try something like this.” Contempt has replaced the sympathy in her voice. She folds her arms and I know I am losing her. “He told me you were jealous, but this has gotten out of control. I saw you outside my building last week. Richard said if you pull something like that again, we’ll file a restraining order.”
Beads of sweat run down my back, and more gather on my upper lip. My long-sleeved dress is too warm for the weather. I imagined I’d planned everything out so carefully, but I’ve stumbled, and now my thoughts are as thick and muggy as this June day.
“Are you trying to get pregnant?” I blurt. “Did he tell you he wants to have children?”
Emma takes a step back, then moves to the side and passes me. She walks to the curb and lifts up her hand to signal a cab.
“Enough,” she says, without turning to look back at me.
“Ask him about our last cocktail party.” Distress makes my voice shrill. “You were there. Remember how the caterers showed up late and there wasn’t any Raveneau? That was Richard’s fault—he didn’t order it. It was never delivered!”
A taxi slows. Emma turns to me. “I was there. And I know the wine was delivered. I’m Richard’s assistant. Who do you think placed the order?”
This I never expecte
d. She opens the door of the cab before I can recover.
“He blamed me,” I shout. “After the party, it got bad!”
“You really need help.” Emma slams the door shut.
I watch as the cab pulls Emma away from me.
I stand on the sidewalk outside her apartment, as I’ve done so many times before, but for the first time I truly wonder if everything Richard said about me is true. Am I crazy, like my mother, who battled mental illness her entire life—at times more successfully than others?
My nails are digging into my palms. I cannot stand the thought of them together tonight. She will tell him everything I’ve said. He’ll lift her legs over his and massage her feet and promise he will keep her safe. From me.
I hope she will listen. That she will believe me.
But Richard suspected I would try this, after all. He told her so.
I know my ex-husband better than anyone else. I should have remembered he also knows me.
* * *
It rained the morning of our wedding.
“That’s good luck,” my father would have said.
By the time I walked down the royal-blue silk runner spread on the grand patio of the resort, flanked by my mother and Aunt Charlotte, the sky had cleared. The sun caressed my bare arms. Waves provided a gentle melody.
I passed Sam and Josie and Marnie, seated in chairs tied with white silk bows, then Hillary and George and a few of Richard’s other partners. And up front, by the rose-draped archway, Maureen stood next to Richard in her capacity as maid of honor. She wore the glass-bead necklace I’d given her.
Richard watched me approach and I couldn’t stop beaming. His expression was intent; his eyes looked nearly black. After we joined hands and the minister pronounced us man and wife, I saw his lips tremble with emotion before he leaned down to kiss me.
The photographer captured the enchantment of the evening: Richard slipping a ring onto my finger, our embrace at the end of the ceremony, and our slow dance to “It Had to Be You.” The album I ordered contains a shot of Maureen straightening Richard’s bow tie, Sam raising her glass of champagne, my mother walking barefoot on the beach at sunset, and Aunt Charlotte hugging me good-bye at the end of the evening.
My life had been so filled with uncertainty and turmoil—with my parents’ divorce, my mother’s struggles, my father’s death, and, of course, the reason I’d fled my hometown—but on that night, my future seemed as straight and seamless as the blue silk runner that had led me to Richard.
The next day we flew to Antigua. We reclined in first class, and Richard ordered us both mimosas before the wheels ever left the ground. The nightmares I’d experienced never came to fruition.
It wasn’t flying I needed to fear.
* * *
Our honeymoon wasn’t documented in an album, but when I think back, that’s how I remember it, too: as a series of snapshots.
Richard cracking open my lobster and grinning suggestively as I sucked the sweet meat out of a claw.
The two of us getting a couple’s massage as we lay side by side on the beach.
Richard standing behind me, his hands on mine, as I helped release the sail on a catamaran we’d rented for the day.
Each night, our private butler drew us a bath perfumed with rose petals and rimmed with lit candles around the curved edge. Once, we crept down in the moonlight to the beach and, hidden amid the billowing curtains designed to block out the sun, we made love in a cabana. We soaked in our private Jacuzzi, sipped rum-spiked drinks by the infinity pool, and napped in a double hammock.
On our last full day Richard signed us up for scuba diving. We weren’t certified, but the resort staff told us that if we took a private lesson in the pool, we could do a shallow dive with an instructor.
I didn’t enjoy swimming, but I was all right in the placid, chlorinated water. Other guests splashed nearby, sunlight illuminated the surface just a few feet above my head, and the edge of the pool was merely a few strokes away.
I took a deep breath as we climbed into the motorboat and tried to make my voice sound calm and carefree. “How long will we be down?” I asked the instructor, Eric, a young guy on summer break from UC Santa Barbara.
“Forty-five minutes. Your tank has more oxygen that that, so we can push it a little if you want.”
I gave him a thumbs-up, but as we sped away from land, toward a hidden coral reef, pressure built in my chest. The heavy oxygen tank was strapped to my back, and fins pinched my feet.
I looked at the plastic face mask atop Richard’s head, feeling an identical one tugging the sensitive hairs at my temples. Eric cut the motor, and the silence felt as vast and absolute as the water surrounding us.
Eric jumped off the edge of the boat, pushing his shaggy hair out of his face after he surfaced in the water. “The reef’s about twenty yards away. Follow my fins.”
“Ready, baby?” Richard seemed so excited to see the blue-and-yellow angelfish, the rainbow-colored parrot fish, and the harmless sand sharks. He pulled down his mask. I tried to smile as I did the same, feeling the rubber seal tightening the skin around my eyes.
I can come back up anytime, I told myself as I began to climb down the ladder, where the heavy equipment would help drag me beneath the surface. I won’t be trapped.
Moments after I sank into the cool, salty ocean, everything was blotted out.
All I could hear was breathing.
I couldn’t see; Eric had said that if fog formed on the inside of our masks, we should simply tilt them just enough to allow a stream of water to clear the condensation. “Hold up one hand if something’s wrong; that’ll be our emergency signal,” he’d said. But all I could do was kick and flail, trying to maneuver to the surface. The straps of my equipment compressed my body, binding my chest. I tried to suck in oxygen as my mask grew cloudier.
The noise was awful. Even now, I can hear jagged, tortured gasps filling my ears and feel the tightness in my chest.
I couldn’t spot Eric or Richard. I spun alone in the ocean, my limbs churning, a scream building in my lungs.
Then someone gripped my arm and I felt myself being pulled. I went limp.
I broke the surface and spit out my mouthpiece, then yanked off my mask, feeling a burst of pain as it ripped away a few strands of my hair.
Gasping and coughing, I tried to draw more air into my lungs.
“The boat’s right here,” Eric said. “I’ve got you. Just float.”
I reached out and grabbed a rung of the ladder. I was too weak to climb it, but Eric hauled himself up onto the boat, then leaned down for my hand. I collapsed on a bench, so dizzy I had to put my head between my legs.
I heard Richard’s voice from below. “You’re safe. Look at me.”
The pressure in my ears made him sound like a stranger.
I tried to do as he said, but he was still bobbing in the water. Seeing the blue ripples made me nauseous.
Eric knelt next to me, unhooking the straps from around my body. “You’ll be okay. You panicked, right? This happens sometimes. You’re not the only one.”
“I just couldn’t see,” I whispered.
Richard climbed up the ladder and hoisted himself over the side, his equipment clanging as he landed. “I’m here. Oh, sweetheart, you’re shaking. I’m so sorry, Nellie. I should have known.”
The mask had left a red imprint encircling his eyes.
“I’ve got her,” he said to Eric, who finished unstrapping my tank, then moved aside. “We’d better head in.”
Richard held me close as the speedboat skipped over the waves. We returned to the resort in silence. After Eric docked, he reached into a cooler and handed me a bottle of water. “How do you feel now?”
“Much better,” I lied. I was still trembling, and the bottle of water in my hand shook. “Richard, you can go back out.…”
He shook his head. “No way.”
“Let’s get you onto land,” Eric said. He jumped onto the dock and Richard fol
lowed him. Eric reached down for my hand again. “Here.” My legs were unsteady, but I managed to stretch out my arm for him to take.
But Richard said, “I’ve got her.” He gripped my upper left arm and pulled me out of the boat. I winced at the feel of his fingers pressing into my soft flesh as he held me tightly to stabilize me.
“I’m going to take her to the room,” Richard told Eric. “You’ll return our equipment?”
“No problem.” Eric looked worried, maybe because Richard’s voice was a little clipped. I knew Richard was only concerned about me, but perhaps Eric thought we’d make a complaint.
“Thanks for helping me,” I told him. “Sorry I freaked out.”
Richard wrapped a fresh towel around my shoulders, and we walked off the dock, through the soft sand, toward our room.
I felt better after I’d changed out of my wet bikini and wrapped myself in a fluffy white robe. When Richard suggested we return to the beach, I pleaded a headache, but insisted that he go.
“I’ll just rest for a little while,” I said.
My temples did throb mildly—a side effect of the dive, or maybe just residual tension. As soon as I heard the door close behind Richard, I walked into the bathroom. I reached for the Advil in my toiletries bag, then hesitated. Next to it was the orange plastic prescription bottle of Xanax I’d obtained in case of a long flight. I hesitated, thinking of my mother as I always did when I swallowed a pill, then shook out one of the oval white tablets and gulped it down with some of the bottled Fiji water the maid replenished twice a day. I closed the heavy drapes, blotting out the sun, then crawled into bed and waited for the drug to take effect.
Just as I was drifting off to sleep, I heard a knock on the door. Thinking it was the maid, I called, “Can you come back later?”
“It’s Eric. I’ve got your sunglasses. I’ll just leave them out here.”
I knew I should’ve gotten up to thank him, but my body felt so heavy it was weighing me down. “Okay. I appreciate it.”
The Wife Between Us Page 15