The Numbers Game

by Danielle Steel

  The boys were asleep, and she checked on Pennie before she went to bed. She was reading her college essays on her computer and looked up when her mother walked in.

  “Are you okay?” Eileen asked, and Pennie nodded.

  “He was such a jerk, Mom,” she said, as tears filled her eyes. All illusions she’d had about her father were over.

  “The boys said the girl is really beautiful and very young, and she looks like a teenager.”

  “She’s twenty-seven, and probably a whore. I hate her.” There was no question about where her loyalties lay now, and Paul knew it too. They all did. And so did Olivia. She thought it would probably turn into a full-on war soon. Pennie, Eileen, Paul, and Olivia all fell asleep that night thinking about it. Just as her mother had predicted, Olivia thought. There would be casualties. There already were, and she and his children had been the first ones. He was a fool if nothing else. Her illusions about him and how smart he was had taken a hard hit.

  Chapter 8

  Olivia told Paul she needed some time to herself the next morning, which concerned him. The meeting the day before with his kids had taken a heavy toll. He went back to his apartment, and she said she’d call him later. Then she dropped by her mother’s apartment.

  She told her about the disastrous meeting over coffee in the kitchen since the cook was off.

  “You were right,” she said quietly, “it gets messy.”

  “It’s inevitable with the undoing of a marriage,” Gwen said. “It’s not a happy thing to be part of. You have to be awfully serious about him to want to go through it. And his children will blame you for many years, maybe forever.”

  “I can see that now. His daughter was looking daggers at me, and I don’t blame her. I would have too, in her shoes. He misjudged it completely, and I became the sacrificial lamb. Now they hate me.”

  “Do you want to marry him?” her mother asked, and Olivia hesitated.

  “I don’t know. Not now anyway. I’m too young to get married. There’s still a lot I want to do. I’ve seen his kids now. That’s a lot to take on, especially if they hate me. I didn’t understand all that before. It’s different once you see them. They’re very real.” And so was his wife, although she’d never seen her.

  “Breaking up a marriage is a big responsibility,” her mother reminded her. “You’d better be ready for it if this is what you’re doing and he is who you want.”

  “He’s handsome and sexy and we have fun, but he’s dragging a wagonload of baggage with him. That’s the part I’m scared of.”

  “It comes with married men, especially if they have kids.”

  “I’m beginning to get that. He made it sound like everything was all free and easy, and they lived separate lives and the marriage was dead. His kids don’t seem to think so, and I’ll bet his wife doesn’t either. He’s the only one who does.”

  “Maybe you need to slow it down a little,” her mother suggested gently, and Olivia nodded.

  “Yeah. Maybe.”

  “Real people are going to be hurt and I’d rather you not be one of them.” Olivia didn’t like being hated either, especially by Paul’s children. Their looks at Serendipity had sliced right through her like a knife. She knew she would never forget it, and she suspected they probably wouldn’t either.

  * * *

  —

  Eileen made breakfast for the kids on Sunday, and dropped them off at their various activities the day after they returned from their visit to their father. They were all in better spirits than when they got home, and none of them talked about it. Eileen took the boys to soccer practice, and gave Pennie a ride to a friend’s. They only had one car now, since Paul had taken his to the city, and Eileen couldn’t spare hers. She was on the move all the time.

  A week later, two weeks after Paul had left, she was surprised by how efficiently things were running. She had always thought that she would be lost without him. She was startled to discover that she wasn’t. It had been disorienting at first, but she had found her bearings. It was lonely at times, but she was lonely when she was living with him too. He came home late from work every night, went to client dinners without her, and most of the time he didn’t talk to her when he got home, he was too tired. He played golf and tennis with friends on the weekends. He loved his children, but most of the time he didn’t help her with them, so life without him wasn’t very different.

  She said as much to Jane too, that life without Paul was easier in a lot of ways. She had to take care of the children entirely herself, but she didn’t have to take care of him too. Even after only two weeks, it was liberating, and she was coping with everything she had to do.

  “Well, there’s a piece of information for you,” Jane said drily.

  It annoyed Eileen that he was having all the fun now, with a hot new girlfriend and no family he had to come home to. He could do whatever he wanted at night, without making excuses, checking in, lying, or commuting. He had the best of the deal, while she did all the drudgery, cooking, laundry, and driving, and helped Pennie with her college applications. She had someone to come in and clean the house, but everything that related to the children had always fallen to her to do, and still did.

  It had shaken her when the twins described what Olivia looked like. She was younger, but it woke Eileen up to what a drudge she’d become. She didn’t care how she looked and how she dressed, and she wanted to change that. She started wearing makeup again. Pennie noticed immediately and told her she looked great. She took a little more care with how she dressed and threw her oldest running shoes away and bought new ones. It didn’t make a huge difference in her appearance, but it lifted her spirits. She was thinking about her future.

  She tried to impart what she was learning to her daughter, and told Pennie not to give up her dreams for anyone. She thought it was the biggest mistake she had made when she married Paul. She had given up editing and her dreams of working in publishing. They had focused on what he wanted, and what he had given up when they got married, and never on her. She was determined never to let that happen again, with Paul, or anyone else. She had to matter too, and not just as the workhorse to serve everyone else’s needs.

  Pennie told her that she’d only had one or two texts from Tim since he’d started school. He was busy with his new college life, and seemed to have moved on, even after losing the baby, which had brought them closer, briefly. Pennie wasn’t ready to move on yet. She wasn’t dating, and she didn’t want to, but her mother hoped she would soon, when she felt ready. She wanted her to enjoy her senior year, especially after everything that had happened to her.

  Eileen made a major effort to make it a fun Halloween for them. She carved pumpkins with the twins, as she always did. She had their costumes ready and drove the twins around trick or treating. Pennie went to a party with friends. It had only been two weeks since Paul had moved out, but Eileen felt as though she was coming alive again. She was managing fine without him, better than she had ever thought she would. It made her wonder if they should have split up sooner. Most of the time, she was amazed to find she didn’t miss him. He had wounded her so badly by cheating on her that it had killed something deep within her. She was beginning to think that she no longer loved him, which was a relief.

  * * *

  —

  In the first week of November, Gwen and Gabrielle went to Paris for Federico’s show at the Petit Palais. It went beautifully, the critics loved it, Gabrielle was very proud of him, and the three of them enjoyed a week in Paris, staying at the Ritz. Gwen had invited Olivia to join them, but she said she was too busy getting her online art gallery running smoothly and meeting new artists.

  Things settled down with Paul again, after the disastrous meeting with his children. They were coming to the city to see him every other weekend, but sometimes they had too many plans of their own and couldn’t make it. They weren’t inte
rfering in his life with Olivia, and Paul and Olivia were settling into a comfortable routine that worked for both of them. They were both busy, but he slept at her place every night, and she liked that. She was too busy to think about his divorce, and assumed he was taking care of it. They had no plans for her to see his children again. Nor for him to meet her mother.

  Paul talked to Eileen about the children’s Thanksgiving plans. She wanted them with her for the holidays, and they wanted to be at home in Connecticut. Paul wasn’t set up to provide a real Thanksgiving meal for them, and didn’t want to take them to a hotel or restaurant, so he agreed to let Eileen have them. He had no plans of his own. Olivia had already told him that she spent Thanksgiving at her mother’s every year, her grandmother and Federico came, and a few old friends of her mother’s, but she didn’t feel comfortable asking Paul to join them. It seemed like too big a statement, and too soon to her. She wanted him to meet her mother, but not yet. And Gwen didn’t approve of the fact that he was married, even if he was separated.

  Olivia said she would only be gone for a few hours on Thanksgiving, and planned to meet up with him afterwards. It was the first time he wouldn’t be celebrating Thanksgiving in years, and wouldn’t see his children. They didn’t want to come into the city during the weekend. They all had too much going on and fun plans of their own.

  Olivia felt mildly guilty when she left for lunch at her mother’s, but Paul was a good sport about it, went back to his own apartment, and caught up on some work.

  Traditionally, Eileen’s mother came to Thanksgiving in Connecticut every year. Eileen wasn’t close to her. Her mother, Margaret, had always been an angry, unhappy woman, and she had never liked Paul. She made no bones about it. Her own marriage had been disappointing. She was widowed at sixty when Eileen’s father died of cancer. But even after he was gone, Margaret led a small life and was a dour woman. Eileen was used to it, and called her dutifully every few weeks, but her mother was a joyless person, probably chronically depressed all her life, with no interest in Eileen or her grandchildren. The children had never been close to her either, and they only saw her once a year on Thanksgiving. Eileen’s father had been browbeaten by her until he died at sixty. Eileen had been thrilled to leave home and move to New York to escape both of them.

  Eileen’s mother lived in Massachusetts, and was only sixty-five years old, but acted as though she were ninety. She had no hobbies or interests, and watched soap operas on TV all the time. She had worked in the finance office of the same company until she retired, and had hated it for all the years she worked there. The children dreaded her visit every year. She complained about everything, and it was the one thing Paul knew he wouldn’t miss over the holiday. He called her the “mother-in-law from hell,” and Eileen didn’t disagree with him. Eileen was an only child and her mother had been constantly critical of her growing up, and her father was too meek to defend her. Eileen had grown up in a suburb of Boston.

  Eileen waited to tell Margaret about their separation until about a week before she came so she could make whatever negative comments she had to make over the phone, and not make them at dinner and ruin the holiday, which she often did anyway. The children paid no attention to her.

  “What brought that on?” She seemed surprised when Eileen told her that Paul had moved out.

  “I guess we’d been drifting apart for a long time, and I didn’t notice it.”

  “Are you getting divorced?”

  “We haven’t decided yet.” She wanted to give her mother as little information as possible, just the basics.

  “You should try to get him back.” Eileen was startled by her comment.

  “You’ve never liked him, Mom. Why would you say that?” She was more curious than interested in what she had to say. Her mother had never given her good advice. She and Eileen’s father had been a poor match, and stayed together anyway, unhappy for most of their marriage. Eileen knew from her mother that he’d had several affairs while she was growing up, but they’d never divorced.

  “You’re not going to find someone else at your age,” she said, sounding as sour and negative as she always did.

  “I’m thirty-nine, not a hundred, Mom.” Eileen was annoyed by her comment, since her age was becoming a sensitive subject, with her fortieth birthday looming.

  “It’s all over at forty, your looks, your future, men. Does Paul have someone else?” She rang a death knell over Eileen’s future, as she had always done, even in her twenties.

  “Possibly.” Eileen didn’t want to give her the details. She always had something depressing to say.

  “You can bet she’s younger than you are, if he does. He’s not going to want another forty-year-old. Maybe that’s why he left.” She hated the idea that her mother might be even partially right. And she was of course, since the woman he was involved with was considerably younger. Pennie had said she was twenty-seven. A lot younger. And Olivia looked like a teenager, according to her boys.

  “I think he had other reasons.”

  “You should try to get him to come back before he marries someone else, and you wind up alone forever.” Her mother’s words were like a curse on her future, or a death sentence, which was why she hated talking to her, and called her as seldom as possible. Her mother had had a negative outlook on life for as long as Eileen could remember. She had insisted that Eileen marry Paul when she got pregnant, to spare them embarrassment. She had also said that no one would ever want her with an illegitimate child if Eileen wouldn’t give the baby up. She never had anything good to say, and she particularly disliked Paul, but thought Eileen should stay with him nonetheless. Once Paul had realized how negative Margaret was, he paid little attention to her, which offended her. He said that listening to her diatribes was like inhaling toxic fumes. Eileen was counting on her mother being wrong about her future after forty, and did her best not to listen to her. The children always complained when they had to sit next to her. But she retired to the guest room right after dinner to watch TV, and went home the day after Thanksgiving so they didn’t have to put up with her for long. It amazed Eileen that her mother wasn’t old, but had given up on life years before. And all she wanted was never to be like her.

  * * *

  —

  Eileen made an especially big effort and went all out for their Thanksgiving meal. She wanted it to be special to make up for their losses in the past month. Paul’s absence was sorely felt, and she knew that the children were sad about it. It was only Eileen, the children, and her mother, but the dinner was exquisite. Even the children noticed it. She had made all the traditional things they loved, and added some new touches and new vegetables, a truffle stuffing, and another one with foie gras. They could hardly move when they got up from the table.

  Margaret had kept her barbs to a minimum and actually enjoyed the meal. She usually upset Eileen more than the children, and Eileen was always sorry she hadn’t been able to provide a better grandmother for them. Margaret made her usual comments, but Eileen did her best to ignore her. Margaret always reminded Eileen about being pregnant when she got married. But it no longer mattered. Pennie was almost grown up and Paul was gone. Her comments about Eileen’s failed career fell on deaf ears and were irrelevant eighteen years later. Her criticisms were all to make Eileen feel bad, but were old news by then. Eileen was surprised to find they had no power over her anymore.

  Margaret left the morning after Thanksgiving, as she always did. She said goodbye to the children, thanked Eileen, and got a cab to the train station. Eileen was grateful that they never invited her for Christmas. Margaret went to her sister’s family in New Hampshire instead, whom she said she liked better. Eileen’s family had paid penance for the year and done their duty. She mentioned again how good the dinner had been before she left.

  “You should have been a cook,” she said, which she considered a put-down, but Eileen just smiled at her.<
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  “Thanks, Mom. I’m glad you enjoyed it.” And a few minutes later, after she was gone, Pennie came downstairs in a cute short black leather skirt, a new pair of boots, and a sweater she had borrowed from her mother.

  “Where are you going all dressed up?” Her mother smiled at her.

  “Tim is home. We’re having lunch,” she said, looking nervous and excited. “He called Wednesday night when he got in. He says he loves Stanford.”

  “I’m glad for him,” she said, studying her daughter. “Are you okay about seeing him?” Pennie nodded, and Eileen got busy with the boys after that.

  Tim picked Pennie up an hour later, and drove her to a nice restaurant for lunch. They had only seen each other once briefly in a rush after his trip to China and before he left for Stanford. He wanted to do something nice for her, and she was happy to see him and impressed by the restaurant. She felt very grown up at the table with him, and he looked more mature than he had when he left in August. A lot had happened to both of them. She told him about her parents’ breakup and in a way he wasn’t surprised. They had never seemed that happy to him, from things Pennie had said and when he was with them.

  “He has a girlfriend. I met her in New York a month ago. My father is an idiot. He tried to surprise us with her. It was a disaster. She’s very pretty and very young. She’s twenty-seven.”

  “Do you think he’ll marry her?” Tim was startled to hear about the girlfriend, Paul seemed like such a family man. He was sorry for Pennie. He knew it was another blow for her.

  “I don’t know. He’ll probably spring that on us too, if he does. We’d all be upset if he marries her, especially my mom. This has been really hard for her. She has to do everything herself. She always did, but she’s really on her own now. At least before, he came home at night most of the time. She’s been really good about it though. She never says bad things about him.”