An Uncommon Family

by Christa Polkinhorn

  “Talk about self-control. I have to watch my weight, too. That one pair of pants? I can hardly close the zipper.” Anna waved to the waiter.

  “Oh, come on. You’re so damn skinny. I’m fat compared to you.” Susan sighed.

  “That’s ridiculous and you know it,” Anna said.

  Susan was a good-looking woman with wavy, naturally blond hair and green eyes. She was a little on the chubby side but it didn’t make her any less attractive.

  “By the way,” Anna said. “I checked a movie out of the library—A Room with a View. I read the novel by E. M. Foster but I’ve never seen the film. It’s about Florence, Italy, and an interesting love triangle. Perhaps we can watch it later on, in case you haven’t seen it already. It’s been around for a while.”

  “No, I haven’t,” Susan said. “That would be fun.”

  At home, Anna turned on the espresso machine and put some cookies on a plate. There was no message on the answering machine, so she tried to call Nico. There was no answer and Anna left a message.

  The following day was Saturday. Anna got up early and went to her aerobics class. When she came back home, the sun was shining through the living-room window, illuminating the thin layer of dust on top of the bookshelf. Anna sighed. It was time to clean, a chore she didn’t enjoy much. She decided to attack Nico’s office, which was a mess. Papers and plans were scattered on the desk, table, and floor.

  The mess in Nico’s office was a bone of contention between them. Nico didn’t like Anna to clean his office. He claimed that she misplaced his important papers. Now, however, he wasn’t here and Anna was sick and tired of the mess.

  She was careful to keep the piles of paper in the order they were in and set them on top of the credenza. While dusting and vacuuming, she remembered the plans of the house Nico had once made for them. They had been talking and dreaming about a future home and Nico had played around with different designs. They were thinking of eventually buying some land outside of the city.

  The phone rang. It was Nico. “Hi there,” he said. “How are you?”

  “Fine. Miss you.”

  “I miss you, too. I’ll be home soon.”

  “Great. Listen, do you remember the plan you made of our house a few years ago?”

  “Yeah? What of it?”

  “Where did you put it? I want to have a look at it again.”

  “It’s somewhere either on my credenza or on a bookshelf or in my desk. But why don’t you wait until I get back? I’ll find it for you. What do you need it for?”

  “I’ve been thinking . . . I’ve been thinking about having a home outside of the city, having a family, kids, you know?”

  It was quiet at the other end.

  “Nico? You still there?”

  “Yes . . . sure.” Nico sounded hesitant. “What brought that on? I thought you liked New York City.”

  “I do but we have to think about the future, too. We’re not getting any younger. It’s time to think of a family. Don’t you want children?”

  “Of course I do. Anna, what’s the matter with you? Why are you suddenly thinking about kids?”

  “It’s not sudden. We’ve talked about it before and we’ve been married for seven years. What’s wrong with having children?”

  “Nothing at all.” Nico cleared his throat. “But this is a serious topic, something we need to discuss once I’m back. This isn’t the kind of thing you just decide on the phone.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. Susan was right. I must have the baby bug.”

  Nico chuckled. “That’s okay. Don’t worry; we’ll have babies, loads of them.” He sounded more loving again.

  After they hung up, Anna went into the kitchen, fixed a cucumber-and-cheese sandwich, and poured herself a glass of water. She ate the sandwich slowly, thinking about the talk with Nico. He was just being the typical man, a little uneasy about having children, the responsibility, perhaps worried about how it would change their lives. He would come around. She needed to find the design of the house. It might inspire him again. The past couple of years he had spent all his time on commercial buildings. Anna knew that his real ambition was modern one-family homes and interesting public buildings. He was an admirer of architects such as Frank Gehry and Mario Botta.

  She searched through the piles of designs on the bookshelves, looking for the plan of the house. She lifted each sketch carefully. There were house plans, floor plans of buildings, large structural designs, but nothing that looked like the design of the cozy home he had shown her. Finally, she opened the drawers of his desk, shuffling through papers and stationary. She found it in the second drawer. The design was different from his other work, more like a regular drawing. He had added a garden with a couple of trees and a flower bed. Anna smiled. She remembered when he first showed it to her.

  It had been winter, around Christmas. They had been sitting on the floor in front of the gas fireplace. He had explained the layout to her, the arrangement of the different rooms. She had told him where to put the furniture and he had added the beds, the dining-room table, and chairs. The kitchen was big. They had always wanted a large kitchen with enough room for a breakfast nook or dining area.

  Anna folded the design again and put it on the bookshelf. There was something scribbled on the back. She picked up the paper and looked at it more closely. It was a Mexican address, a street name and number in Guadalajara. It looked vaguely familiar but she couldn’t remember where she had seen it before. She wrinkled her forehead, then shook her head. Perhaps it was the address of one of Nico’s friends or colleagues at work.

  The phone rang. It was Susan, reminding her of the concert in the evening. Susan and George had season tickets at the New York Philharmonic, and since George was out of town there was an extra ticket.

  Chapter 26

  They played the opera Cavalleria Rusticana by Pietro Mascagni, a story of love and betrayal with beautiful, passionate singing and music, which brought tears to Anna’s eyes. As she was sitting in the dark, listening to the libretto, she remembered that Nico had invited her to a performance of that very opera at the Lincoln Center when they first met. When the lights came on during the intermission, Nico had put his arm around her. He had noticed the tears in her eyes and had kissed her for the first time.

  After the opera, Susan dropped Anna off at her apartment. Anna invited her for a drink, but Susan was tired and wanted to go home. Anna, still keyed up after the performance, made herself a cup of herbal tea. Inspired by the music and the story of the opera, she took her journal out of her purse and made a few notes for a poem.

  As she paged through the book, she came across the address she had written down in Guadalajara after following the family in the park. She stared at it, stunned. This can’t be possible, she thought. She got up and picked up the paper with Nico’s home design. She turned it around, holding her breath.

  Fear gripped her, clenching her stomach and spreading through her body to her chest. The address in the notebook and the one on the back of the plan were the same. Nico knew the woman and the children. He knew where they lived.

  Anna stared out the window into the dark. The pictures of the past weeks passed in front of her eyes as in a slide show: Nico sitting next to the woman in the park, playing ball with a little boy with striking blue eyes. Nico’s eyes? She still tried to deny it, tried to find another explanation for the resemblance. Who was the woman? Did Nico have an affair? Were they simply relatives? But no, that couldn’t be. He would have admitted knowing them. No, there was something else, something so sinister that Anna recoiled from the thought.

  Anna wanted to call Nico, wanted to confront him, wanted him to explain, to tell her it was a misunderstanding. But she couldn’t, not before she had found out the truth on her own. As if in trance, Anna walked into Nico’s office. She sat down on his chair, staring at the desk. Slowly, she began to open drawers and searching through his papers. She didn’t know what she was looking for. She was afraid of what she might find.
The first two drawers didn’t contain anything suspicious, just papers from work. She tried to open the bottom drawer, but it seemed stuck. Perhaps it was locked but she couldn’t find a key anywhere in the desk.

  “Oh, Nico,” she whispered. “What’s going on?” She couldn’t lose her head now. She needed to think clearly.

  Anna went into the kitchen and searched through the toolbox for something to open the stuck drawer. She pulled out a screwdriver. Back in the office, she shoved the blade of the screwdriver into the thin slot between the drawer and the frame of the desk. She tried several times until there was cracking sound and the drawer finally gave. A thin splinter of wood fell to the floor. She dropped the screwdriver and pulled out the drawer.

  It was full of papers and envelopes. Anna grabbed the whole pile and put it on the desk. Her hands were shaking as she lifted each envelope, emptying its contents onto the desk. There was a feeling of relief for each envelope that didn’t contain anything suspicious, but it was immediately replaced by fear of what she would find when she opened the next one.

  “Nothing,” Anna murmured as she reached the bottom of the pile. She grabbed the pile of papers and wanted to put it back into the drawer when she saw something white showing through a thin crack at the bottom of the drawer. She stuck the blade of the screwdriver into the crack and lifted the bottom. Underneath was another envelope. It was sealed.

  Anna’s heart picked up speed again. She sliced the envelope open with a knife. A bunch of papers and pictures fell onto the desk. Anna knew immediately that what she had found would turn her life upside down.

  There was only one photo of the woman. She was somewhat younger but it was clearly her, the same long dark hair and intense black eyes. There weren’t any photos of the older boy and girl, but there were many of the little boy with the blue eyes. There were pictures of him at different ages. One of them was of Nico holding him. It could have been right after the boy was born.

  Anna lifted one of the papers from the pile. It was a document, written in Spanish. Anna’s heart stopped. She was barely able to read it, her hands trembled so much. The acta de matrimonio, or marriage license, stated that Nicolas Foster and a Carmen Maria Calderón were married in Guadalajara, Mexico, two years before Anna and Nico had met and four years before their own wedding. There were the names of witnesses and a bunch of legalese Anna didn’t understand.

  This couldn’t be true. Anna started to feel sick. She quickly paged through the rest of the documents. She found a birth certificate belonging to the little boy. He was born four years after Nico and Anna had gotten married. The parents were listed as Nicolas and Carmen. There was nothing about the older children.

  Anna stared at the floor. Everything was blurry and she noticed only now that she was crying. She dropped the papers and the photos.

  “No,” she cried out again and again. “No. No. No.”

  Anna barely had time to rush to the bathroom. She kneeled in front of the toilet, retching, but she wasn’t able to throw up. After a while, the retching stopped. Anna got up, rinsed her mouth, and went back to Nico’s office. She sat at his desk and stared at their wedding photo. Nico was wearing a tux and smiled his lopsided smile. Anna’s floor-length dress was made of light-green silk. They looked like the perfect couple.

  Overwhelmed by a sudden spurt of fury, Anna screamed and knocked the photo off the desk. It fell to the floor. The sound of shattered glass deflated her anger. She knelt next to the broken picture, her arms crossed in front of her chest, her hands pressed into her armpits. Painful sobs racked her body.

  After what seemed to her a long time, her knees began to hurt. She got up from the floor and walked aimlessly around the apartment, not knowing what to do. She picked up the phone and called Susan. Unable to explain, she kept on crying.

  Twenty minutes later, she heard knocks on the door. She opened and fell into Susan’s arms.

  Susan and Anna were sitting on the sofa, sipping herbal tea. Susan stared at the documents, trying to make sense of them and the photos in front of her.

  “You’re sure there is no divorce certificate?” Susan took Anna’s hand.

  Anna shook her head. “I can’t find one. And even if there was one, Nico never told me he was married. He lied to me the whole time.” Her voice broke again. She sobbed quietly.

  “And look at the birth certificate of the little boy,” she continued. “He was born four years after we were married. Nico must have carried on the relationship the whole time. . . . Married? Susan, we may not even be married.” Anna started to cry again.

  “That’s why we need to talk to George,” Susan said. “We need a lawyer. He’ll be back tomorrow. When is Nico supposed to come back?”

  “In two days. Oh Susan, what am I going to do? He’s going to call me tomorrow. What am I going to say? I can’t talk to him. I don’t even know who he is anymore. I can’t stay here. Everything here reminds me of him.”

  Sunday evening at Susan’s home, Anna sat on the bed in the guest room, staring at the half-empty overnight bag in front of her. She had only packed a few clothes and underwear. She pulled out a pair of jeans, then dropped it back into the bag. Finally, Susan helped her unpack and got her settled.

  Anna barely touched the light dinner Susan prepared. She drank a glass of wine without tasting it. They watched the news on TV but nothing registered in Anna’s mind. Every once in a while, she broke down crying again. Susan kept hugging her.

  In spite of the fact that she was exhausted, Anna couldn’t fall asleep. She spent most of the night crying. In the morning, her face and eyes were swollen and she was deathly pale.

  Susan called the library. Anna wouldn’t be in for a few days, she had the flu, she told Anna’s boss. She also called Nico. Anna was sitting next to her, her hands clasped tight, her fingers bloodless and white. She listened to Susan tell Nico that Anna was ill and wouldn’t be able to pick him up at the airport. She was staying with them. No, it wasn’t anything serious, just the flu. Of course, Nico wanted to talk to Anna.

  “She’s asleep right now. She’ll call you later. She says hello. I can pick you up at the airport.” Susan rolled her eyes and looked at Anna.

  Anna’s eyes welled up. She pressed her hand to her mouth, stifling a sob. She wanted to talk to him so badly. She was hoping against all hope that whatever she had discovered over the past couple of days was a big misunderstanding, that it wasn’t true. Whenever she thought of Nico and their life together, her heart constricted in pain. She went over the past ten years she had known him in her mind again and again, searching for clues, searching for anything that would have pointed to the fact that her husband—or whatever he was to her—had lived a double life.

  “Thank God, he turned down my offer to pick him up,” Susan said to Anna after she hung up the phone. “I don’t think I could’ve looked him in the eyes.”

  Chapter 27

  George examined each document and photo carefully, occasionally brushing his hand over his short brown hair. After what seemed to Anna an inordinate amount of time, he looked up and sighed.

  “I don’t know what to say, Anna. This is incredible. Unfortunately, bigamy is more common than we assume. That doesn’t make it any less painful.” George put his elbows on the table and leaned his face into his hands. Then he looked up again.

  “What can we do?” Susan asked.

  George shrugged. “Well, for one thing, bigamy is a class E felony in New York. If convicted, Nico could be fined or he could even go to prison.”

  “Stop being the lawyer, George,” Susan said in an exasperated tone. “Anna is in pain.”

  “I know. Sorry. Besides, that’s not the point now. The question is: Why? Why did he do it? Why didn’t he tell you he was married? Why didn’t he get a divorce? I mean, we just have to ask him.” George wrinkled his forehead. “Of course, that doesn’t change the fact that he betrayed you, but perhaps his answer will shed some light—

  “Wait a minute.” He peered at Ann
a. “What was his legal status when you first met him?”

  “What do you mean?” Anna asked.

  “Did he have a green card? A visa?”

  “He was here on a student visa. He got his green card after we were married. . . . You don’t mean to say he married me, because . . . no, that couldn’t be.” Anna covered her eyes with her hands. “I don’t know what to think anymore.”

  Susan and George suggested that George would be the one to confront Nico and talk to him first. They were close friends and perhaps a talk between men would shed some light on the situation.

  Anna shook her head. “No, I have to talk to him first. He’ll know that I know,” she said, remembering that she left the desk drawer open and the screwdriver on the floor. “He’ll see right away that the envelope with the documents is missing. Unless he comes here first. Besides, I’m his wife; he has to answer to me.” Tears welled up in her eyes again. “That’s not even true; I may not be his legal wife.”

  “Well, we really don’t know and, in spite of all the evidence, we shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” George said. “Nico may be divorced and the proof may just not be among the papers you found.”

  “But he had a child with the woman after we were married. And why didn’t he tell me he was married?”

  “Well, whatever way you turn it, there’s simply no excuse for what Nico did.” Susan sounded angry. “Let’s face it. He’s an adulterer and most likely a bigamist. I’m sorry, Anna, I don’t mean to hurt you.” Susan put her arm around Anna.

  Anna shook her head. “You couldn’t hurt me any more than Nico already did. No matter what the real truth is, one thing is for sure. He betrayed me. He’s been lying to me for years. How can I ever trust him again?” Anna’s voice broke.

  Chapter 28

  It was two o’clock in the morning. The leaves on the two birches in the front yard shimmered in the diffuse light of an almost-full moon. Anna had woken up after a few hours of restless sleep. Like the nights before, the first thought after waking up was of Nico. Unwilling to face the harsh light of reality, she turned over. The tears soaking into the pillow and the pain in her chest, however, kept sleep at bay.