* * *
Because Caroline couldn’t talk and act at the same time, and the scotch she’d been sipping all afternoon had loosened her tongue, she stood holding a dish in one hand, telling Emma about her two children, the husband who had left her, her apartment in Palo Alto, her job. The dish never moved.
Suddenly she remembered her manners. “Rupert said you teach?”
“Yes, in Santa Clara at—”
But before Emma could continue, Caroline burbled, “I’ve always wanted to teach. I was thinking about going back to school to study art. I love to draw. And I love kids.”
“You should have talked to Clifton about that. You know, he runs a workshop for art teachers at Berkeley in summer school.”
“Oh, really?”
He had talked about it for half an hour. Where was your mind all afternoon?
“Does Jesse teach, too?”
“He did for a while, a few private lessons. But Clifton’s your man.”
“I should talk with Jesse about it.”
Was the woman stupid, or just drunk? Emma took the dish out of Caroline’s hands, dumped the remaining coleslaw into a plastic refrigerator container and said, “That’s enough. Let’s get out of this kitchen.” Before I scream, she thought.
Things weren’t much better in the living room, for Rupert and Jesse were well into their cups.
“Coffee, anyone?” she asked.
The answer was no.
“Come on over here, Emma.” Jesse patted the dark blue leather sofa beside him. “Come and have a little drink.”
“I think I’ll stick with my iced tea.”
“You’re such a prissy schoolmarm,” Rupert teased. “Come on, loosen up, live a little.”
Emma smiled stiffly. How many times did she have to refuse?
“Rupert’s right. Caroline’s going to have one, aren’t you?” Jesse stood and took Caroline’s glass out of her hand. “See?”
See what? That Caroline is a good sport who doesn’t know when she’s had enough?
But there was no point in resisting. “A light bourbon and water,” she said. Jesse made her one, dark and stout. It didn’t matter. She’d just hold it for the rest of the night, however long that eternity promised to be.
When he was sober Rupert was funny. When he was drunk, he wasn’t. He was well into a routine that went “And I says, ‘Bro, you full of shit.’”
“Say what?” Jesse answered, and they laughed, slapped hands as if they lived in the street. Jesse’s grandmother Lucretia, who had taught him to speak, if not the King’s English then a close approximation thereof, would have washed his mouth out with soap.
“And so I axed him, ‘Is that why yo eyes be’s so brown?’”
This was going to go on all night, and she couldn’t go home, because this was home. Emma closed her eyes and imagined excusing herself with a headache, slipping into the bedroom. She’d sneak her flashlight on under the covers so that they couldn’t see the light, and settle into her new book, Fear of Flying.
“Excuse me,” Caroline said suddenly. She staggered slightly as she stood. “Bathroom.”
“Are you okay?” asked Emma.
“Sure,” Caroline answered, but she tripped as she left the room.
Rupert looked up, and then the men went on. And on. Emma disappeared into the kitchen for a while, put the dishes away now that they’d drained. She drummed her fingers on the counter. She dawdled as long as she could.
“Can I get anybody anything?” She poked her head back in.
No one answered. That meant no.
“Where’s Caroline?” It must have been fifteen minutes she’d been gone.
“In the bathroom, I guess,” Rupert said.
“Do you think we ought to check on her?”
“Don’t be such a mother hen.”
Fuck you, Jesse. She smiled and retreated back into the kitchen. What the hell was she doing here—hiding? Yes, hiding with nothing to read. She should cache books all over the house the way the squirrels did nuts. But her purse book was in the bedroom. Her car book was in her car. Her truck book in the truck. Then she spied some old Gourmet magazines she’d meant to file.
In minutes she was arm in arm with Elizabeth David on a journey through the countryside of southern France. They were hot on the trail of the perfect chanterelle when she heard the sound of breaking glass. She dropped the magazine and hurried into the living room.
“What was that?”
“What was what?” Jesse looked up.
“Didn’t you drop something?”
He grinned. “What are you smoking in the kitchen?”
She took a quick look at the ebony coffee table. Nothing broken there.
“Where’s Caroline?”
The two men exchanged blank looks.
“Still in the bathroom, I guess,” Rupert ventured.
“Jesus Christ, she’s been in there for half an hour. You ought to go and see about her.”
Rupert didn’t move.
“Hell, I’ll do it myself.” Emma strode across the room, knocked and, when there was no answer, threw open the bathroom door.
Caroline was passed out on the toilet, her skirt up above her knees. Her head had crashed backward into the mirrored shelves behind. Shards of silvery glass glinted on the floor.
“You guys better get in here,” Emma yelled. Caroline didn’t move.
* * *
“Well, they say God protects drunks and fools.”
Emma closed the door behind Rupert, who had come back in to say one last loud farewell, having thrown Caroline over his shoulder and carried her out to his car. She was fine. Only one shelf was broken. Rupert had insisted that he drive her home now rather than spend the night, and Emma put up no argument.
“Lord, am I glad that’s over,” she said as the door closed.
“You’re awfully tough on people. You should learn to relax and have a good time.”
“I did have a good time, up to a certain point.”
“And then?”
Emma wanted to say, “And then I’d rather be reading a good book, or washing my hair, or doing almost anything,” but she knew better. Jesse had been drinking far too long for her to tell him that most late nights with his friend Rupert bored her to death.
Instead, out fell the words she’d been thinking all night.
“That woman has the hots for your body.”
“Who?”
“Caroline. Who do you think—Maria?”
Jesse looked at her with narrowed eyes, measuring whether she was putting him on or not.
“You’re kidding.”
“I am not. Are you blind?”
“Well, I didn’t notice.”
How could he not see Caroline’s fluttering approach? She’d watched other women do it, too, and it had ceased to amuse or flatter her as it once had when they sidled across a room, chest first.
Well, never mind, she’d let it drop. “Why don’t you go on to bed,” she said. “I’ll clean up the glass so we don’t step on it if we get up to pee.” She patted him on the shoulder. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
Emma dawdled in the bathroom, took her time with the dustpan and broom. The sexy thoughts she’d had earlier had long since evaporated. She was exhausted and had the first cranky twinges of a headache. She swallowed two aspirin. Then she wet a paper towel and carefully mopped the tiles for invisible slivers.
Suddenly the thought struck her: For whom was this broken mirror going to be bad luck? For Caroline or for her?
Jesse was snoring when she joined him. The bedside lamp was still lit. She picked up Fear of Flying and found her place. Soon she was reading about the zipless fuck, the one-time encounter with a stranger, no ties, no recriminations, no goodbyes. Just guiltless pleasure in the dark with a blind, deaf and dumb cock. Sounded like old familiar territory to her.
“Happy Fourth of July,” she whispered to Jesse and turned the page to the next adventure with a dampened fingert
ip.
13
It seemed to Emma that for the rest of that summer the phone never stopped ringing.
Jesse never answered it if Emma was home, and she began jumping at the sound the way Rosalie always did—as if the phone couldn’t possibly bring good news. That summer Rosalie would have been right. It didn’t.
Caroline’s voice was high and fluty with a thrill of laughter running through it, though she seemed a little surprised that Emma had answered.
“Emma!” she said, and then once again, “Emma! I want to apologize for my behavior on the Fourth. And I want to replace your mirror.”
“Oh, don’t be silly.” Emma waved a hand in dismissal of the idea, and the pie crust she was holding almost bit the dust. She rested it atop a pile of papers on the bookshelf.
“Well, I felt like such a fool. I really can’t drink, you know.”
Which is why you shouldn’t, thought Emma, biting her tongue. She’d been doing a lot of that lately.
“Anyway, I’d like to speak to Jesse about the mirror.”
Jesse? Was he in charge of the mirrors in the bathroom?
“Sure, I’ll have him call you when he comes in. He’s up at Skytop.”
“Thanks.” Caroline left her number. “Thanks so much. And again, I’m really sorry.”
For what, Emma wondered, exactly what?
“Ummm,” Jesse murmured that evening over dinner when Emma told him Caroline had called.
“I wonder why she wants to talk with you?”
“Beats the hell out of me.” He shrugged.
A couple of nights later, just before they got into bed, he said, “Caroline wants to have us by for coffee and to give us the piece of glass.”
“What?”
“She took the measurements for the mirror so she could have a piece cut.”
“Why the hell didn’t she just drop five bucks in the mail if she felt so goddamned guilty about it? We go to the hardware store almost every day of our lives. Didn’t you tell her that?”
“I didn’t want to make her feel worse than she already did.”
“So it’s going to make her feel better for us to schlep all the way the hell to Palo Alto to get her stupid piece of glass?”
“What are you so angry about? You don’t have to go, you know. I can do it.”
“I bet you can,” Emma muttered, not quite managing this time to keep her tongue in tow.
“What?”
“I said I’d love to go.” Emma pulled a T-shirt over her head, slipped into bed and turned out her light.
* * *
Caroline’s apartment was exactly what Emma had expected. Everything was very neat, in straight lines, her furniture a mix of black lacquer and light bleached oak. She did indeed paint—large floral watercolors. They weren’t bad, Emma thought. They weren’t good. Her children were five and seven, a girl and a boy, well behaved and beautiful like little windup toys.
But Caroline wasn’t beautiful today. She wasn’t even pretty. The mercurial quality Emma had spotted on the Fourth had landed wrong side up. Caroline looked as though she’d been run over by a truck. Her hair was drab and lifeless, her face was pale, except beneath her eyes where there were liver-colored spots. She wore a limp pink Indian cotton dress. Pink was not her color.
She smiled as she presented them with the piece of mirror that she had prettily gift-wrapped. But she couldn’t seem to think of anything to say. She managed her hostess duties, pouring tea for them into tiny cups. And she’d made little almond cakes. But nothing came together. Time hung there—a suspended afternoon.
Little fits and starts of chatter fizzled, then died out. From the children’s room came the drone of a television, a sound Emma detested, but welcomed now, as it filled the vacuum in the living room. Jesse, never good at small talk, sat staring at Caroline with a puzzled expression. Did your bubble of fantasy pop, my dear? his wife wondered to herself. Finally she took pity on all of them and opened her mouth.
“Didn’t you want to talk to Jesse about art?”
“Oh, yes.” Caroline brightened a little. And Jesse picked up the ball. He gave her a mini-lecture, telling her all he knew about art programs, advising that she call San Jose State, maybe talk with Clifton. He was as helpful as he could be.
Emma sat back and watched. There was something very strange about this woman. Very strange indeed.
“What do you think that was all about?” she asked as they headed afterward into Menlo Park for cheeseburgers at the Oasis, where once, like thousands of other couples, they’d carved their names in a wooden picnic table.
“Maybe she’s depressed about Rupert.”
“What about Rupert?”
“He dropped her. He’s moved on.”
Emma remembered Caroline’s saying she wouldn’t take Rupert from Lowie. Who had dropped whom?
“Moved on? Does Rupert screw around a lot? Does Lowie know?”
“I doubt it. Which question am I answering? Who knows?”
“Jesse, I haven’t talked with you about this because…” She paused. “But I feel insulted that Rupert thinks he can bring his girlfriends over to my house.”
“Your house?”
“Okay, our house. But Lowie is our friend. I like her. How am I supposed to act the next time she comes over with Rupert when I know he’s screwing another woman?”
“How do you know he was screwing her?”
“Come on, Jesse. Please.”
“It’s none of our business.” And as if that would end the conversation, Jesse gulped the rest of his beer and slapped his mug down.
“Rupert makes it our business when he drags his stuff into our house.”
“Stuff? Where do you learn words like that?”
“His piece. His honey. His cunt. What do you want me to call her?”
“Whoa. A little while ago you were being nice to her and now you’re coming down on her like she’s a whore.”
“Well?”
“She’s not a whore, Emma. She’s a perfectly nice woman with two kids who’s probably lonely.”
“Well, let her be lonely somewhere else.”
“Jesus Christ. You don’t have to make such a big production of it. Forget it, okay? It’s over.”
* * *
But it wasn’t. Because a week later Caroline called again. This time Emma was even less friendly on the phone. But it didn’t seem to matter. Caroline got straight to the point.
“Hello, may I speak to Jesse?”
Hello? What am I, some sort of answering service? Emma wondered.
“Yes?” Jesse said. This time he was home.
Emma sat and listened to his side of the conversation, imagining the other half, hearing Caroline’s breathy little voice that sounded as if she’d only just escaped from a boogeyman that very minute.
“Well, I guess I could. Where are the catalogues from?
“No, some programs are better than others. It is something you want to take a close look at.” Pause. “I don’t know. I’ll have to check my schedule. I have your number. I’ll give you a call.”
“She wants help picking out a school,” he said, looking Emma straight in the eye. Too straight, she thought. Guileless people don’t look at you like that.
“So I gathered. Does she think you’re her guidance counselor?”
“Emma, you don’t have to be so ungenerous. Just because you got all the breaks.”
“Breaks? Breaks? Tell me about all my breaks.”
“It’s hard when you’re alone with two little kids.”
“I didn’t tell her to have them.”
“What are you being so hysterical about?”
Emma thought about that for a minute. Was she overreacting? Was she imagining things? She turned back to the jeans she’d been ironing for Jesse before she answered the phone, fingered a thin place. She should put a patch there. How many times had she washed and ironed this same pair of jeans?
She ran her finger down the zipper. She still lo
ved the preliminaries, watching Jesse unbuckling his belt, unzipping his fly. And then something disconnected. When he reached for her, it was as if she were watching a porno flick and suddenly the bulb blew out. The film kept going, but she couldn’t see the picture.
Maybe she ought to face it. Maybe she didn’t really want him anymore. But if she didn’t, what did she want? Did she want to be alone again, free to flit from man to man like a hummingbird?
She flipped his jeans over. On the back pocket was a heart she had embroidered their first year together in red satin stitches. In yellow she’d done the words “Jesse + Emma.” Fancywork was the only kind of sewing Rosalie had ever been able to teach her when she was a girl. Nothing practical, like dressmaking, Rosalie had sighed.
“Jesse,” she began, not knowing what her next words would be.
“Yes?”
She looked into his face, now soft and open. His irritation was gone. She put the iron down, reached across the ironing board and ran one finger across his cheek. He looked so sad, poor little boy.
Want me, Emma, he was thinking. Want me the way I want you. Let me get inside you—the only way I know to touch you anymore. Hold me in your arms and save me from myself, from women like Caroline who whisper sweet words to me on the phone.
Emma smiled. “What are you doing this morning?”
“What I always do. Going up to Skytop.”
“What are you doing right this minute?”
“Nothing. Talking to you. What do you mean?”
She switched the iron to off: “Come with me,” she said and took his hand. “I want to show you something.”
In the next room she pushed him slowly back on the bed.
“No, sit up,” she said. She hadn’t meant for him to recline completely. She plumped two pillows behind his shoulders, leaned over and kissed him, softly, with just a slip of her tongue between his lips. He reached for her. “No,” she said. “Don’t move. Let me do this.”
She turned and opened her chest of drawers and took out something, using her body as a shield so he couldn’t see, then left the room.
She was only a few minutes in the bath, slipping quickly in and out of her clothes. Returning through the living room, she dropped a record on the stereo, rummaged through the little brass box on the coffee table until she found a joint. She lighted it, took a deep drag and, as she glided back into the bedroom, handed it to him.
Keeping Secrets Page 24