Fault Lines

by Anne Rivers Siddons

  “You’re going to ruin your hair with that thing,” I said stupidly, and she smiled, and then laughed. It was a spectral, shadowless little laugh, but it lit her face a little. She did not look dead anymore.

  “Can’t have that, can we? Hello, Met. You look like shit.”

  “It runs in the family,” I said, and went and hugged her. Her ribs felt like separate ridges under my hands, almost like Glynn’s. Not at all like the warm solidity of T. C. Bridgewater. Never again, I would never feel that again.

  “I wish our family ran to fat,” I whispered against her shoulder. “I get so tired of hugging bones.”

  She put both her arms around me and rocked me against her, and we stayed that way for a bit, both needing each other’s body warmth simply to live. I could not ever remember needing Laura’s arms. Wanting them, but never needing them.

  “Go put on some clothes; you must be freezing,” she said. “I’ll pour you some coffee. Then I’m going to sleep for twenty-four hours. You look like you could use some more sleep, too. Then we’ll talk. I’m glad to see you, Met.”

  “We can’t sleep anymore,” I said wearily. “We have to talk now. I have to take Glynn home in…what time is it? Eight? We have a noon flight. I can’t leave without knowing what’s going on with you.”

  She leaned her head far back and closed her eyes.

  “Nothing, not anymore,” she said. “I don’t know. I can’t seem to make my mind work. I thought you might help me. You could always see so much more clearly than I could see myself.”

  I can’t see anything but the shape of my own pain, my mind wailed peevishly. Go away and take all your pretty fragments with you. The one thing I’ve got to do in this world is leave here and take my daughter with me, and right now I don’t see how I’m going to do that.

  “Tell me,” I said aloud, or rather the old Merritt said, popping up like an indestructible jack-in-the-box. Get out of here I told her furiously in my mind; stay out of my head until I’m back where you live. This is not your place. I don’t want you. I want the one who came after you.…

  “Tell me,” I said again to my sister. That was when I knew that the woman T.C. and I had created was not going to survive the trip home. It was the worst moment of all. I have felt no pain since that has even come close to that moment.

  She took her coffee cup and went over to the sofa and sprawled out on it, putting her booted feet up. I followed her stiffly and sat in the facing wing chair. On the way I lit the half-charred logs and pulled an afghan around me. The cold felt as though it was sucking the life out of me.

  She did not speak, and I said, “Did you see Caleb?”

  “Oh, yeah. I found him right off, at his place. It was close to dawn, but he had company. They went out the back way; I never saw them. I don’t know if it was a man or a woman, but I can’t imagine any man friend of Pring’s sneaking out his back door when I happen by. None of them thinks I’m important enough for that. And as it turns out, I’m not. I never was. I don’t know now why I couldn’t see that.”

  “I’m sorry, Pie,” I said, and I was. Sorry, sad, but at a remove, as if through a pane of glass. I didn’t know what else to say to her. I could not make this right.

  “So things didn’t go well about Arc?”

  She stretched mightily.

  “There’s not going to be any Arc,” she said. “I killed Arc. I’m glad I did. It was a monstrous thing, an abomination. It would have been even if I’d played the grown-up Joan, I can see that now. The whole concept is…obscene. He didn’t change his mind about my doing the Dauphine; I thought at first he would, but in the end he wouldn’t. It was no mistake, of course. That’s what he wanted me for all along. That and for Glynn. When I realized he wasn’t going to budge about that I called Margolies and told him there was no chance and you were taking her home. He pulled the plug on the picture that day. Pring was furious and oh, so wounded; he said he hadn’t thought I had it in me to hurt him like that. Can you believe it? After the Arc business, after the baby—”

  She stopped and dropped her face into her hands. She did not weep, just sat there, hidden behind her long, thin fingers.

  “Oh, love,” I said, sadness pouring into the crater in my heart I had thought empty forever. “He didn’t want the baby?”

  “Oh, God, no. Of course not. Caleb Pringle with a baby? A wife and a baby? Met, I was such a fool; I thought he would want it; he always had such a special thing with children. But the only children Pring can relate to are the ones on the other side of the camera. The only way he can see them is through a lens. It was that way with the kid in Right Time; it would have been that way with Glynn in Arc. Beyond that she wouldn’t have existed to him. It would have destroyed her. I was too selfish to see that before.”

  “What did he say about the baby when you told him?”

  “Well, let’s see. He said was I absolutely sure it belonged to him, and that at this stage in his life a baby was not a priority, and then he said he’d take care of things financially for me, and he wrote me out a check for fifty thousand dollars and gave me the number of a man in Santa Monica he said would take care of…things. I don’t know if he’s a doctor or not, but he must be good, or Pring wouldn’t have anything to do with him. I gather the problem has come up before and has been settled satisfactorily.”

  “Laura, you didn’t—”

  “Not yet. I was going to, but then Stuart tracked me down, and came flying over and spent two straight days trying to change my mind, and what with one thing and another…oh, Met. Stu’s dead. He died this morning at three; I’ve been driving ever since. I came straight here from the hospital.”

  “Dead…” It was a whisper. Shock and swiftly following grief took my breath.

  “He was sick when he got to me. I was still at Pring’s; the morning after our little chat he took off for the Bahamas, whether with his mysterious visitor or not I don’t know. He knows a guy with some loose money down there. He still thinks he can get Arc going, but he can’t. Stuart was coughing horribly when he came, and he had a high fever; you could tell without even touching him. He wouldn’t let me take him to a doctor, but after nearly two days of begging me to have the baby and let him help me take care of it, he just…collapsed. I called 911, but it was too late by then. He had pneumonia, that kind you get with AIDS; he was dead that night. Last night. This morning, whenever. The doctor said that all told, it was a fairly gentle way to go.”

  She began to cry. I moved over and sat next to her and put my arms around her shoulder. I simply sat there, holding her while she sobbed.

  What a good man you were, and how much you loved her, I said to Stuart Feinstein in my head. She’s never going to have anybody like you again.

  Thank you, dollbaby, he said. But she still has you.

  No, she doesn’t, I said back. There’s no me left. Ain’t nobody home here.

  “Do you know what he’s done?” Laura said presently, around the sobs. “He’s left me his condo and all his money. He had more than I thought. He’s been saving it ever since he got sick and knew he wouldn’t get well. He made his will then. He only told me the day he died. He never did think Pring was going to look after me. He said that no matter what happened to him, I’d still have a place to live and a little money to raise the baby with. He said he’d talked to another agent about handling me, and that I should call him.”

  “What a darling,” I said, wishing for the ease of tears for Stuart Feinstein but knowing it was not going to be granted. “Will you do it?”

  She raised her head and smiled at me. It was a terrible smile.

  “Who in their right mind is going to take on a pregnant thirty-eight-year-old Caleb Pringle reject, whose hot new vehicle just fell through? I did that to myself, Met. Remember that asshole Billy Poythress, the one who did the interview with me that day at the Sunset Marquis? Well, I got greedy and desperate and shot my mouth off about what a great love Pring and I had going, and about the sensational part I’d h
ad in Right Time, and the even hotter one that was coming up with Pring and Margolies.…I didn’t tell him about Arc exactly, but Billy’s never had any trouble extrapolating. You wouldn’t believe what he made of that interview. It was unspeakable. It ran the very day I saw Pring; the timing couldn’t have been any worse. By now, of course, everybody knows that Margolies has killed Right Time and Arc, and if they don’t know Pring has dumped me and taken off they’ll know this time next week. There’s not an agent in Hollywood who’d touch me. Stu must have known, but he gave it his best shot. It was me he was worrying about when he died, Met. The last thing he said was ‘Take care of yourself, dollbaby!’”

  “So what are you going to do?” I said. “I know you’re hurt and shocked, but we’ve got to make a plan for you; I’ve got to know you’re not going to…do something to the baby or yourself. Come home with us, Pie. What’s holding you here? Leave the car in long-term parking, or with T.C., and just get on the plane with us and come home. We’ll look after you; we’ll find you a good doctor, Pom knows them all; we can help you get settled someplace nice with the baby, and find good day care…you can do all the theater you’d ever want to do in Atlanta; you’d own the city. You can do commercials there, you can do movies; they’re always making movies in the South now…you could make a very good life for both of you. You might even enjoy it. It’s a good place to live, a great place to raise a child.…”

  And I hate it, I thought. Right now I hate it.

  “I can’t have this baby, Met,” she said dully. “I can’t look after a baby. I can’t even look after myself. Do you think I want to screw up a baby’s life the way I’ve screwed up mine? No, I thought I might go to New York. I still know some theater people there. I know I could do character parts, and the television there is always good. You know, after…I get things taken care of here. I’ll have enough money to get started. Pring was generous; he must know fifty thousand is way beyond the going rate for abortions, even in L.A.”

  Her face twisted and I took both her hands.

  “I can’t let you do that. You’d never forgive yourself. I’d never forgive myself. Neither would Pom. You know he’d tell you not to do it; he’s always saying you’ve got to cast your lot with the living.”

  She smiled again, and it was no easier to look at than the last one.

  “Met, I’d say you’re going to have a hard enough time going back without bringing a pregnant sister with you. Can’t you just see it? Maybe that horrible mother of his could babysit while you and Pom go to marriage counseling.”

  I looked at her.

  “I know about things up here, you and T.C.,” she said. “Glynn couldn’t wait to tell me. She jumped me the minute I walked in. Listen, I don’t care, for God’s sake. I hope it was wonderful for you. I just wanted you to know that I know about it, so you don’t feel like you have to talk around it. You’re hurting; any fool can see that. I gather it wasn’t…a small thing.”

  “No. Not a small thing.”

  “I’m sorry. I really am. Your time to talk now, if you want to. Listening to man trouble is one of the things I do best.”

  “I can’t,” I said briefly. “Laura, what did Glynn say? I need to know.…”

  “Not much, other than you’d been screwing him behind her sainted daddy’s back and she hated him and you and couldn’t wait to get home and tell on you.”

  I could feel what was left of the color drain out of my face. This time she was the one to reach over and take my hands.

  “I don’t think she’s going to do that,” she said. “I gave her total hell. I’m quite sure nobody has ever talked to her like that in her entire virginal little life. When I finished she was bawling like a baby. I think she retired to her room with that big old dog of T.C.’s, to lick her wounds. Not before she washed that goop off her face and out of her hair, though. I told her she looked like every other little mall tramp on the face of the planet. Among other things…My God, that nose ring! When will they learn how silly they look with them? Like cattle just waiting to be led around.”

  “She said…she said she could smell it…you know…smell it on me,” I whispered. “It was a horrible thing to say. I don’t know which was worse, that she said it or that she could recognize it.”

  She laughed. It was a better sound, almost an old Laura sound.

  “Don’t worry that she’s been doing it, though she’d probably love for you to think she has,” she said. “That was my fault. Before I went to pick her up I stopped by to pay the guy who’s been taking care of the Mustang; he’s this beautiful kid, a real hunk, and completely gone on me; wants to be an actor, of course, and anyway, one thing led to another and I had some time, and so…I thanked him. It really had been a long time. As they say, I needed that. And then I was late, so I didn’t have time to shower. Anyway, she sniffed around and asked me, and I told her. I think I set her sexual development back at least a decade.”

  “Laura, you are incorrigible,” I said, and then began, incredibly, to laugh. After a moment she joined me. We hugged each other and laughed until the laughter slid perilously close to tears, and then we stopped, and looked at each other.

  “Did you?” she said. “Sleep with him?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I did. Every time I could. All day yesterday. She can tell Pom or not, I’m never going to be sorry about that.”

  “She won’t tell. She’s too ashamed for that. Ashamed and scared.”

  “Ashamed of what? Scared of what? What on earth else did you tell her?”

  “Ashamed of the way she behaved to you. Afraid she’s driven you away. Afraid you’ll leave her dad for T.C. Afraid she’s lost herself now that she’s turned herself into a perfect mall mouse. One of the things I told her was that she’d taken the most special thing she had—that real innocence and sweetness—and sold it to buy nose rings and platform shoes. I told her her looks and presence were the only reason they’d wanted her for Arc, and she’d totally destroyed those. I think she already knew that; I think she hated the way she looked and hated herself for letting her little buddies talk her into it. That’s where a lot of the anger came from. Before she even got in that car she was angry, and being angry makes you scared when you’re very young. I know. I took my anger and fright out on you for thirty-eight years. I just realized it when I lit into her.”

  Tears I did not know I had left stung my eyes.

  “Poor Glynn. Poor Pie. You really let her have it, didn’t you?”

  “Damn straight. That’s not nearly all. I told her Arc was dead as a doornail and just what it was she’d lost by losing it—the chance to be chewed up and spit out and hardened into somebody she’d hate, somebody she’d be stuck with the rest of her life. I told her what Pring had done to me and that he and every one of the others wouldn’t hesitate a New York minute to do it to her, and that it wasn’t acting that made you special; you had to make yourself special before you could really act. I told her there wouldn’t have been a damned thing for her after Arc; that she wouldn’t have done anything to deserve it. That acting wasn’t that easy. That it wasn’t easy at all; that you had to earn it hard, and be ready to be savaged for your pains. I said did she want it enough for that. Because that had happened to me, and I wasn’t at all sure it was worth it. I just realized that, too.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Nothing. She’d started to cry by then. I seized the home court advantage and pressed on. I told her I didn’t ever want to see her take the troubles she’d gotten herself into out on you again; that she could tell you when she was angry or scared, but she must not treat you badly. That you loved her enough to take it, but that you’d spent your whole life taking other people’s loads, and the time had come when you just couldn’t do that anymore, and I wasn’t going to let her grow up into the kind of person who took advantage of love, because that’s not growing up, is it, Met? It’s just growing older and staying the same, and what’s the point of all this shit if you don’t change into something
better as you go along? That’s another thing I didn’t know I knew until I yelled it at her.”

  “Pie…Laura—”

  “No. I need to tell you the rest of it. Most of the rest of it is about me, and I’ve never told it to you. I’ve been a worry and a grief to you most of my life, Met, and I can’t take those years back, but I can try to see that Glynn doesn’t get started down that road. And I can tell you how much I love you for standing behind me all those awful years. I couldn’t then; somehow it just made me madder and scareder. But by God, she’s going to tell you. You should have jerked a knot in me and you should jerk one in her if she does it again. And she will, because she has finally become, God help you both, a seminormal teenager, with all the special little delights that entails. I don’t think you should lock her up, but don’t let her devalue you. Real love always runs that risk.”

  Don’t settle, Merritt. Don’t ever settle…

  Oh, T.C., don’t you see that not settling is the hardest thing in the world?

  I got my trembling lips under control.

  “Dearest Laura, you will never know what this means to me,” I said softly, reaching out to brush a strand of the wounded hair off her face. “But about Glynn being normal, being a normal, healthy teenager is what we always wanted most for her. We used to pray for it in church…”

  I thought of Pom and his dark, troubled face, of the pain in his electric blue eyes when things were worst with Glynn. Pom…when it came to Glynn, he was the “we” of me. Where in this new equation did that fit?

  “How can I punish her for being normal?” I said, feeling thick and stupid and tired again, utterly unable to cope.

  She sat up on the sofa and smoothed back the straggling hair, and made a small face of distaste.

  “Listen and let Mother Teresa tell you. What you do is make a deal. She gets to be a real teenager with all that entails, and you get to be a real person. A real woman, with all that entails. It’s going to be harder for her to honor a deal like that than for you. She’s already had a taste of what you’re like when the woman and not the mommy takes over, and it terrified her. She’s going to want to keep the mommy. And I’m here to tell you, that act has always been a bitch to follow.”