Judgement Day

by Andrew Neiderman

  “Men have a tendency to take their women for granted sometimes,” Norma advised. “We’ve got to keep them on their toes, keep the mystery alive, keep them thinking. Otherwise, you’ll become just another one of their possessions.”

  “Kevin’s not like that,” Miriam said.

  “Nonsense,” Jean said. “He’s a man. He can’t help it.”

  Norma and Jean laughed again. For a moment the two of them appeared childlike to Miriam, their eyes brightening mischievously.

  Before anyone could say anything else, they heard the doorbell. “That must be Kevin,” Miriam said. They all got up. As they started for the front door, Norma put her arms around Miriam.

  “Can’t wait for you to move in,” she said. “Catching you up will give us a chance to relive all our own wonderful discoveries.” Jean opened the door to greet Kevin.

  “Hi. So you found us out.” She turned to Miriam and winked. “We thought you would eventually.”

  “Just simple deduction,” he said and looked at Miriam. “Have a good time?”

  “Yes, yes I did.”

  “You don’t have to worry,” Jean said, smiling and then winking again at Miriam. “She’s already one of us.”

  “I hope that’s good,” Kevin kidded. He flirted with his eyes, and the two of them giggled. Norma hugged and kissed Miriam, and then Jean did the same.

  “See you soon,” Miriam said. They stood side by side in the doorway, smiling as she and Kevin retreated to the elevator.

  “Looks like you three got off to a good start, huh?” Kevin asked.

  “Yes.”

  “You don’t sound enthusiastic,” Kevin said cautiously.

  Miriam was silent as they got into the elevator, but just before it opened on the lobby floor, she turned to him. “What didn’t you tell me about the Jaffees?”

  “Oh.” He nodded. “I should have figured they would. Well,” he said, taking a deep breath as they stepped into the lobby, “it’s a depressing story and I didn’t want to put an onus on the apartment.” He turned to her. “Eventually, I would have told you. I’m sorry. It wasn’t right to keep it from you. It’s just that I want to surround you with pretty things, happy things. I want this to be the best time of our lives, Miriam.”

  She nodded. It was just as Norma and Jean had said—Kevin wanted to protect her from sadness and depression. She decided she shouldn’t fault him for it.

  “It is a tragic story, but I don’t see why it should affect us,” she concluded.

  He beamed. “That’s how I feel.” He hugged her.

  “Why are we getting out here?” she asked, realizing they had stepped into the lobby. “Shouldn’t we have gone down to the parking garage?”

  “I have a surprise.” He nodded toward the front entrance. As they approached, Philip came out from behind his desk to greet them. “Oh. This is Philip, Miriam. He works day security.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Taylor. You have any problems at all or you need anything, don’t hesitate to call on me.”

  “Thank you very much.”

  Philip opened the door for them, and when they stepped out, Charon opened the limo door for them.

  “What’s this?” Miriam asked, looking from the limousine to Charon.

  “It’s the office limo, always at the disposal of the associates. Charon, this is my wife, Miriam.”

  Charon nodded, his almond eyes scrutinizing her so intently, she felt self-conscious and instinctively crossed her arms over her breasts.

  “Hello,” she said and got in quickly. She looked back as Kevin joined her.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Russian Tea Room,” he said. “I made the reservation on the limo phone right after I left the offices. Cocktail, Madam?” he asked, opening the liquor cabinet. “I can make you your favorite, a Bloody Mary.”

  Cocktails in this plush Mercedes limo, lunch at the Russian Tea Room, a wonderful apartment on Riverside Drive, vibrant young new girlfriends—she shook her head. Kevin laughed at the look on her face.

  “I think I’ll make two and join you,” he said. The drink only added to the high Miriam was experiencing. “So,” he said, sitting back after he had made the drinks, “tell me more about your visit. What are they like?”

  “They’re a little overwhelming at first, especially when I think of the women I know in Blithedale. Sometimes they’re so cosmopolitan and deep, and then sometimes they talk and act like teenage girls. But they’re a lot of fun, Kev.”

  “I’m sorry I was gone so long, but . . .”

  “Oh, I didn’t even notice the time. They kept me pretty busy.”

  She began by describing Jean and Ted’s apartment, and then going into Norma’s. She rattled on, telling him every detail about her new girlfriends, except, of course, their plans for simultaneous births and how happy they were to discover that she wasn’t pregnant yet.

  She wanted to tell Kevin about that; she almost did once or twice at lunch, but every time she started to, she pictured Norma and Jean and how they would feel if they found out she had betrayed their first secret. It might ruin the friendship before it had even begun, and what was the difference anyway, she thought? It was a harmless, really humorous idea with, most likely, very little chance of turning out as they planned.

  After lunch, they returned to their apartment for one more look before heading back to Blithedale. Miriam had to confirm the reality. Kevin waited by the front door as she walked through it again.

  “It is a beautiful apartment, isn’t it, Kev?” she asked, as if she had to have her feelings reinforced. “How can he afford to give it to us rent-free? He could make a fortune renting it out, couldn’t he?”

  “He’s writing this off as some kind of a tax deduction. Like my grandfather said, don’t look a gift horse . . .”

  “I know, but still . . .” A ripple of apprehension passed through her. Kevin’s wonderful new job, this beautiful new home, great new friends . . . Did wonderful things really just happen like this?

  “Why fight good luck?” he asked.

  She turned to him, and he shrugged. She smiled. Kevin was right. Why not relax and enjoy it? she told herself. Kevin embraced her.

  “I love you, Miriam. I want to do the best I can and give you as much as I can.”

  “I wasn’t complaining before, Kev.”

  “I know, but why shouldn’t we have these things if we can?”

  They kissed, looked back at the apartment once more, and then left.

  How different the ride back to Blithedale was in contrast to the ride into the city that morning, Kevin thought. On the way in, he could count Miriam’s words on his fingertips. But from the moment they had gone to lunch at the Russian Tea Room to the moment they had pulled into their driveway in Blithedale Gardens, Miriam barely let up. Whatever fears he’d had about Miriam being unhappy with the changes in their lives he was proposing were totally obliterated by her streak of unchecked enthusiasm.

  A few times on the way home, he tried to tell her about the cases discussed at the staff meeting and his own case, but each time he began, she interrupted with another suggestion about their new apartment. It was as if she didn’t want to hear anything about the work. Usually she wanted to know all the details about a case, even those boring real estate negotiations. Finally, he shook his head, sat back, and drove.

  It wasn’t until Blithedale itself came into view that Miriam slowed down her monologue. It was almost as if they had crossed back over some invisible boundary and returned from their dream world into reality. The morning clouds were completely gone, and the late November afternoon sky was a clear, crystal blue. Children were just getting off the school bus, their exhilarated voices preceding their bodies down the steps and out the door.

  Solar heat had already softened and melted much of last night’s snow, so that it lingered in patches only on lawns and here and there along the sidewalks. Almost as soon as they stepped off the bus, the young boys, and even some girls, began t
hrowing snowballs at each other. Kevin smiled at their innocent play. A line of slow traffic followed the unloading bus through the tree-lined wide street. The relative rustic splendor and peace was in sharp contrast to the hustling, bustling, energized city world they had just left. It had a calming effect. Miriam sat back, a soft angelic smile on her face.

  “I wish we could have both, Kev,” she said, turning to him slowly. “The excitement of New York and the easy pace of Blithedale.”

  “We will. We can!” he realized, turning back to her, his eyes wide with excitement. “If we don’t have to pay for an apartment in the city, we can think seriously about a weekend and summer house on the Island.”

  “That’s right. Oh, Kevin, we’re going to do it, aren’t we? We’re going to have it all!”

  “Why not?” He laughed. “Why not?”

  Kevin decided he wouldn’t tell her about his first case at John Milton and Associates until he had returned from Boyle, Carlton, and Sessler, even though he was bursting with excitement about it. She was going to be just as excited and proud when she heard, he thought.

  As soon as they had pulled into their driveway at Blithedale Gardens, he told her he had better go see Sanford Boyle and tell him what he had decided.

  “I can’t wait to rub it in—twice the salary! And they were so smug.”

  “Don’t be arrogant, Kev,” she warned. “You’re bigger than they are, and anyway, arrogant people always get theirs in the long run.”

  “You’re right. I’ll contain myself just like . . . just like Mr. Milton would,” he said. “The man’s got class.”

  “I can’t wait to meet him. From the way Norma and Jean talked about him and the way you talk about him, he sounds like Ronald Reagan, Paul Newman, and Lee Iacocca all wrapped up in one.”

  Kevin laughed. “All right, all right, I may be overdoing it a bit, I admit. I’m just excited, I guess, and you’ve always had your feet planted a little more firmly than I have. Anyway, I’m glad you’re around to help me keep my perspective, Miriam.”

  “I must give that impression,” she said. “Norma and Jean said something similar to me.”

  “Did they? Why not? They recognize a perceptive and intelligent person when they see one.”

  “Oh, Kev.”

  He kissed her on the cheek.

  “I’d better call my parents,” she said, getting out of the car. “What about yours?”

  “I’ll call them tonight.”

  She watched him drive off, the excitement building to a crescendo in her, too. She took a deep breath and looked around. She couldn’t help liking it here. The serenity, the quaintness of the village, and the simplicity of this life gave her a sense of balance and left her at peace with herself. They had had a great deal going for them, already more than most people their age. Were they being greedy, or was Kevin right when he wondered aloud why other people, people who weren’t any smarter or more clever than he was, were enjoying more?

  It was wrong to hold him back, Miriam thought, and yet she couldn’t keep those tiny butterfly wings from fluttering just below her breast. But there was nothing to worry about. It had to be a natural reaction, she concluded. Who wouldn’t feel this way after so much had happened?

  Miriam hurried on, filling her mind with thoughts and plans for the packing and moving that was soon to come.

  The secretaries at Boyle, Carlton, and Sessler sensed something was happening with Kevin. Kevin could see it in Myra’s face when he entered the offices.

  “Is Mr. Boyle in, Myra?”

  Her big brown eyes scrutinized him, but he wore his tight smile like a mask. “Yes.”

  “See if I can see him in ten minutes, will you, please? I’ll be in my office.”

  How small, insignificant, even stifling his office appeared to him now. Kevin nearly laughed aloud when he walked into it. The desk looked half the size of his desk at John Milton’s. He felt like a man going from a small Chevy or Ford to a Mercedes overnight.

  And what did he have waiting for him here since his successful completion of the Lois Wilson case? He looked at the folders on his desk—that teenager who went joy riding, a will he had to draw up for the Benjamins, and a speeding ticket he had to handle for Bob Patterson. Whoopie-do.

  He sat back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk. Goodbye to this closet, he thought. Goodbye to frustrations, to daydreaming and envy, goodbye to small-town minds with small-town futures.

  Hello, New York!

  Myra buzzed him. “Mr. Boyle will see you now, Mr. Taylor.”

  “Why, that’s fine, Myra,” he sang back. “Thank you.”

  He stood up quickly, sucked in his stomach, looked around his office one more time, and went into Sanford Boyle’s office to tell him he was resigning.

  “Oh, I see. So this other offer’s panned out for you, has it?” Boyle’s eyebrows turned in toward each other like caterpillars in pain.

  “At twice the money I would make here, even with a full partnership, Sanford.” Boyle’s eyebrows nearly lifted off his head. “I’ll be at John Milton and Associates.”

  “I can’t say I ever heard of them, Kevin,” Sanford Boyle said.

  Kevin shrugged. It didn’t surprise him. It was on the tip of his tongue to say, “You and your ‘full’ partners don’t know much about the world outside of your precious little Blithedale, but believe me, Sanford, there’s a bigger, wider, far more interesting world out there.”

  He didn’t say it; Miriam’s warnings about arrogance kept him in check. Instead, he returned to his office and packed up most of his personal belongings. Myra, Mary, and Teresa did not come by to wish him good luck. When he carried his things out to his car, they looked up with disappointed and disapproving eyes. He wrote off their censure. They were bucolic, intolerant of ambition, narrow-minded and insular. Typical small-town minds, he thought, condemning me for wanting to improve my lot in life quickly, dramatically. He was positive they thought he was ungrateful. And they expect me to fall on my face, he thought. Won’t they be surprised when they read about me in The New York Times as soon as the Rothberg case begins.

  Kevin felt a sense of relief and elation when he finally got into his car. But Mary Echert couldn’t keep her indignation up as well as the other two. She had to follow him out to say goodbye.

  “Everyone’s very upset and sorry to see things turn out this way, Mr. Taylor,” she offered.

  “I was hoping some would be happy for me, Mary. I’m not going off to hell, you know.” He got into his car and slammed the door. She stood there, her arms folded, looking down at him. He rolled down his window. “Anyway, thanks for all you’ve done. You were always an efficient, competent secretary, Mary, and I did appreciate you.” He couldn’t help the condescending tone; it just came naturally. She nodded, not smiling. He started his car, and she turned away. Suddenly she turned back, remembering something.

  “I wasn’t going to tell you,” she said. “He was so nasty on the phone.”

  “Who?”

  “Gordon Stanley, Barbara Stanley’s father.”

  “Oh. What did he say? Not that it matters now.”

  “He said someday you’ll realize what you’ve done and you’ll hate yourself,” she replied. He could see that for her it fit the occasion, like an all-occasion greeting card or something. He just shook his head and drove off, leaving her looking after him in the driveway.

  It did add a note of depression and bring down his mood. But, thankfully, John Milton came to the rescue, almost as if he knew what Kevin would be going through. At home, Miriam greeted him at the door. Her face was as bright and as ecstatic as it had been when she had first set eyes on the New York apartment.

  “Oh, Kevin. You can’t imagine! What thoughtfulness!”

  “What?”

  “Just look,” she said, leading him into the living room. “It came minutes after you left.”

  There on the living-room table was a large bouquet of two dozen blood-red roses.

&nb
sp; “And he sent it to me!” Miriam exclaimed.

  “Who?”

  “Mr. Milton, silly.” She picked up the card and read it. “‘To Miriam, on the beginning of a wonderful new life. Welcome to our family. John Milton.’”

  “Wow.”

  “Oh, Kevin, I never thought I would be so happy.”

  “Neither did I,” he said. “Neither did I.”

  And like a torch burning away the darkness, John Milton’s timely and thoughtful gift burned away any hesitation they had felt about leaving Blithedale.

  7

  Norma and Jean were waiting outside Kevin and Miriam’s apartment when they arrived with the moving men. The girls were dressed in jeans and sweatshirts, their sleeves pulled up, ready for work.

  “This is so nice of you!” Miriam exclaimed.

  “Nonsense,” Norma said. “We’re like the Three Musketeers.” They hooked her arms and sang, “One for all and all for one.” Miriam laughed, and they began to unpack the cartons while Kevin directed the moving men until all the furniture had been brought up. As soon as Kevin had their stereo placed in the living room, Norma tuned it to an oldies station, and she and Jean began singing along, pulling Miriam into their festive mood, laughing and dancing to the beat of the music as they moved things from one place to another. Kevin shook his head and smiled. The three were already acting as if they had known each other forever.

  He was so happy for Miriam. Her girlfriends back at Blithedale were staid, very conservative. She rarely had a chance to let go and be silly if she wanted.

  They took a break for lunch, sending out for pizza. Afterward, Kevin showered and changed so he could go to the office for a little while. The women debated the placement of paintings, pictures, and knickknacks and then started to rearrange the furniture, again. When Kevin was ready to leave, he stood in the living-room doorway and announced his departure.

  “I get the feeling this would all go smoother if I weren’t in the way anyhow,” he declared. No one disagreed. “Isn’t anyone going to insist I stay?” The three women, all of one face, stopped and looked at him as if he were some stranger who had stepped in from the hallway. “All right, all right, don’t beg. I can’t stand that. See you later, honey,” he said, kissing Miriam on the cheek.