“It’s odd that you say so,” Kristin replied. “I never thought you had any either.”
“Not even after you saw how I let Robert make a fool of me?”
“He strikes me as the kind of man who could make a fool out of any number of women.”
“But not you.”
“Not me,” Kristin said. “Because I refused to talk to him. Otherwise maybe he could have.”
The provost laid her hands on the table. “The thing is, Robert reminds me of my husband.”
“He reminds me of my ex-husband too,” Kristin said, then immediately regretted it. The less this woman knew about her, the better.
“I didn’t say ex-husband,” Bedard snapped. “I said husband.”
“I’m sorry. I heard you were divorced.”
“You hear all kinds of things around a college campus. You hear things at the doctor’s office; you hear things at the grocery; you hear them on the street. Most of them aren’t true. My husband died before I ever came here. In South Dakota. He was quite a few years older. Still, he had some traits in common with Robert. He looked a good bit like him, for one thing, and he was really bright, and he knew how to talk to women. Robert has the same skill set. That’s why it always puzzled me that people here disliked him so much. Of course, they saw a different person from the one who went to a great deal of trouble to cultivate me.” She locked her fingers together. “I’ve submitted my resignation. Effective the end of the spring semester.”
“I’m sorry,” Kristin said.
“No, you’re not. But that’s all right. You know as well as I do that in a position like mine or yours, you’ll never make a lot of friends around campus. People are rarely sad to see us go. Do you think there was much mourning when you left your previous school?”
“I don’t think there was any at all.”
“Well, that’s just par for the course. The thing is, we both add up to much more than the sum of our mistakes, no matter how many we might’ve made. We’re more than the name plates on our doors. I play the piano. Did you know that? I make my own wine. I sew. I cook. I bake things. I have a lot of great neighbors in Swampscott. I have friends in Minnesota where I grew up. I have friends in South Dakota. I have a lovely daughter and a wonderful son-in-law and three beautiful grandchildren in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. I’m sure that away from school you lead a full life too. Right?”
Her earlier remark about how one heard lots of things around campus made Kristin wonder if perhaps her recent indiscretions had really gone unnoticed. The many afternoons she and Matt had stopped for martinis in North Reading, the times he’d picked her up at the Andover station or let her out in Cedar Park: who was to say that no one who worked with her had ever glimpsed her in the company of the wrong man? What if someone had hacked her e-mail and passed on certain tidbits?
On the other hand, why should it matter? Whatever Cal knew would not be acted on again. It had led to the drowning of an old car that was already headed for the junk heap. She would never tell a soul what had taken place in the dark at Penny Hill Park, and idle speculation, if it existed, would fade over time. Unless she granted herself access to her memories, it would be as if the last few months had never happened.
“My life away from school is just fine,” she said.
Provost Bedard stood up and straightened her jacket. “Then we both have plenty to be grateful for,” she said.
That evening she left work early, taking the bus to Andover and climbing aboard the 5:25 for the first time since September. Another snowstorm was bearing down on them, but Cal would be waiting for her at the Cedar Park station tonight and every night from now until she retired or one of them died and left the other alone.
As the train passed southward through Wilmington, North Reading and Wakefield, she remembered playing with Patty Connulty on the banks of the Susquehanna, how her Airedale George loved fetching a slobber-soaked Frisbee. She recalled the day Mrs. Connulty scraped ice off her windshield while tears froze on her cheeks, and the evening her father held her aloft and told her there were people in this world who hated family bliss, as well as how her mother clutched her robe with one hand, the phone with the other, preparing to let it all go. She saw Philip sitting on a bench in an Ole Miss hoodie, Cal holding a dying oriole in his hand, Matt standing at the bottom of the basement stairs, looking up at her while water lapped at his boots. Surrendering to these memories, she leaned against the window and closed her eyes, her mind rich with images that burned like embers.
acknowledgments
As always, Ewa and Lena Yarbrough and Antonina Parris-Yarbrough made the writing much easier with their love and advice. My debt to them is immeasurable. I’m also grateful to my friends and colleagues at Emerson College, especially Maria Flook, Pablo Medina, Pamela Painter, Ladette Randolph, John Skoyles, John Trimbur and Jerald Walker. Sloan Harris remains the best agent any writer could ever have, and I am grateful to him and Kristyn Keene for their continued support. Thanks also to Ruthie Reisner at Knopf and to Wyatt Prunty and the rest of my colleagues at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Lastly, very special thanks to Gary Fisketjon, my friend and editor, who continues to amaze me even after all these years.
A Note About the Author
Born in Indianola, Mississippi, Steve Yarbrough is the author of five previous novels and three collections of stories. A PEN/Faulkner finalist, he has received the Mississippi Authors Award, the California Book Award, the Richard Wright Award, and another prize from the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters. He teaches at Emerson College and lives with his wife in Stoneham, Massachusetts.
Other titles available by Steve Yarbrough in eBook format
The End of California • 978-0-307-38660-1
Prisoners of War • 978-0-307-42732-8
Safe from the Neighbors • 978-0-307-59327-6
Visible Spirits • 978-0-307-43006-9
Visit: www.steveyarbrough.net
For more information, please visit www.aaknopf.com
ALSO BY STEVE YARBROUGH
Safe from the Neighbors
The End of California
Prisoners of War
Visible Spirits
The Oxygen Man
Veneer
Mississippi History
Family Men
The Realm of Last Chances Page 26