Private Affairs

by Judith Michael

  The last word was a fading sigh. The doctor beckoned to Matt and Elizabeth and numbly they followed her into the hall.

  "Not as bad as it might have been," she said. "There may be some lasting paralysis of the left side—we won't be sure for a day or two—and temporary confusion, but, in time, he should recover without crippling damage. It will be slow, however; you should be prepared for that. Is there a history of stroke in your family?"

  "I don't think so." Matt frowned. "I can't even remember Dad's being

  sick. My grandparents, either. They ranched all their lives, bred horses in Nuevo: they only died a couple of years ago, in their eighties. I don't know," he repeated helplessly.

  "I'll need a family history." the doctor said. "My office is down the hall." She turned to Elizabeth. "You could wait upstairs if you'd like, in the solarium. It's more pleasant there."

  "AD right." Elizabeth put her hand on Man's arm and he gave her a brief kiss. "Wait for me." he said, and followed the doctor down the hall.

  Pacing about the solarium, barely aware of lush trees and hanging plants. Elizabeth felt tears rise in her throat. After a while, when Matt had not arrived, she called her mother. "I just need to talk," she told Lydia. "Just to hear you tell me I'm wrong to be afraid."

  "I'm coming over." Lydia said. "Give me five minutes to put some clothes on."

  When she arrived, she found Elizabeth huddled on a wicker couch. "How is he' 1 "

  "I don't know. Matt hasn't come back: I haven't heard. Mother, we're going to have to stay with him."

  "Stay with Zachary 0 You mean have him live with you. Well, that's a problem, but if you find a bigger apartment—"

  "No. Stay with him in Santa Fe. He wants Matt to run his company until he can run it by himself again."

  "But you can't do that!" They looked at each other in silence, then Lydia sat beside Elizabeth and put her arms around her.

  Like a young girl, Elizabeth put her head on her mother's shoulder and began to cry. "I'm sorry. I know it sounds mean and selfish, but I don't want to give everything up. . .

  "You're not mean, or selfish," Lydia said. "But can't you wait before you decide to give anything up? Even if he needs a month or two. we can figure something out ... if necessary we'll pay for a manager to run his company until he's back on his feet. . .

  "I won't let you spend your retirement money. Anyway, I don't think it would help. The doctor said. ..." Elizabeth took a deep breath, pushing back her tears. "It will be a slow recovery; I don't t hi n k a month or two or even twice that would be enough."

  "Then he could close the company for a while. And go to a convalescent home."

  "That isn't what he wants."

  "What he wants. Elizabeth, and what you can do. are two different things."

  "Are they? Oh, mother—" Her tears welled up. "I love him and I want to help him—"

  "Zachary? Or Matt?"

  "Oh , , . both of them. But Matt's feeling about his father is so special ... I told you about his mother, how she walked out and left them, and all the years of Matt's growing up they were more like brothers than father and son . . . they were everything to each other. Mother, is there any way in the world I can ask Matt to stay here with me if his father asks him to take care of him in Santa Fe and run his company?"

  "Not . . . easily," Lydia said. "It could come back to haunt you, years later."

  Slowly, Elizabeth shook her head. "Whatever we do is going to come back to haunt us."

  When Matt came in a while later, he found Lydia with her arm around Elizabeth, the two of them talking in low voices. He kissed Lydia. "I'm glad you're here." Sitting beside Elizabeth, he kicked off his shoes. "Fuck it," he said tiredly.

  "You're going back," Elizabeth said.

  "We'll decide together." In a moment he sprang up and strode away from her and then back. "What the hell can I do, Elizabeth? I'm all he's got. He never left me when I depended on him."

  "I know." She was crying again, the tears streaking her face. "I know. There isn't anything else we can do."

  "Christ, all our plans, everything we wanted . . . But what can I do? What am I supposed to tell him? 'We've got these neat jobs, Dad, so you're on your own.' Can I tell him that?"

  "No."

  " 'We've got an apartment, Dad.' Can I say that? 'And we plan to buy our own newspaper someday, so you'll have to handle your life yourself because we have our own to live.' Can I say that?"

  "No." Elizabeth wiped her face on her shirt sleeve. "Matt, sit with me."

  He sat down. "It's his printing company, not mine. It's his life, not mine. I don't want them. But I don't see a way out."

  "Not for a while." Elizabeth swallowed the last of her tears and steadied her voice. "It isn't forever, you know; only until he's himself again. Didn't the doctor say there wouldn't be crippling damage? He'll only need us for a while, until he can take care of himself again and run his company. And he will: he's only fifty-six; he'll want to feel useful and active as soon as he can, don't you think?"

  In the silence, Lydia stood up. "I'm very proud of you," she said softly

  to Elizabeth. "I'm going to find a cafeteria and have a cup of coffee. Will you and Matt join me when you're ready?"

  "Thank you, Mother." Elizabeth was looking at Matt as Lydia quietly left them. "What did you tell Zachary?"

  "Nothing. I wanted to talk to you first." He clenched his fist, opened it, clenched it again. "Elizabeth, I promise it will only be for a while. As soon as he recovers, or we find someone to help him at home, and in the company, we'll come back here. Or we'll go somewhere else. We won't have trouble finding jobs; newspapers are always looking for brilliant prize-winning journalists."

  She nodded and smiled, knowing he was trying to convince himself as well as her. "I promise," Matt repeated. "We'll pick up where we left off; we're young, there's plenty of time. This is a detour, that's all. I promise."

  Elizabeth circled his neck with her arms, as she had earlier that night, when their dreams were as bright as the sunset. "It's all right, Matt. There isn't anything else we can do."

  "All the dreams," he murmured, holding her. As if, Elizabeth thought, they were propping each other up. "Everything we want. We'll have it all, we'll do it all. It will just take a little longer than we'd planned."

  She put her cheek to his, then kissed him. "It's all right, Matt," she repeated, whispering against his lips. "Don't worry. We'll be fine." Her tears had dried, but she still felt them, flowing inside her. Don't be selfish. Think ofZachary. Think of Matt. Don't be mean. You're young. You have everything ahead of you. "It's all right," she said one more time. "We have each other. That's all that matters. Now—shall we get some coffee? And maybe we should make a list. We have so many things to do."

  Undo, she thought, but she kept it to herself, with the tears still flowing inside her, as she and Matt walked down the stairs, leaving the moonlight behind.

  H A P T E R

  T,

  .he bride and groom stood on the brick patio within the placita of the great house as the guests moved past, murmuring greetings in Spanish and English. Nearby, beneath the arching branches of an olive tree heavy with silver leaves and clusters of tiny, unripened olives, long tables were laden with food and drink, silver goblets, and decorations symbolizing long life, joy, and many children.

  The groom's father slipped away from the reception line. Mopping his forehead with an oversize handkerchief, he stopped to ask the barman for two glasses of champagne punch, then made his way across the garden and handed a glass to Elizabeth. "To drink our health. And to sustain us in our hour of need."

  "What do you need?" she asked, laughing.

  "Patience, since I dislike parties; a look of gratitude for my son's advantageous marriage; and stamina, since soon I must dance with women I have no desire to hold in my arms. I wouldn't mind if it were you: you are extraordinarily beautiful; more so every year. To our health." They touched glasses. "And what makes you so quiet?" he wen
t on when Elizabeth did not speak.

  "I've been remembering my own wedding," she said meditatively. "It

  was in a garden, almost as beautiful as this, on a June afternoon just like this one. And everyone had the same look of expectation. Predicting a marvelous future for the happy couple."

  "And how many years ago was that?"

  "Sixteen," she said.

  "And were they right—about the marvelous future?"

  "Of course," she replied automatically. The groom's father looked closely at her but they were interrupted by guests politely jostling for a chance to talk to Elizabeth, and, with a sigh, he returned to his place in the reception line. Elizabeth listened to the guests, occasionally making notes on a pad of paper, her eyes still on the bride and groom, looking so young, smiling and smiling even as they wilted beneath the white-hot Santa Fe sun. Everyone else sought the shade; bright dresses and dark suits blended into the carefully tended gardens, smooth lawns, and a quietly flowing stream with a wooden bridge leading to the swimming pool and bathhouses.

  Elizabeth breathed in the mingled fragrances and admired the lavish placita. No one ever saw it but invited guests, since it was shielded on three sides by the sprawling adobe house; and the house itself, with its driveway and gravel parking area, was completely enclosed by a high adobe wall with heavy wooden gates. A year ago, she and Matt had enlarged their own house and built an adobe wall around their garden, but they had nothing as sprawling and magnificent as this. Not enough land, she thought, and added ruefully, not enough money.

  The shadows lengthened; the reception line came to an end. Musicians tuned their guitars; servants lit wrought-iron lanterns and swung open tall doors leading to the long salon; and the bridal couple danced, sweeping the length of the room, their fatigue gone, their faces bright, seeing only each other. In a few minutes their parents joined them, and then the guests, filling the high-ceilinged room with the gay confetti of festive gowns. The groom's father returned to Elizabeth. "You will dance with me?"

  "One dance," she said. "And then I have work to do."

  He put his hand correctly at her waist. "A woman of your loveliness should be cared for and spoiled, not forced to work."

  He was very serious and Elizabeth was careful not to laugh, He was an Anglo whose father had come to Santa Fe from Detroit only forty years earlier, but he was a member of the New Mexico legislature and had adopted many of the attitudes of the city's oldest Spanish families, who, like the bride's, could trace their genealogy through twelve or more generations. So Elizabeth said only, "My work is important to me," and when

  the dance ended she excused herself with a formality that matched his, to find a quiet place to sit. She chose a bench between the placita and the salon, where she was inconspicuous as she wrote a description of the wedding for the society page of the Santa Fe Examiner.

  "Ivory satin with seed pearls," she scrawled, glancing at the bride. "Triple-tiered lace veil, an heirloom handed down from mother to daughter since 1730 when the family, members of Spanish royalty, came to Mexico and then Santa Fe."

  She wrote swiftly: the bride's genealogy, the groom's newly-established law practice, his father's influential committee chairmanship in the state legislature, a list of the guests, including the positions and family background of the most prominent, and colorful descriptions of clothes and food. But she had been a part-time reporter for the Examiner long enough to let her mind wander while she scribbled notes, and so she thought about her family: Holly and Peter, who should be home now from summer classes at the College of Santa Fe; Matt, who had advertised that week for a new assistant at the printing plant so he could spend more time at home; and Zachary—who had died three months ago but still seemed part of their lives, since everything they had done for sixteen years had revolved around him.

  His death had hit Matt terribly hard, but Elizabeth, too, was shaken by it, as if it had left them at loose ends, without a reason for their life. "Carne Adovada," she wrote, describing the dinner. "Green Chile Souffle, Tocina del Cielo ..." while she thought: We need a vacation, to get away from the house and reminders of Zachary. The four of us could go hiking, or drive to Denver. . . .

  But who would manage the printing plant? They'd never been able to afford a full-time manager. And what about her job? There wasn't much security for a part-time reporter, and a lot of aspiring journalists wanted to work for the Examiner, since its opposition, the Chieftain, was a small failing weekly. And Holly and Peter were involved in their own projects; they might not want to go anywhere right now. Probably they should wait for a better time. . . .

  We've always said, Not now, not yet, later.

  She bent again to her notes and when she had finished, went to the parents of the bride and groom to say good-bye. Guests reached out to her as she walked through the crowded room; everyone knew her, knew she was writing the story for the Examiner, and wanted to make sure they were in it and properly identified. But when they asked about her story, Elizabeth simply smiled and shook her head. Everything she wrote was her secret until it was printed.

  Matt was the only one who saw her stories before she delivered them to her editor, but even he hadn't looked at most of them for a long time. So many things they didn't share anymore, she mused as she drove home. Mostly they talked about their daily affairs: the house, the children, Zachary—no, not Zachary anymore. What was wrong with her? Why couldn't she get used to it that Zachary was gone? And why did she think so much about changes in her marriage that bothered her, instead of the things that were good?

  It was only a short distance from the wedding party to her home on Camino Rancheros, through narrow streets lined with adobe walls with carved wooden gates, and treetops towering above them from gardens on the other side. Adobe and trees, Elizabeth reflected. Someday, if she ever had her own column, she would write a description of Santa Fe. The words were already there, in her mind.

  ... a small town like a painting in two colors: dusty pink adobe and dark green trees, block after block, serene, soothing, almost hypnotic. Color comes from the people: bright Spanish and Indian clothing, jewelry, furniture, and art. But when the streets are empty, at the dinner hour and at dawn, the unbroken dusty pink and dark green are dreamlike, a tapestry washed clean of colors, then flung upon the desert to dry, blending in with pale, sage-dotted sand—

  Stop it She drove through open gates to park beside her house. Why did she pretend? She didn't have a column because editors gave space to full-time writers, and she couldn't be a full-time writer—not when she also had to help Matt at the printing company and take care of a house and two children.

  "Mom!" Peter was waving to her from the door. "Telephone!" He leaned against the doorway, crushing morning glories beneath his shoulder as he watched her cross the gravel. He was going to be as tall as Matt, Elizabeth thought, and as handsome, beneath his tangle of red hair, once he got through the agonies of adolescence. Each day, in fits and starts, he went from a round-faced, sweet-tempered little boy to a gangly fourteen-year-old, grumbling one minute, sharing family jokes the next, lurching into furniture at home but riding a horse with grace and balance, shying away from his mother's kisses but then, without warning, putting his arms around her and whirling her about the room with an infectious laugh that reminded Elizabeth of Matt—and made her realize how long it had been since he had laughed that way.

  "It's you=know=who," Peter said. "Your glamorous television star."

  "Tony Rourke," Elizabeth said. "You know his name perfectly well." Kissing him on the cheek, she walked with him into the cool house and picked up the telephone in the kitchen. Instantly, Tony's smooth voice flowed around her, like an embrace.

  "Dear Elizabeth, I'm at the airport—"

  "Which airport?" she asked, alarmed.

  "Los Angeles. I've been trying to reach you to tell you I'm on my way to New York and stopping off in Santa Fe to see you. It's been much too long. Can you meet my plane in three hours? We'll have a late dinner a
nd then you can drive me to La Posada—I've reserved a room—and tomorrow I'll go on to New York. My plane arrives at—"

  "Tony, stop. I can't have dinner with you tonight."

  "Why not? Do you know how difficult it is for me to create these opportunities? My manager guards me like a dragon, my secretaries ar= range schedules that are like prisons . . . Elizabeth, Marjorie left me."

  "Oh." Marjorie. Tony had mentioned her a few times in the past year, but Elizabeth knew no more about her than she did about any of his wives. Vaguely she remembered Ginger, who had been at her wedding, but since then she hadn't followed his marriages and divorces. "I'm sorry," she said.

  "So am I. I liked her. She said she found me impossible to live with. True, perhaps, but perhaps I just haven't married the right woman. Why can't you have dinner with me tonight?"

  "Because it's our anniversary and we're going out."

  "To celebrate. How many years?"

  "Sixteen."

  "With the same person. Incredible. Do you still look at each other the way you did at your wedding? I keep waiting for that to happen to me. But I lost my chance—didn't I?—a long time ago."

  "Tony, stop being dramatic."

  "It's my nature to be dramatic. But I mustn't keep you; you want to dress up in your finery and go out on the town with your husband. And you don't want—or your husband doesn't want—Anthony Rourke, tele-vision host adored by millions, waiting in the wings. Of course I won't come tonight. But may I stop off on my way home? Next Wednesday; is that all right? You do want to see me, don't you? At least half as much as I want to see you?"

  His careful voice, warm as velvet, slipped now and then into self-mockery: he never could let anyone know whether he was truly serious. Perhaps he didn't know himself. Ten years earlier, he'd left his father's com-

  pany with nothing but the few dollars he'd managed to save from his extravagant life in Houston, called Elizabeth to tell her he was going to Los Angeles to become the top television personality in America—and had done exactly that. Now he was famous and rich; he lived in a mansion in Malibu; and for the past year he had been calling Elizabeth two or three times a month, saying she was the only one he could talk to, the only one who understood him, the only one who'd known him when he was young, before he got involved in the crazy play-acting of television stardom.