by Joy Fielding
"I can't do it anymore, David," she began.
"What are you talking about?"
"What we always talk about. Just that this time I mean it."
He sat across from her on the sofa. She sat on the floor, her long legs crossed in a semi-lotus position She was wearing a long evening gown which made the position most difficult to accomplish, and once mastered, seem singularly out of place; her reddish-brown hair was pulled back into a bun from which thousands of stray hairs threatened at any second to escape; her skin was blotchy and streaked with tears. She looked as miserable and unhappy as he knew she felt. He also knew what she was going to say and he knew he didn't want to hear it. She knew the same thing but was determined to say it anyway.
"I love you, David," she began again, pushing the reluctant words out of her mouth. "I ache, I love you so much. But I'm tired of sneaking around, or waiting up until two in the morning, hoping vainly that you'll show up. And I'm tired of pretending that you sleep in a room all by yourself when you crawl out of my bed to go home." She paused, sniffing loudly.
"Jill—"
"But most of all, I'm tired of having to madly scramble up a date for my cousin's wedding because the only man I've been seeing for the last two years is married and it wouldn't look nice to show up at my cousin's wedding with a married man!" She let out a loud wail, her hand reaching over to push some loose hairs behind her ears. "Oh, shit, it's gone. I lost it."
David looked confused. "What's gone?"
"My flower!" she cried. "I had a blue cloth flower in my hair. Everyone said I looked beautiful."
"I'm sure you did."
"I lost my goddamn flower!"
"I think you're beautiful," he said softly, moving to the floor beside her and putting his arms around her. She laid her head against his shoulder, feeling her mascara forming little black puddles underneath her eyes.
"You must be very horny," she smiled through her tears.
"I am," he said, kissing her neck. "I haven't seen you in three days."
"And whose damn fault is that?" she asked fiercely, pushing him aside and clumsily getting up on her feet. "Damn it, you should have seen me tonight. I really did look beautiful."
"I'm sure you did."
"Leon—I went out with a Leon, if you can believe it— he asked me out again. If you can believe that! Friday night. He wants to take me to see Second City."
"What did you tell him?"
"I said that I usually liked to keep my Friday nights open just in case my married lover could make it over for a few hours."
"Jill—"
"I said yes, I'd be delighted. What should I have said?"
David got up off the floor. "What is all this in aid of, Jill?"
She shrugged her shoulder. The strap of her gown fell down across her arm. "You have to make a choice, David."
"Oh, Jill—"
"And Tm sorry I seem to be resorting to clichés. But we happen to be living in a cliché so I choose my words accordingly."
"I don't like ultimatums."
"I don't care what you like!"
They stood for what seemed an eternity in their frozen positions. Then, without another word, he turned and slowly walked toward the door. It was a month before he called to tell her he had asked his wife for a divorce and that Elaine had responded by promising to take him for every cent he had.
Jill turned the small air-conditioning unit so that it blew directly at her throat.
"Feeling better now?"
"I will feel better when I have removed this dress and consigned it to an incinerator."
"At least they got him in the ground."
"That was a relief. The way this day has gone, I was sure they were going to wind up dropping the coffin—as a sort of grand finale."
David laughed. "Quite a day." He shook his head. "I still can't believe any of its real."
"I know what you mean."
"Al's actually dead," he said, more to himself than to his wife. "We watched him being lowered into the ground."
"Well, we saw a coffin being lowered into the ground,"
Jill corrected. "Al may still be back at that gas station. Maybe he got a job. Even in his condition, he'd have to move faster than that mechanic."
David burst out laughing, pulling the car to a halt at the side of the busy street. They were only a few blocks from their apartment.
"Why are we stopping?" Jill asked, then watched helplessly as her husband's laughter turned abruptly to tears. "Oh, David," she said, her arms encircling him, her head pressed against his shoulder. Tears suddenly filled her own eyes. For several minutes, they cried together, for the man they had both so liked and admired.
David was the first to break away, sitting up straight and drying his eyes. "Sorry," he said.
"Sorry? What for?"
He shook his head. "For everything. For being such a jerk—making you wear that dumb dress—"
"That's all right."
"No, it's not all right. Look at you, for God's sake."
"I'd rather not be reminded about how I must look—"
"See? I did it again. Every time I open my mouth, I make you feel worse."
"No, really. You don't. I feel terrific. Or interesting, anyway. Let's say I feel interesting."
He leaned over and kissed her. "You're so sweet and I'm such a prick."
"Yes, I am and you are. So, what else is new?" She kissed his cheek. "Come on, start the car. We'll go home; I'll bum my dress; we'll take a bubble bath and get into bed. How does that sound?"
He responded without words, nodding his head and turning the key in the ignition. The car started and they drove the two blocks to their apartment in easy silence.
A few minutes later, David pulled the car into their designated parking space in the large underground garage. He stopped, took the key out of the ignition and kept his head lowered, as if he couldn't raise it until he finished whatever thought was in his head. Jill waited accordingly, knowing there was something he wanted to tell her that was more important than getting quickly out of her clothes.
"What is it?" she asked.
Silence. Then finally, "I owe you another apology.”
Jill held her breath, thoughts of Nicole Clark filling her mind. Had there been more than just the lunch he hadn't told her about? Don't tell me, she begged silently. I don't want to know. "You've apologized enough already," she said, her voice whispered and strained.
"Not for this."
"David—"
"About your job, the teaching."
"What?"
"About the way I reacted when you told me how unhappy you were."
"How did you react?" Jill questioned.
"That's just the point," he said. "I didn't. I told you to grin and bear it. Some nonsense like that. Legal talk. Practical advice when what you needed was a little support and understanding. Damn it, Jill, if you're unhappy teaching, then you shouldn't be teaching. If Al's death teaches us anything at all, it's that life is too short, too precious to waste it doing something we don't want to do. I love you, Jill. I want you to be happy."
"I will be." Jill smiled through her tears. "Something will come up. Irving will call. You'll see."
David scoffed. "I was really all heart that night you told me about your meeting with Irving," he said, thinking back. "My usual sensitive, sympathetic self."
"All is forgiven," Jill whispered. "Sometimes it's better to be practical than sensitive." She paused, then continued again, her voice soft and quiet. "I just wish I saw more of you, that's all. Maybe then the rest of it wouldn't seem so important."
He nodded. 'Tm sorry about that, too. I know it must seem like I'm falling back into old patterns. But believe me, Jill, the work load is extreme at the moment. Everything's gone crazy. I just can't seem to keep on top of things no matter how hard or how late I work. Now, with Al dead, it's even worse. Nobody knows what's going on. It'll be months before things calm down and we get back on a proper course." He looked quest
ioningly at his wife. “Do you think you can be patient for just a little while longer? I promise that after Christmas things should be back to normal. No more working from dawn to dusk every day. I promise. How does that sound to you?"
Jill nodded. ''Sounds good."
He leaned over and kissed her gently. Then they each opened their respective doors and stepped out, closing them again in almost perfect unison. They walked hand in hand to the inside elevator and waited for it to arrive.
"I wonder if Irving will call me again," Jill said absently, as the doors to the elevator opened and they stepped inside.
"You were his top producer. Of course he'll call you again."
"He was pretty negative."
"He gets paid to be negative."
"He said the new girl who replaced me is working out very well."
"Nobody could ever replace you," David said, hugging her to him and kissing the side of her face.
Tell that to Nicole Clark, she wanted to say, but she chose instead to say nothing.
"Maybe a new show will come up," David continued.
Jill nodded. "Something based entirely in Chicago," she said. "And here I would stay."
"Until the first opportunity to see China comes along—"
"I've been to China," she reminded him.
"I know," he said, and then they were both silent.
They were pacing the floor, circling each other like two stray cats, their words hissed at each other across the space of their living room, their backs arched, ready to pounce at the slightest provocation.
"Why are you making such a big deal about this trip?"
"I have already given you my reasons. You've been away enough this year."
"No more than last year."
"You were away too much last year."
"Oh, great. We're just going around in circles."
Jill plopped wearily down into the soft fullness of the print sofa. "I'm tired of fighting every time I have to go away."
"Then stop going away."
"I don't go away that often!"
David stopped his pacing and stared at his wife in genuine amazement. "Jill, in the two years we've been married, you've been to London, Paris, Toronto, Los Angeles, Angola and Argentina! Now you're talking about going to China!"
Jill was quiet for several seconds. "We once talked about going there together," she said, emphasizing the final word.
"You know I can't go now."
"Why not?"
"What am I supposed to do, Jill? Put all my clients on hold while I accompany my wife on a jaunt up the Great Wall?"
"Precisely. Why not?"
"Because people in the throes of a divorce don't take too kindly to their lawyers postponing court dates it’s taken months, sometimes years, to set up."
"You have partners, don't you? What are they there for, if not to help out when one of you gets busy elsewhere?"
"You know I don't like to pass off my work— “
"Some people call it delegating responsibility."
"My clients are my responsibility."
"Can't you just tell them you're going on holiday for a few weeks? I took my holidays around your schedule!"
"Exactly, I've already had my holidays!" David sat down in one of the large wing chairs he and Jill had recently purchased. "What am I going to do in China, anyway? Change the film in your cameras? Be reasonable; I'd only get in everybody's way."
Jill thought of other trips, the spouses of other members of the various crews. David was right. Whenever one of the wives (and it was always the wives, she realized) chose to accompany her husband on any such trip, there was inevitably friction and unhappiness. It was never a good rule to combine pleasure trips with business, she had long ago decided. Somehow all parties managed to feel cheated.
"Besides," David was saying, "we can't afford it."
Jill took a long, deep breath. As a non-working member of the expedition, David would be required to pay his own way. And Elaine had made sure that any of the infrequent holidays David and Jill enjoyed were spent relatively close to home.
"So, where does that leave us?" Jill asked, her voice tired.
"You tell me," David answered, no less fatigued.
"I have to go, David."
He nodded, standing up. "You'll miss the firm party."
"I know. I'm sorry."
"And dinner with the Marriott’s."
"We'll have them over when I get back."
"What do I tell everyone?"
"The truth. That I had to go to China. It'll give the old geezers something to talk about other than the fact your first wife was prettier and what does he see in this television lady anyway?" David smiled wearily in her direction. "If you really want to give them something to talk about you could take a date." A fleeting image of another woman, her legs wrapped around her husband, flashed before her eyes. "On second thought “she said, getting up and slinking over to David, sitting on his lap and wrapping her own legs around him, "let them and their own topics of conversation." She kissed him. 'Please don't be angry."
“I’ll get over it," he said, returning her kiss.
She had gone to China, filmed the first onslaught of American tourists, and returned some two weeks later to find the apartment unchanged, the weather the same, and her husband as happy to see her as he always was whenever she returned home from an assignment. But something was different. Something intangible, caught only in passing, in a glance that didn't quite connect, or a touch that failed to linger. He'd been with somebody else. She knew it. It was as real to her as if she'd witnessed the act herself, as tangible as if he'd put it into words. He never said anything. She never asked. But it was there. A week after her return she told the network that she would accept no more out-of-Chicago assignments, and soon after, she submitted her resignation and accepted a post teaching TV journalism at the University of Chicago.
"What were you talking to Nicki about?" he asked, as they stepped into their apartment. Jill pulled the black wool dress up over her head and let it drop in a sweaty heap to the floor. "Jesus, Jill, wait till I close the door!"
She heard the door close behind her as she walked, robot-like, toward the bathroom. From the door David heard the bath water running. When he reached the bathroom, Jill was nude and standing beside the tub waiting for it to fill.
You didn't tell me you took her to lunch," Jill told him by way of a reply.
David didn't require further explanation. "She was upset. She needed someone to talk to."
"And you were the only one she could turn to?"
"I was there."
“Very convenient," Jill said, wishing she hadn't.
"This isn't worth discussing," he said, walking from the room.
Jill debated following him, but decided that the sight of her nude body would compare unfavorably in any discussion of Nicole Clark. She waited until the bath was filled almost to overflowing before she lowered herself into it and closed her eyes. Somehow, in the few minutes between the opening of their apartment door and the running of the bath water, all thoughts of bubbles and making love had been misplaced. David was in one room; Jill was in another. Nicole Clark was somewhere in between.
Chapter 16
The next day, Jill drove out to Lake Forest to see Beth Weatherby.
From the street, the house looked the same as it had the last time she had visited, the green leaves of early summer still filling the trees which surrounded the large gray brick exterior, giving the lie to the silent passage of almost three months. Soon enough, she knew, the green would turn to autumn golds and reds and then, before she was ready, the color would disappear altogether, leaving the branches bare and black against the overwhelming gray of the Chicago sky. Jill stared at the rows of white and red petunias and geraniums which lined the walkway to the front of the house. Despite the fresh flowers and the surrounding heat—the temperature was only slightly down from the day before— she felt suddenly cold. It was going to be a long win
ter, she thought, taking the first steps up the long path toward the house.
The front door stood before her, a large, heavy oak slab, with a bronze knocker shaped like a dolphin. Tentatively, Jill reached up and grabbed the large fish's tail, feeling a sudden flush of palpable fear race through her body. Why? She wondered, annoyed at her body's reflexes. What was it she was so afraid of? That Al’s ghost would materialize to answer her knock, usher her inside with his customary warmth, as he had several months ago when she and David had arrived for that misbegotten night of bridge? She remembered sitting in the comfortable living room, mesmerized by the serenity of its antiques, the room somehow implying a sense of unspoken continuance, feeling David close by her side, looking over at the photograph of the Weatherby children, and then the calm suddenly shattered by a scream in the night. Beth's scream. She saw herself racing toward the kitchen, her eyes freezing momentarily on Al's frightened face, drained white by the sudden gush of red from Beth's outstretched hand. Jill turned her head back toward the road. White and red, she thought, like the flowers.
Jill stood absolutely still, feeling her panic spreading. This is ridiculous, she thought, her self-annoyance building. She was acting like a child afraid of the Bogeyman. Was it the aura of death she feared? The knowledge that a man had been murdered inside? She shook her head at her invisible questioner. No, she was not afraid of death even in its most grisly manifestations. She had often trained her cameras on the carnage of global civil wars and inner-city brutality. No, she had no fear of death—she had directed its display.
Yet she had no camera with her now to help her keep her distance. She had only herself—and her fear. For whatever reason, she simply did not want to go inside that house. Without requiring further explanation, she somehow knew that there were secrets in there she didn't wish to hear. That once she set foot on the other side of that massive oak door, her life would never be the same again.
"Oh, stop overdramatizing," she told herself out loud, letting go of the bronze dolphin and listening as it thwacked loudly against its base.
The door opened immediately, as if whoever was behind it had known of her presence and had been patiently waiting for her to make up her mind. Jill felt her heart pumping wildly against her chest. Stop it, she told herself as she came face to face with the young girl in the doorway. Lisa Weatherby smiled wanly at her visitor. She looked much younger than her twenty-three years, Jill decided, younger, in fact, than her seventeen-year-old brother, and she'd obviously been crying. Her face was puffy and swollen, a teary mist resting like cataracts over her hazel eyes. She looked startlingly like her father. Jill quickly conjured up the image of Lisa's two brothers, both of whom she had seen at the funeral. Each had much more closely resembled his mother.