The Cousins

by Rona Jaffe

  “Not usually, but this is such a fancy party, I’m sure it’s fresh.”

  “I guess.” They ate it. “Nice apartment, isn’t it,” Olivia said.

  “Amazing. Expensive, though.”

  “I can just imagine. Funny to see Charlie’s son here all of a sudden. I didn’t even recognize him.”

  “He wants to get to know the family better, I think,” Jenny said.

  “Ah. But of course Charlie isn’t here. He never comes to anything.”

  Jenny’s eyes opened wide with shock. “You didn’t know?”

  “Know what?” Olivia said.

  “Charlie’s dead.”

  Dead? “How could Charlie be dead?” she said, feeling as if they were talking about some other family. “How could I not know? When? What happened?”

  “His plane went into a mountain in July,” Jenny said. “He was at the controls, as usual. It wasn’t his fault, it was structural failure. You and Roger were in Paris. I thought somebody would have told you.”

  “Nobody told me.”

  “Well,” Jenny said, “it was a pretty big shock.”

  Olivia was so numbed by the news that she didn’t even know how she felt. Charlie the Perfect had always been the golden boy. Although she had hardly known him, she had known about him. He had been the family genius in business, on the board of many charities: well-dressed, handsome, charming. Charlie dead in a stupid, pointless accident. And he had been so healthy! For this he needed to be a vegetarian, she thought; to work out instead of eating lunch, to run the Marathon and finish at the same time as his son?

  The name Charlie the Perfect, which she had given him years ago, was partly ironic, because like his sister, Anna the Perfect, to the older generation he could do no wrong. But she had always felt that he had been too competitive. She remembered an incident years ago, when he had visited Mandelay. He was already an adult. Olivia had told the family proudly that she had finally swum fifty laps in an Olympic pool. It was a particular triumph for her because she was so unathletic. They were impressed.

  “Single or double laps?” Charlie had asked briskly, his eyes narrowing.

  “Single.”

  “That doesn’t count,” he said. “You did twenty-five laps. I do seventy-five double laps in an Olympic pool at my gym. Where did you do yours?”

  “Here.”

  “Mandelay doesn’t have an Olympic pool,” he said. “An Olympic pool is the size of a football field. You’d know it if you saw one.”

  He had left her feeling embarrassed and silly.

  “Uncle Seymour is teaching Tony about the store,” Jenny said. “He was a lawyer, but now he has to give it up. He always knew someday he would run Julia’s, but he didn’t think it would be so soon.”

  “Even Aunt Myra didn’t tell me,” Olivia said. Now she was beginning to feel left out and insulted. “I would have said something to them.”

  “It’s very strange,” Jenny said quietly. “Uncle Seymour and Aunt Iris never mentioned Charlie again.”

  She imagined their silence. “It must be so painful for them,” she said. “They can’t even talk about it yet.”

  “Of course. At their age, to lose a child. They expected to go first.”

  “Everyone must think I’m terrible not to have gone to the funeral,” Olivia said. “But no one told me.”

  “It was a huge funeral,” Jenny said. “He was a pillar of the community. It was in the New York Times.”

  “We didn’t get the New York Times when we were in Paris.”

  “Well, don’t worry about it. Nobody’s mad at you.”

  “They’re always mad at me,” Olivia said.

  “No, no,” Jenny said calmly, soothingly, like a good mother. Olivia thought how lucky Jenny’s children were. Lila would have told her the family was angry and upset.

  She glanced over at Uncle Seymour and Aunt Iris. Suddenly they seemed very frail. They were smiling at Tony, their grandson. His little boy had come out of the room where the children were playing and was clinging to his mother’s side, asking for hors d’oeuvres. Aunt Iris leaned down to pat him and handed him a cheese puff. Their great-grandson: the chain of life. This was how they could go on.

  The pianist stopped playing. Nick came forward to make a toast. “To my wonderful father,” he said, raising his glass. Olivia wondered if Charlie’s recent tragedy would make Nick think again about continuing to risk his life helicopter skiing. She hoped so.

  Nick began to reminisce. He told of fun-loving Uncle David’s youthful adventures that had been handed down as family anecdotes, and then of the good times they had all had together as Nick and his sister Melissa were growing up. Olivia had heard these stories before. She let her mind wander. She looked at Roger across the room, so familiar and solid and kind—and yet burdened by secrets—and then she thought about Marc Delon’s soft lips against her face.

  Melissa came forward then, slim as a waif in her narrow black dress with the little rhinestone straps, and raised her glass. “To my darling father,” she said. “Happy birthday, and thank you all for coming here to help celebrate his special day.”

  There was applause. Uncle David stood up. “I want to thank my children for this wonderful party,” he said, “and for just being them. I couldn’t ask for better children, or nicer grandchildren. And I thank my beloved wife Hedy for the many years of happiness she gave me, gave all three of us. She was the best of wives, and the best of mothers. I have had a happy life.”

  He always thought Hedy was a paragon, Olivia thought. This marvelous Hedy he was thanking was not the sharp-tongued, critical Hedy she had known. Somehow it seemed strange to hear him talk about Hedy, as if she shouldn’t be there anymore, should just disappear, because nobody else had liked her. I wish I were that important to someone’s life, she thought. I used to think I was to Roger. But Uncle David never looked at another woman in all the years they were together.

  They went into the dining room for dinner. Olivia and Roger sat next to Taylor and Tim, at a table with Jenny and Paul and Kenny and Pam. “It’s nice to have a family,” Taylor said. She looked wistful.

  “You have all of us,” Olivia said.

  “I mean parents and children.”

  “I don’t have parents or children.”

  “I have my mother,” Taylor said, and made a face, as if that didn’t count. But it did count, that was the trouble.

  They ate cold lobster and drank a crisp white wine. “Isn’t this a lovely party?” Pam said. “I’ll give you one, Kenny, when you’re old.” She smiled flirtatiously. The idea of Kenny’s being seventy-five seemed light-years away.

  “ ‘Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m sixty-four?’” Kenny sang. “Do you remember how ancient that seemed? You’d have to be fed.”

  “I’m off Prozac now,” Taylor said. “I can start trying to get pregnant before I’m too old.”

  “The child will feed you,” Kenny said, smiling.

  “The child may have to,” Taylor said. “I’m still paying Grady’s mortgage. No one wants to buy his house. I need to get his deck fixed.”

  “I wanted to fix it myself,” Tim said, signing. “It would have been kind of fun. But she won’t let me.”

  “You have better things to do,” Taylor said. “You’re an artist. Grady is my responsibility.”

  Is she being possessive or guilty? Olivia wondered. Perhaps both. Taylor had to be aware that Grady had never felt secure enough to come to her directly to talk about his life, and she had been the closest person to him in the world. Neither of them had ever mentioned the videotape he had sent her; they obviously felt it had been an overture best forgotten. Perhaps now Taylor was sorry about that.

  They ate tender, rare filet mignon with baby vegetables, and drank a velvety red wine. “How was Paris?” Paul asked cheerfully.
>
  “Wonderful,” Roger said. “It was a perfect vacation.”

  Except that you weren’t really attracted to me, Olivia thought, and I met someone I can’t seem to get out of my mind. “It was fun,” she said.

  “There is something to be said for not having five children,” Jenny remarked dryly, but they all knew she didn’t mean it.

  They ate field salad with brie with the rest of the velvety red wine, and then there was sorbet, long-stemmed strawberries, champagne and a huge chocolate birthday cake which Uncle David cut to applause from the guests. “Your uncle is going to drop dead from this meal before he even gets to go on his cruise,” Roger said.

  His saying that annoyed her; she felt it was ill-advised and morbid. Dear old Uncle David. Why couldn’t Roger behave himself; what was wrong with him? She didn’t want to think about one other person dying. But of course, Roger didn’t know about Charlie yet.

  23

  WHEN OLIVIA MET Marc again at the bar at the Carlyle, “their place,” this time he was waiting for her at a table in the corner, more private than the one where they had sat the first time; they could now sit side by side. In spite of her good intentions, she felt a little thrill of anticipation that she would be so close to him. Across the room she could see a couple sitting together on the banquette in what had been a seat for one, almost on top of each other because the tables were so small, kissing vigorously. She turned away quickly and handed Marc his tear sheets.

  “Well,” he said brightly, smiling at her with the pleasure of seeing her again, his face so unguarded that she was suddenly afraid she could hurt him.

  “Well,” she said back. They sat there beaming at each other. Then the waiter came and they ordered white wine.

  “I want to know what you’re thinking,” Marc said to her. “Right this minute. Tell me.”

  “That you’re even more attractive than I remembered,” Olivia said, and then was embarrassed. It was only a compliment, she told herself; nothing wrong with that. Men loved compliments. And this particular man was probably used to them. She knew that if she weren’t so aware of her infatuation she would be flattering him without a thought.

  “What have you been doing?” he asked. He drew a little closer, looking in her eyes in that anticipatory way he had before, as if he was fascinated by her life, as if it was not like anyone else’s. Well, maybe he was really intrigued. She was more than curious to know what he did on a typical day, if only to place him in reality for her fantasies. He would probably think her life was ordinary if he knew, but she didn’t care if his was.

  “Working,” she said. “You know what that’s like. And I went to my uncle’s seventy-fifth birthday party.” Why didn’t I say we went? she thought.

  “Was it fun?”

  “Actually, it was very nice. But I found out one of my cousins was killed in a plane crash. That was quite a shock.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It happened months ago and we weren’t close. But it was still a shock.”

  “Of course,” Marc said. “In a big family there are more tragedies. That’s the way it is.”

  “I think ours has had more. Maybe not.”

  “Maybe not,” he said. “Life is dangerous. You just can’t think about it.”

  “But I do.”

  “Of course. So do I. So we have to enjoy it.”

  “That’s how he got killed,” Olivia said. “Enjoying it.”

  He suppressed a smile. “You’re funny.”

  “Tell me what you’ve been doing,” she said. And who you did it with, she thought.

  “On the weekend I went to a party. Some old friends. Afterward we went downtown to a club. I don’t like that sort of thing as much as I used to. I feel like I’m reliving my life over and over.”

  “Already!”

  “If you went to clubs, you’d know what I mean.”

  “I did,” Olivia said. “I remember.”

  “And I worked on my book. Ran in the park. Ate a lot of takeout.”

  “Alone?” she asked lightly.

  “Were you?”

  “No,” she said. “But you know that.”

  “I was alone,” he said. “And now you know that.” He gave her his most appealing grin. “Run away with me while I’m still single. I want you.”

  “You’re very good for my ego,” Olivia said, and laughed.

  “Tell me how you see me,” he said, suddenly serious. “Tell me how I seem to you.”

  “As . . .”

  “The truth.”

  She looked at the line of his neck, both strong and vulnerable, and suddenly, in flashes, she imagined she was seeing him when he was five years old, and as a teenager, and now. This continuum of people was endearing but also rather frightening—it made her feel wistful and soft. She wanted to be kind to that little boy, advise the adolescent and fall into the arms of the grown man she saw before her. She felt guilty, not so much because of Roger, who was not there, but because Marc seemed so real, so human when she thought of him this way. The fantasy had been easier.

  “Well,” she said slowly, “I see a very sexy man I want to flirt with, and at the same time I see the little boy you used to be. I think it’s because you’re so much younger than I am.”

  “I’m not so much younger,” Marc said. “And that’s exactly the way I see you. I see the feisty little girl and the sophisticated, beautiful woman. You’ve read enough to know that the child never really goes away. That hidden child is part of what makes you so interesting.”

  “And so nutty,” she said, and laughed.

  He reached over and took her hand. His fingers were neither warm nor cool, and his touch jolted her and traveled through her body, leaving her silent with surprise. “Flirt with me,” he said. “I dare you.”

  “You dare me?”

  “Yes.” His cool eyes looked into hers. Young men do that, she thought, they stare at you, they’re so intense. She felt saved by the waiter, who came over to see if they wanted another drink, but Marc said yes without asking her or releasing her hand, and the waiter went away. “You did want another?” he said.

  “I can’t stay very long.”

  “You don’t have to drink it. I just don’t want you to leave.”

  “I don’t want to either,” she said.

  He turned her hand over and looked at her palm. “You have a star in your hand,” he said.

  “What’s that?”

  “It means you’re very lucky.”

  She looked at her palm. There it was, a seven-pointed star. She had never paid attention. “It’s very unusual,” he said. He ran his thumb over it, lightly, and she felt the same electricity. She looked at his mouth.

  “Do you read palms?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. “Someone told me that once.” He showed her his hand. “You see, I have one, too.”

  “Do you believe in it?”

  “I’ll believe anything that says I’m lucky.”

  “I guess I will, too,” Olivia said.

  The waiter brought their wine. The room had become crowded and smoky. Now, with all the voices chattering, the piano did not seem so loud. She looked around to make sure there was no one there whom she and Roger knew. She had already decided she wasn’t going to mention meeting Marc, but she didn’t know what she would say if Roger found out and she had to explain it. The couple opposite them who had been kissing disentangled and got up and left. She and Marc watched them go.

  “I wonder if they’re going to have dinner or sex,” Olivia said.

  “Probably sex first, then dinner,” Marc said.

  “Or the other way around. Maybe they’re hungry.”

  “But definitely sex.”

  Under other circumstances it could have been us, she thought. She imagined what it would be like to be free again and in lo
ve with someone when it was all fresh and new. No, not someone: Marc Delon.

  “Is Roger romantic?” Marc asked.

  “Why are you asking something like that?”

  “I’m jealous. I want to know.”

  “You can’t be jealous.”

  “But I am.”

  “We’ve been together almost twelve years,” Olivia said.

  He looked pleased. “Is that the answer?”

  “Of course he’s romantic,” she said. She thought of their shared Jacuzzi, the hot bubbling water, the scented candlelight, the music playing, the food on the rim of the tub, the dogs dozing on the floor, Roger rubbing the tension out of her back . . . Romantic? No, just therapeutic. Our relationship has turned into goddamn Canyon Ranch, she thought.

  “But you’re here with me anyway,” he said softly.

  “Yes,” she said. She thought about what it would be like to have him at home in the Jacuzzi with her. His body would be so beautiful, and he would be so intense. To dwell on it for even an instant more was unbearable. “But I have to leave now,” she said. “He’ll be waiting.”

  “Will you tell him you saw me?”

  “I hope it . . . doesn’t come up.”

  He smiled, triumphant. “Will you meet me again?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “When?”

  She thought. “Next week,” she said. A week away seemed safe.

  He paid the check, like an old-fashioned date, and they went outside to the street. It was dark. She was deciding that when he moved to kiss her on both cheeks, this time she would turn her head to meet his mouth; but before she could he had kissed her very gently on the lips. It was exactly as she had imagined it. She stood there, stunned.

  “Yes,” he whispered. “Wow.”

  On the way home there were Halloween decorations in the store windows. Olivia looked at them happily, smiling with joy. She felt like a kid again.

  * * *

  Safe in their house, with the warm chaos of the welcoming dogs, the last of the nightly news on television, the arrival of Roger, virtuous from the gym, the discussion of what to order sent up for dinner, Olivia knew she was glowing with lust for Marc. She wondered if this was the way Roger had felt with Wendy. She hoped not. It hurt her too much to think of Roger being this alive because of another woman, and she didn’t want to think of it at all. She thought of the duplicity of people, herself included, and of how territorial they were. She wanted both Roger and Marc.