Lost in You

by Marsden, Sommer

  I jumped when the wine glass slid from my hand, but was grateful to realise that I hadn’t dropped it, Brani had taken it.

  She set it on the counter and leaned her hip against the cabinet. ‘You look exhausted.’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Maybe you should take a day off. Call in sick to work tomorrow. Lie in bed, eat potato chips, read a book. I’ll take Gladys to her PT appointment. Then I can take her to –’

  ‘Not necessary,’ I said. I hadn’t meant it to sound so rough.

  ‘I think it is necessary, Clover.’

  ‘Brani, butt out,’ I snapped.

  Her eyes narrowed and she fixed her face in that stubborn look she was famous for. ‘You know what, little girl? You don’t scare me. And you don’t upset me. You can be as bitchy as you want and I will still know that look of yours. It’s the look you got during high-school finals when you were popping No-Doz so you could study even more though you had the material down pat. The same look you got in college when you decided you’d do a three-year programme instead of four because you could totally squeeze the four years into three. Only mere mortals needed four years to get through all that stuff.’

  I turned my face from her, unwilling to hear this about myself right now.

  ‘And it’s the look you get when you are sick as a dog but don’t want to give yourself even a foot of slack to stay home and take care of yourself. And now it’s the look of a woman whose heart is broken and who refuses to acknowledge it. Even a little.’ She settled her hands on her hips and got in my face. ‘Now, I am going to tell you what tomorrow is going to bring. You are going to do whatever you are going to do.’

  ‘I –’

  ‘Hush up,’ she ordered and I did. ‘But I am going to take your grandmother to her PT appointment. And then I will take her to an early dinner. You can go to work, you can paint the house, you can go skydiving or you can give yourself some time to feel what you are feeling without running from it like a child.’

  I blinked again. My throat had narrowed. I felt nothing but pressure, like I had a golf ball wedged in there.

  I opened my mouth, shut it and opened it again. I reached for my wine. ‘You’re not really my aunt, you know.’

  We both looked startled that I’d said it. I could feel the surprise etched on my face. I wanted – for the second time in a week – to immediately retract what I’d just said. Instead I watched her face go from surprise to anger to a sudden amused smile. She laughed out loud and patted my leg.

  ‘I know that, kid. But after all this time you’re stuck with me. Like it or not. Now, if you want to have a smack-down drag-out in front of Gladys over tomorrow, we can. And I’ll still win because if I lay it all out for her, she’ll agree with me. You need to deal with how you feel about this.’ She slapped something down on the counter before moving to pour herself a glass of wine. ‘It has to hurt like hell, but judging from the flower shop that was sent here a while back, I’m willing to wager you have a shot at fixing it. If that’s what you want.’

  I waited for her to walk out, to hear her and Gram laughing in the next room, before I picked up the paper. It was folded to the Around Town section. The headline was simple. DORIAN MARTIN OFF TO PARIS WITH MOTHER AND NATALIE HODGINS TO HONOUR FATHER.

  The two inches of text then went on to speculate what it would mean for the two families if these hot singles got together and got married.

  I heard her – Natalie – in my head. He’s good in bed, isn’t he.

  My wine threatened to come back up as I stared at the three of them waving as they ascended the few steps into the private plane we’d used to fly to Nantucket. I touched his face in grainy black and white.

  I’d broken my chance with him. I had to move on. He’d done what I’d wanted. Gone back to his life and the people who fitted into it. I had no idea until that moment how painful my own wishes would be for me.

  I texted Ed at the Rotunda that I had what felt like mild flu. I’d be taking the following day off. Then I texted Brani even though she was only a room away.

  I’M STAYING HOME TOMORROW. THANK YOU FOR HELPING WITH GRAM. I LOVE YOU. I’M SORRY.

  It was only a moment before she texted me back. Unlike Gram, Brani had totally embraced the technology of texts and emails and Internet surfing. She was often quicker on her phone than I was.

  NO PROBLEM, KID. TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF FOR ONCE. WE LOVE YOU.

  The fatigue that I’d just become aware of, moments before, threatened to overwhelm me. I took Gram her meds, kissed her and Brani on the head and carried my glass of wine into my room. I was asleep on top of my duvet before the ten o’clock dramas started.

  I dreamed of Dorian. Flying high in the air. Locked in his arms, feeling safe, feeling pleasure, feeling as if I belonged.

  * * *

  Next morning, Brani stuck her head into my room at about ten o’clock. ‘Leaving soon to take Gladys to her appointment.’

  I nodded. ‘Don’t you think she looks like a praying mantis?’ I asked.

  I kicked the covers back and held out the newspaper. Natalie Hodgins looked very Jackie O in her smart little fall coat, a fetching shade of emerald. Because anyone who was anyone knew that green was in this season. Green was the ‘it’ colour. But unlike Jackie O she was tall and willowy and blonde. Her big sunglasses shielded a lot of her face and her well-styled hair was wind-whipped but perfect.

  Brani came in and sat on the edge of my bed. She looked at the picture and I pointed, desperately wanting someone to agree with me. To validate the feelings that overcame me when I looked at the horrid image of him flying off to Paris with his mother and some other woman.

  As if I could have gone to Paris. As if that could have happened.

  ‘She’s pretty,’ Brani said.

  My heart fell. Even my own honorary aunt could not back me up that Natalie Hodgins, heiress extraordinaire, looked like an insect.

  I sighed, flopped back. I could not wallow in bed for ever. I did not even know if I could wallow in bed for the whole day. Truth be told, I’m not much of a wallower. I’d rather be doing, moving on, pushing past. But apparently always pushing past without acknowledging things wasn’t super-healthy.

  ‘I wasn’t really looking at her, though,’ Brani said, tapping the paper with her fingernail.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I was looking at him,’ Brani said.

  ‘If this is where you tell me how handsome he is and what a good catch he is and that he’s rich, as if I didn’t know … well, I know all that!’

  ‘No,’ Brani said. She thrust the paper back at me and I took it. Looked at the two women turned and smiling to the camera. Looked at Dorian halfway up the steps and caught between them. His mother, Elizabeth Martin, and the green heiress behind him. ‘Look at him.’

  I looked at him again. ‘What?’

  She leaned over and patted my head as if in exasperation. ‘Look how miserable he looks, girl. That is not a moment to be jealous of. She does not make him happy. He is not happy. He is downright miserable.’

  ‘But he took her –’

  ‘You said no. And I’m sure there was a lot of pressure from her.’ She tapped Elizabeth Martin’s tiny face.

  ‘But a man who can’t –’

  ‘What? A man who can’t disappoint his mother to save your fragile feelings even though you continue to reject him is not a man?’

  I swallowed hard around that little jab. ‘I just mean if –’

  ‘Look. You’re young. You’re a kid. You’re hurt. At least to me you are,’ she hurried on when I opened my mouth to balk at that. ‘But his father was an asshole. He publicly mocked his son on more than one occasion. The man hasn’t been dead but nine or ten months. He’s still trying. He’s still trying to win approval. Maybe even forgiveness, as well. It’s a whole ball of toxic psychological rubber bands, I bet. But if you say no and his mother has expectations and he doesn’t want to let her down …’ She tapped the paper once more. I had the
fleeting urge to rap her on the hand with it. ‘He did what he had to do.’

  I chewed my lip and studied his face. He did look miserable. So miserable I wished I could somehow make it better.

  ‘But he doesn’t look happy about it.’ Her dark-brown eyes seemed to pin me down. I squirmed.

  ‘Bran?’ my grandmother called from the next room.

  ‘Coming, babe!’ Brani turned back to me. ‘You want this to be a movie, Clover. This is not a movie. This is real life. He had a commitment and he managed to make it happen. But he certainly doesn’t look like a man whisking off for a few days in Paris with a woman he’s itching to bed. Or even cares for. So …’

  I put my head down. ‘So I might as well have put her on the plane with him myself?’

  ‘I’m not saying that,’ she said, laughing. She patted my leg. ‘What I’m saying is we all have choices to make. And they trickle down. Your choice – for whatever reason – not to go with him led to him having to make an alternative choice.’

  ‘I get it.’ I wanted more coffee. But coffee heavily laced with maybe some Kahlúa. So it was way too early for that. So what?

  ‘And can I ask you one more thing? Can I be nosey, Aunt Brani?’

  ‘Do you ever need permission for that?’ She laughed and slapped her knee as if I’d said the funniest thing in the world. ‘No. Not at all. Why do you think you don’t deserve him? Why do you think you don’t belong together?’

  ‘I never said that to you,’ I said softly.

  ‘But it’s something we’d both like to know,’ Gram said from the doorway. ‘You think you put two old women in a room and they don’t gossip and speculate.’

  ‘Watch who you’re calling old,’ Brani said with a chuckle.

  ‘Sorry,’ Gram said. ‘Well-seasoned.’

  ‘I …’ I shook my head. I loved them both so much. Under their curious gazes I felt silly. ‘We don’t belong together. He’s in one world, I’m in another.’

  Gram shook her head. ‘Dear Lord, girl. Some of the best things happen when worlds crash together.’

  I looked up surprised. ‘What?’

  ‘Your grandfather and I weren’t supposed to be together. He was from money and I was from a farming family. We were dirt-poor and he had his own car when we met. Let me tell you, heads turned and talk was flung around but hey … we were in love. I learned to deal with people serving me dinner and when he came to my house, he learned to deal with going out with me to dig up potatoes for the dinner table. We worked it out.’

  ‘Granddad had money?’

  ‘Yep. His family lost a lot of it in later years and he took none that he hadn’t earned himself, but yes. And it didn’t matter a lick. What mattered was what was between us.’

  ‘And that was?’ Brani asked, grinning.

  ‘Magic,’ Gram said, fluttering an imaginary fan at herself.

  She levelled her gaze at me and tapped her watch. ‘Now you chew on that for a bit. Brani’s taking me to my appointment and a late lunch, early dinner, whatever you want to call it. You do some thinking while we’re gone, Clover.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ I said.

  ‘That’s my girl.’ She blew me a kiss and then they were gone.

  The rest of the day was spent in bed. Me imitating someone licking their wounds and cutting themselves some slack. But I sucked at it. What I really did was sit and stare at the unhappy face of a man I was pretty sure I’d fallen in love with while I wasn’t looking.

  The next morning, the paper brought a whole different image.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  ‘Where’s the paper?’ I was feeling better. Much better. I’d even considered finding Dorian when he returned from Paris, which according to the Sun was tomorrow, and trying to talk to him. Trying to explain to him how I felt and maybe say … just maybe … let’s give this a chance.

  ‘What?’ Gram was drinking her coffee, studying a crossword-puzzle book.

  I poured my own cup and sighed. ‘Where’s the paper? You know, the thing you have here every morning and usually try to read me sections. Where is it? I wanted to check and see if they put the teaser about the Rotunda’s grand reopening in like they were supposed to.’

  Gram gave me a look. ‘Watch your mouth, missy. I’m still your elder.’

  ‘Sorry, Gram,’ I said, laughing. I put some bread in the toaster and found the butter dish, careful not to get any on my dress. I was wearing one of my favourite spring dresses today, only I wore a sweater over it since it was fall. The dress always cheered me up with its shades of lemon, orange and raspberry sherbet. Paired with some tall grey boots and a grey sweater it actually worked as an ensemble.

  ‘About that paper, though …’

  ‘Haven’t seen it,’ she said shortly. She looked off.

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m fine. Why?’

  ‘You seem … not yourself.’

  ‘Just tired, I guess.’ She kept studying her puzzle, occasionally pencilling in an answer.

  ‘Fine. I’ll check outside. Maybe it’s still on the doorstep.’ I opened the townhouse front door and checked. Looking left, right and out on our small patch of lawn brought me no luck. Mr Maguire had moved ages ago and he was the only person who ever stole the paper. When I came back inside, my eye caught the mussed sofa cushions. I went to fix them and found they were mussed because someone had shoved the morning paper beneath the one on the farthest right side.

  HEIRESS AND BEAU LIVE IT UP IN GAY PARIS!

  The photo credits were to Natalie Hodgins via her smartphone.

  ‘Well, isn’t this cosy,’ I muttered.

  Natalie and Dorian hamming it up for her phone’s camera. Beneath that one was a photo – a bit grainy but clear enough – of Natalie planting one on him. Her lips pressed with familiar ease to his lips. His face was obscured but one hand was raised to touch her elbow. He didn’t look as if he were distressed in any way.

  ‘Looks like a very posh event,’ I said. My voice was tough, my heart broken.

  ‘It doesn’t mean anything,’ Brani said, opening the front door with her key. She stood there, key still in the lock, looking worried.

  ‘Yesterday you told me his apparent misery spoke volumes.’ I tossed the paper down without really reading the article. ‘What about his apparent happiness? And kissing! Will he end up just like the handful of jerks I’ve managed to date in my life? Another player out there to bag as many women as possible?’ Old wounds heal slowly. I hadn’t thought about my previous two failed love affairs for a while.

  She sighed. ‘Clover, I don’t think he’s anything like –’

  ‘No biggie. I have to get to work, Brani. Gram’s in there pretending she didn’t see this. My toast should have popped. There’s even a cup of coffee I poured. Have at it. I’m just going to go.’ I grabbed my purse and my work satchel and slipped past her. She tried to say something but I didn’t want to hear it.

  It looked like it could rain, possibly. The fall sky, devoid of sun, with a big pregnant belly of unshed drops, hung low over my head. Brightly coloured leaves skittered along the sidewalk at my feet as I stomped to my car. Now I felt stupid for wearing my spring dress with fall accessories. I felt silly for attempting to let my sherbet-coloured dress lighten my grey mood.

  Dorian was just fine without me. Not suffering one iota. He was hamming it up in ‘gay Paris’ as the stupid newspaper had put it. The Sun needed a hint: no one had called it gay Paris in ages.

  In the car I spared myself a single glance. My hair was done up in a messy knot that the sudden wind had made messier. But fuck it, I had no one to impress. My day would be dealing with Mario and Ed and maybe Matt if he was still working on the marble.

  ‘Matt …’ I said. Even I noticed the suddenly hungry look in my own eyes. The rear-view mirror was showing me something I didn’t want to see so I looked away. ‘Leave him alone,’ I told myself, putting the car into gear. ‘He’s too nice to be a revenge move or an ego boost.’

>   And he was. But who said he was a revenge move? Or even an ego boost? Who said I didn’t actually like Matt the marble guy? I called him that because my mind had temporarily ejected his last name. It was in my files.

  ‘Leave him be. He’s nice. He’s sweet. He likes you. Don’t use him.’

  I turned onto 36th Street and came to a halt at the stop sign behind a short line of cars. Traffic during rush hour was slow but at least it moved some. Not like the Beltway.

  ‘Who said I’m using him?’ I said aloud. Then: ‘Should I worry? Talking to myself this much?’ I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel and then said, ‘Yes.’

  The only sane thing to do was turn on music and try not to think about the selfie of Dorian and Natalie. Or about broad-shouldered, quick-smiling, almost surfer-boy-pretty Matt the marble guy.

  ‘What can I think about?’

  I thought about Brani and Gram and how they had tried to protect me. But in protecting me they’d hidden things from me. I was a grown woman. I was not a child. Toothsome anger overwhelmed me and I beat my hand on the steering wheel until it gave a little surprised squeak.

  ‘Damn it.’

  Then it was my turn at the stop sign and I had to focus. I cranked the radio playing ‘And We Danced’ by The Hooters and realised it would be stuck in my head all damn day now.

  ‘All damn day,’ I muttered and finally found a parking spot in the Rotunda lot. ‘Go in there and get through this day. One day at a time until this job is over. Baby steps.’

  * * *

  ‘Looking good.’

  Matt looked up and grinned. He reached over to turn off the iPod that was blasting out The Black Keys as he worked. His jeans were speckled with paint and sealant and dust. His T-shirt was too. He’d been doing some magical marble thing that marble men do. I had no idea what it was as I looked around at his various bits of equipment. But he looked good doing it.

  ‘Shouldn’t be much longer,’ he said, smiling. ‘That bottom step over there had a crack in it. Your …’ He hesitated. ‘Your boss added that in. Wasn’t sure if he’d told you. He wants me to replace it.’