“Are you really that worried about grades? I thought you did really well last semester.”
“No, I lied. I didn’t do well. I got…,” Dana began, and then stopped, looking pained. She swallowed and continued on in a tiny, ashamed voice. “Two Bs, a B-minus, and a C-plus. It put me completely out of the running for Law Review.”
“Law Review—so that’s why you hurt yourself? Over Law Review? I know everyone makes a big deal about it, but it’s not worth dying over.”
“You don’t understand,” Dana said. Her face pinched up.
“I want to. I’m trying to.”
“I’m the smart one. That’s who I’ve been my whole life. I’ve always had the best grades and gotten more academic awards than anyone else. I was even a member of Mathletes in high school,” Dana said. “When people pointed me out they’d say, ‘There’s that smart girl, the one who skipped three grades.’”
“And you think that if you don’t make Law Review, you’re not going to be that person anymore?” I asked.
“Well, I wouldn’t be, would I? I’m just average now, somewhere in the middle of the class. I’m nothing special anymore…nothing at all,” Dana said, and then she began to cry, the tears leaving silver-red tracks down her hollowed-out cheeks. As I watched her, my heart felt like it was folding in on itself. I wanted to hold Dana’s hand but didn’t know if it would hurt her wrists if I did, so instead I patted her leg.
“What will my parents think?” she wailed. At first I thought she meant what would they think about her suicide attempt, but then she said, “It was bad enough when I didn’t get into Harvard Law. My mom didn’t think it was even worth it for me to go to school at a non-Ivy.”
“Dana, they’re just grades. Just stupid grades. As far as I can tell, there’s no rhyme or reason why any of us do well on one exam and not another. It’s just a giant crapshoot.”
“I hate it here. I hate law school,” Dana hissed. “I wish I’d never come here.”
I nodded. “But then why didn’t you just drop out?”
“Why haven’t you?” Dana countered.
“What?”
“You’re just as miserable as I am. Maybe even more so,” Dana said.
“No, I’m not. I’m here because I want to be.” And even as I spoke, I recognized the lie.
And Dana was shaking her head, not buying it. “You used to be different when I first met you. Happier. But then it was like school started to drag you down. You almost never smile anymore. I can’t remember the last time I saw you joking around with anybody,” Dana said. The words were coming out in a great tumble, and she paused to suck in a breath. “I thought that of all people, you’d understand how…how…trapped I feel.”
As these words hit me, I leaned back in the chair, my lower back suddenly aching. I couldn’t bring myself to look at Dana, to focus on the slight young woman swathed in bandages and white hospital sheets. Seeing her there made my throat feel like I’d been swallowing glass. Suddenly, I was aware of just how numb I was. And had been, for a long, long time.
“So,” I said softly, finally looking at my young friend. “What do we do now?”
I stayed at the hospital with Dana until Renee gently kicked me out a half hour after the visiting hours had ended.
“If you stay any later, it’ll be my hide,” she said, smiling broadly as she changed Dana’s IV. “And, hon…your parents called.” Renee’s voice became softer and twangier, and she took Dana’s thin hand in her own. “They’re going to be here in the morning.”
I’d thought Dana would react with fear or anger, but instead the tension slipped away from her face. She looked almost peaceful.
“Thanks,” Dana said.
“Is there anything you need before I go?” I asked.
“No. Just don’t forget about Holmes,” Dana said.
I patted my pocket, where I’d stashed the apartment key she’d given me.
“I’ll go get him right now,” I promised. “What do you want me to tell the others tomorrow night at study group? They’re going to be worried if you just don’t show up.”
“Tell them the truth,” Dana said.
“They don’t have to know if you don’t want them to.”
Dana shook her head. “I want you to tell them.” She smiled faintly. “I’d rather that they heard it from you than through the law-school gossip chain.”
It wasn’t until I had picked Holmes up—letting him lift his leg on a forlorn rosebush in the front yard of Dana’s apartment building before he hopped up into my Civic—that I remembered I’d turned my cell phone off when I entered the hospital. As I hit the power button on my phone, it immediately began to beep, signaling that there was a voice-mail message waiting for me.
I knew who it was. Graham. We hadn’t talked earlier, as we’d planned to. I typed in my password to retrieve the message, and a minute later Graham’s voice was in my ear.
“Hey, it’s me. Sorry I missed you. I was thinking about flying out there next weekend. While I’m there we could call my parents and your aunt and tell them the news. Give me a call when you get this.”
As I listened to Graham’s voice, I felt…numb. I thought of Dana, lying in her bed, talking about feeling trapped. It should have been ridiculous—a gifted young woman who had the talent and ability to mold her life into whatever she wanted it to be, talking about feeling cornered. It wasn’t like we were trapped in the Gulag, or trying to raft our way through the turbulent waters of the Atlantic in order to escape from a communist dictatorship.
But I knew exactly how she felt.
And I knew what I now had to do.
I reached over to ruffle Holmes’s black curly head, and he licked my hand with a slurping pink tongue in response. And then I turned the ignition key on my Civic and drove home.
Chapter Twenty-Three
My parents once went two whole weeks without speaking to each other. Not one word. Not even a Please pick up a gallon of milk while you’re out, or a Did I get any mail today? It was a complete and total wall of silence that neither breached for fifteen days. They’d had their share of fights over the years, but never as bad as that one.
I don’t even know what the catalyst for the argument was—even in the white heat of their fury, neither one told me—but the conflict bubbled out into every other area of our family’s life. My mother’s eyes flashed when my dad was late coming home for dinner, while the tuna-noodle casserole (my father’s least favorite meal) dried out in the oven. My father cursed under his breath when he discovered that my mother had turned his favorite golf shirt into a dusting rag.
Evenings were the worst. We’d sit around the dinner table, and they’d each talk to me—their voices artificially bright—asking me what I’d done in school that day or how cross-country track practice had gone, or if I’d yet narrowed down the list of colleges I wanted to visit that spring. I played my part, chattering to fill the silence until I’d scraped the last bits of spaghetti and tomato sauce off my plate and could escape upstairs to my homework, leaving my parents behind to carefully avoid each other.
And then one afternoon I got home early from track practice. Our coach had let us off with only a short run so that we’d be rested for the meet the next day. I ran into the house, chilled as the frigid autumn evening air evaporated the sweat from my skin, and was just about to head into the kitchen when something made me stop. Maybe it was the sudden realization that I’d forgotten to kick off my running shoes by the front door and had tracked mud in across the polished maple floors. Maybe it was to listen for my mother, to see if she was upstairs or down. But whatever it was, I didn’t go bursting into the kitchen as I normally would to pour a glass of juice or crack open the oven door to see what was sizzling inside. Instead, I stopped just short of the kitchen door and found myself looking in at my parents.
They were standing in the middle of the kitchen. My mom’s hands were entwined around my dad’s neck, her ash-blonde head resting against his shoulder. H
is arms were wrapped around her waist. And then I realized that they weren’t just hugging, they were dancing, moving slowly in a well-worn circle. Louis Armstrong was on the radio, crooning “What a Wonderful World,” a song that has forever since reminded me of my parents. As they rotated around, I saw the silvery tracks of tears on my mother’s cheeks.
And I stood back, unseen, and watched them dance.
The more I talked, the quieter Graham became.
“I’m sorry,” I said for the umpteenth time. And I was: sorry for hurting him, sorry for backing out of our engagement, sorry for breaking up with him over the phone. I was sorry for all of it.
“You’re sorry,” he repeated, his voice flat.
He was angry. I could tell by his voice, which had taken on a cold, hard tone. Graham wasn’t a screamer. When he was mad, it was as though his entire personality was dipped in ice. His tone would grow haughty, he’d cross his arms, and he’d speak in short, biting phrases that made me cringe. I’d always thought it would be easier if he had been a yeller, if it would burn up some of the anger. That would be preferable to the coldness, which could last for days, weeks even.
In this case, it would probably be quite a bit longer than that.
“Yes, I am,” I said. “I know this sounds trite, but I never meant to hurt you.”
Neither one of us spoke for a minute. And then Graham asked the question I’d been dreading.
“Is there someone else?” he asked.
I hesitated. I know that there are some who stand firmly in the Whole Truth camp and think that a person—particularly a jilted fiancé—has a right to know the complete story. That it would be better for him to know that it wasn’t him, or even us, but some unknown third party who was at least partially responsible for the rift.
But it has always seemed to me that these sort of confessions are a cheap way to make yourself feel better. Yes, maybe I cheated, but at least I was truthful in the end, you tell yourself, wrapping your conscience in the shabby comfort.
And I knew Graham well enough to know that hearing I’d had a one-night stand would not make him feel better. In fact, I was pretty sure it would make him feel quite a bit worse. So the least I could do was spare his feelings on the matter.
“No, there’s no one else,” I said gently. “It’s just…it’s just me.”
“You don’t love me,” Graham said.
God, this wasn’t getting any easier.
“I do. Of course I do. But…just not enough.”
I winced, knowing that the words were going to cut into his already bruised ego. But this was one area where lying wouldn’t make the reality go over any easier.
There was a long pause, and for a horrible moment I thought Graham might have started to cry. But when he spoke again, his voice was clear and colder than ever.
“I think you’ll make a great lawyer, Kate. You have a knack for stabbing people in the back.”
I sucked in some breath. He had every right to be angry, of course. But this was no way to leave things.
“Graham, I don’t want—” I began, but he cut me off.
“Spare me. I have no interest in what you want. FedEx the ring back as soon as you can,” he said. And then he hung up.
He hung up on me.
A four-year relationship ended by a hang-up.
And yet I wasn’t angry. Instead, I had the same mix of feelings I’d had all those months ago when he moved to Arizona. Yes, there was sadness. Sadness and grief. But there was also the warm, soothing pulse of relief.
I padded back to put the phone on its base and noticed for the first time that I had messages on my answering machine. The first two were from Graham—prebreakup, obviously—and the third was from Jen.
“Kate, you have to come out tonight. There’s a Bar Review at the Maple Leaf. We’re going to all meet up at Nick’s and head over together.”
Were they all downstairs? I wondered. Actually, I could hear music, the dull thump of the bass coming up through the thin walls and floorboards.
I got into bed and pulled the comforter up over me while I decided what to do. Holmes hopped into bed next to me, stretching his body along the length of my thigh and sighing as he fell into contented puppy sleep. I was so tired, the exhaustion lapping over me, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep. I thought of Dana lying in her hospital bed, along with other random memories: the anger in Graham’s voice. Hoffman’s cold stare. Finals looming closer, like a great, gaping mouth, ready to swallow me whole. Nick’s face just before we kissed, when he was so close that I could see the flecks of green in his blue eyes.
Nick.
Suddenly, I just knew: I wanted to see Nick. I wanted to tell him that I’d left Graham. I wanted to tell him that I couldn’t stop thinking about him, that thoughts of his face and voice and touch were constantly swirling around inside me.
I took in a deep, shaky breath and tried to ignore the swollen feeling in my throat as I climbed back out of bed, hooked Holmes’s leash to his collar, and walked out my front door and down the dark, narrow staircase. It was dark out, although I had no sense of time. It felt late. Nick’s house was lit up, and I could hear music playing, but there didn’t seem to be that many cars lining the street.
He must not have invited a large group over, I thought, relieved.
There was a couple on the sidewalk, just at the bottom of the front steps, embracing each other. The woman’s back was to me, and her arms were wound up around the man’s neck. It was too dark to see what exactly they were doing, although I could hear wet smacking sounds and see that his arms were in constant motion, traveling along the curves of her body. She gave a little moan, and they stepped away from me, stumbling into the light from a streetlamp. And that’s when I saw that the wavy hair falling down her back was auburn red.
Jen.
I opened my mouth, about to say her name, when it suddenly dawned on me that the man she was kissing wasn’t her husband. Sean was a big man, tall and broad. This guy was gangly, his shoulders narrow. And then they shifted again, tilting their heads in the opposite direction, realigning their lips, and I saw that the man had spiky hair and a beaky nose.
Addison.
Of course. How I could have been so thick not to figure it out? Addison’s secret girlfriend…Jen’s odd behavior. They’d arrived and left together at any number of study-group sessions or classes, too many for it to be a coincidence.
Addison and Jen were so caught up in each other, they didn’t notice me. I turned, crossing the porch to Nick’s front door, pulling Holmes’s leash along after me.
Jen and Addison, I thought. Wow.
I raised my fist, about to knock on Nick’s front door, but then I paused, listening for voices and laughter, indications that the preparty was still going on. But the music was too loud, drowning out all other sounds. No one would ever be able to hear my knock, so I finally just turned the knob and pushed the door open. The music grew louder, although the door between Nick’s office and bedroom was closed, muffling the stereo.
Nick’s office contained an L-shaped workstation, a desktop computer, and a bookshelf. The only light shone from a green-glass-shaded banker’s lamp sitting on the desk. The room was deserted, I assumed, because Nick was so freakishly neat, he probably didn’t want anyone to mess up the carefully organized sticky notes he’d written to himself and arranged along the top of his desk. Outline Con Law chapters eight through twelve, one read. Career Center orientation on April 15, said another.
I crossed the room, figuring that I’d find the others in the living room at the far end of the apartment, where the boom-boom-boom of the bass from Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” was blasting from.
Nick hates Madonna, I thought.
I expected that Nick’s bedroom—which I had to pass through on my way to the back of the house—would also be dark and closed off, that Nick would keep everyone herded into the living room and kitchen.
I was wrong.
Instead, when I gras
ped the glass knob and pushed the door open, causing a sliver of light to fall across the otherwise-dark room, I saw that there were two people in the queen-size bed.
I could see the square pale outline of a man.
Female legs were entwined over male ones.
Hips were thrusting forward.
There was the huffing of labored breathing and a breathy female groan that sounded rehearsed, too much like Meg Ryan’s fake-orgasm scene in When Harry Met Sally.
I still didn’t hear any voices, just the stereo blaring in the living room. I knew I should leave, but I couldn’t seem to make my feet retreat or take my eyes off the bed. My interest wasn’t sexual; I was not fulfilling a secret voyeuristic fantasy. It was more like the sensation of watching a slasher film, when even though you’re squirming with dread, knowing the clueless blonde is about to get jumped by a knife-wielding maniac and you really, really don’t want to see her get gored, you can’t stop watching until her mutilated body comes swinging down from the attic to scare the crap out of her friends.
As I watched, my hand still resting on the clear-glass doorknob, the couple rolled over in the bed, so that she was now on top, sitting astride him. She leaned back, her arms down at her sides, her fingers intertwined with his, and as she did, her small breasts jutted forward and her glossy dark hair grazed the top of her narrow back. He leaned up toward her, and I heard the wet smacking sound of lips on skin.
“Nick,” she said, the word a throaty, guttural sigh. “I’m going to come.”
Nick.
I stepped back just as the Madonna song came to an abrupt end, and in the brief moment of silence before the next CD track queued up, the thin floorboards squeaked under my feet. Holmes whimpered and reared up, dancing on his hind legs, begging to be picked up. It was only then that they noticed the light cutting across the room, only then that they turned to look at the doorway where I stood watching them, unable to speak and yet not turning away. I gaped at them, the skin on my cheeks tight and hot.
Nick looked at me with an expression of shock and bewilderment. And the woman…She’d gone quite still, no longer rocking her hips over his, announcements of her impending orgasm forgotten. The crescent of light shining in from the office was casting a greenish glow on her face.
Testing Kate Page 23