"Are you all right?" David asked, standing when she returned to the table.
"I was nervous," she confessed, sitting down.
"So am I," he said.
"Tell me about everything you've been working on," she said then, knowing that David would quickly lose himself in the subject.
After he told her about two movie projects that he was working on, Elizabeth was tempted to interrupt him and say, "I hate you, you know. It makes me jealous and angry to hear how happy and productive you've been without me." But she didn't and he prattled on, making her feel as though she hadn't meant anything to him at all. Ever.
Elizabeth, she told herself, the only way to feel better is to stop the abuse in your head the moment you become aware of it. Amazing how old habits came back the moment people from her past reappeared. Instantly, she began setting herself up; creating stories in her head about why other people had acted the way they had, making assumptions about what they felt, and then acting on that information as if it were absolutely real.
"I guess I should just come out with it," David said suddenly, startling her back to the present.
"Maybe not quite yet," Elizabeth said, eyes on the waiter who was coming to take their order. "David," she said, "I'm afraid I'm not really hungry. Not at all, as a matter of fact."
He looked at her. "Neither am I."
They ended up making apologies, paying the bill with a handsome tip, and leaving the restaurant quickly.
"It was kind of heavy-duty being back there, wasn't it?" David asked.
She didn't say anything.
"Do you want to sit over there?" he asked, pointing across the street to the benches in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. "I really need to get this off my chest."
Elizabeth felt her stomach seizing up again, so she tried to remember all the reasons why she should hate this man, why her body need not be paralyzed by his presence, and most of all, why she should kill the hope she felt that he might still love her. She was a mess inside. But hadn't she always been?
I am completely safe because I am here with me, I am taking care of me.
Elizabeth had already accepted a teaching post at Columbia, her alma mater, when she had met and fallen in love with David. "When it had come to wanting to share her life with him, however, it meant going back on her word to the university.
"UCLA?" the department chairman had said, eyes wide with disbelief. He had frowned then and asked, "Why, Elizabeth?"
"I've fallen in love," she confessed.
"And Greg got a job out there?"
Greg was the man Elizabeth had dated all the way through graduate school. He was an older and very successful magazine editor, who had happily escorted her to all the Columbia functions over the years, so everyone knew him.
"No," she said, "Greg will be staying in New York."
After a long silence, the department chairman said, "I hope you know what you're doing, Elizabeth. It's not wise to abandon a post you have formally accepted."
She was still horrified to remember what she had said at the time. "But I've never had anyone really love me before!”
The chairman had murmured, "Be very careful, Elizabeth, and keep in close touch. We'll miss you terribly." And then, as if offering formal forgiveness, he had held out his arms and she had rushed into them. They had been through a lot over the years. She was his star student. Leaving Columbia had been like moving away from her childhood home in North Stamford all over again.
And for what? Elizabeth thought now—with another warning flip—flop in her stomach—as they sat down on a bench near the museum.
"Oh, God, not again," David said, making Elizabeth look up. Walking toward them, in the shadows of the trees, was a homeless man who had approached them earlier on the way to the Stanhope. David had given him a dollar, an act which Elizabeth had suspected had only been for her benefit.
"Donation for a suit for a Merrill Lynch interview?" the homeless man asked David. In that instant, the man recognized them from before. "As you can see, madam," he said to Elizabeth, "I have made enormous progress since the last time I saw you."
"Oh, God," Elizabeth said, laughing, "you sound just like Montgomery Grant Smith."
"A compliment, madam," the man said, mimicking Montgomery fairly well. "We the homeless are committed to listening to Mr. Smith as the consummate act of self-hatred."
Elizabeth searched in her bag, carefully scrunched up a twenty-dollar bill so David couldn't see how much it was, and handed it to the man. "Good luck to you," she said.
"God bless you, ma'am." He had the sense to back off before looking to see what she had given him. When he did, he saluted her.
"All he'll do is spend it on drink and drugs," David said, shifting his weight.
"He might get something to eat."
David sighed. "I never remembered New York being like Calcutta."
"It wasn't before the Reagan and Bush years," Elizabeth said.
"Oh, don't be an ass, Elizabeth. What are you voting as these days, socialist?"
"As you may recall," Elizabeth said crossly, "I was originally registered Republican, not you. And if we ever get a normal Republican party, I might be again."
"Some things never change," David sighed, looking at the sky overhead.
"Basic human kindness never should, regardless of politics."
"We're fighting," he told her.
"Of course we're fighting!" she said. "I can't believe you still think that somebody else is going to fix the problems—"
"Elizabeth—enough!"
"No, not enough!" she exploded, jumping to her feet. "I put up with the most unbelievable garbage from you. You'd happily turn every American city into Calcutta if you thought it meant getting a new sports car. What I can't believe is that I just sat there, listening to you rationalizing the economics of your greed!"
"Oh, you didn't just sit there and listen, believe me," David said, angrily crossing his arms over his chest and looking down Fifth Avenue. "Some great citizen you turned out to be," he added. "You bailed out to a foreign country, that's how much you cared about solving this country's problems."
"You arrogant, self-centered son of a bitch, I hate you!" she cried, turning on her heel and hurrying down Fifth Avenue. She was sobbing and she didn't care that people saw; she only wanted to get away from him. After four blocks she slowed down, took some Kleenex out of her bag, wiped her eyes, and blew her nose.
"Better?" David said from behind her.
She turned around and slapped him across the face. She had never hit anyone in her life, and his look of shock and amazement made her think that she might be losing her mind.
"Elizabeth," he murmured, trying to hold her.
"Don't touch me!" she said, pulling away, sobbing.
They stood there a while, her sobbing, him holding her, people walking by with their dogs and children.
"Elizabeth, this is crazy, we've got to go somewhere and talk."
She wiped her eyes and blew her nose. "I wish to God you had never come." When he didn't say anything, she looked up.
And then she saw that he was crying, too.
22
"Is that you, Elizabeth?" Henry called down the hall.
"Yes," she said, slipping off her coat and hanging it in the front hall closet. "David's here, too," she added.
They walked down the hall. "I was just going to bed," Henry said, appearing in his robe, slippers, and striped pajamas. "There is a lot of good food in the kitchen—I hope you kids will help yourselves."
Elizabeth kissed him good night and David and Henry shook hands. Elizabeth and David went into the kitchen and poured themselves some juice, found some oatmeal cookies, and went into the study.
Elizabeth had spent many evenings in this apartment over the years, sometimes at a cocktail or dinner party in honor of one of Dorothy and Henry's clients, but most often it was to slip off her shoes and curl up in one of the big leather chairs in this den
and sip tea and gossip with Dorothy about nothing. Elizabeth felt tired and glad to be home, where, within moments, she could simply tell David to leave and she would be alone. She slipped off her shoes and curled into one of the leather chairs, yawning.
"I need to sit near you," David said. "Please, Elizabeth." Without a word she moved to the couch, tucking her legs under her and turning to face him.
After hesitating a moment, he took hold of the hand that she had rested on the back of the couch. He held it in both of his hands and sighed, looking at her. "What happened was..." he began.
She waited.
He averted his gaze and swallowed. "What happened to me..." he tried again.
"You went on location for six weeks," she said, "and when you came home you wouldn't touch me, you wouldn't talk to me, and you left after three days."
He sighed, but said nothing.
"That was three weeks before our wedding," she added.
"It seems so stupid, now, but at the time—" He looked at her, squeezing her hand. "At the time, Bets—"
She stiffened, withdrawing her hand.
"Sorry," he murmured. "Oh, my God, I'm so sorry."
Neither was looking at the other. She didn't know what he was thinking about, but she was remembering how he had come to call her Bets. He had said that the whole world knew her as Elizabeth, but only he would know her as Bets. It all seemed so ludicrous now.
"I always assumed it was another woman."
"Not the way you think." He looked at her, took a breath, and added, "But I did cheat on you."
She let out a cynical laugh. "You would have to be an idiot to think this comes as news to me."
"Do you remember the night? I swore to you that I hadn't? And wouldn't ever?"
"Of course I do," she said. "The Mexican operator kept breaking in on the line to say you had an emergency call from some woman—probably the one you were sleeping with!"
"I got the clap." He looked at her. "And I got herpes. When I got home to L.A. it had broken out everywhere—especially my crotch."
Elizabeth sighed, rubbing her eyes.
"So when I slammed the door that time," he said quickly, "when I was in the bathroom—I wasn't rejecting you. Oh, God, Bets, I just couldn't tell you what I had done after I had sworn to you so many times that I hadn't."
"So you did nothing?" Elizabeth said, slamming her hand down on the couch beside her. "You just left?"
He stood and began to pace. "When I finally got my act together, you'd taken off, and then it just seemed like—well, like I didn't deserve you. Never had."
She looked at him, tears streaming down her face. "I don't buy it, David. I don't buy it for one minute! Why make up a ridiculous story now? Why even bother? What the hell could you possibly want from me now?"
"It's the truth," he said quietly. "I felt like I had the fucking plague."
"You didn't want to get married! That's what the problem was!"
Instead of protesting, he sank back down on the sofa and covered his eyes with his hand as he rubbed his forehead. "I didn't want to get married," he admitted, lowering his hand. "Not even to you."
In the silence that suddenly filled the room, they could hear the tick of the brass clock on the mantelpiece.
"Finally," she sighed, sniffling and wiping tears off her face with the back of her hand. "Well, thanks for telling me, even if you are three years too late."
David got up and walked over to the mahogany cabinet near the windows. On top sat a silver tray holding a crystal decanter and six small brandy glasses. He poured an inch of the amber liquid into two of them and gave one to Elizabeth. She noticed the tears in his eyes and handed him a tissue.
"Do you still have it?" she asked him.
He nodded, sitting down and rolling his glass between his palms. "The clap they could cure, but not the herpes." He blew his nose. "It goes in remission and then it comes back—stress sometimes brings it on. And that's when you're infectious."
"You should have told me, David," she said.
"I couldn't. Not then. We were getting married in three weeks, for chrissakes. Somehow it all just started to snowball the second I came through the door. You were so happy to see me. You were in that silk thing I loved. And you wanted to make love and I had to push you away. You were upset, and you thought ... but I couldn't—hell, I just had to get out of there, I couldn't stand it. I was going to come back that night, but I didn't. The next day I..." He sighed, rubbing his eyes. "I don't have any excuse, Bets." He dropped his hand and looked at her. "But I was in love with you. You know I was."
Elizabeth's mind had safely detoured into the matter of his health and this last part did not fully register. It would later, she knew, when she was alone and she replayed this conversation in her head. For right now, it was best to take the detached course. That way none of this seemed quite real, not the past, not the present.
"Are you seeing anyone now?" she asked him.
"Yes," he said.
Well, of course, he was. When had he ever been alone? When would women ever find him not attractive? When would women like her stop thinking they were different, that they could be the one he’d fall in love with and settle down with?
Good old irresistible David.
"And does she know about the herpes?"
He paused, and then shook his head.
"Shouldn't you tell her?"
"It's in remission," he said. "I will, I—"
"David, you must tell her. How else will you know who really cares for you, if you don't?"
He raised his head and looked at her. "I love you," he said.
Her breath was gone, her body froze. "I love you, too," she said.
They sat there, unmoving, as the clock chimed twelve times.
"But you should leave now," she murmured.
"I know," he said. He put his glass down, got up, and walked to the door. "I do love you, Elizabeth." And he left.
23
"What do you think you're doing?" Georgiana demanded when Montgomery Grant Smith jumped into her cab late Monday afternoon and slammed the door shut behind him.
"Go, driver, wherever she told you," he said. Instantly the car took off.
"Wait, driver," Georgiana said. They lurched forward as the car stopped.
"Go!" Montgomery yelled. "Go!" They began to move again.
"Stop!" Georgiana screamed.
The driver shouted something foreign into the rearview mirror and shook his fist as he applied the brakes.
"He's on my side," Monty told her.
"Oh, all right," Georgiana said. "Go on, the West End Broadcasting Center, Sixty-seventh and West End Avenue." She turned to glare at Montgomery. "What has gotten into you?"
"I'm crazy about you," Montgomery said, trying to kiss her.
"What the devil do you think you're doing?" Georgiana said, pushing him away.
"What's the matter? What's wrong?”
"What's wrong? What's wrong? What is wrong with you? You've been stalking me all weekend and now you jump into my taxicab and attack me!"
"I wouldn't call that an attack. I just want to spend some time with you." He took her hand in his.
"Would you please stop it!" she said, wrestling her hand away.
"Okay, fine!" he said, moving over toward his window.
They drove along for a minute or two in silence. Georgiana glanced over. He wasn't pouting, exactly, but she could see that his feelings were hurt.
"Look, Montgomery."
"Monty," he said.
"Look, Monty."
"No, you look," he said suddenly, "we had a wonderful night Friday night. It was obviously no big deal for you, but it was a big deal for me. There. Okay? Satisfied? Now you know. And now that you know that, you should know that I don't see anything wrong with my wanting to know you better, and to perhaps court you properly. So if you're insulted, I'm sorry. I'm offering the greatest compliment I have to offer."
Georgiana was silent, trying to th
ink of what to say and how to say it. "I feel as though you're trying to cage me," she finally said. "And I don't react well when people try to touch me—without my permission."
"I know," he said. "I'm sorry. No one should touch you without your permission. I apologize."
"About Friday night," she added.
He held his breath.
"I made a mistake. For both of us. I had too much to drink..."
"I hate that excuse," he said.
She looked at him, but let the comment pass. "Had I known it would mean anything more to you than it did to me, I would not have done it. I guess I thought that with your fame and success, you were simply as lonely as I was."
"I am," he told her. "And I'm looking for a partner."
"And I'm not," she said, looking down at her lap.
"I think you lie like a rug, lady, but I accept your attempt to make peace." He cleared his throat, looking out the window. "So, where are we going, DBS?" he asked, as if they had been planning to go there together all along.
She looked at him.
"You're a very beautiful woman, have I told you that?"
"For a moment," she said, "I thought you were going to be rational."
"I am, I am," he assured her. He shrugged. "So why are we going to DBS?"
"I am visiting Jessica Wright," she said, "and then having a bite to eat with Alexandra Waring. You are going back to the hotel."
"But I know Jessica, the Terror of Tucson," he said.
Georgiana had to smile. It was Jessica's nickname from the old days, when her talk show had originated out of Tucson, Arizona.
"She used to be a real hot ticket, I hear, but I didn't know her that well."
"She also used to drink too much," Georgiana said. "But not anymore, not for years. Seems to me, Monty, you know a lot of women who shouldn't drink."
"What about blow?"
She looked at him.
"Cocaine," he clarified.
"And what would you know about cocaine?"
Any Given Moment (The Alexandra Chronicles Book 3) Page 13