“Honey, I know you’re hurting, but you can’t be naive about this. The man reviewed his options and made up his mind to leave. What you need is a divorce lawyer. We have to keep a roof over your head, make sure you get your fair share of what’s coming to you. After spending twenty years wiping the man’s ass.”
“I don’t think that Todd would want to deprive me.”
“A man in his predicament? I wouldn’t count on it. Anyway, much better to play it safe.”
It’s a comfort that Alison is looking out for her, but she is not receptive to Alison’s advice. What’s knocking around in her head is that people act on impulse, make mistakes, and regret them later. Maybe he needs to know that he’s forgiven. Maybe he’s waiting for a sign. And really, when you think about it, no actual harm has been done. Even the baby is not a major complication, doesn’t need to be. He won’t be spending a lot of time with it while it’s an infant. Infants need their mothers. And when it’s older—well, it might be nice having a youngster around to liven things up.
12
HIM
Refusing to look back he throws himself headlong into his new life, beginning by shopping for clothes to replace the wardrobe he left behind. Natasha tags along and he allows her to influence his purchases, with the upshot that his look becomes more stylish and up-to-date. His belt has a larger buckle; his shoes taper to a point. He learns to wear a T-shirt with a blazer and jeans. The new clothes have designer labels and they fit him better. He likes the reinvention of himself and gets into the swing of it, letting his hair grow out and cultivating a roguish stubble. All in all it makes a younger, sexier man of him. He looks like someone who is still in the game. And then there’s the payoff that trumps all others: When he and Natasha are out together people no longer mistake him for her father.
Evenings are spent getting dinner, going for walks, going shopping, making love. If Natasha has schoolwork Todd takes over things like dishes and laundry. If Todd goes to the bar Natasha goes with him, although—given that she’s pregnant and therefore not drinking—she usually drags him away before he can really get started. For this he takes some ribbing from the boys, Cliff in particular, who refers to Natasha as the she-boss. On weekends they pack a lunch and drive out of the city or eat pizza and watch movies or babysit for people in the building. Natasha says they need to make friends with their neighbors.
One Saturday they pass the afternoon getting matching tattoos—armbands of intertwining foliage, his and hers. The needles bring tears to his eyes—he wasn’t ready for the pain—but he likes the idea of a rite of passage, an initiation of sorts, something to symbolize the start of their life together. The tattoos were Natasha’s idea. Tattoos, she says, are permanent and nonnegotiable—unlike wedding bands. Not that she wants to forgo a wedding. On the contrary, she has moved the date up to mid-December, which is ideal, she says, because not only will it be Christmas break but she will barely be showing and will still fit into the dress of her dreams.
His workdays are spent in a state of heightened energy and purpose. The buyer he’s been courting for the Jefferson Park apartment house has come through with a signature, so now it’s just a matter of finishing the work. This includes digging out the west foundation, waterproofing the exterior wall, and replacing the concrete walk that will be damaged in the process. The whack of cash he was counting on for the new office building will be a smaller whack than he foresaw, but right now he’s riding a wave of optimism and feeling that he has Natasha to thank for all of life’s blessings. He won’t soon forget the ordeal of his depression. Before Natasha, life was hardly worth living. Now, his renewed spirits are rippling outward, creating promise for the future. He stands firmly by the choices he’s made and the path he’s taken. His advice to everybody would be: Don’t allow anything or anyone to stop you from living your life.
Eventually, he knows, he’ll have to settle things with Jodi, something he is not looking forward to. He’s seen enough of his friends through breakups to anticipate the shock to his income and assets. What he needs to do is call his lawyer. It’s not as if putting it off is doing him any good. Even now Jodi is out there spending his money. Her credit card statements come to his office and are paid by Stephanie—along with the condo fees and other household costs.
In spite of these concerns it’s only Natasha’s nagging that eventually prompts him to action. Natasha is adamant that he close things out with Jodi. She has pried out of him every detail of his and Jodi’s financial arrangements and is livid that he allows things to go along as if nothing has changed, as if he and Jodi were still together.
Todd’s lawyer, who sees him through the ins and outs of property deals, is also a practitioner of family law. A man in his sixties, Harry LeGroot has been through three divorces and knows what it means to make mistakes and pay for them. He married his first wife when he was a student in law school, and although he hasn’t set eyes on her in thirty years he is still required to send her a monthly check. The second and third wives, in addition to bleeding him of money, are living in palatial homes that he foolishly bought and paid for while he was married to them. Harry himself lives in a rental unit and prays daily for their deaths. Dear Lord: Please take Shoshana; please take Becky; please take Kate. But Shoshana, Becky, and Kate are in no hurry to leave this world.
Todd meets Harry for lunch at Blackie’s in Printers Row, where they order steak sandwiches and draft beer. Harry has silver hair that he combs straight back, playing up the prominent features and high forehead. He’s wearing a light gray worsted suit and a charcoal dress shirt with no tie. Harry and Todd go back more than two decades, almost to the start of Todd’s career in property development. Their relationship thrives on business, but they like to conduct it in restaurants and bars, where they can feel good and open up to each other on a personal level. For Todd, Harry is a father figure as well as an expert navigator in the arcane sphere of city bylaws and urban politics. And Harry, whose failed marriages have used up his own tolerance for risk, admires the audacity and stamina that power Todd’s success.
When they’re settled in with their food and drink, Todd delivers his news. “You’re not going to like this,” he says. “I’ve left Jodi.”
Harry bites into his sandwich, chews, swallows, runs his tongue over his upper and lower teeth, drinks from his pint glass, and belches politely with a hand over his mouth. When he speaks, his voice is a deeply purring baritone.
“Here you are with a gorgeous home, a beautiful wife who loves you, and all the recreation on the side that a man could possibly want. Not to mention a life mercifully free of the kind of financial drain imposed by bloodsucking ex-wives who hate your guts. And now you want to throw it all away and join the ranks of pussy-addled middle-aged men like me whose brains are in their pants. I’m disappointed in you, Todd. I thought you had more sense.” He shakes his head sadly. His watery blue eyes wander around the restaurant. “How old is she?” he asks.
“How old is Jodi?”
“How old is the home wrecker. And please don’t tell me you’re planning to marry her.”
“Stop it, Harry,” says Todd. “You haven’t even met her.”
“I don’t need to meet her. Whoever she is, she’s not worth it. And if she’s younger than you, she’ll make your life hell.”
“There’s a reason you’re such a cynical bastard,” says Todd. “I pity you, Harry, I really do, because in spite of all your marriages you’ve never found the real thing. Natasha and me, it’s something you’ll never understand. It’s like I was dead and now I’m alive. Yes, she’s younger than me, but that means we can have a family. I’m going to be a father, Harry. Congratulate me. At least you have your children. Imagine what you’d be without your children.”
“Fatherhood is wildly overrated,” says Harry. “Don’t you watch TV? The courts award custody to the mother, your ex-wife, who makes a vocation of turning your kids against you, and you get to see the people who despise you growing fat and lazy
on your profits while you work your sorry ass off and never get ahead.”
“You’re breaking my heart,” says Todd.
“You think you’re immune?” says Harry. “Whatever else happens, Jodi gets half.”
“Okay,” says Todd. “That’s what I need to know. Jodi gets half of what, exactly?”
“Half of your net worth, doofus. Half of your investments. Half of every property you own. You two have been together since you were practically children. Since before you bought your first house. That means she has an interest in every last cent, right down to the change in your piggy bank.”
Todd sits with his lower lip dangling, trying to take it in. It can’t be right, what Harry is saying. He’s thinking back, doing his best to remember what actually happened.
“I’d already bought my first house when I met her,” he says. “I remember that because I took her there to show her, and it was gutted. So no, when I bought the house I didn’t even know her. And we didn’t move in together till after I’d sold it.”
“Living together is one thing,” says Harry. “When did you get married?”
“We didn’t,” says Todd. “I mean, there wasn’t an actual ceremony.”
“You’re not married?”
“It’s a common-law marriage.”
“You’re joking,” says Harry.
“Is that bad?” asks Todd.
“Poor Jodi. I could almost feel sorry for her.”
“She didn’t want to get married. She didn’t see the point.”
Harry is wild-eyed and grinning like a monkey. Todd thinks he’s being mocked. “What does it mean?” he asks.
“It means we should have another drink,” says Harry. “We need to celebrate.”
13
HER
On a Tuesday, after her workout and before lunch, she calls him on his cell phone. He picks up and warbles the notes of her name.
“Surprise!” she says. “Where are you?”
“I’m in my car. How have you been?” He sounds flustered, wary, no doubt assuming that she’s called to berate him.
“I’m fine,” she says. “I’ve been thinking about you. In a good way.”
“Really,” he says. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
“Well, you know,” she says. “It is what it is. We can only go forward.”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” he says. “I’ve been thinking about you, too.”
“That’s nice,” she says. “Do you miss me?” She hadn’t meant to ask him that.
“Of course I miss you. I miss you every day.”
She takes a breath and lets it out. “I’m here,” she says.
“Yeah. Well. I didn’t think . . .”
“I know. We parted on not such great terms.”
“Even the sound of your voice,” he says. “It’s nice.”
They are both acting a little coy, choosing their words with care. Her plan was to test the waters first and if he seemed receptive to follow through with her invitation.
“Listen,” she says. “Why don’t you come for dinner?”
He doesn’t immediately reply. She waits, listening to the sounds coming through the receiver: traffic, a radio announcer. When she pictures him at the wheel he’s in the same cargo pants and sweatshirt he was wearing the morning he left. She thinks daily about the fact that he went away with only the clothes he had on. He must have done some shopping, but she can only conjure him up the way he looked then.
“I’d love to,” he says finally. “When do you want me?”
“I was thinking tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow,” he repeats, sounding doubtful.
What can be going through his mind? Does he have to account for every evening out? Is he even allowed an evening out?
“Tomorrow it is,” he says.
“Can you come at seven?”
“Seven,” he agrees. “Can’t wait to see you.”
The conversation proves to be transformational. As she puts the phone down she’s already living in an altered world, a world created by the resurgence of their love as it once was, a younger love, untarnished and all of a piece, not prone to dismemberment—pulling the other apart and considering the bits, this one good, that one bad. In those days even her eccentricities were dear to him: her addiction to spending, her aversion to clutter bordering on obsession, her habit of saving wine corks and cheese rinds, her love of panty hose, which she still wears even with jeans, her undemonstrative nature. He used to scribble affectionate notes and leave them in unexpected places before he left for work. He’d play with her hair, join her in the shower. And likewise, back then there was nothing about him that she didn’t adore. The way he drank his coffee, blowing on it with lips pushed out comically, long after it had cooled. The way he showered, soaping himself from head to foot till he all but disappeared in the lather. The way he carved butter into slabs and set about paving his toast. She even loved the way he drove, cutting people off and laughing when they gave him the finger. She loved him like that for a long time, even after she knew him well. The renewal of her love she attributes to their separation. The shock of losing him has affected her deeply, reactivated her pulse, flushed out disused chambers of her heart.
She spends the rest of that day and all of the next in a thrall of counting down the hours. The time unfolds in visits to the supermarket, cheese shop, fishmonger, florist. In chopping herbs, making marinades, cleaning squid, trimming vegetables. She takes the dog to the groomer and goes for a manicure, pedicure, bikini wax, facial, and massage. Impatient during sessions with clients, she cuts their time a little short. She goes to bed late and gets up early. There are bouts of trying on outfits. She has a lot riding on this, she knows. A drink in a bar or dinner in a restaurant would do just as well. But she’s been overcome by a persuasive euphoria, and all she can see is the stars in her eyes and all she can hear is the music in her head.
Lapses of this kind are part of her history, marked by a buildup of excitement around some upcoming social event. When she was a girl, she and her mother indulged in them together. A sense of occasion, a flirtation with promise and possibility, that’s what makes for the high times in life. But even on ordinary days, even in the face of disappointment, a positive outlook is her mainstay. She’s good at rebounding from setbacks, resisting the undertow, riding the waves. Staying afloat is what she does well—something that Todd has always remarked on. He likes her buoyancy; it’s kept him from falling permanently into a black hole and from getting too addicted to alcohol, getting addicted the way his father was. Though during his depression she wasn’t able to help him.
She tried to get him into therapy, but he wouldn’t have it. “That’s your world,” he said. “Leave me out of it.” Maybe she should have tried harder. He would have benefited from the practical approach of an Adlerian like Gerard Hartmann. As far as difficult childhoods go, Todd’s could set an example. Any child with an alcoholic father and a victimized mother is going to be damaged, and Todd has done well for himself considering, but the real story is told in his lying and equivocation, his inability to talk about his feelings, his aversion to authority, and his compulsive risk-taking, which has worked out for him in business but along with his never-ending affairs reflects the deep-seated feelings of inferiority that drive him to continually prove himself. According to Adler, having a good measure of self-esteem leaves us free to be task oriented rather than worth oriented in all that we undertake, whereas feelings of inferiority keep us focused on ourselves. That’s Todd in a nutshell.
Jodi first encountered Adler in university, but it was through her studies at the Adler School and her work with Gerard that she gained a solid working knowledge of Adlerian principles. Along with Jung, Adler was a colleague of Freud’s in Vienna in the early twentieth century, but Adler and Jung, each in turn, broke away from Freud and formed their own schools of thought. That Adler’s school is pragmatic and socially attuned is nowhere quite so evident as in his three main life tas
ks, which he identified as hallmarks of mental health: (1) the experience and expression of love, (2) the development of friendships and social ties, and (3) engagement in meaningful work. In these terms Jodi could only be counted as utterly sane—and as her therapy with Gerard progressed this fact became somewhat glaring. Whichever way they turned, whatever line of inquiry they pursued, they ran smack-dab into her inspired relationship with Todd, her excellent social skills, and her professional dedication. She’d done her time in the client’s chair; did she really need to continue on with her weekly sessions? The question was often in her mind, and it came to a head when she suggested to Gerard that they call it quits. But Gerard was inclined to stick with it, and so they did. He asked questions, listened, and took notes. Jodi reported her dreams and talked about her family of origin: her parents, her older brother, Darrell, and her younger brother, Ryan.
She was three years older than Ryan but had no memory of his entry into the family, no mental picture of how he looked the first time she saw him. Ryan had been in her life as far back as she could remember, and her interest in him had always been proprietary. When they were little he was more or less on a par with her favorite stuffed animal—hers to coddle, indulge, dress up, teach, scold, and generally boss around. Back then he was compliant, sweet, good-natured, and he easily surrendered to her well-meaning despotism. It wasn’t until he was older, no longer a toddler but a boy, that the outbursts started, the nightmares and self-inflicted wounds that had everyone so worried, but all of that passed in the end, as did his many other phases: obnoxious prankster, contrary know-it-all, paranoid loner.
She had loved him through it all and loved him still, even though she was far from reconciled with the way he had ended up: with the fact that after opting out of university he had spent his twenties traveling in India and Southeast Asia and had ever since been living half the year in Kuala Lumpur teaching English and half the year in Baja California Sur, where he surfed and waited tables; with the fact that he was a certified, card-carrying black sheep who would one day be too old to continue doing what he was doing and what would become of him then?—without money, far from home, and too proud to ask for help.
The Silent Wife: A Novel Page 13