Listen to the Marriage

by John Jay Osborn

  “Yesterday,” Gretchen said angrily.

  “So Gabrielle’s website has this really true, and accurate portrait of her?” Sandy said.

  In spite of feeling lonely and vulnerable, Gretchen actually smiled at this.

  “Well, it has recipes that look pretty accurate,” Gretchen said. “She has a clip of her making raviolis. With the machine and everything. I’ve always wanted to try that. I watched and I thought, This is someone Steve is going to like.”

  “And?” Sandy said.

  “On the website, she comes across as very likable,” Gretchen said. “In a very Italian way. You know, the dark earth mother. I suppose I’m the blond, blue-eyed ice princess. That’s how Steve sees it. In reality, I’m sure she’s a super bitch and will make Steve’s life miserable, but, you know, we keep coming to see you, Sandy, good for us, but one of these days, some Italian cook is going to cook a meal for Steve that makes him fall for her. And then this is done.”

  “I’m not going to fall for anyone,” Steve said.

  “What really makes me crazy is that I’ve made you so much better, and some beautiful Italian is going to get the benefit,” Gretchen said. “Sometimes I wish I was ready to live with you again.”

  “But you’re not?” Steve asked.

  “No,” Gretchen said.

  “Why not?” Steve asked.

  “That is a good question, a very good question,” Gretchen said. “One reason is that I’m not ready to give up Bill.”

  Steve started to say something, but then he thought better of it, Sandy noticed.

  “I mean, yes, I’ve given up on him in a sense, but I can’t seem to get him out of my system. When he calls, it still knocks me over sometimes,” Gretchen said.

  “He is such a jerk,” Steve said slowly.

  “Agreed. But I was telling you how I feel. You should pay attention to that.”

  “Why does he knock you over?” Steve asked after a moment.

  “When I met him, I was a damsel in distress,” Gretchen said. “You remember when you and I went to Mendocino? That time when we left the kids with your parents? We rented kayaks and paddled up that river.”

  Sandy noticed how Gretchen dropped Bill. Sandy felt that Gretchen was about to switch to Gabrielle, that Gretchen had made a connection between the two.

  “That was great,” Steve said.

  “So take Gabrielle up the river,” Gretchen said.

  Which was not what she meant. It wasn’t close. It was the opposite of what she meant. Steve was just looking at Gretchen. He didn’t say anything.

  “Bill really hurts, doesn’t he,” Sandy said to Steve. “Why do you think Gretchen brought him up? What did she mean when she said she wasn’t ready to give him up?”

  She says the opposite of what she means …

  Steve looked at Sandy and then back at Gretchen. Sandy saw the idea hit him. It literally pushed him back in his chair.

  “I’m not going to fall in love with Gabrielle,” Steve said. “It’s a nice relationship, but it’s not like what you had with Bill.”

  Steve paused for a moment.

  Then he said: “I have an idea. You’re talking about the fact that I’m going away for the weekend with Gabrielle. Why don’t we plan a weekend away. For ourselves.”

  He got it, Sandy realized, he understood that Gretchen had given up Bill and didn’t want him to come back as Gabrielle.

  “Maybe we can talk about it after you get back from your weekend with Gabrielle,” Gretchen said.

  24.

  “So how was your weekend with Gabrielle?” Sandy asked Steve, thinking it was a pretty obvious and not very creative start. But it was what she wanted to know.

  Gretchen was looking out the window. Now she turned back and faced Sandy.

  “Let’s stop it right there,” Gretchen said. “You told me that I was beating myself up by looking at Gabrielle’s website. Fair enough. I agree. So I certainly don’t want to hear that they had a great time and how the sex was.”

  “How do you know they had a great time?” Sandy said. “Or if they slept together?”

  Gretchen shook her head. She turned her right hand palm up and raised it.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Gretchen said. “I thought hard about this. Whatever happens outside this room doesn’t matter.”

  “I don’t understand what you’re getting at,” Steve said.

  “You and me, our story?” Gretchen said. “It’s what is going on right now, in this room. This is where it happens. This is what counts. If you’re not here, in the room, you don’t count. Gabrielle isn’t here.”

  “But isn’t the idea for us to learn stuff here that helps us in the real world?” Steve said.

  “What real world?” Gretchen said. “Can I be honest with you, Steve?”

  Gretchen turned to Sandy.

  “I’m not asking Steve if I can be honest, I’m asking myself, as in do I dare to be really honest with Steve?”

  “Sure you can,” Sandy said.

  “Okay, here goes,” Gretchen said. “I spend a huge amount of my time in what you call the real world, thinking about what happens here, in the one hour a week I spend in this room with you and Sandy. My whole week is organized around this hour.”

  Steve nodded.

  “I do too,” he said.

  “So I think there is a story going on here,” Gretchen said. “Sandy may be creating it for us, or bringing it out in us. I’m not sure who is the real author.”

  “What kind of a story is it?” Sandy said.

  “It’s about Steve and me being vulnerable with each other,” Gretchen said. “Being willing to take chances with each other. It’s also about learning what we really feel, which is pretty hard to do.”

  “Right,” Sandy said. “And it’s also about changes you two have made in terms of how you lead your lives.”

  “You mean how Steve has turned into a good father,” Gretchen said.

  “Yes, that’s part of it,” Sandy said. “The other part is that you let him.”

  “Steve, do you get what I’m trying to say?” Gretchen said, looking at Steve. Her voice was pleading.

  “I think I do,” Steve said.

  Gretchen said: “Months ago, when I went to that divorce lawyer? Remember?”

  “Of course I remember,” Steve said.

  “I was so wired, so wrung out, so gutter,” Gretchen said. “Should I divorce Steve? Should I get it over with? What was Steve going to do? What lawyer would he hire? Would his lawyer be tougher than mine? All these questions running through my mind. Now?”

  Gretchen stopped. She shrugged her shoulders.

  “Now, if you came in here and said, Gretchen, I went to see a lawyer, and I’m filing for divorce, I would say, Fine, Steve, if that makes you happy. But I wouldn’t do anything about it. I wouldn’t go to see a lawyer. As long as you were still coming here, I’d just let it go.”

  “What would you do if Steve stopped coming here and went to see a divorce lawyer?” Sandy said.

  “Oh, let’s go all the way,” Gretchen said. “What would I do if Steve stopped coming here, saw a divorce lawyer, and then filed for divorce? Am I still coming here? Even if it’s alone?”

  “Sure,” Sandy said. “If you wanted to.”

  “I would want to,” Gretchen said. “So I wouldn’t do anything. I’d just keep coming here and talking to you.”

  “Even if I filed for divorce?” Steve said.

  “Oh, Steve,” Gretchen said. “Come on. Work with me. What difference would it make if you filed for divorce? You think that would get you anywhere?”

  “It would get us divorced,” Steve said.

  Gretchen looked at Sandy. “Is he ever going to get it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” Sandy said. She looked at Steve.

  “Do you want to get a divorce?” Sandy asked.

  “Of course not,” Steve said. “It’s the last thing I want. I said that.”

  “But if you got
a divorce what would change?” Sandy asked. “Would you still feel the same way?”

  “It would end something. I mean, suppose Gretchen died, that would be the end of our relationship, wouldn’t it?” Steve said. “What if Gretchen died and I got remarried? You’re saying that wouldn’t make any difference?”

  “So, I have a friend,” Sandy said. “She was with her husband in Africa. He worked for the UN. They got into a car accident. He was killed. She almost died. Now he comes back to her in her dreams. Every night. It’s been going on for seven years. In her dreams, he rings the doorbell, or she hears him open the garage door. Now she writes down the dreams every morning.”

  “You’re saying he died and nothing changed?” Steve asked.

  “Not for her,” Sandy said. “Her dreams are her therapy. You come to this office. She dreams.”

  Steve was looking intently at Gretchen.

  “Steve, here’s the thing,” Gretchen added. “I’m saying that our time in this room is the real world. The stuff outside this room? Who knows?”

  Gretchen smiled to herself. She was looking down. Then she looked up again, at Steve.

  “Steve, this is also another way of saying that we had to let each other go,” Gretchen said. “I’ve let you go.”

  “Now you lost me,” Steve said. “I thought I was beginning to understand when Sandy talked about her friend whose husband had died.”

  “Remember at the beginning how Sandy was always telling us that we had to let each other go?” Gretchen said. “She said there was this paradox. If we were ever going to get back together, we had to let each other go?”

  “I remember that,” Steve said. “And I never understood it.”

  “I didn’t get it then either, but I think I’m beginning to,” Gretchen said. She turned and looked at Sandy. “You meant that we had to give up trying to control each other. I could get Steve not to sleep with Gabrielle, but that would be useless, wouldn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Sandy said. “It would.”

  “He is the one who has to decide what happens with Gabrielle, not me,” Gretchen said. Now she turned back to Steve.

  “Steve, what happens with Gabrielle? It’s all your call,” Gretchen said. “So, like with divorce, Sandy was saying that is just another method of one person in the relationship trying to control the other. Sandy is saying, even with the ultimate control, death, you still don’t ultimately control. So don’t even think about killing me, by the way, it won’t change anything, I’ll just come back to haunt you. Sandy is saying that what you do with Gabrielle is irrelevant until you are finished dealing with me. Are you finished with me?”

  “No,” Steve said. “Obviously I’m not, because I keep coming here, to this office week after week.”

  “And the fact that you go out with Gabrielle? It won’t influence me one way or the other, it won’t do anything to me, I don’t care. I don’t want to be controlled, I won’t let her control me,” Gretchen said.

  “So anyway,” Sandy said. “Steve? How was your weekend with Gabrielle?”

  “If you mean, did we sleep together? No, we didn’t,” Steve said.

  25.

  It had come over Sandy gradually: a warm and affectionate feeling for both Gretchen and Steve, a belief that they were both decent, careful people. Sure, they’d lost their way, but that happened sometimes.

  They had come in together—Steve holding the door open for Gretchen.

  “Nice to see you,” Sandy said. “Do we have any business to attend to this week before we get down to it? I mean practical stuff. Kids have scheduling issues? Job demands?”

  “I have something,” Steve said. “As you know, I’ve changed my relationship with my firm. I’m working three-quarter time, but I’m still an actual member of the firm and I’ve begun earning back my capital investment as well as earning a percentage of the firm revenues. I just received my first draw.”

  He had come in with a thin brown leather attaché case that had shiny bronze latches. Now he snapped them open and pulled out a manila folder.

  “Anyway, half of the drawdown is yours,” he said, holding out the folder to Gretchen.

  She took the folder from him, opened it, looked at it, closed it, and handed it back to Steve.

  “It’s a lot of money,” she said.

  “Not really,” Steve said.

  “I still have the money from when we sold the house. I put it into a money market fund. It’s sitting there. I’ve used less than twenty thousand,” Gretchen said. “I’m not ready to deal with more money right now. There’s too much going on.”

  “You need to deal with it sometime,” Sandy said.

  “For the time being, Steve can invest it for me,” Gretchen said.

  “I don’t want to do that,” Steve said. “I don’t think I should.”

  Gretchen looked at him, as in, Why, Steve?

  “At the very beginning, Sandy told us that I’d used money as a means of control,” Steve said. “We are supposed to be letting go of each other.”

  “Do you want to let go of me?” Gretchen asked.

  “You know I don’t,” Steve said.

  “Then don’t,” Gretchen said. “Hold the money for me. You’re good with money, you always have been. I realize I’ve given you trouble about it, but I appreciate your skill. Managing money just isn’t something I want to have to learn about right now. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want money, that I want to live like a starving student or anything. I like nice things.”

  Sandy thought: It shows that you like nice things, Gretchen, but you don’t advertise it. Gretchen was looking particularly beautiful this morning. But not expensive, not downtown. She wore old, gnarled black leather boots. A simple black skirt, with a plain white blouse. No jewelry, not even a watch. The only fancy thing was the brown leather bag from Bottega Veneta, which Steve had bought her. She was clean, simple, straightforward. Now Sandy noticed the diamond studs in her ears, large and beautiful stones, hiding in the straw of her long blond hair. So there was some jewelry after all, but you had to find it.

  “I know how to do a spreadsheet,” Gretchen said, and smiled. And then Steve smiled back at her.

  In this instant, Sandy thought, they were together, as together as any couple anywhere, except for the broken clocks in their hearts.

  But Sandy wasn’t sentimental. She was into clock repair.

  “You could take a course in investing,” Sandy said.

  “I don’t want to take a course in investing,” Gretchen said. “That is the last thing in the world I want to take a course in. Sandy, after all this time? Are you kidding me?”

  “Why not?” Sandy said. Her mother had made her take accounting her freshman year in college. Either that or Heidi wasn’t paying tuition.

  “I don’t get it,” Gretchen said. “I’m still married to Steve. Why shouldn’t I get some benefit out of that? I live on my own, I run my life on my own. Why do I have to do everything? Steve is not going to lose the money.”

  “How do you know that?” Steve said.

  “You wouldn’t be able to sleep at night, I know you,” Gretchen said.

  “That’s probably true,” Steve said.

  “You know, you have some useful qualities,” Gretchen said. “And in some ways we are very complementary. But then I let you take our life and run away with it.”

  Gretchen shook her head.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t stop you,” she said.

  “I was pretty unstoppable,” Steve said.

  “You were, but we both made mistakes,” Gretchen said.

  Gretchen was all soft this morning, Sandy realized, a continuation of their last session.

  “My husband and I have an investment advisor who runs our money, such as it is,” Sandy said. “I could give you her name.”

  “Who is she?” Steve asked.

  “Donna Logan at Bostick Davis,” Sandy said.

  “I don’t know her, but I know the firm,” Steve said.

&nbs
p; “Sandy, what is the problem?” Gretchen said, irritated. “I have asked Steve to keep the money for me. Why are you trying to mess with that? We are always going to have some connections no matter what happens.”

  “As Steve said, the problem with that is that money is often an instrument of control,” Sandy said.

  “But do you remember, it was at one of our first sessions together, and I said I needed money because I was moving into my new flat and there were a lot of expenses? What happened? Steve handed over everything we got from selling our house in Ross.”

  Because I told him to, Sandy thought. And he did it because he realized if he didn’t, you would divorce him then and there. But it was a very, very smart move on Steve’s part. I give him that.

  “I remember,” Sandy said.

  “Has anything like that happened with any of your other people?” Gretchen said.

  “It was unusual,” Sandy said.

  Maybe Gretchen was right. For them money wasn’t a problem. For Sandy it had always been an issue. Maybe she was blinded by that.

  “You could be onto something,” Sandy said. “When I think about it, we haven’t spent any time dealing with money. It’s never seemed to be a problem.”

  Of course, you guys have always had money, Sandy thought, you could do with knowing what it’s like when you don’t. As when my mother was on the verge of bankruptcy.

  “Maybe we didn’t argue about money because there always was some,” Gretchen said. “But that was because of Steve.”

  Okay, Sandy thought, we’re in sync. So let’s explore this.

  “I’m sure that’s part of it. The fact that you have had money. But you know what I’m hearing?” Sandy said. “What I’m hearing is that you trust Steve. Is that what you’re saying?”

  Gretchen looked at Steve for a moment, and then turned back to Sandy.

  “That’s a good question, isn’t it,” Gretchen said. “Could it be possible that after nine months here, I’ve somehow begun to trust Steve again? I need to think about that. Are you lying to me about anything, Steve?”