“I did?” he said, looking at her up and down. She was mortified. “Okay.”
He opened his top drawer and took out a small bag of white powder and a mirror and began to make lines with a rolled-up twenty dollar bill. He took a large sniff of the first and then the second, then looked up at Helen.
“Want some?”
She wasn’t sure. She’d tried coke once before and she was not crazy about it, preferring instead pot or mushrooms—but what the hell. She leaned down and snorted a line.
“Let’s go,” he said, shoving all the drug paraphernalia into his drawer and slamming it shut.
They went to a small nondescript Japanese restaurant in a strip mall, where the waiters placed sashimi in front of them without even asking what they wanted. Helen and Dirk didn’t really speak that much, and she started to wonder what she was doing there. Arm candy? Did he just not want to be alone? Did he realize he’d made a mistake but didn’t know how to get out of it?
After dinner, Dirk invited her to his house. She didn’t really want to go, but something about Dirk scared her. He was so volatile—he was just the type to make a scene if she said no. So she agreed. Since they both had their own cars at work, she had to follow behind him in her little Honda. He was driving a new souped-up Porsche, and was obviously a glutton for speed. With no consideration for the fact that she was trying to keep up with him and had no idea where his house was, he took off, higher and higher up into the Hollywood Hills, whipping around the corners of those streets so narrow that only one car could pass through at a time.
His house was an ugly modern structure teetering on the edge of a ravine, with no yard in the front or back, and giant metal gates that looked foreboding. Of course Dirk didn’t even wait for her to get out of her car, marching instead into his house and leaving her to fend off the two slobbering and barking pit bulls that were less than thrilled to see her. When she entered the living room, it was dark, but she could see an enormous television, and an entire wall covered in stereo system equipment, with giant speakers and several shelves of CDs. There were black leather couches and a shag rug, and a disco ball hanging from the ceiling.
“Dirk?” she asked.
“In here,” came his voice from another room. Helen walked through the living room and turned a corner into a dark foyer. She turned again into what must be Dirk’s bedroom, and he was sitting on a king-size bed with black sheets, snorting more coke.
“Sit down,” he said, not looking up.
Helen was feeling less and less enthused about this whole adventure. She’d been flattered that Dirk asked her to dinner, but now he repulsed her. He was just an asshole with a drug problem. They had no connection whatsoever.
Dirk looked up and offered her some coke. “No thanks,” she said.
He shrugged and put the coke down on the side of the bed. Before she knew it, he had pulled her into his arms and had his hands down her shirt and was kneading her breasts.
“Uh, Dirk…”
“Shhh,” he commanded. He leaned back and pulled down his pants, and then yanked Helen’s arm so that she fell to her knees. “Give me a blow job,” he ordered.
Helen felt herself being both repelled and attracted to him. She had never been with someone who was so bossy, and frankly it was kind of kinky. She did as she was ordered. After he came, he leaned back on his bed. She wiped her mouth and stood up. Was there to be no tit for tat?
“Hey, dude, are you going to pleasure me, or what?” asked Helen boldly.
Dirk closed his eyes and crossed his arms behind his head. “No thanks.”
Helen felt the blood rush to her face. “Not cool,” she said.
Dirk opened his eyes and gave her a surprised look. Then he leaned over and snorted another two lines of coke without saying a word.
“I’m gonna go,” she said finally.
“Don’t go—I want you to watch that French movie with me,” he said, picking up the remote and turning on the large-screen television on the wall. But then he stood up and started pacing. “Or maybe we should go dancing? You want to go dancing?”
“Um, no thanks,” she said. She could see that the drugs were hitting him. He was now entering that frantic mode that she had seen too often in Hollywood.
“Let’s go listen to music, then,” he said, walking into the living room. She followed him and he turned on some sort of techno music extremely loud.
“Wait, I want you to hear this,” he said, and started searching through his CDs maniacally.
“I’m gonna split,” she said, walking to the door. The dogs came out of their beds and started barking, and just as she was about to leave, Dirk put his hand on the door and slammed it shut.
“You’re not leaving,” he said evenly. He was glaring at her so intensely that she immediately became fearful.
“Dirk…”
Then his mood changed and the severity lifted. “Stay, please,” he whined. “One more song.”
She stood where she was, frozen, and watched him. He was flipping through the CDs, discarding them everywhere, and then he jerked up and walked over to the bar. He opened a drawer and pulled out more cocaine and did another line.
“This feels so good…” he said, and thrust his head back.
All of the sudden, he fell backwards. The dogs started barking and went up and licked his face, but he remained motionless.
“Dirk?” asked Helen.
He didn’t respond. She waited and then said his name again. “Dirk?”
The dogs were still licking his face, and Helen went over to get a closer look. He had foam coming out of his mouth. “Dirk!” she screamed frantically, feeling for his heart. It wasn’t beating.
“Oh, God!”
She pounded on his chest. Nothing happened. She didn’t know CPR, but she attempted to blow in his mouth, like she had seen TV doctors do. No response. He seemed…dead.
She didn’t know what to do. Call 911? But would she get caught up in some drug and sex scandal? Call a friend? But who? She ran to her bag and pulled out her Filofax. It opened to her date book and she looked down and was horrified to see that she was supposed to have a date with that guy Wesley tonight. At Morton’s. Oh, shit. She looked at her watch. It was 10:13. He was probably there waiting already. For some reason, she became convinced that she had to get in touch with Wesley. He was older, seemed mature, he’d know what to do. She dialed Morton’s and explained to the guy that she had to speak to Wesley Fairbanks. She waited until he came to the phone.
“You have to come here, to meet me,” she said, and Wesley agreed. She rummaged through Dirk’s wallet to find out his exact address on the license, and then told Wesley. She hung up after telling him to rush.
What seemed like an eternity passed, and Helen paced around the room. The dogs were still barking but had calmed down considerably and ultimately went back to their beds. It was odd to see Dirk dead. She was scared to be in the same room with him, so she sat in the bedroom. Suddenly the doorbell rang and the dogs started barking again. Helen went to get it, and Wesley entered. He looked adorable in a tweed blazer and a tie, even. She pointed at Dirk. “My boss…” she said.
Wesley, to his credit, remained completely calm, as if he saw dead people all the time. He checked his pulse and confirmed he was dead. “What do you want to do?” he asked, composed.
“I want to get the hell out of here. I want to have never been here,” she said. She knew she should call the police or an ambulance, but what help could they be? He was dead.
“Okay,” said Wesley, as if leaving the scene of a crime, or a death, were totally normal. “Tell me everything you touched.”
Helen watched as Wesley washed off imaginary fingerprints, cleaned up the walls that Helen might have brushed against, and erased traces of her. Helen was touched by how in control and strong Wesley seemed. He hadn’t asked her any embarrassing questions, like did they have sex or anything—he just went about cleaning up her mess.
“Wow, it seems like you’ve done thi
s before,” said Helen, lamely attempting a joke to break the ice. Wesley looked up at her but didn’t say anything. Then he returned to his cleanup. When they decided they were done, Wesley turned to her.
“You must never tell anyone you were here. For all you know, this never happened,” he ordered, gently but firmly.
“I promise,” Helen said, nodding.
Helen glanced over at Dirk’s dead body with a wave of disgust. He was a jerk. He deserved to die. Just because someone is dead doesn’t mean he was a good person. Good people die, but bad people die too. You can only hope that bad people die earlier than good people.
Wesley got up and put his arms around Helen. “You’ll be okay. I’ve taken care of it,” he said.
She turned and looked at Wesley, who had rescued her. It was that moment that Helen knew she would marry him. He had saved her. This was fate. They should be together.
On Monday, Helen returned to work. When her boss told her that Dirk had been found dead of a drug overdose over the weekend, she channeled Meryl Streep and acted shocked and depressed. She was even able to muster up some tears to cap off her performance. No one suspected a thing.
That was years ago. They’d married, had a daughter and…and, what? Helen couldn’t think of anything else. Wesley had come for her, taken care of things, and she had married him. Classic damsel in distress. She’d thought he would save her forever, but she found herself still in distress. Perhaps he wasn’t her knight in shining armor. And what if the man she was supposed to be with was still out there? What if that person would be the one to make her feel whole?
•• 12 ••
Leelee was anxiously waiting for Brad to get home. Today was an important day, because he was meeting with his boss to ask for the promotion that the boss had been dangling in front of him for weeks. This promotion would mean more money, which could mean a new house. Leelee had already secretly met with a Realtor and looked at a few houses on the sly. She knew Brad would get angry and feel pressed, but she really wanted out of the tiny jewelry box that they called home.
Another thing that would come out of this promotion was the possible return of Brad. With his work pressure, he had become morose and testy, and was completely withdrawn. They had their good moments, but she couldn’t get over her feeling of disappointment with him, and he sensed it. She was obsessed with everything she couldn’t afford, and the fact that she was already in her thirties and her friends were so much better off than she was. She wished it didn’t matter, but it did! Brad had let her down. And now everything was suffering. They had virtually no sex life. At first she wasn’t interested, and then he couldn’t get aroused. She knew it was because he didn’t feel like a man, and she also knew she could do nothing about it. To hell with him. She was the one who was trying to make the most out of their situation. She had done up the house really nicely, had gotten them into the right clubs and made sure their kids went to the right schools and they socialized with the right people. All he had to do was bring home the bacon. But he failed. It would be one thing if he would put on a happy face, but it was getting impossible to live with such a depressed person.
Jack would never do this to her, Leelee thought. She was increasingly comparing her life to his. If she were Jack’s wife, everything would be great. But he had chosen Tierney, a shallow, silly girl who liked to go out every night. Maybe he regretted it. Maybe she really should follow Victoria’s advice and go after Jack. Why not?
Brad walked into the house and put his briefcase in the corner as Leelee leapt up from the sofa where she had been reading Eloise in Moscow to the girls.
“So?” she asked eagerly. She noticed he was wearing his good suit, and the monogrammed gold cuff links that she had given him as a wedding present.
Brad shook his head and went into the kitchen.
“What do you mean?” asked Leelee, the blood draining from her face.
“He said no,” snapped Brad, opening the refrigerator.
“That’s it? Did you ask…”
“He said I need to bring in more clients and all this stuff, just making up excuses.”
“Do you think he wants you out?” said Leelee, a tremor in her voice.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said, interrupting her. He walked over to the stove and lifted the lid on a pot. Seeing that it was soba noodles with tofu and bean sprouts, he scrunched up his nose in disgust and returned the lid.
“Brad,” she began.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he snapped.
“But we have to…”
“No, we don’t. Because it’s just going to be the same: how this affects you, how you can’t have the life you want, et cetera, et cetera. What about me? This is devastating for me.”
Leelee stared at Brad, whose eyes were gleaming. He walked back to the refrigerator and reopened the door as if something new would have sprouted there in the ten seconds between the last time he looked.
“I’m sorry you feel that way, Brad,” she said. “I just want what is best for us and for our girls.”
“Well, it didn’t happen. There’s nothing I can do about it!” he said, slamming the refrigerator door.
She felt like screaming, but instead she calmly went upstairs to their bathroom and closed the door. She got undressed, carefully folding her clothes and placing them on the hamper, took the bath mat off the side of the tub and aligned it on the floor, and got into the shower. As she let the hot water run over her body, she thought about Jack.
It wasn’t hard to love Jack Porter. As charismatic and brilliant as his father, he was even handsomer, and he possessed that insouciant confidence that comes with both privilege and good looks. He was brave but not dangerous, mischievous but not inappropriate. He had exquisite manners and was a comfortable public speaker, and his only fault was that he sometimes came off as a little too suave—not slick, in a cheesy way, but just a little too self-assured and cocky. But that didn’t bother Leelee. Her mother’s constant promotion of the divine Jack Porter coupled with the shiny radiance of the boy himself always made him the most mythical, magnetic, fantastic creature in Leelee’s eyes. There was no question that her heart belonged to him. There had been no question in her mind that they would be together. There was one time in Martha’s Vineyard when it almost happened. It was August, the summer after Leelee’s junior year of high school and Jack’s senior year. She could remember the events as if they were yesterday.
Leelee was in her bedroom getting dressed for a beach party. When a breeze came through the window she knew she’d have to wear something warmer than the usual shapeless white Hanes V-neck T-shirts she favored. Since she’d left all her fall and winter clothes in Brookline, she rummaged through her mother’s drawer to borrow something and could come up with only a tight black ribbed turtleneck sweater that fit very snugly on her ample bust. She was still a little sensitive about her breasts, annoyed that they had recently come in, and that they had come in so large. It hindered her field hockey game, made running a real drag, and also made her the recipient of unwanted older male attention. It really grossed her out when some guy her dad’s age leered at her. In efforts to avoid that, she always put on the baggy T-shirts, but unfortunately tonight she would have no choice.
When she went downstairs Jack was already waiting and talking to her father. Although in essence he was acting only as a designated driver, in Leelee’s mind he was always her date picking her up. He was laughing at something her father said when he turned and watched Leelee enter the room. “Heeey, Swifty,” he said—he always called her Swifty, his pet name for her. (Jack gave everyone nicknames. It was his thing. She, in turn, called him Porty.) But after greeting her warmly, something in his dark eyes changed and he gave her a surprised look.
“What?” asked Leelee, walking over to her dad and Jack.
“Nothing,” said Jack.
“You look nice, sweetie,” said her father. “Where are you kids off to?”
“I’m having a
beach party. Gonna get your little girl all liquored up,” said Jack, slapping Leelee’s dad on the back. Her father laughed and wished them a good night. Only Jack Porter could get away with something like that, thought Leelee.
As soon as she was in the car, Leelee immediately started reprogramming the radio stations. “You cannot listen to these terrible grunge bands, Jack!” scolded Leelee. She adored being maternal with him and was often reprimanding him for this or that. They were their roles: Jack was the naughty child and she was the mother. She thought it was an indication of their closeness that Jack would confess bad things he had done and she would scold him, and she was quite territorial if any other girl tried to assume that role.
After fiddling with the dials on the radio, she suddenly realized that Jack hadn’t pulled out of the driveway and was instead staring at her. She looked up at him.
“What?” she asked. He was giving her a curious look, one she hadn’t seen before, as if he was deciding something, or confused by something.
“You look different,” he finally said.
Leelee immediately blushed, and unfortunately with her fair, freckled skin there was no way to conceal it. “What do you mean?” she asked defensively.
“I’m not sure yet. Did you get your hair cut?” asked Jack.
Leelee brought her hand to her strawberry blond hair and played with the ends. “No.”
Jack squinted his eyes a little as if thinking. “There’s something…I can’t quite pinpoint it.”
For the first time Leelee felt that Jack was actually looking at her as a girl and not as the family best friend that she had been for so many years. She had been waiting for this moment, but she was totally unprepared.
“Well, is it good or bad, Porty?” she finally sputtered.
“Good, good,” he murmured, still looking at her intently. Jack had the ability to eat you up with his eyes. “I’m gonna think of it, Swifty. I’ll let you know,” he said, starting up the car and backing out of the driveway.
When they got to Katama Beach and unloaded the keg by the bonfire that some of Jack’s friends had already started, Leelee made a beeline over to her friend Hilary, who like all of Leelee’s friends knew everything about Leelee’s love and complete devotion to Jack, and all of her plans to marry him. Even though she and Jack had never been romantic, Leelee had staked him out as her own and would have been completely traumatized if any of her friends had ever attempted to make a move on her man. After she told Hilary about the conversation in the car, Hilary looked at Leelee from head to toe.
The Infidelity Pact Page 9