He eyed her for a long searching moment, seeing the sadness still there, and the seriousness, and at the same time something tender, and he reached gently for her hand as he set down his cup. “You've grown up, Serena.”
“I hope so.” She smiled at him. “I'm twenty-seven now.”
“That doesn't matter. Some people never make it.”
“I've had a lot of reason to grow up, Teddy.” She looked toward the other room, to where Vanessa was playing, and then back at him. “So have you.”
He nodded slowly, remembering things he didn't even want to. “Sometimes I didn't think any of us would survive it.” And then he forced a smile. “But we did. And I suppose the experience will be worth something.” And then, seeing all that was in her face, and unable to restrain himself from asking, “You still miss him, don't you?”
She nodded. “Yes, I missed you both.”
“And you only got one of us back.” He looked at her strangely as he said it. He had understood everything he had seen in her face when he first saw her at the gate. “Maybe it never sinks in that someone isn't coming home. I don't know.” He shook his head. “At times I'd wonder for a minute when I'd get a letter from you why there was no news of Brad, and then I'd remember.”
She nodded understanding. “He had only been dead for two months when you left. I don't think either of us had had time to absorb it.” And she knew now more than ever how true that was.
“I know.” He looked at her searchingly. “And now?” He was asking her a serious question and she knew it.
“I think maybe today I finally understood.” She sighed softly. “In a way I've hidden from the truth a lot. All I've done is work and take care of Vanessa.” He knew that from her letters.
“At twenty-seven, that isn't much of a life.” And then, with a gentle smile, “You know, you look different.”
She seemed surprised. “Were you disappointed?” But at this Teddy laughed and shook his head.
“Oh, Serena … haven't you looked in the mirror in the last three years?”
This time she laughed at him. “Too much! That's all I've done.”
“Well, whatever you've done, you're even more beautiful than you were when I left here.”
She squinted at him in amusement. “Has the war perhaps affected your eyesight, Lieutenant?” But they both laughed together.
“No, princess, it hasn't. You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. And I thought that was true when I first met you in New York.”
“Ah.” She waved a disparaging hand at him. “Now it's all fakery and makeup.”
“No.” It was something more. Something difficult to describe. Something in her face, in her eyes, in her soul. It was maturity and gentleness, wisdom and suffering, and all of the love that she had lavished on Vanessa. It was something more that she had become in addition to her physical beauty. It was something that made one want to stare at her, something one sensed as well as saw. He looked at her then and asked her a question. “Serena, are you serious about modeling?” He had never given it a thought in all the years in Korea. He just assumed that it was something she did to pay the rent. But now that he saw her, the way her bones had begun to stand out, the way she looked, the way she did her hair and her face, the way she moved now, he knew that if she wanted to she could have a tremendous career. It was the first time the thought struck him, as they sat on the couch. But Serena only shrugged.
“I don't know, Teddy. I don't really think so.” She smiled and looked like a very young girl again. “Why would I want to do that? Except maybe to pay the rent.” That was still a month-to-month struggle for her. Even now.
“Because you're so beautiful, and you could make a lot of money.” He looked pointedly at her. “And since you won't take anything from me, it might be a thought. Have you thought at all about going to New York to model?” She had said nothing about it in her letters, but now he wondered, and he began to like the idea more and more, not for entirely unselfish reasons.
“I don't know. The thought of New York scares me.” She looked worried. “I might not be able to find work in New York.” And yet it was an appealing prospect and maybe a way to make more money than she had in the last three years.
“Are you kidding, Serena?” He took her by the hand and walked her to the mirror. “Look at that, love.” She looked embarrassed and she blushed as she glanced at herself and the handsome blond man standing behind her. “That face would find work as a model anywhere in the world. Principessa Serena … The Princess …”As they stared at her together he suddenly realized that something magical was happening, as though they were seeing each other for the first time.
“Teddy, no … come on.…” She pulled from the mirror, embarrassed, and he turned her slowly to face him, and kissed her, and when he did, he was suddenly overwhelmed with desire for this woman he had secretly loved for seven years. But just as he was about. to touch the beautiful body, he felt her stiffen in his arms, and he made himself stop.
“Serena … I'm sorry …”He looked suddenly deathly pale, and he could feel his whole body tremble. “It's been a long time … and—” He faltered, and she took his face gently in her hands, her eyes filled with tears.
“Stop it, Teddy. You have nothing to be sorry about. I knew this was coming. We both did. We've been pouring our souls out to each other for three years.” And then she dropped her hands from his face, hugged him close, and nestled her face in his shoulder. “I love you as a brother, Teddy. I always have. I was wrong in thinking that there could be something more. For the last year I'd begun to wonder, without really admitting it to myself, but I was hoping that you could come home and”—she choked on her tears —”replace … him.” She felt guilty even saying it, and she pulled away from Teddy at last. “It's not fair to expect that of you. It's just not the same thing. It's funny.” She smiled through her tears. “You're so much like him, but you're you. And I love you, but I love you as a sister, not as a woman, or a lover, or a wife.” They were cruel words and they hit him like rocks. But they were words he needed to hear. He had deluded himself for too many years.
She was watching him closely and he took a deep breath and looked at her with gentle eyes. “It's all right, Serena. I understand.”
“Do you?” She was quiet and firm and more beautiful than he had ever seen her, as she stood before him in her narrow silk dress. “Do you hate me for not being able to give you more?”
“I could never hate you. I love you too much. And I respect you too much.”
“For what?” Her eyes were empty and sad. “What have I done to deserve that?”
“You've survived!—under rotten circumstances, thanks to my mother—you're a terrific mother to Vanessa, you've knocked yourself out working and supporting her. You're an amazing woman, Serena.”
“I don't feel amazing.” She gazed at him with enormous eyes. “I feel sad. Sad at what I can't be to you.”
“So do I. But maybe it's better this way.” He hugged her again, praying that his desire for her wouldn't betray him. He pulled away again after a minute. “Just promise me one thing, when you fall in love again one day, and you will, make sure he's a terrific
guy.”
“Teddy!” She laughed and the agony of the past half hour began to lighten a little. “What a thing to say!”
“I mean it.” And he looked as though he did. “You deserve the best there is. And you need a man in your life.” He knew from what she had told him in her letters of her celibate life just how long it had been.
“I don't need a man.” She was smiling now.
“Why not?”
“Because I have the best brother in the world.” She slipped an arm around his waist and kissed his cheek. “You.” And as he felt her next to him he felt his whole body tingle, but they had come a long way from the past in a few hours and now he knew where he stood.
33
The next day Serena had to go to work, and instead of leaving Vanessa with the
sitter, she left her with Teddy, and after lunch they came to visit her at work. They found her on the second floor, in a magnificent lilac taffeta ballgown, and as they got off the elevator Teddy saw her, and he stopped for a moment just to watch her, as he caught his breath. What a magnificent woman she had become in his absence. She had grown into her full promise and more. Even Vanessa seemed to sense something remarkable in her mother and she looked at her with awe. Serena looked like someone in a priceless painting as she swept into a chair and held out her arms in opera-length white kid gloves.
“Hi, sweetheart. Oh, you look so pretty!” Teddy had dressed her in a blue organdy dress and black patent-leather shoes with white knee socks and a blue satin ribbon in her silky blond hair. And then Serena's eyes found Teddy. “Hello.” She smiled. “How are you managing?” “I'm loving it.” And then as Vanessa wandered away for a moment, his eyes held her close to him for just a fraction of a second, and then the brotherly look came back to his eyes. “What are you and Vanessa doing this afternoon?” “Going out for ice cream. I told her I'd take her to the zoo tomorrow.” “Don't you want some time for yourself?” She looked troubled. What would they do when he was gone? But perhaps he would come out and visit. They had talked about it this morning over breakfast, but everything but the present seemed very remote. “I'll be home at five thirty. I'll take over then.”
He chuckled softly. “Seeing you in that outfit, I can't imagine you doing anything except maybe going to the opera.”
“Not exactly, love.” She grinned at him. “I have to do the laundry tonight. This is all make-believe.”
“You could have fooled me.” He laughed softly, still somewhat in awe of her looks. And as he gazed at her Vanessa came scampering back to show her the lollipop one of the saleswomen had given her.
“And now we're going out for ice cream!” She looked happily at Teddy.
“I know all about it. Have a good time, you two.” It was an odd feeling, watching them leave hand in hand. She always felt so terribly responsible for Vanessa, as though there were no one who could ever take her place, but as she watched the child with her uncle, she suddenly felt as though she could relax. If something had happened to her at that very moment, Vanessa would have been safe and well cared for. Just knowing that took a thousand-pound weight off her back.
That night the three of them cooked spaghetti, and Teddy read Vanessa stories in bed, while Serena cleaned up. She wore slacks and a black turtleneck sweater, her hair wound high on her head, and she looked very different from the magical creature who had worn the lilac taffeta ballgown only that afternoon, as Teddy mentioned with a grin when she came in and told them that it was time to turn off the lights.
“You know, I was serious last night when I asked you about your modeling.” He looked at her intently as she finished up in the kitchen and he munched a handful of grapes. “You have the makings of a great model, Serena. I don't know a damn thing about the business, but I know what you look like, and there's nothing like it in this country. I bought some magazines when I was out with Vanessa today.” He pulled them out of a bag on one of the kitchen chairs and showed her, flipping through them. “Look at that … baby, there's no one like you.”
“Maybe they like it like that.” She refused to take him seriously. “Look, Teddy.” She looked almost amused at his faith in her. “I got lucky, I got a job here at the store, they use me a lot because they need me and I look all right in their clothes. But this is a small town, this is not like New York, or where there's a lot of competition. If I went to New York, they'd probably laugh in my face.”
“Do you want to try it?” He looked intrigued at the idea, and Serena shrugged.
“I don't know. I have to think about it.” But her eyes had begun to light up, and men she looked at Teddy seriously for a moment. “I don't want you to pay my way to New York though.”
“Why not?”
“I don't take charity.”
“How about justice?” He looked annoyed. “I'm living off your money, you know.”
“How do you figure that?”
“If my brother had had enough sense to make a will, you'd have got his money and none of this would even be an issue. Instead, thanks to my charming mother, it reverted to his brothers. I got half of Brad's money, Serena, and in truth it belongs to you.”
She shook her head firmly. “If it belongs to anyone, then maybe Vanessa.” Her eyes lifted to his. “So when you make a will, perhaps one day …”She hated to say the words, but he nodded.
“I did that before I went to Korea, because you were so damn stubborn you didn't take anything from me.”
“I'm not your responsibility, Teddy.”
He looked at her soberly. “I wish to hell you were.” But she didn't answer. There was no question of that. She would never have accepted anything from him.
She was independent now, and intent on taking care of herself and her own. “Why don't you ever let me help you?”
Her eyes were serious as she answered. “Because I have to take care of myself and Vanessa, there's no one else who's going to be there for us all the time, Teddy. You have your own life. You don't owe us anything. Nothing. The only person I ever counted on was Brad, and now that's over, he's gone.”
“And you don't think that anyone will ever take his place?” It hurt him to ask her the question, especially after what had happened between them the night before.
“I don't know.” And then she sighed softly. “But I do know one thing, and that is that no matter how much I may love you or need you, Teddy, I will never let myself be dependent on you.”
“But why? Brad would have wanted you to.”
“He knew me better than that, scrubbing floors in my parents' palazzo. Besides, I made a deal with your mother.”
Teddy's eyes were instantly angry. “A deal that cost her nothing and has cost you three years of hard work.”
“I don't mind that. It's been for Vanessa.”
“And what about you? Don't you have a right to more than that?”
“If I want more, I'll get it for myself.”
He sighed then. “You don't suppose you'll ever get smart and marry me, will you?”
“No.” She smiled gently at him. “Besides, I tore one Fullerton away from his family”—her eyes clouded as she said it—”I couldn't do that to you too.” And it was unlikely that Margaret Fullerton would ever let her. She'd see Serena dead first. And Serena knew it.
“You know, what my mother has done to you makes me sick, Serena.” His face was sad and serious as he spoke to her.
“It doesn't matter anymore.”
“Yes, it does, who are you kidding? And one day it could matter a lot to Vanessa.”
Neither of them spoke for a long moment. And then Serena looked at him with worried eyes. “If I go to New York, do you think she'll come after me?”
“What do you mean?” He looked shocked.
“I'm not sure. Drive me away somehow, hurt my career if she can … do you think she would?”
He wanted to say no, but as he thought of it he wasn't certain.
“I wouldn't let that happen.”
“You have your own life, and God only knows how she'd do it.”
“She's not that powerful, for chrissake.”
“Isn't she?” Serena looked at him pointedly, knowing full well just how vengeful his mother was.
And softly Teddy whispered. “I wish to hell she weren't.” But she was. They both knew she was.
34
“You'll write to me?” Her eyes were bright with tears, but she was smiling, and he kissed her for a last time.
“Better than that, I'll call you. And I'll come out to visit you both as soon as I can get away.”
Serena nodded, and Teddy reached out once more to Vanessa. “Take care of your mommy for me, princess.”
“I will, Uncle Teddy.” And then with a sad little wail, “Why can't we come too?” His eyes instantly sought Serena's, and she felt
as though there were lead weights in her heart. For Vanessa it was like losing the past all over again. And more than that, Teddy had once again become an important part of her present.
They kissed him one last time, and a moment later he boarded the plane, and Serena and Vanessa stood at the airport, waving at the plane as it took off down the runway and then, hand in hand, they went home, feeling as though a part of their souls had left them.
He called them from New York a few days later, and reported that all was well. He was starting work at the hospital in a few days. He was going to be working with one of the country's leading surgeons, polishing up what he had learned in Korea. He mentioned in passing that he had contacted the wife of an old friend, because she worked in a modeling agency. He had hand-delivered Serena's photographs the previous morning, and he'd let her know what the response was as soon as he heard himself. But after the phone call Serena felt an ever greater void than she had before she spoke to him. It was almost a physical ache as she thought of how far away he was and how long it might be before she saw him again. And aside from Vanessa he was the only family she had.
But four days later he called her. He was laughing and excited and almost stammering into the phone as she tried to sift out what had happened. He sounded as though he had won the Irish Sweepstakes.
“They want you! They want you!”
“Who wants me?” She was still confused as she stared at the phone.
“The agency! Where I took your pictures!”
Remembrance Page 30