“Call a friend. And if you need me or have any more questions, call me.”
Annie walked in a daze, wanting to talk to someone, not knowing what to say. If only John were home. She needed him now more than ever, but he wasn’t due back until tomorrow night. He would make it home just in time for the Bridgeses’ big Fourth of July party. How could he not leave his phone number? What kind of a marriage was that?
She drove home on automatic pilot, staring straight ahead and following the roads, unaware of traffic. She took the turns slowly, staying close to the curb. When she arrived in her own driveway, she applied the brake and remained in the car, unsure of what to do next. There was no one in the big house. She didn’t know where to go. She’d never felt so alone and unsure.
She heard again and again the words malignant and cancer like explosions in her head. Slumping forward over the steering wheel, she put her hands over her ears and rocked. But the word echoed relentlessly inside her—cancer, cancer, cancer—a loathsome word that spread fear and shock throughout her body. Looking at her belly, she imagined thousands of the evil, horrid plague-cells multiplying inside of her. She swiped and rubbed with desperation at her midriff. All she could think was how she wanted to rip them out of her.
Get out! Get out! I’m not ready. I’m not ready, she cried to herself. Rocking was the only thing that soothed her—back and forth, back and forth.
* * *
Midge worked with Susan at the gallery until the last minute. Robert, the gallery director, chased them off at two to rest and get dressed. Even as they left, they looked over their shoulders at their paintings with concern. When she stepped inside her loft, the midafternoon sunshine was pouring in through her large windows like molten lava. The stifling air was choking and made each groggy step an effort. She barely managed to open a window, strip down and hit the bed before dozing quickly off. She was awakened some time later by the persistent ringing of the phone by her bed.
“You were asleep, weren’t you?” It was Susan.
Midge blinked sleepily and stretched to see the clock. It was four o’clock already! She had to be at the gallery in an hour. “Thank God you called,” she mumbled.
There was a husky chuckle. “I thought I’d better check. I slept through an opening once and I wouldn’t wish that on you.”
Midge was groggy, scratching her head. “Thanks Susan,” she said, yawning loudly. “I owe you. See you at five.” After hanging up she pushed aside her sweaty blanket and rose to the window, opening it wider to allow the refreshing air to flow over her body, cooling it. Music was coming from a neighbor’s window. Midge closed her eyes, allowing the sweetness of the opera to slowly waken her sleep-soaked thoughts. She felt drugged, still half caught in the dream that had slipped from her memory on waking. It was odd that she woke to Susan’s voice. She had the strange feeling that her dream was about her, if only she could remember. It was an erotic dream. A visit from Incubus. Her nipples tingled and there was a telltale ache in her groin. It was one of those dreams that left her feeling a strange longing for hours after waking.
She leaned her head against the window frame and felt a sigh ripple through her as she struggled with the sexual attraction she felt for Susan—the first time she’d felt such a feeling for a woman in many years.
The last time was long ago, back when she was in college. Dear Rachel. They were the closest of friends, shared everything openly and freely. Yet still, Midge had felt something was missing. They’d hugged often and held hands once or twice, but their relationship was never sexual. Their intimacy was more heartfelt than physical. After graduation they’d parted among tears and vows to write always. For years they did. They still exchanged Christmas cards and Midge knew if Rachel ever walked through the door they’d hug and pick up right where they’d left off.
In graduate school, Midge began a relationship with Tim, a jazz musician. They were friends first, lovers later. They married during the draft push of the Vietnam War. After two years the war ended and he left her for fame and fortune and a kissy-lip singer in California. After the divorce, Midge just shut down. She had a few affairs over the years, all of them with men, but none of them were fulfilling or based on anything but random sexual need. After a while, either they stopped asking or she stopped looking. A long void began and she developed a cold apathy, as though her body had died and sex of any kind was just not interesting to her.
Throughout the years, Midge’s closest, most meaningful relationships had always been with women. She liked women, preferred spending time with them than with men. Yet though she’d been blessed with several deep friendships, it was her nature to remain a loner. It had been almost a decade since she’d had an intimate relationship of any kind.
Yet today, in the gallery, she’d felt a bond with Susan. Her determined warmth seeped through the cold shroud Midge wore around her heart like the spring sun that melts the blanket of snow. Once again, Midge felt there was something missing in her life. Seeing her friend, Eve, moving on with her life again, sharing intimacy again, she suddenly realized how stagnant her own life was. Watching the way Paul Hammond’s large hands had wrapped around Eve’s small shoulder in a tender, loving manner, she was suddenly hungry for the feel of arms around her once again.
Why not me, she anguished?
She went to the shower and stood with her palms flat against the tile as the hot water beat down upon her back. Gradually her muscles loosened as her worries, anguish and memories of the dream rolled from her body and swirled down the drain. She dressed slowly, gathering her wits and mentally girding herself for the evening ahead. She was done with the nagging worries about whether anyone would like her paintings. Now she began a distancing between herself and her work.
She thought of her friends and the image of their smiles filled the void in her heart. As her long fingers worked their way up the wide silk buttons of her blouse she wondered if Eve, Annie and Doris would joke or rave about her work? Though they were close, they never came by to see her paintings and Midge didn’t expect them to. She didn’t stop by to visit their children, either, except Gabriella’s. They were closer friends, a unit within the unit. Like Eve and Annie, or the way Eve and Doris used to be. Clasping a large, handcrafted silver pendant around her neck, she thought of Gabriella and a smile escaped her as she wondered if Gabby would rush up to hug her in her sweet-smelling embrace? Closing her purse and shutting out the lights, she smiled, grateful that she had the Book Club in her life. They were her touchstones.
* * *
Eve stepped from the hot, scented waters of her tub where she’d just soaked with cool cucumber slices on her eyes for the past blissful thirty minutes. She’d read that cucumbers brought down the puffiness and redness from the eyes. In the past week she’d taken to reading Bronte’s teen magazines with all their beauty tips and lover’s advice. For that’s what she felt like—a teenager again. A young girl dressing up for a date. And oh, it was so much fun! She felt a rosy glow all over just anticipating Paul’s powerful arms around her again. Tom had been a wonderful lover, innovative and playful. Paul’s lovemaking was different, more intense and demanding, like him. She giggled again, realizing it was true what she’d heard all those years about different lovers.
She was humming some love song, enjoying the early evening breeze on her skin, swirling with and laying out her clothes, when Finney and Bronte entered her room. She smiled when she looked up, her heart overflowing with a warm happiness. But one look at their faces chilled the air. They approached with all the grim, solemn determination of a storm front. Eve tightened the sash of her terry robe and stood ready to clash wills.
“Hi, there. Do you two want something?” she asked, forcing cheer into her voice.
“We want to talk to you.” Bronte spoke without inflection.
“What about?” In her heart Eve cringed, knowing what was coming. She glanced at Finney who slouched b
eside Bronte. His head was ducked and he was pinching his arm once again, something she hadn’t seen him do in months. She bent her head inquisitively, searching his face for clues. Her inner alarms were ringing.
“You’re going out with that man again, aren’t you?” Bronte asked.
“If you mean Dr. Hammond, the answer is yes. You know that. I’m not making any secret of it.”
“How could you!” she blurted out, red-faced with her fists balled at her thighs.
Bronte’s outbursts were always dramatic. She had had tantrums as a child and Eve was prepared for the worst. She drew herself up with indignation and put her hands on her hips.
“How could I what? Go out with a man?”
“Yes!” Bronte shouted back, as though this admission were a confirmation of guilt.
“There’s nothing wrong with that.” She almost said I’m not married but couldn’t. Not to her children.
“Yes, there is! You shouldn’t go out with him. With anyone! It’s not right. Daddy’s only been dead for a year. It’s...it’s disgusting to think you’re with someone else already. What’s the matter? Didn’t you love Dad?”
“Of course I loved him!” Eve cried out, stricken. Not love him? The sense of injustice heaped on her by this fourteen-year-old filled her with rage. “How dare you ask me that?”
“Then how can you go out with someone else?” Tears sprang to her eyes, instantly dousing Eve’s hot fury. “It makes me sick,” she lashed out. “And Finney, too.”
Eve, struck dumb with hurt and shock, looked at Finney for confirmation. He nodded, all humped over as if he were trying to make himself very small. While she stared at him he looked sheepishly back and forth from the floor to her. When his eyes filled with tears, Eve’s own heart was near to breaking. Her boy had seemed so much better over the summer. He’d laughed again, gone out with friends, played sports. He was gradually coming out of his shell and it killed her to see him retreat into it again. She was furious at Bronte for dragging him into this battle.
“Do you feel it’s wrong, Finney?” Her voice was a cracked whisper.
He nodded. “Please don’t do it, Mom...you’re still kinda married to Dad. I mean, to us you are. If you go out, I dunno. It’s not right.” He sniffed, then said, his voice full of reproach, “Don’t you miss him?”
Tears sprang to her eyes as it hit her full force how much Finney missed his father. She turned to face Bronte, who stood with the same hurt and mutinous expression she’d worn when she was a two-year-old standing at her knee feeling betrayed and bereft watching the invader, Finney, nursing at her breast. Eve realized with a softening that Bronte was feeling lost and abandoned again.
“Daddy wouldn’t be going out if it was you who died,” Bronte added.
Eve reeled with guilt. She’d been so preoccupied with the newness of dating and falling in love again and all her renewed physical experiences that she didn’t see how uprooting it was for her children to observe. She’d never meant to hurt them.
She opened her arms to them, but this time they did not come to her. That final blow broke her.
“Of course I miss him,” she said, dropping her empty arms to her side. “So very much. But he’s gone, and I’m lonely.” For the first time since Tom died, despite all her resolutions, Eve began to cry in front of her children. She couldn’t help herself, the tears just spilled over. Suddenly she felt Bronte’s long arms around her shoulders, then Finney’s thin ones around her waist, shuddering. Their arms encircled each other and they wept together. The memories of their father and a different time were pouring through them, uniting them. Their tears washed away all the earlier bitterness and recrimination, leaving space in their hearts for love and forgiveness.
* * *
An hour later, an exhausted Eve picked up the phone and ordered for pizza delivery. Then, taking a minute to cross the room and close the bedroom door, she dialed Paul’s number. When he answered he sounded very upbeat and delighted to hear from her.
“Paul, I’m sorry. I won’t be able to go out tonight.”
There was a pause. “Is everything all right? The children?”
“Yes. No, everything is not all right.” She caught her breath, holding back a sob.
“Eve, what’s the matter? Tell me. Do you want me to come over?”
“No, please don’t,” she replied quickly, choking on the words. “This is all so hard to explain. Paul,” she said again, determined, “I can’t see you tonight. Or any other night. The children aren’t ready—I’m not ready—to start seeing anyone. I shouldn’t have...” She almost said slept with you but the words died in her throat. Still, she thought he understood because he spoke again in a somber voice.
“I didn’t want to rush you, Eve. I’m sorry. I didn’t think you had regrets.”
“I don’t. But it can’t happen again. I can’t see you, at least not for a while. Please, Paul, try to understand. My children need more time. They see my dating as a betrayal.”
She heard a grumble over the line and knew his temper well enough to realize he was holding back a torrent of words. No doubt arguments that she’d made herself: he was not a rival, her husband was dead, her children had no right to make such demands. She had to go with her heart, however, and her heart belonged to her children. She stood her ground, unafraid to face his fury.
“Will you go to your friend’s show tonight?” A simple question, though his voice was measured.
“No. I...I don’t think so,” she said, bringing her hand to her cheek, nonplused. She and Paul had planned to go to Midge’s opening together, but in the heat of the emotions tonight, she’d forgotten about it. “The children are too upset. I need to stay with them.”
“May I still meet you for lunch?”
“I think not. It would be too hard.”
“Ah, I see.” He paused and she could hear ragged breathing. Her decision was coming hard on him, as it was on herself. She could imagine him raking his hands through his unruly thatch of gray hair. “Well, then...” He paused. “Take all the time you need,” he said with compassion. Then with sadness ringing through his self-deprecating humor he said, “I’ll have to be content to be like our friend Paolo. Whirling in my black inferno, just knowing you are near...my dear Francesca.”
Eve bent her head and laid the receiver beside her cheek, knowing she would be whirling in hell right beside him.
* * *
The crowd of guests at the gallery was sparse but constant. The well-heeled, those with money to buy and no personal connections to the artists, were few. They walked into the gallery dressed in suits and casual clothes, probably straight from work. There wasn’t much exchange; they paced through the show making comments in low voices, then left after a quick tour. Friends and family of the artists, however, were in a celebratory mood, drinking wine, laughing, lavishing compliments and staying longer. Most of the other artists were joining in, relieved that the push was over. Midge’s style was more cool. She never kissed or touched or hugged strangers but she warmly greeted with a handshake those acquaintances, fellow artists, and clients who stopped by.
Edith waltzed in with a coterie of friends near six o’clock, flushed from a full dinner served with ample bottles of wine. She was wearing a coral suit with large chunks of lapis at the neck and ears. With her hair dyed a new tawny brown, she looked to Midge like a brightly plumed bird chirping loudly among a flock of solemn black crows. Midge only laughed and caught Susan’s eye when she heard her mother’s voice croon above the noisy crowd, “Look over there, girls! Those are my daughter’s pictures!”
Edith preened in front of her friends and it did Midge’s heart good to see her mother actually proud of something she’d done. “So, where are the girls?” she asked, looking around the room. Midge knew she was referring to the Book Club. Feeling a stab of disappointment, she mere
ly shrugged and turned her head. Nothing escaped her mother’s birdlike gaze, however. Edith pursed her lips and muttered a short, “uh-huh.” For the next hour Edith lavished praise on her artwork, using words like pretty and cute, doing her best to compliment her daughter even though she didn’t have the vocabulary.
“It’s all right, Mother,” Midge said kindly. “You don’t have to like it. Abstract art isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.”
“But I do like it! Especially that one. I don’t know why, exactly, but it’s sexy.” She sauntered over in front of the five-foot canvas. “I see a woman lying on her back. See the way the pink goes up and down in two humps? Those are the knees. And there? Those round orbs are the breasts,” she said, moving closer and stretching her hand up to move it in circles near the top of the painting. “And those dark areas are the nipples...and see those long lines up there? Those are the arms lying over her head. A woman does that when she’s sated, you know. Or when she’s just lying there, expectant, waiting for something. It’s very womanly. Beautiful. Sensual. What’s it called?”
Midge listened to her mother with an open mouth. In simple language, she’d described the painting perfectly. Edith never failed to amaze her.
“Ample Knees,” she replied.
Her mother tapped her lips with her fingertip and tilted her head, squinting. “Yes, yes, exactly!”
“Thank you, Mother,” Midge said sincerely, turning to face her.
Edith looked up, startled. “Whatever for, dear?”
“For caring. For coming. I’m glad you’re here.” She meant for more than just the show and her mother knew it.
Edith’s eyes misted. Then taking a deep breath, she cast a slow, assessing gaze up and down over her daughter.
Midge involuntarily stood straighter under the power of the look. She was wearing a new long, black silk skirt and a creamy silk blouse that complemented her tall, slender frame. Her scarlet shawl was a find from her favorite vintage shop. In pristine condition, the satin was intricately embroidered and shone with a soft patina, setting off her salt-and-pepper hair that was swept up tonight into a loose coil. Makeup was still an anathema, but she did wear silver at the neck and ears.
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