Missing Pieces

by Joy Fielding

  Was there a pattern here? And were we not making love because we were tired and confused, or had we grown tired and confused because we’d stopped making love? Did everything ultimately come down to sex? No matter how old we were?

  Nothing ever really changes, I thought. We are who we were. Our pasts are always with us, our personalities chronic, like a lingering illness. No need to look over our shoulders. The past is right in front of our eyes, setting up roadblocks, blocking the way to a happy future.

  My mind raced back through more than thirty years. Another parked car in the rain. A deserted strip of country road instead of a crowded parking lot. Robert and I in the front seat of his father’s black Buick, his lips on mine, his tongue halfway down my throat, his hands reaching for my breasts. “Let me,” he whispered, and again, more urgently, “Let me.”

  And I might have. I was so close. Why not? I screamed silently at my conscience. Robert was the boy all the girls wanted, and he wanted me. I’d heard the rumors about Sandra Lyons, the girl he sometimes went to see after he drove me home. Was I driving him into her arms? Was I prepared to lose him? All my friends were doing it. What would be so wrong?

  I let his hand sneak higher, held my breath. It felt so good. I was so close. “Let me,” he said again.

  And then that awful knocking on the window. A flashlight shining on our faces, two strangers peering in. We scrambled to fix our clothing, regain our composure. We’d heard all the apocryphal stories of young couples ambushed in lovers’ lanes. By thieves, by killers, by monsters with deadly hooks in place of arms. Was that to be our fate?

  “You all right?” a uniformed police officer asked me as Robert rolled down the car window.

  I nodded, too frightened to speak.

  “Would you like a ride home with us, miss?”

  I shook my head.

  “This isn’t a good spot to be,” the second policeman said to Robert.

  “No, sir,” Robert agreed.

  “I’d get this girl home right now if I were you.”

  “Right away,” Robert said, starting the car engine.

  “Drive carefully,” the officer said, slapping the top of the car with the flat of his hand, sending us on our way.

  “What do you think?” Larry was asking now, his voice snapping me back into the present, as if I were wrapped inside an elastic band.

  “What?”

  “I said, it doesn’t look like it’s going to stop.”

  I stared at the rain beating down on the front window, aware of my heart pounding wildly in my chest. He was right. The rain was coming down as strongly as before. I checked my watch. It was ten minutes after eight.

  “Do you think we should make a run for it?”

  “Let’s give it another few seconds,” I said. What were we doing here anyway? This isn’t a good spot to be. How had I allowed myself to be talked into having dinner with my prospective lover and his wife? Had I had any choice? “Pick a day, any day,” Brandi had chirped over the phone the previous week. What could I say? And when had I started thinking of Robert as my prospective lover?

  Probably around the same time I decided my marriage was unhappy, I told myself, understanding how one such decision necessarily impacts on the next. The last time I’d thought of going too far with Robert, the police had intervened. This time, I doubted there would be any cavalry riding to my rescue.

  Larry restarted the car. “I’m going to drop you off.”

  “We’ll lose our spot.”

  “Maybe we’ll find something closer.”

  We did. Right in front of the restaurant.

  “Tell me again these people’s names,” Larry said as we pushed open Prezzo’s heavy glass doors, shaking the rain from our heads.

  “Robert and Brandi Crowe.” My eyes darted skittishly around the noisy, crowded room.

  “And you knew her from high school.”

  “I knew Aim,” I shouted over the noise, spotting Robert in a corner booth on the other side of the room. He was on his feet, waving. “There they are.”

  We began snaking our way through the crowd in front of the bar, which was normally the focal point of the large, well-lit room, but which tonight was all but hidden by the crush of well-toned, well-tanned bodies milling ten deep around it, vying for one another’s attention. There were a trio of blondes in coordinating tight red dresses, a brunette in an emerald-green sweater, a redhead in a black plunging neckline and white thigh-high boots. The men wore expensive gold jewelry under open-necked silk shirts in a variety of hues, and black trousers, as if they were students at the same exclusive private school. “Do you have a license to carry that smile?” I heard one man ask as I passed by, but I didn’t bother to turn around. I knew he wasn’t talking to me.

  Robert was waiting for us with his hand extended. Behind him was a large red poster of white noodles wrapped lovingly around a fork. “You must be Larry. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Kate speaks very highly of you,” he said, shouting in order to be heard.

  Larry smiled, shook Robert’s hand, shouted back, “I understand you knew each other from high school.”

  “That we did.” Larry and I slid into one side of the booth, upholstered in subtle green and beige stripes, opposite Robert and his wife. “Larry, this is my wife, Brandi.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Larry said.

  “A pleasure,” Brandi agreed, then looked over at me. “That’s quite the deluge out there.”

  For a moment I thought she was referring to the crowd, then I realized she meant the weather, and self-consciously swept my hair free of any possible remaining raindrops. “We’ve been waiting in the car, hoping it would let up.”

  “I think this is an all-nighter,” Brandi said.

  We were actually talking about the weather, I thought, avoiding Robert’s eyes by concentrating on his wife. Yellow Valentino had replaced pink Chanel, although her eyes were still heavy with blue shadow, obviously a personal trademark. Her black hair was brushed away from her face and secured with a beaded black headband. She was trying to look ten years younger than she was, and as a result, looked ten years older. It was sad, I thought, hoping I wasn’t making the same mistake.

  “You’re looking very lovely,” Robert said, as if reading my mind, and I buried my face in the menu, thanking him without looking up. I’d already taken in every detail of his appearance when I first spotted him across the room: the brown slacks, the tan shirt, the hair falling carelessly across his forehead, the wondrous smile. Tell me, do you have a license to carry that smile?

  I realized, in that instant, that I had no idea how my husband was dressed, and glanced guiltily beside me. Larry was wearing an old dark green floral shirt that had always been one of my favorites, but which now seemed rather dull, even a trifle shabby. His thinning hair seemed sparser than usual, and his forehead was red and peeling slightly from too much golf and too little sunscreen. Still, he was a handsome man. I wished that he would look over at me and smile, give me some indication that he was still on my side, that he wouldn’t let me do anything foolish.

  Was my foolishness his responsibility?

  I should have told him how nice he looked before we left the house. Say something nice to your spouse every day, I always advise clients. It’ll change your life. But I was too busy thinking of other ways to change my life.

  “You look very glamorous in black,” Robert continued.

  “Thank you,” I muttered as the waiter approached to take our drink order.

  “That’s quite the scene, isn’t it?” Brandi Crowe pointed with her chin toward the bar. “You should have seen what it was like before you got here. There was this young guy with a little girl. She was about three years old, and I heard him tell these two women that he was her uncle, and of course they were oohing and aahing, and making a huge fuss over her.”

  “The better to show off their qualifications for motherhood,” Robert quipped.

  “And next thing you know, he’s got both women�
��s phone numbers, and they’re taking care of his niece while he supposedly uses the men’s room, but is actually off trysting with bachelorette number three. It was amazing.”

  “It was quite a display,” Robert agreed.

  “The kid’s probably not even his niece.” Brandi laughed. “He probably borrows her from a neighbor to meet girls.”

  “Sounds like something I might have done,” Robert said.

  “I doubt that would have been necessary,” I heard myself say, then bit down hard on my tongue.

  Brandi reached over and patted her husband’s hand, the gesture unleashing the same kind of havoc in my body as the first time I’d seen it several weeks earlier. “Yes, I understand my husband was quite the ladykiller back in his high school days. You have to tell us all about him.”

  “I’m afraid I didn’t know your husband that well,” I lied, doubting that Robert would have said much about our past relationship to his wife.

  “Well, you obviously made quite an impression if he remembered you thirty years later.”

  “I’m the one who remembered him,” I told her.

  “Amazing, running into each other in court like that,” Brandi said.

  “So, what do you think of our boy getting the chair?” Robert asked, deftly switching the subject.

  “I couldn’t be more thrilled,” I said, truthfully.

  “How’s your sister taking it?”

  “As you might expect.”

  “Your sister?” Brandi asked.

  “Jo Lynn Baker,” I said, assuming this was explanation enough.

  It was. “Oh my God,” she whispered, then glared accusingly at her husband. “You didn’t tell me that.”

  The waiter returned with our drinks and a list of the night’s specials, the conversation drifting back to the weather, the sports pages, and the joys of life in southern Florida. I cocked my head, feigned interest in the small talk, probably even contributed to it, but my mind was elsewhere, back in Jo Lynn’s messy one-bedroom apartment, where I’d spent most of the morning listening to her rail hysterically against a justice system that could so heartlessly condemn a man to die for crimes he didn’t commit.

  “How could they do it?” she sobbed repeatedly, yesterday’s mascara streaking her swollen, unwashed face. She’d been crying since the previous afternoon’s sentencing hearing, when the judge had dispatched Colin Friendly off to the Florida State Prison in Starke to await execution without so much as a by-your-leave. “Of course, his lawyers are planning an appeal.”

  I held her while she cried, said little. I wasn’t there to gloat. Colin Friendly had been found guilty and sentenced to die, and my sister, probably the only person in the world who hadn’t been prepared for this eventuality, was in torment. Why she’d put herself in this position, how she could love such a man, why she did any of the crazy things she did, all this was now irrelevant. Out of sight, out of mind, as the saying goes, and my sister’s attention span was limited at the best of times. She would weep for him, maybe even make the trip up to Starke to visit him once or twice, but eventually, Jo Lynn would grow tired of the long drive, the longer wait, the lack of a normal life. Eventually, she’d accept the inevitable, proceed with her life, forget about the man on death row.

  Colin Friendly, I assured myself, tuning back in to the conversation around the restaurant table, was now safely out of our lives.

  “I find the names of the streets so fascinating,” Robert was saying. “Military Trail, Worth Avenue, Gun Club Road.”

  “Prosperity Farms,” I chimed in.

  “Exactly,” Robert said.

  “I don’t think there’s anything particularly fascinating about any of those names,” Brandi Crowe said. “Military Trail was probably just that a long time ago; the same is likely true of Gun Club Road. Worth Avenue was undoubtedly named after somebody important, and has nothing to do with all the expensive stores on it, and this part of Palm Beach was all farmland at one point, and the largest one was probably called …”

  “Prosperity Farms,” Robert concluded with a shake of his head. “You’re right. Nothing very interesting there, I guess.”

  Brandi Crowe slipped her arm around her husband’s shoulder and laughed as my fists formed tight little balls in my lap. “In case you hadn’t realized it, my husband is the last of the romantics.” She laughed again, withdrew her arm. My hands relaxed. “So, what do you think of your wife becoming a big radio star?” she asked Larry.

  “A big radio star?” Larry repeated.

  “You mean she hasn’t told you?”

  “I guess not.” Larry turned to me, waited for an explanation.

  “Well, nothing has been decided yet,” I stammered.

  “I thought you had it all worked out,” Brandi said to her husband.

  “I’ve made your wife an offer,” Robert said to Larry. “I think she’s waiting to see it in writing before she makes any announcements.”

  “What kind of offer?”

  “To host her own phone-in show,” Brandi Crowe explained.

  “My wife is a therapist,” Larry said.

  “Exactly,” Robert told him. “She’d be giving advice.”

  “Like on Frasier?” my husband asked.

  “We haven’t decided on a format,” Robert said.

  “Well, actually, I do have an idea I think is pretty good.” A wide smile stretched across my face for the first time that evening.

  “What’s your idea?” Robert’s smile was almost as big as mine.

  “A weekly two-hour spot which would combine love songs with advice to the lovelorn.” I spoke rapidly, nervous excitement creating a slight wobble in my voice. Until then, I hadn’t realized how excited I was about the idea, how eager I was to throw myself into something new. “Every week, we pick a different topic, choose some appropriate songs, and intersperse the songs with the live phone-ins asking for my advice. The music can be used to illustrate, a point, or underline it, or the song can be the advice itself, like Stand by Your Man or Take This Job and Shove It, depending on what the show’s about. The list of topics is endless—drinking, loneliness, marriage, cheating …” I broke off, coughed into the palm of my hand. “What do you think?”

  Larry shrugged. “It’s different.”

  Brandi smiled. “It’s interesting.”

  “It’s great,” Robert said.

  “When would you have time to do this?” Larry’s voice was a glass of cold water, dampening our enthusiasm.

  “Well, naturally, we’d have to work around Kate’s schedule,” Robert began.

  “You’ve never done anything like this before,” Larry said.

  “That’s the whole point,” I told him. “It would be a challenge.”

  “You don’t think you have enough challenges in your life at the moment?”

  I fell silent. What was the matter with him? Had he always been such a wet blanket?

  “Ideas like this take months to develop,” Robert said. “We’re in the very beginning stages. And we haven’t even started contract negotiations.”

  “Should I be hiring an agent?” I joked. Kidding on the square, as my mother would say.

  “Uh-oh,” Brandi said, and laughed, once again snaking her arm across her husband’s shoulders. “Something tells me you’re going to have your hands full with this one.”

  “Don’t fuck this guy,” Larry said, his voice measured and calm, his anger restrained and simple.

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “You tell me,” Larry said as we climbed into the car. The downpour had ceased, but a light drizzle persisted.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Are you sleeping with him?”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Do I sound as if I’m joking?”

  “You think I’m sleeping with Robert Crowe?”

  “Are you?”

  “No, of cou
rse not. Where is this coming from?”

  “You tell me.”

  “There’s nothing to tell.”

  “This is just some guy you knew from high school,” Larry said.

  “Yes.”

  “Who you just happened to run into one day at the courthouse.”

  “Yes.”

  “And he just happens to own a radio station.”

  “His wife’s father …”

  “And he offers you your very own show. Just like that. Out of the blue,” he continued, not interested in my clarification.

  “More or less,” I conceded.

  “How much more?”

  “What?”

  “Why would he offer you your own show? You have no experience. He hasn’t seen you in thirty years. What’s he really after, Kate?”

  “This is very insulting,” I said, and actually managed to be offended.

  “I’m not an idiot,” Larry said.

  “Then stop acting like one.” My voice was shaking, although whether it was shaking more with indignation or guilt, I’m not altogether sure. Was I really so transparent? And did just thinking about having an affair make me guilty as charged? Maybe I should be on my way to the state prison in Starke along with Colin Friendly.

  Larry started the car and we drove home without speaking. I flipped on the radio, tried to make my mind a blank, to lose myself in the music. “Here’s an old favorite,” I suddenly heard my voice crackle across the airwaves. “Your Cheatin’ Heart by Hank Williams. Callers, the phone lines are now open. Have your questions ready.”

  Chapter 19

  It was around this time that I started having recurring dreams. There were two of them, different in content, though equally disturbing. In the first one, I’m lying facedown on my bedroom floor, my hands tied with a rope behind me, my sister sitting on the small of my back, bouncing up and down, riding me as if I were a pony, as a faceless stranger ransacks my drawers, throwing a seemingly endless supply of bras and panties into the air, letting them fall where they may.