"Well, I don't," said Quentin. "I'm just winging it."
"So am I."
"The blind will lead the blind."
"Until we fall into a pit."
They laughed. He kissed her. She went home to get some clothing. Later, at lunch, they laughed about it all over again. "That's going to be such a great story to never tell our kids," said Quentin.
She rolled her eyes. "Of course we'll tell our kids. Just not in front of each other, that's all."
"Do parents tell kids things like this?"
"This is the nineties, Quentin," she said. "Isn't it?"
"Next time I fly to the coast, Mad, come with me."
"I'm unemployed and homeless. I think I can fit a trip to the coast into my schedule."
"I want you to meet my parents."
"Won't they hate the girl who's going to take away their little boy?"
"Are you kidding? They'll kiss the ground you walk on. They gave up hope of having grandchildren years ago. And the bonus is, with any luck the kids will look like you."
"I'd love to meet your parents," she said.
"And when do I make the trek to the Hudson River Valley to meet your folks?"
Her face darkened and she looked away. "My family isn't like yours, Quentin. I think I want us to be married before I take you home."
"Are you kidding?"
She shook her head. "Let's not talk about it, OK? Not today."
"You don't want me to meet your family and you don't want to talk about it?"
"Just picture me naked in that stupid coat and it will take your mind right off my family."
"Not true. It just makes me imagine your father holding a shotgun."
She giggled. "My father holding a shotgun. Now there's a picture. He'd never touch a weapon."
"A pacifist?"
"No, a klutz. He'd shoot off his own leg." She laughed again, but in a moment that dark, distant look was back on her face. It wasn't until Quentin moved the conversation far away from parents and families that the mood cleared and she was happy again.
5. Bliss
Was it possible that his parents liked Madeleine too much? Quentin expected them to be delighted that he had a fiancée at all and that he had brought her home to meet them, and he expected her to charm them because she was, after all, charming. But within hours they seemed to have lost all sense of proportion. Everything she said, they laughed or oohed or tsk-tsked or whatever the appropriate response was. Their attention toward her never flagged. They offered her drinks, food, their own bed—it was way beyond hospitality.
They were obsequious. It was as if they were servants and Madeleine was the mistress of the house. It embarrassed him, but he couldn't seem to get either of his parents alone to tell them to lay off a little; nor could he seem to find a moment alone with Mad to explain that they didn't always act like this, that they must be compensating for all those years that they had given up on the idea of his marrying.
Poor Mad must be going crazy with them fawning on her all the time, but she was a trouper, she didn't show a sign of irritation. Just acted as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
Quentin tried to take her out to dinner.
"The four of us?" asked Mad.
"Nonsense," said Dad. "The two of you just go."
"The lovebirds need some time for tête-à-tête," said Mom, smiling.
"But you must come," said Mad. "How often will we be together like this? We have to make memories together."
"And I'll bet the crockpot chicken I was making will be just as good tomorrow," said Mom.
"Oh, that's right, Tin," said Madeleine. "I forgot that I helped her pound the chicken this morning."
"But it doesn't matter, if Quen wants to take you out."
"I wouldn't dream of missing out on the chance to taste your crockpot chicken when it's just so."
Quentin wanted to scream. It wasn't just his parents gushing over her, she was also gushing over them. If everybody would just stop trying so hard, maybe they could have a civilized visit. But that apparently wasn't going to happen without some kind of intervention.
"Listen," said Quentin, "I don't really care if we eat in or out. I don't care if we have chicken or Big Macs. I brought my fiancée here to meet my parents. And the way it looks right now, we're going to leave here without ever having done that."
They all looked at him as if he were insane.
"Quen," said Dad, "here we are. There she is. We've met."
"That's my point. My parents have a personality. They have habits and customs. They have a life. I wanted to bring Madeleine into the life. So she could see who you are, the family we are together. But you two are being so completely, insanely accommodating that—it's like your own personalities have been completely erased."
Tears filled Mom's eyes. "We've just tried to be nice."
Madeleine looked desperately embarrassed. "Tin, I thought it was all going really well."
"We only want you two to be happy," said Dad. He put his arm around Mom.
"Look, I'm sorry, I didn't want to make a scene," said Quentin. "Tell you what, you three stay here and have the crockpot chicken and tell each other how perfect it is and then spend the rest of the night insisting that the other person choose what TV show to watch or game to play. I'm going to the movies."
He turned and headed for the front door. He had his hand on the knob when he heard something that stopped him cold.
Laughter. Warm, throaty laughter. Lizzy's laugh.
He caught his breath. He turned. It was Madeleine. But now the laughter had changed. Still low, still warm, but no longer Lizzy's voice. Mad didn't look at him.
"Well, shucks," said Mad, speaking to no one in particular. "Maybe there is such a thing as getting along too well." She looked at Dad and winked. "Let's have a fight, Mr. Fears. It'll make Tin feel so much better."
Dad smiled and nodded. "Well, maybe not a fight. Maybe just a tiff."
"I know we're all joking and we're embarrassed and all," said Mom, "but there is just the one thing, just the tiniest thing—I know you have a right to call him by whatever pet nickname you want, but... calling him 'Tin'..."
Mad put her hand to her mouth. "Oh, I should have known. I should have realized."
"How could you have known that our Lizzy called him..."
"But he did tell me that," said Mad. "It just never crossed my mind, after all these years, that it would—but of course, it was this very house where she—it did seem all right with Tin—with Quentin—and so I just—please forgive me."
"No, no," said Mom. "Now I feel just awful for mentioning it. Because it is all right. I just—I just thought that—"
"Acknowledging her," said Dad. "That's all that was needed, maybe. To acknowledge her. That she called him that. And then it's OK."
"Yes," said Mom. "You can call him that, really. It won't bother me now, because I've, because I've spoken of her."
"But you should have spoken of it before," said Mad. "Two days I've been driving you bonkers with—"
"No, no, nothing like that," said Mom, "I just—every time you said it, you called him that, I wanted to speak, to say, 'That's what Lizzy called him,' and it wasn't even going to be a complaint, just a comment, just to say, I don't know, that she still has a place in our home, in our memories. But when I thought of saying it, I just, it just felt like something clamped down inside me and I couldn't speak."
"Well," said Dad, "you're speaking now."
"See?" said Mom. "Quentin was right to just bring things out in the open. We were being on our best behavior a bit too much, weren't we? Why, I'm—I'm almost exhausted with politeness. And yet I really do like you, Madeleine, dear. I just wanted so much to make a good impression, I suppose."
"The main thing," said Dad, "is this: Dinner in or dinner out?"
It was dinner in and now, at last, it was as if his parents had come out of hiding. There was chatter and banter and some catty gossip about neighbors and othe
r church members, and the laughter was genuine and Mad actually got to see what life in his home was like.
And when, about ten that night, he suggested that he and Mad might take a walk around the old neighborhood, Dad yawned and said, "About time we got rid of you for a few minutes, you two. Let these old bones go to bed." And that was that. Mad and Quentin would be alone together.
They held hands walking from streetlight to streetlight. "They used to just be mounted to the telephone poles," said Quentin. "Then when they were building the expressway over the old creekbed behind the house, they buried all the phone lines and put up these aluminum poles. Shame, too. Because Lizzy and I had scratched graffiti into all the old poles. Like marking our territory. No good trying to mark anything on these things." He slapped the pole and it rang metallically.
"It's her shadow in the house that made everything so tense, wasn't it?" said Madeleine.
"Not her shadow. Her memory isn't a shadow," said Quentin.
"Losing her was a shadow," said Mad. "That's what I meant."
"I don't think it had to do with her," said Quentin. "My parents—I've just never seen them act like that. Like complete strangers."
"I wouldn't know," said Madeleine. "I've never known a normal family."
"What, your parents have eight legs each?"
"Life in the Family Arachnid," she said, laughing. "No, my parents were fine. But... well, to be honest, they acted like your parents were acting, all the time. When I actually saw them, of course. Just always sort of—what—on, I guess."
"On what? Cocaine?"
"More like on stage." She jabbed him. "They weren't that hyper."
"I didn't mean to make a scene like that," said Quentin. "But I couldn't seem to get you alone. Or them either."
"I was so afraid that I wasn't doing it right," said Mad.
"Well, it wasn't you, anyway. They were the ones acting strange. You were a hero about it all."
They walked on to the corner. "That way was where I used to ride my bike to junior high. The elementary school was back that way, through an orchard. Now it's a park. The orchard. The school is gone. My Scout Troop once took on the job of distributing flyers for a supermarket through the whole neighborhood. I had two hundred of them to tuck into people's screen doors. I did about twenty and then dumped the rest in a culvert, right down there."
"There's no culvert there."
"That used to be a bridge over a creek. Everything's changed. I wish I could show you the place I actually lived in. You're lucky that way—didn't you tell me your family had lived in their house forever?"
"Not forever. We're all descended from immigrants."
"It must be nice, though, to go back and have nothing changed."
She laughed but it was nasty. "Oh, yes, it's so nice."
"Is there really some major problem between you and your family?" said Quentin.
"It's not a feud or anything," said Mad. "There was a rift for a while, but I've had it under control for years now."
"But you still won't take me to meet them."
"Oh, in good time." She turned and faced him. "After we're married."
"What, you think they'll come between us if we're merely affianced?"
"I want to be part of your family before I take you into the bosom of mine."
"Do I hear the sound of somebody moving up the date of our wedding?"
"We haven't set a date yet."
"I meant from 'let's talk about it sometime' to 'let's get married pretty soon.' "
"Sooner than that."
"How soon?"
"I suppose tonight wouldn't be practical."
Quentin kissed her. "There's the matter of a license."
"As soon as possible. Here, in this town. At your family's church. Surrounded by your parents' friends."
"Nothing would make them happier."
"And you? Would that make you happy, Tin?"
He nodded.
"And yet you still look sad."
He shook his head, smiling. "Not sad at all. Very happy. The sooner the better—you know that's how I feel. Short engagement, yes, but then I've been waiting twenty years for you."
"Do you love me as much as her?" asked Mad.
Quentin made a show of looking over his shoulder. "Who?"
"As Lizzy. Your sister."
"Let's put it this way—I never would have married my sister."
"No, I was wrong even to bring it up. But I've felt it—I've felt it almost from the start. Another woman. And yet you kept insisting that there was no other woman, there had never been another woman, only every time you had a memory of childhood Lizzy was in it. She's the other woman, the one in your past. And because she's... dead... I can never measure up to her."
Quentin kissed her, long and thoroughly. "You're not being measured against Lizzy. She's my childhood, my memory, my past. But you're my future."
"It's selfish of me, isn't it? But you have to love me. More than anyone, you have to love me, or I can't... can't anything. Can't be happy."
"Mad, you're already off the scale. I love you more than life."
She clung to him under the streetlight.
But as he stroked her hair he wondered—was it true? Did he love her more than Lizzy? Was there still some crazy part of him that clung to Lizzy and wouldn't let her go? After all, he had never hallucinated seeing Madeleine.
He shook off the thought. It was Madeleine who had opened up his life and given it meaning. He was excited for the future now. That was something that his memory of Lizzy had never been able to do. Hallucinations, but no dreams.
It took longer than they thought, because a proper church wedding required some lead time—invitations, if nothing else, took a week. But by the end of August they were married, full church wedding and all, the bride like a goddess in white, the groom grinning like an idiot, or so Dad assured him just before the ceremony.
The honeymoon was Hawaii, of course, because neither of them had ever been there and from the bay area, that was the only place you could go with a more pleasant climate. They made love for the first time on their second morning in the Turtle Bay Hilton, after recovering from jet lag and post-wedding exhaustion. They were both shy and awkward but it worked pretty well. "After all," said Madeleine, "if it was really hard, stupid people wouldn't have so many children."
They snorkeled, they visited Japanese Buddhist temples, they flew to Maui and the big island, they ate fresh pineapples and shopped in the open-air mall in Honolulu and stood at the pass where hundreds of warriors plunged to their deaths in an ancient Hawaiian story. They watched the show at the Polynesian Cultural Center and tried out some of the dances back in their room, minus the costumes, of course. Quentin noticed during the week that he actually had something of a knack for having fun.
But there was still a shadow between them, and it wasn't Lizzy, because the shadow wasn't in Quentin, he was sure of that. It was in Mad. They would make love and he would hold her in his arms and she would smile at him and he would say, Yes, it was wonderful, it was sweet, I love you. And she would assure him, too, only he knew, though he wasn't sure how, he knew that he was telling the truth and she was lying. It wasn't good for her. Something was wrong with this part of their marriage and she wouldn't tell him what. He couldn't even ask her, because she really wasn't giving any outward sign of dissatisfaction. It was more as if there were some inner pain that she couldn't shake off, that nothing he did could ease. A pain that became most painful in those moments after sex when she should have been happiest, should have felt most loved, most worshiped by her husband. Something was stealing joy from them, something in her past.
Something in her family. Something in that mansion on the Hudson that she was determined not to let him visit.
Was she molested as a child? Beaten? Emotionally starved? If she didn't want to tell him, how could he find out? This was certainly one case where it wouldn't help for him to get his lawyer working on finding the answers. Besides, Wayne
would have such a smirk. Married a week, and already you're having me investigate her family? Maybe if you had let me investigate them before the wedding...
No, he wanted her to tell him. When she trusted him enough. And so he would make sure she never had cause to doubt his love and loyalty, his strength and honor. When she knew that nothing she told him could shake his bond with her, then she would speak.
At the end of the week, she was the one who brought up the future. "Our week is almost up," she said. "And it occurs to me we haven't said anything about what happens next."
"We could stay another week. Another month, if you want. I made kind of an open-ended reservation."
"This was a wonderful week, but the best part of it was you, Tin, and I get to keep you wherever we go. Have we even decided where we're going to live?"
"I have connections in most cities in North America. But don't feel limited by that—I'm sure that we could find a way to get along in England. Or France. Paris? Provence?"
"I don't think I'm cool enough for Provence."
"But you have the body for the beaches of the Riviera."
"Nobody would even notice me there."
"I wouldn't be able to keep the Frenchmen's hands off you."
"Really, Tin, where will we live? Your stuff is in Virginia, and mine is still packed, my family can ship it wherever we decide to live. Have you finished your business there? Are you ready to move on?"
"I don't know," said Quentin. "I mean, that wasn't exactly a career. It was more of a pastime. I was marking time till I met you. So now... I don't know."
"It was a wonderful pastime," said Mad. "Making other people's dreams come true."
"Helping them make their own dreams come true, you mean."
"What I mean is, Tin, why stop?"
"Well, for one thing, too many of them have succeeded."
"What does that mean?"
"When I talked to my lawyer about revising my will to include you, he had me get my accountant to provide me with a complete inventory of my assets. Some of my partnerships are now worth more than the fortune I started with. My point is that I'm now rich on a whole different scale. Maybe it's time to help somebody with a truly extravagant dream."
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