TWENTY-FIVE
MARIANNE
Madness didn’t take a break, and neither did therapy. Marianne stared at the framed family portrait on Dr. P.’s desk. His name came with a complex pronunciation that refused to stick in her brain even though she’d practiced it alone in her room. The first time she’d referred to him simply as Dr. P., his tired smile had suggested he was used to compromise. The precious little girl in the photograph probably had something to do with that. Marianne looked up.
“Are you having thoughts of dying or hurting yourself?” Elbows raised, Dr. P. created a triangle with his index fingers and thumbs in a let’s-quiet-it-down-and-find-our-happy-place gesture. This psychiatrist had one speed: slow and deliberate, like a well-rehearsed performance that drew crowds but lacked heart. “Have you been thinking about death?”
Two tricky questions, since she hadn’t been doing a whole lot of thinking. After talking with Gabriel, she’d been ridiculously happy. A little too happy, Dr. P. decided, and another week of endless meds-tweaking followed: You put the right leg in, the right leg out, you do some hokeypokey and you shake the meds all about. Meds shifts came prepackaged with their own quiet version of hell. Back to being a medical dartboard. But at least it had delayed reentry to life, given her time to think about her marriage. Not that she was. Thinking.
“No. I’ve been focusing my brain power on putting one foot in front of the other so I can leave my room each day.”
He tapped his index fingers against his chin. “And does this have something to do with Emmajohn Peel? I gather you’ve become friendly.”
“You’ve got the nurses spying on us?”
“It was a simple question, Marianne.”
She tried to give Dr. P a withering stare, but her eyeballs ached with the need for more sleep. “Yes. When she leaves, she’s coming to my friend Gabriel’s house. Any strings you can pull to get us released on the same day would be much appreciated. She has nowhere else to go.”
“Gabriel has agreed to this plan?”
“After pondering the complexities of his decision and, no doubt, having a tête-à-tête with the deity in the sky, Gabriel said yes.”
“You think this a wise course of action, Marianne?”
Outside Dr. P’s window, the grounds staff clipped potted privet into elegant topiaries. Lots of curved, round edges created by very sharp hedge shears. All with red handles.
“Yes, I do. I can teach EmJ to focus on her music. Music can save her the way it’s saved hundreds of young women I’ve helped through my nonprofit group.”
“Your idealism is noble, but encouraging a fellow patient to indulge in fantasies of fame and glory might not be advisable. She needs to live within the means of her illness, not stretch for stars she can’t reach.”
“Ah, but there, dear doctor, is the flaw in your argument. I’m not talking about fantasies. Music is my business and I can spot talent with my eyes closed. And with all due respect, the idea that nutters”—she smiled as she quoted EmJ—“like me have to live within the lines of our illness is utter bullshit.”
He nodded as if in agreement. Marianne picked up his paperweight, juggled it between her hands like a Hacky Sack, put it down and crossed her arms. And her legs.
“I was told to lower my expectations of life, to give up hope of having a family and a career. But I’ve managed all those things despite my illness. EmJ doesn’t have to think like a disabled person.”
“I disagree. Accepting your limitations is part of the process.”
“I do accept my limitations, but living within the confines of manic-depressive illness doesn’t mean we can’t reach for success. I can help her. Where’s the harm?”
“EmJ is not your problem,” Dr. P. said.
In the distance a phone rang. “If not mine, then whose? Who’s going to make sure she doesn’t end up living on the streets and back on the Molly? She’s got no support system, and no one can do this alone.”
“No, Marianne. You can’t.” He paused. “Your husband is calling the front desk multiple times a day. Have you taken any of his calls?”
Marianne shook her head.
“How were things between you and Darius before February’s car accident?”
“Good. We used to fall asleep holding hands.” Then she couldn’t help herself. “Sex off the charts.”
He stared back, unfazed. “When was the last time the two of you were intimate?”
She broke eye contact and shrugged.
“How have things been between you since the accident?”
“Bad. He hovers all the time, reassuring me it wasn’t my fault. I don’t want reassurance. An unborn baby is dead. I deserve to suffer.”
“Next week is the six-month anniversary of the accident. Am I right?”
“Thanks for reminding me. That certainly puts a smile on my sedated face.”
“Yesterday you told me you were responsible for what happened, but I gather you weren’t charged with reckless driving.”
Marianne slumped back in her chair. Verbal sparring was a brain drain. “I spooked the deer and started the chain reaction. Then I lost concentration for a second when Darius . . .”
“When he what, Marianne?”
“He turned down the music. I laughed and turned it back up. That’s all I remember. I woke up in hospital with a head injury, and Darius told me the other driver was fine. But he lied.” She reached across Dr. P’s desk for the tissue box. “She was seven months pregnant, the other driver. Her baby was stillborn.”
“Is this why you’re mad at Darius, because you think he lied to you?”
“No! I’m not mad at him. The very opposite.”
“Does he know about your baby?”
She blew her nose loudly. “No one ever knew except for me, Simon, Gabriel, and our parents.”
“Why did you never tell Darius?”
“He was my do-over. My second chance. Technically my third. We both wanted a clean slate—no rehashing of past mistakes. His first wife was half-baked, and I was going to be everything she wasn’t. For Darius, I was doing to do Stepford-wife normal.” She screwed up what remained of the tissue. “Denial is a great drug, Dr. P.”
“And now?”
“Now he wants to be knee-deep in madness and part of my treatment plan.”
“And why does that scare you?”
“He and I made a deal to not share the past. To put it aside. My past with Gabriel and Simon represents the worst of me—everything I’ve tried to change. It’s not just about the baby, it’s about what I did to a family. My best friend’s family. My best friend who then didn’t talk to me for thirty years.” She dragged her hands through her hair. “Simon shouldn’t even have been there that night. Mrs. Bonham was supposed to pick us up, but she came down with a migraine and sent Simon in her place. And everything that followed was a direct consequence of my secrets, my lies.”
“If you don’t remember what happened, how can you blame yourself for the accident?”
“I remember enough to know that I’m the reason a mother has to live with the guilt of sending her son to his death. That accident is my Pandora’s box. What if Darius sees inside and decides been there, done that, no effing way I’m reordering the T-shirt in a different size?” The merry-go-round was starting up again like a song set to repeat. “I can’t lose him.”
“Talk to him, Marianne. He may surprise you.”
“I’ve worked hard to protect him and Jade from my past. I crossed the point of no return a long time ago.”
“Protect them or shut them out?”
She didn’t answer.
“And what about Gabriel? You seem to trust him more than your family.”
“That’s not fair.” She stood, walked to the window, and stared out at the bench where she and Gabriel had sat, hands entwined like a pair of kids. “Our connection might be . . . a little weird, but we go back a long way.” We go back all the way.
A light rain started to fall, and
the grounds crew began packing up their tools.
Dr. P. was right. Ten days ago Jade and Darius had flown back to North Carolina, and with each day it became easier to not return their calls and harder to figure out the way home. The one relationship that didn’t need fixing was with Gabriel. God’s ultimate irony.
TWENTY-SIX
GABRIEL
Never before had Gabriel wished to be clairvoyant.
Using the rectory as a refuge for those in need was highly appropriate; his level of conflict over how long the situation would last was not. In the three weeks minus a day that Marianne had been in the Beeches, he’d fallen back into a blissful routine—dull except for his nightly conversations with Jade—but yet again he would be tiptoeing through uncertainty in his own house. Trying to piece together the puzzle of Marianne’s plans was tougher than translating the new BBC weatherman with the Welsh accent. And EmJ, who sat in sullen silence in the back of Hugh’s Volvo, was a closed book.
Hugh’s car smelled of dog and was stocked with pear drops, a weakness Gabriel didn’t share. As penance for being the sherbet lemon thief, he had avoided boiled sweets for the last three decades.
Marianne pulled forward in the backseat, nodded in Hugh’s direction, and then fixed her focus on Gabriel. “Thought you needed reinforcements?”
“Do you recall how small my car is?” Even to him that made an unconvincing counterargument. He half turned in his seat.
Marianne, who had successfully petitioned for two extra days in the Beeches to ensure that she and EmJ were released on the same day, raised her eyebrows. Next to her EmJ picked off what remained of her nail varnish.
“Seat belts, ladies?”
EmJ ignored him. Marianne sat back and made a big show of strapping them both in.
“Happy?” she said, and squeezed EmJ’s knee.
Gabriel turned back to stare through the windscreen. “Extremely. It’s the law over here.” How could she have such a cavalier attitude toward car safety? Sometimes he felt he knew Marianne better than himself; other times he didn’t know her at all. He closed his eyes briefly and tried to imagine the soothing sounds of the indoor water fountain in Hugh’s office, but it quickly transformed into the deafening roar of a mountainous waterfall.
Inhale, exhale; inhale, exhale.
As the car inched through the avenue of beech trees that led to the main road, EmJ muttered something that could have been, “Good riddance.” They turned right and followed signs to the M1. Before long they were in a stream of fast-moving traffic. Whether he liked it or not, they were heading home.
“Do you mind if we drop you at the rectory and leave for a while?” Gabriel said. “Hugh and I need to meet with some members of the youth group.”
Hugh glanced up in the rearview mirror. “They formed a band for a teen dance, but it all got a bit out of hand.”
That was a humongous understatement. Despite having once been a key participant in teen melodrama played to the hilt, Gabriel had never before witnessed teen girls declaring war on each other. Hugh, however, had found the whole thing mildly amusing.
“The lead singer quit,” Hugh said. “You should come with us, EmJ. Try out as a replacement.”
Gabriel glared at him.
Hugh responded with a quick smile. “Why don’t you pass around the pear drops?” he said.
Gabriel picked up the white paper bag of loose sweets and offered it to the backseat passengers. Marianne shook her head, and EmJ gazed out of the window at the concrete barriers. Gabriel waited, his arm held out. Slowly EmJ turned and reached for a sweet. She gave Gabriel a shaky smile that made her look about ten years old. He grinned back, and something settled inside. Hope.
“Are they snotty and all religious?” she said quietly.
“Hardly.” Hugh laughed, and Gabriel kept his thoughts unexpressed—that the recent behavior he’d witnessed had been far from religious.
“And Marianne, you might have some good advice for them,” Hugh continued. “The idea is to create a regular event for local bands. Village life can be deathly quiet for teenagers.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Marianne said. “We never had a problem finding our own entertainment, did we, Gabriel?”
Hugh glanced sideways at him, this time minus the smile.
They walked across the wood floor of the cavernous village hall, their footsteps as loud as firecrackers. The boys, with the exception of Tom, were not subtle about watching EmJ. And EmJ, who had struck Gabriel as asexual up until that point, appeared to walk toward them with a slight sway in her hips.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” he whispered to Hugh. Tom was a good sort, Jack too, but Charlotte—Let’s be honest, God—was not an exemplary Christian, and he knew nothing about Matt, who lived one village over.
Charlotte greeted them with a too-wide smile. “Good afternoon, Reverend.”
Gabriel nodded at the pretty blonde in the shortest skirt he’d ever seen. Did it even count as a skirt?
EmJ ignored the boys and looked straight at Charlotte. A wise move from one so young. “You, like, need a singer?”
“Yar,” Charlotte said, her voice posher than usual, but then Charlotte enjoyed flashing her social class. “Why?” She looked EmJ up and down. “Do you know of anyone?”
“Might.” EmJ shrugged and folded her cardigan around herself.
“EmJ’s a talented singer.” Marianne moved forward to stand next to EmJ. “And I have some experience with live musical performances. We’re going to be in the village for a while with nothing to do. We’d be happy to help out, if you’d like us to. No pressure.”
Marianne had also read the situation well.
“She owns a recording studio in America,” EmJ said with a sniff. Finally she turned to the boys. “They’re recording the new Media Rage.”
Nobody moved, but Tom’s eyes grew wide. Taking this as her cue, Marianne stepped toward him, hand outstretched. “Nice to meet y’all. I’m Marianne.”
Oh, she was good. Whereas Charlotte had polished her accent, Marianne had turned hers southern. For some reason it made her less intimidating.
“She’s in her element,” Hugh whispered.
Tom shook Marianne’s hand. “I’m Tom, the guitarist.” He pointed at the others. “Matt plays the drums, Jack’s on bass. Charlotte’s our manager. She makes all the posters and stuff.”
“Is there a Media Rage song you could play?”
“Too bloody right!” Tom said, his handsome face lighting up with the same impish grin he’d had as a small boy wreaking havoc during his brother’s baptism. Gabriel couldn’t help but smile. What a handful Tom had been as a youngster, but even so, he had such compassion, such generosity of spirit. Hopefully when he went up to Oxford in the autumn he would find someone more deserving of his affection than Charlotte. Good Lord, that was an inappropriate thought.
Sorry, God.
He tried to listen as Marianne quizzed Tom about Media Rage.
“EmJ knows that one,” Marianne said. “How about you let her audition?”
“Why not?” Charlotte said, and tugged on the large gold-and-ruby cross dangling around her neck.
Gabriel leaned against the far wall of the village hall and watched the energy in the room shift from Charlotte to Marianne. As she talked and gestured, the band members nodded.
Marianne winked at him. “We’ve got this covered, Gabriel. We’ll walk back when we’re done.”
“Would you mind terribly if we watched the performance?” Hugh said.
“Guys?” Marianne asked the band members. They all mumbled their approval. Much scraping of chairs and shuffling followed before the boys hopped up on the stage with an agility Gabriel doubted he’d ever possessed, even in the sixth form. EmJ took the stairs.
Hugh leaned in to Gabriel. “I think EmJ’s more than capable of dealing with one Sloane Ranger, but I’d like to make sure.”
“Me too. Since I appear to be responsible for her well-being.”
“Come on, you old fogy. Admit it, she’s bringing out your inner Papa Bear.”
The band tuned up and exchanged a few words.
“I don’t have an inner Papa Bear,” Gabriel said.
“Balderdash and poppycock.”
Gabriel laughed. “What?”
But before Hugh could answer, Matt tapped his drumsticks together, Tom plucked his guitar strings as if his life depended on it, and music—loud and wild—exploded.
Matt, a quiet boy who never looked Gabriel in the eye, started bashing the drums with a savage intensity. His hair flopped back and forth; his mouth hung open in a silent howl. EmJ stood alone, isolated in the middle of the stage in a trance. She held the mic close with one hand, and with the other, clasped her cardigan to her throat.
And then she detonated.
Stomping to the drumbeat, gyrating one way, then another with an uncanny sense for where the equipment and other band members were, she grabbed her hair and yanked it back to expose huge, black-rimmed eyes. Her voice—raspy and gravelly—unleashed its power, transforming her from a brittle, soft-spoken urchin into a fearless, screaming presence. She screeched the lyrics as if they were being ripped from her soul. Her performance was aggressive, ferocious, and unlike anything Gabriel had ever seen. The music jolted through his body, and his scalp tingled. What would Jade make of this? Blast, he should have been recording it for her on his phone. He sort of knew how to do that.
The band stopped. Tom and Jack rushed EmJ with high fives while Marianne clapped and Hugh whistled. But Gabriel stood still. This was a window into Marianne and Jade’s life halfway round the world. Their real life that he didn’t share.
“We don’t really know what we’re doing.” Jack, who normally kept his face lowered due to acute acne, smiled at Marianne.
“Bull. You guys were rocking it! Name of the band?” Marianne said.
“We couldn’t agree on one.” Charlotte blushed.
Marianne rubbed her hands together. “No worries.”
“Come on, old chap.” Hugh slapped his back. “I need a cup of tea and a chocolate digestive. Please tell me your biscuit tin is full.”
Echoes of Family Page 18