“Well, then,” Ned said. “I guess congratulations are in order. As long as you’re not really hurt. Sweetheart.”
“I’m fine,” Anne said, somehow missing not only the silence, the awkwardness, but also the fact that while Ned was speaking to her, while he was saying sweetheart, his eyes were still on Francie. “Never better, in fact. Winning a match like that-and it was all thanks to Francie-is just so…” Words failed her.“How would you put it, Francie?”
All eyes moved to her. Her tennis self took over, rescuing her.“We haven’t won anything yet,” she said automatically.
“You see, Ned?” said Anne with delight. “That’s my partner, right there. Just like Vince Lombardi.”
“Thanks,” Francie said, and Anne started laughing at the way she said it, but she was the only one.
“Who’s Vince Lombardi?” Em said.
The question was directed at Ned. He licked his lips and quoted: “ ‘Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.’”
“Puke,” said Em, glancing at Francie to see if she really thought like that. Francie caught the glance-this was a child she could like; at the same time, she was aware of the proud paternal smile that flickered briefly on Ned’s face, despite everything. Em came first. Again Francie glimpsed herself in the mirror and was stunned to find a smile on her face, too.
“Not that I’m suggesting she resembles Vince Lombardi in any other way, ” Anne was saying. “Quite the opposite, as you can plainly see. In fact, the men on the other courts are always-”
“I’ve really got to get going, Anne,” Francie interrupted, her voice much too loud, or so she thought.
“But Ned just arrived,” Anne replied. “You’ve hardly had a chance to meet. At least finish your drink first. And why don’t you have one, too, Ned? Even if it is that Romanian stuff.”
“I’m not really-”
“Come on, Ned. You wouldn’t want Francie to think you’re a wine snob.”
Ned’s mouth opened. Francie knew what was on his mind: Francie knows better. He said nothing, went into the kitchen. Em moved closer to her mother, gazed down at her ankle. Francie had already seen the Ned in Em; now she saw Anne in Em’s graceful stance. “How did you win playing on that?” Em said.
“Your mom’s tough.” The words popped out of Francie’s mouth unbidden. Now her subconscious was defending Anne, shoring her up. Not hard to understand why, like the guilty parent who buys her child an ice cream cone an hour after the spanking. Her next thought was conscious, and she kept it to herself: she’d better be.
Em was looking at her in surprise.
“She knows that’s not true,” Anne said.
Ned returned with an empty glass. “What’s not true?” he said, an overflow of anxiety in every syllable. Surely Anne heard it, too.
But she did not. “That I’m tough,” she explained, handing the bottle to Francie. “Mind filling Ned’s glass?”
That forced them into proximity. Ned held out his glass. Their eyes met briefly; his filled with pain, then went blank. Francie poured. Their hands, so familiar with each other, almost touched and even at that moment seemed right together, like perfect lovers in miniature, at least to Francie. The two hands right, and everything else wrong.
“Thank you,” he said. And: “Cheers.” He wasn’t good at this, but she was worse.
“Cheers.” She made herself say it, too.
They drank. Francie tasted nothing, wasn’t even conscious of the wetness.
“It happened on the last point,” Anne was telling Em. “Two-six, seven-six, six-love.”
“So you didn’t choke?” Em said.
“Em!” said Ned.
“But Mom always chokes in the big matches. She says so herself.”
“Couldn’t this time,” Anne said. “Francie doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”
“Oh, but I do.”
“Don’t listen to her, Ned. She’s very modest. Why, I didn’t even know about her job till just the other day, a job I’d die for.”
Another silence.
“Oh?” said Ned at last.
“Tell Ned about your job, Francie.”
“It’s nothing, really.”
“Nothing! Francie buys all the art for the Lothian Foundation.”
“Oh?” said Ned.
“Is that all?” said Anne. “ ‘Oh?’Men, every time-right, Francie?”
“It’s not a big deal,” Francie said. “In fact, there’s a committee, and-”
“Mom’s an artist,” said Em.
“I know,” Francie said. They all turned to the still life behind the desk lamp. Grapes. And here was the girl, in the room, as though she’d stepped out of oh garden, my garden: a wild card.
“You should see the one she did of Dad-it’s much better. I’ll get it.”
“I-”
But it was too late. Em was flying up the stairs. They watched the long Day-Glo laces of her sneakers flap out of sight.
“She can be a bit wild sometimes,” Anne said.
“She seems like a great kid,” said Francie.
“She is,” said Ned, his voice suddenly thick. Anne shot him a glance. He cleared his throat, drank from his glass, perhaps a bigger drink than he’d planned, because a red trickle escaped from one corner of his mouth, ran diagonally down his chin. He didn’t notice, but Anne did. “Ned,” she said in a half whisper, and mimed a cleaning-up motion, another domestic detail-a wifely detail-that made Francie writhe inside.
“Excuse me,” Ned said, wiping his chin.
And then Em was back with the portrait.
“Really, Em,” said Anne, “I don’t think Francie-”
“It’s all right,” said Francie. She gazed at the painting. So did Ned and Anne, while Em gazed at them. Francie’s eye couldn’t help seeing things. Ned’s sensuality, for example, one of his most obvious characteristics, was completely missing. And perhaps because of the immobility of the pose, and the way his body almost filled the canvas, like Henry VIII in Holbein’s portrait, Anne’s Ned appeared more powerful than in life, even dangerous. She’d missed him, not entirely, but by a lot, yet somehow the resemblance was still astounding.
“Well?” said Em.
“I like it very much,” Francie said.
“Think it’s worth anything?”
“Em!” This time they said it together, husband and wife.
“Is it for sale?” Francie said.
“Of course not,” Ned said. Too quick, too emphatic-and Francie knew at once that he was afraid she might do something crazy, like make an offer, the way she’d called IntimatelyYours. Anne noticed: Francie caught her giving Ned a look; he caught it, too. “I wouldn’t want to part with it, is all,” Ned said. “But it’s not my call.”
Anne smiled at him. He smiled back, another faltering smile, even more false than the first, but Anne appeared to miss that.
“You like it ’cause it makes you look cool, right, Dad?” said Em.
“Right. Cool, that’s me.” He tousled her hair. She made a face. Anne laughed.
Francie set her glass down on an end table, not softly.
“Yikes, ” said Anne. “We’re keeping you. ”
“Not at all,” said Francie. Em was staring at her.
“Mind giving Francie a lift, Ned?”
“A lift?”
“To the tennis club-her car’s there.”
“Not necessary,” Francie said. “A cab will be fine.”
“I wouldn’t hear of it,” Anne said.
“No, really,” Francie said, and reached for the phone. Anne covered the receiver with her hand. Their fingers touched.
“You know where it is, Ned?” Anne said. He nodded. “And we’re out of milk, if you get a chance.”
“Thanks for the drink,” Francie said, moving toward the door.
“Thank you,” said Anne. “For driving me home, for being so kind, for everything.” She started to get up.
“Don’t,” Francie said.
<
br /> But Anne did, hardly wincing at all. “See? It feels better already.” She leaned forward, kissed Francie on the cheek. “We’re going to win this thing.”
Em gave her mother another surprised look. Ned held the door. Francie walked out: a cold night, cold everywhere, except the spot that Anne’s lips had touched. That burned.
“And to celebrate we’ll get together for dinner,” Anne called after her. “The four of us.”
They drove in silence, down the block, around the corner, both staring straight ahead.
“The four of us?” Ned said, speaking quietly, as though there were still some risk of being overheard.
“You and her,” said Francie. “Me and Roger.”
“God.”
Francie sat up straight, hands folded in her lap. What was there to say? She felt Ned’s eyes on her.
“It’s so incredible,” he said. “It almost makes you believe there’s some God. Or anti-God.”
Francie said nothing.
They rounded another corner. Farther now from home, Ned’s voice rose to conversational level. “I thought I was going to have a heart attack,” he said.
“It was horrible.” Francie knew that the full horror of it wouldn’t be apparent for a long time: a series of little revelatory bombshells awaited her.
Ned licked his lips. “I know. But…”
“But what?”
“But looking at it rationally, what does it change, really?”
She gazed at him. “I beg your pardon?”
He shrugged. “This just adds the visual component to what you already knew. I have a wife. That wasn’t a secret. Now you’ve seen her. It could be worse.”
“How?”
“Suppose she’d been your sister, for example.”
Her stomach turned.
“Things like that happen, Francie.”
“Not to me.”
Ned’s hand left the wheel, perhaps on its way to touching her, paused, and went back. “We fell in love,” he said. “That’s a fact, and nothing changes it.”
“You’re wrong.”
Ned pulled into the parking lot at the tennis club. Lights glowed in the windows of nearby houses, sparks flew from a chimney and vanished in the night sky. He faced her. “Are you saying you don’t love me anymore?”
Francie didn’t speak.
“Because if that’s the case, I want to hear it.”
She remained silent. She thought she saw tears in his eyes, but then a cloud covered the moon and they were gone. “I love you,” he said. “More than ever.”
“What do you mean, more than ever?”
“The way you were tonight. With Em. With Anne, even. You bring out the best in her.”
“Stop it.”
“And in me. It’s true. You were the only adult in the room. I adore you. I’ll do anything you want, leave Anne, anything.”
“Don’t you see that’s impossible now?”
“Why? Why is it impossible?”
There were two reasons. First, what would be left of him, after? Second, she couldn’t allow it, not now, not knowing Anne-and the girl. Francie gave Ned the second reason.
She watched him absorb it, saw his pain, also saw how young he looked, and more beautiful than ever. Yes, there was no question: he was beautiful. Beauty in pain was something to which she reacted strongly, especially when it was visible to the eye. “Then that leaves us right where we are, doesn’t it?” he said. “Why can’t we just go on like this?”
Francie laid her hand on his knee. “You’re a sweet man, ” she said. “But…” For a moment, there was a lump in her throat and she couldn’t get the sentence out. But only for a moment. “… where we are is intolerable now, ” Francie said.
“What are you saying?”
“It’s over, Ned.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do. ”
His lip quivered. Then he mastered himself and said, “Tell me you don’t love me.”
She said nothing.
He covered her hand, still on his knee, with his: two hands that still went together perfectly.“Until you can say that, nothing’s over.”
“Then-” began Francie when the car phone buzzed.
“Shit, ” said Ned.
It buzzed again. “Answer it,” said Francie, thinking that Anne might have fallen, might have reinjured her ankle.
Ned put the phone to his ear, said, “Hello?”
But it was on speaker, and the car filled with a woman’s voice, not Anne’s. “Ned? Hi. Kira.”
“Kira?”
“The same.”
“I’m very sorry,” Ned said. “I don’t have those figures yet. I’ll call you in the morning.”
Pause. “Okeydoke.” Click.
Ned put the phone down. “Syndication,” he said, rubbing his forehead as though struck with a sudden ache. “Go on, Francie.”
She withdrew her hand and said, “Let’s just leave it like this: we can’t see each other anymore.”
“You know that won’t work.”
“It has to.”
“Please, Francie.” He leaned toward her, put his arms around her, brought his face to hers. She leaned back, forced herself to lean back, because it was unnatural, like rejecting herself.
“It won’t work-you already know that in your heart,” Ned said. “How could someone like you ever throw this away?”
“How couldn’t-”
Someone tapped at her window. Francie pushed Ned away, hard enough so his back hit the door, then twisted around, saw Nora peering through the fogged glass, racquet bag over her shoulder, steam rising off her hair, still wet from the shower.
“To be continued,” Ned said softly.
16
“I heard all about it,” Nora said as the windows of Ned’s car slid down. “Way to fire, kiddo. How’s Anne?”
“It’s just a sprain,” Francie said.
“She going to be ready to play for the hardware?”
“She says so.” Francie opened the door. She turned to Ned, found she couldn’t quite look at him. “Thanks for the lift,” she said, again attempting to find the tone she’d use with a new acquaintance, again getting it wrong.
“The pleasure was mine,” he said, not even trying: more than that, making a deliberately careless reply, one she didn’t like at all. And then, could that possibly have been his hand she felt, brushing the back of her thigh as she got out of the car?
Francie glanced at Nora-what had she seen? what had she heard? — but Nora’s eyes weren’t on her. “Hi, Ned,” she was saying. “How’s it going?”
He peered at her. “Nora, right?”
“Got it in one. Legal Seafood, at Chestnut Hill-you and Anne were ahead of us in line.”
“I remember.”
“Finally caught your show the other day,” Nora continued, talking past Francie, turning on the charm, in fact. With her profile view of Nora’s face, Francie could see her doing it. “Blended families, I think it was,” Nora said. “Are those callers for real?”
“Paid-up members of Equity, each and every one,” Ned replied. Nora laughed, was still laughing when Ned said, “Good night, ladies.” His eyes lingered for a moment on Francie, then turned orange under the sodium arc lights as he drove out of the parking lot. They watched him swing into traffic and accelerate away, tires spinning on a patch of ice.
“What do you think of pretty boy?” Nora said.
“Pretty boy?”
“Come on. He’s gorgeous. Gorgeous, smart, sexy-and funny, too.”
“Grow up,” Francie said.
“Testosterone versus estrogen-what could be more grown-up than that? No holds barred. On the other hand, he’s married, and I soon will be. Bernie wants me in white-can you believe it?”
“Why not?”
“Why not?” Nora said, and gave Francie a look at a bad moment, the very moment the first of those bombshells she’d anticipated was going off in Francie’s brain: Someone like Anne, t
hat’s different-modest sex drive at best. What were the implications of that now?
Nora’s eyes narrowed; then she went on: “Maybe you’re right. Some marriages-I’ll take that a little farther-most marriages baffle me. Why should mine be any different?”
Francie hadn’t followed, was aware that a question had been asked, no more. She nodded.
“What does that mean?”
Francie didn’t answer. She had meant to tell Nora about Ned, the constant omission of this fact of her life putting too great a strain on their friendship, but how was that possible now? Nora knew Anne-and more, much more, had speculated about Anne’s sex drive, found Ned attractive: how horribly tangled every little aspect of this was-and would thus be put in the intolerable situation of having to lie for Francie, an adulteress once removed. Impossible. Impossible and unnecessary, since it was over. She had just seen Ned for the last time. That was that. The resolved and the unresolved, all in a box. It just had to be closed and put away: a tidy, persuasive image, like slicing through the Gordian knot. But the back of her thigh still tingled in the place he’d touched it, if in fact he’d touched it at all.
“Are you saying that Anne and Ned make sense to you, for example?” Nora asked. “As a couple, I mean.”
Francie whipped around to face her. “Who the fuck does?” she said.
Nora stared at her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. You’re a thousand miles away, and when you’re not, you’re mean as a snake. And you look like you’ve seen a ghost. I’ll take that farther, too-you look like shit, if you want the truth, which isn’t your style at all. Something’s wrong, very wrong. Fess up.”
Francie took a deep breath. At that moment, she remembered the conversation on the ice: There’s someone I have to tell. I won’t say it’s you, if you don’t want, but I have to tell. Had she mentioned Nora’s name? Yes. Had Ned therefore assumed that Nora already knew? How else to explain his reply when she’d thanked him for the ride? The pleasure was mine. Was it a sort of inside joke, inviting Nora in on the secret? If so, why now, when he’d always been so careful? Did the burden of the secret sometimes grow so intolerable that the truth had to burst out, even be flaunted? That could be dangerous-could have been, Francie corrected herself, because it was all going in a box, resolved and unresolved.
A Perfect Crime Page 13