Ms. Taken Identity

by Dan Begley

  She smiles again to the group and we all say goodbye, then she’s off, weaving her way through the tables to the front door, and as she does so, I hear Sheldon say he plans to rush the book through production, six months tops, and absolutely no author photo for the jacket, to play up the mystery of it all, and Katharine agrees, then I realize they’ve asked my opinion.

  “Great. Listen, I need to make sure she’s okay.”

  I dart to the front door and outside, where I’m met by a frigid blast of January air and a million people. But Marie hasn’t gotten far. She’s on the corner, waving for a taxi.

  “Marie, wait up!”

  I push my way upstream through a wave of bodies to get to her.

  “Can you believe it, Marie? We did it! You did it. You were fantastic in there. They loved you. You couldn’t have been any better if you actually were Bradley.”

  I step forward to give her a hug, but she stiffens, pulls back. I freeze.

  “Marie… ?”

  She takes a breath, which immediately disappears over her shoulder as a ribbon of vapor. “You didn’t have to tell me, Mitch. You could’ve kept me in the dark about the whole thing, played it off like it never happened, and I never would’ve found out. You know that. But you did tell me, even though you knew I could walk in there today and spill my guts and ruin everything for you. You gave me that much. So that’s why I came.”

  Her eyes are turning glassy.

  “But I spent the whole night tossing and turning and crying, that image of you and Katharine… together, playing out in my head. But you know what made it worse? Wondering where you’d gone and what you were up to, and had you gone back to her, and were you doing it again, right now. Can you imagine how that made me feel, thinking my fiancé was out screwing someone else?”

  Sick. Insane. Just the way it’d make me feel.

  She gives me a bitter stare. “So did you?”

  I deserve that.

  “No, Mitch, don’t just stand there. This isn’t a fucking rhetorical question. I want you to look me in the eye and give me an answer. Did you sleep with Katharine last night?”

  “Marie. No. God. I got a hotel and went to bed. That’s it. That’s the truth.”

  “That’s such a comfort, coming from you. Jason.” She says it with a meanness I’ve never heard from her. “And you didn’t even think about it, going off to a bar, club, some place to take your mind off us, do something stupid?”

  I’m silent.

  “Jesus, you did.”

  “Maybe something crazy flashed through my head, I don’t know. We all get crazy thoughts. The important thing is I didn’t do anything.”

  “This time. But what about the next? Or the next? Can’t you see, Mitch, that’s what I’ll always be wondering, what about the next time? What if things get dark enough or bleak enough and you think it’s over, so you go off and do something again?”

  You can see how angry and disgusted she is with herself for having these thoughts, for grilling me like this, for being backed into this corner in the first place, and I want to sweep her off the sidewalk, take her back to the hotel room, sit her down, and tell her this is all a horrible misunderstanding. But the Marie I know and love has checked out of her skin and I’m talking to someone else.

  “Look at me. I’m a wreck. I’m a fucking paranoid wreck. Because I have this thought in my head now, the seed is there, and I can’t get rid of it. I can’t claw it out, even if I want to.” Tears are streaming down her cheeks, and she tries to wipe them away with her sleeve but misses most of them. “I’m sorry, Mitch. I can’t do it. I can’t live a life always looking over my shoulder or holding my breath, wondering what you’re up to when things go bad, and not trusting you, and feeling so awful about myself. I won’t live my life that way.”

  A taxi pulls up to the curb.

  “So what are you saying?” My throat clamps down, shutting off air, and I can’t swallow.

  She reaches into her pocket and pulls something out. Her ring. I didn’t even notice it was off. She presses it into my hand.

  “Goodbye, Mitch,” she says, and slides into the darkness of the cab.

  There’ve been a dozen or so movie versions of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, and I’ve seen most of them, including the classic with Alastair Sim. But there’s a scene in the one with George C. Scott, from the mid-eighties, that gets me every time. Scrooge travels back in time with the Ghost of Christmas Past, and he’s looking at a twenty-something version of himself meeting up with his fiancée, Belle. They’re out by a frozen pond and haven’t seen each other in a while, and she senses hesitancy in Scrooge’s eyes about continuing their engagement. When she asks him what’s wrong, he says that instead of getting married now, he wants to work for a while longer, amass his fortune, because then they’ll be happier when they marry. She gives him a sad, sad look, and her eyes tear up, and she releases him from his engagement promise. As she walks away, the Old Scrooge gets a fiery look in his eye and you can see he wants to shout out, “Damn the money, boy! Go after her!” and the Young Scrooge feels it too, wants to chase her down. But he doesn’t. He just lets her walk away.

  As I watch Marie’s cab pull away, I have the feeling that if I run out in the street and stop the cab, and make her get out and tell her that I love her; that if I pull her by the hand back into the restaurant, stand in front of Katharine and Brent and Sheldon, and confess what I’ve done; if I promise I will never do anything like this again, and beg her just to be patient, and work with me, and let me talk when I feel any strange or panicky urges, she’d listen, and she’d know how much I love her, and she’d take me back, and she’d wear my ring again. But I don’t. Like Scrooge, I just stand and watch her go.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  There’s little fanfare to greet me when I get back to St. Louis. In fact, there’s no fanfare. But why should there be? Only two people knew why I’d gone, and one of them has given me every indication she never wants to see me again. I can hardly expect the other to be waiting at the airport, ready to strike up the band, especially if Marie has gotten to him first and regaled him with all the details: “The Empire State Building was tall and the food was good, but Mitch fucked another woman, not in New York, but not so long ago, so I dumped him. Here’s his flight information, in case you wanted it.”

  I collect my bags and catch a cab to the apartment, which is plenty cold since it’s cold outside and I turned down the heat before I left. I take as hot a shower as I can stand without giving myself third-degree burns. Afterwards, I slip into my sweats and start unpacking. I save Marie’s ring for last, which I pull out of the pocket of my jeans. What does one do with a used engagement ring? I suppose I could keep it, hope the next woman I meet, if I ever meet another woman, will have exactly the same taste as Marie. In fact, I hope she’s like Marie in every way, except for the fact that I won’t have cheated on her, or whatever it is I did. But what’re the odds of that? Besides, maybe that’s not the brightest idea, kicking off a new life with someone with a ring that failed the previous owner.

  I put it on the tip of my pinky and polish it against my shirt. It’s a good-looking ring, and it looked great on her. The center stone was the perfect size for her finger, and the little diamonds that speckled all around the band gave it a sort of Goldilocks gleam: not too little, not too much, but just right. I hold it up to my nose, to see if it still has her scent on it, that cocoa-butter cream she’s always slathering on. But it doesn’t. In fact, you’d have a tough time finding any clue that it was ever on her finger at all.

  When I finally get hold of Bradley, he’s at Skyler’s, and it’s obvious Marie hasn’t broken the news: he suggests the two of us come over and tell them how it went. In truth, this is exactly what I’d love to do, but seeing how there is no longer a two of us to come over, I suggest a different two of us—he and I—meet at Colchester’s. Once we’ve settled in and ordered sandwiches and a round of beer, and I’ve told him what I think of New York—massive
, frigid, fun—I tell him about the contract. And the amount.

  “Get lost,” he says, and wipes his mouth with the back of his shirt cuff. “And they also want you to bat cleanup for the Yankees.”

  So I pull out my copy of the contract, which I brought for exactly this reason, and slide it over to him. He reads it, then does a couple twitchy things with his brows and lips.

  “That’s really how much you got?”

  “That’s really how much I got. Pre-tax, of course. And before Susannah takes her cut.”

  “Still.” He leans back in his chair, clearly in awe. “Son of a bitch.”

  “Yeah. Son of a bitch.”

  He’s taking this part very well, which he should, since his best friend is more than halfway to being a millionaire, and he knows this means a lot of free beer and sandwiches and pool and many other things, for a long time, so I have a feeling it’s all going to be okay. I decide to ride the good-time momentum. “Hey, not to change the subject or anything, but there’s something I want to tell you.” I pause. “Marie and I hit a rough patch while we were up there.”

  “Hmm? Lovers’ quarrel?” He’s still eyeing the contract, and all those zeros.

  “Yep, that’s exactly what it was. Lovers’ quarrel. Maybe a bit worse. In the sense she gave me my ring back.”

  Now he snaps to. “Wait. What?”

  “She gave me my ring back. We pretty much broke up.”

  His expression turns stormy quicker than I expected. “You broke up? What happened?”

  “Actually, it’s kind of a long story.”

  I give him a jokey smile to let him know the worst is over, and I’m doing okay, and that there are bits of humor to come, probably, though I don’t know where, or when. What I’m looking for, really, is a way to paint the whole picture, give him all the shades, since I know he’ll be talking to Marie, and I want him to see that this wasn’t a one-issue breakup, that, sure, I slept with Katharine, which was wrong, but we both realized we weren’t the best people for each other, or would have in time, since that’s what she basically said when she told me she couldn’t be with me, and that other problems were already knocking on the door, or just around the corner, or somewhere in town. Maybe.

  “You did something stupid again, didn’t you?” His tone is cold and flinty, and I don’t like the accusatory finger poking through it.

  “What do you mean, again?”

  “Jesus, Mitch. Do you have amnesia? Don’t you remember Jason?”

  “That wasn’t stupid. That was just a lapse in judgment. A miscommunication. We’ve been over this.”

  “It was fucking stupid. It was idiotic. And then I had to bail you out.”

  “You didn’t bail me out. I talked to her. I gave her the truth.”

  These, from the look on his face, are the most ridiculous words a person has ever spoken. “You gave her the truth all right. After I talked to her every day for a week and listened to her scream and cry and told her you were my best friend and not some psycho, and there had to be a reason why you did what you did, so why don’t you let him explain?” He glares at me like I’m a snotty-nosed kid. “What, did you think it was your charm and good looks and chocolate pies that got you over to her place that night? Don’t flatter yourself.”

  I’ve never seen him this pissed.

  “So what was it?” he sneers. “Did you gamble away a few thousand? Pick up a prostitute? Tell her she was an imbecile because she couldn’t keep her Turgenev straight from her Tolstoy?”

  “Why are you getting so hostile, man?”

  “Because she’s my sister. Man.”

  Something in the way he says “man” triggers it, like what he’s really saying is, “You’re not a man at all, but a good-for-nothing screw-up, which is what you’ve always been, and I’m her brother, and you had no business being in the same city as her, much less engaged to her.”

  “Oh, I get it. The two of you are so close. I don’t hear about her for five months when she moves back from North Carolina. You tell me to go to the studio where she dances, to listen to her and her retard friends. And now your heart breaks when you hear her cry. Give him a medal, for brother of the year.”

  “Fuck you,” he says, shoving the table at me as he scrambles to get up. The beers spill all over the place. I get up too and we both stare each other down.

  “I thought I owed you an explanation,” I say. My breathing is ragged and shallow and my pulse is thrumming in my ears. “But apparently you already have all the answers. So I guess I don’t owe you shit.”

  He takes a step back, then lunges forward and smashes his right fist into my face. What I see is a burst of light, then the ceiling, and I realize I’m on the ground. He’s standing over me, towering and humongous from this angle.

  “Now we’re even,” he says, and storms away.

  I’ve never been in a fight, not unless you count childhood spats on the playground, which I don’t, since that’s more pulling on hair and shirt collars and rolling around in the dirt. The closest I ever got was about five years ago, when I witnessed a car accident, and the two guys got out and started pounding each other. A few of us saw where this one was headed, the Skipper thrashing Gilligan, so we jumped in and pulled the big guy off and pinned him down for a couple minutes, till he cooled off. Now, as I pick myself off the floor of Colchester’s, I realize I still haven’t been in a fight: a fight requires two, an exchange of punches, an Ali and a Frazier. I’ve just been flattened.

  I assure everyone I’m okay, then go to the bathroom and splash cold water on my face. I open and close my jaw a few times, to make sure it works, and it does, barely. I stare into the mirror at the spot, gingerly poking at the skin to differentiate the parts that hurt from the parts that don’t—my right cheek is already swelling up. Then I take a look at the larger picture. Me. As a whole. Where do I go from here? And I don’t mean, do I go back to my table or home (though it is a legitimate question, since I’ve a feeling I need a bag of ice, and soon), but more, how do I view myself in light of all that’s happened with Marie. I suppose I could just slink around town with my guilt and regret, wait for the next roundhouse-right sucker puncher to knock me on my ass (“Go ahead and sock him: he cheated on his woman”). But when does it end? I told Marie the truth when I didn’t have to, I apologized and sincerely meant it—and she dumped me. I brought Bradley to Colchester’s and sat him down, bought him beer and a sandwich, tried to break it to him gently—and he did his best to jack a few teeth down my throat. Fine. I get it. Message received. I’m an asshole. You don’t want any part of me. Now if you’ll both excuse me, I have a life to live. I splash a last bit of water on my face and towel it off. I feel better. I’m okay. I’m fine.

  And I am. I have my health (except for the pain in my jaw), my brain (except for a slight concussion), and over half a million dollars coming my way. This is my chance to improve my life, make a difference, be kind and charitable, all those things we all say we’d do if we ever won the lottery, and though this isn’t exactly winning the lottery, it’s as close as I’ll ever come. And while I’m not saying money is the answer to everything, or many things, it can, to paraphrase what I heard Oprah tell Cameron Diaz not too long ago, be a good thing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  When the check finally comes from Susannah—all six figures of it—and I’ve deposited it, and I’ve waited a few days, and there’s no knock on my door from the bank manager, police, or FBI wanting to know whom I robbed, what I’m laundering, or do I have any other counterfeit checks in circulation, the first thing I do is buy my Malibu. The purchase price is in my lease agreement, and I’m probably paying a few bucks more than if I’d gone to a dealer and haggled, but so be it: I’ve grown fond of my little Chevy.

  I’m teaching again this semester, and this new batch of students is a lot like the last one—hardworking, interested, chatty—without a Molly. This makes things a little boring, and if you’re waiting for me to say something like, “Gee, I
actually miss her and all the excitement and drama she brought,” keep holding your breath; sometimes you just want to walk into a classroom and have the kids do their work, and not feel like you’re co-starring in an episode of Gossip Girl or The Hills, or some other angsty teen drama. Now’s that time. And for the most part, over the next few weeks, the students oblige, which lets me teach in peace and work on my dissertation, since, by the grace of God, I was able to wheedle and coax and cajole—but mostly grovel—my way back into the good graces of my dissertation committee, after missing various appointments and deadlines over the last four months.

  Scott invites me over for a Super Bowl party in early February. A few of his college buddies and lawyer friends are there, and we spend the afternoon eating nachos and pretzels and pizza, drinking beer and soda—all before the game even starts, thanks to a sixteen-hour pre-game show.

  My father shows up just before kickoff, with Nathan.

  “Did we miss anything?” Nathan asks anxiously.

  I assure him he didn’t, after which he settles in with a soda and handful of chips.

  “He was getting a bit antsy,” my father leans over to tell me. “We’ve been working at the course all day.”

  “I thought you were closed for the season.”

  “The course is. But I’m renovating inside the clubhouse. I’ve put if off all winter, but if I want to open up in early spring, now’s the time to get it done.”

  “You’re doing it yourself?”

  “What I can. I have help from my course manager, Kip, and a couple of guys he’s hired.”

  The game gets under way, with a near touchdown on the first run from scrimmage.

  “I could help out,” I say, a few plays later. “If you need it.”

  He slows down on the pretzels he’s chewing, aware that this is something of a moment. “That’d be great.”