Babyland (35 page)

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Authors: Holly Chamberlin

BOOK: Babyland
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It was something. It was better than nothing. It was breaking my heart.
89
Sink or Swim
“I
just might have a skeleton story to top yours.”
Alexandra opened her eyes wide. “You have a murky past? You've been lying all along about your spotless reputation? I don't believe it.”
We were having drinks at Lemur, Alexandra's pick of the week.
“No,” I said. “I mean, the story isn't mine. It's Jack's. Just promise me you won't tell anyone. He didn't ask me to keep it a secret, but I think it's safe to say he doesn't want just anyone to know.”
“Thank you for considering me not just anyone. Now, what is it?”
So I told Alexandra about Heath, the little boy who was possibly—possibly, I repeated—Jack's son.
“Wow,” she said when I had finished. “Let me guess. It doesn't make a difference in how you feel about him. Right?”
“Right.” But then I considered. “Only it does make a difference. I feel like now I want to protect him from more hurt. I don't know. If it's possible, my feelings have intensified.”
“It's always possible to feel more,” she said, matter-of-factly.
Yes, I thought, it certainly is.
“I'm mad about him, Alexandra. I'm mad for him. I feel like a rabid animal. I want to tear at him, I swear, it's the most awful feeling. And the most wonderful. Except that if I don't get to be with him I don't know how I'll stand it. Can you believe this is me? I can't believe I'm saying these things but ... I just feel so desperate. I have to be with him.”
“You're in love.”
“Hah!” I said. “If this lunacy is being in love ... But what if it's not love? What if it's just lust? What if I'm just having a delayed adolescence? That's sickening.”
“Why should you be above passion?” Alexandra challenged.
“I didn't mean that!” I knew I sounded angry, and I was angry, although I wasn't sure why or with whom.
Wait. I'd lost my baby. I'd lost my wedding, my fiancé, my marriage. I'd lost what I'd thought I wanted my life to be. Of course I was angry. I was angry because I was bereft. I had nothing left, not even a vague idea of what I really wanted my life to be.
And now I had to start all over, create my life anew, and I resented that. I was tired. Suddenly, the idea of starting another relationship seemed overwhelming.
Why did I have to tell Jack how I felt about him? I'd put this show of his work in motion so of course I'd have to see it through. And then what? Be realistic, Anna, I told myself, suddenly feeling very foolish, too. Jack's not going to declare his love for you. In less than a week he's going to get on a plane and head for the West Coast, and then you can grow old with your pathetic secret, a picture of Jack under your pillow, a scrap of his handwriting hidden in your underwear drawer. Life will be empty but calm.
I don't have to do anything, I assured myself. I don't have to reanimate myself. I can just stay put and rot away like the macabre Miss Havisham. It's my life. I can do what I want with it even if that means wasting it magnificently. Even if that means avoiding love. My friends might not like it but there's nothing they can do to make me get up and start over. Nothing.
“So,” Alexandra said, calling me back to the irritating moment, “what are you going to do about your life?”
I had no answer. Maybe Jack's revelation had affected me more than I'd first assumed. Maybe I was afraid that Heath—if indeed he was Jack's son—would stand in the way of Jack's realizing I was the woman he loved.
Jealous of a child. How pathetic.
“This love business,” I said, “is wearing me out.”
“You'll toughen up. Either that or you'll fall apart. It's your choice.”
I looked at my friend. I realized I didn't want to waste away. I realized I wanted to have what she had. Love. Great big love.
“Is there some magic potion that will help me toughen up?” I said with a smile.
“Yes,” Alexandra said. “It's called a martini.”
90
The Time Is Now
“E
verything's in place for tomorrow night. At the risk of jinxing the show, I think it's going to be a success.”
Jack grimaced. “You're not superstitious, are you?”
“No,” I said. “It was just something to say. I'm tired.” Jack and I had worked on the show until ten; now we were sitting at a corner table in the almost empty bistro, finally ordering dinner.
“You should be exhausted. Have you slept at all in the past week?”
“Surprisingly, yes,” I admitted. The bad dreams were temporarily in abeyance; also, I'd come to better terms with the notion of Jack's possibly having a son. Since the day he first told me we'd talked through the situation again, solving nothing but, I hoped, helping Jack to come to better terms, too.
“By the way,” I said then, “have you ever given an interview?”
“Who would want to know about how I like my eggs or what brand of detergent I use?”
“You don't use detergent. You take your laundry out. And don't be silly. I mean, have you ever given an interview about your work?”
Jack considered. “Yes. I think so. There was some small rag and I was just out of college. I don't remember.”
“You don't have a copy of the interview?”
“I doubt it.”
“Oh. I have a clippings file that dates back to when I was in the Girl Scouts and my troop put on a play at the local senior center. Does that sound pathetic?”
Jack laughed. “Only slightly. But why the sudden interest in interviews?”
“There's going to be a reporter at the show tomorrow night. And I'm working on setting up a full-length interview with the arts editor of an important magazine. I'm not telling you which magazine until I've got the interview nailed down, so don't ask.”
Jack took a long swallow of his beer. “Fine,” he said. “I'm not looking forward to any publicity, but I'll do as you command. So, have you ever given an interview?”
“No,” I said. “Not really. Just silly quotes about an event. Like, the reporter from the society pages says, ‘How do you think the party is going?' And I answer, ‘It's just wonderful, everyone is having a marvelous time, the food is just great, and the music has everyone on their feet.'”
“That's disgusting.”
“I know. I'm ashamed of myself. But it's my job. A dirty business but somebody's got to do it and all. Pour me more wine?”
Jack did and then said, “So, would you want to be interviewed by some serious publication?”
I laughed. “Oh, no! Besides, who would want to interview me? I've done nothing noteworthy.”
“In this day and age you don't have to do anything even remotely noteworthy to make the cover of
People
.”
“Well, that's true. But is
People
a serious publication? I'm sure it makes serious money but it isn't exactly the
New Yorker
.”
“The
New Yorker
isn't exactly the
New Yorker
anymore,” Jack noted. “Great, the food's here.”
Neither of us spoke until we'd eaten enough to take the edge off.
“I feel human again,” I said. “Almost. And stay away from my fries.”
Jack withdrew his hand from my plate. “How about I interview you right now?” he said. “Just for fun.”
“Whatever. As long as I can chew while I talk.”
“Deal. Okay. Tell me about your expectations.”
I frowned. “I thought you were going to ask me questions like, what's my favorite movie?”
“I'm not pretending to work for a dating service. I'm pretending to work for a serious publication. So, talk to me about expectations.”
“I don't know what you mean by expectations,” I replied. “Do you mean the things everyone expects without realizing they're expecting them? Like enough food to eat and a roof overhead, the things everyone takes for granted but shouldn't?”
“Do you really expect a roof over your head?”
“No,” I admitted. “Not since I've had to earn my own living.”
“I didn't think so. I don't think you take much for granted. That opinion is the reporter editorializing, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Okay,” Jack said then, “what about hopes and dreams?”
“You're sure you don't want to know my favorite color? My favorite flavor of ice cream?”
“Pink and butter pecan.”
I felt weak with desire. Jack's hand on the table was inches from mine. I couldn't take my eyes off it. “Oh,” I said with a croak. “Oh. I mean, I don't know. I had fantasies, when I was a little girl.”
“This reporter,” Jack said, “would like to know about those fantasies.”
I raised my eyes to his face. Had he moved his chair closer to mine? “They're pretty silly,” I said.
“Tell me.”
“Okay. Well, when I was a little girl I fantasized about living in a big castle on a windswept moor. Or on a cliff overlooking the sea. With a stable of horses.” Jack hadn't laughed. He was looking at me with ... “It was all stuff from the books I was reading,” I said dismissively. “I'm sure lots of little girls were fantasizing about castles and horses and princes landing on the shore in beautiful ships.”
“So,” Jack said, and he leaned back, away from me. “Do you think the fantasies were really about romance?”
How, I wondered, had we gotten to this wonderful, dangerous topic?
“I don't think so,” I said. “I think they were mostly about escape. Escape from my real world.”
“Was your real world so terrible?”
“No.” I laughed. “It wasn't at all dark and menacing. But that was the problem. My real world was boring. I fantasized about a world that was dark and menacing, in a romantic way of course. So maybe the fantasies were about romance at heart. I'm embarrassed to admit I fantasized about a life of difficulty and distress.”
“Why should you be embarrassed?” Jack said. “You were just a kid.”
“I know. But then you grow up and realize that too many little girls are living real nightmares and that they'd give anything to live in a safe and boring world. If they can even imagine a world without mayhem and murder.”
“This is a side of you I haven't seen before. Do your thoughts always turn to darkness?”
“Of course not,” I protested. Did they? “At least, I don't think so. I guess I'll have to monitor my thoughts for a while and find out.”
“What makes Anna tick. Now that would be a fascinating documentary.”
“Don't mock me.”
“I mean it,” Jack said, and I felt my cheeks flush.
“This wine,” I said brightly, “is making me warm.”
Jack crossed his arms in a matter-of-fact, professorial way. “So,” he said, “what do you do for drama in your adult life? Where do you find the spooky castles and wild moors and guys on mighty steeds? I'm asking as a reporter, of course.”
Was Jack's question really meant in a serious way? Or was he flirting with me? I was too overwhelmed to know.
“Oh,” I said flippantly, looking at a spot on the wall over his head, “I rent movies like
Rebecca
and
Wuthering Heights
and
Possession
. You know. I'm always so busy I don't really have time for ...”
“So, what did you want to be when you grew up?” Jack's sudden change of nuance put me back on more even ground. Maybe I'd been imagining the erotic charge between us. Did it matter?
“Nothing in particular,” I said. “I wasn't sure I had the brains for law or medicine or banking. I stumbled on event planning, really. I like to see people enjoy themselves, and I like to know I had some part in making them happy.”
“That's it?” Jack's tone was kind.
I shrugged. “That's it. I'm a pretty simple person, really. Either simple or very dull.”
“You're not dull, Anna. But at the risk of pissing you off, let me just say this. You can't live on the fumes of other people's lives. In the end you'll still be left with your own life. You'll be all alone, just you and yourself. Other people don't owe you anything; they're not responsible for filling up those empty spaces inside. You are.”
“Are you trying,” I said boldly, “to convince yourself of that, or me?”
Jack grinned. “Both.”
The waiter appeared, put the check on the table, and glided away.
“They're throwing us out,” I said, reaching for my bag.
“This is on me.” Jack tossed a credit card onto the table.
The night was almost over. Jack would pay the bill and we'd each go home to our separate apartments.
“What about the one you marry?” I said boldly.
“What
about
the one you marry?”
“You were talking about being all alone with your life. So what about your life partner? Aren't you responsible to each other? Aren't you supposed to complete each other? Isn't that what
soul mate
is all about?”
Jack looked first at the table, then up to me. “I don't,” he said finally, “think you're ‘supposed to' do anything or ‘supposed to' be anything in particular for anyone else. Love is a gift; it has no reasons, it just is. You love someone—that's it, you can't help it. That's fact. Love isn't hard to do. Liking someone all the time, now that can be hard.”
I thought of the things about Ross that had driven me crazy, like the way he peeled an apple before eating it because he didn't want apple skin getting caught between his teeth. Would that habit have bothered me less if I'd been in love with Ross?
Jack went on. “You can get pissed off at her for spending too much money or hate the way he picks his nose when he thinks you're not looking, but you still love the one you love. Love is big. Still, it's not big enough to be someone else's soul. The term is soul
mate
, meaning companion, best friend for life, buddy.
Mate
implies two people. Two complementary people.”
I looked down at the bag in my lap. “Alexandra says much the same things about love.”
“You know what they say about great minds.”
I laughed and looked back to him. “That's lame. Even for you.”
“I know,” he said. “I'm tired, too.”
We left the bistro and without consultation began to walk in the direction of Jack's studio.
Ross, I thought, was not my complement. He was not my soul mate. He was not the great love of my life. But it didn't matter anymore, did it? Because Ross and I were history, we were the past.
Jack's arm brushed mine.
I didn't want to be a Miss Havisham. I didn't want to rot away. I wanted to grasp my present.
I stopped. Jack stopped, too. We stood face to face. And then I kissed him, right on the mouth, and he kissed me back.
“Hello,” he said when we pulled away.
“I want you to come back to my apartment,” I said. “Or I'll go with you to yours, it doesn't matter. I want us to be together, Jack, just tonight, just this once. And look, if you don't want to, okay, fine, just don't, don't, don't tell me you're too tired or I really think I'll go medieval on you. I really do. No stupid excuses, just a simple
no
will do.”
Jack put his hands on my arms and pulled me closer again. “Of course I want to, Anna. I've wanted to for a long time. Believe me. But ... you've been through so much lately ... I don't want you to—”
“Jack,” I said, “I know what I want and what I can handle. How many times do I have to tell you not to think for other people. You act so mind-numbingly superior sometimes—”
Jack grinned. “And you still want to have sex with me?”
“Yes.”
“Then I'd better stop arguing and just do it.”
“Just do it, Jack.”
He did.

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