Cameo Lake (29 page)

Forty-one

A
lice had agreed to have the kids come to her house on the second Tuesday of December. I was nearly honest with her, I was meeting a friend in Boston. We would have lunch and I would be home by seven. I was a tyro liar and the effort not to blurt more detail was difficult. I thought it very obvious, my avoidance of any pronoun to describe this “friend.” It was a mark of her regard for me that Alice didn't ask who it was I was meeting. I left the impression that the lunch had something to do with publishing. My work was a mystery to Alice and I counted on her not to ask questions.

The kids were unconcerned with their mother's day away. Any day they could go somewhere besides home after school was a good one. Lily did lobby for going to a friend's house instead, but lately her selection of friends had bothered me and I said no. She sulked but got over it.

I hadn't waited for Sean to join me to tell the kids we were moving-ahead with the divorce. The three of us were eating a pickup dinner of canned clam chowder, squeezing in a family moment before homework, when I simply told them.

“You need to know that Daddy and I are getting a divorce.”

“Is that like the Separation?” Tim always made it sound like a proper noun.

“Not exactly. It means that Daddy and I aren't married at all anymore.”

By this time both kids had had enough counseling and easy-reader books on a “Children's Guide to Divorce” to understand intellectually what was going on. And I had enough instinct to know they'd need more reassurance of our love for them than ever. To that end I gathered them into my arms and told them that none of this meant they weren't the most important thing in our lives.”

“Except for the new baby.” Lily had, as always, pulled away from me, and she faced me to deliver this bomb.

“What new baby?”

Adding to the potency of her revelation, Lily folded her arms across her chest. “I saw the test thing in Eleanor's wastebasket.”

I wasn't going to ask when Lily had been in Eleanor's bathroom. “How did you know that's what it was?”

“TV.”

“So what color was it?”

“It wasn't a color, it was an
X.”

“Do you mean like a letter
X,
or a plus sign?”

“A plus sign.”

I felt a slow heat rise from my waist to my armpits to my neck. So classic. “Do you suppose Daddy knows?”

Lily shrugged.

I kept trying to figure out how Eleanor's pregnancy would affect our divorce. Primarily it assured me that it would happen. Secondarily, I knew that I needed to get certain financial and territorial considerations locked in. I called my lawyer immediately and she was on the job. My second call was to Grace—there was no way I could keep this tidbit to myself.

“Cleo, if this wasn't so serious it would be funny. Sean's kids tell his first wife his mistress is enceinte. Too bizarre.”

“I have more bizarre for you. I'm going to Boston to meet Ben next week.”

“Is that a smart thing to do?”

“Just for lunch, Grace.”

“I repeat. Is that a smart thing to do? He's being pursued by paparazzi, you don't want to be on the cover of the
Enquirer,
do you?”

“Might boost book sales.” I wasn't going to let Grace cast a shadow across the only thing which had been keeping me from despair in the past week. “Besides, the press is tired of all that. It's blown over.”

“Be careful. And tell Ben hello for me.”

“I will, Grace.” I was grateful that she hadn't lectured me further. I wouldn't let the doubts about the wisdom of this meeting gain any foothold. I had only allowed the sweet anticipation of it to grow.

“And, Cleo . . . despite what I maybe have said about him, Ben is a good man, and you deserve a little fun.”

I smiled into the phone and could barely get out my goodbye.

Eleanor's pregnancy was like the sound of a handful of dirt on a casket. Although I had declared the marriage over, news like this, whether true or not, rattled me. Sean had yet to tell me about it, and I swore the kids to silence. Lily might have been mistaken. To myself, I acknowledged that Eleanor was playing what she thought was her trump card. Her timing was good, though, even if her imagination was limited. At four in the morning I wondered if Eleanor's attraction for Sean was that she was young and fertile. Had I damaged my marriage in some way by refusing to have another baby? Had that decision somehow been construed as a primal punishment? In the dark hour before dawn I wondered if that had been my way of getting even with Sean. I had made that choice, thinking that it would prevent him from wandering. Awake and cold in my uncompanioned bed, I probed my intentions for some subconscious malfeasance in making that choice.

Driving into Boston, I realized how nervous I was by the several mistakes I made finding my way into the city. I knew where I was going,
but suddenly nothing seemed familiar. I parked the car in the garage under the Hynes Auditorium and decided to walk to Copley Square rather than take the “T.” Despite being dressed as if going to meet an editor, black from head to toe, wearing my good wool coat, I felt as though I wore an aura visible to any passerby.
Woman going to meet special man, see me glow.
We were to meet on the portico of Trinity Church, that much we decided on Thanksgiving. After that we'd find a place for lunch. I imagined something intimate and quiet, we had so much to say to one another.

It was cold, a damp breeze against my cheeks hinted at snow later in the day. I had listened to the forecast last night with fear that the whole expedition would have to be called off because of the weather. When the day arrived cloudy but snowless, I'd seen it as a sign of God's blessing. I leaned back against the brownstone wall of the church and waited. I waited long enough to begin to worry that I'd mistaken the place, then long enough to worry that he wasn't coming. Sharp bits of snow began to fall. For the first time I wished that I carried a cell phone. I didn't dare leave the portico to find a pay phone in case he came along at just that minute. Anxious tears began to rival the sharp flakes stinging my eyes.

“Cleo!” Ben came striding up to me from across the square. “I'm so sorry I'm late. The stupid car quit on me again. I ended up on the bus.”

I stood where I was and watched him come. I felt the tears transform from anxiety to joy. Ben wore a green ranger's parka but no hat. He looked out of place in the city and wonderful to me. I hadn't intended on throwing myself into his arms like a schoolgirl, but he bear-hugged me like a boy. Everything was familiar about him, despite the winter clothes and strange setting. His scent, his spontaneous laugh, his keeping my gloved hand in his. When we finally settled down and I looked at him, I saw that he'd grown a goatee. “I like it.” I reached up and touched the short beard hairs.

“A feeble attempt at incognito.”

We headed for Newbury Street, moving quickly through the lunchtime crowd. We were lucky enough to find a table for two in a
small coffee shop, although Ben hesitated just a little as it was in the window. “Oh, screw it, I've become just a little too paranoid.” He held my chair out for me and then went to hang up our coats. Coming back to me, he commented, “You look lovely and you've grown out your hair, I like it.”

“I suppose I have.” It wasn't really a conscious decision, but I had let my wavy hair grow out. For so many years I'd kept it short and under control.

We had so much to say, it was hard to begin. I saw Ben looking at my bare left hand and I nodded. And told him my marriage was over. I told him about Alice's reaction, about Lily's behavior and Tim's sleeplessness, I even told him about the baby. For a long time I talked, and I began to feel self-conscious, but Ben kept me going until I was depleted. At the end my sandwich was untouched as was his and I felt as if I had lanced a blister and all the poison had flowed out. I took a cleansing breath and laughed, “Ben, you shouldn't encourage me to use you like a father confessor.”

He was leaning against one fist, watching me as I talked, his collie brown eyes full of interest and concern and a little hint of amusement, as if looking at me was giving him pleasure. No man had ever looked at me like that. Not Sean, not really—he had looked at me with lust, or by habit. Not my father. He had never looked at me with interest, only with annoyance.

“Ben, will you tell me what's happening with you?”

“I grew a goatee.”

“Seriously, how bad has it been since the press found out?”

“Very invasive. I came very close to moving Talia out of the convalescent home because the press were camped out on the lawn. Fortunately, it got cold and they gave up. What's difficult is that they've made this discovery just as she's reaching, well, for lack of a better word, the end. They know, just like vultures, that the end is near and it's worth waiting around for the big finale.”

“Ben, you sound so . . .”

“Cynical? Hard? Flip? I am. I'm at the end of my rope, Cleo. I envy you. You've come to a conclusion and it's over and done.”

“Not entirely.”

“You know what I mean. I never know from day to day how much longer my life is going to be on hold. I'm so fed up with the whole thing, I wish it were over.” He suddenly covered his face with his hands and then ran his fingers through his hair in a gesture so familiar to me. “I don't mean that. I'm just very tired.” He looked tired, his summer tan gone, and pale and faint circles lay beneath his eyes. I should have seen it immediately but I was so happy just to see him, I hadn't noticed.

I took his hand away from his face and held it, glad for the small table, glad to give him a moment to let down his guard. I knew what he meant, though. In some faint parallel way, I, too, had been waiting for a death. Now that the clock was ticking down on the life of my marriage, ticking toward that day when the courts would pronounce it dead, I understood the peculiar limbo of being not quite free. I didn't do bedside vigil, but every day some new reminder of its termination struck me. I could only equate my divorce with the loss of his wife metaphorically, but because of it I did understand his ambivalent feelings and his quiet cry from the heart that it would soon be over.

“Can I ask you something?” I still held his hand and the question which clogged my throat needed asking in order for me to reconcile what I'd heard on the television with what Ben had told me.

“Of course. Anything.”

“The report on
Entertainment Tonight
said something about an investigation.”

“Actually, it was a routine inquiry, but, given who we were, it seemed more newsworthy to the media to call it an investigation. I'll show you the clippings someday.” Ben slowly withdrew his hand from mine. A waitress hovered nearby and he caught her eye.

I needed more. I realized that Ben never finished the details of his story, he moved me ahead in it only by increments and only prompted by my questions. I was always left puzzling out the details. “They said she drowned. I thought she'd broken her neck.”