The Cousins (14 page)

“Wozzle and Buster,” Roger said fondly, trying to win her. “They’re our kids.”

He had his way of pulling her apart and she hardened her heart against it. “I want you to end it with Wendy Wilton now,” Olivia said. “From here on in, every day it gets worse.”

“She’s very neurotic,” Roger said. “She’s emotional, unpredictable. I have to handle the breakup carefully. I don’t want her coming to see you.”

“The way she already did?”

He paled again. Of course she had meant Wendy’s office visit, but Roger didn’t know that was all there was. “Did she tell you she tried to kill herself?” he asked.

“No. Did she?”

“She pretended to. It was a cry for help. I don’t want to drive her to do it again more seriously.”

So Wendy wanted Roger so much she was willing to do anything, risk anything to keep him. While Olivia was trying to act controlled and strong.

“Do what you have to do in the way you think best,” she said. “I’ll get out the linens for the den. You can use the bathroom in there. The shower’s good.”

He was silent as she laid the folded guest linens on the sofa bed in the den. Then he went into their bathroom and took out all his things. She felt her heart scream.

16

W
HEN YOU HAVE LOST
your lover there is no season so sad as late spring, when the lengthening days with their pastel twilights and softening air remind you of romantic beginnings and hopeful continuances that are not for you. Now that Olivia and Roger were sleeping in separate rooms under an uneasy truce, she felt she had the worst of both worlds. Sometimes it felt as if they were living miles apart, and yet they were in the same house with its closeness that made it hard to have secrets. But as he had once said jokingly to her cousin Nick, she had such separation anxiety that she couldn’t even leave a bad hotel, so how could she push him further out of their life together?

She knew he had not yet made a clean break with Wendy.

“I can’t just drop her,” he said. “She’s too fragile.”

“Most men do it,” Olivia said.

“I’m not most men, and she’s not most women.”

“Neither am I,” Olivia said.

She waited for him to tell her he had finally ended the affair forever, but he didn’t, and sometimes he went out saying something ambiguous, knowing avoidance was not so heinous as a lie or as insulting as the truth. He went to the gym only two or three times a week, so she supposed he really went. Once in a while she did a check on his gym clothes and they were always used.

“She asked me to try to be friends with her,” he said. “There’s something sad about that.”

“Friends!”

“I feel as though I’ve messed up her life.”

“What about mine?”

“But you have me.”

Olivia didn’t answer, because anything she could have said would have cut.

Every evening she and Roger still had dinner together. He always asked her first if she was free, as if she too had another life. She thought perhaps she should start to have one. When they had dinner together they tried to pretend nothing had changed, which was impossible, so they gently talked about safe things: the news, patients, movies. He even asked her if she had heard from her cousins and what they were up to, a subject that had never interested him before.

“Charlie the Perfect is going to run the New York Marathon with his son again next fall,” Olivia told him. “Remember it was in the newspaper last year when they did it together and they both finished at the same time? He’s fifty and Tony is twenty-five. Charlie trains six days a week. And he’s a vegetarian. But I couldn’t decide if he finished the same time as his son because he’s such a good athlete or because they’re so symbiotic.”

Roger laughed. “You talked to him?” he asked, surprised. Charlie the Perfect ran the store with his father, Uncle Seymour, but other than that his life never touched most of the rest of the cousins.

“Of course not. Aunt Myra told me. And she said Charlie got cows for the summer again.”

“Cows?”

“They have this estate in Beaverkill. A hundred acres. Cows look very picturesque grazing and lying around, and you don’t have to pay to cut the grass, but they’re hard to take care of during the winter, so every spring Charlie and his wife buy a herd of cows to decorate the estate, and then in the fall they sell them.”

“Not to a slaughterhouse!”

“Of course not. To a dairy.”

“Do they make a profit?”

“I don’t know,” Olivia said. “For a used car you don’t. Used car, used cow? Don’t ask me.”

Roger laughed again.

Look how funny you think I am, Olivia thought. How well we get along. Has Wendy got anything for you besides sex? I doubt it. Maybe fear. How much obligation do you have, and for how long, to a suicidal mistress? Get rid of her. But maybe you think I’m boring. Maybe you’re only laughing because you’re fond of me.

She thought perhaps sex with her was boring compared to sex with Wendy. Maybe it had been boring all along, and that was why he had looked elsewhere. Maybe she had been too complacent. If he came back she would try again, make it more exciting. But then she realized that she was too angry with him to try at all. They didn’t touch each other anymore; they were both too afraid of her rage.

At night she let Wozzle sleep on her bed. Buster slept in the den with Roger, confused the first night and then quickly getting used to it. Watching the large blond dog walk calmly into the den behind Roger, seeing Roger shut the door behind them, Olivia felt as if they were truly separated and torn apart, and that Roger had taken with him all his worldly goods.

“Oh, Wozzle,” she murmured, dropping tears into her dog’s soft black fur. “Wuzzy, Wuzzy, what’s going to become of us?”

She had a hard time getting to sleep. She watched old movies on television late at night so she could have another excuse to cry. Sometimes, when there were patients staying over in the clinic, she wandered downstairs to look at them. Everything was so clean. The sleeping animals breathed quietly in their cages. Everything she and Roger had—this practice, their house, their life together—had been the fulfillment of their dreams. Maybe it was true that when you got what you wanted, the trouble began.

Her old friend Alys called. “I haven’t seen you since Thanksgiving,” Alys said. “This is a disgrace.”

“I know,” Olivia said. “Everyone gets so busy.”

“Can you have lunch with me next week? No, dinner. Let’s have dinner. Will Roger let you out?”

“As in out of jail?” Olivia said dryly. She knew Roger would rush to dinner with Wendy if he knew she had made plans of her own. “Lunch would be easier,” she said. “Things are a little hectic right now.”

They met at Alys’s new favorite Italian restaurant. It looked just like Alys’s last favorite Italian restaurant, and as always Alys ordered a salad with no dressing—a spare handful of torn-up greens on a plate for six dollars—and dry grilled chicken, and as always the salad annoyed Olivia, and by extension so did Alys. Olivia ordered just the chicken. The waiter looked disappointed. Alys had had her hair cut very short since Olivia had last seen her and she looked younger and quite attractive.

“You look great,” Olivia said.

“I have found the new best hairdresser in New York,” Alys said. “You have to go.” Every six months Alys found the new best hairdresser. Her life was a constant search for better beauty.

“How’s your job going?” Olivia asked, passing it off. Alys was an editor on a women’s magazine, and sometimes wrote an article when no one else wanted to do it, for which she claimed she was unfairly meagerly paid.

“I hate it just as much as always,” Alys said, “but they’re cutting down the staff and firing people right and left because of the recession, so I don’t dare leave.” She sipped from her glass of their seven-dollar bottle of Evian water. Olivia thought about the people who were hungry and out of work.

“You’re lucky to have this job,” she said. “You have great perks.”

“Yes, I get on screening lists. And I still have an expense account, so lunch is on me. You did Thanksgiving.”

“Thank you. So how’s life?”

“It’s seven months since I’ve been to bed with a man. I’m ashamed to tell anybody.”

“That’s not so long these days,” Olivia said.

“I take a certain grim satisfaction in thinking I’m working on my first celibate year. I hardly ever meet men anymore. They’re married or taken or gay or just hopeless. I’d settle for the hopeless ones, but there seems to be a waiting list.”

“You’ll find someone,” Olivia said.

“You always say that. You’re so lucky you have Roger.”

“You always say that.”

“It’s true.”

“Roger is having an affair,” Olivia said. As soon as the words came out she felt better. It had been hard keeping the burden all to herself.

“No! What a rat! How did you find out?”

“It’s a long story.” Olivia told her most of it.

“How old is she?” Alys asked.

“Late twenties, I’d guess. No more than thirty. And pretty. Roger’s almost fifty.”

“Do you remember when we were that age and going out with older, sophisticated married men? We thought their wives were some old bat. The old bat was probably in her mid-forties. What we are now.”

“Don’t even say it.”

“We couldn’t understand why those guys wouldn’t leave their wives for us. And sometimes they did leave them for somebody else—young, of course. It’s come full circle. When we were young they cheated
with
us, and now they cheat
on
us.”

“I never went out with a married man who wasn’t already separated,” Olivia said.

“Well, I did.”

“Fairly recently, as I remember.”

“What are you going to do about Roger?”

“I’m afraid to think about it,” Olivia said.

“He’ll give her up eventually and then you’ll reconcile and forgive him. People don’t throw a relationship away when they have as much together as you two do.”

“I don’t believe it can ever be the same again,” Olivia said.

“You know,” Alys said thoughtfully, “ever since I was a kid I wondered what real life was. I kept waiting for it to happen to me. I looked at other people, their families, what they did for fun, and I wondered if that was it. What did they do when I wasn’t there? When I was a grown-up, I mean actually
now
, I even used to look into the windows of the big apartment building across the street from me—everybody keeps their blinds up in New York like no one else exists—and I would watch people’s lives. Who’s watching television, who’s alone, who’s found someone, who’s out for the evening. I’d watch them cooking. I’d look into people’s shopping carts at the supermarket. I wondered how often people had sex. What their everyday conversations were.”

“Because you’re a writer.”

“No. And I always wondered what your life with Roger was really like.”

“You were curious about my life?”

“Yes. Because I thought I was the only person in the world who didn’t have a real life. And then do you know what happened? The other day I was walking along the street, and it hit me. I realized this
is
my real life. Every day of it. This is all there is. This is it.”

“How could you not know?”

Alys shrugged. “I didn’t.”

Olivia thought about her cousins who loved danger. They said it made life worth living, but now she suddenly wondered if they needed to risk everything in order to know they were alive. And Roger: did he need his affair with Wendy for the same reason? Push it to the limit. Be ready for that one moment to be caught, to lose. Know you had won, until the next time. Did that mean it was not her fault after all?

They finished lunch and had cappuccino, which always seemed like dessert.

“Now this Wendy, if she’s thirty,” Alys said, “she’s going to want to get married. She’s probably thinking about when she’s going to have a child. At least a husband. And Roger’s not budging. Eventually she’s going to move on.”

“She’s threatening to kill herself over him, Alys.”

“He’s got to be hating it.”

“Did you ever do anything like that when you were young?”

“Once,” Alys said. “The guy would never see me again.”

“He wasn’t Roger,” Olivia said.

They parted in the street outside the restaurant with a hug and promises not to wait so long before they saw each other. But Olivia knew they wouldn’t keep them. “Call me and tell me what happens with you and Roger,” Alys said. Was it possible? She seemed almost pleased. She had always been jealous when Olivia was happy and she wasn’t, even though she pretended not to be.

“I will. Thanks again for lunch.”

Olivia took a cab back to her office. She didn’t even like her oldest friend. Alys was superficial and self-indulgent. She always had been. That was why Olivia hardly ever saw her.

But who else could she have told about her domestic crisis? So many of her friends were hers and Roger’s friends together, and this was still a private matter. She couldn’t tell her family, even Jenny, with whom she felt particularly close. She had pretended on the phone with Aunt Myra that everything was fine. She could just imagine the grapevine, the criticism, the “I told you so”s. The last thing she wanted was for her family to know she had another failure.

She realized with a wave of the most intense sadness who was the one she used to tell when something was bothering her, when she was unhappy or upset, when things were not right. Who had always been the one she went to: her confidant, her best friend. It had been Roger.

17

“I
CAN’T BELIEVE
you and I are having lunch together on a Saturday like normal people,” Wendy said. She was happy and bubbling. She was wearing a black bodysuit under tight jeans with a hole in the knee. Roger smiled indulgently. He wished he weren’t there. He had told Olivia he was going out to do his “things,” but it hadn’t fooled her. He felt as if Olivia were sitting in the restaurant watching them, and at the same time he was wondering where she was and what she was doing.

Wendy had chosen a small new trendy place in the Village that her friends liked. He was sure Olivia had never heard of it and he would be unlikely to run into anyone they knew. The restaurant was not crowded because people were already starting to go to the country for the weekends. Next weekend would be Memorial Day, and after that the summer exodus.

“I’ve taken a house in East Hampton for the summer,” Wendy said. “It’s a share with three other people, but I get every weekend. It’s a much bigger house than the one we had last year. And it has a pool. There are lots of parties to go to.”

“You’ll enjoy it,” Roger said. “You should be with people your own age.”

“They’re not all my age.” She tilted her head. “You could come visit me.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“Just dreaming out loud.”

“I wish you wouldn’t,” Roger said.

“Let’s order,” she said.

He looked at the menu. Everything was greasy and fatty and full of cholesterol. Three-egg omelets. Hamburgers and french fries. Macaroni and cheese. Old-fashioned meatloaf with gravy.

“This stuff looks like what my mother used to make,” he said.

“It’s the new trend in food,” Wendy said cheerfully. “Comfort food. Don’t you love it?”

“I didn’t like it much the first time,” he said. “But except for fabulous chocolate chip cookies, my mother was a terrible cook.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“I didn’t know it either. I thought that was what food was supposed to taste like.” He waited for her to laugh, but she didn’t.

“Does Olivia cook?” she asked.

“I don’t want to talk about her, Wendy,” he said uncomfortably. Ever since they had been caught, she had started asking more questions about Olivia, and whenever she did he felt as if she were intruding on something private.

“Does she know you’re with me today?”

“Probably,” he said. Talking about Olivia made it even worse.

Wendy had begged him to have dinner with her in a restaurant, so he had compromised on lunch. He was trying to break off with her slowly, wean her away, not just for her but for himself. But ever since he had told Wendy that Olivia knew about them, there had been a shift in their relationship. Wendy seemed to think that now that the thing he had most feared had happened, and the world had not ended, he hadn’t gone anywhere, she had a chance to win him for herself.

He had told her that if Olivia found out about them the affair would be over, but here he was. Of course that exposed his weakness. It only fed her optimism and her stubbornness. He had stopped pretending he loved her; he said nothing. But she attributed that to nervousness on his part. He had stopped seeing her on their regular schedule, but she could understand why that was wise. He did still see her.

They ordered hamburgers and beer. When their food came they sat there for a while in silence while he tried to think of something neutral to say. “You’re not eating,” he said finally.

“I’m not very hungry.” She smiled at him. He supposed she was thinking that next they would go to her apartment, but he had no real enthusiasm to go there; he just wanted to get away. He felt unaccountably lonely. They had never had a conversation that wasn’t either a highly charged prelude to sex or a discussion about their relationship, and now over a simple lunch he didn’t even know how to talk to her.

“You can do a lot better than hanging around with me,” Roger said. “You’re so pretty and bright. There must be men falling all over you.”

“Oh, yes. There always were. But it never worked out.”

“I’m wasting your time,” he said.

“I love you.”

“I wish you didn’t,” he said.

“But I do.”

Why don’t you just strangle me, he thought. “Do you want coffee?” he asked.

“Sure.”

The waiter took away their barely touched food. “Something wrong with this, folks?”

“No, it was fine.”

“Deep-dish apple pie with ice cream? Rice pudding?”

“Just two coffees.”

The waiter left. “Are you having sex with her?” Wendy asked.

He didn’t answer.

“Has she forgiven you? Is she pretending I don’t exist?”

“You exist, all right.”

“I’ll bet the sex with her isn’t as good as with me.”

“This is an inappropriate discussion,” Roger said.

“I want to know.”

“There’s no sex,” Roger said. “I sleep in the den. We try not to step on land mines.”

Wendy brightened. “Is she going to leave you?”

“That makes you happy, doesn’t it?”

“Of course. Then you and I could be together.”

“I don’t want to start with anyone again,” Roger said. “I want what I have.”

“I don’t understand,” Wendy said, frowning.

“I know.”

“I realize you and I never had a chance to really know each other,” Wendy said. “It was all so passionate and so much fun. It was even romantic in a crazy way. But we were always rushing. Now you could stay with me longer. She doesn’t know when you come home. You could stay overnight with me. If you knew me you might want me more than you want her. Just give me a try.”

Poor Wendy, he thought. “You and I could never live together,” he said lightly. “Gregory would scratch me to death.”

“You’ll win him over. I’ll win you over. You’ll see.”

He was rescued by the arrival of the waiter with the coffee. For a minute or two they pretended to concentrate on it. He wondered if he was the only man in the world who didn’t know how to get rid of a woman. If he didn’t watch out, Olivia would be the one who left him. He knew he should be more forceful with Wendy, but he was afraid to because a part of him still wanted her. His ambivalence was his worst enemy.

“I don’t have much more time,” he said, looking at his watch.

“Come to my apartment,” she whispered.

“I . . .”

“Just for a minute. I have something to show you.”

“What?”

“It’s a surprise.” She ran her fingers through her thick shiny hair and smiled at him coquettishly. He wished she weren’t so pretty. “You have no idea what it is, but you won’t be disappointed.”

He paid the check and they left.

In the cab Wendy put her head on his shoulder and her hand on his thigh. “I’m your biker babe,” she murmured. “Your motorcycle mama. I belong to you.”

Her doorman greeted them, as always. Roger wondered, as he did now every time he saw him, what he had said to Olivia. He thought how hurt Olivia had been and he could hardly bear to look at the man, not that it had been the doorman’s fault.

As soon as he and Wendy entered her apartment, she started taking his clothes off. “I’m going to ride with you,” she said, “and do anything you want.” She was kissing him and rubbing up against him, and then she was taking off her own clothes at the same time. “Any bitch tries to put her hands on you, I’m going to kill her. You’re the best. I’m yours. All yours.”

She led him into the bedroom. In spite of his resolve and the reluctance he had felt in the restaurant, he realized he desired her almost as much as he had before getting caught. Her body was as enticing as ever; it was only her emotions that frightened him away. Wendy lay on the bed on her back, her pale skin nacreous in the soft afternoon light.

“Look,” she said.

Right above her pubic hair she had gotten a tattoo. In the middle of a small red heart and green and purple flowers it said
Roger
.

He was suddenly impotent.

She thought it was temporary and was all over him, fondling, coaxing, taking him in her mouth, but he pulled away. It was hopeless. He thought that if his frightened, shriveled dick could dive right up into his body cavity it would have, testicles and all. He stared at the tattoo of his name on her belly and he felt so invaded that he could hardly breathe. He sat up and retrieved his clothes.

“What is it?” Wendy asked.

“I have to go.”

“You’ll be all right soon,” she said.

“How could you do that?” he asked, gesturing accusingly.

She smiled. “It didn’t hurt much. I did it for you.”

He was at the door, dressed, fleeing. She followed him, still naked. “Don’t do anything else for me,” he said. “Do you understand? I don’t appreciate that.”

“Oh, Roger, you’re so silly.”

“I mean it.”

“I thought you would think it was sexy.”

“Not to me,” he said.

“Oh,” she said. “Well.” Then she started to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” He had always suspected she was crazy, but now he was sure of it.

“It’s just a
stick-on
,” she said. “It will come off in two or three days. I didn’t think you’d freak out.”

He thought he was probably on the verge of freaking out about everything lately. He felt like an idiot, humiliated. He had never been impotent before, and he had no interest in trying again to see if he wasn’t. He only wanted to escape. When he left Wendy’s apartment her laughter followed him down the hall.

“Come back!” she called, and then he heard it turn into tears.

He kept on going.