Tied to the Tracks (13 page)
Read Tied to the Tracks Online
Authors: Rosina Lippi
“Is that a mockingbird?” She was looking up into the oak tree.
John shifted a little. “A thrush, I think.”
“A thrush. I’ve been meaning to go to the library to find a tape on birdsong. So I know what I’m hearing. And a book on flowers.” She was looking at the garden, no doubt because she didn’t want to look at him. The shadows moved over her face and neck and touched her shirt and the strong hands and the faded jeans. He was glad she stood so far away, and frustrated by it, too, which was ridiculous, which was insupportable.
He said, “Did you stop by just to say hello?”
And saw that he had made the first mistake, as he knew he must, and he always did, with this woman. The color climbed in her face.
“Am I intruding?”
“No,” he said, quietly. “No, you’re not. I’m glad to see you.”
She produced a small, dry laugh. “I just wanted to ask you a couple questions.”
John studied his hands where they gripped his knees, white knuckled. He stood up. “Best we go inside, then.”
She took a step backward. “Afraid I’m going to embarrass you?”
He sat down again. “Can we call a truce before we get started?”
“I didn’t know we were at war.”
John forced himself to take a few deep breaths. “Of course not. Go ahead with your questions.”
She said, “Does Miss Zula know that you and I used to date?”
He had expected something very different, and at first could hardly make sense of the question.
“Date?”
“Date, yes. You do remember.”
“Of course I remember. I’m just not sure I’d use that word. I don’t know how she would know. I never mentioned it to her. Why?”
Angie’s mouth pursed itself. “And Caroline Rose? Have you mentioned it to her?”
John held on to her gaze, though it cost him a great deal. “I haven’t raised the subject yet.”
“Why not?”
John heard the screen door open behind him. Angie’s face told him that it wasn’t Rob standing there.
“Let me introduce you to my sister-in-law,” John said. “I may have been slow to bring Caroline up to date, but there’s no keeping secrets from Kai.”
The house was just exactly what Angie expected. Solid old furniture, simple, elegant, comfortable. Not a pile of paper in sight, or a book out of place. A few small watercolors, an antique map in a gilded frame, a sampler: Jane Ogilvie 1825. No photos, not of his parents or grandparents or anyone else. Nor would she find them anywhere else in the house.
When she took him home to Hoboken the first time, John had spent a lot of time going over what Tommy Apples liked to call the family shrine, a whole wall full of photographs, some more than a hundred years old. John had been sincerely interested in Angie’s family, but could not be bothered with the artifacts of his own.
This comfortable, well-used, strictly kept house was much like an expensive hotel room. It was one of the things that she had only begun to understand about John, this way he went about constructing a world for himself free of conflict and unpleasant memories, and it was immediately familiar.
On the other hand, Rob’s wife took her by surprise. Kai Watanabe looked like a teenage boy’s geisha fantasy, but presented herself like the theoretical mathematician she was. Small and slender with a long veil of shining black hair, she came at Angie so directly and with so much undisguised curiosity that only two choices presented themselves: to be affronted or charmed. The fact that Kai’s smile was as honest and unassuming as her gaze made the choice easier.
On the screened rear porch, Angie stood at the old oak table that had been set for a late breakfast and tried to sound regretful.
“I’ve eaten, but thank you.”
“Sit,” said John, and pointed at a chair.
“How rude,” said Rob.
“Me?” said John and Angie together.
“Both of you,” said Rob. “Have coffee at least, Angie. Kai will think you don’t like her.”
“Don’t listen to him,” said Kai, holding out a coffee cup. “He is teasing. You will like me and I will like you and now that’s settled.”
Her English was excellent, save for a distinct and unusual rhythm. To Angie’s ear it sounded as though Kai had learned British English that was now giving way to her husband’s slow Georgia drawl.
She sat down, and then John sat down across from her with his back to the wall.
The immediate problem, as far as John was concerned, was not the fact that Angie Mangiamele was sitting at his breakfast table with a barely disguised scowl on her face. As odd as it was to have her here, and as disturbing as this discussion promised to be, there was a bigger issue, and that was the fact that Caroline and all of her sisters would be here in an hour for one of their planning meetings. What he didn’t want, what he couldn’t afford, was to add the subject of Angie to flower arrangements and discussions about color schemes.
“Isn’t this cozy,” said Rob, looking around the table with true and undisguised pleasure. He put a sticky bun the size of a wagon wheel on his plate. “How is your filming coming along, Angie?”
Angie sat very straight with both hands wrapped around her coffee cup. She was pale, and there were shadows under her deep-set eyes. John counted the tines on his fork.
“We aren’t actually shooting yet,” Angie said. “There’s a lot of prep work to do. As far as Miss Zula is concerned, there are a few mysteries to solve.”
“Mysteries?” Kai’s small, neat head turned, and the veil of her hair swung with it.
“Yes. The biggest mystery is why Miss Zula seems set on throwing Caroline Rose and me together. Any idea why that might be, John?”
Kai put her hands flat on the table to either side of her plate. “I like her,” she said to Rob. “She asks good questions. Do you play poker, Angie?”
“Don’t answer that, Angie. My wife is a card-counting shark.”
“I could teach you to throw craps,” Angie said to Kai, and in spite of the seriousness of the situation and his growing uneasiness, John had to smile at the idea of these two women at a craps table.
She said, “And about questions, the thing is, I keep asking them until I get answers. John?”
A small V-shape crease had appeared between Angie’s brows. It was true that she wouldn’t stop asking; her persistence was one of the things that made her good at her work.
“Maybe you should ask Miss Zula directly,” John said. “I can’t read the woman’s mind.”
“I can,” said Rob.
John sent his brother an irritated look, but Rob was unconcerned.
“Well, then,” said Angie. “Enlighten me.”
“It’s simple. Miss Zula’s main joy in life is throwing people who interest her together, just to see what happens. A year down the line there’ll be a new short story in
The New Yorker
or
Harper’s,
unless you and Caroline disappoint her by getting along.”
The New Yorker
or
Harper’s,
unless you and Caroline disappoint her by getting along.”
“I like Caroline just fine,” said Angie. “You’re saying that while we’re filming Miss Zula, she’ll be taking notes on us?”
Rob said, “That’s not it, exactly. She does get most of her stories from watching people, but she’s not likely to make it obvious enough to identify you.”
“Unless you’re Button Ogilvie,” said Kai.
“Zula hasn’t buttoned anybody for years,” said John. “You’d really have to be on her bad side to get that kind of attention.”
“I’ll bite,” said Angie. “Who is Button Ogilvie, and what did she do of such great significance that she’s been transformed into a verb by Zula Bragg?”
“It’s an old family feud,” said Rob. “Button Ogilvie is big on revisionist history, and Miss Zula finally struck back by writing Button into a novel—”
“Miss Callie,” said Angie, and a look of understanding came over her face, her eyes bright as she put things together and then filed them away for further reference. “Miss Callie is Button Ogilvie? Oh, it must have been fun, when
Sweet-Bitter
came out. Who else has been buttoned? I’m interested.”
Sweet-Bitter
came out. Who else has been buttoned? I’m interested.”
“Nobody still living,” said John. “These days you won’t really recognize any of her characters as real people.”
Kai gave a high, hooting laugh. “I recognized John,” she said. “She called him Harvey Carson and he ran a family shoe factory in Mississippi.”
Very calmly John said, “Harvey Carson was not based on me.”
Angie sat up straighter, looking disturbingly pleased with the turn in the conversation, and with Kai. “
Dollar Short,
right? Came out two years ago? Of course you’re Harvey Carson,” she said to John. “First son of the local gentry sets up the ideal life for himself and discovers perfection is overrated. Or maybe you haven’t got to that last part yet?” She took a swallow of coffee and looked at him over the rim of the cup.
Dollar Short,
right? Came out two years ago? Of course you’re Harvey Carson,” she said to John. “First son of the local gentry sets up the ideal life for himself and discovers perfection is overrated. Or maybe you haven’t got to that last part yet?” She took a swallow of coffee and looked at him over the rim of the cup.
John met her gaze and felt the shock of it before he looked away again, this time at Kai. “I am not Harvey Carson. Harvey Carson falls in love with his sister’s husband. Are you saying I’m gay and don’t know it?”
Kai lifted a shoulder. “Angie would be a better person to ask, I think.”
“No,” Angie said calmly. “He’s not gay. But he might be in love with his brother’s wife.”
John felt himself flushing. “Hell no. Sorry, Kai, but no.”
Kai smiled. “I am not offended. Are you offended, Rob? Your brother isn’t in love with me.”
Rob winked at Angie. “I always had better taste. And anyway, that’s the story where the sister is too weak to stand up for her husband when he needs her most. Obviously not me and Kai. So you’re free and clear, John, you can’t be Harvey.”
“Great. Now can we change the subject?” John asked.
Kai said, “I have a question,” and the knot in John’s gut pulled tighter. But then there was no harm in Kai and a great deal of kindness, and he liked her for her own sake as much as for Rob’s.
He said, “You always do, darlin’. What is it?”
“I would like to know why your relationship with Angie failed.”
He heard himself draw in a sharp breath. Angie blinked in surprise.
“And here I was just thinking what a good sister-in-law you’ve been to me. Sorry, but I can’t answer that question.”
Kai’s gaze shifted to Angie and he added: “And neither can Angeline.”
“I can’t?” said Angie.
“You choose not to.”
“I do?”
“Here we go,” said Rob, reaching for more coffee.
Angie put down her cup and crossed her arms so that her hands rested on her shoulders, and she gave him a long, considering look. “I’d like to hear what you have to say about this, Harvey.”
“Oh, good,” said Kai cheerfully. “I also.”
“Me, too,” said Rob.
“You see?” said Kai. “We all want to hear.”
“Rob was correcting your English,” said John. “ ‘Me too’ instead of ‘I also.’ He was giving you the more colloquial usage.”
“No I wasn’t,” Rob said. “I do want to hear.”
John took a breath, looked from Kai’s intense expression to Rob’s amused one, weighed the possibility of further evasion, and gave in. “Our relationship ended because Angie felt our goals and priorities were too different.”
“Now see,” Angie said, “I’d say it had more to do with the fact that I dyed my hair blue to go meet your grandfather Grant.”
John studied the crumbs on his plate before he let himself look up. “The color of your hair was—is—irrelevant. That was just your way of forcing a confrontation.”
To Kai, Angie said, “I just didn’t fit in. His grandfather Grant hated me.”
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