Willow (28 page)

I
couldn't help but want to ride the waves of his love.
It carried us both to his bed, where we were soon entwined, naked, holding onto each other as tightly as two people being carried off in a hurricane. Afterward, like two exhausted swimmers who had reached the safety of the shore, we lay quietly beside each other. He fell asleep, and then I rose, got dressed quietly, and returned to my room.
Suddenly, I felt guilty, and not because I had made love to him again. It was more of a selfchastisement over losing direction. purpose. It was the wrong time to fall in love. I was like a teenage girl passing notes in class to the boy on whom she had developed this great crush when the teacher notices and gets angry that she wasn't paying attention to the lesson... only
I
was the teacher.
Nothing could have brought it home to me more than what I saw after
I
got undressed for bed and went to the balcony door to close the curtain.
There she was again.
My mother.
On the dock, swinging her lantern in the night.
Looking for the dream she had been promised.

14
Painted into a Corner
.
Thatcher left a message for me in the morning

that he had to go to a negotiation at an office in Jupiter Beach and would call me later in the day. Just like yesterday, after I had breakfast and came downstairs. I found the house empty and quiet. Bunny and Asher had apparently had another one of their late nights. How people could spend so much of their lives going from one party or recreational activity to another without ever doing very much that was substantial was a mystery to me. Weren't they ever tired of seeing the same people, saying the same things, eating the same food? I bet neither Asher nor Bunny had ever gone into the kitchen and made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. With service people everywhere, servants coming out of the woodwork, and business managers handling every single financial concern, what did they do for themselves beside seek ways to be entertained? It was not hard to see why one of the most feared things here was boredom,

Still. I knew lots of people who would say. "Give me the chance to be frivolous. I'll risk fighting boredom as the biggest challenge of my life any day." Who knows. I wondered, maybe they were right and I was wrong. Maybe the rest of us were like the mythical Sisyphus, pushing boulders up a steep hill only to have them roll back down whenever we got too close to the top. We were cursed with endless ambition. The only ambition Bunny and Asher seemed to have was finding a new caterer for their upcoming weekend extravaganza.

I was nervous this morning. I hadn't told Thatcher that I had agreed to go sailing with Linden to his private bay. I was sure he would have been upset enough not only to insist
I
didn't go but to speak to Linden as well, and that would only have made things terrible just when I was succeeding in entering our mother's world. I really had no choice if I wanted to continue to win his trust.

He hadn't forgotten. He was waiting for me, and not in a pair of old jeans and a well-worn sweatshirt; he was actually wearing what looked like a relatively new sailing outfit, including a cap.
I
sensed that this wasn't something he did often. His smile of anticipation set off the wind chimes in my head, little alarms of panic.

"Everything we need is already in the sailboat." he called as I started toward him. "And what a beautiful day. Perfect sailing wind. I brought along lunch. too. I thought you might enjoy doing
something different," he said, nodding toward the house and adding. "different from that. It's just something simple,: he said when I didn't react. 'Good bread, cheeses, some wine.
If
you don't want to, it's all right,' he followed, practically leaping on my small hesitation.
"I
just thought you might like it."

"No, no, it's fine. Linden.
I
just didn't want
to
dominate your day,'"
"Dominate my day?" He laughed. "I don't think of days anymore, or weeks or months. Time just seems to run together for me. My mother usually has to remind me what day it is, sometimes even what month."
We stopped on the dock.
"Well, here she is my yacht." he said. It's nothing at all like the speedboat Thatcher was driving. This is just a twelve-foot, gaff-rigged wooden sailboat. All that's left of the Montgomery navy, I'm afraid."
It didn't look all that much bigger than a rowboat to me. "Is it safe to go out far with it?" I asked,
"The Vikings crossed the Atlantic in a boat not much more than twice the size of this. I'm a good sailor,: he added. "Better than Thatcher.
I
grew up here on this beach, on this ocean, while he was enjoying the high life, but if you don't feel as safe with me as you felt with him, that's fine. Forget it." he said abruptly.
He was so explosive, like a decanter of nitroglycerin just waiting to be nudged off the table so it could hit the floor and blow up everything around it. One wrong word, one wrong expression, even a sigh in the wrong place, could send him pounding away, his head down, his arms flying up like some hermit charmed out of his cave rushing back to the safety of his silent darkness.
"No, no," I said quickly. "I have no doubt you're a wonderful sailor. I was just curious. I don't know anything about sailing.'
"If you don't know anything about sailing, then how do you know I'm wonderful at it?" he asked.
I shook my head and smiled at him.
"What?"
"Let's just say I'm psychic and leave it alone. Linden."
Even he had to smile at that. "Okay, okay." he said. "Let's go, then."
I looked at the beach house. "Your mother knows I'm going along with you, doesn't she?"
He gazed at the house. his eves darkening a bit and his forehead going into thoughtful folds.
"Yes," he said. "Let's go." he repeated more sharply.
He stepped into the boat and held his hand out to guide me.
"You can sit right there," he said. nodding. "This is a simple, one-man operation. You can just enjoy the trip."
"What did she say?"
"Who?"
"Your mother.
I
suppose you told her everything, then, my posing for the picture as well, right?"
He was quiet as he untied the boat and then pushed off and hoisted the sail.
My question hung in the air like a fallen leaf caught in the wind.
"I didn't tell her about the painting, no." he finally replied. "She really took to you yesterday. I thought."
"What do you mean, you thought? Did she or didn't she?"
"I asked her about you right after you had spoken with her."
"And?"
"She smiled in a way
I
haven't seen her smile in a long time and said, 'She's very nice.' She even asked about you."
"She did? Like what?"
"How long you were staying with the Eatons. I told her I didn't know for sure. Then..."
"Then what?"
He sat at the rudder. "Then I mentioned I was taking you sailing today, and she became upset."
"Really? Why was she upset?"
"I don't know.
I
asked her if there was anything wrong, and she just shook her head and went to her room. She didn't talk about it anymore. so
I
didn't.
I
think she's just worried I'll get involved with someone and leave her," he offered. "I wouldn't." he added quickly. "I mean. I'd get involved with someone. but I wouldn't leave her.
"Here we go." he cried as the wind filled the sail.
Of course, it wasn't anywhere as fast as it was with Thatcher on the speedboat, but being this close to the water, getting the spray in my face, feeling the wind, and bouncing on the waves, it was just as exciting, if not more so.
Linden did look at home on the sea. His whole demeanor changed. His face filled with a glow, and his eyes picked up the blue of the water and the sky. He no longer looked as fragile and no longer looked depressed or forlorn. He was energized and alive, and that change had a good effect on me.
I never realized how beautiful it was to sail, to feel the water beneath us, the wind in my hair, the breeze caressing my face. I couldn't help but squeal with delight when he made a turn so sharply that the boat seemed ready to tip and just hung in the air for a few seconds before righting itself and bouncing on.
He laughed at my reactions,
"Give me a sailboat any day," he shouted. over a multimillion-dollar motorized yacht. This way, you're part of the process. You're connected. Understand?"
"Yes," I said.
He smiled,
"I
thought you would. I knew you would."
He looked so pleased, as much with himself as with me. and I wondered when he had last felt this way. It wasn't a bad thing I was doing, being with him, giving him some companionship, helping him enjoy things he should have no problem enjoying every day, was it? I wasn't wrong.
Silence,
I told the chimes in my head.
Stop the alarms,I'll be fine. We'll be fine. There's nothing wrong with this, no danger.
I
sat back and laughed. "Look," I cried, pointing to a pair of male waterskiers. They waved at us and turned to send the spray in our direction.
"A couple of showoffs," Linden shouted in their direction, even though there was no way they could possibly hear him.
We saw speedboats and dozens of other sailboats. He pointed out a luxury liner.
"Probably going to the Fort Lauderdale pier," he said, raising his voice again. The wind played havoc with our voices, but settling back, feeling myself being swept along. I didn't want to hear anything but the wind and the boat on the water and the cry of terns. He pointed vigorously at a small inlet as he turned the sailboat in its direction. It was caught between two well-combed beaches but hidden by rocks and the way it was carved deeply out of the shoreline.
"Linden Beach," he called, and laughed.
Minutes later, we were at the shore. He hopped out, beached the boat, and reached up to take me at the waist. I had my shoes off and expected to wade in, but he showed remarkable strength in those lean arms and carried me to dry land instead, his lips practically grazing my cheek.
"Isn't it beautiful here?" "Yes,"
I
said.
"We'll set up by those rocks there," he indicated, and returned to the boat to get his things.
"Need any help?"
"No, I'm fine. Relax. Just enjoy it."
I liked the feel of the cool water and sand on my feet. Some curious terns swooped down to get a better look at us and then veered away, sounding as if they were laughing. I placed my sandals on the rocks and watched him set up his easel and then go back to the boat for the rest of his things. He handed me the paper bag holding the clothes I had worn for posing the day before.
We both instantly realized there wasn't any place for me to have privacy, not for some distance.
"Oh. Well. I'll keep my back to you," he said. As far as those people go," he said, gesturing toward the other boats in the sea. "they're too far away to make head or tail of it. Is that all right?"
"Yes," I said.
I
unbuttoned my blouse and slipped it off. He knelt and leaned over his paints and brushes while I continued to change into the skirt and peasant blouse.
"Ready,"
I
said, and he turned, smiled, and explained where he wanted me to sit.
"How can you paint me in two different places?" I asked.
"The background isn't important. You're what's important." he replied.
I
took the same position and gazed around the cove. It did look untouched. But how could it remain undisturbed in the midst of one of the world's most developed water playgrounds?
"How come this place is undiscovered?" I asked.
"It's not exactly undiscovered. It was just left undeveloped by the original owner of the estate inland from here. I'm sure it won't be like this too much longer.
I
heard he's died and the family is dividing the spoils. Won't surprise me to see a hotel built over there soon. Ready?"
"Ready? I don't have much to do."
"Sure you do. Look out at the sea and hold that beautiful pose," he said. "In other words, relax and be yourself"
I waited until he had been working for a good fifteen or so minutes before speaking.
"What makes you so positive your mother was upset about your taking me sailing. Linden?"
"I know when my mother is upset about something. We've been so close, half the time I can tell her moods even before she can Stop worrying about it. She'll be fine when she sees I'm coming back and not sailing off into the sunset with the first beautiful young woman who talks to me." he added.
"How does she spend most of her day?"
"She reads, watches a little television, very little, and takes care of me and the house. It's plenty. I never heard her say she was bored."
"She never goes anywhere?"
"Nope."
"Not even to a movie or a restaurant?"
He paused.
"I'm sorry," I said quickly. "I don't mean to break your concentration."
"It's all right. No, my mother is quite introverted, as. I suppose, am I. It doesn't mean we're mentally ill," he added pointedly. "I do what shopping we need to have done. We're fine."
"She doesn't have any old friends who call or come around?"
He laughed. "Old friends? Hardly. She was persona non grata even before she had her problems. You can imagine how it was when she returned." He thought a moment, "There was someone who came around once."
"Who?"
"Someone from the place she had been at when she needed treatment," he said, and started working again.
"You mean, like her doctor?" I held my breath. Had my father paid her a visit after all?
"No, not her doctor. Doctors don't take that much interest in you once you're no longer their responsibility and they can no longer earn money from your troubles," he said bitterly.
"Then who? Was it another patient from the clinic?"
"Might have been. yes. My mother didn't want to tell me much about her. but I remember it wasn't a very pleasant visit. When she left, my mother went into a rather deep depression. It lasted days, matter of fact. So maybe she was better off not renewing old friendships. huh?"
"Could it have been a nurse from the clinic?" He shrugged.
"Maybe.
I
don't know.
I
thought it might have been some kind of follow-up visit, but my mother insisted it wasn't, and
I
never saw the woman come around again.
I
knew she wasn't from Palm Beach, that was for sure. I remember she had an unusual name... Nadine.
I
don't hear that name often. Do you?"
"No."
Nadine Gordon, I thought. The nurse who suspected, the one Dr. Price thought had a crush on my father. She had come here, but why?
"Look at that," he said, pointing to the sky. A plane was spewing some advertisement by writing it in dry ice or something across the magnificent blue, "Pollution, even up there. Fm surprised the kings and queens of Palm Beach don't complain. It's crass commercialization of their air space. I guess everything's for sale: everything has a price."
He returned to his painting as if it were a true avenue of escape from the reality around him lie despised so much.
I
watched him lose himself in his work again, his face tightening with the intensity of his efforts. I said nothing more, afraid to break his concentration. Nearly twenty minutes later, he seemed to realize he had been in his own world and came up out of it like something rising from the sea before us, exploding out of the water. He looked surprised at his own accomplishments.
"Wow. You've been a great model." He studied his work in progress and nodded. "Yes, you have." he said, and turned back to me. "You know how you realize you have a great model?"
"How?"
"It's when you get so lost in the moment, in the artistic inspiration, that you don't even realize the model is there.
I
know that sounds silly or
contradictory, but it's as if I see beyond you, within you, into your very heart and soul, and for that period of time, everything else ceases to exist for me. It just flows from you to me or through me to the canvas. Understand?"
"I think so. yes,"
I
said It sounds very exciting, at least for you."
It has been. Thank you." He put his brush down and came beside me, folding his legs and sitting. Then he took a deep breath, enjoying the air. I laughed at his exuberance, and he smiled at me.
"This is the sort of day that happens so rarely in a lifetime, a day filled with so much special feeling, you can't ever forget it or duplicate it Every moment doesn't have to be similar to the one before it, but it often seems like that, doesn't it? At least, it does for me. It's only when I work or get the opportunity to meet someone like you and get you into my work that I rise above the mediocrity.
"Gosh, listen to me mouthing off like this," he said, catching his breath and realizing how much he had said. "I'm sorry"
"No, it's nice. It's like being invited into a special place, an artist's world, seeing and feeling everything the way he does, at least for a moment or two Thank you for sharing it," I said.
He stared at me. "You're remarkable," he said. "It's as if you came out of one of my dreams, my fantasies-- just appeared, sort of like a kindred spirit. You feel that, too, don't you?"
I was at a loss for words, for a way to slip out of this far too emotional moment, but he mistook my silence for agreement and brought his lips toward mine.
As if the air between us was filled with shocking electricity. I pulled back and away from him abruptly. He was caught, committed, exposed, his desire naked, and that filled his face with blood so fast I thought the top of his head would explode. It instantly retreated, forming deep white patches of anger and disappointment at the corners of his lips.
"Am I that distasteful?" he asked. infuriated.
"No, no," I said. "I was just taken by such surprise."
"Right. I forgot. You're becoming Thatcher Eaton's latest amusement, off-limits to the likes of someone like me." He pushed himself to his feet,
"No, Linden. I'm no one's amusement."
"Oh, no, you're in control of everything. Just like all the others he's paraded through that house and taken to his bedroom." He paused and looked down at me. "You have been to his bedroom already, haven't you?"
"That's not really something I'd like to discuss. Linden."
"Of course not he said, darkening his eyes, eyes that seemed to know all the wicked and tricky ways of the world,