You Don't Love This Man (17 page)
Read You Don't Love This Man Online
Authors: Dan Deweese
“That's all right. I've quit, too.”
“You never started.” She studied the rows of cars parked in the lot before us. Beads of mist were collecting on the windshields, but the scuffed and dusty bumpers were still dry. “So when you talked to Miranda, did she tell you where she was?”
“No. But I didn't just talk to her on the phone. I met her for lunch, too.”
“What?” she said. “Why didn't you say that before?”
“Because she sat down at the restaurant for a few minutes, asked a few questions about our marriage, said she was going to the bathroom, and then snuck out the back door of the restaurant. She sent me a text message.” I opened my phone, found the message, and showed it to Sandra. “What do you think that means? It doesn't sound good to me.”
“I don't know,” she said. “All text messages sound like that. What did she want to know about our marriage?”
“That wasn't clear,” I said. “But look, this morning you said Miranda didn't come home last night, and you acted like it was something I should be taking care of. So I found her. But I still don't know what's going on.”
At first Sandra looked at me without any expression at all, but then she shrugged. “You're right,” she said, as if I'd made a point of such commonsensical persuasiveness that it had returned her to her senses. “It wasn't fair of me to ask you to spend your day tracking her down. Did you even get to eat lunch? The little bar at the back of the lobby has sandwiches and things. I'll talk to Miranda when she gets here. There's no need for you to worry about it anymore.”
She was managing me. I thought I was managing her, and she thought she was managing me. And when Miranda had asked about control issues between married couples earlier in the day, I had responded using the past tense. “I might get lunch,” I said. “But I don't think I'm going to stop worrying about Miranda. I'm having to call her with other people's phones, and she's disappearing out back doors. I'm not a stranger or some visiting cousin. I'm
her father, and I'd like to know why she's so upset. I'm going to track Grant down so I can ask him what's going on, but if you can save me time by telling me what you know, that would be helpful.”
“I'm the one who suggested you talk to Grant in the first place,” she said. “This morning, on the phone. I've told you I don't know anything more than you do.”
“At the restaurant, before she left, Miranda said she had talked to you about âit.' She didn't say what âit' was, but it seemed like it was something specific.”
“I'm sure it was,” she said angrily. “But I talk to Miranda every day, about all sorts of things. I'm sorry I don't know what she was thinking about when you saw her at lunch, but I wasn't in her mind then.”
“I'm not accusing you of anything.”
“Then why are you interrogating me? You're acting like I know what's bothering her, even though you're the one who has seen her, not me. I can't tell if you're acting this way because you're trying to help our daughter, or if you're just creating some kind of drama so that you can be the good guy in it.”
“Miranda isn't worried about her relationship with us, Sandra. She's worried about Grant. And if we knew what was going on, we could help her, or at least know whether she needs us or not. I feel like there's a piece missing somewhere. And I don't like this feeling.”
“I'm sorry you feel that way,” she said. “But I don't think you have to investigate all of these things today, Paul. We're not prosecuting a case here. We're just trying to make sure she's okay. Have you talked to Grant?”
“No. He's been busy with his friends from out of town. They're
guys he knows professionally, I thinkâpeople he's made money with.”
“So if they're business types, try the country club. Or go by his condo. That's where he entertains, isn't it?” She tossed her cigarette to the sidewalk, and it rolled over the curb and into the gutter, from where it sent up a last, sad curl of smoke. “This is your friend, not mine.”
I didn't know how to respond to thatâthere was more than one element in the statement that I felt like disputing. So I said nothing, while Sandra looked again at the sky, standing there alone in her jeans and T-shirt by the sliding glass entrance doors, her hair done and her face set. The breeze picked up, and it began to rain harder. I was close enough to the edge of the overhead roof that I felt some chilled drops hit my arms and neck.
“Call me if you find out anything,” Sandra said. The lobby doors slid open as she walked toward and then through them. When they closed, she disappeared behind the wobbling, canted reflections in their glass: the cars in the lot, the trees swaying in the breeze, and behind and above them all, the sky gone gray and cold.
A
S THE ELEVATOR IN
Grant's building carried me upward with a whir of motors and mechanics, I wondered if I was making a mistake. I had called him on my way over, at least, and had asked if he was at home, and whether I could stop by for a few minutes. “Of course,” he had said. “Should I fix you a drink?”
“Just a beer would be fine,” I told him.
“I'll leave the door open.”
He lived in a tenth-floor condo in a neighborhood just north of downtown, which only a handful of years before had been blocks of run-down and forgotten five-and six-story warehouses. Developers had gotten hold of the warehouses, though, and remodeled them into expensive lofts with polished concrete floors, track lighting, marble countertops, and stainless steel appliances, and when they had run out of authentic warehouses, they bought up the adjacent square miles of abandoned rail yards and open land that stretched down to the river. Eighty years earlier, stables had
housed hundreds of draft horses on the land, but now the developers had put in new buildings designed to look as if they, too, were rehabbed warehouses, and in the space of a few short years had created a whole new section of city from almost nothing, complete with parks and fountains, restaurants, banks, upscale clothing and gardening stores, designer eyeglass shops, and at least one business that provided nothing but specially designed stalls in which residents washed and dried and kissed their dogs.
But it had been on an evening almost two years earlierâI had been happily anticipating the arrival of a vodka tonic I had ordered at Prosperity, a new restaurant in Grant's neighborhood that featured a lone orchid in a white bud vase at the center of each linen-covered table, and a wine list that ran to fifteen pagesâwhen I felt a pair of hands settle on my shoulders. Sandra has a weary tight-lipped smile she gives to only one person and when I saw that look on her face, I knew who the hands belonged to even before I turned to look up.
“Always a pleasure to run into old friends,” Grant said. His khaki pants and knit polo shirt suggested a just-completed round of golf, and although Labor Day was a fading memoryâthrough the restaurant's tall windows, I saw an occasional yellow-orange leaf flutter to the ground from the maples along the streetâGrant was as tan as if it were midsummer. I asked if he'd been traveling, and he admitted he'd just spent four days alone on a beach on Maui. It was a reward he'd given himself for finishing a big project, he said.
“Alone on Maui?” Sandra said. “Have you run out of places to chase women in our own state?”
Grant's smile didn't falter, but neither did he manage to respond before Sandra, who seemed as surprised by the comment as any of us, said: “That didn't come out the way I meant it.”
“Is there an event of some sort this evening?” Grant asked. I'm sure he was wondering why he should encounter Sandra and me sitting together in a restaurant. When I told him it was Miranda's twenty-third birthday, and that she was supposed to arrive any minute, he seemed stunned. “She's twenty-three? Are you sure?”
“Fairly sure,” Sandra said.
“This is a family occasion, then.”
“But you qualify,” I said. “Sit down with us.”
“No, no,” he said, “but wish her a happy birthday. I'll catch up with you another time.” And still smiling, he wished us a good evening and headed back across the room and behind the wall that divided the dining room from the bar.
“I didn't think what I said was
that
bad,” Sandra said.
“I don't think he cared,” I said.
“Then why didn't he sit down?”
“He probably thought we were just being courteous.”
Sandra raised her eyebrows. “Finicky, finicky,” she said.
Miranda arrived a few minutes later. I was facing the entrance when she did, and watched her step through the front door and peer into the room with an expression of bemusement, as if playing a game of hide-and-seek. When she caught sight of my raised hand, she smiled, as if pleased that she had won the game. As she crossed the room at a brisk pace, I noticed a number of peopleâmen and women alikeâlook up at this young woman in loose black slacks and a red silk Chinese blouse. Her cheeks were flushed nearly as crimson as her blouse, and she sighed dramatically as she leaned down to hug her mother and kiss me on the cheek. “I'm sorry I'm late,” she said, shaking her head as if dazed. “It's been a weird day. I just got a new job.”
Only a year removed from finishing her undergraduate
degree in liberal studies, she had spent the previous six months as a filing clerk at a law firm whose senior partner, Eli Bernhardt, was an account holder at my branch. When I told him my daughter was out of college and looking for a job, he had offered to take her on without so much as an interview, but Miranda had quickly assured me the work was dullâ“soul-sucking,” she called it. So there in the restaurant, while carefully adjusting the two black enamel sticks she was using to keep her hair up, she told us how a woman had come into the firm that morning, and that unlike most clients, who were fidgety and anxious while waiting, this woman had been well dressed, relaxed, and composed, and had actually had a conversation with Miranda instead of just chatting in her direction. It turned out the woman owned an art gallery, and used the law firm to help her write contracts with artists and collectors. While she spent a few minutes in the reception area waiting for her lawyer, she told Miranda she was looking for a “gallerina” for her galleryâa hostess who would welcome people when they came in the door, answer their questions, handle the telephone, and do some general office work. “I thought about it for a couple hours, and it sounded a lot more fun than working at the law firm,” Miranda said, “so I called her this afternoon and asked if I could interview, and she said I should stop by after work. And then she offered me the job as soon as we finished the interview.”
“But do you even know anything about art?” Sandra said.
“She said I would pick everything up soon enough. And now, here I am.”
Sandra looked at me as if it were my turn to say something. “I assume you've given Mr. Bernhardt two weeks' notice,” I said.
“I've never seen Mr. Bernhardt in the office, Dad. I asked my
actual supervisor if he wanted two weeks, but he said Gina had already talked to him about it on the phone, and they have temps and assistants who can cover. So I start tomorrow.”
“What's the name of the gallery?” Sandra said.
“That's the other thing. As soon as she saw my full name on my résumé, she asked if you were my parents, and when I said yes, she said she knew you. Her name is Gina Crivelli.”
I tried to recall any occasion during the years I had known her on which Gina had expressed an interest in art or owning a gallery, but I came up with nothing. Sandra laughed with what sounded, to my surprise, like genuine pleasure.
“Why are you laughing?” Miranda said.
“I'm just surprised,” Sandra said. “Gina is an old girlfriend of your father's. And of Grant's, too.”
“She was a girlfriend of yours
and
of Grant's?”
“You should see if she's still single,” Sandra said to me. She had taken to making occasional comments like that over the years, as if we were buddies. I could never tell if her tone signaled earnest encouragement, though, or if it was closer to the tone police use when making jokes over a homicide.
“He's here tonight, too,” I said.
“Who?” Miranda said. “Grant? For my birthday?”
“It's a coincidence,” I said. “He's in the bar.”
No sooner had I completed the statement than Miranda stood and headed in that direction. And a minute later, she emerged from the bar leading Grant by the elbow through the maze of tables, while he did his best not to spill his drink. “He tried to resist, but I wouldn't let him,” she said as she pulled out the fourth chair at our table and pushed Grant into it. I saw Grant no more than once every five or six months in those yearsâat the occasional birthday
gathering, holiday party, or similar social eventâand I had never once seen Miranda handle him that way. “If the birthday girl gives the command, I guess you have to follow it,” he said.
“I just got some gossip on you and Dad,” Miranda said. “And I want to grill you about it. Do you remember Gina Crivelli?”
The same puzzled look passed over Grant's face that had appeared when he heard about Miranda's birthday. “This city gets smaller every year,” he said.
“She hired me to work at her gallery. And Mom says Gina went out with each of you at some point.”
“That was a long time ago,” Grant said.
“Did she break up with one of you to go out with the other?” Miranda said, pressing her palm to her cheek in an expression of mock horror. She may have felt she was allowed more leeway on her birthday than usual, or maybe she was still energized from getting a new job in just one day, but either way, she seemed perfectly comfortable and greatly entertained by her aggressive questioning. When I assured her that I dated Gina in college and Grant dated her a couple years later, and that regardless, these things had happened almost a quarter century ago, in a past so distant as to be almost prehistory, she laughed. “Oh, Dad,” she said. “She broke up with you, didn't she?”
“Why do you say that?”
“I can tell from your explanation. And what about you?” she asked Grant. “Who broke up with whom?”
His expression went blank. “I'm sure I don't remember.”
She studied him. “You broke up with her.”
“You don't know that,” he said.
“You guys give yourselves away,” she said.
“Miranda, this is not particularly elegant,” Sandra said.
“Should we ask about
your
personal life? Are you seeing anyone lately? Any interesting dates?”
Whether Sandra was stopping Miranda out of dinner-conversation politeness or due to some other motivation was unclear, but the question was effective: Miranda's face clouded, and her shoulders dropped in annoyance. “Not really, Mother, no.”
“No dates at all? No one we should know about?”
“No. No one you should know about. And I get it. You can stop any time.”
“Then I'm done, darling.” Sandra refilled Miranda's wineglass, and as often happens when I watch them speak to each other, I sensed that they were communicating through a series of tones and gestures too subtle for me to fully understand. I also knew that if I were to ask either of them about it later, they would profess to have no idea what I was talking about.
“And what has our old girlfriend hired you to do?” Grant asked.
“I'm a host. I say hello when you walk in the door, and I ask if you have questions, and I answer the phone when it rings.”
“But will you still be able to read novels on the clock, like you do at the law firm?” he said. He suggested she was underestimating the importance of that perk, and as we were served our appetizers and the meal proceeded, he continued controlling the conversation until he had guided it into breezier territory. The warm, day's-end light that had suffused the room at the beginning of the meal slowly dimmed, and we found ourselves a little party of four at a candlelit table. We had a bottle of wine, and then another, and then ordered a third as Sandra complained about eccentric clients at the interior design firm she worked at, and Miranda pretended to help by suggesting ridiculous room themes: she described a bed
room of nothing but leopard prints, a dusty reading room presided over by a mannequin dressed as a spinster librarian, a kitchen with a variety of microwaves but no oven, and a handful of other fantasy propositions. I expected Grant to play along, but he seemed content to do little more than smile and listen until dinner was finished, at which time he placed his napkin on the table, thanked us for inviting him, and wished Miranda a happy birthday. When I told him we were planning on dessert, too, and he should stay, he shook his head. “I've enjoyed this, but I should go,” he said. He shook my hand, patted Miranda and Sandra on the shoulder, and then returned to the bar. It was only a few minutes later that we saw him through the restaurant's windows as he moved down the sidewalk and then passed out of view. It wasn't until after dessert, when I asked for the check, that the waiter informed me the bill had been taken care of.
Sandra shook her head angrily. “He shouldn't have done that.”
“He was being nice,” Miranda said. “For my birthday.”
“I know,” Sandra said. “But he shouldn't have done that.”
And now, less than two years later, I had driven through that same neighborhoodâand right past that very restaurantâon my way to Grant's building. I had expected the streets to be lively, but the lingering storm clouds and the overriding sense of clean and seamless functionality in the neighborhood had combined to produce a surprising degree of order and quiet. Grant hadn't asked why I was stopping by, or what I needed, or how long I would be there, but that didn't surprise meâhe wasn't inquisitive in that way, and especially not on the phone. He was used to peopleâemployees and clients especially, but probably just about anyone who knew himâcoming to him with problems. The exquisite courtesy he had developed over the years, in fact, was probably
not only a way of being respectful toward people, but also a defense against them. Grant certainly believed that it was more productive to speak about a problem face-to-faceâhe had said that to me more than once over the yearsâbut he also seemed the type who not only hates emotional phone conversations, but dislikes the phone in general. And here I was, on the day of his wedding, calling him on the phone with a problem. Did he have a tight schedule that I was intruding on? I had no idea. And I also knew that even if the answer to that question was yes, he would tell me it was no.