Brass Ring

by Diane Chamberlain

  She was still squirming over the lie as she got into her car and drove down the driveway to the main road. She should not have involved Amelia. By tossing Amelia into the story, she was making it seem as though being with Randy was wrong in and of itself.

  And it couldn’t be wrong. She wished she could tell Jon that Randy wasn’t the cause of her problems. Rather, in a way she couldn’t explain, she felt certain that he was the cure. This sort of clandestine meeting, though, couldn’t become the norm. She would have to find a way to occasionally spend time with Randy without hurting Jon in the process.

  Randy had asked her if she could drive tonight; his car was in the shop. She followed his directions to the row of town houses in McLean, a few blocks from the little theater, and pulled into the space in front of number 167. The parking lot was well lit, and she could see that the town houses were quite stunning. Randy had told her they were only five years old, but their weathered-brick exteriors gave them a soft, mellowed appearance. Number 167 stood fully in the glow of one of the parking lot lights. It was built of faded white brick. The shutters were black and the door, red. Wintergreen azalea bushes graced the small front yard, and she wondered what color they would bloom in the spring.

  She was at the top of his brick steps, about to lift the brass knocker, when he opened the door.

  “Almost ready.” He smiled. “Come in.”

  She stepped into the small living room, which was filled cozily with heavy, dark antique furniture.

  She took off her coat, and he slipped his arm around her for a brief hug. His beard softly brushed her cheek. “Haven’t seen you in too long,” he said. “You look good.”

  “Thanks.” She smiled with a sense of safety she hadn’t felt since the last time she’d stood in his arms.

  “I’ll be back in a second,” he said, heading for the stairs. “Make yourself at home.”

  She sat down on the plush, pillow-laden sofa and studied the room. A black-and-beige Oriental carpet nearly covered the hardwood floor. The corner near the fireplace was dominated by a huge, dark, rolltop desk, open to expose dozens of drawers and shelves and compartments. Any visible papers were neatly arranged. In fact, despite the riot of furniture and fabric, a sense of order enveloped the room.

  The walls were thick with paintings, all Hudson River Valley-style with their dark and haunting images of thick trees and black water. On the mantel, though, were a few decidedly contemporary framed photographs. Claire walked over to the hearth. Two of the pictures were of the same boy—Cary, no doubt. One had been taken at the age of six or seven, the other at nine or ten. He had Randy’s blue eyes and a tentative smile. The third photograph was the family portrait she had given him from Margot’s room. It was in a different frame, however, a brass frame warmed by the sepia tone of the photograph. The image of the gawky-looking, dark-haired boy who stood apart from his family made her smile with a tenderness she hadn’t felt the last time she’d seen the picture.

  They talked about dancing as they drove to The Castle, a club he said he and LuAnne had once visited in Rosslyn. He loved to dance, he said. It was the performer in him. LuAnne, though, would have preferred almost any other activity, and so they hadn’t gone dancing very often.

  The dance floor was large and uncrowded, and the music was provided by a DJ who played an eclectic mix of Glen Miller, Eric Clapton, Billy Ray Cyrus, and some loud and unrecognizable disco music. Randy taught her the Texas two-step and a few other dances that had either been invented or reincarnated during her last twenty danceless years.

  He hadn’t lied about enjoying the performance aspect of dancing. Randy had no inhibitions whatsoever, and after a few shy, stiff moments, Claire let herself be swept into the freedom he offered her on the dance floor.

  As the evening wore on, the music grew progressively slower. The lights dimmed, and the dancers paid less attention to the steps and more attention to one another. Randy held her as they moved smoothly around the floor, but there was nothing suggestive in his touch, nothing insistent in the press of his thigh against hers, and that relieved her, let her relax. He held her hand on his chest, but he didn’t stroke her fingers, nor did he shift his other hand from the small of her back. He didn’t nuzzle her temple, like other dancers were doing. It felt so good to be holding a man this way, though. Standing. Moving. She didn’t want to let go, ever, and she was disappointed when he broke the spell by talking.

  “Let’s see if the DJ has ‘Let Me Call You Sweetheart,’” he said.

  She couldn’t tell if he was teasing. “No, thanks,” she said. “And I’m sure he doesn’t.”

  “Seriously. What if he does? It might—”

  She shook her head. “Forget it.”

  “It’d be perfect if he did. You could flow with the feelings, Claire. See where they lead. You ran away from them too quickly in the store.”

  “I was going to pass out.”

  “Well, if you pass out, I’ll be right here to pick you up.”

  She felt hot tears. “You don’t know how bad it feels,” she said.

  He tightened his arm around her. “All right,” he said. “You win.”

  She was almost disappointed that he let it go. She longed to know the source of her discomfort, but she didn’t yet have the courage to let him push her without pushing back.

  “Well, whether he has your favorite little ditty or not, the DJ’s done a great job with the music selection tonight,” Randy said.

  “Yes,” she said, breathing more easily now that the danger had passed. “A little bit of everything.” She thought of all the Chopin she’d listened to after Margot’s death. “Except classical.”

  “Perfect. I loathe classical.”

  She cocked her head to look at him. “That’s ironic, isn’t it? That you had two siblings who were classical pianists, and you hate the stuff?”

  He groaned. “I used to think that if I heard Chopin played one more time, I’d explode. Margot and Charles would listen to that stuff ad nauseam, and when I’d complain, they’d look at each other as if they couldn’t understand how I could possibly be related to them. They’d say, ‘Can’t you hear how beautiful it is?’ and they’d play it louder, as though I was missing the point because I couldn’t hear it well enough. It sounded like nails on a chalkboard to me.”

  Claire rested her cheek against his shoulder, thinking back, remembering Margot on the bridge. “Was it you?” she asked.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Margot said, ‘He could never hear the music.’ Could she have been talking about you?”

  Randy missed a step. She felt his toe under her foot. “It’s possible,” he said.

  “But why? Why at that moment would she have been thinking about you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “She said—”

  “Claire.” He stopped dancing and looked down at her, squeezing her shoulders so tightly it hurt. “Could we talk about something else, please? Or better yet, not talk at all?”

  He averted his eyes, and she knew better than to continue her questioning.

  “All right.” It was her turn to let it go.

  They started dancing again, but Claire felt the change in him. He moved stiffly; his hands had lost their tenderness.

  When the music ended, he asked her, “Can we get out of here? Do you mind leaving now?”

  They got their coats and walked to her car in silence. He slipped his pipe into his mouth but didn’t light it.

  “What time do you need to be home?” he asked once they were sitting inside the car.

  She turned on the heat, shivering, as she calculated how long it would have taken for a movie and a quick bite to eat with Amelia.

  “I have an hour,” she said, and somehow she was not surprised when he suggested she drive to the deserted little theater in McLean.

  It was dark inside the theater, cool and still. Randy lit the balcony lights but left the others off, and he and Claire moved to the middle
of the chapel, sliding into the pew that had begun to feel as if it belonged to them.

  Randy leaned forward, elbows on knees. He hadn’t spoken since asking her when she needed to be home. “I’ve never told a soul what I’m about to tell you,” he said.

  She rested her hand lightly on his back. The balcony lights hit her fingers, making them glow against the dark cloth of his suit.

  “I was jealous of Margot and Charles,” Randy said. “There were plenty of times when I was a kid that I wished they would disappear.” He glanced at her. “I told you about my father, right?”

  Claire nodded.

  “According to my mother, I’d inherited all his loser qualities. I swear, I think I was basically a normal kid, but next to the ‘angels,’ as my mother called them, I looked like a juvenile delinquent who was tone deaf and all thumbs and nothing but trouble. If she and my stepfather, Guy, could have found a legal way of getting me out of their hair, I’m sure they would have done it without batting an eye.”

  “I’m sorry, Randy.”

  “I did love Margot and Charles, though,” Randy continued. “It’s amazing that any of that feeling could survive, but on some level I know I did.”

  “That bond between siblings is hard to break,” she said, although she didn’t know that for sure. She thought of Vanessa. She must have loved her sister, but she couldn’t recall that emotion. It came with the territory, though, didn’t it?

  Randy didn’t seem to hear her. “I didn’t tell you the complete truth about what happened that night on the bridge.”

  “You didn’t?”

  “No. The truth is that my younger brother Charles was no daredevil. He was not the kind of kid to go running out on the platform outside the guardrail. As a matter of fact, both of them were terrified of crossing the bridge at all. I don’t think they’d ever done it on foot before. If they needed to go across, they’d always get a ride. But with the snow, that was impossible, which was why I was supposed to walk them.”

  Claire could see once again that pristine blanket of snow, and her curiosity was piqued. “What happened?”

  “Margot was doing okay with it,” Randy said. “She walked right in the middle of the road and was singing something to keep from thinking about how high up she was. She was doing pretty well. But Charles was really in a panic. I guess I felt—I don’t know—a lot of things. Embarrassed that I had such a wimp for a brother. Sorry for him that he was so scared. Angry that I’d had to go fetch the two little angels when I could have been building snowforts with my friends.”

  Randy turned his head from her, and the balcony lights caught his temple, his cheek, the long eyelashes she hadn’t noticed before. She didn’t like the pain she saw in his face. She thought of stopping his story, of telling him it didn’t matter. It happened so long ago; why think about it now? But he continued before she could speak.

  “I wanted to help Charles. I mean, I think my intentions were noble. I don’t think I’m kidding myself on that. I wanted to help him get over being such a wimpy little pantywaist. So I held his hand as we walked, and I told him there was nothing to be afraid of. It was just a bridge, for Christ’s sake. Charles looked up to me. He wanted my approval, and I know he was trying to be brave, but I remember looking at him once, and his face was absolutely white. I remember thinking that he looked like a mime. Anyhow, he was hanging on to my hand, and I kept walking closer and closer to the edge of the bridge, telling him, ‘It’s okay. It’s just a bridge. It can’t hurt you.’”

  He ran a hand across his beard and closed his eyes, and Claire put her arm more fully around him.

  “It’s all right,” she said, although she was not certain what she was alluding to. She was always good with those empty words of comfort. Her forte.

  His voice was thick when he spoke again. “As we got closer to the edge, he really started getting scared. I could feel him shaking all over. I started saying things to him to shame him into bravery. I told him my friends thought he was a…a pansy. I think that’s the word I used. That they would ask me about my two little sisters.” Randy shook his head. “God, that must have hurt that little kid, hearing that. He was only ten. Cary’s age.” Randy grimaced at that realization, then drew in a heavy breath.

  “The bridge was different then,” he continued. “The guardrail isn’t much to speak of now, but it was essentially nothing then. It was just a metal railing, and that was all that separated the bridge from the platform, where you were with Margot. So, I got Charles all the way over to the railing, and he held on to it as we walked, and I was telling him he was really great to be walking right next to the edge of the bridge like that. But he was crying. Trying not to let me see, but I could tell he was scared shitless. He wouldn’t let go of my hand for anything. One hand on the railing, the other hanging on to me.”

  Claire could see the scene, could feel the cold railing in her hand. She didn’t want to hear any more.

  “And I got this great idea to show him how there was nothing to be afraid of,” Randy said. “I told him I was going to go out on the platform. It was icy out there, and my plan was to hang on to the railing and skate along while Charles walked on the bridge side of the railing. I’d done it before with my friends. It seemed like no big deal to me, but Charles started crying in earnest, because it meant he would have to let go of my hand. Margot stood in the center of the bridge, screaming at me not to do it.”

  “Randy,” she said softly. “I can see where this is going. You don’t have to—”

  “Yes, I do,” he said, his voice feverish. “I wrenched my hand out of Charles’s and…” He stopped speaking, covering his eyes with his fingers. Claire tightened her hand on his shoulder. “Oh, shit,” Randy said, “I can see his face. He was just frozen there, too afraid to move. Clutching the railing with one hand, the other reaching for me. He was crying. Margot was yelling something at me. I don’t remember what. I kept saying, ‘I do this all the time. Don’t be such a baby.’ I ducked under the railing and started skating—sliding on the ice, leaning back. I kept calling to Charles to come on, telling him to hang on to the railing with both hands if he had to, but to start walking, and I was getting further and further away from him, and he couldn’t budge. I moved back toward him and tried to coax him, and he kept begging me to come back onto the bridge and take his hand. I was within a yard of him, and I promised I would walk right next to him, me on the platform, him on the bridge with the railing between us. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘You’re not a pansy, are you?’”

  Suddenly, Randy sat up straight, throwing off her arm. “God, if any kid ever taunted Cary that way, I’d kill him.”

  Claire nodded. “I know, but you were just being a—”

  “I promised to stay close to him on the other side of the railing,” Randy interrupted her. “He finally mustered up all his courage and took a step, and then I darted away from him. Teasing him. I just wanted him to see that he could do it on his own.” He made a wry face. “Or maybe I wanted to torment him.”

  “Or maybe you were just being a fifteen-year-old boy.” She wanted to soothe him. Save him.

  “And then,” Randy said, “I swear I don’t know how it happened.” He raised his hands, palms open, before tightening them into fists. “There must have been ice beneath the snow right there. It was as though something sucked him under the metal railing, out onto the icy platform. He was wearing mittens, and couldn’t get a good grip on the railing, and in an instant he was gone. There was this horrible look of terror on his face. Then he disappeared. If he screamed, I don’t remember it. Maybe because I was screaming so loud myself.” Randy leaned back against the pew. His face was very pale.

  “I’m so sorry.” Claire had taken her shoes off, and she drew her feet up to the padded seat of the pew, the skirt of her violet dress covering her legs. “But it was long ago. So long ago. You can’t fix it.”

  “No, I certainly can’t.” He shook off her attempt to comfort him. “Anyhow, the rest of the story
is the same as I told you. Margot tried to go after him, and fell herself, and I did carry her, unconscious and bleeding, all the way home. Of course I lied to my mother and stepfather about what happened, and Margot was in no shape to talk. Once she was better, I lived in terror that she’d tell them the truth, but she never did. I’m not even sure she remembered it. As we got older, I wanted to ask her why she kept it to herself, but she was so strange by then. I always wondered if she would have developed those psychiatric problems if she hadn’t gotten that head injury.” He sighed. “I like to think it was inevitable, but I don’t really believe it. I guess what I do believe is that I killed both my brother and my sister that night.”

  What a burden to live with, Claire thought. What terrible guilt to carry around. “You were just a kid yourself, though,” she said. “Kids aren’t great at thinking through consequences. And they don’t think in terms of danger. Or mortality. If you’d known your brother could get hurt, I’m sure you would have done everything possible to prevent it.”

  Randy looked at her. “Do you know I never even told LuAnne the truth about what happened that night?”

  “Why me?” she asked. “Why now?”

  “Because I knew you wouldn’t run away. You try too hard and too fast to fix people, but you don’t run away from them, no matter how messed up they are.” He shook his head. “I guess I always thought that LuAnne only needed one little excuse to walk out the door. I could never have told her what I just told you.”

  Claire rested her chin on her knees. “I’m so glad you could tell me,” she said. The score was somehow evened. They had each shared something private. Painful. She wanted to hold him, to make him feel the way she had the week before, when he’d held her in the museum. Safe and warm and accepted. She settled for resting her hand on his arm. The stillness of the chapel surrounded them, and she closed her eyes.