The Final Act

by Joy Fielding

  Cindy pushed herself into a sitting position, took a long sip. “It’s good.”

  Tom sank down beside her. He stretched his long legs across the wood-and-glass coffee table in front of him, laid his head back against one of the pillows. “That was quite the ordeal.” He leaned sideways toward her, clicked his glass against hers. “To better days.” He promptly downed half his glass in a single gulp.

  “Better days,” Cindy agreed, taking another sip of her drink, the presence of the vodka both flattening and emphasizing the tartness of the cranberries. She looked around the large, expensively appointed room, with its muted furniture and bright needlepoint rugs, its bold splashes of modern art against pale ecru walls, its south wall of floor-to-ceiling windows providing a magnificent view of Lake Ontario. “This is some place you’ve got here.”

  “You’ve seen it before, haven’t you?”

  “First time,” she reminded him. “It’s beautiful. I didn’t realize the Cookie had such good taste.”

  “The Cookie?” Tom looked genuinely perplexed.

  Cindy turned her head to hide an unexpected blush. “Sorry. Fiona.”

  A slow smile crept across Tom’s handsome face. “You call my wife ‘the Cookie’?”

  “Term of endearment.” Cindy took another sip of her drink. “What am I doing here?”

  “You fainted. Remember?”

  “Yes. I seem to be doing that a lot lately. But then I woke up.”

  “And said you couldn’t face going home, that your mother and sister were driving you nuts.”

  “They mean well.”

  “Yes,” he said cryptically. “I remember.”

  “So you brought me to your condominium,” Cindy stated, choosing not to explore his last remark, marveling at everything that had transpired in the last hour. “Where’s the . . . Fiona?” she asked, listening for the click of the woman’s high-heeled shoes on the marble floors.

  “Muskoka.”

  “She’s at the cottage?”

  “We decided it was probably a good idea for her to stay up there this week, what with everything that’s going on, and Heather being here.”

  Cindy glanced toward the long hall that ran the length of the huge apartment. “Is Heather at school?”

  “I think she said she has classes till six.”

  Cindy checked her watch. It was barely four.

  Tom brought his feet to the floor, leaned forward, rested his elbows on his knees. “She’s planning to go back home this weekend.”

  Cindy nodded gratefully. “And Julia?” she asked, speaking the name that had gone unvoiced since that awful moment in the morgue when the attendant had unzipped the white vinyl bag.

  It’s not her, she heard Tom whisper. It’s not Julia.

  “We wait,” he said now. “What else can we do?”

  Cindy jumped to her feet, her drink sloshing around in her glass, spilling onto her hand. “I feel so guilty,” she said, wiping the back of her hand on her jeans.

  “Guilty? Why on earth would you feel guilty?”

  “Because when I saw that poor girl’s face and realized it wasn’t Julia, I was so relieved, so grateful, so happy.”

  “Of course you’d feel that way.”

  “I think it’s Sally Hanson,” Cindy said.

  “Who?”

  “The girl who disappeared the week after Julia. Her poor parents. . .”

  “At least they’ll know.” Tom swallowed the last of his drink, then deposited his glass on the coffee table with an authority that was missing from his voice.

  Cindy nodded. Would it be better to know? she wondered.

  “At least there wasn’t any blood,” Tom said, his eyes returning to the morgue, still clearly haunted by what he’d seen.

  “As we were leaving, I heard the dispatcher talking to Detective Gill about some couple who were killed in a car accident this morning,” Cindy said, remembering. “He said the car exploded, and the people were badly burned. He called them ‘crispy critters.’ ” Cindy stared at her former husband in disbelief. “Did he really say that or did I just imagine it?”

  Tom shook his head. “I heard the same thing.”

  “I can’t believe they talk that way.”

  “I guess you’d have to develop a pretty thick skin in order to survive in that kind of environment.”

  “Still . . .” Cindy shuddered. “Crispy critters?”

  “Think they’re anything like Krispy Kremes?” Tom asked.

  A bubble of laughter suddenly burst inside Cindy’s throat, then tumbled into the air, like a child tossed from a toboggan. Immediately, Tom’s laughter somersaulted after hers, the disparate sounds becoming hopelessly enmeshed, impossible to separate one from the other. “I can’t believe we’re laughing,” Cindy said, laughing harder.

  “I’ll have an order of Crispy Critters, please,” Tom said.

  “Hold the mayo,” Cindy embellished.

  “Oh, that hurts,” Tom said, doubling over from the waist, holding his sides.

  “What’s wrong with us?”

  “We could use another drink.” Tom took Cindy’s almost empty glass from her outstretched hand, retrieved his own glass from the coffee table, and marched out of the room.

  Cindy followed after him, as if afraid to be left alone, even for an instant. She ran her hand along the dark oak finish of the long dining room table as she walked purposefully toward the kitchen, stopping to stare at the impressive wine cabinet built into the wall between the two rooms, each bottle of wine neatly labelled behind the thick layer of glass, the bottles secured in metal berths, stacked one on top of the other. Like bodies in a morgue, Cindy thought, fresh giggles gathering in her throat. “That’s quite a collection,” she said, coming into the gleaming marble-and-tile kitchen, watching as Tom refilled their glasses. “How many bodies are there?”

  “What?”

  “Bottles,” she corrected. “I meant to say bottles.”

  Tom smiled. “There’s room for four hundred.”

  “You always wanted a wine cellar.”

  “I always wanted a wine cellar,” he agreed.

  It was Cindy’s turn to smile. “So, what shall we toast this time?”

  “How about no more visits to the morgue?” Tom offered.

  “Sounds good to me.” Cindy took a long swallow. This time the vodka overwhelmed the subtle hint of cranberries. She noticed that a pleasant tingle was beginning to settle around the back of her neck. Any minute, her head would separate from the rest of her body and float into the air, like a helium-filled balloon. “So, how many bodies do you think that thing at the morgue holds?”

  Tom laughed, once again finishing half his drink in a single swallow. “You asked that question on the drive home.”

  “I did? What was the answer?”

  “Detective Bartolli said ninety. Apparently, it’s at three quarters of its capacity right now, and most bodies are in and out within forty-eight hours.”

  “And they use a forklift to take the bodies from the top row. I remember now.”

  “You were very concerned about their backs.”

  Cindy laughed, shook her head, grabbed the side of the island in the middle of the room to steady herself.

  “You all right?”

  “Feeling better every minute.” Cindy took another swallow. “So, are you going to show me around this dump?”

  “My pleasure.” Tom made a sweeping gesture with his hands. “This is the kitchen.”

  “We can skip the kitchen.”

  “Still don’t like to cook?”

  “Hate it.”

  “Which is a real shame, because if memory serves me correctly, you were a very good cook.”

  “Really? How would you know? You were never home. What’s down this way?” she asked before he could protest. She let go of the island, skipped from the kitchen, turned left at the hall.

  “This is the library,” Tom said of the wood-panelled room they came to first. Except
for the southern expanse of window overlooking the waterfront, the room was essentially wallpapered with hardcover books.

  “Very impressive.”

  “The view helps.”

  “And I didn’t even realize the Cookie could read.”

  “Fiona is a very prolific reader,” Tom said curtly, although there was laughter in his eyes.

  “A woman of many talents.”

  “Yes, indeed.” Tom led Cindy into the next room, its east wall completely taken up by an enormous flat screen TV. “This is the media room.”

  “Still like leather, I see.” Cindy gave the dark red leather sofa a seductive squeeze. “Where are the bedrooms?”

  “Down this way.” Tom led her back down the hall, past the marble powder room to the right of the marble entrance. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine.” Cindy followed after him. Like a puppy at his heels, she thought, recognizing she was way beyond fine and teetering into plastered. It didn’t take much, she thought. A dead body, a couple of vodkas—pretty soon she was sailing.

  “This is the guest room.”

  Cindy peeked inside the green-and-white bedroom, saw a pair of Heather’s jeans draped over a small, flowered-print chair, several of her blouses strewn across the white bedspread covering the queen-size bed. “It’s lovely.”

  “It has its own bathroom, of course.”

  “Just like the comfort room.” Cindy giggled. “Amazing how they think of everything, isn’t it?”

  “Amazing,” Tom agreed.

  “You think Granger, McAllister designed it?”

  “Who’s Granger, McAllister?”

  “Our neighbors, the Sellicks. My neighbors,” she corrected, leaning against a wall to keep from lying down on the floor. “He’s an architect with Granger, McAllister.”

  “You think he designed the morgue?” Tom asked, one word sliding into the next as he directed her toward the master bedroom suite.

  “No.” Cindy giggled. “You’re so silly.”

  “You’re so drunk.”

  “I certainly hope so.” Cindy kicked off her shoes, burying her toes in the plush white carpeting. “Wow,” she said, her eyes sweeping across the enormous room, taking in the full-length sofa and chairs that were grouped in front of the southern wall of windows, the ornate credenza that sat against the wall opposite the bed, the bed itself a king-size extravaganza complete with tall pillars swathed in yards of cream-colored satin. “Looks like something out of the Arabian Nights. Spend much time in it?” she asked pointedly.

  “Cindy, Cindy,” Tom said, coming up behind her, his hands falling heavily on her shoulders, his slender hips pressing into her backside. “What am I going to do with you?”

  Cindy felt his breath on the back of her neck, recognized the once-familiar tingle creeping between her legs. “What’s in here?” she asked, extricating herself from his grasp and diving toward a small area off the main bedroom. “Wow. Do you actually use all this equipment?”

  Tom moved easily between the treadmill, the StairMaster, and the stationary bicycle. There was also a large, red, exercise ball in one corner, and an impressive selection of free weights stacked against one wall. A medium-sized TV sat on a high shelf across from the treadmill. “I work out most days for about an hour. What about you?”

  “I do yoga,” Cindy told him, recalling her one visit to The Yoga Studio.

  “Really? I wouldn’t have pegged you for the yoga type.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I wouldn’t have thought you had the patience.” He laughed. “I can just see you lying there, thinking, Can we please speed this up a bit?” He shook his head. “What do I know? Anyway, it obviously agrees with you.”

  “You told me before that I look like crap.”

  “I did? When?”

  “In your office.”

  “Ah, yes. But that was before our little trip to the morgue.”

  “You’re saying I look great in comparison to that girl on the table?”

  “I’m saying you look great. Period.”

  “So you lied before, when you said I looked like crap.”

  “I lied.”

  “You’re a liar?” she pressed giddily.

  “I’m a lawyer,” he agreed, and they both laughed.

  “And the bathroom?” Cindy asked as he leaned toward her. “This way?” She ducked out of his reach, tripped past the two walk-in closets toward the en suite master bathroom.

  It was a big room, its walls the same beige marble as the floor, with a double Jacuzzi, a large open shower stall, his-and-hers counters and sinks, and enough mirrors to satisfy even the most dedicated narcissist.

  “Oh, jeez,” Cindy said, seeing her reflection bounce from one mirror to the next: the old T-shirt, the sloppy jeans, the stringy hair, the zombie-like eyes. “I do look like crap.”

  “You look beautiful,” Tom said, leaving his glass on the counter and coming up behind her.

  “Lawyer,” Cindy said, falling back against his chest, his arms wrapping around hers, and the side of his cheek pressing against her own as he removed the glass from her hand and placed it on the other counter. Was he really going to kiss her? she wondered, as he slowly spun her around. Was she really going to let him?

  (Flashback: Cindy stands in front of her bathroom mirror, removing the makeup she painstakingly applied only an hour earlier, replaying Tom’s phone call in her mind. “Sorry, babe. I can’t make the movie. We’ve got something of an emergency going on here, and I’m going to be tied up for at least a few more hours. Give the sitter an extra couple of bucks, and see if you can line her up for next week.”)

  He tasted of vodka and cranberries, Cindy thought now, luxuriating in the softness of his lips, feeling his tongue slide gently across hers. Not too much, not too little. Just the right amount. Just like old times, she thought, recalling her mother’s words.

  What about Neil? she thought, seeing his reflection in the mirror behind Tom’s head.

  You’re the most courageous woman I know, she heard him say.

  “It was always so good with you,” Tom was whispering, his hands tugging at her T-shirt, expert fingers disappearing beneath it, unhooking her bra. “God, real breasts. I’d almost forgotten how good they feel.”

  (Flashback: Cindy lying in bed, her pillow moist with her tears, as Tom crawls in beside her, reaches under her nightgown, cups her breasts in his hands. “Sorry I’m so late,” he says, kissing her neck. She smells the wine on his breath, as his fingers reach between her legs. “Client wouldn’t stop talking. I thought dinner would never end.” He buries his face in the side of her neck. Cindy inhales another woman’s perfume as he enters her from behind.)

  “Come here,” Tom said now, guiding her between the treadmill and the stationary bicycle toward the bedroom, pulling her T-shirt over her head as he pushed the layers of satin aside, her bra falling from her shoulders, disappearing into the white carpet, like a child’s mitten into snow. “You always had such beautiful breasts,” he marvelled, pushing her back on the bed, and unbuttoning his shirt.

  What am I doing? Cindy wondered, again thinking of Neil. Three years of being a nun and suddenly I’m the town slut? I don’t feel so great, she thought as Tom’s tongue found her nipples, and his fingers struggled with the button of her jeans.

  (Flashback: Cindy in bed, chilled and nauseous, sipping herbal tea and fighting the urge to throw up, when she hears the front door open and the sound of a woman’s laugh. She crawls out of bed and staggers to the top of the stairs.

  “Can I get you a drink?” she hears Tom ask from the kitchen.

  “Hello? Tom?” she calls, watching as Tom emerges at the bottom of the steps, clearly surprised to see her.

  “What are you doing home? Isn’t this your day to help out at Heather’s school?”

  “I wasn’t feeling well. I had to cancel. What’s going on?”

  “Forgot my briefcase,” Tom says breezily. “Look who I ran into coming d
own the street,” he adds, almost as an afterthought.

  A woman’s head pops into view. Cindy recognizes her as the mother of one of Heather’s friends.)

  What on earth was she doing? Cindy wondered now, shaking her head in an effort to clear it, the motion making her dizzy and nauseous.

  “We had some pretty good times together,” Tom was saying, clearly oblivious to her discomfort.

  As always, Cindy thought. “When you weren’t cheating on me,” she said flatly.

  A nervous chuckle. “You took all that much too seriously. You know it meant nothing to me.”

  Was that supposed to make her feel better? “It meant something to me.”

  Silence. His hand froze on her bare skin. “You’re killing the mood here, babe.”

  “You’d really make love to me in this apartment? In this bed?”

  “Jesus,” Tom said, sitting up and lifting his hands into the air, as if there were a gun pointing at his head. “You can’t just relax and let things happen, can you? Damn it, Cindy. You haven’t changed at all.”

  “Damn it, Tom. Neither have you.” Cindy pushed herself off the bed, rezipped her jeans, her eyes searching through the white carpet for her bra. Probably not a good idea to move so fast, she decided, falling to her knees and locating the bra with her fingers, already back on her feet when she heard the voice from the doorway.

  “Dad? What are you doing home so early?”

  It was too late to do anything but turn around.

  “Oh, wow!” Heather’s eyes opened wide with disbelief, moving from her bare-chested father to her half-crouching, half-naked mother.

  “It’s not what you think,” Tom said lamely, fiddling with the buttons of his shirt.

  “Nothing happened,” Cindy said, pulling her bra into position, securing the clasp at the back. First her mother and sister walk in on her and Neil; now her daughter finds her with Tom. That’s what I get for not having sex in three years, Cindy thought.

  “Sure. Okay. Wow.”

  “It was a momentary lapse in judgment,” Cindy explained.

  “I thought you had classes till six.”

  “Does this mean you’re getting back together?”

  “Absolutely not,” Tom said forcefully.

  “God, no,” Cindy echoed.