“You make it sound so serious,” Nancy said, after Richard had asked her again about her work, and she’d forgotten—all those other projects, this life spent organizing, and planning years in advance, for what?
“It is serious,” he said.
“Come over tomorrow then,” she said, smiling forcibly. “I’ll show you.”
“I wish I could. Have that faculty meeting, and then I set a deadline for Friday. For this paper—”
“Maybe some other time.”
Richard wiped his mouth with his napkin. A paper one, since she hadn’t felt like using good linens. “Tell me,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I’m fine.” But in her mind she saw the image of Sarah walking along the brightly lit corridors of her Greenwich apartment, Taylor’s warm head nestled by the young mother’s chin.
“Did you hear about the guy in Alabama?” Richard always brought part of the newspaper to the dinner table. How many times had she asked him not to?
“No.”
“Apparently this guy went into a community college with an AR-15.” He dug his knife into the chicken, impatient for a large chunk. When he finished, he failed to set it down and shift his fork to the right hand.
“Killed one person. Injured three.” Richard had grown up in rural Ohio, the son of a plumber and kindergarten teacher. Murray’s situation in Pennsylvania had been worse, but even his single, depressed mother had found time to teach him manners.
“Did he work there?”
“No—I don’t think so,” Richard said, mouth full. “The rest of the story is in my office. I’ll get it.”
“That’s alright. I don’t need to see it.”
Murray hadn’t met Sarah only for early-morning practices those first months after Jean; sometimes he stayed late with her after practices too. One April night, toward the end of Sarah’s freshman year—not long before Nancy began her affair with Richard—she decided to stop by his office after she’d left her own. To offer to pick up dinner, feeling hopeful about that, the first time she’d felt this desire before Jean—to think ahead about what they needed. She’d opened Murray’s office door just like she used to, ready to ask him the question—and then she’d found them, Murray and Sarah, sitting cross-legged on the floor by his desk, holding hands. Later in their apartment, when she’d broken down, he’d insisted it was nothing, that they’d been practicing simple race-day visualization.
But then a few months later, she’d gone to Murray’s car to grab his road map—it had been pouring rain, and Nancy had wanted to look up the fastest route to Amherst for a meeting with a bookseller; she’d found the photo then, the note on the back of it. Thanks for everything it had said, a heart around the words. She’d cried, alone in the car, over the racing shoes Sarah held up like a prize, the medal around her neck. She’d felt this rage, this hatred, too, that Murray could smile, could give so much to someone else’s eighteen-year-old, while their child—Jean, who would have been six now—lay underground.
“Tell me.” Richard reached into the silence, across the table, for her hand. She had started sleeping with this man not long after finding the photo in Murray’s car. She could be numb with Richard, she could feel her body, the comfort of his touch, and not feel anything at all; she could smoke and stare off.
But Richard was waiting for her reaction: his brow furrowed, lips almost pouting. She’d begun to wonder if Richard was all pretense, as false in his ability to truly empathize as Murray had been—and it had taken her four years to discover this? Katherine, she thought, would disagree. Katherine would say it all went back to Nancy’s neglectful, workaholic father, even more so than her compulsive mother—that Nancy still had work to do, to give in to Richard’s love, to accept and forgive herself, but Nancy didn’t know. Her therapist, she thought, let them—Murray and Richard—off the hook.
Katherine had come recommended by a coworker, Sylvia, whose young son was battling depression and social anxiety; Sylvia was a younger conservator Nancy didn’t know that well, but her son’s therapy had come up in conversation, and Sylvia had shared Katherine’s name when Nancy asked. Nancy had been too overwhelmed by her work at the library to commit to seeing a therapist herself, but Sylvia’s description—someone more than a name on a Rolodex—had given Nancy the courage to make an appointment.
Katherine’s office was bright yellow, shelves stacked with children’s books and art supplies, and Nancy had felt foolish for not assuming this, that Katherine’s office might be designed for children, too, since Sylvia’s son saw her.
For their first session Katherine had agreed to turn the lights off for Nancy, because Nancy said she couldn’t come back otherwise, and they always met in the afternoon, when there was just enough light through the windows. Katherine always sat in a wooden chair with her notepad. Sometimes, she held her hand at her stomach when Nancy spoke, as if she suffered the same void.
In the quiet, Nancy took a long sip of water. She didn’t look at Richard while he ate quickly—his habit—and she tried not to think about the empty chairs that suddenly seemed egregious, compared with what Sarah’s table might have looked like with Taylor at home.
Despair. Katherine often cut her off midthought, the moment she began this loop, because it was the easier narrative, she’d say, over hope—which came through absorbing the moment, through gentle, easy breathing.
“Oh no,” Richard said. “The wine—I almost forgot!”
“Really?” she said calmly, evenly. “I don’t think we need it.” Then she realized she’d forgotten—his birthday—she hadn’t said it yet like she’d planned, in serving the food: Happy birthday, Richard. I made this for you. All the moments she tried to plan but couldn’t execute, the thoughtful things she used to be able to do and say automatically, because there’d been an order, a logic to them.
“How often do we drink together anymore?” Richard smiled.
When she didn’t answer, he stole three bites of potato from her plate.
He was still chewing as he walked to the kitchen. She imagined him winding down their cheap corkscrew, and then thrusting his weight into the bottle. The bottle’s pop shook her and was only further exacerbated by Richard rummaging for the right glass, and then the liquid’s gurgle. He stockpiled the same label from a winery in the Finger Lakes. How hard was it to remember her one request for a cheap chardonnay?
“I poured you a small glass anyway,” he said. Then he took a few swigs from his own glass, quickly depleting it by half.
“I hate red,” she said. She exaggerated a sip of water and pushed her wineglass toward him. “Take it,” she said.
She placed her fork and knife across her plate, then her napkin, covering less than one-third of her meal. She contemplated a cigarette on the fire escape.
“If you’re not going to eat, give that to me too.” Richard laughed. He said it through his wineglass, his voice echoey, nose and lips concave.
“If you’re finished, I’ll take your plate,” she said. She rinsed it in the kitchen as Richard’s fork clinked ravenously over hers. He liked her to be in the mood these nights, but tonight she really wasn’t. She thought she’d apply some lubricant next time she had to use the bathroom. She was premenopausal, and the dryness, the frequency of yeast infections, was excruciating.
First there were strawberries, so she went for the carton and rinsed them again. She poured the fruit into a ceramic bowl, listening to their wet, quiet toppling. She picked up a berry and admired its rich red.
Underneath her turtleneck, she wore a supportive navy-blue bra and black panties she’d purchased on summer clearance at the mall. Richard would have to make do with them.
She plucked a few strawberries, holding on to the green tops in her hand.
“Richard,” she said, sitting down across from him again.
“Yes?” he said, his own finger poised over the paper, since he sometimes read articles twice for no apparent reason.
“Have you
thought more about it?”
“About what?”
“Children,” she said. “Adopting.”
“Nancy.” He sighed and took two large gulps of wine. “We’ve been through this.”
“And you said you’d think about it.”
“I did? Well, I don’t remember saying that. But anyway,” he said, gulping more wine. He had a perfectly clean napkin, but still he used his fist to wipe his mouth. “I suppose I’ve thought about it, and decided we really aren’t in the financial place to raise a child. Not until I have tenure and you—”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Until I what?”
“Until you get a grip on yourself. Look at yourself.”
She peered at her lap, the empty roll of her belly, hands still clenching berry tops.
“It’s been years, and you’re still on the verge of tears all the time. Do you think raising a child will really make that easier?”
“You know something?” she said. “You can be a real prick.” She walked to the kitchen and dropped the leaves into the sink and washed her hands, breathing deeply, thinking about Katherine’s pause button, the way she made her hand like a stop sign for a street it wasn’t time to cross.
Nancy wasn’t certain if she’d ever go through with adopting a child, but in the end, it didn’t work with Richard because he could not open his heart to this possibility, not even after he was offered a tenured position at Yale the following year. In the weeks leading up to her decision to leave him, she told herself it was because he never cleaned his phlegm from the bathroom sink, because of the whipped cream at night, because he drank too much. The last time they had sex, both of them lying on their backs afterward, a thick squiggle of bedsheet between them, looking up at the ceiling and talking about literature, as they always did, she’d changed the subject, asking him again if he’d thought more about adopting. He’d said he had—but the truth was that a child would ruin things; he wanted passion without responsibility. Conditions.
It would take Nancy another year to leave him officially. She left one Friday morning in early February, after six blurry years. Quietly she gathered a few of her possessions, enough to fit in a suitcase. She had her books and a box with Jean’s birth certificate, her tiny footprints. Her pink fleece hat from the hospital. She regretted not taking more photographs, but at least she had one of Jean smiling, looking up wide-eyed from her changing table, her legs stretched long. Another from the day she was born, Nancy’s back pressed into a blue hospital pillow, Murray decked out in scrubs with his arm around her, smile wide as she’d ever seen it. She had added this one to a baby book with congratulatory cards from friends and coworkers, and now she slid in sympathy cards she’d saved in a box. Last, she packed one of Jean’s sleepers, one she’d found in the laundry after Murray packed all the boxes. The sleeper still carried, even if Nancy only imagined it, a tinge of her child’s sweet, milky scent. Their bodies together, folded into the cotton, the warmth and oneness she still felt if she held it close and breathed in.
FIFTEEN
Tuesday
10:03:07 a.m.
Lisa Sanders, Becky’s mother, had wanted to meet at a restaurant called the Pantry on Mechanic Street, not far from the hospital. It was always crowded here, even on weekday mornings, and as he waited by the door, he had to keep moving out of the way for people. He and Nancy used to come sometimes; she would get scrambled eggs with mushrooms and avocado.
The walls were painted the same bright orange, covered in posters from various jazz festivals. Light piano played in the background, too, but he didn’t recognize the artist. Nancy was good at that. Miles Davis was a favorite. Charlie Haden.
Lisa walked in wearing a jean jacket and sunglasses. She didn’t hug him or say anything, just hooked her glasses over her collar when they sat down at a small table by the window. Nearby an older couple shared a Belgian waffle with a side order of home fries.
“Doug doesn’t know I’m here,” she said.
He nodded, watching as she removed her jacket. She had a tight black T-shirt on—Becky’s same tan, bony shoulders. When the waitress brought coffee without even asking them, he thought maybe Lisa had been coming here often. She flicked two packets of sweetener.
“I guess I’ll start with the good news.” She tipped one full packet, half another. “She’s able to make solid eye contact. Not speaking yet, but she can recognize Doug and me.”
“That’s great,” he said, surprised by his lilt.
“And the other day, when the doctor asked her to hold up two fingers, she did.”
Murray shifted in his seat. “When can I see her?”
“I don’t know. I’m more open to the idea, you know. But Doug’s still having a really hard time—”
The waitress asked if they were ready. “Blueberry pancakes,” Lisa said. “A short stack.”
Murray wanted a spinach-and-tomato omelet with wheat toast. No home fries.
“I’m not even hungry,” she said. “But pancakes sound good.” She looked out the window. The streets were still wet from rain, leaves slick on the pavement. Murray waited for her to speak again. He partially focused on the brick building across the street: AGENCY ONE, it said. For selling insurance.
“She still has a feeding tube, but she’ll likely transition soon.”
Murray’s legs twitched. He placed his hands between his knees to steady them.
“Doug—” she said. “The truth is, he’s really angry. I don’t know.” She reached for her coffee, but she didn’t lift it from the table.
“How many hours has it been?”
Lisa’s eyes tightened. “Since when?”
“Since she’s been more responsive?” He pinched the inside of his thigh.
“A little over two days. Right before I called you on Saturday.”
“Oh.”
“The right side of her face is less mobile than the left, but it’s getting better. The doctors are hopeful, if she’s made this much progress already.”
“What about her limbs? Her legs?” Murray’s knees were twitching more forcefully. It usually happened when he watched his runners run. He could feel his heart thrumming through his stomach.
“She can move them—that’s good. And she’s been getting massages. But she’s still very weak.” She lined up her knife with the edge of her place mat.
“Shouldn’t she be seeing a physical therapist?”
Lisa sat back in her chair. “Look,” she said, but she didn’t continue.
The waitress set down maple syrup and a plate with four dabs of butter.
“She’s going to have to relearn everything. The doctor said she might suffer from chronic headaches. Dizziness. She could develop epilepsy.” Her voice broke. “You understand?” She blotted her eyes with a napkin. Pushed her butter plate away.
“I could come and bring Anna again,” he said.
“I don’t know,” she said. “We should give it at least a few more weeks. Maybe even a month.”
“What?”
“She needs time—”
“But I don’t know what to tell the girls. When they ask me.” He was louder. He wanted to see Becky today, to follow Lisa to the hospital, but the waitress, pupils pinpricked, cat-eye glasses, had already arrived with their food.
“Please just ask for their prayers,” Lisa said, wiping more tears.
They ate in silence, Lisa using the side of her fork to cut syrupy pieces. For a moment, it was Becky there—he and Becky, when they’d gone for breakfast after Regionals.
Lisa dropped her napkin on the table.
“It’s just really hard,” she said. “I’m so tired of fighting with Doug.”
The place was small enough to hear dishes clanking from the kitchen. The swinging door screeched too much; louder was their waitress stacking dishes from the older couple who had left. He jolted when he thought he heard her drop something. A plate, or was it the throb of a knife, landing on its point?
Murray stared at his hands. He imagined the time on his watch, how it had passed 528 hours. But then she opened her purse, rifling for dollar bills, some loose change to make up the difference. He told her to leave it, that he’d get this one.
“She moans in her sleep,” she cried, still rummaging. “The other night I thought I heard her say your name. It might have been Mom, or Mommy, but it sounded more like Murray.
“I want to make it work,” she went on. “For you to bring the girls. For the team to come back again. I’ll let you know.”
He reached across the table for her arm, told her it was alright, but she cried the whole way to the car into a napkin he’d grabbed on the way out. After he’d closed the door, he was about to motion her to roll down the window. To remind her to call him as soon as he could visit, but she was already backing out. She didn’t wave goodbye, just stayed hunched, napkin still in her hand over the wheel.
On the way home, Murray kept seeing the syrup-drenched pancakes—blueberries bleeding blue. Then that diner he’d taken Becky to in the Bronx right after she’d placed second at Regionals. She’d already qualified for Nationals with her time of 16:12.07, but then she’d dropped another eight seconds at Regionals, and since Doug and Lisa hadn’t been able to make it up, he’d wanted to do something special to treat her. He’d been surprised when she ordered pancakes with butter and whipped cream, thought maybe it was part of some ritual he hadn’t been aware of.
Late Air Page 17
