Promises

by Belva Plain

  As if he knew Danny needed him, Rufus, who always slept in the hall, had come in to lie next to the bed. When Danny let his hand dangle, he could reach the top of Rufus’s head.

  He was trying to sort out his feelings. There were so many of them, and so mixed up. At the moment, his embarrassed thoughts had strayed where they should not, imagining his father and a slim young woman, blond, no doubt, with long hair to her shoulders, and then breasts, small ones that turned up.… He had been thinking about that tonight while he was eating pizza and glancing at his mother when she wasn’t looking.

  His mother wasn’t old, though. Not old-old. He had noticed her hands with the gold band still on her finger. The nails were pink and clean: the hand, the arm, the white collar, the white cheeks, were all clean and helpless and sad.

  His throat hurt. Could it be, could the reason why Dad had left this nice woman and this nice house, could it have anything to do with him, Danny? Was it my fault? he cried quickly to himself, and as quickly recalled the article he had seen in a magazine at the dentist’s office about how children of divorce believe they are part of the cause. And he remembered that as he glanced through a couple of paragraphs, these children had meant nothing to him but statistics. And now he was a statistic.

  He thought maybe he ought to go downstairs and get something to eat, some chocolate-chip cookies or something. They might make me feel better, he said to himself, although he knew they wouldn’t.

  Margaret pulled down the shade against the moonlight, which disturbed her thoughts. It was absolutely necessary now to have orderly thoughts, to cease all wandering lamentations, to cease the search that came to nothing.

  That night in New York when they had met the woman—was that the night, were those the few minutes, when she had bewitched him? Later in that room they had drunk champagne, and—she remembered it clearly—he had kissed her and blessed them both; had he not loved her, Margaret, with that blessing?

  Fruitless questions. Think now, she thought sternly, about what you must do.

  First above all, you must guard your children. It is essential that you never belittle their father. You must keep yourself calm; they have seen enough tears that you were not able to hold back; there must absolutely be no more of them. Understand that each child will react in his own way. A twelve-year-old boy has different responses from those of a teenaged girl. Make sure that they keep in touch with their friends, and you must keep in touch with their teachers. See the lawyer whom Fred has recommended. If I ever need to lean, although I shall try not to, I shall lean on Fred. He wants me to.

  When she had finished her mental list, she turned over and willed herself toward sleep. Yet even as she felt its approach, unanswerable questions still floated in the darkness: What is Adam thinking about all this tonight? And where have they gone, our nineteen years?

  “Adultery means nothing anymore,” said Stephen Larkin. “You’re looking for some sort of penalty for it, but there is none.”

  He was a young man about Margaret’s own age, dark where Adam was blond, but with the same lean bones and rather grave, ascetic look. She was aware that already she had begun to relate other men, even a man seen in passing, to Adam.

  “So it comes down to what you’ve been telling me: who sues whom, on what grounds, how much money I’m to have, how we divide what we own—papers. Everything, all the despair, the heartbreak, everything is reduced to a pile of papers.”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  She looked around the room, at the heat-wilted leaves of the maple framed by the window, and at the walls of legal writings in their dreary brown bindings. All was dry and hopeless.

  And she who had been so correctly businesslike until now let her emotions explode, crying out to the stranger on the other side of the desk.

  “How did this happen to me? No woman ever thinks life will do this to her!”

  He replied quietly, “You live in America in 1993. What reason can anyone have to think it will not happen?”

  “There was a worldwide flu epidemic in 1918, but my grandmother didn’t know of anybody who died in it. You don’t live expecting to die in an epidemic, and you don’t live expecting to have your family torn apart. He was my whole life. I wanted to be a doctor, but it didn’t fit in with his plans, so I gave it up. I did it gladly. Gladly, for him! I never in any way, even in thought, belonged to anyone but him.”

  And then, in spite of all her sturdy resolutions, she began to cry. Humiliated by her own sobs, yet unable to stop them, she covered her face with her hands.

  Considerately, he looked away to leaf through papers. After she had quieted, blown her nose, and wiped her face, he said, so softly now that she strained to hear him, “I hear your pain.”

  “Maybe I’m a coward,” she said. “I don’t know.”

  “I don’t think you are. Your friend Fred Davis has an entirely different opinion of you. He gave me a lot of helpful background for this case.”

  “He spoke well of you too. That’s why I’m here.”

  “You’ll be here more than once, you know. The law moves slowly, as you’ve no doubt heard.”

  “The next step, you said, was for you to get in touch with Adam?”

  “With his lawyer, if he has one yet.”

  “I don’t know whether he has one yet. I haven’t talked to him and don’t intend to. I let the children answer the phone. Except for Megan, who doesn’t speak to him, which worries me so.… You’ll need his address, anyway, won’t you? I’ll get it for you. He’s staying with—with her.”

  “No need to. Fred gave it to me first thing.”

  The meeting was over. At the door Margaret turned back and said sadly, “I don’t think this will be a hard case for you. There’ll be no custody fight, and there’s no fortune to be fought over.”

  They shook hands. “You’ll be all right,” Larkin said. “You may not think now that you will be, but you will.”

  It was deep night when Adam woke up. What had awakened him he did not know, unless it was the inner happiness that had simply burst through his skin. Looking up through the clerestory windows at the vast brilliance of the stars, he felt a compulsion to go outside. Without disturbing Randi he slid from the bed, unbolted the door, and walked in the silent grove. A night bird twittered and was still. A raccoon sped across the lawn and rustled through the underbrush. It seemed to him then that the loudest sound in all that enchanted place was the steady beat of his own heart.

  And he felt a great peace. True, there were many things yet to be considered, loose ends to be gathered up, but for the moment he would consider only the end that had finally been accomplished. He was here with Randi; they were healthy, young, and free.

  That morning, just a few days since, he had driven away from Elmsford with a sense of relief that was almost wild. On a sudden crazy impulse he had even stopped at a jewelry store in town and bought a gold bracelet. Having never bought a piece of jewelry before, he was astonished at the price of it; yet the reckless sensation of taking it out of his pocket and handing it to Randi had been worth any price. And he chuckled now, remembering her delight.

  He had told the office that he was sick and would be out for the next few days. Having taken no more than three sick days in all his years at ADS, he felt no guilt. He felt, as a matter of fact, no guilt about anything.

  “What are you doing out here?” said Randi.

  “Do you mean to say you heard me get out of bed? I didn’t make a sound.”

  “No, but I felt your absence.” She put her arms around him, murmuring, “I’m so happy that I still can’t believe this is true.”

  “I love it here with you, Randi.”

  “Of course. This is home. Tomorrow you will even have your kids here.”

  “Just two of them. Megan won’t come.”

  “Girls that age are stubborn. Don’t worry. She’ll change her mind. And we’ll have a great time with Julie and Danny. I hope you told them to bring their swim-suits.”

&
nbsp; “I surely did. I notice a box of chocolate-chip cookies in the kitchen. You remembered that I told you Danny could live on them.”

  “I remembered. It’s important that your kids should feel that this is their home too.”

  “You’re so good, Randi. The only thing that bothers me is the holidays. I wish they could have Christmas here with us.”

  “We’ll have it the next day, that’s all, a second Christmas. Now let’s go back to sleep so you can get up early in the morning and get them.”

  The day was beautiful, breezy, blue, and not too hot.

  “Gee, this is great,” Danny said, giving approval to the house, the pool, and probably, Adam thought, to Randi as well.

  She looked like a kid herself in her white shorts and red sandals. She said all the right things, admiring Julie’s sundress and telling Danny that no one would ever guess by his height that he wasn’t at least fourteen.

  Having made the tour of the house, the four now stood uncertainly, watching Rufus nose his way around the pool.

  “I didn’t think you’d mind our bringing him,” Adam said.

  “Goodness, no. He’s a gorgeous dog. His hair must need a lot of brushing.”

  Danny said promptly, “That’s my job. I do it every day. You don’t have to worry about allowing him in the house. He never does anything in the house.”

  Randi smiled at Adam. Adorable, the smile said, an adorable boy. Yes, he was. And Julie, thin little thing with shoulder blades like wings and enormous eyes, was a hidden treasure, the kind of wispy adolescent who grows up to be a woman of unusual grace, delicate and piquant. She was unusual already. And Adam was filled with a warm, fatherly pride.

  “What do you say to a swim?” Randi proposed. “Danny, you change in the bathroom, and, Julie, come along and I’ll show you the guestroom. Let’s swim, too, shall we, Adam?”

  There was for Adam an awkward moment when he followed Randi into their bedroom. His children, in passing the door, had certainly glimpsed the bed, and he knew as if he had been told what had gone through their minds. The moment passed, however, as the reality of the day returned to him, the lovely reality of being with Randi and his children all at the same time.

  When he emerged into the sunlight, Danny was already in the pool, while Julie, immaculate in her blue sundress, sat in the shade.

  “Why, Julie, no suit?”

  “I don’t feel like going in.”

  “What’s the matter, don’t you feel well?”

  “I’m all right. I just don’t want to swim.”

  “Okay,” Adam said cheerfully. “Do you want something to read? A magazine or the paper?”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  Julie was furtively observing Randi’s white satin bikini. Danny, too, had taken rather a long look. Poor kids, he thought with a sudden shock of understanding, and was ashamed that he had not before considered how they would actually feel on seeing Randi. He had thought only how glad they would be to see him.

  “Well, let’s go. Come on, Danny,” he called. “I’ll race you for six laps.”

  After Danny had won by an arm’s length, he challenged his father to an underwater race.

  “I’m no good at that,” Adam said.

  “I am. I learned how last year at Scout camp.”

  “Aren’t you going this year?” asked Randi, who was tanning herself.

  “No,” Danny said, and when Adam, surprised, asked why not, he replied soberly, “We don’t want to leave Mom.”

  The introduction of the word Mom, however innocently spoken, was disconcerting and produced a silence that needed to be quickly filled.

  It was Randi who filled it by remarking, “Your father tells me you’re quite a pianist, Julie.”

  “Not really,” Julie said.

  “Well, you’re not Rachmaninoff, but you’re mighty good,” Adam asserted. “Did Mrs. Watts give you another piece yesterday, or are you still on the waltz?”

  “I didn’t have a lesson yesterday.”

  The child had no expression on her face or in her voice. Sitting there with her legs crossed neatly at the ankles as she had been taught in dancing school to do, she looked as if all the air had gone out of her. Adam felt slightly irritated, but chiefly worried.

  “Well, as long as you don’t skip too many lessons,” he began, when Julie interrupted.

  “I’m never going to take any more lessons.”

  “What? You can’t mean that.”

  “I do mean it,” Julie said in the same flat voice.

  This was not how Adam had envisioned the day. He could not, however, let the subject drop, so he tried coaxing.

  “You’ll be making a big mistake. It’s a great joy to be able to make your own music. I wish I could play the way you do, but I’ve no talent.” Starting to say something about Julie’s evening performance, he stopped himself just in time.

  Danny, who had been throwing a stick to Rufus out under the trees, came running back to announce that Rufus’s tongue was hanging out.

  “I think he needs water, Dad.”

  “I’ll get a bowl,” Randi said. “I have to go to the kitchen anyhow, to see about lunch.”

  “Listen to me,” Adam said quickly when she was gone. “I know this must be very strange for you both, and we’ll have to talk more about it, but for now I want to say one thing. Nobody’s angry at anybody. I’m not angry at your mother. She’s a very good mother.”

  There was a pause. The children were scrutinizing his face, expecting more. And since of course he knew what they wanted, he gathered his courage and proceeded.

  “That’s not why I left. I left because I love Randi.”

  They said nothing.

  “You’ll like her when you know her. You really will.”

  “Do you want to bring Rufus in here?” Randi called. “It’s hot out there, and he’s got so much hair.”

  Danny went in with the dog, but Julie, whose eyes shone with tears, held back, taking a tissue out of her purse.

  Proper little old lady with a purse, Adam thought, and he put his arm around her shoulders.

  “It’s not so bad, honey. Everything’s going to be all right. You’ll see.”

  “Don’t,” she said, pulling away. “It’s worse when you do that.”

  “All right, I won’t.”

  They stood there for a minute or two while Julie sniffled, and Adam had his thoughts. Surely this business would straighten itself out soon enough; millions of kids went through it and survived. It was just that Julie was especially tender and always had taken things harder than most kids do.

  In all other respects his children’s lives would be unchanged, he swore. He would see to that. Tomorrow he had an appointment with a lawyer. They would settle everything decently. He would do his full duty by his family.… He wondered what they would say at the office when they heard the news. They were definitely not going to hear it from him; he had never been one of those garrulous types who talked all over the place about their personal affairs.

  “Do I look all right?” asked Julie. “I have no mirror.”

  “You look just fine. Pretty as ever. Go on in and offer to help Randi with lunch.”

  The rest of the afternoon passed pleasantly. Food always helps, Adam thought. Randi, the good cook, had made a fine pasta. The salad and dessert were all delicious, and Danny ate enough for two.

  “You’re really giving them a good time,” Adam whispered.

  “They’re sweet, Adam, and they’re yours,” Randi replied.

  When it was time to go home, his children were gracious with their thanks. And again, he felt pride. Margaret had brought them up well; they were not like so many of the raucous, rude teenagers that one saw these days. And the meeting that could have been difficult, he reflected, had really gone rather well. The next time would be easier still.

  Back in Elmsford, Adam sat for a moment in the car watching Danny and Julie go around the side of the house. He felt a curious shock at the realization
that he might very well never enter this house, that had been his home, again. Had he been asked whether he was feeling grief because of it, he would have said: No, not grief, but rather the pathos that change brings, even change for the better. It is a kind of lament over the passage of time.

  As he was moving away from the curb, he was astonished to see Nina coming down the walk. She had a sheaf of letters in her hand.

  “Hey,” he called. “Nobody told me you were in town. What’s going on?”

  She stopped, stood with hand on hip, and gave him a long stare. “Why nothing, nothing at all. What should be going on?” Then she smiled. “Everything is just perfect. Perfect. I’m surprised that you need ask.”

  This was going to be difficult.… “Are you on your way to the post office? I’ll drive you. Get in and we’ll talk.”

  “Thank you, Adam, but I don’t want to talk. Actually, I know very well what’s going on, and I don’t care to hear whatever phony explanation you may have to offer for it.”

  The mockery in her eyes infuriated him. Yet he replied calmly, “It isn’t phony, Nina.”

  “Yes, it is. Nothing you can ever say will justify what you’ve done here.”

  “Not so, Nina. One doesn’t have to ‘justify’ love.”

  “Love! It’s a dirty affair, your love, and nothing else, so don’t try and wipe it clean. Save your energy.”

  “You’re hardly the one to talk, are you?”

  “Yes, I am. What I did was wrong, and I’m finished with it. I’ll admit it, and you won’t. When I look at Margaret, I see the other side, and then I really know how wrong I was.”

  “So you’ve had a religious conversion, have you? Suddenly you’ve seen the light.”

  “You aren’t going to knife me with sarcasm, Adam. You’ve knifed me with disillusionment instead. I thought you were the best of the best, the king of the world, and now you’ve fallen off your throne. But me! What am I doing talking about me? It’s Margaret and those children.…”

  For a moment he had to look away from Nina’s outrage. And then, hesitantly, he asked, “How is she?”

  “Great. Just fine. How the hell do you think she is?”