Back In the Game

by Holly Chamberlin

  “It died a slow and agonizing death some time around the turn of the nineteenth century.” Nell paused before adding, “Maybe earlier.”

  “Romance is still alive,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely sure I believed what I was saying. Was romance just a pretty word for lust? If so, yes, romance was alive and I’d encountered it recently.

  Nell finished her glass of wine in one long draught. “If I’d known my marriage would end in the way it did,” she said then, “I would never have gotten married in the first place.”

  Laura gripped her sister’s hand. “What about Colin and Clara? If you’d never married Richard, you never would have had the children.”

  Nell removed her hand from Laura’s death grip. “I know, I know. I’m just venting. You always take everything so literally.”

  “No one goes into marriage thinking, hey, what the hell, if it doesn’t work, I can get a divorce, no big deal. Not even me.” I laughed; no one laughed with me. “It’s so much work even to get to the point of talking about marriage, let alone planning a wedding and a life together. You have to believe that marriage is forever. You just have to, in spite of all evidence to the contrary.”

  Nell smiled ruefully. “So, everyone who gets married is an idiot?”

  “Blinded by visions of lacy veils and lush bouquets?” Grace suggested.

  “Naive?” Nell said.

  Laura drained her Cosmo.

  I shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe just hopeful. To be human means to be weak and hopeful. Though hope, I suppose, is a sort of courage.”

  “Weak, hopeful, and newly single. Or in my case,” Grace went on, “not so newly single. Just newly committed to getting on with my life post-Simon.”

  “You know,” Laura said suddenly, “divorced women with young children are really at an advantage.”

  Nell shook her head. “Excuse me?”

  I hoped there weren’t any single mothers within earshot. But of course there weren’t. Single mothers were at home paying the bills, cleaning the toilets, and helping the children with their homework.

  “No, I mean it,” Laura said. “Because they can meet divorced men with children through school activities and soccer practice and Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. Children are even better than dogs when it comes to attracting attention.”

  “Maybe,” Grace said carefully. “But life isn’t exactly rosy for single parents of little kids. Even if they do manage to get remarried, there’s a good chance they’ll have to deal with a blended family. And that has to be exhausting.”

  Laura rolled her eyes. “Duh, remember The Brady Bunch? Blended families can work just fine.”

  Really, at times I wondered if Laura’s already tenuous grasp on reality wasn’t beginning to weaken.

  “Sure,” Nell said, “on television anything can happen. Aliens can be fuzzy smart alecks and astronauts can keep genies in their living rooms.”

  “By the way,” Grace added, “in real life the actor who played Mike Brady, all-American dad, was gay.”

  “You know, I always thought he was the only character on the show with half a brain.” Nell turned to Laura. “So, as a single mother of college-aged kids, I’m out of luck?”

  “Not necessarily,” Laura said, missing, as she often did, her sister’s sarcastic tone.

  “Speaking of kids,” I said to Nell, “how are they faring? I’m sure they have opinions about the divorce and their father’s new life. And I’m sure they’re not shy about voicing them. Kids that age don’t seem to be shy about anything.”

  Nell shrugged. “Remarkably, both Colin and Clara have been pretty quiet about the whole thing. I know Richard’s coming out and our divorce must have shaken them up, but so far, I haven’t seen much fallout. We’ll see. Maybe they’re having a delayed reaction. Maybe when they’re thirty or forty they’ll go after Richard with an axe.”

  “Colin and Clara love the both of you,” Laura protested. “They understand.”

  “Kids never understand their parents’ divorce,” Nell said. “Not really. They have to blame someone. With my luck they’ll probably decide I’m the one they hate for breaking up the family.”

  “But, Nell,” Grace protested, “Richard is gay. He’s in love with a man. You had no choice. You had to get divorced. You’re not to blame.”

  Nell’s face took on a hard look. It was a look I’d seen too often since Richard’s bombshell. I looked forward to the day when it would go away for good.

  “I could have figured things out a long time ago,” she said. “I could have been smarter; I could have been not so embarrassingly stupid. I can easily imagine my kids having no respect for me. I mean, what kind of example did I set for them? Why would either of them ever want to get married after the debacle that was their parents’ marriage?”

  “Richard was very deeply in the closet, Nell,” I said carefully. “You couldn’t have known.”

  “I should have known,” Nell replied fiercely. “I was his wife, for God’s sake! How could I not have known? I was so wrapped up in my own life I never really saw the person on the other side of the bed. And yet, I loved Richard; I thought I was being his true partner.”

  “You were his true partner,” Grace said. “Don’t blame yourself for his choice of secrecy.”

  Nell ignored her and ranted on. “I swear I still don’t know when he was having all this anonymous sex because we spent almost every night together, from dinner through Jay Leno. Sure, sometimes he had to work late, but when he came home, he never smelled of anyone else’s cologne! I’m furious with myself for being so blind. I’m furious with Richard for tricking me so thoroughly. And I’m furious for having wasted twenty years of my life as Mrs. Richard Allard. Who was she, anyway? Who was that sorry woman?”

  I wished I had an answer to that question, something smart and also comforting, but I didn’t. Neither, it seemed, did Grace or Laura.

  “Um, I have a date next weekend,” Laura said.

  Grace rolled her eyes.

  Nell poured more wine into her glass from the bottle on the table. “In spite of my sister’s freakish success in the dating game,” she said, “I believe that the four of us are at a disadvantage. We’ve been off the market for too long, and yes, I know I’m mixing metaphors. Single women our age who’ve never been married or who’ve never been in a long-term relationship know the rules. And you can bet they’re not going to share insider information with us. They’ll view the four of us as an additional threat. We’re swelling the already swollen population.”

  “Why thanks, Nell,” I joked lamely. “You’ve really lifted my spirits.”

  “Sorry. Anyway, I have no interest in dating just yet. Not much interest, anyway. God, it’s not like my dating someone is going to make Richard jealous!”

  Grace looked troubled. “I’ve been wondering. What kind of man is available to women our age? And to women the age we’re going to be in a few short years? Men in their thirties and forties—if we can find them—are either married or looking for younger women.”

  “Some younger men are really into dating older women,” Laura said. “You know, because it’s hip.”

  “Dating is the operative word,” Nell pointed out. “Most young guys aren’t going to stick around for marriage and menopause.”

  “And older men?” I said. The oldest man I’d ever been with was twenty years my senior. I was just out of college. I thought I was being terribly adult, about to embark on an affair with an “older man.” Visions of foreign cigarettes and dry martinis and expensive lingerie danced in my head. And then we had sex and I discovered that the reality was far less interesting than the fantasy. He wore faded boxers. Alcohol made him break out in hives. His smart suits hid a significant roll of fat around his middle. When he called me a few days later, I told him I’d gotten back with an old boyfriend. It was a lie.

  “Well, that depends on the man, I guess,” Nell conceded. “If he’s tired of life’s nastiness, if he’s learned the value of true companions
hip, he might be interested in meeting a contemporary.”

  “It’s all so unfair.” Laura pouted; it made her look about fifteen. “Women have the advantage for such a short time. The minute we hit thirty we, like, stop being desirable to a huge part of the male population. Men grow into the advantage. A man in his fifties—even if he’s not filthy rich—can still get a woman in her early thirties. If he is filthy rich he can get a woman in her twenties. It’s ridiculous!”

  I wondered how carefully Laura had considered this fact when she dumped Duncan.

  “But, consider the mature man,” Grace said. “I mean, someone not looking for a trophy wife, someone looking for love. If I met a man in his fifties who wanted to go out with me, I’d say yes. Assuming, of course, he seemed nice. And had a job. And wasn’t an artist.”

  Nell laughed. “Yes, you’ve had more than your share of the creative types. Still, think about the baggage an older man is sure to be lugging around. Like bitter ex-wives and greedy kids. And, if he’s been living alone for some time, nasty bachelor habits.”

  “Everyone has baggage,” I said. “We’d be terribly boring if we didn’t.”

  “True,” Nell agreed. “But with age come health problems. Once a man reaches fifty the illnesses start coming on fast and thick. Heart problems are almost guaranteed. Weight gain. Prostate troubles. Erectile dysfunction. Then a man reaches his sixties—if he reaches his sixties—and it just gets worse. Before you know it, you’re a forty-five-year-old with an invalid on your hands.”

  “That’s not always true,” I protested. “The general population is healthier than ever.”

  “Except for the obese,” Laura added, nodding none too discreetly toward a table at which sat a hefty couple. “There’s an epidemic, you know.”

  “People live longer lives. Medical care is available.” Grace paused before adding: “For those who can afford it.”

  Nell shrugged. “I’m just trying to make a point. Sure, older men are appealing in a way, but in another way, they’re simply not.”

  “Well,” Laura said, “older men aren’t an option for me, anyway. I need a man who’s young and virile, someone who wants to start a family. I don’t want my children to have a doddering old man for a father.”

  “Heaven forbid,” Grace murmured.

  “He needs to be able to help with midnight feedings and take the kids to soccer practice. He can’t be falling asleep at the dinner table and in bed by eight.”

  “Here’s a news flash, Laura.” Nell leaned close to her sister, as if about to impart a vital piece of information. “All parents fall asleep at the dinner table and yearn desperately to be in bed by eight. You have no idea what you’re in for.”

  Laura made a dismissive motion with her hand. I noticed her empty ring finger and wondered what she’d done with the set Duncan had worked so hard to afford.

  “I remember when Colin and Clara were little,” she said. “It didn’t seem too bad.”

  Grace and I shared a look. It was hard to know if Laura was truly dim or just besotted with the notion of having a cute, cuddly baby of her own.

  “Because you went home at night and left the demons to me!” Nell laughed a bit harshly. “You were the fun, young aunt. I was on the front line; I was the mean, crabby mommy. I was the one who cleaned up vomit and went to boring teachers’ conferences and made the rules the demons struggled mightily not to follow.”

  Laura looked deeply distressed. “How can you call Colin and Clara demons? They’re your pride and joy! Aren’t they?”

  For a second, only a second, Nell’s eyes glimmered with tears. “My children,” she said, “are my life. Now that Richard isn’t.”

  I called for the check.

  Chapter 6

  Jess

  When your date tells you that his divorce was uncontested and without bitterness, don’t believe a word of it. It’s the guilt talking. He was a dirty, lying cheat and will always be a dirty, lying cheat

  —It Was Just One of Those Things: The Myth of the No-Fault Divorce

  I remember when it first came to me that my marriage would be over before long.

  It was less than a year after the wedding. I’d driven to Ogunquit for a weekend at a colleague’s beach house. The weather was good. Each of us spent an afternoon on our own; most academics enjoy solitude. I was sitting on the sand, gazing at the water, which was very flat, very blue. A big pink beach ball drifted along lazily, and the extreme calm of the scene was comforting and at that exact moment I knew I’d be divorced from Matt.

  And the thought didn’t kill me.

  Later, as I was getting ready for bed in the tiny, sparse room I’d been assigned, I remembered the flat blue water and the big pink ball. Yes, I thought, I won’t be wearing this diamond ring for long.

  I knew I wasn’t going to set out to destroy the marriage, but at the same time I knew I was waiting for it to end. I didn’t know how it would end, but I knew it would soon be over, and not because of death or any other noble or tragic thing. I felt very calm about the whole prospect, too.

  You see? I was doomed from the start. The first day back in Boston after that trip to Ogunquit I met a new assistant professor in the bioengineering department. His name was Seth Morgenstein and he was a mere twenty-five years old. Seth was—is—everything Matt is not. He’s communicative and witty; he’s an intellectual; he’s passionate. Seth listened to me.

  We started an affair within weeks of meeting each other. I enjoyed it enormously, for a while. Finally, the guilt got to be too much to bear, but only after I’d exhausted every ounce of passion between Seth and me. That process took four months.

  And now? Now I’m left with the dark realization that I can’t trust myself, and the darker realization that I can’t be trusted.

  It’s said that some people aren’t cut out for marriage. I think I know what that means. I like the idea of commitment, the comfort, the goodness of that. But I don’t think I’m capable of putting that idea into action. And I don’t think I’ll change with “the right person.” Nothing was wrong with Matt. He’s an okay guy, a decent guy, most of the time, anyway. His only serious flaw is that he married the wrong woman—me.

  He should have married someone—well, someone more like Laura, someone less demanding and “interesting”—someone more like him.

  Matt is a corporate accountant. He makes a lot of money, though to hear him talk, you’d think he was starving. Matt’s life revolves around “getting ahead” and football. The getting ahead part, the desire to climb the corporate ladder, was always a bit foreign to me. As an academic, I know the pressure to publish or perish; I guess that’s my version of “getting ahead.” But the money part, the part that interests Matt so much, isn’t there for me in the first place and honestly, I don’t care all that much about getting rich. I don’t want to starve; I want to be comfortable and more, I want to be secure, but I lack the desire to upgrade my car, my home, my vacations on a yearly basis.

  And the football. Okay, I’ve never been interested in sports, though I can enjoy a Super Bowl party as much as the next person who’s not entirely clear on what teams are playing. So before we moved in together, I considered Matt’s rabid interest in the game kind of cute. His face would light up when he scored tickets to a game; he’d stumble over words when trying to describe to me an “awesome play”; he’d jump out of his seat when a player did something spectacular.

  And then, Matt moved into my apartment. Things were okay at first; Matt was respectful of my space and I of his and there was virtually no football to be found on television. We were married that August.

  And then it began. Before two weeks had passed, I had become the proverbial football widow. If Matt wasn’t watching a game, he was taping one. If he wasn’t watching a commentary show, he was on the phone with a buddy, sharing his own commentary. If he wasn’t parked in front of the living room television, he was parked at a local sports bar, watching a game on a wide screen.

  Mat
t didn’t seem to care that I didn’t share his obsession. He didn’t need me; he needed football. So he could never understand why I would want him to attend a lecture with me or to go out on a Thursday night to hear some blues or jazz. Before long I realized I was even more alone than I’d been when I was single. Because when I was single, there was no one person I was supposed to be able to rely on as a companion. But now there was that one person and he had virtually no interest in being my companion.

  We never fought about this. I realized right off that arguing, cajoling, discussing would get me nowhere. Matt was happy; why should he change?

  Certainly not for love of me.

  Why, I began to wonder, did I get married in the first place?

  And the sex, our “love life” as it used to be so euphemistically called, it wasn’t so good. Frankly, the sex was average, even boring. Passion hadn’t brought us together; passion hadn’t compelled us to link ourselves legally until death did us part.

  The truth is I’m still wondering why I got married in the first place, and why I married Matt. I try to remember how I felt when I said yes to Matt, how I felt just afterward, but I can’t remember, not clearly.

  I do remember that my parents were happy. I remember my mother saying it was “about time I settled down.” But what I can’t remember is what they said over the years—if anything—about my being single. Had they been exerting a subtle pressure on me to choose a husband all along; and if so, had I been at all aware of the pressure?

  No. I can’t blame my parents for my saying yes to Matt. I can’t blame anyone but myself, certainly not societal norms or the pressure of my peers.

  After all, I’m a professional person with a stack of degrees to prove it. If I can’t be trusted to stand apart from the group and think for myself, who can? I observe society’s ever-changing mores; I don’t blindly accept them.

  Or do I?

  Chapter 7

  Nell

  He likes football, you like figure skating. He likes refried beans, you like salad. He likes action movies, you like foreign films. What the hell were you thinking?