Heartwood

by Belva Plain

  Good job, Laura. I’ve never been to a better wedding.

  And then finally it was quiet.

  In the living room, Laura’s family rested on chairs and sofas, shoes kicked off, holding the obligatory postmortem. In the ballroom, Nick was packing up his cameras. Diana and Jeff were outside loading up the van. Laura went to the ballroom.

  His back was to her, but he must have felt her coming because he straightened and turned. She walked to him, and he took her hands. His were cold—icy cold—she thought perhaps hers were too.

  “I can’t,” she said.

  “I know.”

  –—

  She walked with him to the back door, where his van was waiting for him in the driveway. They passed the living room, where her brothers, her niece, her sister-in-law, her daughter, her father, her mother and her husband were all sitting. The back door wasn’t visible from the living room but you could hear the voices. And presumably they could hear hers.

  She and Nick stood facing each other. She wasn’t going to cry.

  “It’s okay,” he said softly.

  “Speak for yourself,” she tried to joke, and they both managed to smile, which was the best good-bye they could have. The only one. Nick left and she turned back to the family that was waiting for her. And the promises she’d made.

  –—

  “It was so nice to see Robby and Laura dancing together. They’re such an attractive couple, don’t you think, Theo?” Iris asked, as she pulled down the covers on her side of the bed. The long wedding day was over, and she and Theo were home and getting ready to go to sleep. “Don’t you think, Theo?” Iris repeated. He knew she wanted him to agree with her; she was all but demanding it. At his side of the bed, Theo sighed quietly.

  Iris wanted him to say that he thought Laura and Robby were still a good couple. He didn’t, not anymore. There was a certain something you felt when a man and a woman were right for each other. It was in the air when they were together. It was like … what was it the young people said? It was like the vibrations … the vibes … they sent out. Theo climbed into bed and leaned back against the pillows. He closed his eyes. There was no mystery about that “something”; it was the man-woman thing, and old as the hills. It was the attraction that no one could explain, but it had been entrapping the human race since the beginning of the written word, if not before. Sex was at the root of it, but it was usually more than that. Sometimes it inspired the very best of human art and thought, the tales of Tristan and Isolde, or Romeo and Juliet, had been reconfigured over and over in poetry, music, theater and dance. Sometimes that same sexual attraction could turn dark and ugly, bringing on degradation and despair. Poets wrote about that too. But it was one of the most powerful forces mankind knew, maybe the most powerful one. And like the fire it was often compared to, once it had started to burn it was almost impossible to stop. And once it had died it was almost impossible to rekindle.

  At his side Iris was still waiting for him to answer her. Theo opened his eyes. “What did you think of that young man?” he asked. “The one who was taking the pictures.”

  “I really didn’t notice him that much.” But she had, Theo was almost positive about it. Iris was too smart about people and too instinctive not to have sensed the man-woman pull he had sensed between their daughter and the photographer. Iris wouldn’t admit this, certainly not out loud, but his wife was no fool.

  “I thought that man, whatever his name is, was kind of silly, if you want to know the truth,” she said after a second. “Taking pictures as if it was the most important thing on earth.” Oh yes, she had noticed the photographer.

  “Well, Steve and Christina will probably think it was pretty important when they’re looking at their wedding album,” Theo said. “And those pictures will be used for Laura’s book.”

  “That darned thing! I know it’s a big honor for Laura and I am proud of her, but the sooner she’s done with it, the better. It’s been too much of a drain on her time, and Robby isn’t happy about it.”

  “I wish Robby had better things to do with his time than go tattling to you.”

  “You don’t understand. Robby needs support. It hasn’t been easy for him … he had so many pressures and expectations … and I hate to speak badly of someone who’s died, but that father of his … well, you met the man … you know the kind of damage a parent like that can do to a boy …”

  It was the same kind of psychobabble she’d used to excuse Steve when he was giving them so much trouble. “I’d hardly call a man who is in his thirties a boy, Iris.”

  There was silence. Then she said in an anxious voice, “He’ll find his way. It’s just taking him a longer time than most. Laura has to be patient. She has to be there for him.”

  Be there for him. That was another of the psychobabble phrases Theo detested. And what if his daughter got tired of being patient and being there? What if she wanted to experience joy again? What if she decided she wanted a man who was her equal, not an overgrown schoolboy still nursing the wounds of his failure?

  A thought occurred to Theo. How would he feel about a divorce in his family? As far as he knew there had never been one. There had been plenty of infidelities, particularly back in the old country—that was, after all, the European way. And in families of a certain class especially, it was almost always the men who indulged, which was also European—and very old-fashioned.

  But this was not Europe and it was not the old days. American women considered themselves as free as any man to find love and sexual satisfaction where it pleased them.

  So how would you feel, Theo, if Laura had an affair? Lord knows you’ve had them. Steven and Jimmy were not virgins when they were married and neither is Phil as a single man. And to be fair, you wouldn’t want them to be. But Laura, your beautiful Laura?

  Theo closed his eyes again. The weariness that was now his nemesis was threatening to take over his body. But his mind went on.

  Iris wants Laura to be a saint, the way she imagines her own mother, Anna, was. But I know differently about Anna. So how would I feel if Laura is more of a throwback to her grandmother than anyone knows?

  Theo opened his eyes. I don’t have an opinion, he realized. It’s a new time, one I don’t understand. A new generation is making the rules and the decisions, and unlike Iris with Laura, I don’t want to control what happens.

  –—

  Why do I feel so alone? Iris wondered as she turned out the light on her nightstand. Most people would say it’s natural because my son got married today and I’ve lost him. But I haven’t. If anything, now that Christina is my daughter-in-law, he’ll be in my life more than he ever was. I love that girl.

  So this isn’t about Steven, its about Laura. But I already knew that. Today, when I watched her, it was as if I was a child again, watching my mother. I remembered all those old feelings—that Mama was hiding something, that she was holding something back. I’ve never felt that before with Laura. We’ve always been so close, so open with each other; I’ve been proud of that. But it hasn’t been like that for a while now. I don’t know if I could stand it, if she and I became like my mother and me.

  Robby had better start paying more attention to his marriage. I defend him to everyone because I remember the shining boy he was, and I know he’s still a good person. And he’s my daughter’s husband and the father of my granddaughter. But something is going on with Laura and he’s not seeing it.

  “That photographer should do something about his hair,” she said, and her voice was angry in the darkness. “It hangs in his face like he’s a stupid schoolboy.”

  But Theo had fallen asleep.

  –—

  Robby was downstairs, and Katie was asleep in her room, after having hung her creamy yellow party dress on her closet door so she could see it when she dozed off. Laura’s tea gown was hanging on the front of her closet door too, but she couldn’t bear to look at it. She never would be able to again. It was the gown she’d worn when she’d said
good-bye to Nick. The pain was just starting to sink in. Throughout the day she’d been so busy covering her emotions that she hadn’t had time to feel them. But now her family had gone to their various homes, her cleanup crew had done the heavy work and would be back in the morning to do the rest, and she was sitting in front of her vanity. And the pain had begun to throb. She wanted to sit quietly, and try to absorb it, and to mourn. But Robby had come into the room and he was talking to her.

  “I just got off the phone with Mother,” he was saying. “I’ve decided to go see her. She hasn’t been feeling too well, and to be honest with you I need a break. I know you haven’t noticed it, but I’ve been having a rough time. Your brothers seem to think I shouldn’t have quit my job. I’ve gotten a lecture from every one of them, and—”

  His voice finally got through the mist of sorrow and loss. “I’m sorry,” she broke in. “What did you say?”

  “I don’t know how I could make it much clearer. Don’t tell me a member of the brilliant Stern family doesn’t understand English.”

  “Robby, please.”

  “I’m going home for a visit. I want to see my mother and I need to clear my head.”

  She forced herself to focus on him. To put her pain aside. “What about your writing?”

  “I knew you were going to bring that up. You’re just like your brothers. You think I should be working nonstop because I quit that job Steve arranged for me as a consolation prize for moving here …”

  “That’s not what I was saying and it wasn’t what Steve did it for.”

  “All right then, it was charity. A gift he cooked up to keep the little man busy while his sister became a household name. I suppose I’m lucky you’re still using ‘McAllister,’ by the way. Thank you, dear, for putting me on the map.”

  “That is unfair in so many ways I don’t know where to start. Steve didn’t—”

  “Your brother has nothing but contempt for me! Your whole damn family does! And why shouldn’t they? I let them treat me like a weakling.”

  “My brothers don’t feel that way. Nor do my parents.”

  “Don’t try that with me, Laura!” He was shouting. Just like his father used to.

  Nick, I gave you up for this!

  “I let you walk all over me!” Robby ranted on. “I never should have let you push me into moving here.”

  “I didn’t push you. You wanted to come.”

  “Don’t tell me what I wanted. Don’t put words in my mouth. I came here and I took your brother’s lousy job for your sake. I let you wear the pants in our family and I became a nothing.”

  She was so sick of trying to be good. Sick of trying to be good to him. “And what the hell did you do, Robby?” she burst out. “You got fired from one job because you wouldn’t do as you were told, and you quit a second one because you’re the great Robby McAllister and the work was beneath you. How is any of that my fault?”

  He was startled. He’d never seen her like this before. “You work all the time. Your business is more important than I am, how do you think that makes me feel?”

  “I don’t care! I don’t give a damn about your precious feelings!”

  In the silence that followed, her words seemed to echo throughout the room. It wasn’t completely true, but it was more honest than she’d ever been with him. And the trouble with that kind of honesty was, there was no way to take it back. But she tried. “I didn’t mean it that way, Robby,” she said.

  But suddenly he was not fighting anymore. “Yes, you did,” he said quietly. “You meant it exactly the way you said it.”

  “I was angry …”

  “No. This is about a lot more than anger, don’t you see? You’ve lost all respect for me. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

  I have, but not for the reasons you think.

  But she wasn’t going to say that, wasn’t going to risk honesty again.

  “I need to get your respect back, Laura. I need to get my self-respect back.” He was eager now, and there was a trace of the old sweetness too. She remembered their college days when he’d find a poem by Emily Dickinson that he knew would delight her, or when he’d hear a new song he wanted her to hear, and he’d race across campus to share it with her. She remembered the way he had looked at her when he’d put Molly in the back of the car because he knew she loved the dog and couldn’t bear to leave her out in the desert. He had wanted to make her happy then, and in his own way, he was still trying to do that now. She wanted to cry.

  “Let me get out of here for a while, I’m starting to hate this town,” Robby said. “I’ll get my head together and come back and we’ll make a fresh start.”

  Suddenly she didn’t want to cry anymore, she was just tired. Too tired to try to point out how many fresh starts they’d already made, or how many times he’d tried to get his head together. Maybe he was right and it would do him good to get away. Maybe a miracle would happen. And if it didn’t, at least if he was in Ohio she could finish the work on her book without him wanting her to stop what she was doing to make dinner or to take time out to go someplace, and then sulking when she said she couldn’t.

  “When do you think you’ll go?” she asked.

  –—

  Robby left the next week. He kissed her before he walked out to his car—he was driving to Ohio—and she stood in the doorway and waved good-bye. Then she closed the door and went back inside and made herself a cup of coffee, and listened to the whir of her refrigerator in her silent kitchen. She and Robby had been separated before, of course. But this time … she wondered if she’d miss him.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  “Robby’s gone to Blair’s Falls, and Laura says she’s not sure when he’s coming back. Something’s wrong,” Iris said. The worry lines were creasing her forehead, and she was biting her lip.

  “It’s not a separation,” Theo soothed. “He went to visit his mother.”

  The worry lines relaxed a little. “I wish Laura could have gone with him.”

  “She had to work. There’s the reception she’s catering for that pianist.” The reception was to be held in Manhattan, and the pianist in question was a young girl who was the big new name in the classical music world. The job was very glamorous and a big coup for Laura. “It’s the first time she’s done a party in the city. This is important to her.”

  “So is her marriage.”

  And they were back to Iris’s concern … no, it was a fixation … with Laura’s marriage. Unfortunately, her motives weren’t as pure as she liked to think. It was true that Iris genuinely believed in marriage and she couldn’t imagine a full, joyful life for any woman without it. But it was also true that she didn’t want her daughter to fail at the thing at which her mother had been so brilliant. Theo shook his head. Mothers and daughters, he would never understand that relationship. They loved each other so much, certainly Iris and Anna had, but Iris had always been in competition with Anna—not that she’d ever admit it. Laura had been Iris’s secret weapon in that competition. It was as if Laura could vindicate her mother in her struggle with her mother. Theo shook his head again. It was all so very feminine … and so very convoluted.

  He should probably try to say something that would put his wife’s mind at ease … But no, he wasn’t going to have to. Because Iris was looking at her watch, which meant that her agile mind had just switched to an even greater concern than Laura’s marital status. Him. Sure enough, she came bustling to his side. “Good gracious, Theo,” she said. “I’ve been going on and on, and it’s time for you to take your nap.”

  There had been a time when he would have argued that naps were for children and he would have given her a hard time. But these days he was always grateful for a rest. Not a good sign, but to be expected. That was what he had to remember. It was to be expected. He allowed his wife to lead him into the bedroom and soon he was lying in bed with the lights turned off, supposedly trying to sleep. But his mind returned again to the never-ending puzzle of Iris, Anna
and Laura. And Anna’s secret. Which was at the heart of the puzzle. He could still remember the fateful afternoon when he’d learned the secret. The man who had told him the story was named Paul Werner. Before that day, Theo had only known him as an old friend of Anna’s. Theo closed his eyes and in his mind he was transported back to the late sixties, when his life was in shambles.

  The immediate cause of his misery had been a terrible accident. It had occurred during a furious quarrel with Iris, when she’d closed a car door on his hand. She hadn’t meant to do it, hadn’t seen his hand, but his fingers had been severed and in a few seconds his career as a plastic surgeon had ended. That was all it had taken; some words spoken in rage, a car door slammed shut and a hand that was in the way. And his life as he had known it was over. He couldn’t earn a living, and since he had always lived beyond his means, he hadn’t had a penny of savings. He was soon drowning in debt, and Iris was drowning in guilt. She couldn’t be in the same house with him, and he had been living in his office.

  Theo had pulled down the blinds and was playing Verdi’s Requiem on the stereo when Paul Werner had knocked on his door. He’d let Paul in—he’d never been sure why, since he barely knew the man—and after a bit of prodding Theo had spilled all the details of his desperate situation. To his amazement Paul had offered to support him and his family while he trained himself in a new branch of medicine. Paul had claimed he was making this outrageously generous offer because of his old friendship with Anna, but Theo had dismissed that lie and demanded the truth. Then it had been Paul’s turn to tell his story—the one he’d been carrying inside him for almost forty years.

  When she first came to America from Poland, Anna had worked as a maid in the home of Paul’s parents, Florence and Walter Werner. The Werners were an old and respected New York family with deep roots in the German Jewish community of the city. All of this Theo had known. But he hadn’t known that while Anna was working for the Werners, she and Paul had fallen in love—helplessly and, as it turned out, hopelessly, because Paul was already engaged. His fiancée was a girl of his own class and his family had been hoping for years for the match. Unable to disappoint them, Paul had married his fiancée, knowing that Anna was the only woman for him. A heartbroken Anna had married Joseph Friedman, knowing that Paul was the love of her life.