Summer in the City

by Robyn Sisman

  Betsy felt her mother’s sympathetic gaze. “Is that where you met the awful woman who couldn’t discipline her children?”

  “She wasn’t awful,” Lloyd protested. “She was delightful. How could you say such a thing, Betsy?”

  Betsy was beginning to feel like a circus performer, trying to balance on two galloping horses with minds of their own. “Why don’t we discuss this another time?” she suggested.

  Her mother took no notice. “But, Lloyd, you can’t possibly be thinking of living in England?”

  “Not forever,” he agreed. “I don’t want to do anything forever. It’s good to move around, try new things, not get trapped. But I need to talk everything over with Betsy and we haven’t had a chance yet. We’ll let you know when we’ve made our decision.”

  Mother bridled. “That is not a satisfactory answer.”

  Anxious to prevent further argument, Betsy opened her mouth to speak.

  Her mother flung up a commanding palm. “No, Betsy, I will not be silenced! Someone has to speak up for you. I think it would be very selfish of Lloyd to take you away from your home and your family—especially at this particular time.”

  “And what particular time is that, Mrs. Rennslayer?” asked Lloyd. His tone was even, but his upper lip had a pinched look to it that Betsy recognized. He was getting angry.

  “Motherrr,” she warned.

  “I don’t pretend to approve of what has happened, but a mother cannot harden her heart against her little girl—however she has behaved.”

  “Mother, please—”

  “Betsy is not a little girl. She is thirty-four years old.”

  “You know what I’m talking about, Lloyd.”

  “No, I don’t. Do you, Betsy?” Lloyd was looking very stern.

  Betsy began to panic. There was something she had not yet brought herself to explain to her mother. She could see disaster hurtling toward them all. She began to stumble out excuses, but Mother simply turned up the volume. “I am referring, of course, to the baby.”

  “But I never said—”

  “What baby?”

  “It is an American baby. It belongs in America.”

  “Betsy, what’s she talking about?”

  “Mother, please let me explain—”

  “No grandchild of mine is going to be born under socialist medicine!”

  “Mother, shut up!”

  There was a ghastly silence. Betsy’s hand crept to her mouth. What had she said?

  She became aware that a large object had appeared next to her. Glancing sideways, she saw a glistening chocolate cake exuding jam, a bowl of blood-red berries, something yellow submerged in cream. She wondered if she was going to throw up.

  “Something from the sweet trolley, madam?” intoned a sepulchral voice.

  “Give us five minutes,” said Lloyd, with aplomb.

  “I am going to my room.” Mother rose majestically from the table. “I have no wish to interfere in matters that apparently do not concern a mother.” Her wounded eyes swiveled to Betsy. “I will talk to you later, Elizabeth.” She walked from the room, handbag clasped to her heart. As she reached the exit she tottered and gripped the door jamb for support.

  Betsy half rose from her seat. Then she felt a hand on hers.

  “Good for you,” said Lloyd warmly.

  His touch released a gush of tears. “I shouldn’t have said that.” Betsy groped for her handkerchief.

  “Yes, you should. It doesn’t mean you don’t love her. She has to understand that you’re grown-up enough to run your own life.”

  “Am I?” Betsy hung her head. At this moment she didn’t feel capable of running anything. Her mother’s reproachful eyes scorched holes in her conscience.

  “You’re also grown-up enough to tell me that you’re having a baby.”

  Betsy’s head jerked up. Lloyd was watching her steadily. He looked calm, but remote. She felt almost frightened of him.

  “It’s not that I didn’t want to talk to you,” she tried to explain. “I never seemed to find the right moment. You’ve been so . . . strange these last couple of weeks.”

  “Strange?” He laughed abruptly. “Can you blame me?”

  “And then when I found out for sure, there didn’t seem any point in making a big drama about what might have been.”

  “ ‘Might have been’?” Lloyd pounced on her words. “You mean you’re not pregnant?”

  “It must have been a stomach bug. I did a test, but I didn’t do it right. So then I had to buy another kit and wait until you’d gone out of the house to try again. Except you were always telephoning or fiddling with your papers.” Betsy hoped he was beginning to understand how difficult he’d been to live with. “I finally got a chance the night before last, when you went off to that big party. The result was negative.”

  “You’re not going to have a baby,” he repeated wonderingly. Betsy was hurt to see how relieved he looked.

  The dessert man was trundling toward them again. “Not tonight, thanks,” Lloyd said, forestalling his patter. “We’ll have the check.” He turned to Betsy. “How come your mother seemed so convinced you were pregnant?”

  Betsy hesitated, framing her answer. “She happened to call the first time I did the test. You were out and I was lonely so I told her what I was doing. She was so excited. She went off into this big fantasy about grandchildren and birthday parties and having us live nearby so that she could babysit.”

  Lloyd grunted. “And what about the father?” he asked. “Were you planning to inform him at some stage?”

  “Of course I was, Lloyd. But you were always so busy. Then I discovered that there was nothing to tell.”

  “And you haven’t told your mother you’re not pregnant because you didn’t want to disappoint her, is that it?” Lloyd sounded bemused, but he seemed to swallow it.

  “I wanted to tell her in my own time.” Betsy twisted her napkin in her lap. She did not pass on Mother’s view that there was nothing like a pregnant fiancée to keep a man on his toes in the run-up to a wedding, a dangerous period during which relentless discussion of flowers, bridesmaids and engraved invitations had been known to make many a prospective bridegroom turn tail.

  She looked guiltily at Lloyd. He looked warily back. The silence between them lengthened.

  “You don’t have to marry me, you know, Betsy,” he said gently.

  “But I want to!” she protested. Was this true? Panic gripped her. She wanted to go back to the way things were.

  “Do you?”

  Betsy could only nod. The right words had deserted her.

  Lloyd reached across to her. “Come on. Let’s take a little walk.” Outside it was still light but the traffic had quieted. They left the hotel and walked toward the park. Lloyd put his arm around her. It felt comfortable, and familiar. Betsy could hardly stand the thought that he might ever become a stranger.

  By the time they returned the sky was dusky, noisy with nesting pigeons. Lloyd paused on the steps of the hotel and disengaged himself. He smiled into her eyes with such a sad, affectionate look that Betsy’s whole body flushed with sudden heat. Never had he seemed more attractive. If he had asked her, she would have gone upstairs with him right there and then.

  “It’s been a tough evening,” he said. “I think we both need time alone to think. Why don’t I see if I can find you a room here tonight?”

  Chapter Thirty-two

  As the plane leveled out from its climb, Suze pressed her cheek against the cold window and squinted down through a milky dawn sky. A frill of white showed where the silver sea met flat, mottled land, and she wondered if she was looking at Long Island—if, a few hours from now, the smart crowd would emerge from mansions and cottages below, groomed for another weekend of whoop-de-doo. Then the plane tilted and she felt a burst of joy as she caught a final glimpse of Manhattan, angled against the horizon, looking as peaceful and as static as a monochrome postcard. “I’ll be back,” she whispered.

  The v
iew disappeared in a rush of cloud that spattered the window with moisture. Suze closed her eyes. Her ears were fuzzy with the thrum of the engines, her limbs sluggish in the pressurized atmosphere. Images formed and dissolved in her mind: Lloyd’s disarming grin when Harry, Bernie and Bannerman all offered him jobs; Sheri’s office, stripped of its pictures and flower vases; Dee Dee’s face when Suze presented her with a pair of the Eiffel Tower sandals she had so coveted, ordered by phone and couriered from London at reckless expense; a yellow flash in the dark street as Raymond opened the cab door to let her climb into its musty interior. It had been four in the morning when she said good-bye to the apartment. As the driver gunned his car through empty streets, Suze had rolled down the window to breathe in the city’s warm exhalations for the last time, watching through half-closed eyes as the gaudily necklaced buildings flashed past.

  The past twenty-four hours had been exhilarating but exhausting. Once Harry and Bernie had carried off the Passion team to a celebratory lunch, the rest of Schneider Fox had decided it was playtime. As news of Sheri’s dismissal spread, Suze found half the company crowding into her office, avid for a blow-by-blow account. Their blood-lust was disconcerting: she had been unaware of how much Sheri was disliked—or how much Lloyd was missed. A sentimental, valedictory mood prevailed. People Suze scarcely recognized squeezed her hands and said how wonderful it had been knowing her. She had been presented with a farewell card and a squashy parcel that turned out to be a six-foot inflatable Chrysler Building, complete with battery-operated light. Suze promised that it should take pride of place in her London bedroom. Halfway through the afternoon Harry had poked his head around the door, grinned at the melee and given her a thumbs-up sign: “See you in London.” Bernie never reappeared. The word was that he had gone straight on to his primal-screaming session.

  By five o’clock the office was empty; everyone had taken off for the weekend. Suze swept her few personal possessions into a plastic bag and took a last look around. She would miss the wide blue view from the window. Her eye alighted on one of Lloyd’s sharpened pencils; she popped it into her bag for good luck and closed the door.

  The sight of the apartment, strewn with papers and coffee mugs and half-filled suitcases, made her want to weep. Instead, she called up Raymond and after a stiff bout of bargaining wrote him an enormous check to cover cleaning, restocking the fridge and a fresh supply of boring old houseplants. Then she showered off the contaminations of the day, washed her hair until it squeaked and prepared herself for one last evening in New York.

  The restaurant was predictably chic, with minimalist styling and subdued lighting. It was eight o’clock when she arrived—early by Manhattan standards—and the tables were empty. She had not promised that she would come, only agreed under pressure that she might. But there he was at the bar, as he had said he would be, the golden boy with his all-American smile.

  “Hello, Nick.” She kept her voice casual.

  He jumped off the bar stool and came forward to kiss her on both cheeks. “Great to see you! Let’s sit down.” He led her to a corner table—“his” table, she was sure—and ordered her a drink. He was very self-possessed. It was hard to believe that this was the man who had turned so vicious only a week before.

  “Thanks for coming.” His blue eyes were sincere. “I want to apologize. I couldn’t let you leave town thinking badly of me.”

  Suze said nothing. His phrasing gave him away: Nick wasn’t really interested in her, but in himself.

  “I hated that argument we had in the country,” he protested. “It was my fault. I was a little uptight that weekend.”

  Uptight? What a useful weasel-word that was, excusing a multitude of sins. Suze twisted her glass around and around, trying to block out the images of his savage anger. “What happened to the movie deal?” she asked.

  Nick flashed her a sunny smile. “Perfecto. All fixed up. Zarg’s forgotten all about that little problem we had.”

  And what about Jodie? Suze wondered. Had she forgotten?

  “Good.” She gave him a smile. “There’s something I want to know. Tell me honestly, did Sheri really tell you to ask me out?”

  Nick look embarrassed. “I said a lot of things that night I didn’t mean. I was mad at you. All Sheri did was to tell me that you were new in town and might be lonely—but only because I was pumping her about this great-looking English girl she had working for her.” He leaned across to her. “I liked you. You know that. I loved that day we had, doing goofy things in Central Park. It was nice. It was . . .” He frowned, searching for the right word. When he found it, he sounded faintly surprised. “. . . normal,” he pronounced.

  Suze studied his face. She thought she believed him. “I’m beginning to think I am rather normal,” she said, with a sigh.

  “You’re gorgeous,” Nick replied automatically. “Maybe when I’ve finished having fun I’ll be normal too.” He didn’t look enthusiastic about it. “You don’t want to go believing people like Sheri Crystal,” he continued. “The first time I did some work with Sheri, she made a play for me. Then I found out she was balling another guy—Tony somebody. All she wanted was to get my ideas for free.” He looked disgusted.

  “Tony who? Do you remember?”

  Nick shrugged. “Some Italian name . . . But who cares about Sheri?” He held out a hand to Suze and gave her his irresistible bad-boy smile. “Friends?” he asked.

  Suze’s eyes wandered over the smooth, tanned planes of his face, noting the curl of his smile and the tousled forelock, just asking to be smoothed back. He was a gorgeous hunk of manhood. She didn’t fancy him one bit. “Friends,” she agreed, putting her hand in his. They shared a long smile. She felt the balance of their relationship swing between remembered highs and lows, and settle somewhere comfortable in between. She had been silly, but she hadn’t been used.

  A purring noise interrupted the amicable silence: Nick’s mobile phone. Politely, he let it ring, in case she had anything more to say. Suze watched anxiety cloud his face. She burst out laughing. “Go on, answer it. You know you’re dying to.”

  “Well, if you’re sure . . .” He slid it out of his pocket.

  Suze stood up. “I must go anyway. I’m meeting somebody.”

  Nick blew her a distracted kiss, already on to the next excitement. In the doorway she paused to look back at him, lounging in his chair, talking enthusiastically into his little black telephone. “Hey, Larry, great to hear from you!” She felt a spurt of tenderness. Then she had turned her back on him and walked free.

  A hand touched her shoulder. It was the stewardess, wondering if she wanted lunch. Suze sat up in alarm. Crikey! If it was already lunchtime by the English clock, that meant dinnertime was only eight hours away. Her stomach began to flutter—though not with hunger. Tonight, at long last, she was going to meet Lloyd Rockwell.

  They had arranged to have dinner in her favorite Notting Hill restaurant, during the narrow slice of time between the arrival of her plane and the departure of his. Lloyd had sounded excited about meeting her; probably he was just being polite, because of the help she had given him. No doubt actually seeing her would prove a disappointment. Nevertheless, Suze felt a ripple of pleasurable anxiety. Could he possibly be as nice as he sounded on the phone? She had rather liked the look of him on the videolink, but then she had only seen his face, and a fuzzy version at that. He might have a beer paunch or bad breath. Jay said he was very intellectual: would her conversation bore him?

  Last night, after leaving Nick, she had picked up Jay in her cab and taken him to the 21 Club, where they had finally drunk the bottle of champagne that had been awaiting Suze for thirty-odd years. One by one they had raised their glasses to Jay’s movie, Lloyd’s rehabilitation, Suze’s boardroom triumph, Suze’s dad, eternal friendship, true love and tobacco. It was a wonderful evening. In between the bouts of sentiment, Suze had fished for clues about Lloyd.

  “Will he like me, do you think?”

  “I don’t know.
He’s pretty picky.”

  “Well, will I like him?”

  “His taste in ties is terrible.”

  Half giggling, half exasperated, she had gone on pestering him for details until he brought her up short. “You haven’t forgotten Betsy, have you?”

  She had, temporarily. Somehow, Suze had never quite believed in Betsy.

  To Jay she had said, “Don’t be silly. Betsy Whatsername isn’t even going to be there. This is a business meeting—combined post-mortem plus key exchange plus sorry-I-broke-your-wineglass sort of thing. It’s not exactly romantic.”

  The stewardess reappeared, offering drinks. Suze considered ordering an enormous vodka; then she remembered reading that drinking alcohol in airplanes was disastrous for the skin. Feeling very adult and responsible, she asked in dignified tones for a bottle of mineral water, a pillow and a blanket.

  She drank her water, then slipped off her shoes and replaced them with the slippers provided. Perhaps she ought to get some rest. She didn’t want Lloyd to think her an old hag—not that it mattered. She slapped on some face cream. Then she pulled down the window blind and covered her eyes with the shade. She groped for the airline pillow and snuggled under the blanket. In five minutes she was asleep.

  “Ohhhh, yeah . . . oh, yeah. Everything’s gonna be all right this morning . . . WHOO!”

  Lloyd turned up the stereo to full blast and boogied back to his breakfast. The window was thrown wide. Midday sunshine warmed his back. He was wearing shorts, sunglasses and nothing else. He felt good.

  “I’m a man,” he growled alongside Muddy Waters, shaking his cereal packet in time with the pounding bass drum. “I spells M . . .”—he poured a slurp of milk from the bottle—“. . . A”—he dug his spoon deep—“. . . N”—he tossed the toasted flakes into his mouth and dispatched them with a virile crunch. Under the table his bare foot thumped out the insistant blues beat on the floorboards.

  The flat was a wreck. Lloyd stared around vaguely at the piles of paper, books and acquired oddments he had halfheartedly begun to collect. Yesterday afternoon, in celebration of his triumph, he’d bought over three hundred dollars’ worth of blues CDs at some beaten-up store near King’s Cross: yet more stuff to pack. The bedroom was worse. He had spread out his clothes on the unmade bed, but had got no further. Who was going to fold his shirts? Betsy usually did the packing, but . . . Lloyd stopped tapping his foot and looked solemn. This morning she had called from the hotel; at the end of their long conversation she had told him that it would be better if they didn’t meet today, she would collect her things some time when he was out. She had sounded subdued. He hoped her mother wasn’t bullying her. Last night she had been so sweet. Lloyd gave a mournful sigh.