Private Affairs

by Judith Michael

"Come on, my brilliant friend, you know what I mean. How come you fought harder for all of us than you did for your marriage?"

  "Harder . . . ? I don't know. You've never mentioned this before."

  "Never thought of it before. But just now, when I heard myself saying you'd won, it came to me. Usually I'm quicker."

  "Usually you're smarter. There are differences, Isabel."

  "Big ones?"

  "I think so. Matt wanted me to make my life fit his. I didn't want the life he had; he wouldn't make any changes in it. Why would I fight for that? It was different when I fought for Nuevo; that was something I wanted to do, and I decided how to do it and when to do it. Do you think

  I

  I could have written about Jock if I'd been living with the publisher of Rourke Enterprises? I was able to help you win because I'd made a name for myself—not as somebody's wife, but as me."

  "True. All true."

  "Well, then?"

  "I was just wondering why you never worked like hell for a compromise, which is what you and I did, finally, for Nuevo."

  Silently, Elizabeth brushed away some of the dust on her jeans.

  "Well, think about it," Isabel said at last. "There's no rush; after all, he's only been gone for ten months."

  "He has Nicole," Elizabeth said finally.

  "You had Tony."

  "But he was never more than—"

  "A man to be close to, when you felt alone and rejected. Maybe Matt feels the same way about his lady friend. I know you weren't the one who did the rejecting, but you didn't go with him when he asked, either. And then you never fought to get back what the two of you once had. I don't know why. Do you?"

  Elizabeth gazed across the valley at the dusty mountainside. "I think I was afraid to compete for him. I think I was afraid I'd lose because he was having such a wonderful time being a success. And I resented the whole idea. Why should I have to compete with other people, other women, for my own husband? I thought contests ended when we got married."

  "In an ideal world," Isabel said dryly.

  "But there were other things, too. I kept wondering what would make me feel good about myself if I had to concentrate on his dream instead of mine. If all I had to be proud of was famous, powerful Matt Lovell—as if I were telling everyone, Look at me! I'm important because an important man loves me!—I'd suffocate. I want to be proud because I'm me, not because I'm Man's companion."

  She paused, then shrugged. "I don't know if those were good reasons for not going after him; they seemed good at the time."

  "They still sound good. But you haven't said anything about love. Or building something together. Is that all gone? Because if it isn't, and you still divorce him, wouldn't that be like letting Nuevo drown without trying to build a new town in a safer place?"

  Frowning, Elizabeth picked up her sweater. "It's something to think about. I have to get home, Isabel, but I really will think about it." Her frown deepened. "I don't understand ... I don't know why I never thought of Matt that way."

  "You're too involved. It takes an observer."

  Elizabeth pulled the sweater over her head. "I have to think about it. And I've got to go; I want to talk to Paul, and if I really am writing three columns a week again, I've got to start planning interviews. And you have to talk to the governor!" She put her arms around Isabel. "I'm so happy for all of you."

  Isabel's arms encircled her. "Aren't we all. Mainly for having good friends. You'll help us move our town, won't you?"

  "You couldn't keep me away." They heard the telephone ring. "The governor. I hope. I'll call later." With a quick kiss on Isabel's cheek, she ran to her car. It was true that she had work to do, but mainly she wanted to get away so she could think.

  You fought harder for us than for your marriage. But I had reasons, she thought as she pulled onto the main road and drove away from the dirt and noise. All those reasons I gave Isabel. And Matt didn't fight for it either.

  But maybe both of us were too busy going after the brass ring to think of anything else.

  But I stopped. I got off that merry-go-round.

  She had stopped everything but her writing. The day after she found Tony in Holly's room, Elizabeth canceled her scheduled speeches and television appearances. And she refused all the new requests that came in. She hesitated once: when her agent called with an offer from a television network to host a one-hour talk show one night a week. But she didn't hesitate long. She wanted to be home. Holly needed her—they needed each other—and Peter and Maya would be back for the summer, living wherever they decided to live, and she had her writing and her friends . . . and the hope that "Private Affairs" would be syndicated again. And that was enough.

  There should be a time for all of us when we can say, This is enough for me; I know where I am; I've got what I want.

  The road curved between mountainsides covered with pines and aspens bursting with the pale green leaves of spring. Elizabeth saw three pick-up trucks driving to Nuevo. A dam, a resort, a state park, wilderness areas, a new town. Because we compromised.

  She drove down the sleepy main street of Pecos and made the turn toward Santa Fe. The road widened; she increased her speed and settled back. Maybe I left something out when I said, This is enough for me. Maybe all those reasons I gave for not fighting aren't important anymore. Maybe what's really important is what I do next.

  Maybe I siculc g: :: fluMluc There real; ire - .c: ;:" :™gs Mar and I haven't talked about.

  :clc her They were sitting it the kitchen ccunier. >re_r.^ peas "He s^d he wmmtoA tc pel nag Gram e-.er.:r_r_g and everybody for a wink."

  ■'E-.e.; -Iz: pretty sure he did. He didn't mention . anybody else."

  "Where will he go when he comes backr

  -I don't know. He didn't seem to, either. He said he'd call/'

  "How long will he be gone?"

  "I; .

  "Do yon know where he's staying in Eurc:

  "No He saic :e : v

  Disappointment swept over her. She hadn't realized how much she'd looked forward to seeing him. She slipped a neat row of peas from then-pod. ~WeiL let me know if he calls," she said, trying to keep her voice izi:

  "Why"" Ooiy asked.

  Elizabeth snapped open another pod. **I was thinking I might go to Houston."

  u were? Mother* Why didn't yc_ Why didn't you tell

  Daccy^"

  "I've only been thinking about it for the last tew days." ™»*h—*■ studied the sudden brightness in Holly's eyes. "Do you think he would have liked it if Td goner

  Ye> Well—•" Hcllys face clouded. Tm not sure. I think he might have hked it, but maybe he wouldn't know that he did. That doesn't make

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  t a pea pod and opened it like a book,

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  and want each other, I think if at least one part of my life was back to normal, if you and Daddy were the way you used to be and all of us were together, then everything else wouldn't seem so . . . big. Too big for me to manage all at once."

  "I've thought about it, too, Holly."

  "And?"

  "And I got as far as thinking I'd go to Houston. Only no one is there for me to see."

  "Well, how was Daddy supposed to know?" Holly gathered up the empty pea pods and wiped the counter with a sponge. "Everything seems so . . . gray. I just wish somebody would make everything seem bright again."

  Well, don't look at me, Elizabeth thought, briefly impatient. I know it
was silly to expect Matt to be sitting around waiting for me to call, but I did try. And whatever he's feeling, he isn't looking for me; he behaves like a man with his own life and his own plans. He probably thinks he did all he needed to do for me by sending his story to Paul and the AP.

  It was pure luck that they had Nuevo, she thought the next afternoon. So much was happening, it was like a story, with a new chapter unfolding each time they visited. Elizabeth began picking Holly up at school every afternoon to drive out and see what had happened since the day before. "The place is jumping," Isabel would say with a grin. "Take a look."

  There was activity everywhere. Dust swirled around the dam that grew higher each day; the yellow hats of construction workers moved about like small moons; trucks piled high with crushed rock made a steady procession to the dam, returning empty, leaving a trail of rocks that rolled off as they jounced along the road. One of them had knocked a porch off a house at the edge of town, another had taken a garden fence with it.

  But the excitement was higher up, on the land Keegan Rourke had donated for a new town. It had begun a few days after the meeting at Las Cruces, when the governor's office sent in trailers as temporary housing for the townspeople. Overnight, a small city sprang up. And in the next week, volunteers began to appear, bringing their own trailers or tents strapped to the roofs of their cars. And another small city came to life beside the governor's trailer city.

  Some of the volunteers were college students taking a break; some were men and women out of work who wanted to help and hoped to find permanent jobs at the resort or in town; some were shopkeepers, some were housewives, some were retired people who couldn't do heavy work and so brought charcoal grills and cooked for everyone, taking up a collection after each meal to buy groceries for the next.

  Tables and aluminum chairs were set up beside the tents and trailers; blue smoke rose from firepits dug in the ground; the smell of roasting meat and potatoes drifted through the valley. With Isabel and Cesar supervising, the volunteers formed groups to help the townspeople move from their houses, to help Gaspar empty his general store and set up a new one in a trailer, to work with Roybal in moving the contents of his gasoline station to a trailer and connecting his hose directly to a gasoline truck.

  Jock Olson, on his lunch hour, gave instructions to the largest group of volunteers, who would be moving the church and the three adobe houses, leaving only the wood houses behind. "Clear out the inside," he said at the door of the church. "Pews, altar, pulpit, the works. Then we'll take the stained glass windows out, frame and all if we can; if not, we'll have to take the glass out in sections. After that, we'll brace the building, jack it off its foundation, put supports and wheels under it, and tow it up the slope to the new foundation we'll be pouring. You can clean out the inside without me. The rest we'll do after four o'clock every day and on weekends."

  Each day at four, Jock would stop working on the dam and, without taking off his construction hat, stroll a few hundred yards to take charge of what he called "my other crew." At first his construction co-workers looked on in silent disapproval; then, as the new foundation neared completion, a few began drifting over to help. By the second week, only half the crew went home at four; the other half simply moved from one part of the valley to another, bringing the construction company's equipment with them. And with more workers, and heavy-duty equipment, everything speeded up.

  The crew's shouted jokes and directions to the volunteers filled the valley, along with the cries of blue jays, the noise of drills and hammers, and the shrieks and giggles of children playing in empty houses. More quietly, their parents emptied the church and moved personal possessions, and the older people turned meat on grills, cut wedges of avocados and tomatoes, stirred rice in iron pots, sliced bread or heated tortillas, set out beer and lemonade, and made pots of strong coffee. By seven o'clock the volunteers, the construction crew, and the townspeople sat down to dinner, warmed by campfires that encircled them as darkness fell.

  When they were there, Holly and Elizabeth forgot everything else. They wandered everywhere, watching the building of the dam, the pouring of the new foundation, and the jacking up and moving of the church and houses. "Isn't it odd?" Holly said to Elizabeth. "We all thought the dam would destroy the town, and now they'll be built together."

  "Odd and wonderful." Elizabeth's eyes brightened. "It would make a wonderful story." And she began to outline the story she would write, this time about a very public affair.

  A week later, Maya suddenly appeared. "My parents called and told me what was happening and I couldn't stay away. I had to help. Peter will be here next week; he's taking a few days off so he can help, too. What can I do?"

  "Everything," Isabel said. It was a Saturday morning; Holly and Elizabeth had arrived early; Luz had joined them for coffee, and Maya found the four of them sitting at a table beneath a sweet-smelling pine. Isabel had unrolled a wide sheet of paper and was sketching a layout for the new town. "The governor's sending a couple of planners next week to decide where to put power and water lines and such, and most people have ideas about where they want to live, so we're trying to draw a map of the town. All we know so far is that the church stays where they're putting it— forever, I hope. You should have seen them hauling it up the hill; I had visions of the whole thing sliding backward and collapsing in a heap of adobe bricks, after all the work of getting it ready—"

  "But it didn't happen," said Luz. "It's here."

  "It looks wonderful," Maya said.

  "It looks like a sad old hulk with holes in the walls, perched on a rolling platform. But give Jock a few days to get it on its foundation and we'll begin putting the windows back . . . Good morning," Isabel said as Olson came up beside her. "Just in time for coffee."

  He put his hand briefly on her shoulder and sat down. As he filled a mug, Holly looked from Olson to Isabel and back to Olson. "I thought you worked on the dam until four."

  He nodded. "So I do. But when we work a six-day week, I take longer coffee breaks." He glanced at the sketch in front of Isabel. "Where are you putting my house?"

  "At the end of the road, next to the forest," she said. "You told me that was what you wanted."

  "Just making sure. What about Elizabeth's?"

  "I haven't decided," Elizabeth said.

  "We're keeping a whole area undeveloped," said Isabel. "Plenty of time for people to choose later on."

  "Just make sure the souvenir shops aren't near the houses," Olson said.

  They all leaned over the sketch and made suggestions and Isabel wrote them down, to give to the planners. Elizabeth watched Olson reach out to point to something on the sketch, not once but again and again, and each

  time his hand just brushed Isabel's. How wonderful, she thought, and saw Holly and Luz watching, too.

  Olson finished his coffee. "Back to work. Isabel, I've been ordered once and for all to bulldoze the town."

  "When?"

  "Next week."

  "When next week?"

  "You tell me. How much more time do you need?"

  "How about Friday or Saturday?"

  He laughed. "You're pushing your luck. Friday morning. Best I can do." He gave a casual wave to the others at the table and walked down the slope to rejoin his crew.

  Holly and Luz had been exchanging glances. "He's extremely nice," Luz said. "I told Mother it's fine with me if she wants to be friends with him."

  "I was relieved to hear it," Isabel said dryly to Elizabeth. "But Luz is right; he's a very nice man. And I like working with him. I haven't worked with a man in a long time, and you know how good it can be."

  Elizabeth smiled. "I do know. Isabel, it's wonderful; I never thought of you and Jock—"

  "Wait! Don't put us together like that; I'm superstitious. Anyway, there are other problems. What if I decide to run for governor?"

  "Mother!" cried Luz.

  "I said What if. What else will I do with myself when you're in college and the town is rebuilt a
nd all the battles are won?"

  "Your ceramics; you haven't done any for a long time."

  "And?"

  "You're in the legislature."

  "Two months a year. Not enough. I don't know what to do with all my energy. You wouldn't deny me a respectable goal, would you? Governor Isabel Aragon. I like the sound of it."

  "I do, too," said Maya. "But why couldn't a man be part of that?"

  "I don't know. It's been so long since I thought about a man when I looked ahead ... I assumed I'd never find another one and I'd leave romance to Luz and Holly; they seem to enjoy it."

  Luz laughed, but Holly flushed deeply and looked away. "I'm like you, Isabel. I don't think about men when I look ahead."

  "Well, I imagine that will change," Isabel said casually. "Whoever he was, the unworthy snake who made you think that, he is condemned to a life of peevish dissatisfaction under someone else's thumb. You're well rid of him."

  "What makes you say that?" Elizabeth asked.

  "My vast knowledge of men. A man who could make Holly unhappy and bitter is a man with no backbone, no strength of character, and no imagination. Therefore, he'll never find what he thinks he wants, so he'll be peeved and dissatisfied, and he'll be under someone's thumb because he won't be able to get anywhere on his own."

  Holly was watching her with wide eyes. "You're amazing."

  "Experience," said Isabel. "Do you think maybe I should aim higher than governor?"

  They laughed and then Isabel said, "Well, as Jock said, back to work. If they're going to be knocking down houses next week we have to make sure everyone's out by Thursday." She looked at Elizabeth. "We have to call a meeting so everybody can vote on what to do about the town on Thursday night."

  "What to do?" Maya repeated. "But everyone will be gone. The town will be empty."

  "That's the idea," said Isabel. She and Elizabeth shared a smile. "We're going to burn the place down," she said.

  When the wind shifted, Matt felt a light spray from the fountain and for no apparent reason thought of quick summer showers in Nuevo. He sat on the wrought-iron bench and contemplated a marble horse in a pool of water in the center of the fountain, so real he could almost hear it whinny in protest as a cherub tried to rein it in. Elizabeth had been here, too, contemplating the marble animals, gargoyles, and cherubs as he was. Holly and Peter had told Matt about her letter describing the Piazza Navona and its fountain. "She said the cherub trying to hold onto the horse reminded her of you with Mr. Rourke," Peter had said.