Off Season

by Jean Stone

  No one had told him Charlie wanted to rent his apartment over the tavern. Was he moving in with that woman, the one from the mainland? Ben wanted to ask but was more concerned right now with Jill’s need to control Amy’s life. It wasn’t a lot unlike her need to control his, too, to try and make this ordeal go away on her terms, not his. “Have you mentioned the apartment to her?”

  “I had my secret assistant do it for me. Rita. Mom said no way. As expected.”

  To Ben, this seemed like a perfect solution. If Amy rented Charlie’s apartment, she’d be out of the house, away from the opportunity of learning about Mindy. Amy was eighteen—and she was supporting herself. Well, almost. A good dose of independence might be just what Amy needed to help her realize how important family support—and furthering her education—really was. And it would sure give him and Jill more freedom to sort things out, their marriage included.

  He took off his cap and rubbed his head. “Has Rita rented it yet?”

  “Don’t know. Hey—what about you? Not that it’s any of my business, but the tension around home is so thick, you couldn’t whack it with a ginzu. Maybe you should take a break. An amicable separation before it leads to marital disaster.”

  Ben stiffened. “Your mother and I are just fine, Amy. And you’re right, it’s none of your business. But when I married her, I made it my business to see that you’re happy, too. And if I have anything to say about it, you’ll have this apartment. If it’s what you really want.”

  She dropped the bats, flung her arms around him, and kissed him square on the lips.

  Just at that moment, Jill walked through the door.

  • • •

  Jill wasn’t sure how to describe what she felt when she walked in and saw her husband in her daughter’s arms, lips upon lips. If it hadn’t been for Mindy Ashenbach, she might have thought nothing.

  She watched in stunned silence as her husband untangled Amy’s arms a little too quickly.

  “Jill,” he said, as if speaking her name would eradicate any negative insinuation the act had evoked.

  “Ben,” she replied, trying to push down a seed of doubt that had neatly been planted. “I was hoping I’d find you here.”

  She looked at Amy, who looked at Ben, who looked at Jill, then Amy, then back at Jill.

  She blinked. “Rick Fitzpatrick is looking for you.” She supposed she shouldn’t have mentioned the lawyer in front of Amy, but right now she wasn’t feeling very patronizing of her husband or his problems.

  “Rick?” Ben asked, stepping away from his stepdaughter. “It must be about the land titles for Sea Grove.”

  She wanted to blurt it out right then and there, to tell Amy about Mindy so she could watch his face freeze in dull shock, the way hers felt frozen now. Instead, she folded her arms. “Oh, yes, I’m sure.”

  He put his hands on his hips as if in defense. “Amy was just thanking me because I promised to put in a good word for her. It seems Charlie wants a winter renter for his apartment. The fact that you plan to be gone so often would make the apartment ideal for Amy. No sense in turning her into a housekeeper for this old man.”

  Jill wanted to kill Ben for bringing up the apartment right in front of Amy, as if she had not already said no. She also wanted to kill him for hinting that Amy would be better off out from under the same roof where he lived. As if she didn’t trust him. As if …

  Ben moved closer to her. “Come on, Jill, what do you say? Let her have a try. She’ll only be two blocks away.”

  Inside her jacket pockets, she balled her hands into fists. “Do what you want, both of you,” she said. “I don’t care anymore.”

  With a shriek of delight, Amy high-fived Ben and Jill went out the door.

  Something must have happened. Rita had known Jill for over forty years, and in all that time she’d never once changed her mind, had only grown more stubborn after she’d made a decision. Well, of course, she had changed her mind and married Ben and not that celebrity asshole, but Rita never believed she’d been serious about him in the first place. After all, a big part of the reason Jill had become so successful was because she had sense.

  So when Jill called Rita in the morning and told her she had changed her mind and wanted Amy to have the apartment, Rita was surprised. She wasted no time in leaving a message on Charlie’s machine, in case he ever bothered to haul himself out of Marge Bainey’s sack long enough to see if the rest of the world was still there.

  Apparently he hauled himself out not long after lunch, because a few minutes later, he was on the phone.

  “So it looks like you’re off to Florida whether you like it or not,” Rita said. “Or you’ll be bunking at the homeless shelter in Vineyard Haven.”

  “Or with you and Hazel,” he said with a chuckle, which Rita did not think was very funny.

  “Do you want me to draw up a lease agreement? What about the rent? You never mentioned what you want.”

  “For Amy? Come on, Rita, she’s family. Besides, the heat might be costly if it’s a cold winter, but it will be better for the building if it’s on. If she wants cable TV, she’ll have to pay for it to be installed. Those things plus the fact she’ll be watching out for the tavern should make us about even.”

  “That figures,” Rita said. “I finally make a real estate deal, and the guy wants to cut me out of a commission.”

  “I’ll send you a pink flamingo for the lawn.”

  A baby stroller might be more appropriate, she wanted to say. She felt a slow pang of sorrow that this time separation from Charlie seemed somehow permanent. A fleeting thought that maybe she should tell him about the baby, that maybe she should stop him from doing anything stupid like marrying Marge Bainey, went through her mind and did just that: fleeted. When he came home in the spring, it might be too late for them, but it wouldn’t be too late for him to be a father to his child, if she decided he should be, if that was what he wanted, if he weren’t so angry with her that he ignored their baby.

  No, Rita thought, Charlie was like Ben Niles. Neither had a mean bone in his body.

  “When are you leaving?” Rita asked. “Not that I care, but Amy might like to know when she can move in.”

  “Well, I hadn’t made definite plans, but now it looks as if you’ve forced me into them. Give me a few days after the Halloween party to get organized. How about if she moves in the following weekend?”

  “Good deal,” Rita said, then rang off, feeling somehow elated that she’d beaten the odds and would not have to face Charlie and tell him the truth and risk him wanting to marry her and her having to say no.

  Chapter 10

  Mindy took her time walking home from the school bus. Part of her was hoping if she were late, she wouldn’t have to go today. Tomorrow might be better. Or next week.

  But she saw the doctor’s old Volvo as soon as she reached the driveway. The doctor stood outside with Grandpa—oh, God, was he going, too?

  He was. They were.

  Grandpa hustled Mindy into the pickup truck. The doctor said she’d follow them, so she wouldn’t have to come back out to Menemsha. Mindy was glad because that meant she wouldn’t have another “session” today, another hour of talking about fairly stupid things and getting neither of them anywhere, wherever they were supposed to be going.

  “Let’s stay with this a moment,” the doctor said whenever the subject of Mindy’s mother came up.

  “And what about your dad?” she must have asked a skillion trillion times, though Mindy barely remembered him and told her so.

  Stupid questions wasting time. Wasting Grandpa’s money.

  She wanted to tell him that now, but when she looked over, he sat forward on the seat and said, “You be sure to tell them how Niles made you come there every day after school.”

  He scowled a familiar scowl and added, “You be sure to tell them how he always brought you snacks from that tavern—those homemade cookies you told me about. You be sure to tell them how he took you out to the cliffs an
d how he made you play that game.”

  “Making pictures from the clouds?”

  “Yes. You be sure to tell them that.”

  You be sure of this and sure of that. Mindy pressed her face against the window and wasn’t sure of anything.

  It was a small room with only one window where someone had put a plant that was mostly dead. There were three chairs and a wooden table. The walls were painted the color of old celery: a painting of a lighthouse hung on one, a calendar on another. In the corner of the room, a video camera was set atop metal legs. Behind the camera stood a thin young guy who could have been a fisherman except he wore a white shirt and bow tie.

  It wasn’t how Mindy pictured a courthouse room would look. It didn’t have a big bench or Judge Judy in a long black robe. It was just a room, and it just had … them.

  “I guess we can sit down,” Dr. Reynolds said, so the three of them sat.

  A moment later, a man came in. He had gray hair and a cardigan sweater the same color. He smiled.

  Grandpa stood up and shook the man’s hand. “Mr. Winkman,” Grandpa said, “nice to see you again.”

  Mindy crossed her feet under her and tried not to think about his funny name. Winkman. Winkie. Wink-wink. She wondered if he winked a lot or if he had a twitch. She bit her lip.

  “This is my granddaughter, Melinda.”

  Sometimes she forgot that was her name.

  “Hello, Melinda,” Mr. Wink-wink said. “I’m Mr. Winkman, the district attorney. I’m going to ask you a few questions today. Is that all right?”

  She wondered what would happen if she said no. She pointed to the camera. “You’re going to tape me?”

  “Yes,” he replied. “This is what we call a deposition. You will answer my questions, then we’ll show the video to the judge. That way you won’t have to go to the trial.”

  “Will I be cross-examined?” She remembered that from the Law & Order reruns she watched late at night when she couldn’t sleep and there was nothing else to do. Cross-examination was when the other guy’s lawyer yelled and screamed and got the defendant to say things he didn’t want to say, and to confess things like “I lied! I’m the killer!”

  “You won’t be cross-examined,” Mr. Winkman replied. “You’re a minor.”

  “Oh,” she said, guessing that was good. She folded her hands. “Well, go ahead, then. Ask me anything.”

  Everyone started bustling around the room like they were playing musical chairs because there were four of them plus the camera guy and only three chairs.

  “Just you and me,” Mindy said. “I don’t want Grandpa here. Or Dr. Reynolds.”

  Everybody stopped.

  “I’m ten years old. I don’t need baby-sitters.”

  “But, Mindy,” Dr. Reynolds protested, “I think it would be better for me to—”

  She shook her head. “You already know what happened. You, too, Grandpa. Just let me do this so we can go home.”

  Everyone but Mr. Winkman and the cameraman finally left the room.

  • • •

  Jill’s marriage was falling apart.

  How could her marriage be falling apart?

  Two weeks ago she was more in love than she’d ever dreamed possible. She’d hated every second that she and Ben had to be in separate towns, in separate rooms, in separate beds. Now, even though her heart would not stop aching, she looked for excuses to be somewhere else, anywhere, where this darkness might not follow.

  The “somewhere else” she’d chosen now was the studio, where Jimmy and Devon were finishing the edit. She sat at her desk, the FedEx envelope nagging at her elbow, the contract as yet unsigned. In case she changed her mind.

  For the who-knew-how-many-eth time, she scanned the paragraphs. On air Monday through Friday, February 1st through 28th. Availability for preview publicity photos in December—date and location TBD. There was no mention of a longer-term commitment, no hint that signing this could be the ruin of her marriage, the end of life as she now knew it. There was, of course, the standard morals clause. But Jill hadn’t been the one accused of “questionable” behavior that could reflect negatively on the show’s production or its image.

  She wanted to ask Rita if she should do it. But that would open up that can of troublesome, forbidden worms.

  “How many dubs?” Jimmy, who now stood beside her, asked.

  Quickly, she tried to cover the contract with her hand, to hide those worms. “The same as for the Vermont piece?” There was no sense pretending that anyone but the feeder services would be interested in her work. There was no sense pretending that going direct to the networks—to 20/20 or Dateline—would work.

  Jimmy nodded and went to the refrigerator and pulled out a case of tapes, which they often stored there, safe from the island dampness. Before he shut the door, Jill noticed the bowl of blueberry buckle, partially eaten. She stopped herself from asking if they’d enjoyed it. Then she wondered if Amy really would have been worse off in L.A., where she might at least have had the chance to meet more kids her age, all of whom could not be bad.

  Would Amy be angry if she signed on the dotted line? But Jill could not ask Amy, for her daughter would not know all the details.

  She could not ask Amy and she could not ask Rita. She could only listen to her own heart and know that unless Ben got a better lawyer, the risk was too damn high.

  Picking up the pen, she hesitated only briefly before signing in triplicate.

  “We need to talk, Ben,” Jill said that night after a dinner of pot roast and carrots that they barely touched. Amy was at the tavern; now was as good a time as any.

  Ben lowered his head. “I’m listening,” he said without enthusiasm.

  She wanted to shout that she needed him to do more than listen. She needed him to stop acting defeated, to stop behaving as if she were not completely on his side. But shouting had never been Jill’s style. Nor was Ben the type of man one shouted at.

  “Honey,” she said quietly, “I know you’re upset about the contract.”

  He took his napkin from his lap and set it on the table. “What I’m upset about is your deceit.”

  A twinge of guilt—deserved guilt, she knew—fluttered in her heart. “I know,” she replied. “And I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to deceive you.” Well, perhaps a little, but with good reason, she admitted only to herself. But now was not the time to mention that, or that she fully intended to secure him a good lawyer. Nor was now the time to challenge him about which of the two of them was feeling more betrayed.

  “I’m only afraid you think this is going to blow over,” Jill said, “as if you’ll wake up some morning and it will all be gone.”

  Silence hung in the kitchen amid the lingering aromas of pot roast and onions and ten or twenty thousand meals Jill’s mother had cooked long before Ben sat here, long before Jill had known that she would, one day, truly fall in love.

  He put his elbows on the table and looked straight into her eyes. “Don’t pretend to know how I feel,” he said, “because you don’t have a clue. Take today, for instance. You walked into the tavern right after I told Amy that I would try and convince you to let her rent Charlie’s apartment. She was so excited she gave me a hug and a kiss. Then I saw you standing there and the first thing I thought of was that you were wondering if you’d interrupted something … that if this man you’d married really was a … pervert.”

  A tiny pool of acid bubbled up inside her throat. “I did not think that, Ben.” She lied because she felt she had to. She lied because she hated her doubt. “How can you even say that?” she asked, underscoring the lie, punctuating its existence into a greater sin.

  He studied her, his wonderful gray eyes now sad and tired, not the eyes of a villain, but those of a man who’d been through too much, who was worn out from grief. “I knew what you were thinking because you are my wife. And because I’ve loved you long enough to be able to read the look that was on your face.”

  She wanted to crumble. She
wanted to scold herself for not being more like her own mother, the dutiful wife who held back her own thoughts, her own needs, to keep her man the master, lord of the house.

  Though Jill was not her mother, she knew when to let go and when to be supportive, even when she did not feel quite like doing it. “Perhaps what you saw was your own fear, honey. The fear that no one will believe you.” She did not add that he might be right. Which was all the more reason they needed the best lawyer in the world.

  “So you took the job in L.A.” He did not mention Christopher this time, and for that she was grateful.

  “Only to jump-start my career. To reopen doors that Addie closed. Remember when you said I’d been blackballed? Maybe this will end it once and for all. Trust me, Ben. Please.”

  “And what about us?” he asked. “I did trust you, Jill. Then you went behind my back. How can I trust you again?”

  Her head was aching now; her heart was filled with tears that wanted to come out. She dropped her chin and began to cry. “Oh, God,” she said, “I can stand most anything, Ben. What I can’t stand is arguing with you. I can’t stand fighting with each other. I feel like you’re a victim and Mindy is a victim and so am I. I feel like my marriage is falling apart because of a spoiled kid.”

  Ben was quiet, then he spoke. “She’s not spoiled, Jill. I told you. She’s misguided.”

  She raised her head. “And what can we do to change that?”

  “We can’t. We can only take care of ourselves. One step at a time. Which I suppose means we—I—have to forget about Good Night, USA. The deal is done. I’m not going to let my petty insecurities get in the way of your career.”

  She lowered her eyes. “I am so sorry, Ben. For not telling you first.”

  He touched her cheek. “I’m sorry for a lot of things, honey. But I want us to get through this, and maybe we can if you leave Addie Becker and her connections out of it. Deal?”

  She could not agree. But she knew that if she wanted to save what was left of her crippled marriage, she’d better act as if he were right. Then she could hope and pray that later he would come to his senses. Later, but not too late.