Change of Heart

by Sally Mandel

  And the thing was, if he were to express this to her, she’d understand—smile, take his hand. There would be no hint of contempt for his sentimentality, not from Sharlie. She ridiculed only her own feelings—the more intense the emotion, the more flippant her attack on herself. But his feelings she took very seriously.

  Oh, God, he thought, stretching in the soft sand. What do I need the sun for when I’ve got Sharlie Converse Morgan?

  Chapter 43

  Sharlie stared at the viewer in Diller’s office and marveled at the contours of her new heart. Before the operation she’d shuddered at her X rays, her heart’s flabby bulges expanding malevolently with each new set of pictures until it seemed as though there could be no room left for any other vital organs. Udstrom’s streamlined heart, no bigger than Walter’s clenched fist, nestled comfortably in its compact niche.

  Diller lifted the corners of his mouth just perceptibly, and Sharlie reminded herself that he was smiling.

  “Marriage must agree with you. You’re fine.”

  “Can I go?”

  He nodded.

  “How long?”

  “Indefinitely.”

  “You mean I don’t have to come back? Ever?”

  “Make your reservations for New York.”

  She exhaled slowly, a long, trembling sigh.

  “If it weren’t for Saint Joe’s, we’d never release you this early,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “You must check in twice a week without fail. They’re all set up for you in Coronary.”

  She nodded.

  “You have your medications?”

  “All sixty-three of them.”

  “You’re clear on the urine and stool measurements?”

  “I’ve been carefully coached.”

  “Don’t miss even one day of medication, or you’ll end up right back in the hospital.”

  “I know, Doctor Diller.” She smiled, recognizing his reluctance to let her go. “Are you coming back to New York?”

  “Soon,” he said.

  “Well,” she began, then shook her head helplessly and whispered, “Thanks.” She held out her hand, and he grasped it briefly. His palm felt very soft. Sharlie’s eyes were beginning to sting, so she turned and walked quickly out of the office.

  Walter and Margaret had been waiting for her and approached her eagerly when she emerged.

  “Well?” Margaret asked.

  “I’m sprung.”

  “Marvelous.” Her mother gave her a restrained hug.

  “I don’t see why we couldn’t come in there with you,” Walter grumbled.

  “I just wanted to hear the verdict by myself,” Sharlie said.

  “Well, I knew you were okay. I can tell by looking at you. Your temperature is ninety-seven point eight or point nine, and your blood pressure is a hundred and ten over seventy.”

  Sharlie said, “Aren’t you going to congratulate me?”

  “Congratulations,” he said irritably.

  Sharlie glared at him and said, “Let’s go.” She led the way down the hall.

  “Well, what’s the matter with you, young lady?” Walter asked, catching up with her.

  “You know something, Daddy?” Sharlie said, her voice quavering. “Sometimes I think you don’t give a damn about me. All you care about was that I didn’t let you come in with me and monopolize everything.”

  Walter gave Margaret an exasperated look, but she just shook her head at him as if to say, don’t look at me—I don’t know what’s the matter with her.

  Walter put his hand on Sharlie’s elbow to bring her to a halt. “Keep your voice down,” he said, nodding toward the nurse’s station. A young couple stood nearby, watching them curiously.

  Sharlie’s voice rose another notch. “I’m not a piece of office equipment you’ve taken a lot of time and money to fix.”

  “Oh, Sharlie,” Margaret said reproachfully.

  Walter looked wounded. “So what do we do, your mother and I? We drive out to the airport and hop on a plane, and you’ll call us once in a while, is that right?”

  “Something like that,” Sharlie said.

  “Oh, I’ll just pay the bills. Or should I send them to your husband now that you’re no longer my responsibility?”

  “That’s … awful,” Sharlie retorted. “You know he can’t come up with that kind of money.”

  Walter prodded her into the elevator, grateful that for once, there was no one else inside. He looked at Margaret briefly, then took a deep breath and said, “Okay. I’m sorry. I don’t know how we got into this.”

  “Well, I do—” Sharlie began.

  He interrupted hurriedly. “… but let’s drop it for now. You just walked out of Diller’s office, and I just said, ‘Hey, honey, that’s great news.’” He tried to smile. “Okay?”

  She dropped her eyes for fear he’d see the triumph there. “Okay,” she said.

  The elevator stopped at the ground floor, and Walter put his arm around his daughter. “I’ll go get things straight with Admissions. Is that all right?”

  Sharlie nodded, but found that she was unable to speak through the confusion of her conflicting emotions.

  “We’ll see you in New York, dear,” Margaret said, giving Sharlie a kiss on the cheek.

  “Mrs. Morgan,” Walter said, patting her arm awkwardly.

  For a moment Sharlie’s eyes welled up, but then she said formally, “Have a good time in San Francisco.” She raised her hand in a stiff wave good-bye and went outside to wait for Brian.

  Walter and Margaret walked down the hallway in silence. Finally Margaret said, “I don’t know, Walter. She’s baffling.”

  “She wants me to butt out, I’ll butt out” His face was furious and hurt in just about equal parts.

  Margaret put her hand on his arm. “Look, we’ve all been through a lot.”

  He snorted.

  “Once we get back home, we can start living like a normal family again,” she continued.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake, Margaret. She’s married. We’re not going to have a family anymore.”

  “Now, don’t hurt my feelings, Walter. I’m family, too, you know.”

  He ran his hand across his forehead wearily. “Let’s finish up and get the hell out of this godforsaken place.”

  When Brian pulled up by the gate, Sharlie was perched on the cement column by the entranceway.

  “Going my way, lady?” he asked, leaning out the window.

  She nodded and slid into the car. Her face was flushed, almost feverish.

  “So?” he said.

  “So let’s pack.”

  He slammed the car into “Park” and grabbed her. Then he held her away from him so that he could look at her face. His eyes were puzzled.

  “I just had a fight with my father,” she explained. She held out her hand to show him the trembling fingers. “I’m an awful ungrateful daughter, but sometimes … sometimes he’s like the bully in the advertisements who runs around kicking sand at the skinny, runty guy.”

  “What was it all about?”

  “It’s not like me at all,” she went on shakily. “I don’t do this sort of thing.” Brian smiled. “I mean I didn’t,” she said.

  “I’m sure he deserved it,” Brian remarked.

  “Did you? The day I threw the newspaper at you? What is happening to me?”

  Brian took her hand between his. “There is nothing wrong, unusual, bizarre, or neurotic about any of it,” he said.

  “Maybe not,” she replied slowly. “But it isn’t me.”

  “Well, whoever you are, I’d like you to come home to bed.”

  He started the car and looked at her questioningly. She raised the corners of her mouth with effort, and he shook his head, unconvinced. She took a deep breath, batted her eyelashes seductively, and flashed him her exaggerated version of the Hollywood starlet smile.

  “Oh, beautiful,” he
said, grinning at her. Then he put the car in gear, and they drove off toward the motel.

  Chapter 44

  Margaret and Walter had taken a suite of rooms on the top floor of a fashionable old hotel in San Francisco. They planned to stay a week and would arrive back in New York soon after Sharlie and Brian.

  Since that eerie night by the lighthouse, Walter and Margaret had circled around each other, cautiously exploring and testing out their new relationship. He often took her out to dinner away from the hospital now, and they began to discover each other across white tablecloths.

  With his new tenderness, she began to relax and bloom. He noticed she left her blouse open by one more button and even went bare-legged when she wore sandals. The day before, when he’d found her sunbathing on the terrace of the motel back in Santa Bel, she didn’t instantly grab her robe and pull it closed with her belt as if protecting herself against imminent rape. Instead, she sat with straps tucked between her breasts and talked with him about the young man at the pool who had given her a diving exhibition that afternoon and how beautiful it was.

  The first night of their trip to San Francisco Walter had lifted his wineglass to Margaret and said, “To honeymoons.” They had smiled at each other and taken the first sip. Then Margaret lifted her glass and said, “To middle age.” She was delighted with herself, and he was charmed by her happiness, and the mutual toasting became a kind of private rite between them. And sometimes as they walked together, he put his arm around her very lightly.

  Walter found his sexual appetite for her undiminished but shifting. He was stirred by her as always but no longer tormented by the urgent need to crush her, to conquer her, and too apprehensive of damaging the delicate infancy of this new marriage with Margaret to assert himself sexually with her.

  The last evening in San Francisco Walter ordered omelets and champagne, and they sat on the terrace overlooking the bay, bundled in heavy sweaters against the cool summer evening. They talked for a long time and gradually sipped their way through most of the champagne. They discussed Sharlie and Brian at first, with Margaret remarking how strange it was not to be thinking of her daughter all the time–practically the whole day had passed without her giving Sharlie a thought. She felt guilty about it, and they discussed how wonderful it would be if they could begin to enjoy their parenthood even at this late date in the way that other people with healthy children seemed to. Then they began to reminisce about their own parents, and Margaret asked Walter about his father. He would never tell her much, and now that he seemed willing to talk, she took advantage of the moment.

  But she talked, too, about her mother’s cool beauty, her grace, and her contempt for her husband, whom Margaret adored.

  Perhaps when they had first met thirty years ago, they had discussed these things, but it all seemed new to them tonight, long forgotten on the other side of years full of wounds and habitual resentment.

  Finally Margaret stretched and said, “I’m tired.”

  “Go ahead. I’ll sit a minute,” Walter said.

  But Margaret didn’t get up. She sat staring at him, and when he looked at her, she dropped her eyes.

  “Walter …” she began hesitantly.

  “What is it?”

  “If you come with me … to bed, I mean. Do you think we could … well … oh, dear …”

  He was stunned to silence. After a moment he got up and stood behind her to pull out her chair. They went inside. Walter closed the glass door behind them, and then the curtains.

  Margaret began to undress in silence. She slipped off her bra and panties and slid into bed under the covers. She lay there looking at him with frightened eyes.

  He undressed and sat at the edge of the bed beside her. His penis was huge, and he felt embarrassed at the blatant enormity of his response to her.

  “Margaret, listen,” he began. “I don’t want to screw things up between us…”

  He saw she was smiling, but he went on earnestly.

  “It’s obvious that I want you. But you’ve got to be happy with me now.”

  Margaret said quietly, “Let’s go very slowly, and if I’m not … comfortable, I’ll try to tell you.”

  She tilted her face up to be kissed, and he leaned over her, trying to hold back his heat. They had never spent much time with preliminaries, and now they lingered over each other’s mouths, delaying and exploring. Finally he pulled back the covers and slid next to her. In the past, Margaret had always worn a nightgown, forcing him to pull it up to her breasts to get it out of the way. Now her naked shoulders seemed lovely and vulnerable, a statement of trust.

  He held himself up on his arms when he entered her so that he wouldn’t hurt her as he began to move with more intensity. She lay still and quiet at first, but after a few moments of his slowly moving in and out of her, she raised her hips toward him slightly, and he felt her gentle motion beneath him.

  It was too much for him, her movement, and he came almost instantly, crying out against her shoulder. Then he lifted himself off her and lay next to her, his arm across the curve of her stomach.

  “I’m sorry,” he said after a while.

  “For what?”

  “I was too quick.”

  “No,” she murmured, and he thought he heard tears in her voice. He propped himself up on his elbow to look at her in the dusky light and saw that she was crying.

  “Margaret, what did I do?” he whispered, anguished.

  She shook her head, smiling through the tears. “No. It was … it felt good. Really. I don’t know why I’m crying.”

  She began to sob in earnest now. He put his arms around her, and she clung to him, with her naked breasts pressed against him for the first time in their lives, and he stroked her long, soft back and said awkwardly, over and over, ‘There, there. There, there.”

  Chapter 45

  Traffic into the city from Kennedy Airport was heavy. When they finally inched their way through the Mid-town Tunnel, the cabdriver waved a disgusted hand at the bumper-to-bumper lineup and said, “Holy fucking Christ, will you look at this? First Avenue’s a fucking parking lot.” He craned his neck around and shouted at Brian through the open partition. “Hey, fella, you mind if I try Park?”

  Brian nodded that it was okay, and with some hair-raising maneuvers and a few expletives aimed at fellow drivers, they lurched their way to Park Avenue.

  “Goddamn politicians, that’s what screws it up. Buncha assholes. Jesus, on a Friday night even. Everybody’s supposed to be leaving.”

  He swung his face around again, keeping one hand on the wheel. “Ya know, Fire Island, Hamptons. Must be a fucking faggots’ convention in the city this weekend.”

  Sharlie and Brian blinked at him silently, and he faced forward in time to speed through a traffic light that had just turned red.

  Sharlie smiled at Brian. “Home,” she whispered.

  “California it’s not,” he agreed.

  She took a deep breath. The air seemed more like crisp September than July, but maybe it was just the difference between Los Angeles and the Northeast. She stared greedily out the window as they hurtled uptown. The awnings stretched out from the magnificent stone buildings, making her think of rich old snobs poking their tongues out at everybody else who couldn’t afford Park Avenue rents. She snuggled happily against Brian’s shoulder.

  She had hoped he could spend the weekend at home with her while they settled in, but after his prolonged leave, he felt compelled to plunge back into his work first thing Saturday morning. She walked him to the front door, he pulled her by the sleeve to the elevator, both of them laughing at their reluctance to say good-bye. But once the doors closed and he had disappeared, she found herself enjoying the prospect of a day alone to poke around Brian’s apartment and think of ways to make it theirs instead of his alone.

  She poured herself a cup of tea and sat at Brian’s desk, contemplating the accumulation of papers and bills, realizing that
soon she would be familiar with all the mysterious cubbyholes of his days. She was tired and felt the need for quiet thought, for taking stock and assessing her new life and what she would do with herself now. Whoever thought there would be choices?

  From long habit she cupped her hands around her mug as if to warm them. A police car raced up Third Avenue, siren screaming, and she smiled.

  Until yesterday she had not realized how alien California had felt to her. Perhaps it was the frontierlike atmosphere of the place, as if the East were the staid mother country and the West her rebellious colony. Sharlie wondered ruefully that if she had been a settler during the American Revolution, she might have sided with England and King George. People seemed so earnest in California. The comfortable, shabby, worn-out East drew her back like a slightly cynical but dear old friend.

  Out of embarrassment she had never admitted aloud to her fear of earthquakes. No one else in Santa Bel ever seemed to worry about them, but sometimes she had awakened in the night to a deep rumble beneath her hospital bed. The vibration had terrified her, no matter how hard she worked at convincing herself that it was only the generator snoring in the dark.

  The East had sat placidly on the edge of the Atlantic for centuries, its gentle hills battered smooth and round. California perched on the other side, its landscape either scraped flat or tormented into monumental sharp protuberances. Surely the entire coast would someday tear free of the mainland and sink into the Pacific, leaving a jagged scar along the shore, lined with millions of young people with sun-streaked hair and disappointed faces, surfboards under their arms, and nothing but churning foam to greet them.

  The forgotten inch of tea remaining in Sharlie’s cup had grown cold. She got up from Brian’s desk and walked stiffly to the window to peer into the apartment across the courtyard. She smiled, remembering how Brian had insisted on pulling the shade when they made love this morning. She had tried to persuade him that no one could see inside during the day unless the lights were on. Or unless she and Brian pressed themselves to the window and made love against the glass. She’d reminded him of her opera glasses and how she knew from firsthand frustration how impossible it was to see past the black reflection of a sunlit window.