Come Pour the Wine

by Cynthia Freeman

  “Oh, come, Dominic, let’s not play that game again. You know damned well what I want.”

  He got red in the face and answered, “Well, what you want, I can’t do.”

  “Yes, I know … that sweet smell of success, as the sayin’ goes, really invaded your nostrils, didn’t it, Dominic?”

  “Look, Catherine, I’m going to tell you something, for a long time you’ve tried to hold me back and I tried to understand and be patient. Your problem is you can’t stand not being first. You’d like to have dominated me. I knew it … I wasn’t blind, I could have been a very satisfactory husband and made you happy. But you’re not going to dictate to me. I’ve given you the best life I know. You’re the most extravagant woman I’ve ever known, all you want are things … and I’ve gone along with you to keep peace but that wasn’t enough. You’ve pushed too hard … you’re trying to strangle me. It’s ironic, you once accused my family of holding on to me … Some joke. You’ve done the same thing with the children. Whenever I disagreed with you about anything, you always told me to stick to my business, that they were your children and this was your home. Your home … your children. What the hell is mine. You’ve played the part of the great martyr … but what have you done for me except complain about the difficulties you’ve had raising my children. They become my children when it suits you. Now, I’ll tell you one more thing. You’re jealous. I know that sounds crazy, but you’re actually jealous of my success, and you know something else? You’re mixed up because my success is yours, and if you weren’t so blind you’d know that.”

  “Okay … Okay … Dr. Freud. Go ahead, who else can you use? You’ve told me so often about the problems I have. Now suppose I tell you somethin’ since you haven’t spared my feelin’s. You’re a selfish son of a bitch who was never around long enough for me to have a life with. What the hell do you think I have except things? I’ve dominated and programmed my children, have I? Well, they turned out fairly well for someone who controlled their existence, didn’t they? Dom’s at Harvard followin’ in Papa’s footsteps. The only difference is, I’m gonna try and see that he has a little bit more responsibility toward a wife of his. I’m gonna try to impress him and my other children that their wives come first. Why, you were never here when they had a toothache or an earache or a bellyache or any other kind of ache. It was all over by the time you unpacked your suitcase. What kind of life did you give me, always dashin’ off hither and yon …

  “Well, if I hadn’t been dashing off hither and yon, as you put it, I wouldn’t have been able to provide all the gracious living you needed so badly to become a grand lady. A grand lady, so accustomed to the finer things in life, the things your Mama trained you for.”

  “Dominic, you’re a liar, a goddamned liar. Remember I’ve lived with you for twenty years and I know what makes you tick. I also know your little tricks. You didn’t do any sacrificin’ for us. You did it because you wanted people to say, There goes the great Mr. Dominic Rossi and that’s a fact and you know it. You gave me things to pacify me … why, I didn’t need things from you. I could have bought and sold you … and don’t you forget it.” With that, I got so mad … so mad, I ran over to Dominic and slapped him square in the face, a thing I shoulda done long ago, but he grabbed my wrist so hard, I thought he was gonna break it and that’s a fact. His face turned beet red and he had a wild look in his eye. Well, sir, I surely expected him to beat me, but if he did, I swear I woulda shot him … I mean it.

  “Don’t you ever do that again!”

  But I wasn’t scared and I screamed back, “What if I do … you gonna stop givin’ me things?” I suppose because he was afraid of himself and his Sicilian corpuscles pulsatin’ through his veins … he ran from the room, down the stairs with me runnin’ after him shoutin’ as I leaned over the bannister, “I’m goin’ home … you hear?” I don’t think he heard the last of my words because he was out and slammin’ the door behind him.

  Well, I packed myself up and with my children, went home to Mama with a heavy heart, I can tell you. But thank the dear Lord, it was June, I guess providence was watchin’ out for Catherine because school had just let out. Funny thing about life … the illusions and delusions … Thomas Wolfe was right, you can’t go home again. I’d been away from New Orleans for so long that the lovely hot summer exhausted me … and the lazy afternoons, sitting on the piazza gossipin’ with Mama and Rosa Ann bored me. I was like a fish out of water, my life had changed me so, I didn’t even realize how much of a stranger I’d become … imagine, in a place I’d thought of all these years as home. What I missed … really was my home, my own home where I was the mistress. I longed for that marble foyer and the antiques. I missed the feel of my own bed, the feel of cool linen against my body, my room. The excitement of overseein’ meals, directin’ things, tellin’ the help how I wanted them done … I missed Dominic … of course not in the very beginnin’. I was too angry at first to even allow myself to think about him … I refused to regard him as an essential to my life. That’s why I was glad I could deprive him of the children … let him rattle around that big empty house without a soul to talk to … and I knew he would be hurtin’ when he was home, but, like all things, nothin’ is forever … time heals the wounds. It even gets rid of the anger and hatred until you begin to forget what you were so mad about in the first place … and o’course when you been livin’ with a man for twenty years for better or for worse, as the sayin’ goes, it’s hard to get him out of your system. I wasn’t fool enough to think that Dominic was gonna be callin’ like he had once before when I was a young wife and mother and him beggin’ me to come home. “Not tonight, Josephine,” as Napoleon told his lady … it was a man’s world even then. But after two and a half months, I couldn’t stand the silence. I called, after swallowin’ my pride. As I waited for the phone to ring, my heart pounded for fear Dominic wouldn’t be home. It jumped and skipped a few beats. You’d better believe I wondered what he’d say when he heard it was me. I was about to hang up when Stella answered, “It’s a de Rossi residenta.” Good Lord, how good she sounded, just hearin’ her voice, like money from home and that’s no lie.

  “Stella, this is Mrs. Rossi, how are you.” I laughed nervously.

  “Oh, Signora, benissimo grazie, e lei?”

  “Fine, Stella. Is Mr. Rossi there?”

  “Si, Signora, un momento.”

  It seemed forever before Dominic answered. His voice was strained, but he said, “Yes?” coldly. Nothing had mellowed him.

  I had to brace myself against the wall and take a deep breath before I responded to his aloofness. Finally, with my composure intact, I said, “Dominic, I’m comin’ home.”

  “Fine.”

  “Is that all you’ve got to say?”

  “That’s all.”

  “You not even gonna ask how we’ve all been?”

  “No. I don’t think you worried too much about how I’ve been while you were drinking all those mint juleps out there on the veranda.”

  “That’s not true, Dominic, and you know it.”

  “Sure.”

  “Look, Dominic, I know what happened was nothin’ more than happens between married people. I’m sure we’re both sorry for what we said … now, I think the time has come when we’ve got to act like grown up, mature human bein’s. For heaven sake, we can’t go on bein’ mad for the rest of our lives … now can we?”

  I didn’t think he was gonna answer, but he said, “Do what you want.”

  “Is that any way to talk, when I’m humblin’ myself.”

  “Yeah, that’ll be the day.”

  “There you go, Dominic … when I’m tryin’ to make up our differences. I’d think you’d realize how difficult this is for me, your bein’ so cold and all.”

  “Look, Catherine, I’m not going to argue with you. This is your home, the children’s home, so do what you want.”

  “I’m not gonna come home if you keep freezin’ me out. Don’t you have any feelin’ or cons
ideration for me at all?”

  “It’s a little bit difficult after what happened, then suddenly, you call up and that makes everything alright after almost three months.”

  “Two and a half.”

  “Oh, so you’re counting?”

  “Dominic, please … I wish you could hear yourself, I honestly do. It’s just plain childish stubbornness … If I did anythin’ so unforgivable, I’m truly sorry.”

  “Oh, my God, if you did? You’re not even sure about that. You bet you did.”

  “I hadn’t meant this to be a contest, Dominic, but you’re provokin’ the subject. You said some pretty awful things to me, you know, which I’m not holdin’ against you.”

  “I think that’s very generous of you, Catherine.”

  “I know you’re bein’ sarcastic, but I’m gonna overlook it. Now, Dominic, I’ve got to come home and get the children ready for school and I fervently pray that by the time we come back, you can forget our differences, so that we can have harmony once again. Will you do that … Dominic, darlin’?”

  There was a peculiar sound I took to mean as a laugh, but I wasn’t sure, then Dominic answered, “Fine … sure … okay. I guess that’s about all then, right?”

  “Well, only for one more thing … I’ll call you before I leave so as you and Dom can meet us at the airport.”

  “Fine.”

  “I hope you mean that.”

  “What?”

  “That everythin’s fine.”

  “Oh … yes, of course. Well, I guess that’s it, then.”

  “One thing, Dominic, Gina Maria wants to say somethin’.”

  I handed the phone to my only daughter and stood there with tears of relief in my eyes as I heard her say in that sweet voice, “Buona Sera, Papa, I miss you.”

  I could almost feel Dominic swallow the lump in his throat and see him wipe the tear from his eye as he answered across that long span of distance, “Grazie, mia cara. I miss you more than you know. I’m so happy you’re coming home.”

  “Me, too, Papa. Arrivederci.”

  “Arrivederci, Gina Maria… arrivederci.”

  Oh, God, Catherine sighed, there was so much to remember. What are we but our memories and bein’ alone as I am now leaves me with nothin’ to do but think and thinkin’ at this time is a most distressin’ thing. I’ve simply got to get some rest, but I can’t seem to turn it off. As she got up and walked wearily to the bed and lay down, she thought, the years are like yesterday, so vivid, like mental portraits hangin’ on a wall. All the light and shadows of the past indelibly painted in the recesses of her mind. Something that happened ten years ago crept into her consciousness like a foe that would not leave her at peace. Before dropping off to sleep, her last thought was about Dominic. Did he remember what he had done to humiliate her ten years ago, which was an unforgivable thing she had never ever been able to forget. Did he remember … did he … ever … re … mem … ber …

  There were times Dominic did remember, and those times were as bittersweet for him as Catherine’s were angry and hostile. Of course he remembered, how could he ever forget when Catherine had gone off and left him that year taking the children with her and leaving him completely alone, drained emotionally, with plenty of time on his hands to do his own thinking in the wee small hours of the morning. His thoughts were bitter and the whole of their lives made him feel trapped. Here he was, forty-three, married twenty years and seven children later with nothing left but a marriage on the rocks. Had the fault been his? Had he really failed Catherine? Be honest, Dominic. Were you an understanding husband? Did you do all you could to make your marriage work? Because what marriage requires is hard work, constantly. It’s a continual reaffirmation time and time again. Marriage is not a one-shot thing. Think hard, search your conscience … did you?

  Maybe, Dominic thought, we plead our own cases in our own behalf and delude ourselves because we have to preserve our own image, our own self-esteem, that precious little corner of our egos. Maybe it’s totally impossible to see and evaluate ourselves as we really are or how we appear to other people. That being the case, he tried with all his integrity to step over the hurdle of self-deception and come face to face with the past. To begin with, he had married young, married a girl whom he knew for a very short while and although he thought he was astute enough at the time, he really didn’t know Catherine at all. Certainly there was a sexual attraction. She was beautiful, different and spirited with a provocative uninhibitedness. In the beginning, he made excuses for her possessiveness, her demands upon him which later he felt, in all honesty, were unreasonable. To have no more illusions is a devastating thing. To see someone as they are is a shattering experience and when he could no longer blind himself to Catherine’s caprices, he took a long … long look and what he saw under the facade of her external self was a woman without understanding of how to take or give in a marriage. She even mistook the act of childbearing as a gift to him, feeling that she had immortalized his being for posterity. She did not consider that having children was, in reality, the sacred culmination born out of the love of two people. Dominic tried with all his might to be honest in his evaluation of Catherine, but in the end, he could not delude himself. She had tried to carry on a traditional Italian household, perpetuate in the children a pride of their heritage, and as a mother, although she was possessive and demanding, she was devoted and loving and made them the center of her existence. But Dominic felt that his function as a father had ceased after the birth of Vincente. Catherine battled him all the way, as though she begrudged his success. When the thought first came to him, Dominic tried to fight it down saying he was imagining it … but the thought persisted until he could no longer deny it. What bothered him almost more than anything was her unwillingness to be with him when he was away. Naturally, he knew it would have been impossible for her to travel with him constantly, but never once did she seem to feel her obligation toward him. If the children had not been provided for with loving care, then he could have understood, but that wasn’t the case… The residue of all his reflections left him with one painful reality, that his marriage was a failure from which he could not escape, because not only was he a devout Roman Catholic, but he had seven children and how could he walk away from them. He was trapped, beholden to an illusion of his youth…

  3

  THE BALANCE WHEEL OF destiny turned and where it stopped was at the door with the name of Henricks, Wilcocks and Lang. Dominic, indeed, had his memories. In his desperation to escape the lonely absence of children’s voices echoing in his ears, he attended a cocktail party his friend, Lawrence Henricks, was giving, having just moved into the penthouse suite of the Hills Tower building. At first, he disregarded the invitation, feeling in no mood, so he tore it up and sent a flower arrangement with a note of congratulations, as well as regrets for not being able to attend. But at the end of the day he sat in his office, listlessly, wondering how he was going to endure the evening. Catherine had been away for a week and the walls of that house seemed to close in on him. He swiveled in the large red leather chair with a pencil between his teeth. Impulsively, he reached for the phone and dialed his mother’s flat, but in that split second before the ringing started, he hung up, thinking no, he couldn’t go through the pretending tonight. Knowing his mother would guess something was wrong since he had not taken the children to see her after mass on Sunday which was what he did every week in view of the fact that it was the only time she saw them. He had made some ridiculous excuse, knowing she was not taken in, but at that moment he simply couldn’t bring himself to say Catherine had taken the children and gone home. So that still left him adrift tonight. He placed his elbows on the long hand-carved Italian desk, buried his face in his hands and saw a kaleidoscope of images emerge out of his mind. Suddenly, Lawrence J. Henricks became a part of the fabric of his imagery. He looked at his watch … it was seven. What the hell, he had nothing else to do. So, without another thought, he went into the small washroom, shaved with
his electric razor, applied after-shave lotion, combed his thick auburn hair, changed into a clean shirt (which he always kept a number of in the office), then quickly left. Once out in the street, he felt slightly better at least. On the way toward Montgomery Street, he thought maybe he would have Dom come home from summer school so they could be together, but just as quickly, he dismissed the thought as being selfish. Besides, what would happen when he had to be away on business. It would mean Dom would be alone during the day if he were to take him along. He’d just have to accept things as they were and God only knew how long Catherine would be away, or more to the point, what her final intentions were. Maybe she would decide on a permanent separation and stay in New Orleans, knowing how much she missed her own people. She had always thought of that as home. Okay, Dominic, that’s enough, trying to second-guess life. Just go have a few drinks and get a little high … or better still, even plastered. He entered the building and got into the elevator, where he pressed the button to the penthouse. When the doors opened, it seemed to him that the immediate world was present. He heard his name being called above the sounds of voices and laughter, “Dominic, come over here,” Lawrence Henricks called out as he held a glass of champagne in his hand. Dominic weaved through the crowd. When he approached, Henricks said, “I’m glad to see you, Dom … thought you were busy tonight.”