The List

by Alice Ward

  “Do you think we’re ready to go back to that life?” I asked him. “I mean, honestly, isn’t it just a little erotic to have those surprise visits and total immersion in one another and then go back to the more humdrum part of living on your own?”

  “I want you by my side all the time,” he said simply. Evidently, he wasn’t feeling the festive atmosphere of “sleeping over” that I felt. I wondered why that was.

  “You know, Tyler makes a good point,” I said, partially to move the spotlight off my sleeping arrangements and partially because it seemed like a good time to talk about it. “If there are hundreds of kids and counselors just over at the track, this estate is going to seem awfully small. We’ll have virtually no privacy.”

  “What does that have to do with your staying at the condo?” he asked, pouring himself another glass of milk as we sat companionably at the kitchen table.

  “Nothing, actually.” I got up to slide leftover apple pie from the refrigerator and slice us each a piece. “Ice cream?” I offered.

  “No, but warm mine up, if you would,” he requested and I popped them both into the micro for a minute.

  “You know what?” I spoke up. “Actually, it does have something to do with the condo. In fact, quite a bit.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Okay, hear me out on this, promise?” He nodded and I continued, “Just so you know, this isn’t exactly spur of the moment type of thinking. I’ve changed since I moved out.”

  “Yes, I noticed,” he agreed. “I might say you’ve changed for the better. You seem so much happier.”

  “Exactly. Worth, you and I were raised in families that never lacked for anything. In fact, I would say in the case of your father, money even corrupted him. Certainly money and position made my mother give up Linc, and we both know how that worked out. Your father did things to protect his money and reputation. Things that were far worse than his reputation had been up to that point. While I’ve been living on my own, I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. When I come down to it, money and power and reputation; these have all been the sources of unhappiness in my life, in one sense or another. Yet, the two things that mean the most to me, Ford and you, were also a victim and therefore, we’re perpetuating the underlying problems while trying to dress up the top.”

  “I think I see where you’re going, Auggie,” he agreed.

  “Well, think about it. Our son is at a military school right now, instead of home here where he belongs, because you and I cannot do anything but shove money and position at his problem. That’s not right and we’re actually audacious enough to think we can fix someone else’s problem with their child by doing the very same thing — throwing money at it.”

  Worth nodded for me to continue.

  “While I was living in the condo, granted it still has five bedrooms, but the point is that I used some of them for other purposes. I adapted to the space I had for my needs. You know what? I realized that I spent the majority of my time on my bed, on the sofa, and in the kitchen. I didn’t need those other rooms. I didn’t need the wardrobe because I was most comfortable in jeans and a shirt. In fact, I began to feel guilty for not wearing the clothes I’d bought — almost as if I owed it to them to be worn. I made dates with my girlfriends, just so I’d have an excuse to wear them. How sick is that?”

  Worth sort of shook his head in a daze and I could see in his eyes that he was deep in thought.

  “You know what? When I was in jeans, I was myself. When I laid on the bed and watched television, I was myself. I wasn’t pretending to be someone I wasn’t. I could be honest with myself. My thinking pattern wasn’t reliant upon your approval, or that of my girlfriends, my father or anyone. I only had to approve it myself. Do you see where I’m going with this?”

  “I believe I see where you’re headed. Keep talking, Auggie.”

  “So, when you ask me to move back in here, it has nothing to do with you. I love you and always want to be with you,” I pointed out and he breathed a sigh of relief. “I know, I know… you were taking it as rejection. It wasn’t about you; it was about me — the real me, inside. The me who didn’t have to outwit my mother, or be seen with the right friends or graduate from the right school. It was the me who wanted to be a woman. To have original ideas and imagination.”

  “I could tell that the night you asked me to meet you at the Hilton, honey. You were a completely different woman from the one I’d parted from. I loved the new you — and still see you blossoming.”

  “Exactly. The old Auggie would never have been so bold, so adventurous and made those moves on you. The new Auggie is me. I can’t fake this; I wouldn’t know how. I don’t have anyone as a role model but my own inner persuasions. So, you see, to move back here to the estate means to move back to that old way of thinking. The selfishness, the sanctimonious judgments of others. The value system based on corrupting materialism. That’s what I don’t want to come back to, Worth. I’m sad about Ford because I don’t know how to fix him. Why don’t I? Because I’ve raised him the same way I was raised.”

  He opened his mouth to interrupt me, but I plowed on. “Oh, I’d like to think I haven’t. I tell myself all the time that I’m nothing like my mother. But that’s bullshit. I’m exactly like my mother. I can’t help but be anything else. You’re just like your father for the same reason. It’s in our genes.”

  Worth was letting me talk, but I knew he was getting as much from it as I was. “So, we’ve been identifying in our parents what we don’t like in general, and then trying to cover it up with some of the same devices they used. We think we’re different, better… and the scary thing is, they probably thought the same thing. I mean, my mother slept with your father and they weren’t married. You know what? We did the same thing. My mother ran away from the truth of it. You know what? So did I. Your father focused more on his business and growing his wealth than he did his family. You know what? So did you! Don’t you see? We’ve become exactly what we hate the most. Why do we hate it? Were they totally wastes of human flesh? No, they were raised to be that way. Once you take that first step to the dark side, there’s no going back. Not unless you acknowledge the dark side and refuse to stay there. Well, I refuse to go back to the dark side, Worth.”

  “What are you saying, Auggie?”

  “I’m saying this. First of all, I want to be the authentic me, whoever that is, good or bad. I want my son to come home and be raised for who he is, using the same gauge as I will; what makes sense for each of us individually. I want you to do the same thing; not because I want to control you, but because I truly feel it’s the path that will make you happiest. If you’re happy, then we’re all happy, because we use you as an example. Why can’t one of us be happy and the others miserable? That makes all of us miserable.”

  “Auggie, are you sure you didn’t go to shrink school?” he asked me, grinning.

  “I think that shrink school can sometimes be the last place to learn about human nature — in the wild. In school, you learned how to apply concepts and identifying tags to people who were simply being what life brought them to be. It didn’t make them bad or sick or sometimes even wrong. It just made them. Your job was to straighten them out — and yet look at us. Are we straightened out?”

  Worth was shaking his head. He’d stopped eating and was looking at me with amazement. “Have I ever told you how you blow me away with your head?” he asked. “You have made more sense in the last half hour than all those years in ‘shrink school,’ as you call it.”

  I sat back in my chair, beaming. I felt so much better for having said all that. The fact that Worth had let me say it, and hadn’t interrupted or argued or minimalized my thoughts was the most gratifying, loving thing he could have ever done for me. “Thank you for letting me say that,” I said. It was important to me to acknowledge the gift he’d given me.

  “I’m not demonizing them, but if you’ll permit the example, Worth. Look at Joe’s. When you go in there, it’s no
t because their drinks are particularly appetizing or volatile; they’re the same as you can get at any bar downtown. You go to Joe’s because of the fellowship. You like the idea of sitting among people who do unconscionable things and then sit together and justify it. Not only justify it but perpetuate it. Helping one another with tips and stories and back-slapping cooperation where you have the advantage because there is a fix in. Those men think they’re real men, when in truth they’re the furthest thing from it. They’re cowards, hanging together in a herd mentality that permits them to be disreputable. They have their own code. You can’t go in there and brag about being decent, can you, Worth?”

  He shook his head and thought about it. “Now that you mention it, not exactly.”

  “No, of course not. Most of what goes on in there is illegal and it’s only because the people in there have money and have bought off the right politicians that you get away with it. Do you leave there feeling proud? Feeling as though you’ve accomplished something credible? No. You leave feeling fulfilled, but it’s a fulfillment of having beaten the system that applies to all those other poor slobs out there who don’t have the money or the lineage to get things done. You figure they work for you, but they certainly aren’t examples of who you want to be. So you would leave a den of thieves feeling more justified than if you went down and packed groceries for survival. It’s not a fair system, Worth. It’s an elitist system. I know I don’t want it anymore, and I don’t want to raise our son to want it, either. What have we done? We’ve shipped him off to live in the den of the very people I don’t want anything to do with.”

  “Auggie, I’ve let you have your say, now let me have mine.” His face was intent and I owed him the same liberties as I’d taken. I nodded to go ahead.

  “As idealistically wonderful as what you’re saying sounds, this is an imperfect world and there are no guarantees for anyone. Not those of us with money, and not those who will never have a penny left over. We are all victims of one kind or another. Did all our money stop the Linc disaster? No. Would not having money have stopped it? No. It’s because we are imperfect, just as you say. The world is nothing more than a collection of the same kind of people. Fate gets us all in the end, as they say. It’s how you ride the wave that separates us. I want to be happy. Hell, we all want to be happy. Money may not make me happy, but I can damned sure guarantee you that poverty will make me far more miserable.”

  I sat back and processed what he was saying. “So, you think I was happy at the condo, not because I stumbled upon an individual reality, but because it was simply different?

  “Not exactly, but yes, sort of. You’re high on the feeling that you can chuck everything and everyone to the side of the road. That felt good. Want to talk reality? Was it honorable to leave me and to leave your son? To not want to see people who cared about you and had your back? How do you think that felt to me, Auggie?”

  My mouth gaped. He was so right. I had thrown away the world, gone underground and loved it; never giving a moment’s thought to how it affected others. That was so, so wrong. I had abandoned my family, myself.

  He went on. “I get it that Joe’s is not the role model for a life with integrity. Don’t you think I know that? But what are the alternatives? Shall I go down the street to O’Charlie’s and sit with the rest of the wannabees? Listen to their tales of being stepped on and overlooked for promotions they believe they deserved? On what basis? On the basis of having shown up for work most often? That’s not integrity, Auggie. That’s the system. They have theirs, we have ours. Ours has been around longer and has more money. Theirs? There are just more of them. Do you think if I stepped into O’Charlie’s and held up a check for a million dollars and said it goes to the first person who’s willing to leave his wife at home alone five nights a week — do you think there wouldn’t be any takers? Of course there would. There always will be. In some crazy ass way of thinking, they are happier because we are who we are. We are the role model for who they think they want to be. That makes us their incentive. Their incentive to show up to work, to get an education, to have a savings account for a bigger house. We provide a billboard for what they think they want. We are the excuse they give to themselves for not having money. They criticize us, deride us, even hate us; but they still admire us. It’s how they’re raised. Do you really believe that knowing that, you would be happier among them? Because that’s what you’re suggesting, Auggie. You’re suggesting that we give up our way of life in order to embrace theirs, which includes wanting to become just like us. See the insanity of it?”

  I felt alive for the first time. I was being challenged to think in a way that had never happened before. Sure, I was educated — which was simply another word for being trained. What Worth was giving me, however, was mental stimulation and I was eating it up. My brain was swimming with new thoughts, new ideas, new perspectives. I absolutely loved it and it was erotic as hell!

  “I’m sorry for leaving you, Worth,” I said in a humble voice.

  “Don’t worry, sweetheart. You left me the first time willingly. You left me this last time because it was part of the necessary healing process. The next time you leave me, it will be because I’ve driven you away. I don’t want that to ever happen, Auggie. If you take nothing more than this from all you’ve just said, realize that I acknowledge I was wrong to leave you out. You’re an intelligent and honorable woman and I’m very, very proud to have you as my wife. I shouldn’t have left you behind. I should have pulled you closer, connected you to my hip. The problem with that is you begin to use my values as your own and while that may result in fewer arguments, it also takes away from the added perspective you bring to me, to us.”

  I stood up to make coffee, turning my back not to separate myself from him, but to gain a few moments’ worth of space in which to think. I turned eventually, holding out a cup for him and taking my own into the family room. I slid into the lounge chair in front of the fire. He joined me momentarily, sitting on the sofa nearby and putting his feet up so he, too, was reclining.

  “So,” I began in a quiet, less animated voice, “where does that leave us?”

  “How do you mean?” he asked, and I could hear a tinge of fear in that question.

  “Not us, as in you and me and our marriage. That’s a given. We’re together, for good. No, what I mean is where does all this leave us in terms of how we relate to life, as we’ve been given it. What do we decide to do about Ford? About the foundation? About this estate? I can’t disregard all I said or felt about the condo. I enjoyed my life there, Worth, I really did.”

  “Sweetheart, I may have a wall full of diplomas, but that doesn’t mean I have all the answers. We are unique; everyone is unique. The best we can do is to decide what’s best for us and let others have that same right.”

  “So,” I began, “what I’m hearing you say is that the best answer is to empower people. Let them make the decision for what is best for them and we’ll do likewise. Is that right?”

  “I think it’s right. It’s the best answer I can give you.” Worth was generous in his humility.

  “Then let’s take this one step at a time. Tomorrow, Bernie is going to drive up and bring Ford back for Christmas. He’s been there for a semester now, so the homesick part is over with. Let’s be a real family over the holidays. Let’s spend time together and be respectful to one another. Then, at the end of the vacation, we’ll ask him if he’d rather be at school, or be here. If he chooses school, we agree, right now, you and I, that we’ve allowed him to make the best choice for himself and we won’t interfere. We won’t let it hurt. We will have given it our best shot. If he chooses to come home, then we make him finish out the term, just for the sake of self-discipline, and he can begin his next year at a school closer to home, whether private or public.”

  Worth gave this some thought and finally nodded. “Agreed. We’ve only explored two options so far, neither of which has worked perfectly. There’s always room for something that will fit
him better. In fact, although he’s young, he is still also relatively unaffected by peer pressure or hormones, so his judgment will be pretty sound.”

  “Okay, then we’re agreed on this point. Now, as for my moving back in here, in order for us to have a complete family, we have to legitimately be complete. Yes, I learned some things about myself being alone, but you make an excellent point about it being at the expense of others. That was selfish of me. So, for now, I will move back here. When I say ‘for now,’ I only mean until you and I decide where we want to live permanently. That brings us to the third big decision about the foundation. Do we want to do it? Are we capable of doing it well? Will it damage our family life? Are there options we haven’t considered?”

  “Boy, you’re sort of on a roll here, aren’t you?” Worth laughed.

  “Well? Why not talk about all this at the same time? It’s all sort of linked, you realize?”

  “I think that we should deal with family first and foundation last. Let’s have your things moved back here, but we’ll keep the condo open and furnished. It can be our ‘in town’ nest. When the weather is bad, particularly, or if we have meetings for the foundation, being already in town could be a nice arrangement to have. As for the foundation, let Brandon finish up the paperwork because if we don’t do it the way we’ve discussed, we’ll adapt and the foundation will still be necessary. I suggest that maybe after the holidays, you and I take a trip and visit some of those neighborhoods, get community leader input and visit some other similar camps around the country. We’ll stick to a southern route for the best weather. It would be good for us to get away, don’t you think? Then, when we have the best information, we can make the best decision. How does that sound?”

  “Like a man who knows what he’s doing. I’m proud you’re my husband, Worth. I truly am. If you’ll follow me into the bedroom, I’ll show you just how proud!” I smiled wickedly.