by Nancy Thayer
“If you’re going to look at it that way, Peter,” Patricia said, “then it was his life the day he learned to walk.”
She left the windowsill and crossed the room. “I think we both deserve a drink,” she said, and picked up the brandy decanter.
Peter was quiet for a moment, occupied with his thoughts, but he watched Patricia as she poured the brandy into glasses, and he could not help but notice how in the darkened room the light from the window caught and glinted off the cut glass, off the golden liquid, off Patricia’s pale and shining hair. Patricia brought him his glass, then went to the leather sofa and sank down in one corner of it, drawing her bare feet up under her, pulling the afghan down about her in a nest.
“It’s getting cold,” she said. “I’ll have to get out all our winter nightclothes. I need my good warm nightgowns.” She fussed about, wrapping the afghan over her shoulders, and it seemed to Peter as he watched that there was something ageless and endearing about his wife curled up like that with the afghan draped around her like a shawl. As she rearranged herself and the cover, her bare arms, neck, and feet shone smoothly, a wealthy substance, glossy against the muted leather and wool. She sat there smiling up at him, vivid, gleaming, real.
“It seems harder for me than for you,” Peter said. He sat down at the other end of the sofa, and sipped his brandy. What he wanted to do was believe that she was magic, eternal, that if he threw himself before his wife now and implored her, she could make things change.
“You expect more of him than I do,” Patricia said. “You want so desperately for us all to get things right.”
“What’s wrong with that? Of course I expect a lot. And I do all I can to provide every kind of assistance I know.”
“Yes, that’s true. You are wonderful that way. But do you think you might be a little limited in your views of what is right?”
Patricia smiled as she spoke, and she raised her glass to her lips. The afghan fell from one shoulder, exposing the bare flesh of her arm and neck and the soft blue cotton of her nightgown rode up a little, so that the smooth stretch of her leg gleamed.
Peter realized that he had not looked at his wife for a while. Their bodies were as familiar to each other as all the other daily things which dwelt where they belonged within their lives. And as he looked at Patricia, he saw how she had changed. She was forty-five, and still slim in her clothes, but her body had taken on a roundness and a soft solidity. He touched her knees carefully, then ran his hand up and down her leg for the warmth and the comfort.
“It’s possible, you know,” Patricia said, smiling at him from the other end of the sofa, “that your father wanted certain things of you. Perhaps he wanted you to stay on the farm, to follow in his work. Perhaps he was puzzled when you went off so readily into the dangerous world. Perhaps he was hurt because you left the farm so easily. That beautiful, safe home.”
Peter listened to his wife, but now the words were less important than her hushed, beguiling tone. It was almost as if she were singing him a song. Absentmindedly, he ran his hand from slender ankle up the swell of calf, over a silken knee and up her thigh. Here, at the apex of her legs, was a concentration point of body heat, and as naturally as any animal moving toward warm comfort, he extended his arm just a little farther until his hand came to rest in the heated hollow between her legs. She was naked. The sweet surprise of this made his heart thump. He pushed his hand against the furry swell of her crotch, and pushed again.
“Hey,” Patricia said, so softly that it was more an exhalation of breath than a word.
“Hey,” Peter replied, with equal softness.
They smiled at each other in silence, and suddenly there they were: just Peter and Patricia, who loved each other. In one sleek and generous second, everything else in life fell away, leaving them alone in all time and space. Peter put his brandy snifter on the floor, turned to Patricia, and carefully pulled her hips down toward him, moving at the same time so that he could kneel on the sofa between her legs. Patricia held her arms up to him and he unsnapped the waistband of his pajamas and slid them down his hips, then gently lowered himself down over her. They moved together, moist and murmuring, smiling at each other, looking in each other’s eyes, pleased, happy.
Finally Peter just lay there, curled between Patricia’s legs, his head on her breast, her arms wrapped around his back. She stroked his arms and shoulders and smoothed his hair.
“I love you,” he said.
“And I love you,” she answered.
They fell asleep like that in the shadowy room. At some point in the night they shifted positions so that Patricia could cover them with the afghan, but they didn’t really wake up until the strong morning light brightened the room. Then they sat up, feeling cramped from the strange positions. Patricia’s shoulders were chilled, and so were Peter’s feet. But they were happy.
“Well,” Peter said, adjusting his pajamas and robe.
“Well, yourself,” Patricia said.
“I’ll make coffee.”
“I’ll go shower and dress, then come down and make breakfast. It’s only seven-thirty. There’s no rush.” Patricia rose and stretched. “Oh, my aching back,” she said. “I’m getting too old for this.”
“Oh, no you’re not,” Peter replied, and wanted to embrace her again, but did not, because he felt suddenly and strangely shy, and strangely smug.
He had moved through the kitchen this morning like a traveler who has come home after a long and arduous journey. Each pedestrian household thing shone cleanly, and he felt great gratitude toward his wife for putting their house and their lives together with such grace. He dug a measuring cup into the ground coffee beans like a man digging into a treasure, and when the coffee was brewed and the rich aroma filled the air, he just stood in the kitchen, smiling at the toaster and the butter dish, a man happy with his life.
Patricia came into the kitchen, wearing a quilted robe, her hair freshly shampooed. She smelled of herbs and perfume.
“Ummm, coffee,” she said.
Peter took down two mugs, poured the coffee, handed a mug to his wife. “I think you seduced me last night,” he said.
Patricia smiled. “Why, Peter, what a thought!”
“Did you have any ulterior motive?”
Patricia measured a spoon of shimmering white sugar into her mug. “Well,” she said, smiling at him, “perhaps when I first came down to the study I did think of distracting you from your worries about Michael. There are three other people in this family who want your attention, you know. But believe me, my love, after a while I wasn’t thinking anything at all.”
Patricia set her mug down on the table and came over to wrap her arms around Peter. They stood there for a while, just nestling against each other.
Then Peter went upstairs to shower, and as he stood under the steaming water, he felt brisk and hearty and confident: he felt he had regained perspective on his life. He knew there could be no mother more fierce in her love and protection of her children than Patricia. He knew that the health and happiness of her family was her main concern. During the eighteen years of their marriage there had been times when they had argued and disagreed, and even weeks at a time when they had been too angry at each other to make it through with more than a pretense of civility. But they had always trusted each other. They had an honorable marriage.
In the past few months, as Peter realized he was approaching his fiftieth birthday, he had come to view his marriage, when he stopped to think of it at all, as a finished thing, a fine accomplishment, almost a tangible object that he and Patricia had built together. Something, say, as useful and well matched and necessary to their lives and their children’s lives as their walnut dining-room table and chairs. Now he saw that they were not finished, not set in any limits. No. He had seen Patricia through fresh eyes last night, or she had been a new person, or both: she had been a subtle, glowing temptress, and he had been an ardent lover, with a passion both renewed and new. How grateful he was fo
r the variety and complexity of people’s lives. And he hoped he could manage to extend to his elder son, and to his other children, this new generosity of understanding. He wanted to be brave enough to give them freedom, to let them be whatever they wished to be.
But now he sang the last stanza of the hymn, and although he saw Patricia, standing there, he also saw Michael, whose face was set, whose handsome eyes were fixed with their Stuffed Animal Stare. Immovable, sullen son! Peter had to look away. Michael might be one of the most important people in his charge, but he was not the only one, and if he were to allow Michael the freedom he desired, then he, Peter, would have to allow himself an equal freedom of thought. After all, his furious concern was doing little good.
So Peter let his eyes rest on Patricia until the anger subsided and the joy returned.
Then he turned his gaze to the other people in the church, his congregation.
Something was wrong with Wilbur Wilson. All the other members of the church were standing, singing this final hymn, but Wilbur had stayed seated in the pew, his head bowed—in prayer? illness?—his body curved. Beside him Norma Wilson stood turned sideways, holding her hymnal dutifully in her hands, but her eyes were cast downward, as if she did not dare stop her vigilance for a moment. Then Wilbur looked up at Norma, and nodded, and Peter breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps he was only sick, perhaps he had a touch of flu.
In another pew, Suzanna Blair stood with her hymnal in one hand, and with her other hand, she was buttoning her jacket around her. She had put the first button in the wrong buttonhole, so the jacket hung crookedly. She seemed to be awkward now, ill at ease. Peter renewed his resolve to ask Judy Bennett to speak with Suzanna, to offer help.
Judy Bennett stood in the front pew, her head held high as she sang the closing lines of the hymn. On either side of her stood her husband and son, like a pair of tall male bookends, but Peter suspected it was she who supported them rather than the other way around. Peter admired the symmetry of the trio as they stood there, such healthy, clear-eyed people, and he felt a twinge of envy that the Bennetts’ son had fit himself into their lives so well. He wondered what it was they had done right where he as a father had gone wrong. How had they managed to raise a son who stood at their side with such content?
Liza Howard had already put her hymnal in its wooden rack in front of her, and now she stood with her hands raised, holding the collar of her mink coat up against her neck and face. She was staring, dreamy-eyed, at Johnny Bennett, and a sleek fat-cat smile played on her lips. Slowly she rubbed her chin into the silky collar of her fur coat. Steadily she gazed at Johnny Bennett, with slightly lowered eyelids: a sinister, compelling look. My God, she is bewitching, Peter thought, and just then Johnny Bennett, pretending to bend to put his hymnal in the rack, turned slightly and looked back at Liza. Peter could not see Johnny’s expression, but he could see Liza’s: her eyes flashed in recognition and she slowly opened her mouth and touched the tip of her pink tongue to her soft pink upper lip. Her smile widened. Johnny turned back to face the front. He had been turned toward Liza for only a few seconds. But Peter could see from his vantage point how Liza stood now, eyes glittering. She and Johnny were conspirators; there could be no doubt. But what could Peter do about it? What should he do? For now, he tried to focus on the rest of the congregation while his thoughts cleared.
Leigh Findly was sharing a hymnal with her daughter Mandy, but neither woman was singing. Mandy was half turned to look toward the back of the church, her body tense, and Peter could see enough of her face to tell that she was biting her lip. She was searching out someone—who? Beside her, Leigh looked down at her daughter with smiling curiosity, then, as the last word of the hymn was sung, nudged her. Mandy started, looked up at her mother, and the two women shared a quick affectionate glance before turning to the front and staring up at Peter with expectation. He could sense from their attitude of forced composure that the moment the service was over they would lean into each other and laugh.
Behind him, Reynolds’s voice swelled powerfully and held the last note of the hymn. That man had the breath and stamina to outlast the organ, Peter thought. He was grateful for Reynolds’s presence in the church, and in fact he always kept Reynolds and his knowledge and critical intelligence in mind when he wrote his sermons. It kept him from getting sloppy. Peter couldn’t imagine why Reynolds needed to talk to him today, but it pleased him to think that he might be able to be of some help to this solitary man. “A matter of grave concern,” Reynolds had said when he asked Peter if they could talk after church. Well, Peter was not worried. Reynolds was a grave man, his problem was probably intellectual.
The hymn ended. The organ music swelled, faded, died. The members of Peter’s congregation looked up at him for one brief moment, then bowed their heads as he raised his arm to give the benediction. Peter saw them all then, old and young, rich and poor, glad and worried, and he loved them. Suddenly a longing flared up inside him, and he wanted to tell them that they were beautiful, that as they stood before him, they seemed ensconced within the church like precious vessels, and that all the objects man holds dear—velvets, jewels, perfumes, silks, silver, gold, houses, and even land—were thin and meager substances compared to their own persons. It was a miracle that the vast electric energy of their minds and hearts could be contained within a fabric so smooth and complete as skin. They really were true miracles, each one of them, and in his mind, he bowed down before them all. He loved them, these members of his congregation, he loved them, body and soul. He wished he could keep them just as they were at this moment. He wished he could keep them safe and happy forever.
Instead, he lifted his hand high in blessing and spoke the usual ceremonial words: “May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be with us now and forevermore. Amen.”
In their loft, gathered around the organist, the choir very softly sang the choral amen. Mrs. Pritchard’s plump fingers began to press out a gentle postlude, Handel’s Allegro. Peter Taylor walked down the five steps from the chancel and passed down the red-carpeted center aisle of the church, to be at the door to greet the congregation when they filed out. The members of the First Congregational Church of Londonton raised their bowed heads slowly, as if awakening from a dream, and moved politely from their pews out into the day.
Part Two
Sunday afternoon and evening
October 18, 1981
The last notes of the Allegro resonated through the sanctuary. Peter Taylor reached the central doors which opened onto the narthex, and waited there to greet the members of his congregation. Gary Moyer, who had been ushering, pushed the high brass-trimmed main doors open to the outside world. The chilly October air entered, making the hem of Peter’s black robe tremble.
While his father was occupied greeting his parishioners, Michael Taylor managed to slip out the door, past the knot of handshakers.
Pam Moyer also slipped out onto the narthex without greeting Peter; she wanted to be sure that the bulletin board in Friendship Hall was ready.
Liza Howard passed through the line, then stood slightly to the left of the main doors, ostensibly easing her brown kid gloves over her hands. It was a difficult task; she had so many large rings. Her expression and posture were those of a person relaxed to the point of boredom, but she was alert. She was watching for Johnny Bennett to come, shake hands with the minister, greet other members of the congregation, and then to set eyes on Liza. They would look at each other briefly, and smile. Just those few seconds of recognition and conspiracy, just that one electric pinpoint of contact, that rush of lust—that was what Liza wanted for a little snack right now before leaving church and going out into her day.
The sanctuary emptied; the entrance hall filled. People moved in and out of the various doors leading from the narthex to the basement, which held Friendship Hall, or to the nursery, or to the Sunday school rooms and bathrooms. Friends searched out friends, parents looked for childre
n, children raced up the choir-loft stairs to hide from parents and giggle with friends; people shook Peter’s hand and went out the front doors, then came back in again, having remembered a message they wanted to give someone, and went through the door leading to Friendship Hall.
Wilbur Wilson said to Norma after they had greeted Peter, “I don’t feel very good. I think we’d better forget the coffee hour and go on home.”
“Oh,” Norma said. “All right. Just wait one moment, though. I have to ask Flora about the auxiliary meeting. Okay?”
“Okay,” Wilbur said. “I’ll wait here.” He leaned up against a wall and watched people come out of the sanctuary.
The Bennett family approached Peter Taylor. They had been sitting at the front of the church, and were among the last to leave. The sanctuary was nearly empty now, and the entrance hall was crowded. Voices echoed; people said, “Excuse me, please,” and squeezed past one another.
Reynolds Houston shook hands with Peter, said, “I’ll talk with you after coffee hour,” and walked toward the door leading to Friendship Hall. It was then that he felt someone rudely nudge him in the back—in fact, it was actually quite a hard shove. He moved aside, turning to see just who it was that had affronted him. In the very act of turning, something in the air alerted him: something more significant than rudeness had just happened. He turned quickly enough to see Wilbur Wilson buckle and crumple to the floor.
“Norma,” Wilbur said, and his knees came up to his chest with pain. The tiles were cold and he was surrounded by legs and shoes.
“Oh, my!” someone said, and the room around Wilbur went still for a moment with shock, while people at opposite ends of the entrance hall began to call, “What’s happened? What’s going on?”
Reynolds squatted down so that Wilbur could see his face. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
