Evie slammed down her champagne glass. “Don’t give me any of your stupid advice!” she screamed. “I’ve had enough to last me a lifetime. Anyway, who ever said I was going to marry you? I’m never getting married—understand?”
She had totally lost control of herself. “Here’s to marriage!” she screamed, and threw her drink in Peter’s face. Then she turned and fled up the stairs and locked herself in the bathroom.
Kim followed her up and angrily rattled the doorknob. Fortunately the party was so noisy that only a handful of guests had noticed the scene. “Let me in, Evie.”
“Go away.”
“Evie, open the goddamned door and stop acting like a brat.” With a sigh of relief, Kim heard the lock turning. Evie was sitting on the edge of the tub. Her eyes were read and swollen, and her hair was strewn over her distraught face.
Kim’s heart went out to her friend. She took Evie’s hand. “I know we’ve all been a little rough on you, Evie. But we’re trying to help. We just want you to accept the situation with your parents. And Peter really loves you—he’s just a little gauche, that’s all.”
“I know,” Evie sobbed miserably. “I acted like a bitch. I just don’t know what’s happening to me.”
“I do, I think,” Kim said. “All these upheavals—your grandfather, the divorce, learning about Adam and Linda—they’ve really gotten to you. But give Peter a break—he feels rotten about the whole business.”
Evie swallowed hard. “I guess you’re right—I’d better shape up. Let me fix my face and I’ll be right down.”
Fifteen minutes later, when an outwardly composed Evie returned to the party, Peter was nowhere in sight, and no one seemed to know what had happened to him. She couldn’t blame him for disappearing—he had every right to despise her, didn’t he? But how could she stand to lose him? He was the one remaining constant in her life.
At a loss what to do next, Evie went over to the buffet table, picked up a glass of champagne, drank it down, and refilled it.
An hour and several glasses of champagne later, she was still in the same spot, swaying slightly in an almost agreeable haze, when the host, Chuck Swanson, sauntered up and stood close by her. He was dressed in a beautifully tailored velvet tux and was holding a glass of scotch.
“You look a little lonely,” he said quietly.
“I am,” Evie said. “I am a little lonely.”
“Aren’t you a friend of Kim’s?”
Evie nodded.
He hesitated. “Evie Coulter—I remember now.” He gently took her empty champagne glass from her hand. “How about a refill?”
Evie had seen Chuck several times on the Berkeley campus and at football games. He was, by unofficial vote among the coeds, the prize catch of the year: from a wealthy Bay Area family, good-looking, an excellent dancer, and headed for Yale Law School after graduation. His attentiveness was balm for her bruised spirit.
She tried to think of what to say next, but she felt only anger and defiance. So Peter’s gone. Well, then, to hell with him. Too bad for Peter.
She lit a cigarette, then quickly put it out. She looked at Chuck and smiled. “Yes, Chuck, I’d love a drink. But bring me what you’re having. I’m tired of all these bubbles. Happy New Year …”
The next morning Evie came to with a horrible headache. At first she thought she was back in the sorority house, but then she realized that she was lying in a strange bed in an unknown bedroom, and that she wasn’t alone. Lying next to her, in red-and-white candy-striped pajamas, snoring placidly, was Chuck Swanson.
Evie almost screamed, then stopped herself. Dear God … did I spend the night with him? She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate, but she couldn’t recall anything very clearly. It was obvious, however, that she had lost her virginity like some teenage tramp drunk for the first time on cheap beer and looking for a nice way to end the evening. It was probably a blessing that she couldn’t recall anything. She couldn’t even remember this man’s name.
If it had only been Peter.
She tried to slip out of bed, but Chuck awoke and reached out for her. Evie knocked his hand away.
“What’s the matter?” Chuck asked. “You didn’t act like that last night.”
Evie’s eyes filled with tears. “What do you mean?”
“Just what I said. You came on like Gangbusters. Forgotten already?”
Evie closed her eyes. The room suddenly began to spin. “I think I’m going to be sick….”
She rushed to the bathroom, bent over the toilet, and vomited until there was nothing left. Then she sat on the edge of the tub, half naked, and wept softly, more over the possibility that Peter would find out than for what had happened the night before.
When she returned to the bedroom, it was empty. She put on her soiled and wrinkled party dress and her pumps and went downstairs. Chuck was in the kitchen, opening a can of Budweiser. The house seemed to be deserted.
Evie finally remembered his name. “Chuck … listen. I had way too much to drink last night. I … well, you’ll keep it quiet, won’t you?”
He put down the can of beer and looked hard at her. “That depends. You were pretty damned good. A tiger, I’d say. Maybe someday I’ll want a repeat performance.”
“Chuck … please.” She stopped, knowing that begging would be useless. “I’d better go home now.” She took her topcoat from the hall closet.
He didn’t bother to see her to the door.
Evie stumbled out into the winding streets of the Berkeley hills with no real idea of where she was headed. The important thing was to get away—from the house, from Chuck, and from her own intolerable thoughts. After an hour she found herself in downtown Berkeley. There was a coffee shop open, so she drank two cups of strong black coffee, smoked a cigarette, and walked to the bus stop.
An hour later she was home.
Another empty house greeted her—Consuela was off for the day—but this time it was a sanctuary. Evie ran upstairs, tore off her party dress, and stuffed it in the wastebasket. Then she took the hottest tub she could stand.
She went down into the living room in her bathrobe and stared bleakly out the window at the winter fog. Whom could she talk to? Not her mother, who was in New York. Phillip, perhaps? She reached for the phone. Linda answered, and all Evie could bring herself to say was, “Hi, Linda … it’s Evie … I just wanted to say Happy New Year.”
“Why, thank you, Evie,” Linda said. The warmth in her voice was obvious. “Let me get you your dad.”
“No, no … Just tell him I called. Bye.” She hung up, her courage gone. She had been about to tell her father that she had given herself to an older man she hardly knew, at a drunken party—she, who had assumed such a high moral tone about her parents’ indiscretions.
Evie realized that she couldn’t confide in her mother, either. Ann was, in spite of her relationship with Adam, a highly moral person, conventional even, and always had been. She had always, by word and example, conveyed to her daughter that physical intimacy was a gift that could be all too easily squandered. Still, Evie reflected, if she just heard Ann’s voice, she would feel better.
For the second time a parent failed to answer.
“How nice of you to call,” Adam said. “Before I get your mother, tell me—did you have a good New Year’s?”
“Fine, thank you. I went to a party,” Evie said woodenly.
“Well, I wish you’d been here. Your mother was the belle of the ball. I hardly had the chance to dance with her once.”
There was a pause while he handed the phone to Ann.
“Evie, darling—Happy New Year!” Ann’s voice rang with happiness. Evie dutifully answered her questions, feeling like a hypocrite. Yes, I went to a great party in Berkeley. Yes, I had a great time. Leslie and Kim did, too. While all the time she wanted to throw herself into her mother’s arms and tell her what had happened. But Ann was in New York, and Evie knew she couldn’t bring up the subject on the phone.
She was
in tears when she hung up—speaking with Linda and Adam had only intensified her isolation. Her mother and father had found new lives. When she had tried to do the same thing, the result had been disaster. She couldn’t bear to think about Peter. How could she face him now? Above all, what would happen if he found out?
The renewal of classes provided some solace. Evie plunged into her studies with a fierce determination that astonished her sorority sisters. A couple of them who had been at the party tried to question her about the scene with Peter, and about how she had gotten on with Chuck, but she somehow managed to defuse their curiosity. Apparently they suspected nothing.
Peter phoned several times, but Evie refused to take his calls. Finally one morning he waited in front of her sorority house and waylaid her on the way to history class. Taking her arm, he said, “Evie—I’ve got to talk to you.”
She shook him off. “Peter, we don’t have anything to talk about.”
“Evie, all these years I thought we meant something to each other. Don’t you think you owe me some kind of explanation?”
Taking her silence for assent, he led her over to a low stone wall and made her sit down, then sat beside her.
“Well—what is it?” he asked point-blank.
“It’s nothing, Peter,” Evie said sullenly, staring at the ground.
“Nothing? Evie, you know how it’s been between us. We’ve been together since the day you started college. Suddenly it’s over? Why?”
“It just isn’t going to work out, Peter.”
“Evie, look at me!” He took her face between his hands and said more gently, “Evie, I’m in love with you. Now look at me and tell me you don’t love me!”
Evie clenched her fists at her sides as she looked up at Peter’s dear face, so concerned, so full of love. It was intolerable to hurt him, but how could she explain what she had done on New Year’s Eve? She must simply end it, once and for all.
“Peter, I don’t love you anymore.”
His eyes were wide with disbelief as he searched her face. Then he dropped his hands to his sides and stood up. “Well, that’s that, isn’t it? Excuse me … I didn’t realize …” He made no attempt now to conceal the bitterness in his voice.
“I’m sorry, Peter.”
As she watched him walk away, Evie, for the first time in her life, wished she were dead.
Chapter Forty-Two
ADAM TOOK THE WEEK after New Year’s off from work. It was a magical time for Ann, who had never really had a vacation with nothing to do but play. It was as if they were the only two people in the world.
Adam fell deeper in love with her each day, and Ann’s love for him knew no boundaries. One of the most surprising things about Adam was that, mature as he was, he brought a marvelous spontaneity to everything they did. She was catapulted into a vibrant world that she had never known existed. Over and over, she thanked God for sending her Adam. She reveled in the maturity of their love. Things that would have bothered her ten years ago no longer mattered.
Adam’s energy amazed her. He had so many interests outside his work and still found time to swim, ski, and play tennis. More important for Ann, he had never forgotten his roots.
One Sunday he drove Ann over to Brooklyn to show her his parents’ bakery. “You’d be surprised how large that tiny flat looked to me when I was a child,” he reminisced.
Ann remembered the dreadful day Phillip had taken her to meet Eva and Simon. Dear God, how nervous she had been. But today she couldn’t wait to meet Adam’s parents.
When they arrived, Leah was wearing her best dress in honor of her Avrum’s lady friend, and nothing could have been warmer than her greeting. For a moment Ann felt as though her own mother had returned, and as she hugged Leah she knew that someday Adam’s mother might fill the lonely space in her heart.
As soon as they were seated, Leah put the teakettle on and brought out some homemade Strudel and several sumptuous-looking cakes. Then she led them into the old-fashioned parlor, and over Adam’s laughing protests, proceeded to drag out all his old baby pictures.
“This was Avrum at four … and at his Bar Mitzvah … and on graduation day.”
Leah urged Ann to come back as soon as she could. “And don’t bother to bring Avrum if he’s working.”
Over the next three months, as Adam and Ann kept up their bicoastal romance, Ann decided that the fact Evie came home so little meant she was settling down to enjoy college. She would have been less sanguine had she known the truth.
When Evie first missed her period she felt a stab of fear. Then she reminded herself she had always been irregular, especially since she left home. But several weeks later, when she began waking up too sick to face breakfast, she suspected the worst. She stayed in the bathroom nearly an hour, and when she emerged and sank wearily onto her bed, Kim came over and said with concern, “You must be coming down with the flu, Evie. Why don’t you stay home. I’ll get your French notes, and Les can give you hers from math and Chinese history.”
“Okay,” Evie had mumbled.
Later that day she had felt much better and hoped it was indeed the twenty-four-hour virus. But the next morning, as she sat miserably on the floor of the bathroom, she admitted the other signs she’d tried to deny—the extra weight, the sore, tender breasts.
When she finally staggered out, she looked at her two roommates and burst into tears.
“How long has it been since you had a period?” Leslie asked shrewdly.
“Leslie! Evie’s a virgin, remember?” Kim exclaimed.
“Then she’s the first pregnant virgin in two thousand years. Evie,” she said as her friend tried to bury her face in the pillow, “sit up! This isn’t something you can fool around with. Is it possible that you’re pregnant?”
“Yes.”
“You haven’t had a period lately?”
Evie shook her head.
“Since when, Evie?” Kim asked. “You told me you haven’t seen Peter in months.”
“It wasn’t Peter,” Evie cried. “It was Chuck Swanson. You know, on New Year’s? I got drunk, I guess, and I went to bed with him. I can’t remember one thing about it, but that’s when it had to be.”
“Evie, for God’s sake—this is March! What have you been waiting for? You’re over three months’ pregnant!” Leslie exclaimed.
“I don’t know,” Evie whispered brokenly. “I just don’t know. I wish I were dead.” Visions of her parents’ disgusted reaction brought a fresh burst of sobs. She had thought sleeping with Chuck was the most horrible thing that could happen. Now she realized that this was a million times worse.
“Damn it, Evie, pull yourself together,” Leslie said. “Stop carrying on like a grade-B movie heroine. There’s a simple solution to all this: you’ll have an abortion.”
“How?” Evie moaned. “I can’t just go to our family doctor.”
It was very simple, Leslie explained. It wasn’t legal, strictly speaking, but all you had to do was find a doctor who was willing to certify that the health of the mother would be endangered by carrying the baby to term. Thousands of abortions were done every day.
By the time Leslie finished, Evie had made up her mind. There was really no choice. She couldn’t have Chuck Swanson’s baby—worse, she couldn’t disgrace her mother and father.
A few days later, Evie found herself sitting next to Leslie in a dingy waiting room in an outlying district of Oakland. Leslie reached over and patted her hand. “Relax, Evie. You’re as pale as a ghost. It will be all right—you’ll see.”
“It’s not going to be all right, Leslie. I can feel it. I’m scared.” Her voice was so low that Leslie could barely hear her.
Frightened by Evie’s pallor, Leslie got up and walked over to the receptionist’s area. She rapped smartly on the closed panel. “Nurse!”
Nothing happened. Then, after about five minutes, the window opened a couple of inches and two sleepy-looking eyes peered out. “Yeah?”
“I need a glass of water
for … Mrs. Smith.”
The nurse looked at Leslie and sighed, then slammed shut the partition. Leslie had just about decided that her request was going to be ignored when the nurse opened the partition again and shoved through a paper cup filled with tepid water.
It was better than nothing. Leslie brought it to Evie and urged her to sip it. She was terribly worried. Evie seemed to be taking this so hard. She had barely eaten anything for the past week, and several times Leslie and Kimberly had been wakened by her screams as she had nightmares. Every morning the dark circles under her eyes seemed bigger. She was smoking incessantly, and drinking cup after cup of coffee.
Leslie had gotten the name of an abortionist from a boy she had been dating, who said that several of his frat brothers had sent their girlfriends there. The doc was very cheap and no questions would be asked about her marital status.
Evie knew that she couldn’t go to any of the reputable practitioners in San Francisco because they might know one of her parents. But Oakland was more anonymous, and, as promised, the doctor asked no questions. The operation would take thirty minutes and cost only three hundred dollars: less than half the going rate.
Evie and Leslie had been taken aback by the untidy office and the coarse, gum-chewing receptionist, but everyone said that the man knew what he was doing.
Finally the receptionist opened the door and called out, “Mrs. Smith—the doctor will see you now.”
Summoning what courage remained, Evie stood up, smiled at Leslie, and walked through the doorway into the operating room. The doctor was a thin, bald little man in his late fifties. Evie immediately disliked him, even though she had to admit that, unlike the waiting room, both he and the operating room were scrupulously clean.
He asked her politely to disrobe and lie down on the table, where he put her feet up in stirrups, then left the room.
Seasons of the Heart Page 30
