She sat in bed looking shell-shocked, and when he was through, she started to cry again. She could sense with everything she'd ever felt for him that she had already lost him, perhaps had years before. He had slipped away quietly one day, and she had never seen him go. And now all he was doing was picking up his things. The one thing he didn't want to take with him was her. She had no idea what she was going to do with the rest of her life. Die, she hoped. After being married to him, and seeing her dreams come true, no matter how hard it was sometimes, she couldn't imagine living without him. But she knew she had to now. It was as though someone had come to tell her he had died. In a way, he had. He had opted for work and success, and not love. It seemed a poor choice to her.
“You and the kids can stay in the apartment for as long as you like. I'm going to stay in California for the rest of the year.” He had asked Hazel that morning if she would move out to L.A. till the end of the year. She had grandchildren in New York, but she had thought it would be a fun thing to do. She'd had no idea he was planning to leave Kate behind permanently.
Kate looked horrified. “You've already decided all that? When did you make up your mind?”
“Probably a long time ago. I think I knew this summer. And when I came back to New York, I thought it was the right time. There's no point hanging on anymore. I think I've been gone for a long time.” What had happened? What had she done? How had she failed him? It was impossible to believe that she hadn't done something terrible to him. But the truth was she hadn't, other than marry him. It was the one thing he didn't want, and thought he had. But he'd been wrong. She fascinated him, she intrigued him, she excited him, but that was all it had ever been for him. He had been drawn to her like moth to flame, but he wanted the sky rather than her warmth, and he had flown away.
She lay beside him and cried quietly all night. She stroked his hair, and looked at him as he slept. If he had been anyone else, she would have thought he was insane. But there was something very cold and calculating about what he had said. It was the only way he knew to save himself, and it reminded her of their ending in New Jersey years before. Not knowing what else to do, Joe shut down emotionally and ran away. She had been dispensed with, dismissed, as she understood it, he didn't want her anymore. It was the cruelest thing anyone had ever done to her. In some ways, even crueler than her father's suicide. In Kate's eyes, the reasons Joe had offered weren't adequate to justify his leaving her, although they were to him. Gouging her out of his heart, no matter how painful to him or her, was all he knew how to do.
She never slept all night, and at first light she got up, washed her face, and then went back to bed. He lay close to her, as he always did, when he woke up. But this time, he said nothing, he simply rolled over and got out of bed.
And when he left the apartment for his flight to London, he said goodbye to her very carefully. He didn't want to raise any false hopes that he'd change his mind. He was leaving her forever, and she knew it to her very soul.
“I love you, Joe,” she said, and for an instant he saw the girl he had once met, in her pale blue satin evening gown, with the dark auburn hair. He remembered her eyes that night, and they were the same ones he saw now. But as he looked into them he saw immeasurable pain. But she looked scarcely different than she had sixteen years before. “I'll always love you,” she whispered, as she realized she was seeing him for the last time. They would never be together this way again. He had purposely not made love to her during his entire stay in New York. He hadn't wanted to mislead her and he didn't want to now. He was sending her back to her own life, so he could reclaim his.
“Take care of yourself,” he said softly, taking one last long look at her. It was hard to let her go, in his own way he had loved her as best he could. Not the way she had loved him, but in the best ways he knew how. It would have been enough for her, but not for him. The funny thing was, he wanted less and not more. “I was right, you know,” he said, as she stood looking up at him, engraving him in her memory, the face she loved so much, the eyes, the cheekbones, the cleft chin. “It was an impossible dream. It always was.”
“It didn't have to be,” she said, her blue eyes blazing at him. Even now, in so much pain, she was more beautiful than he wanted to see. More beautiful than he needed her to be. “We could still have this, Joe. We could have it all.” What she said was true, he knew, but he didn't want it anymore. He told himself he had enough without her.
“I don't want it, Kate,” he said cruelly, but he wanted her to understand, he couldn't hurt her anymore. He couldn't stand the guilt or the pain.
She watched him without saying another word as he walked out and closed the door.
23
AFTER LEAVING KATE, Joe went to California for six months, and moved to London for five months after that. He offered her a huge settlement, which she gracefully declined. She had her own money, and she didn't want anything from him. All she had ever wanted for sixteen years was to be his wife. She had been that for four, which was all Joe Allbright had to give, or so he believed when he left.
Kate had caused him so much pain, and inflicted such intense guilt on him, that all Joe wanted was to flee. He had wanted her more than anything, loved her more than he had ever dared, given more than he had known he was capable of. And in spite of everything, it hadn't been enough for her. For all the years of their marriage, he felt she had wanted more and more and more of him. It had terrified him, and brought up all of his old wounds. Every time he listened to her, he could hear his cousin's voice telling him what a rotten kid he was, and how disappointed she was in him. Just seeing Kate, whenever he came home, reminded him of how inadequate he had felt as a child, and what a failure he believed he was as a human being and a man. It was a demon he'd been fleeing all his life. And even the vast empire he had built couldn't protect him from it. The pain he saw in Kate's eyes catapulted him back to the worst of his boyhood again and conjured up all his guilts. In the end, it was easier for him to be alone than to be tormented by her, or cause her pain. Every time he knew he hurt or disappointed her, it was agony for him. And there was a selfish side to him as well. He didn't want to meet anyone's needs but his own.
It took Kate months to understand what had happened to them. The divorce had been filed by then, and they had been separated for nearly a year. He had refused to see her during that time, but called occasionally to check on her and the kids. For months, Kate had wandered around the house they'd rented, in a daze. The hardest part was learning to live without him again. It was like learning to live without air.
She thought constantly about what had happened to them, trying to understand her part in it. And through the months of her despair, the light began to dawn, slowly at first, and in time she could see how her reaching out and wanting more time with him had panicked him. Without meaning to, she had terrified him. Not knowing how else to deal with her, or stop the deadly dance, he could think of nothing else but to run away. He had never wanted to do that to her, but in the end, he knew that he would hurt her more, and himself, if he stayed.
At first, all Kate could think about was what she had lost when he left, and for months her own panic grew worse. She thought about losing her father years before. And she endured another blow when Clarke died in the spring. And just as she had years before, Kate's mother retreated into her own world, and all but disappeared. Kate cried herself to sleep at night, and the loneliness she felt was overpowering. But as the months drifted by, she slowly found her feet again.
Joe had suggested she go to Reno to speed up the divorce, but she had filed it in New York instead, knowing it would take longer. It was her final act of clinging to him. She was still holding on to him by a single rapidly fraying thread. And in fact she had nothing left of him but his name.
It would have been hard to say when the change happened in her. It didn't come suddenly. It wasn't a sudden awakening. It was a slow, arduous winding path up a mountainside toward maturity and growth. And as she climbed th
e mountain day by day, she grew strong. The things that had once so desperately frightened her seemed less ominous. She had lost so much of what mattered most to her that abandonment was finally a monster she had faced and conquered on her own. Of all the things that terrified her, losing him had been her worst fear. But she had, and lived.
Her children were the first to see the change in her, long before Kate was even aware of it herself. She laughed more often, and cried less easily. She went on a trip to Paris with them. And this time, when Joe called when she came home, to see how they were, he heard something different in her voice. It was ephemeral and intangible, and he would have been hard put to explain what it was. But Kate no longer sounded terrified or desperate about being alone. She had gone on endless walks in Paris, down backstreets and on boulevards, thinking about him. She hadn't seen him in nearly a year by then. He had stayed well away from her, and had every intention of never seeing her again, although he had moved back to an apartment in New York.
“You sound happy, Kate,” Joe said quietly. He couldn't help wondering, in spite of himself, if there was a new man in her life. He wanted that for her, and yet at the same time, he hoped not. He had avoided all the available women he had met for the past year. He didn't want to get tangled up with anyone. Perhaps ever again, he told himself. As always, for Joe, it was easier to be alone. But he had missed Kate, and the warmth she brought to his life, for many months. What kept him away from her was that the price of being with her and loving her was too high for him. He was certain that to approach, or even see her again, would only sear his wings again.
“I think I am happy,” Kate laughed. “God knows why. My mother is driving me crazy, she's so lonely without Clarke. Stevie cut most of her hair off last week. And Reed knocked out both of his front teeth playing baseball with a friend.”
“That sounds about right,” Joe laughed. He had forgotten what it was like living with them. But at the same time, he had not.
As Kate did every morning when she woke up, he remembered only too well what it was like waking up next to her. He had not touched a woman for an entire year. Kate had begun seeing other men for dinner from time to time, but she could not bring herself to do more than that. They all paled in comparison to him. She couldn't imagine being with anyone else. And when she came home at night, she was relieved to climb into her bed alone. In truth, being alone no longer seemed menacing to her. It had grown comfortable, she had the children and friends. She had looked loss in the eye and she had not died of it. And slowly, she realized that nothing would ever frighten her in just that way again. She could see it all so much more clearly now. She could see how frightening being married had been for him. She wanted to tell him how sorry she was. But she knew from everything he had said to her that it was too late to make any difference to him.
It was a month later, when she was writing quietly one day, in a journal she kept, that Joe called about some detail of the divorce. She had continued to refuse to take money from him. Clarke had left half his fortune to her, and she had never wanted to take anything from Joe. He suggested his lawyer send some documents to her. It was about a piece of property he had just sold, and he wanted her to sign a quitclaim deed. She agreed, but for a moment on the phone, her voice sounded odd.
“Am I ever going to see you again?” she asked, sounding forlorn. She still missed seeing him and touching him, the smell of him, the feel of him, but she accepted now that he was gone forever from her life. She knew she would not die of it, but it still felt like losing an essential part of her, like a leg or an arm, or her heart. But she was entirely prepared to go on without him. She had no other choice, and she had made her peace with it at last.
“Do you suppose we should see each other, Kate?” he asked, hesitating. For more than a year, he had thought of her as dangerous. It wasn't that she meant to be, but he was afraid that if he even saw her he would fall in love with her all over again, and the deadly dance would begin again. It was a risk he was no longer willing to take. And he was far too cognizant of her charms. “It probably isn't a good idea,” he said quietly before she could answer him.
“Probably not,” she agreed. And for once she didn't sound devastated, or distraught. There was no desperation in her voice. No subtle reproach to cause him guilt. She sounded peaceful, and sensible, and calm. She went on talking to him about a new subdivision he had formed, and a new plane he had designed. And after he hung up, it gnawed at him. He had never heard her sound quite like that. She sounded suddenly grown up. And he realized that, even more than he had, she had moved on. She had found freedom finally. And in losing him, she had found peace. She had faced the worst of her fears, looked the monsters squarely in the eye, and had somehow managed to make peace not only with herself, but with him, and go on with her life. She knew there was no chance he would ever come back. She had given up the dream.
He lay awake long into the night, thinking about her, and in the morning he told himself how unkind it had been of him not to at least see the kids. It wasn't their fault that his marriage to their mother hadn't worked out. He realized then that she had never reproached him for it. She had begrudged him nothing in the past year. She had asked nothing of him. She had fallen down the abyss she had always feared, and instead of hanging on to him to survive, and strangling him, she had let go. The thought of it mystified him, and all he could ask himself as he went to work that day was why. He couldn't help thinking that it had to be because she was clinging to another man. There had to be. He had felt devoured by her needs. But late that afternoon, he called her again. The same document was still sitting on his desk. He had forgotten to give it to his secretary the day before to send to Kate.
When he called her, Kate answered the phone. He always felt some trepidation when he called. He knew that one day it would be answered by a man. But Kate sounded distracted and relaxed when she picked up the phone.
“Oh… hi… sorry… I was in the tub.” Her words instantly conjured up images he had been repressing for months. He no longer wanted to think of her that way. There was no reason to. As far as Joe was concerned, she was gone. It had to be that way. There had been no other choice, for either of them. He knew he had done the right thing. He had saved himself. If he hadn't, she would have destroyed his life, and driven him insane. The guilt and complaints she had constantly hurled at him had been worse than bullets or knives to Joe. In the end, he knew they would have cost him everything he was. But she sounded so innocent. It was hard to believe that she had presented such a dire threat little more than a year before. His memory of the pain and guilt he had felt was finally growing dim.
“I forgot to send you that paper to sign yesterday,” he said apologetically, trying not to think of her standing naked at the phone. He wondered if she was wrapped in a towel, or wearing a robe. He stared out the window, and all he could see was Kate as he held the phone. “I'll drop it by.” He could have sent it by messenger, or mailed it to her. They both knew that. But Kate sounded casual as she smiled at her end.
“Do you want to come up when you drop it off?” There was a long empty pause, as Joe thought about it, and her. His instincts told him to hang up on her, and run away, to resist all of her unspoken and long since unseen charms. He didn't want her in his life again, and yet she still was. He was still married to her, and she was his wife.
“I… uh… is that a good idea? Seeing each other, I mean.” A little voice in Joe's head was telling him to run.
“I don't see why not. I think I can handle it. What about you?” She might as well have said “I'm over you,” and Joe had no way of knowing it, but she was not, and thought she'd never be. But there was no point saying that to him.
“I suppose it would be all right,” he said, sounding distant again. But Kate didn't seem to mind. He no longer frightened her. He couldn't leave her now. He already had. All the worst possible things had happened to her, all the things she used to have nightmares about, and she had survived.
&nbs
p; More important, even from the distance, she had finally understood who Joe was. And even if she never saw him again, there was no question in her mind. She knew she would always love him, he would always be the standard against which she would measure other men. He was the biggest and the best, the only man she had ever truly loved, and the one she had accepted that she couldn't have. Knowing that, and that it was in part her fault that she had lost him, had been hard blows to recover from, but nonetheless she had. And she had come out of it, not broken but strong. He had never heard her sound quite like that before. Even over the phone, he knew there was something different about her. She no longer sounded like the wife he had left, but a much loved old friend. It made him long for her suddenly as he hadn't in months.
“When do you want to come by?” Kate asked hospitably.
“When will the kids be home?” he asked, feeling lonelier than he had in months. Suddenly it was Joe who felt the full impact of the loss, and he wasn't even sure why. Why now? Until then, he had protected himself so well.
“They're at Andy's this week,” Kate said apologetically about Stevie and Reed. “Maybe, if we don't throw things at each other, you could come by and see them another time.” He could hear in her voice that she was laughing at him.
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