Acts of Love

by Judith Michael

  Claudia sighed deeply. "She called me."

  "And?"

  "I said I'd try, one of these days when something interesting comes along."

  "Interesting?"

  "Luke, she does the worst kind of drudgery! Stuffing invitations into envelopes, for God's sake. Typing names and addresses into computers. Haven't they heard of secretaries?"

  "Those organizations are raising money. They have to keep expenses down. That's what volunteers are all about."

  "I know that; good heavens, do you think I'm a child? But they could afford at least one secretary if they were better organized. Anyway, I can't see myself sitting there all day stuffing envelopes. I said I'd help with flower arrangements, decorating the tables, things like that. Fun things."

  "Maybe it's like any job: you have to serve an apprenticeship and work up to fun things."

  "It's not a job; there's no salary."

  "It's a job because it's work, and people with money and free time do it for the causes they care about. Why don't you let yourself try it? You spend more energy keeping yourself bored than you would giving some shape and purpose to your days. You wouldn't have to start out full time; offer Gladys two or three days a week. You might enjoy thinking about something besides yourself for a change."

  "I'm going to order," she said defiantly, and beckoned to the waiter. "Salmon. Oh, wait a minute." The waiter refilled her wineglass, then watched attentively as she opened the menu she had examined earlier and once again studied each item carefully. "Salmon," she said at last. "I think." She scanned the menu again. "Yes, I think so. And bisque. Or do I want the salad? Luke, should I have the salad?"

  "If that's what you want."

  Claudia heard his voice tighten as it always did when she tried to force him to make decisions for her. She sighed. "Bisque." She waited until Luke had ordered and then said briskly, "Now tell me about the play."

  "Tell me about Ed Peruggia," Luke said evenly.

  "Luke, you know I like to save serious discussions for the end of dinner."

  "So that if we're not finished we can go back to your place. I learned that a long time ago. But we're not going to do that, so if you want to talk you'll do it now."

  She made a gesture of resignation. "He says he wants to marry me."

  "Do you want to marry him?"

  "I want to be married to you. I should never have agreed to a divorce; I should have—"

  "I thought we were talking about Peruggia. Are you asking my permission to marry him?"

  "I don't need your permission."

  "My blessing, then."

  "I don't need that, either. Damn it, why are you always directing me? Giving me permission, or blessings, telling me where to go and what to do, what would be a good experience for me, what would 'give shape to my days'—whatever the hell that means. You're always trying to manipulate me, as if I'm one of your actors who can't make a move until you say left or right."

  "Keep your voice down."

  "See? You're still directing me!"

  Luke took a long breath. "Tell me what you want me to do."

  "Take me back."

  "I won't do that and you know it. What else?"

  "Tell me what to do about Ed. I don't think he really intends to marry me. He plays with people—you know?—and sometimes he's mean. A mean person. He says things and then sits back to see how people react."

  "And how did you react?"

  "Where's the waiter? Would you pour me some more wine?"

  "You're drinking too much, Claudia." "Don't tell me—!" "All right." He filled her glass. "We need another bottle."

  130 ~ Judith Michael

  "No, we don't."

  "Luke, please. We haven't even started eating yet. We have to have wine with food."

  After a moment he shrugged and signaled for another bottle. "You were telling me how you reacted."

  "I told him I'd think about it. I told him I didn't think he was in love with me."

  "And he said.''"

  "That he adored me and wanted to spend the rest of his ... you know, the usual stuff."

  "The same things I once said."

  "But you meant them. I don't think Ed means much of anything he says. He's not really very nice, you know— do you know him?"

  "No. But I've heard that he's not a good man."

  "Tricia probably told you that; she had an affair with him once and now she hates him. At least he told me she hates him and he hates her, too. I suppose I could end up hating him; sometimes I already do."

  "Then why are you thinking of marrying him?"

  "Because what else can I do? And don't tell me to call Gladys or I'll scream."

  "I'm listening," he said.

  "I can't stand being alone, Luke. I've got to have somebody fill the space around me. I've got to know whom I belong to and how I'm supposed to behave."

  "No one can give that to you," Luke said quietly. "It has to come from within you."

  "I don't know how to do that. Not everybody can, you know. Some people need help, because there's too much space around them and no boundaries. I need to know where the boundaries are, Luke, and how to make up a life. I just float. I don't belong anywhere." She put her hand on his. "I look at other people and they're busy organizing their lives as if they're organizing dinner parties or board meetings. They have all these goals. They have plans and lists and they're always deciding things. My God, it's like they cut notches in their belt to show how much they've done. Raised money, won prizes, bought a company, got elected to something ... they're so damn busy! And they feel good about themselves. / can't do that. I never feel good about myself. I never know what I should be

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  CTS of LOVE ~ 131

  doing to feel happy or satisfied or just to get through the days without feeling lost and . . . loose. That's what I want you to do, Luke; help me be happy and settled. Not floating. I thought you cared about me enough to give me help when I need it."

  He shook his head. "There's nothing I can—"

  "There is. You know there is. Give me your name. Marry me. Then I'll really be Claudia Cameron. It's a fake now, it doesn't make sense to have your name but not be your wife. I know how to be your wife, Luke, I know what you expect of me. I know what everybody expects of me. I'll have goals and plans and I'll get things done."

  "Because they're my goals and plans."

  "Yes, of course; what do you think I'm talking about? You have enough for ten people; good heavens, you keep two assistants and a secretary busy full time. But you know I could help you in ways they can't. You told me I was a good hostess. How many dinner parties have you given in the past few years? I can take trips with you and talk to you about your plays and make love to you ... whatever you want. Didn't I do whatever you wanted when we were married? All you had to do was tell me what you wanted and how you wanted it done, and I took care of it. Damn it, you do it for your actors, you could do it for me! Then I wouldn't be alone. And neither would you."

  The waiter refilled her wineglass, then served their soup. Luke pushed his aside and turned his hand to clasp hers. "Listen to me. All of us are alone. We have to figure out by ourselves what we'll do with our lives, what name we want—which means what reputation—what we think people expect of us, and how we want to live and shape our days. You knew what I meant when I said that earlier. We fill our days and give them substance so that late at night we can look back and measure what we've done and how well we've done it, and think about what's waiting to be done tomorrow. I can't do that for anyone but myself I can do it for actors on a stage because I'm working with a script and/^«ow/^ow^//f«^^". But I don't have that luxury in life. All I have is each day, and my hopes for tomorrow and as far ahead as I dare plan, knowing that none of it may actually happen."

  "You could help me do it."

  "I can't. You wouldn't be happy and neither would I."

  She put her chin up. "I'll marry him."

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hael

  "From what I hear, I don't think he'll make you happy, either. But I can't stop you."

  "You really don't mind imagining me in his bed. . . ."

  "I'm sure you've already been there. And, no, I don't mind imagining it if I know you've chosen it freely."

  "Oh, freedom." She made a dismissive gesture. "I've got too much of that."

  "Do you want your soup?"

  "No."

  "You can take them both," Luke said to the waiter, and he and Claudia sat in silence while the soup was removed and their main courses were served.

  Claudia sniffed several times, as if putting away tears, then gave Luke a trembling smile. "Well!" she said gaily. "The salmon looks wonderful, as usual. Did I tell you about the salmon at Ralph Lauren? He really is so on top of things, Ralphie. I mean there were these elegant packages of whole sides of smoked salmon from Scotland, and everybody was snapping them up . . ."

  And Luke knew that she had decided that she had done as much as she could for this night and would wait for another one. He let it go. It was easier than forcing her to admit that she was living a fantasy—assuming he could force her to admit it—and he was in no mood to prolong the evening. In fact, dinner turned out to be more pleasant than he had expected. Claudia could do that when she wanted to and since, finally, he did answer her questions about the play, and smile at her anecdotes about people they both knew, they had enough conversation to see them through espresso and a shared caramel dessert.

  But it was Jessica whom he thought about when he got home, and he thought about her the next morning when his airline tickets were delivered, because suddenly it had occurred to him that he was not sure she still lived on Lopez Island. Her letters about a new house, about gardening and riding and the production o^ Pygmalion, had all been written three years earlier. She could be anywhere by now.

  At breakfast, he took Constance's box with him to the terrace and pulled out the last few letters, to look for clues. They were sparser than her earlier ones, warm and loving but almost completely barren of private thoughts or feelings. Whatever Jessica Fontaine was at this time in her life.

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  she was not revealing it to Constance, even though she described in detail the books she was illustrating and others she had read, her gardens and a new greenhouse, and descriptions of people she knew.

  Her garden. A greenhouse. Probably on Lopez, Luke thought. She was still using stationery with an embossed fountain in the upper left corner, but where once the words "The Fountain, Lopez Island, Washington State" had been below it, now there was nothing. Probably Lopez, he thought again, but it was a long way to go without being sure. And so, later that day, when rehearsal broke for lunch, he called her publishing house to get her address.

  No one would give it to him. He was transferred from the publicity department to customer relations to the art department, the editorial department, even the sales department. They all said they did not know, and anyway, it was the policy of the publishing house not to reveal an author's whereabouts.

  "She's not an author, she's an illustrator," he exploded to a secretary in the office of the president and publisher.

  "We have the same rule for both," the secretary said. "And Miss Fontaine has been very specific, Mr. Cameron. She absolutely does not want her address given out. The people you talked to were telling the truth. They don't know where she lives. All her correspondence goes through this office."

  "Let me talk to Warren," Luke said. He made it a rule not to use social contacts for private requests, and so he had not gone directly to the top when he made his first telephone call, or even his third or fifth, but he had to get back to rehearsal, and he was out of patience. And he had known Warren Bradley casually for years, at dinner parties and benefits, and even as a guest in his home for a few small dinners.

  "Luke, it's always a pleasure to talk to you," Bradley said, "but I can't help you. Miss Fontaine has requested—well, in fact she's demanded—that we keep her address within this office. I wouldn't give it to anyone."

  "Just tell me one thing," Luke said. "Does she still live on Lopez Island."^"

  "What.?"

  "In a house that she built. On a bay."

  "God damn it, why have you been tearing through every department in this company if you already knew that.?"

  134 ~ Judith Michael

  "Thanks, Warren. I knew she'd lived there in the past; I wasn't sure she still does."

  "Luke, do you know her?"

  "I met her years ago. Why?"

  "Because as far as I can tell, no one's seen her and that's the way she wants it. We talk on the phone, we use faxes and FedEx for letters, contracts, memos, manuscripts ... and that's it. Lopez is a small place and I'm sure you can find her if you want to, for whatever reason, but I'd think twice about it, if I were you. She must have powerful reasons for wanting to be left alone."

  "I don't intend to batter her door down."

  "But you are going to see her?"

  "If I can. I want to take her something that Constance left her in her will."

  "You could ship it to her."

  "I'd rather not."

  "Well, call me when you get back, and tell me what she's like now. I remember her so clearly . . . but of course that was a long time ago. She's become an important illustrator, but I can't imagine why she'd give up the theater for that. Let me know."

  "I will. Thanks, Warren. I won't tell anyone we talked. Including Jessica."

  For the rest of that week, he had no time to read Jessica's letters or her books. A hundred small details had come up, many of them issues that had been pushed aside in the early weeks of rehearsal, and now, with only ten days left, he and Monte and Fritz were together every night, smoothing them out.

  "That entrance always was awkward," Fritz said as they looked at a diagram of the stage. "Martha complained about it a long time ago."

  "Move the door," Luke said. They stared at him. "About a foot and a half downstage. Then when Martha comes in there's no way she'll miss seeing Lena; she'll practically stumble over her."

  "I like it," Monte said. "Fritz?"

  "Not a bad idea. Okay. What about the tea things in act two? The silver reflects the spotlights and there's these blinding glares shafting out to the audience."

  "Use china," Luke said. "I know Kent wanted silver, but if we can't, we can't."

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  "China," Fritz muttered, and wrote it down.

  "I was thinking," Monte said, "that we ought to hold a while longer before the final curtain."

  "While they stand there like dummies?" Fritz asked.

  "It's a very moving moment. Give the audience time to absorb it."

  "Let's talk to the cast," Luke said. "I like it, but I want to make sure they're comfortable with it. Anything else?"

  "Costumes," Fritz said. "Abby doesn't like her shoes."

  "Get new ones. The greatest actress in the world can't act if her feet hurt."

  "She doesn't like the way they lool{."

  "I'll say it again: get new ones. Fritz, we can't have her worrying about shoes, for whatever reason."

  The lists went on and on and it was not until Luke was on the plane for Seattle that he finally settled down to read the twelve slender children's books he had brought with him.

  The stories, for children two to six years old, were amusing and lively, some deserving close attention, but Luke was concentrating on the illustrations. And as he studied them, he knew that they would have captivated him no matter who the artist was.

  Their styles varied, from Russian fairy-tale art to French folk art, from African tribal art to modern American realism, and they were done in wa-tercolors, oils, charcoal, even crayon, depending on the style. But in spite of their differences, all the illustrations gave one overwhelming impression: that nothing was real.

  Luke tried to put his finger on what made him feel that way. He found t
he hidden drawings, ingeniously flowing into and out of other parts of the pictures but clearly visible once discovered, and he knew how exciting it would be for children to discover them and show them to parents and friends. But they were not the reason that he felt this pervasive unreality. There was something else, something more elusive. It was not until he had finished dinner and put his head back, worn out from the long days and nights of the week just ended, that it came to him. "They're dreams," he murmured aloud. His eyes opened and he sat up and turned on his reading light again.

  "May I bring you something?" the steward asked. "Another glass of wine?"

  "Coffee," Luke said. "Thanks." He pulled his table from its niche in

  136 ~ Judith Michael

  the arm of his seat and spread the books on it, opening them at random. The steward reached across to set a cup of coffee on the small ledge between the seats, but he barely noticed. He was absorbed in the drawings. And he saw that even the most mundane activities in them—a young girl raking leaves, a boy taking out the garbage after dinner, a dog hiding under a porch—were like dreams: a little bit distorted. Sometimes the pictures erased boundaries and ran into each other as dreams did. Sometimes they were multiple images that overlapped as dreams did. Sometimes they became blurred at the edges, then faded to nothing, as dreams did. Everything was recognizable, but nothing was exactly as it was in reality.

  Everything a little ojf center. Marilyn Marks had said that about her first set for The Magician when she described it to Luke and Kent. A woman who's always been different — and now she can't figure out what's gone wrong. That feeling of things asew, like a dream that she's trapped in.

  Luke put away the books and his table, once again turned out his light, and pushed back his seat. A movie flickered on the large screen at the front of the cabin, but he closed his eyes and saw Jessica, her photographs he had seen in the library, his memory of her on stage, the way he had pictured her with his grandmother in Italy from descriptions of her visits in her letters. Trapped in a dream. Was she? Nothing she had written hinted at that. Maybe he'd missed something; he'd read many of her letters so quickly, hungry for the next. That feeling of things askew. Well, it doesn't matter, he thought drowsily. Because I don't have to rely on letters anymore. I'll be able to talk to her about everything, find out everything I want to know.