Queen of Broken Hearts

by Cassandra King

  He looks embarrassed, his shoulders hunched and his head hanging down. “After I married Elinor, I found myself living my fantasy, crazy as it sounds. All I wanted was to take care of her and … Aw, you know, all that stuff. That never changed. All our years of marriage, it didn’t change. You believe me?”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  He shrugs. “Most guys I palled around with, naval guys, you know, had women on the side. Even career officers with model kids and perfect wives, they’d have their girlfriends, too. You’ll think I’m shitting you or trying to adjust my halo, but I swear I wasn’t like that. Just wasn’t interested. I had Elinor, and I felt like the luckiest man in the world.”

  I struggle to keep my face from revealing my thoughts. When he said he’d gone crazy earlier, obviously he had. “So, when did things start to go wrong?”

  He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “Lately I’ve been looking back, trying to figure it out. I think Elinor took up with me in the first place mainly to piss off her mother, one of those snooty Boston bitches. Jesus, did they have a bad relationship. Elinor’s old lady was always telling her she wasn’t skinny enough, or pretty enough, or smart enough. The old biddy hated my guts the minute she laid eyes on me. I was her worst nightmare.”

  Now I know where Elinor gets her charm genes, I think, but I keep my face expressionless as Lex continues. “Elinor’s old lady tried to convince all the other high-society biddies that I was from one of Maine’s prominent families, and since none of them knew jack about Maine, I guess they bought it. They sure had lots of parties and stuff for us.”

  “Did you like that kind of thing?” The image of Lex in Boston society is beyond my imagination.

  “Hell, no. But I was a young stud and pretty full of myself back then. And I’ll admit it: I wanted to impress her folks, thinking I’d make them like me. My career was going better than I ever imagined; I’d been promoted to captain; and to top it off, I’d landed a classy beauty like Elinor. Guess I was a cocky bastard.”

  “Was?” I say, hoping for a smile from him, but he furrows his brow, remembering.

  “I got the big head, thought I was on top of the world. When we first married, we were stationed in the Philippines for a few years, which was right up Elinor’s alley. Everything went great for us, you know? We had maids and gardeners and a fancy house and lots of friends, and Elinor seemed happy as a clam. She spent her days at the officers’ club and her nights with me. She couldn’t have been more loving or attentive, and I was in heaven. When we got back to the States, we were sent to Pensacola, then to Baltimore. We finally had a kid, and hell, I hoped we’d have a houseful. Not Elinor, who said one was more than enough for her, that it took her forever to get her figure back. When Alexia started school, Elinor opened up her dress shop, and stupid me, I thought everything was going great. The first time she claimed to be miserable and said she was gonna leave me, I was floored. It came out of the blue.”

  “I’m sure it felt that way, but it never does. Even when it’s a surprise, usually we can look back and see the signs.”

  He shakes his head. “I was too damn busy to look for signs.” He crooks his fingers to indicate quotation marks over the last word. “I was brought up piss-poor, when times were always hard. Elinor never really believed that as a kid, I went to bed hungry half the time.” He pats his belly and looks up with a half-smile. “No chance of that now, huh? If I didn’t work so hard, I wouldn’t be able to see my shoes. Anyhow, when we had a kid, I didn’t want her to ever want for anything, so I started working my ass off to provide nice stuff for Elinor and Alexia. Once Elinor’s store took off, things got better. Until then I was always doing overtime, working weekends so they could have expensive things, like everybody else.” He shrugs. “Maybe I was still trying to impress her folks, convince them she hadn’t married a loser after all.”

  “The first time it came up, did Elinor say why she wanted to leave you?”

  “Just that she was sick of me being such a loudmouth and a lout and not having fancy manners. Said she was ashamed to go anywhere with me. I told her she knew what I was when she married me.”

  “So that was her reason? She was ‘sick’ of you?”

  He nods glumly. “Yawp. She said she’d been able to overlook things until we had a kid, but Alexia needed a dad she could look up to. Turns out I’d embarrassed Alexia at her school play.” He grins sheepishly. “When Alexia came onstage, I stood up and clapped and whistled. Guess it was pretty embarrassing for a young girl.”

  “So Elinor left after that?”

  “Went home to her mom and stayed half the summer, but she and her old lady fought the whole time, and the shop didn’t do well without her, so she came back. It was tough while they were gone, though, not seeing my little girl. Elinor told me I could see her anytime, but first time I showed up, she’d sent Alexia to camp. I said I’d be back for my daughter’s tenth birthday regardless, and Elinor claimed she’d never keep me from my child. I got there, no one was home, and none of the maids would tell me where the fuck they were. I acted the fool and yelled and kicked in the front door. When Elinor and Alexia got there, I started yelling at Elinor, and Alexia cried and ran off, scared to death of me. What a god-awful scene that was. Ended up, Elinor agreed to come home if I’d go to a marriage counselor.”

  “So the two of you have had counseling?”

  “Couple of times after she came back. Not that it did us much good. Mainly because every time she threatened to leave, it’d scare me so bad that I’d go out and get drunk. We’d fight, then I’d sober up and promise to do better. Jeez, it was miserable. The bottom line was Elinor had stopped loving me. I filled her with disgust, I think. I had a hard time admitting it, but there it was.”

  Leaning over, I place a hand on his arm. “She must love you in spite of everything. She came here with you—”

  “Then she promptly left my ass,” he reminds me.

  “Yes, but she’s decided now that was a mistake. Let me assure you that you’re doing the right thing to get a commitment from her before rushing back into a reconciliation, however.”

  He grins. “A commitment, huh? You folks have your little buzzwords, don’t you?” Before I can respond, Lex slaps his knees and gets to his feet. He’s said all he’s going to. “Jeez, I’ve been yapping for an hour. You’re gonna be late to work, and I’ve got a marina to run.”

  I look down at my watch. “Yeah, I have someone coming in at nine.” I’ll be rushed, but it was worth it. Lex has talked more this morning than he has since we’ve known each other. I get to my feet, too. “Maybe your blood pressure has gone down a few points, if nothing else.”

  “The coffee helped get rid of my hangover.”

  “I hope you’ll have better sense than to overindulge like that again,” I say, but I’m thinking I’d get drunk, too, if I were him and faced with getting back with Elinor. But it’s what he wants, so I put an encouraging hand on his shoulder as we start walking toward the kitchen, Lex carrying the tray with my untouched bowl of yogurt and our coffee cups on it. “If you promise you’ll keep me posted on how things are going, I swear I’ll return your calls,” I tell him.

  But it turns out to be a promise I don’t have to keep. Friday after work, Lex and I, back on good terms, plan another trip to the Landing. When he runs several minutes late, I check my messages. It’s him, apologizing that he won’t be able to go with me after all. Elinor just showed up at the marina, ready to discuss that commitment he’s asked for.

  Rye’s historic old house is located on a high bluff overlooking the bay, which is spectacular at night. He and I often sit on the upstairs balcony off the master bedroom suite because it offers the best view, perched among the tops of the spreading oaks like a tree house. It’s such a glorious and star-stunned night that we can’t resist taking our brandy to the balcony, in spite of a biting wind blowing in. We pull our chairs together for warmth and raise our glasses in a salute to Mobile Bay, a vast, shimmering piece
of black silk spread out under stars close enough to reach up and touch. The lights of downtown Mobile sparkle on the dark horizon like a city of diamonds. “Wish we had a fuller moon,” Rye murmurs, but I reply that it couldn’t be more perfect.

  We started the night with champagne, one of Rye’s prized bottles of Dom Perignon he’d been saving for years, topped off with a feast of pickled shrimp and chocolate-pecan cake his housekeeper had left us, which she knows to be my favorite. “What are we celebrating?” I asked in surprise when I arrived. “Us,” Rye replied mysteriously, putting his hand over mine to steady the glass as he poured my champagne.

  After having two pieces of chocolate cake and licking the thick dark icing off my fingers, I’m so stuffed I don’t want to move. I pull my legs under me on the cushioned rattan chair, grateful that I wore a long full skirt, which now serves as cover against the chill wind. I usually wear a swirly skirt when I go to Rye’s, since our evenings almost always end with a run-through of our latest dance steps. I look over at him with a smile and raise my glass. “What a lovely evening this has been!”

  He tries not to look too pleased with himself as he clinks his glass against mine. “I thought you needed a treat after all you’ve been through with Haley lately. And I had an ulterior motive, I’ll admit.”

  I take a tentative sip of cognac in the fat-globed glass I hold. I’ve never cared for brandy, but Rye insisted I give this kind a try. The taste isn’t too bad, and it feels really good going down. “That sounds ominous.”

  “I just wanted to gossip,” he says with a chuckle. When he leans over to light a candle in a hurricane lamp, it occurs to me that he hasn’t mentioned having a smoke. I wonder if he’s quit, but I’m not about to bring it up. “You’ve been occupied with your new retreat site, and Dory’s taken off with Son, so I haven’t had anyone to gossip with.”

  “Oh, boo-hoo. Half of Fairhope would line up in a hurricane to hear one of your juicy morsels, and you know it.”

  Rye has the same quicksilver eyes that Mack had, but his are livelier, dancing as he says, “The well has run dry.”

  “You mean you’ve attended every Mardi Gras party in a five-hundred-mile radius and haven’t picked up enough gossip to keep you happy?” I say with a laugh.

  He wrinkles his nose in distaste. “Are you suggesting that I’d go to that debauchery in New Orleans? Please. At least our celebrations have retained an element of tastefulness.”

  “A tasteful Mardi Gras parade is an oxymoron, Rye.” I eye him suspiciously, then say, “Wait a minute. Why are you asking me about gossip, my good man? Surely this isn’t another sly attempt to get me to betray a professional confidence. I thought we’d settled that.”

  He swirls the cognac in the brandy snifter, closing his eyes to savor the smell. “Oh, you mean the time you told me if I ever asked you to do so again, you’d drop me in a New York minute? No, it’s not a professional confidence I’m asking you to betray, but I’ll get to that. First, what’s going on with Dory and Son?”

  “Better put your ear to the ground for the thundering of hooves, because your four horsemen might still ride in,” I tell him. “Dory stood up to Son; she told him it was her way or the highway. He pouted and acted the fool, of course, since it comes so naturally to him, then damn if he didn’t straighten up. His halo is back in place, so Dory rewarded him by taking off a couple days to go to a Bama game. Son’s so pleased with himself, you’d think he just treed Jesus.”

  Rye groans. “If I’d been a betting man, I’d have lost a fortune by now, wagering my last penny that he’d never make it this far.”

  We sit in a comfortable silence, sipping our drinks and looking out over the bay until I say, more wistfully than I’d intended, “I’ll tell you something if you swear never to tell Dory. When she and Son split up last year, I had hopes that maybe you and Dory could get together one day. Pick up where you left off that summer all those years ago.”

  Bemused, he tilts his head and eyes me sideways. “I had no idea you were such a romantic. I wouldn’t think it possible in your profession.”

  I pull my shawl closer, then turn my head to look out over the bay. “I’ve had to watch myself to keep from becoming bitter and cynical. At times I’ve teetered, and it’s those times when the world has looked too gloomy for me. I’ve felt comfortless and utterly desolate. I’ve concluded that life is easier when we have someone to share it with. So I have to believe some relationships are good and solid. And lasting, most of all.” With a swing of my arm, I motion at the bay. “If I didn’t think so, I’d row a boat to the middle of the bay and jump in, I swear I would.”

  He’s pensive, nursing his drink, his eyes distant. “It’s a romantic notion, but I’m not sure I was really in love with Dory,” he says finally, surprising me. “She served an important purpose in my solitary life. I held her up as my ideal, the only woman I would’ve given up my treasured freedom for. It worked because she was unavailable. Ah, but that was in my youth, which is long gone now.”

  “Hear, hear,” I say with another lift of my glass. “To our lost youth!”

  “Things look quite different when you get to be my age, my dear,” he says softly.

  “We look at things differently in each decade of our lives, don’t you think? Our needs change, but so do our desires. Or maybe they just become blurred.”

  “As a younger man, I prized freedom above all things,” Rye says thoughtfully, but there’s no mistaking the regret in his voice. “I didn’t want to share my life with anyone, and I think that’s why I’ve had so many women yet never settled down with one.”

  I widen my eyes in mock surprise. “Uh-oh. True confessions. If I pour you another brandy or two, maybe I’ll leave here with the hottest gossip in Fairhope.”

  “I have many regrets, Clare.”

  “Who doesn’t? Do you really think any of us can make it this far and not have them?”

  He looks at me strangely. “Do you regret loving Mack?”

  “No. Never.”

  “I can never tell you how much I envied the kind of love that you and Mack had. It seems to me it only comes once in a lifetime, and some of us never find it.” Putting down his brandy glass on a small table in front of our chairs, Rye leans toward me, his eyes opalescent in the flickering light of the candle. “If I thought you’d love me like that …”

  I take his hand in mine and smile at him. “I’ve loved you for years, and you know it.”

  “And I treasure the special closeness we’ve always shared.” With a graceful move, he raises my hand to his lips. “As I tried to tell you last summer, though, I don’t want to be your brother anymore. Your friendship is dear to me, but I want more. I’ve played it cool until I thought you were ready, but now … since things have changed …”

  With a puzzled frown, I ask, “What things?”

  “That’s the other thing I wanted to talk to you about, the gossip going around. Everyone is saying that your Yankee sea captain is back on Magnolia Street.”

  I stare at him in shock. “Lex has left the marina and moved to Elinor’s?”

  Rye shrugs nonchalantly, releasing my hand as he reaches for his glass. “So I hear. You mean you didn’t know?”

  I swallow hard, too stunned to speak. “I—I didn’t. I mean, I knew she’d asked him to, but the last time he and I talked, they were still discussing a reconciliation. Nothing had been decided.” The shock and dismay I feel that Lex didn’t even bother to tell me catches me off-guard. Then it hits me what Rye said, and I turn my head to look at him, aghast. “You think this changes things between us? You and me? But … how?”

  Again he shrugs. “When you blew off my proposal last summer, I thought it might be because of Lex.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” I say sharply, and Rye studies me with a knowing smile.

  “Methinks the lady protests too much,” he says.

  “Nonsense. I’ve told you all along that Lex and I were just good friends, but you chose not to believe me.
I thought you were just pretending to be jealous of him. I had no idea you thought I cared for him in that way.”

  He stares at me in wonder. “Then we’ve been at cross purposes. Guess I should’ve had this conversation with you long before now, but I was afraid to. I had to hold on to hope, and I couldn’t bear not to have at least a slender thread.”

  “And what hope was that?” I ask, even though I know the answer.

  “Well, I hoped you’d see that you and I were meant to be together. And one day you might feel the same way about me that I feel about you. You’ve spent your life taking care of everybody else. I’d like to spend the rest of mine taking care of you.”

  “Oh, Rye.” I scoot my chair closer to his and put my arms around him, my head on his shoulder. “You’re such a fine man, and you’re so good to me. But you have to know—what you’re asking of me? I’m not sure I can love anyone like that again.”

  “I know that, sweetheart,” he says into my hair. “I was there the day we found Mack, and I’ll never forget your face, never. As long as I live, it will haunt me. But even on that awful day, I wanted to take care of you, more than anything. Now that Mack’s gone, I’ve come to the conclusion that you and I were meant to be.”

  “You deserve someone who’ll love you the way you want and need to be loved. Anything less wouldn’t be fair to you—”

  He puts a finger over my lips to silence me. “Shhh.” When I raise my head to his, he kisses me, then whispers, “Stay with me tonight, Clare.”

  Even though the combination of his kiss and the brandy has left me feeling more responsive than I’ve been in a long time, I force myself to pull away, pressing my face into his neck until I can catch my breath. When I raise my head, I say in a hoarse voice, “I can’t tonight. I need to sort some things out first. When—or if—I stay with you, I’d want it to be for good.”

  “Mmm. I like that you said ‘when’ before ‘if.’”

  “You’ve been my buddy for so long that it’s difficult to put you in another context. I guess I need some time to readjust my thinking. After having so much of your champagne and cognac, I’m feeling so woozy that I don’t trust myself.”