Loving (1981)

by Steel, Danielle

  But she shook her head again. "No. My parents are dead, and ... there's no one." Ivo didn't count anymore. For her, he was gone too.

  "Tell me the truth now, and I mean it, just between us, was that why you did it? Last night?" She looked at him and for an instant, just an instant, she knew that she could trust him, but she only shrugged.

  "I don't know. I started thinking ... about my--my husband ... some other mistakes I've made ... the baby ... I got nervous ... I took some aspirin, I went for a walk ... all of a sudden it was like everything was closing in on me. But I've felt peculiar ever since I lost the baby, like I can't get my motors going anymore. It's as if I don't care about anything, as if nothing matters ... and ... I--" Suddenly she was looking at him and crying. 'If I hadn't--if I hadn't gone on the road with that show, I wouldn't have lost it, I wouldn't ... I felt so guilty ... I...." She was suddenly telling him things she hadn't even known that she felt, and unconsciously she had reached out to him, and he soothed her, holding her gently in his white-coated arms.

  "It's all right Bettina ... it's all right. It's normal for you to feel like that. But I'm sure they told you that no matter what you'd have done, you'd probably have lost the baby. Some babies are just not meant to be born."

  "But what if this one was? Then, I killed it." She looked at him miserably and he shook his head.

  "When a baby is all right, you can do almost anything, ski, fall down the stairs, you can do just about anything and you won't lose it. Believe me, if you lost it, it wasn't right."

  She lay back slowly in bed and watched him with troubled eyes. "Thank you." And then with a look of sudden worry, "Will you make me see a lot of shrinks now? Are you going to lock me up with the crazies because I told you about last night?' But he smiled at her and shook his head.

  "No, I'm not. But I'd like to have you looked at by one of our gynecologists just to make sure that everything's okay, and then I'm going to ask you to stay here for a few days. Just so you can catch your breath, get on your feet, get some rest, and take some of those sleeping pills, if you need them, under our supervision, not your own. But what you're going through is normal. It's just that usually a woman has a husband or a family to turn to with this kind of anguish. It's very hard to handle this alone." She nodded slowly. He seemed to understand.

  "And I'd like it if we could talk some more." He said it very gently, with a small smile. "Would you mind that very much?"

  She shook her head slowly. "No. What kind of doctor are you, by the way?" Maybe he was a shrink after all. Maybe she was being tricked.

  "An internist. If you're going to stay in the city, you're going to need one of those too. And maybe right now, while you're settling down here, you could use a friend." He smiled at her then and held out a hand. "I'm John Fields, Bettina." She shook his hand firmly, and then he looked at her again. "And by the way, how did you come by so many names?"

  She grinned at him then. If he was going to be her doctor and her friend, he might as well know the truth. "Pearce is my most recent married name; Daniels is my maiden name, which actually I suppose I'll take back now; and Stewart was"--she hesitated for only a fraction of an instant--"my first married name. I've been married once before."

  "And how old did you say you were?" He was still smiling as he walked to the door.

  "Twenty-six."

  "Not bad, Bettina, not bad." He saluted and prepared to leave, and then for a moment he stopped and looked at her. "I think you're going to be just fine." He waved then, and as he left he smiled at her in a way that told her everything just had to be okay.

  Chapter 25

  "And how are you today, Bettina?" John Fields walked into her hospital room with a smile.

  "Fine." She returned the smile. "Better. Much better." She had slept like a baby the night before, without the nightmares, the ghosts of old faces, without even a sleeping pill. She had put her head down on the pillow and fallen asleep. Life in the hospital was wonderfully simple. There were mommies and daddies in white uniforms who were there to take care of you, to keep all the bad dreams and bad people away, so you could relax. She hadn't felt this peaceful in a year. And as she thought it she looked up at the attractive young doctor sheepishly. "I shouldn't say it, but I wish I didn't have to leave."

  "Why is that?" For only an instant a trace of worry crossed his smile. He had taken a lot on his shoulders, not bringing a psychiatrist in on the case. But he didn't really feel that she had deep-seated problems.

  She was looking at him now with that childlike smile of hers and those devastating green eyes, which seemed to dance. She certainly didn't look like a crazy, but nevertheless he was going to keep an eye on her after she left.

  She lay back again against her pillows, with a little sigh and a smile. "Why don't I want to leave here, Doctor? Oh, because"--the eyes drifted toward him--"because it's so easy and so simple. I don't have to look for an apartment, find a job, worry about money, go to the grocery store, cook for myself. I don't have to find a lawyer." She looked at him, smiling again. "I don't even have to wear makeup and get dressed." But she had bathed for half an hour and there was a white satin ribbon in the long auburn hair. He looked at her and returned her smile. She looked pretty and young and as though life were terribly simple; she looked more like twelve years old than twenty-six.

  "I think you've just given me all the reasons why some people stay in mental institutions for years, or even all of their lives, Bettina." And then more quietly, "Is that what you have in mind for yourself? Is it really all that much trouble to get dressed or to go to the store?"

  She was suddenly startled by what he had just told her, and she shook her head. "No ... no, of course not." And then she felt she had to explain to him. Just so he wouldn't really think her crazy after all. "I--I've been"--she looked for the right words as she watched him--"I've been under a lot of pressure for a long time." Jesus. Then maybe she did have a major problem. He wondered as he watched her, wondering also if he should send her home.

  "What kind of pressure?" Quietly he pulled up a chair.

  "Well"--she stared down at her hands for a long time--"I've been running houses, servants, kind of elaborate households for a lot of years." She looked up with a small smile. "Two husbands and a father have kept me busy for about the last fifteen years."

  "Fifteen? What about your mother?" His eyes never left her face.

  "She died of leukemia when I was four."

  "And your father never remarried?"

  "Of course not." And more softly, "He didn't have to. He had me."

  The doctor's eyes grew suddenly wide in horror, and she quickly shook her head and put up a hand. "No, no, not like that. People like my father marry for all kinds of reasons, the convenience, someone to talk to or advise them, someone to keep them company when they're on tour, or to run interference for them while they're writing a book. I did all that for him."

  He watched her, suddenly fascinated by something in her face. She seemed oddly knowing and much older as she spoke of it, and she also looked more beautiful than any woman he had ever seen.

  She was nodding slowly. "I think most people marry for convenience and to combat loneliness."

  "Is that why you married?"

  "Partly." And then she smiled and lay her head back on her pillows with her eyes briefly closed. "And I also fell very much in love."

  "With whom?" His voice was barely more than a whisper in the small room.

  "A man named Ivo Stewart." She continued to talk to the ceiling, and then she looked back at him. "I don't know if it makes any difference, but he was the publisher of the New York Mail for years. He retired a little more than a year ago."

  "And you married him?" The young doctor looked more surprised than impressed. "How did you meet him?" He still couldn't place her, couldn't understand her. He knew she had been with a theatrical road show. Yet there was something still more worldly, more regal about her bearing, and how did a little girl with a road show come to be ma
rried to the publisher of the New York Mail? Or was she lying? Was she really crazy? Maybe he should have checked on her further. Who was this girl?

  But Bettina was smiling at him now. "Maybe I should go back to the beginning. Have you ever heard of Justin Daniels?" It was a stupid question. Even she knew that.

  "The author?" She nodded.

  "He was my father."

  Then she gave him the unabridged version of her life, sparing no details. She really needed to talk it out.

  And when she was finished with all the details, the hopes, the dreams, he said, "And now what, Bettina?"

  She looked him square in the eye. "Who knows? I guess I start fresh." But she still felt as though she had a load of bags on her back from years gone by. It was a heavy burden with which to travel into a new life, and even telling him hadn't really lessened the pain.

  "Why did you choose San Francisco?"

  "I don't know. It was a spur of the moment inspiration. I just remembered it as being very pretty and I don't know anybody here."

  "Didn't that frighten you?"

  She smiled at him. "A little. But by this time that was a relief. Sometimes it's nice to be anonymous, to go where you aren't known. I can start over here. I can just be Bettina Daniels and find out who she is."

  He looked at her seriously. "At least you can forget who she was."

  Suddenly she looked at him and knew he didn't understand. "That's not the point really. I've been several different people, but all of them meant something. All of them had a reason. In their own way each of those people was right at the time. Except maybe this last time--that was a mistake. But my life with my father--" She hesitated, looking for the right words. "That was an extraordinary experience. I would never give that up for anything else."

  But John was shaking his head. "You've never had a normal moment in your life. No parents to love you, no simple home, no kids to bring home from school, no marriage to a boy you met in college, just a lot of nightmares, and odd, eccentric people, and show business, and old men."

  "You make it sound so sordid." It made her sad to listen to him. Was that how it would sound to people now? Ugly and freakish? Was that what she was? She felt tears well up inside her and she had to fight them back.

  And then suddenly he felt horrified at himself. What was he doing? She was his patient and he was badgering her. He looked at Bettina with guilt and horror in his eyes and reached out to touch her hand. "I'm sorry, I--I had no right to do that. I don't know how to explain it to you though. It frightens me when I hear all that. It upsets me that you had to go through it. I'm worried about what will happen to you now."

  She looked at him oddly, the hurt still fresh in her eyes. "Thank you. But it doesn't matter. You have a right to say what you think. As you said in the beginning, if I'm going to settle down here, I'm going to need more than just a doctor, I'm going to need a friend." It was time she got out and discovered how the rest of the world lived, the "normal people," as John would have said.

  "I hope so. I'm really sorry. It's just that you have had a very, very hard life. And you have a right to much better now."

  "By the way, where are you from?"

  "Here. San Francisco. I've lived here all my life. Grew up here, went to college at Stanford. Med school there too. It's all been very unexciting--peaceful and normal. And when you ask me what I think you have a right to, when I say that you have a right to better than you've had, I mean a nice, decent, wholesome husband, who's not four or five times your age, a couple of kids, a decent house."

  She looked at him with hostility for a moment. Why wouldn't he understand that some of that life had been beautiful, and whatever it had been, it was part of her?

  He read something in her eyes. "You're not planning to get a job in the theater again, are you?"

  Slowly she shook her head, holding his eyes with a firm look of her own. "No. I was planning to start working on my play."

  But he shook his head. "Bettina, why don't you get yourself a regular job? Something simple. Maybe something secretarial, or a nice job in a museum, or something in real estate maybe that lets you see nice, wholesome, happy people. And before you know it, you'll have your life back on the right track."

  She had never thought of being a secretary or a real estate agent before. It wasn't really her cup of tea. The literary and theatrical worlds were all she knew. But maybe he was right. Maybe it was all too crazy. Maybe she had to get away from all that. And then she remembered something else.

  "Before I do that, do you have the name of a good lawyer?"

  "Sure." He smiled at her and pulled a pen out of his pocket. "One of my best friends. Seth Waterston. You'll like him a lot. And his wife is a nurse. We all went to school together as undergraduates at Stanford."

  "How wholesome." She was teasing but he didn't laugh.

  "Don't knock it till you've tried it." And then hesitantly he tilted his head. He paused for a long time as he considered, not sure if it was the right thing to do. But something was pushing him to do it. He had to. For her. "As a matter of fact, Bettina--" He seemed to hesitate for a long time as Bettina watched. "I want to suggest something to you that may not be entirely ethical, but it might do you some good."

  "It sounds fascinating. What is it?"

  "I'd Mice to take you to dinner with Seth and Mary Waterston. How does that sound?"

  "Delightful. And why is that unethical? You said you were also my friend."

  He smiled slowly then, and she smiled in answer. "Is it a date, then?" She nodded. "Then I'll call them and I'll let you know before you leave when they can make it."

  "By the way, when am I leaving?" They had both forgotten as she told him her life story.

  "How about today?" She thought briefly of the hotel to which she would have to return. It was not a very cheerful thought. It was the place where she had stayed with Anthony and suddenly she didn't want to go back there. "Something wrong?"

  But she shook her head briskly. "No. Nothing at all." She had to work it out for herself. And he was right. What she needed was a normal life, a simple job. She could wait another six months to start her play. All she needed now was an apartment, a job, and a divorce. She'd work out the first two and hopefully John's friend would help her with the last one. Now she understood she was divorcing more than just a person this time. John helped her see that. She had to divorce a whole life.

  Chapter 26

  Five days later Bettina had her own apartment, a tiny but quaint studio overlooking the bay. It had previously been the main parlor in a lovely Victorian owned by three men. They had fixed up the two top floors for themselves and had divided the bottom floor into two studio apartments, which they rented out. Bettina got the larger one, and it was a beauty. It had a fireplace, two huge French windows, a tiny balcony, a kitchenette, a bathroom, and a devastatingly beautiful view. She was enchanted when she first saw it, and the miracle of it was that it was something even she could afford. The rent was so low that she could have managed just on her monthly money from Ivo, which she would have, no matter what, for the coming years.

  Two days after she found her apartment John Fields arrived to take her to dinner with his lawyer friend and his wife.

  "Bettina, you're going to love them."

  "I'm sure I will. But you haven't told me. How do you like my place?" She looked at him as they left her apartment. He had commented only on the view. But now he looked at her squarely as he opened his car door. He drove a small American compact, in a subdued navy blue. There was nothing flashy or ostentatious about his clothes, his car, or his person. Everything was attractive, but quiet, like the tweed jacket he wore, the button-down shirt, the gray slacks, the well-polished loafers. In fact it was oddly comforting. He was predictable, in his style and taste. He looked like every good American ought to, he was every mother's dream of the perfect son. Handsome, bright, attractive, well-mannered, a graduate of Stanford, a doctor. Bettina smiled at him. He was really a damn good-looking m
an. She felt suddenly awkward in his presence. As though everything she had on was too expensive, too showy. Maybe he was right. She did have a lot to learn. "Well, what about my apartment, Doctor? Isn't that some find?"

  He nodded slowly with a smile. "It is and I like it. But it still has the look of 'Milady's Manor.' I kept waiting for you to tell me you'd rented the whole house."

  He smiled to soften his words as he helped her into the car. The door slammed shut, and she wondered if she'd worn the wrong dress. She was wearing a white wool that she and Ivo had bought in Paris. It wasn't dressy, but it was easy to see that it was expensively made. It was a simple dress with long sleeves and a small collar, and she had worn it with a single strand of pearls and black kid Dior shoes. But when she reached the Waterstons' house in Marin County, she knew that she had made a faux pas again.

  Mary Waterston came to the door, smiling broadly, her hair swept up on the back of her head with a leather thong. She was wearing a button-down shirt, a green V-neck sweater, bare feet, and jeans. And Seth arrived in almost the same costume. Even John looked overdressed, but he had come from the office. Bettina didn't have that excuse. She shook their hands with a faint look of embarrassment, but they were quick to put her at ease. Seth was a tall, handsome, sandy-haired man with a cowlick, a look of surprise, and seemingly endless legs. Mary was small, dark-haired, and pretty in spite of horn-rimmed glasses, and she was almost as thin as Bettina except that she had a somewhat noticeable paunch. A little while later she saw Bettina glance at her bulging midriff and she grinned.

  "I know, isn't it awful? I hate this stage, everyone just thinks you're fat." She patted it fondly, and then explained. "Number two on the way. The first one is asleep upstairs."

  "Is she?" John had just joined them, the two men had been outside for a moment and had just returned. "I had hoped we would see her." He looked warm and kind as he said it, and for an odd moment Bettina felt something pull at her heart. Why hadn't she ever had a man who felt that way about children? It had been a closed door with Ivo. And Anthony had hated the baby from the start. For a moment she felt a terrible flash of pain as she looked at Mary. Only a few weeks before she had been about as pregnant as that.