Love and Other Lies

by Ben McPherson

  “Seventeen years married,” I said.

  I took a swig, felt the citrus and the salt as the alcohol warmed me, though the day already was hot.

  “Seventeen years.” She knocked her glass hard against mine, drained it half down.

  She was looking at me matter-of-factly. The emptiness was gone.

  “What?” I said.

  “He will arrive three minutes early, because he always does. Which means we have eighteen minutes.” She must have seen me looking in through the door, toward Franklin, because she said, “Franklin is asleep, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, then . . .” She reached over, let her hand trail in my lap.

  Still that directness about appetites that stops me short.

  What is this? I wanted to say. What are you doing? But I let her guide me to my feet and into the bedroom.

  “Wait here,” she said. She crossed to her side of the bed. She turned toward me, raised her arms above her head, let her dress slip to the floor. She looked at me as I looked at her, half-naked, matter-of-fact. And that smile, and the certainty of it, and despite myself I found myself smiling back at her.

  “Now you,” she said.

  I heard you return home, I wanted to say. The clock said four.

  Instead I undressed and lay down on the bed while she stood in her Calvin Klein underwear, looking down at me.

  Where were you, Elsa?

  And still I could feel desire gnawing at me. Her smile, her eyes drinking me in. The jut of her lips. The tilt of her thigh. The sheer confidence she had in her body, unlike any other woman I’d known. Her pride in the gentle curve of her belly. She turned. I watched as she walked through the door past Franklin and into the bathroom. I heard the taps run.

  From the terrace I heard voices. Neighbors. Elsa wouldn’t care that the door was open. I did. I got to my feet, padded naked out onto the terrace, fetched the drinks, and closed the door. I returned to our room, put a glass on each nightstand, lay with my head against the headboard.

  When Elsa came in, she was naked too.

  I heard you, I wanted to say, when you came home this morning at four. When I felt you roll in beside me I looked at the clock. But she had been up at seven with the baby as if nothing were wrong, and I knew that if I asked her she would laugh it away.

  It’s what we do here, Cal.

  And oh, her lips, her breasts, her tilted thigh.

  “Venus,” I said.

  She looked down at me, amused, cupped her left hand across her pubis and her right across her breasts.

  “Swollen Venus,” she said.

  “Venus Venus,” I said. “Now and forever.”

  She sat down on the bed beside me. She looked at me, ran her hand along my jaw. “Why are you so sweet to me, Cal?”

  “Take the compliment,” I said.

  She shook her head. “But thank you. I appreciate the thought.” For a moment she looked vulnerable and small. I wondered if I had misread her.

  Your confidence, Elsa . . .

  Then there it was; her smile returned. She ran her hand down my thigh. “Also,” she said, “how can you possibly be so hard?” And when we kissed it felt as if she meant it, for the first time in months. She held me close, pushed her tongue deep into my mouth. I ran my hand down her back, let it rest, flat, at the base of her spine. She bit my lip and I pushed her forward and onto me.

  The doorbell. A two-tone chime.

  I pulled away. “Fuck,” I said.

  “Fuck,” said Elsa.

  The doorbell rang a second time.

  Two

  “You’re going to have to answer,” I said. “I am going to have to shower.”

  “Okay,” she said, getting up. She turned. “Although, actually, why?”

  I got off the bed, threw on my dressing gown, began to walk toward the bathroom. “Because I am not answering the door to your father in this state.”

  “Okay, that is not an image that I want in my mind.”

  “Or your father’s.”

  “You made your point.” She bent down, picked up her dress, pulled it easily over her head and down, smoothed it around her thighs. “Go take your shower, Cal.”

  I showered my erection away, braced, swearing as icy needles of water bombarded my shoulders, cascaded down my chest, and on to my groin. I took shampoo from the bottle, lathered it into my hair, then stepped forward so that my head was fully under. I counted to thirty through gritted teeth, then reached out and turned off the tap.

  In the bedroom I pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of shorts. Elsa and her father were next door in the living room, their voices hushed. Odd. You could barely hear them, but it was enough to put me on edge. Elsa’s pitch was wrong, as if her voice had slipped out of tune.

  My phone chimed. A text message on the lock screen, from a number unknown.

  CELEBRATE

  Cheers, I thought. Whoever you are. There was an attachment. A video. I turned the phone on the side so it filled the screen, pressed play. A screenful of black.

  I deleted it.

  I found a pair of black trousers in the drawer of the wardrobe and pulled them on, then went to join my wife in the living room.

  “Hey, Cal,” said Henrik.

  “Henrik, hey.”

  The television was on, though neither of them was looking at it. On the screen a building, indistinct in the smoke.

  Henrik watched me as I crossed the floor to greet him. A strong jaw; his daughter’s eyes, like a waiting animal, patient and appraising, all senses firing. He drew me toward him, hugged me solemnly, then looked questioningly at Elsa.

  “What is it?” I said.

  “There’s been an explosion in town,” said Elsa.

  “A big one,” said Henrik.

  I looked at Elsa. Elsa nodded.

  “Viktoria is all right,” said Henrik very quietly. “Frightened, but all right. I spoke to her from the car. Said that Cal, you would collect her. The next train leaves in eleven minutes, so you will leave in five.”

  I looked at Elsa. Elsa nodded.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Licia, I could not reach,” said Henrik. “Though I did try. Several times. And of course your telephones are switched off.” He stepped forward again, held me by the shoulders. “You have no landline, Cal.” There was a critical edge to his smile.

  I looked at Elsa. She looked back at me. She had her phone in her right hand, my phone in her left. She was turning her phone over and over, her fingers fluid and nimble, though her eyes remained fixed on my face. I smiled. Are you okay, love?

  Elsa nodded at me. She blamed herself for switching off. I could see it.

  I turned to Henrik. “I mean, we decided we didn’t necessarily need—”

  He cut me off. “Licia’s telephone rings, but she does not answer her telephone.”

  “She’s at summer camp,” said Elsa. “So she’s miles away.”

  Henrik made to speak.

  “What, Dad?” said Elsa.

  He turned to me, smiled. “I mean, this explosion . . . probably nothing—right, Cal?”

  Elsa switched her phone out of airplane mode and dialed Vee’s number.

  The explosion didn’t look like nothing. On-screen the town hall stood shrouded in smoke. Papers swirled in the breeze, though outside our apartment the air was still.

  In his windowless room off our bedroom little Franklin, tiny Franklin, slept his own restless sleep. Elsa stood on the threshold, watched the stuttering rise and fall of his chest through the bars of his wooden crib.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey.”

  We had brought the crib with us from D.C. The first piece of furniture we had bought. Both girls had slept in it. Now it was Franklin’s turn.

  “Hey.” I stood behind Elsa, wrapped my arms across her chest.

  She said, “Oh man, the way my dad says probably nothing, like it’s the end of the fucking world.”

  “He tried to apologize,” I
said.

  “And I have no idea what conversation he had with Vee, but you can bet he was happy to leave her thinking this was a major terrorist event. Even Franklin looks stressed to me. And I don’t think I can blame my father for that.”

  She was right. Something had left Franklin fearful and tense. His tiny fists clenched and unclenched, his elbows tight at his side.

  Elsa leaned gently over Franklin, slipped a hand behind his back and another behind his neck, drew him up and in to her breast as she quietly roused him from sleep.

  “Sweet child,” she said. “My sweet, sweet baby.”

  Franklin clung to her gratefully, chuttering and fretting at her, anxious for milk, for comfort, for love.

  “Do we need to worry that we can’t reach Licia?” I said.

  “Licia will be fine,” said Elsa. “She’s safe on her island.”

  I took the path toward the station.

  At a few minutes after eight that morning Elsa and I had followed Licia down this same path, until Licia turned, and laughed, and asked us please to stop. We had stood there, Elsa and I, smiling at our daughter as she smiled back at us. Her kingfisher dress shimmered brilliant in the sunlight: every imaginable green and blue.

  “What?” she said, almost shyly.

  World at your feet, I thought.

  Elsa held out her hand. “Here.”

  Licia stepped forward. Around her wrist Elsa placed a heavy silver bangle with a large embossed dragonfly. Licia held up her wrist, turning the bangle before her eyes.

  “The first piece of jewelry your dad gave me.”

  “I know,” said Licia, looking from Elsa to me. “Mum, I can’t.”

  “Love,” I said, “we want you to have it.”

  “Thanks, Dad. Thanks, Mum.”

  Still strange after all these years to hear her say Mum—never Mom, always Mum—the only trace of Britain she and Vee carried with them when they spoke.

  “Go and have fun, love.”

  Something very adult about the look Licia gave me as she tightened the straps on her backpack and turned away. We watched her all the way to the station, holding hands, our hearts full of pride. As she reached the steps down to the platforms I saw her wave to another girl, who approached her and hugged her. I saw Licia hold out her wrist, and I saw how the bracelet glinted and the kingfisher dress shone.

  Our daughter, all shrouded in sunlight.

  The train I took into town was half-empty. By the doors sat a woman in a headscarf, talking animatedly into a telephone in a language I did not understand. When she ended the call I made a point of smiling at her. The woman smiled cautiously back.

  Footsteps echoed around me at the National Theater station. A crowd flowing into town, toward the center of whatever it was that had happened. All heading toward their loved ones. Faces of every kind, all set in the same expression: stoical, impassive, determined.

  At the side of the royal park a man stood shouting. His face was bloodied, his clothes torn. At his side a woman stood, a phone by her ear, trying to summon help, listening for an answer on the line that did not come.

  Three

  Light blazed through the stained glass on the stairwell. After the clamor of the streets the stillness of the building felt wrong. There was a grandeur here, a wastefulness both beautiful and intimidating. Painted angels looked down on me from the plasterwork.

  I rang the doorbell. From the wooden floors inside the apartment I heard footsteps. A gap between the door and the threshold. I heard my breath too, panting and heaving, though I was only three flights up. My nerves. The windows were out all along the street. There were glass fragments under the soles of my shoes.

  The door swung open.

  “Hi,” I said. Because I couldn’t remember her name. Julie’s mom.

  “Hello,” said Julie’s mom. Immaculate in three-inch heels and a two-piece suit, her asymmetric bob artfully mussed. In her left hand was Vee’s gaming headset.

  “Cal,” I said.

  Julie’s mom smiled coolly, offered her right hand.

  “Nora. Did we meet already?”

  “We did.”

  Her eyes would not fix on my face; there was something unsteady about her stance.

  Behind her stood Vee, lit up with nervy energy, shoes in one hand.

  Relief flooded my veins. “My little girl.”

  “Hey, Dad.”

  Julie’s mom passed the gaming headset to Vee.

  Vee hunched her shoulders as she stepped across the threshold onto the tiles outside the apartment, bending away from me. And when I reached down to hold her she slipped from me and headed down the stairs in her socks.

  “’Bye,” she said without looking back. “Thank you so very much for having me.”

  “Vee,” I said. “Your shoes.”

  “I’ll put them on downstairs.”

  “Now, please, Vee.”

  Julie’s mom put a hand on my arm.

  “Your daughter is a brave girl. A bomb goes off and she does not lose her head.”

  “If we can be certain it was a bomb.”

  “Did you not see the glass in the street?” The look she gave me told me she was in no doubt.

  “Proud of you, honey,” I called after Vee, who ignored me and continued on down.

  “Hey,” I said. “Wait.”

  Vee didn’t turn around.

  “Have a safe day,” I said.

  “You too,” said Nora Gundersen as she closed and locked the door.

  Vee heard my footsteps behind her, quickened her pace. When I got to the lobby she was standing there, hunched and shaking, trying to fix the laces on her sneakers.

  “Hey, Vee. Vee. It’s all right. It’s okay.” I tried to take her in my arms. “My love,” I said. “You’re safe. You’re safe, okay?”

  She shook me off. “Who are they trying to kill, Dad?”

  “We don’t know that anyone is trying to kill anyone, Vee.”

  “It was a bomb,” she said, her voice soft and matter-of-fact.

  “It was certainly an explosion.”

  “It was a bomb.”

  “If your plaits weren’t screwed down so tight I would ruffle your hair.”

  “Just don’t, Dad.”

  I could feel the resentment dripping from her. I was speaking to her as to a child.

  “Okay,” I said. “Sorry.”

  “You never listen. You . . . you impose your version of what happened.”

  I could see that she meant it. “I’m listening now. I promise. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  We sat side by side on the third step, looking out. The building was cool in the summer heat: old and grand, and nothing like ours. The world beyond looked peaceful. You couldn’t see the glass fragments that littered the street outside.

  “Okay, so, there are two beds in Julie’s room. And I was sitting on the spare bed, and Julie was sitting on her bed, and there’s just this flash. I mean, it was bright. Julie was just a silhouette. It was so weird. And then the window fell away.”

  “It fell away?”

  “It was like it bent inward first. You’d swear it bent inward. And I kept thinking it was going to shatter, and we’d be stumbling bleeding into the street. It was like I could see that. And then there’s this moment where Julie’s looking at me, and I’m looking at Julie, and she reaches across and takes my hand. And at the same moment the window was sucked out. The whole pane, and the wood and everything just kind of pivoted on the lower edge and fell away. And there’s just this really creepy silence . . .

  “It felt like the birds stopped singing. And then you heard this huge roar. Like the end of the world. And we both turned over on the beds and put our hands over the backs of our heads. We knew what to do. Which is also weird. And then finally you hear the glass shattering in the street. And we just lay there facedown on the beds until Julie’s mom came to get us.”

  I reached out, pulled her gently toward me.

  “Mum’s going to say
I’m dramatizing.”

  “She won’t.”

  Then Vee wrapped her arms very tightly around me, and I wiped the tears from her face and told her everything was going to be okay, and this time she allowed me to comfort her.

  The streets had emptied. At the sound of rotors Vee stopped and looked up. A news helicopter. It made a lazy sweep toward the palace, then tipped and headed toward town.

  “Dad,” she said, “about Licia . . .”

  In my pocket my phone was vibrating against my thigh. Vee made to speak.

  “I’m sorry, love. I think this could be important.”

  “But Dad—”

  I raised the phone to my ear.

  “This is Lori from WXWD in Washington, D.C.” A pleasant American singsong. “Am I speaking with Cal Curtis? Dan said now might a good moment to bring your eyewitness testimony to our listeners.”

  “Tell Dan I’m collecting my daughter. Could we speak in half an hour?”

  “Sure. Speak then.”

  I hung up.

  Vee looked at me, reproachful. “What?”

  “Your Uncle Dan wants me to talk about what people are feeling after the explosion.”

  “What are they feeling, then?”

  I laughed. “Maybe it would be better if you did the piece. You have a headset and everything.”

  For a moment Vee laughed too. Then she stopped, became serious.

  “Dad, who’s collecting Licia?”

  “Licia’s safe on her island,” I said.

  The glass was sand beneath our shoes. We heard sirens, though we saw no police. The few people we did see floated past, empty-eyed, or stood on corners, watching the clouds of smoke and brick dust as they rolled and turned in the Midsummer air.

  I stood on the subway platform, Vee’s headset covering my ears, the cable attached to my phone. In front of us was the empty carriage, lights on, doors open. Even down here the air was filled with dust.

  “Dad,” mouthed Vee.

  I lifted the earpad from my right ear. “What, love?”

  “Is it true you can breathe in bits of people and not know it?”

  From my left ear I could hear the station assistant’s voice. “This is Lori. Am I speaking with Cal Curtis again?”