The Comfort of Lies: A Novel

by Randy Susan Meyers

  What are you going to say, Nathan?

  “When Mom was little, Easter was hard for her. Now I think I’ve made it just as bad.” It sounded like Nathan was patting the door, as though it were her back. “Come on, give her some privacy.”

  They walked away, and Juliette hated Nathan more than ever. If he knew her so well, why didn’t he come through for her more? Why couldn’t he always be like that?

  Why had he ever gone to that woman?

  • • •

  Juliette removed a load of hot towels from the dryer, wishing she could make a nest of the warm cotton and lie down. Tuesdays were quiet at the shop. She’d come in early that morning, eager to get away from Nathan and her pounding questions.

  A key turned in the front door. Gwynne’s light footsteps came toward Juliette.

  “What are you doing?” Gwynne asked.

  “Folding towels?”

  “Isn’t Helen coming in?”

  Helen was their cleaner, towel folder, and official moaner. They tried to placate her with gifts. (Look, Helen, freesia perfume to mask the smell of disappointment! Poppy-red lipstick to smear on your wrinkled lips!) She made everyone miserable, but neither Gwynne nor Juliette had the guts to fire her.

  “She’s cleaning the bathrooms.” Juliette raised her eyebrows at Gwynne.

  “Which means you have to fold?”

  “I had to go somewhere I wouldn’t hear her muttering ‘Pigs, pigs, they’re all pigs.’ ”

  Gwynne looked at her with skeptical eyes.

  “Okay, I needed to do something mindless,” Juliette admitted.

  “What’s wrong? You’ve been in a funk for weeks.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You are so obviously not fine that I feel as though I should be pouring you tea laced with brandy.”

  “Really. It’s nothing,” Juliette insisted.

  All that “nothing” burned at her throat as she worked to keep it from bubbling out and scalding everything in the beautiful shop. If she didn’t, she might unleash a torrent of “Life sucks!” all over Helen’s clean floors.

  “You know what they say. Crying gets the sad out of you.” Gwynne’s light words didn’t hide her concern.

  “And what gets the Nathan blues out of you?” Juliette asked.

  “What’s he done now?” Gwynne knew about the affair with Tia. If Juliette hadn’t shared it, she’d have exploded like the blueberry girl in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, except instead of bursting from eating too much candy, bullshit would have blown Juliette apart.

  She buried her face in a towel. Too late. It had already cooled off, and now it had to be washed again for no good reason. Here she was, adding to Helen’s reasons to hate Americans.

  Gwynne took the towel from Juliette’s hand and dumped it in the laundry bin. “Stop. It looks as though you’re veiling yourself, covering your mouth like that.”

  Juliette flapped her eyelashes, but tears still leaked out.

  “Is he seeing someone again?” Gwynne asked.

  “I don’t think so.” She retrieved the towel Gwynne had thrown in the basket and wiped her eyes.

  Gwynne fell on the cushy couch and patted the seat next to her. It wasn’t elegant, this back room where they had the washer-dryer, old magazines, employee lockers, and tables piled with the cosmetic samples that flew into the store. Old chairs and frayed pillows ended their lives in this room where no one bothered sucking in her stomach.

  “He has a daughter.”

  “He has a daughter,” Gwynne repeated.

  “Nathan has a little girl. She’s five.” Juliette leaned back, pushing her hair off her face. She’d released the secret. Made it real. Savannah, Honor, Tia’s baby, Caroline’s child, Nathan’s daughter, no longer lived only in her mind, and now she had to deal with her.

  • • •

  Juliette tried to be friendly at dinner, for Lucas, for Max, and for her plan. She’d worked with Gwynne to craft a strategy for talking to Nathan. She’d be calm. Easygoing. Give him room to have his feelings and reactions before she had her say.

  Otherwise, she’d screech. He’d retreat. That would be useless.

  What was more frightening in a marriage than the moments you caught your husband looking at you with dispassionate eyes, when he revealed that he didn’t like you very much in that moment? So Juliette didn’t slam the Swedish meatballs on the table. She slid them.

  “Meatballs?” Max hummed in anticipation, imagining the rare treat of real beef.

  “Don’t be a dope. They’re turkey balls, right, Mom?” Lucas stabbed one on his fork.

  “Wait until everything’s served.” Parmesan cheese formed a perfect fat S for Soros on the platter of spaghetti she’d placed on a copper trivet. “And the meatballs aren’t turkey.”

  “Real meat? Hey, thanks for the miracle.” Lucas spread the cheesy S over the pasta. Juliette wondered if a daughter would at least comment on Juliette’s food art before smearing it like that.

  “Do you really think you can taste the difference?” Juliette asked.

  Lucas paused before biting his meatball. “So it isn’t meat?”

  Max chomped down on his. “Whatever it is, it’s good.”

  “You’d think crap balls were good if Mom put cheese and bread crumbs in them.”

  “Lucas, language,” Nathan said.

  “Maybe they’re soybean balls,” Juliette suggested.

  Lucas took a suspicious sniff. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Taste it,” Juliette said. “See if you like it. Then I’ll tell you.”

  Nathan swirled a forkful of spaghetti and then tipped it with a quarter meatball. “It’s beef,” he said after chewing. “Coleman beef.”

  “Come on, Dad. How could you tell what kind of beef it is?” As usual, Lucas sprinkled salt over his plate before tasting anything.

  “Because your mother wouldn’t serve any other kind. She loves me too much not to give me natural free-range beef,” Nathan said.

  “Don’t you mean she loves us too much?” Max asked. “All of us.”

  “Sure, she loves us all.” Nathan gave Juliette a lazy smile and winked. “But she loved me first.”

  Juliette poured herself a generous glass of Cabernet.

  Surely Nathan noticed. Juliette rarely drank.

  • • •

  Why not forget about it?

  She watched Nathan remove his shirt. Crinkly hair covered his chest, some sprouted on his back. Ugly, except not to her. Nathan’s back endeared him to Juliette. It was the part of him that he couldn’t see, so she felt as though it were hers.

  Before Juliette could fall further into her sentimental admiration of Nathan’s body, jealousy rushed in to replace her pleasure. Tia had seen his back.

  Why did men cheat? That song kept playing. The thought of listening to it forever terrified her.

  Gwynne theorized that Nathan’s mother and father doted on him too much. “You know,” she’d said, “the precious only child of immigrants. First they raise him to do well in the world—constantly assuring him that he’s brilliant! So handsome! One of a kind! Then he makes it, and they’re all: ‘Oh, Nathan! A professor! So brilliant! Your children! So handsome! Your wife! One of a kind!’ ”

  Who could live up to that? Was Juliette supposed to constantly assure a husband who belched and scratched and trailed dirty coffee cups that he was God’s particular gift to the world and to her?

  Still, Juliette worried that the affair was her fault. She’d become boring: talking about moisturizers and makeovers instead of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Maybe she’d become a sexual robot, always following the tracks she and Nathan had laid down early on: touch this, stroke that, rub this.

  Nathan pulled on his robe.

  “What reason did I give you?” Her words sprayed out without care, lacking the coolness she’d planned. She fell back on the bed, picked up a pillow, and held it first over her face and then across her stomach.

  H
e turned to face her, his expression a mix of worry and puzzlement.

  “Reason for what?” he asked in a deliberate tone.

  “You know.” She threw down the pillow and brought her legs to her chest, circling them with her arms. “Her,” she said to her knees.

  Give Nathan credit. He didn’t pretend ignorance. He sat next to Juliette. “Her again? Her doesn’t exist anymore,” he said. “I’ve kept my word. I’ve never even been tempted.”

  She lifted her face just enough to look at the corners of his mouth where the lies showed first.

  Not lying.

  Big deal.

  Though, really, it was.

  But they had business to face. She didn’t want to. He touched her leg and she wanted to pull him down and make love in ways that weren’t routine, or were, but who cared, because the act would scrub everything out of her brain. She wanted to become stupid with sex.

  Well, la-di-fucking-da, Juliette. Tough luck that the past is toddling around somewhere on Max’s legs and wearing Nathan’s hair.

  “You have a daughter, Nathan.” His hand froze.

  “She’s five.”

  He drew his hand away.

  “Maybe you already knew, huh?” she asked. “Did you know about her?”

  “Did I know?”

  He was buying time. She saw the wheels turning.

  “Do you know about Honor?” Juliette asked.

  “Honor?” Now he sounded genuinely puzzled.

  Okay, so he didn’t know her stupid Tia name.

  “Savannah?” Juliette asked. “Do you know about Savannah?”

  “Savannah? Honor? Honestly, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You don’t know the names, or the topic?”

  “Neither,” he said.

  Now he was lying. His lips quivered that millimeter she knew.

  “Liar,” Juliette said. “I know.”

  “You know what?”

  She knew he wanted to jump out the window. “I know you knew that Tia was pregnant. I know that.”

  Of course, that woman used the baby as leverage to pressure him to leave Juliette. An obsessive stalker who sent Hallmark heart cards would do anything.

  Nathan moved away from her and slumped at the edge of the bed, holding his head in his hands.

  “What are you going to do?” Juliette asked.

  “Do? Do about what? I barely have a clue what you’re talking about. How do you even . . . ?”

  Juliette crossed her arms. “I opened the letter she sent you.”

  “What letter?” A bit of anger tinged his words. “A letter to me?”

  Screw you, Nathan. What, you have a privacy issue going on here?

  Juliette reached into the top drawer of her nightstand. The envelope looked as though she’d carried it through ten storms. “Here. Read it.”

  He slipped the letter and the photos from the envelope. He looked at the photos first. Was Nathan more curious about the child than he was about Tia, and if so, was that good or bad?

  He stared at the girl for long minutes. His daughter. Juliette knew he was trying to keep his face impassive; she could see his emotions, she just wasn’t sure what they added up to.

  He unfolded the letter. Juliette kneaded the bedspread, and then went to lean over his shoulder.

  When he’d had enough time to read it five hundred times, Juliette burst out, “What are you going to do?”

  “About what?”

  “About what?” Juliette jumped off the bed. “What do you feel? What do you feel about this child? About her?”

  “Juliette, I didn’t know about the child until I opened this. I haven’t spoken to . . . to her, since—”

  “Since when? Since you swore it was over? Since she told you she was pregnant?”

  Nathan remained silent.

  “Which is it? Which? Answer me!”

  He sank his head back into his hands.

  “Don’t play hangdog.”

  “Jules, give me a minute at least.”

  “It takes no time to tell the truth. You don’t need a minute. Talk.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t. Not yet. I need to absorb this.”

  “We have to plan everything together: how you’ll respond to Tia, to the news of Savannah, or it will drive us apart. Please, Nathan.”

  “Enough. You’re right, you’re right. But you’ve been thinking about this, obsessing about it—I just found out. Surely you can understand that?”

  She paced around the room, picking up a necklace lying on her dresser, putting it in her jewelry box, and then folding a towel from a basket of laundry in stiff, jerky movements. “Damn it, talk to me. Tell me what you’re thinking.”

  “Not yet.” He shook his head as though she barely registered. “I need to sort it out.”

  After squeezing the white towel until her hand ached, she threw it at him. “What are you feeling?” she shouted. “Do you feel like you have a daughter? Does this make you feel connected to Tia? What about Max and Lucas? Do we tell them?”

  He stood up and grabbed her shoulders. “Give me some time,” he said through gritted teeth. “I mean it. I can’t handle you like this. Not right now.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Caroline

  The San Diego Marriott lobby was nearly empty. Caroline glanced around, guilty as a kid cutting class. She’d tried to give off the air of a doctor called out to tend to a life-or-death situation as she’d slipped out the back of the lecture hall, but she just wanted to breathe fresh air and shake off her jet lag.

  “A New Paradigm for Considering the Ramifications of Treatments of Retinoblastoma” had given her a new paradigm for sleeping with her eyes open. The lecturers at the Future of Pediatrics conference obviously meant well—more than well. They were dedicated people willing to share their expertise. If they gave out caffeine tablets when you entered, then she could truly appreciate their paradigms.

  The hotel lobby opened to a wide concrete plaza. FedEx was to her right. Across the way was a row of small shops. Caroline turned left and was grateful for the sight of a Starbucks. Good. After spending an hour yawning, she craved caffeine.

  “Large coffee,” she said when she reached the front of the line.

  The barista looked at Caroline without hiding her boredom. “So you want a venti?” Why did this girl crayon her eyes so heavily? The thick green semicircles looked like a grotesque signpost announcing her foul attitude.

  Caroline looked up to the wall for help. Grande sounded larger, but what was venti? Tall sounded large also, but it was the name for small, right? Starbucks made her feel stupid. How was she supposed to keep their drink sizes straight? Was she supposed to learn Italian to drink coffee?

  She took a chance. “I think I meant grande.”

  Green-circle smirked. “That’s a medium. Is that what you want?”

  The man next in line tapped Caroline’s shoulder. “You want a large, right?”

  She nodded.

  “A venti for the lady and a tall iced latte for me. Skim milk, light ice, please.”

  “Thanks,” Caroline said. “I get lost here.” He appeared familiar, a weedy type with wire-rim glasses and an eager-puppy look.

  “My claim to fame,” he said. “I speak fluent Starbucks.” He put out his hand. “I snuck out of the lecture right after you.”

  As Caroline shook his hand, she realized she’d missed Green-circle’s demand for money. She held out a twenty.

  “Let me,” her new friend offered, his money already in the girl’s hand.

  “Thank you.” Caroline tucked the twenty back in her purse, knowing she’d just given him rights to something. Nothing big. But something.

  They sat inside—both Easterners afraid of the sun, as it turned out. Jonah—Dr. Jonah Weber—ran a private practice in Vermont. The Northeast Kingdom.

  “It sounds grand, doesn’t it?” he said. “The Northeast Kingdom.”

  “Is it?” Caroline sank deeper into the velvety
club chair, awash in good feeling. She’d escaped the lecture and was three thousand miles from the gilded cage to which she returned each night.

  “It’s beautiful in the extreme. And also horrific.”

  “How?” she asked.

  “How is it beautiful? Or how is it horrific?”

  “Both,” she said. “Tell me about both.”

  “The landscape is almost mythical. Craggy, and then suddenly rolling hills. My house has a three-hundred-sixty-degree view. On the other hand, the town is filled with people poor in ways you can’t imagine.”

  “Is your practice small?”

  “Actually, too big. I cover a vast amount of territory. I could use help. Not many doctors want to live in a place where mud season outlasts summer. I’m not a pediatrician; I’m a family doctor. Where I live, that means being everything to everybody.”

  “Did you grow up in Vermont?”

  “I did. I escaped for a bit.” He looked happy, remembering. “I interned right here in San Diego. Stayed for a bit afterward. I loved being in a place where I didn’t need ten pairs of flannel-lined jeans or five pairs of boots.”

  “So why’d you leave?”

  “Not completely sure.” He opened his hands as though offering her something. “Crazy?”

  “You don’t seem the crazy type.”

  “I think maybe some of us who grow up so specifically one way—like a hothouse flower, or in my case, a mud weed—need that environment to function. Even if we don’t like it.”

  Caroline thought about the solitude she’d treasured as a girl. Lying for hours on her neatly made bed, reading, sketching angled houses during the period when architecture interested her, listening to Jascha Heifetz during the years she played violin. She’d felt complete.

  “So you need mud and snow to function?” she asked.

  “I guess I do. I haven’t thought about it for a long time. I suppose I’m content being where I am.”

  Caroline snuck a look. The reassuring wedding band circling Jonah’s finger took away her tickle of concern. This was safe; hardly even flirtation. Just colleagues playing hooky. Strangers offering each other revelations.

  Jonah folded napkins into perfect squares and then triangles. “How about you? What do you need to function?”