Family Trust

by Amanda Brown

Before he stood to leave, though, Edward calmly asked her a question.

  “How do you know, Mother, if I love Bunny Stirrup?”

  She squinted at him without understanding. He had always been intended for Bunny, and Bunny for him.

  “Edward, don’t be silly,” she scolded.

  She approached him, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Dear Edward,” she began, and her eyes filled with tears.

  “Oh, Mother, don’t cry,” he said, reaching for her hand. He removed her hand from his shoulder and gripped it warmly.

  “Edward, please,” she said, her voice calm and serious. “This is so important to the family. Bunny has always been meant for you. She’s so devoted to you, darling.”

  She noticed that this news hardly affected Edward, who stared vacantly across the room.

  “She keeps an excellent seat,” his mother pointed out. “So many riders these days bounce around like cowgirls. Roberta pays attention to the important details. Mark my words, Edward: Roberta Stirrup will never use bad form.”

  He was amused to hear his mother use Bunny’s proper name.

  “You call her Roberta now?”

  His mother nodded. “And I’ve already asked her to call me Mum,” she added.

  He sat for as long as he could manage, speaking respectfully to his mother as he felt the warm scones crumble in his fingers. For the first time within the sanctum of his family, Edward felt his impulses separating from his actions. He promised to cooperate, but out of duty, not love.

  Edward caught his reflection in the gilded mirror. His blue eyes were empty, as blank as smoke. He stood and leaned forward to kiss his mother’s cheek. Just then the butler brought a telephone into the room.

  Bunny had put a call in to Catherine Kirkland from her car, to clear up one matter they had overlooked.

  Catherine was again touched by the insistence of young love when she considered that Bunny must have stopped somewhere to use a telephone.

  “What a surprise, Bunny, dear.”

  Edward walked away to give his mother privacy. Still he could hear her courteous voice. He cringed to think what subplots Bunny was creating now.

  Bunny explained that she’d be hand-delivering invitations in a matter of days, and certainly would include everyone on the list Catherine’s private secretary had sent over. They had discussed the sensitive matters presented by a few divorces, and come to amicable conclusions. But what would they do about Becca Reinhart?

  Catherine considered the matter with consternation. In her noble graciousness she knew the event gave her an opportunity to reach out to the alienated, but when she put a fine point on it, she realized that she couldn’t risk exposing herself to ridicule among her own guests. And she had planned to use her French Regency porcelain table settings, the eighteenth-century Sevres celestial blue arrangement. She would simply die to see those elegant antiques shattered in the plate-smashing festivities that Ms. Reinhart would find culturally necessary.

  “They do tend to smash plates at weddings, don’t they, dear?”

  “Oh, absolutely,” Bunny said in a rush. “It’s positively a rule for her kind of people.”

  “All right, then,” Catherine decided. “Send her an announcement, but no invitation.” Catherine would have said something about how she wished they could be magnanimous, but she had not yet excused Edward and he stood nearby.

  “Yes, you’re exactly right,” Bunny agreed, pumping her fist in the air. She hung up the phone before Catherine could reconsider, and redirected her driver to the Warren-Tricomi Salon on West Fifty-seventh. This day called for Zen music, floating roses, and a full-body massage.

  “Good-bye, Mother.”

  She caught his arm before he reached the door.

  “Edward?”

  “Yes?” He noticed she looked nervous. She held her hands together, and with a finger and thumb was hastily twisting her large sapphire ring back and forth.

  “We’ll manage the guest list. All very close friends, intimates and the like.”

  He sighed. He had tried to hide from this day for ten years.

  “Okay, Mother,” he said, raising his eyes to hers to nod with an agreeable smile. Another action separated from feeling. Edward saw his whole life before him, days strung together with lies—lies to appease, lies to deceive, eventually, he supposed, lying got to be the norm. He was eager to leave, and tried again to turn for the door.

  “Edward?”

  He turned again. “Yes, Mother?”

  “We don’t want any surprise guests,” she said. She had moved an uneasy hand to the pearl clasp on her necklace, which she tapped with her manicured fingernail.

  He stared at her, and she turned an evasive glance to the window before forcing herself to look back at him. He saw now what she meant. She didn’t want Becca to set foot on the family’s sacred ground. And she lacked the courage to tell him that directly.

  “None of Emily’s grown-up friends, you mean,” he said. He did not conceal the bitterness in his voice as he glared at his mother. “No guardians.”

  “Exactly,” she returned coolly.

  He nodded, and walked away without turning back.

  It seemed to take no time at all for the car to get him through town to the Upper East Side, as Edward sat silently, his senses lulled out of focus by the fleeting lights and sounds of city life.

  Emily had just gone to sleep when he walked into the apartment. He went to her bedroom and kissed her cheek, drawing comfort from the rose blush of her cheek and sweet smell in her hair. As he left the room, he turned off the television, which was tuned to CNN Financial. Becca had turned it on to help Emily get to sleep.

  He entered the library. He knew to look for Becca there: She liked to sit close to Emily’s bedroom, where she could hear her, at least until she was sure Emily had gone to sleep. She was reading the Sunday Times, he noticed. Or anyway, it was at her feet. She took a sip from a bottle of Perrier, then held the bottle up to offer him a drink.

  He declined her offer. His eyes darted around the room nervously. He remembered a different time in this library, when he had sipped wine and looked inward, discovering himself as he opened to Becca, about Arthur, about college: seeing intimately, in the soft evening light cast by the single brass standing lamp, into Becca’s casual beauty, her mysterious self-possession.

  His shoulders sank when he saw her lift the newspaper to her eyes. Everyone read the bloody New York Times, he thought, feeling a surge of resentment at its uncontrollable circulation. A million Sunday readers and pass-along readers and waiting room readers were now expecting Edward Kirkland to get married. If he made the wire syndicate, his wedding announcement would be news from Tucson to Concord, by way of Duluth. The Harvard alumni magazine would pick it up; St. George’s would paste him into their “Milestones” section. He could picture, already, the announcement cut and tacked to the bulletin boards at the Racquet Club and the Union Club; no doubt some piece of buffoonery was scribbled beside the headline: “The Soldier Bows to the Queen.”

  She squinted at him. “You look pale. Are you all right?”

  He forced a smile. “Sure. Why?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe it’s just the light.”

  He offered to bring in another lamp for her.

  “Don’t worry about it,” she said, giving him a curious stare. She glanced at her watch. “I didn’t expect to see you this early. It’s not even ten o’clock. Not much of a tango this year, was it?”

  Edward blushed, feeling ridiculous.

  “Where’s the kilt?” Her grin was playful, but even as Becca toyed with him she could sense his embarrassment. He seemed ashamed.

  She dropped her chin to the palm of her hand and looked at him, standing there bashfully with his hands in his pockets. Doubt and sympathy mingled in her eyes, and the tender concern that washed over Edward felt stark in relief against the cold hand of duty with which his mother had steered him.

  Edward knew he should tell her, but he couldn�
��t find the words. It was supposed to be good news. How would Becca understand the bitterness that would crackle around his words? He couldn’t even pronounce the word engagement without hostility: without the degraded, dishonorable rage that he felt, guilty and helpless in the vortex of his responsibility to the Kirkland name. It was time for Edward to give back, the delayed price of admission to his golden circle of luxury and ease had finally, unalterably come due.

  “Listen,” he tried, his eyes on the floor. “I didn’t go to the party. I—”

  “Are you okay, Ed?” Becca stood and walked close to him. He felt her hand drop down on his shoulder, and his eyes met hers directly. They were the same height.

  “Hey, buddy, who moved your cheese?” she asked him in a quiet voice.

  His face broke into a smile. Her humor was so kind and open. Becca didn’t pause to think much before she talked, unlike his perfectly cultivated mother, with her precious decorum; unlike his shrewd, cunning bride-to-be, who would have a pond measured for ripples before she ventured to toss her pebble in. He smiled, looking at her fondly; but Edward could get no closer to the thing he had to say.

  “I forgot something,” he began, his eyes searching the room. “I forgot about the kilt. I’ll, uh—I’ve got to get back to the party.” He heard himself speaking in a monotone. Here’s how lies started. He could not face her. Edward turned with a heavy step and walked out of the room.

  “I won’t be home tonight,” he said, his back to her.

  He wondered, as he walked away, why he had called this place his home. He swallowed hard. What was he doing here, anyway? Becca was “on duty” with Emily tonight and tomorrow until lunchtime. He lived at the Carlyle.

  Becca shrugged, listening to Edward walking slowly down the hall. She didn’t believe him, but he was entitled to have his bad days. Returning to the reading chair, she put her feet up on the ottoman and reclined with the newspaper. She pulled out the “Week In Review” to scan the headlines.

  Becca paused when she heard the apartment door close quietly. She smiled, knowing that Edward made an effort not to let the heavy door slam when Emily was asleep. Abruptly she dropped the newspaper, realizing that he had left immediately. He hadn’t picked up his kilt—he hadn’t picked up anything. What had just happened?

  She rubbed her neck, feeling a sudden wave of pity for Edward. And she didn’t know why. With a deep sigh, Becca dropped her head into her hands, he had seemed ready to say something, standing there before her, shoving his hands in his pockets, shifting his feet. She reproached herself for failing to listen. Why did she have to do that bit about the cheese? Why did she want to make him laugh all the time?

  But Becca warmed, remembering his smile at her little joke. Maybe that was what he needed. Edward was so naturally genial that the sudden cloud over his mood seemed tragic. He was not the kind of guy made for suffering.

  What was the matter with Edward?

  She shrugged, repeating to herself that she could not let it get to her. It was the same with Emily: Her moods would fly past, and if you allowed yourself to be victim to a foot-stomping moment over mixed-up food at the restaurant, then you would miss all the fun when Emily, forgetting, would crack fortune cookies, poke a paper umbrella in her hair and hide giggles behind her plump little hands.

  Once again she picked up the heavy Sunday edition of the New York Times to set about the long business of reading it. She removed the front page, placed it on top of the business section and dropped the rest of the newspaper to the floor.

  CHAPTER 21

  Any Port in a Storm

  The next morning began like any other. Emily’s footsteps pounded down the hall to the master bedroom, picking up speed as she approached the room where Becca sat in bed, tapping on her laptop. Quickly, Becca pushed her cup of coffee a safe distance away on the walnut nightstand, hid her slim computer under the bed, and in a minute was prepared for Emily’s crash landing. The child burst through the door and exploded onto the bed with a great running leap. Eddie’s old dog, McDuff, lifted his head to check out the action, but then returned to his doggy dreams.

  With a little shriek and a great act of being surprised, Becca rolled Emily into a burrito in the fluffy duvet that covered the bed like a cloud. Emily squealed with delight as Becca poked her, tickled her, and finally unrolled her to say good morning. She kissed the happy cheek of her little red-faced girl, who gasped a breath before burrowing under the sheets for a repeat of the beloved morning ritual. Giggling, diving, and laughing in squeals, Emily alternated between hiding and popping up to startle Becca, who tackled her in a flurry of tickles.

  Finally Becca collapsed backward against the wall of pillows that guarded the brass headboard, pretending to fall asleep. Emily pressed her face right into Becca’s, her wide, shining eyes not an inch from Becca’s closed ones. Her giggling was too much to resist; Becca opened her eyes, encountering Emily’s enormous fluttering blue ones. Her face was so close it seemed to float like the moon. The trust she shared with her little angel made her feel warmed. She loved being woken by Emily.

  Becca rubbed Emily’s pillow-tangled curls.

  “Come on, Em. Let’s go brush your hair. The early bird catches the worm.”

  Emily jumped to the floor. Her pudgy feet immediately sought the warmth of the heart-patterned mohair rug, where she wiggled her pink-painted toes in pleasure. The mornings had grown brisk. Emily wrapped a silk kimono, which she insisted was her bathrobe, around herself.

  “Can I have some guava juice now?”

  “It wouldn’t kill you to ask nicely.”

  “Pleeeease. And please please some truffles from Maison Du Chocolat? I saw the box on top of the refrigerator. Pleeeease?”

  Becca softened the answer no with a loving smile. She wrapped herself in one of Edward’s plaid flannel robes, which he had lent to her on a chilly morning.

  “Eddie gave me a Toblerone,” Emily bragged. “I hid it and I know where it is.”

  Becca laughed, pulling socks on her feet. She lifted Emily to her hip for their speed-skating down the hall to the kitchen. The brushing could wait.

  Emily always began her mornings with a glass of guava juice and a plea for candy. Though Becca was perfectly comfortable with an eat-when-you’re-hungry approach, adopted during years of working 24/7, as a parent she knew implicitly that she had to draw lines. She could find better things to do with their money than build a third beach house for Emily’s pediatric dentist. So Becca decreed that nobody would eat candy at least until after lunch, and then it would be followed by tooth-brushing, plus a rinse with the Water Pik. Emily tried all morning to find ways to sneak candy, and failing that, bided her time until Sunday mornings, when Edward would take her out for sugary donuts after church.

  Edward was “on duty” with Emily around eleven, for the rest of the day, and Becca already regretted the time she would lose with her chirpy little bird. But she suspected there were fires to put out at the office: She was used to being needed there, and hovered, even after her leave of absence, like a back-seat driver.

  As she poured her coffee into the twelve-ounce mug and Emily’s guava juice into a “jewel”-studded goblet, Becca felt her neck and shoulder muscles growing tense. She had not slept well, puzzling about Edward’s black mood, and finally gave up trying. Her laptop greeted her with hundreds of unread e-mails, and many gave her cause to worry. She had not checked in at the office for several days, and always paid dearly for inattention.

  Her chief concern was an underperforming company to which she had extended one round of bailout funding. (This was the compromise she had carved out for herself—no travel and only one day a week in the office allowed until her “leave of absence” was over.) She had a confab scheduled with their executives—the execs wanted more, and she had to squeeze them harder. She would require between eight hundred and a thousand job cuts as a condition of the supplemental loan she offered—and she knew the corporate officers would be shocked at the level of cut
s she required in management. The big-screen conversations she looked forward to having with them were not pleasant ones.

  The hard tone she would have to take in her meeting seemed a world away, as Becca hid under the waving neon crepe paper legs of Emily’s octopus collection. They were playing sharks and minnows, and Emily, as usual, was the shark. She squealed with laughter as she identified Becca’s hiding place, then launched a shark attack with delighted fervor. Even before her second cup of coffee, Becca was racing around the apartment, making fins on her head and shoulders, hiding behind doors and chairs to escape the shark. The duality of her life felt peculiar; the playful, loving person of the morning could not simply button a jacket and scowl over the inarguable economics of her spreadsheets. But that was what Becca had to do. And since Edward had not yet returned, she would take Emily with her. Philippe was turning into a high-priced baby-sitter and he loved it!

  Frustrated by her inability to control the troubled thoughts she had about Edward, Becca went over this rather routine meeting hundreds of times in her mind, grateful for the chance it gave her to focus on something firm. She felt nervous, though, from the intensity of her thoughts: She had particular trouble waiting for Emily to get dressed, which was challenging for her even on a good day.

  The task was one of “enabling” the child to get herself dressed. If parenting magazines had one theme, it was this: Preschool children developed essential independence and self-confidence by learning to do little tasks by themselves.

  It sounded simple enough to Becca, from the “give a man a fish” versus “teach a man to fish” perspective that she regularly quoted to companies who wanted money without strings attached. But when she required funded companies to “learn to fish,” Becca never had to stand uselessly there in the room while they struggled up the learning curve. Standing in place, straining not to take control while helplessly watching a four-year-old fumble at her shirt buttons could tax the patience of a calm soul. For Becca, it was almost unbearable.