Barefoot: A Novel

by Elin Hilderbrand

  Melanie remained there a few seconds longer, but she was a hostage in her own body. She was dying of thirst—and, as ever, she had to pee.

  She moved forward, pretending not to have noticed him and trying not to worry about her appearance. She hadn’t seen the man in nearly two months. She was bigger now, with a swel at her abdomen. She had been swimming at the beach, and her hair looked like . . . what? When she touched it, it was curly and stiff with salt. The skin of her face was tight from too much sun. And yet, Melanie felt beautiful. Because of Josh, she told herself. She felt beautiful because of Josh.

  She opened the gate and strol ed down the flagstone walk. Peter saw her, she could feel his eyes on her, but she would not look at him, she would not acknowledge him, she would not be the first to speak.

  “Melanie?”

  His voice was not fil ed with wonder, as she had hoped. Rather, his tone was the one he used when he wanted to cal attention to something that was right in front of her face. Earth to Melanie! She responded to this not by acting surprised but by cutting her eyes at him, then quickly looking away. She reached past him for the doorknob and he touched her shoulder. His voice softened considerably.

  “Hey, Mel. It’s me.”

  “I can see that.” She looked at him. It was both familiar and strange, the way her neck arched so she could look him in the eye. Peter was tal , six foot six, whereas Josh was just a few inches tal er than Melanie. Peter’s skin was a warm, golden color, despite his claims that he’d been trapped in the office al summer, and she’d missed his almond-shaped eyes, the intricate creases of his eyelids. This was her husband. The man she’d been with for nearly ten years.

  Before she knew what was happening, he bent to kiss her. She closed her eyes. The kiss was distinct from the thousands of other kisses of their marriage, many of which had been dutiful, passionless, dry, quick. This kiss was searching, lingering, it was exploratory and apologetic. It took Melanie’s breath away.

  But come on! Melanie told herself. She was not such an easy mark. She pushed into the house. Peter had to duck to get through the doorway.

  “Be quiet,” Melanie said. “Vicki and the kids are sleeping.”

  “Okay,” Peter whispered. He fol owed Melanie into the big room. She noticed he was toting an overnight bag. “This is a cute place. Not exactly what I imagined, but cute. Old-fashioned.”

  “I love it,” Melanie said defensively, as if Peter had been insulting it. “It was built in eighteen oh-three. Vicki’s family has owned it for over a hundred years.”

  “Wow,” Peter said. Because of the low ceilings, he was hunched in the shoulders. Melanie watched him take in the details of the room—

  fireplace, bookshelves, coffee table, sofa, kitchen table, rotary phone, silver-threaded Formica, sixty-year-old appliances, braided rugs, ceiling beams, doors with glass knobs leading to various other rooms, presumably rooms as smal and precious as this one. He stood there, nodding, waiting maybe, for Melanie to invite him into her room.

  “Where are you staying?” she asked.

  “Oh,” he said as if she’d startled him. “Actual y, I haven’t booked a place.”

  “It’s August,” Melanie said. “It would have been smart to make a reservation.”

  “I thought I would stay here,” he said. “With you. I thought . . .”

  Melanie cut him off with some high-pitched laughing. Laughing because she didn’t know what to say or how to feel. She had to pee.

  “You’l excuse me one second?” she said.

  “Uh, sure.”

  She shut the door of the bathroom and locked it for good measure. I thought I would stay here. With you. Melanie pictured Frances Digitt with her cutesy-butch haircut and her lively blue eyes. Frances had always asked about Vicki’s in vitro in a confidential sotto voce. How’s it going? My sister, Jojo, in California, the exact same thing. Must be so tough . . . For months, Melanie had thought that Frances Digitt was genuinely sympathetic, but it was clear now that Frances Digitt hadn’t wanted Melanie to conceive at al ; most likely, her sister, Jojo, in California, was fictional. Frances Digitt skied the backcountry of the Canadian Rockies; she was dropped into remote mountain terrain by helicopter. She was a person who sought out danger—so, another woman’s husband? Sure, why not? Frances Digitt’s chocolate Lab was named Baby; she was one of these women whose dog was her child. The dog probably knew Peter by now, the dog probably licked his hands and rested his head in Peter’s lap and whined to be stroked between the eyes.

  I thought I would stay here. With you.

  Melanie flushed the toilet. When she stood, her legs were jel y. She staggered to the brown-spotted mirror and smiled at herself. She looked okay; she looked better than okay. Her fury was empowering—and she was furious! She was about to pitch a fit like a little kid. How dare you! You bastard! You asshole! No doubt Peter expected Melanie to happily invite him back into her bed. He was, after al , her husband and the father of her child.

  Melanie didn’t care!

  She washed her hands and face, patted them dry with a towel, and drank from the children’s bathroom cup. Vicki could wake up at any moment, and Brenda would come home. Melanie had to figure this out, and soon.

  Peter was standing right where she’d left him. A giant in the dol house. The cottage was hot, she realized. He must have been sweltering in his suit.

  “Would you like a drink?” she said.

  “I’d love one.”

  She poured two glasses of lemonade and added ice. She sucked hers down and poured herself more. She col apsed in a kitchen chair; she couldn’t stand up another second. Peter remained standing until she nodded to the chair across from hers. He took off his suit jacket, loosened his tie, and sat.

  “How do you feel?” he said. “You look great.”

  “What are you doing here, Peter?”

  He rol ed up his shirtsleeves. There were things about him that she’d forgotten—the muscle tone of his forearms, for example, and his brushed-chrome Tag Heuer watch, which he always kept facedown and jangled on his wrist when he was nervous. She’d forgotten how smooth his skin was, practical y hairless; he only had to shave twice a week. And the glossy pink wetness of his lips and the faint scar on his nose, a half-inch white line with hash marks (he’d gotten the cut as a child in a bus accident). Melanie had touched that scar innumerable times, she had kissed it, licked it, batted it with her eyelashes. This was her husband. Before Frances Digitt, what had that meant? At first, they’d lived in Manhattan, they rode the subway, ate take-out food, went to movies and readings, worked out at the gym, volunteered at a soup kitchen and a shelter. They tried new restaurants and met in hotel bars for drinks with people from Peter’s work, people like Ted and Vicki. They had shopped for things: a new sofa, window treatments, a birthday present for Peter’s mother, who lived in Paris. They had plenty of money, and, more important, they had plenty of time. They spent hours reading the paper on Sundays and going for long walks in Central Park. Once they moved to Connecticut, they raked leaves and mowed the lawn, painted the powder room, and worked in the garden. But something was missing, a connection, a purpose to their union beyond the acquisition of things , the completion of tasks . Children! Melanie wanted children. That was when her marriage came into focus, or so it had seemed to Melanie. She and Peter embarked on a quest; they were united by their wanting. The gifts and the trips that arrived in place of a child—the orchids, the truffles, the oceanfront suite in Cabo—were meant to console Melanie, to make her happy. But they had only served to anger her. She was, in the final months, a woman who could not be made happy, except by one thing. The lovemaking became a job; Melanie did everything short of bringing her basal thermometer, calendar, and stopwatch to bed. Was it any wonder Peter had begun an affair with someone young, someone daring and fun, someone whose idea of a child weighed a hundred pounds and was covered with brown fur?

  Yes, to Melanie it was a wonder. Peter was her husband. She’d assumed that meant they
owned if not each other, then at least the relationship.

  The marriage was something they had agreed to value, like a Ming vase; it was something they were entrusted to carry, each holding equal weight.

  But Peter had dropped his end.

  “I wanted to see you,” Peter said. “You’ve been gone forever . I miss you.”

  “That’s bul shit.” Melanie touched her bel y. “You’re only here because I’m pregnant.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Oh, God, of course it is. Why pretend otherwise?”

  “It’s over with Frances,” Peter said.

  Melanie did not respond to this, though she was keenly interested by it. Did Peter end the relationship with Frances because he was overcome with love and longing for his wife? Or did Frances Digitt simply meet someone else at her share in the Hamptons?

  “I said, it’s over with . . .”

  “I heard you.”

  “I thought you’d be . . .”

  “What? Overjoyed? Relieved? I don’t trust you, Peter. You cheated on me and you cheated on our marriage and although you didn’t know it, you cheated on this baby.”

  “I knew you’d overreact.”

  Now, there was the Peter she recognized. It was as though he was torn between the mean person he real y was and the kind, conciliatory person he was trying to be.

  Melanie smirked. “Right. I’m sure you did. Get out of here, Peter.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “Sorry, sorry.” He leaned forward and gave her a look that could only be described as beseeching. “I love you, Mel.”

  “You do not.”

  “I do. I want you to come home.”

  “I don’t want to come home. I’m happy here.” She took a breath and counted to three, the way she did each afternoon before she plunged into the ocean. “There’s someone else.”

  “There is?”

  “There is.” Melanie’s stomach made some weird squelching noise, loud enough to offer some comic relief, but Peter’s expression remained shocked, incredulous.

  “Who is it?”

  “It’s none of your business,” Melanie said. Already she was chastising herself—Josh was secret from everybody, and that meant secret from Peter, too. But Melanie couldn’t help herself. She had wanted to tel Peter about Josh since the first night of her and Josh together, in the garden of the ’Sconset Chapel. She wanted Peter to know that she had settled the score. She had a lover, too!

  “Wel ,” Peter said. “Okay then.”

  “Okay then,” Melanie said.

  “He stays with you here?” Peter said.

  “No,” Melanie said. “But that doesn’t mean that you can stay here.”

  Peter held up his palms. “Say no more. I get the picture. I’l book myself a room. Maybe at that place out by the airport.”

  Melanie tilted her head. She was torn, too, between the nice person she real y was and the mean, spiteful person she wanted to be. “They might not have anything available.”

  “I’l check.”

  “Why don’t you just go home, Peter?”

  “Oh, no,” he said. “I’m not giving up that easily.”

  “This isn’t a game, Peter. I’m not a trophy you can win back.”

  “I know that,” he said. “But I’m not leaving this island until you’re certain with every cel of your body that I love you. I’m a genuine person, Mel.”

  “You are not.”

  “I am genuine in this,” he said. He came around the table and folded himself in half to embrace her. The hug was awkward, but like the kiss, there was something distinct about it, something earnest.

  “Let me take you out,” Peter said. “Anywhere you want to go.”

  This was the old Peter talking. Let me spend money on you.

  “No,” Melanie said.

  “So, what are you saying? I get to see you for five minutes and that’s it? You won’t even eat with me?”

  “That is correct.”

  “Oh, come on, Mel. I took off from work. I flew al the way up here.”

  “No one asked you to. If you had cal ed, I would have told you to stay home.”

  “You have to have dinner with me. Please?”

  “You don’t get it, Peter. You hurt me. You broke my heart. You destroyed my trust in you.”

  “I know, Mel, I know. I’m trying to tel you it’s over and I’m sorry. That’s why I’m here. Just let me stay and have dinner with you. That’s al I’m asking for. Dinner with you. Please, Mel.”

  “Fine,” Melanie said. “But we eat here.”

  “With Vicki? And . . .”

  “Her sister, Brenda. Yes.”

  “Ahhhh,” Peter said. He didn’t want to have dinner with Vicki and Brenda, of course he didn’t, but this was the first test. “Okay. Sure thing.” He hoisted his overnight bag. “Would it be okay if I changed my clothes?”

  “Peter!”

  Melanie ground her molars together as Blaine launched himself into Peter’s arms. Here was something Melanie hadn’t considered. Vicki and Brenda might not mention Peter’s presence to Josh (she would ask them not to, for what reason, Melanie had yet to conjure)—but Blaine would tel Josh immediately, first thing.

  Peter laughed. “At least someone is happy to see me. How’re you doing, buddy?”

  “Good,” Blaine said.

  Peter set Blaine down. “You’re getting tal . How old are you now? Seven?”

  Blaine beamed. “I’m four and a half.”

  “See? You’re so tal I thought you were seven.”

  “Did you come with my dad?” Blaine asked.

  “No,” Peter said. “I came by myself. I wanted to see Melanie.”

  Blaine looked puzzled. “What for?”

  “Melanie’s my wife. Remember?”

  “She is?”

  “Wel . . . ,” Melanie said.

  “What?” Peter said. “You are my wife.”

  Vicki and Brenda were as quiet as thieves in the kitchen as they pul ed dinner together. They had been shocked by Peter’s presence, but Melanie couldn’t tel if they were happy for her that her husband had come back, or if they were angry and disapproving. Brenda had been more visibly stunned, Vicki more openly cynical with Peter, but she had known him a long time.

  “And the baby in here,” Peter said, patting Melanie’s bel y, “is my baby and Melanie’s baby.”

  “It is?” Blaine said.

  “Amazing,” Brenda said from the kitchen. Her voice was just loud enough for Melanie and Peter to hear.

  Angry, Melanie thought. Disapproving.

  “Peter brought some wine,” Melanie said. “Brenda, would you like some? Vicki?”

  “Yes,” Brenda said.

  “Yes,” Vicki said.

  Melanie poured three glasses. She was dying to take a sip herself, but no, she wouldn’t.

  Blaine said, “Want to go outside and throw rocks with me?”

  “Sure,” Peter said. “I love to throw rocks.”

  The front screen door slammed behind them.

  “I’d like to throw some rocks at him,” Vicki said.

  “Vick . . . ,” Melanie said.

  “Sorry,” Vicki said. “Couldn’t help myself.”

  “I don’t feel sorry,” Brenda said. “You spent so many weeks feeling miserable because of that jerk, I think we have a right to be angry. I mean, what is the deal with the show-up-out-of-the-blue tactics?”

  “He knew if he asked, I’d say no.”

  “You should have told him to go to hel ,” Brenda said.

  “He’s not staying here,” Melanie said.

  “He got a hotel?” Vicki said.

  “I think he’s planning on staying out by the airport,” Melanie said, though she knew Peter had done nothing about booking a room. And not only that, but Peter’s overnight bag was resting possessively on the other twin bed in Melanie’s room.

  “I see they gave you the nun’s quarters,” Peter had said when he walked into Melanie’s room.
“Do you and your lover share a twin bed?”

  “I told you, he doesn’t stay here.”

  “I can see why,” Peter said. He’d proceeded to make himself comfortable, changing into shorts and a polo shirt right in front of Melanie. Watching him undress had seemed strange, and she’d nearly excused herself from the room. But he was her husband. How many times had she seen him undress before? Hundreds. Thousands.

  “Who is it?” Peter said. “Some rich guy with a house on the beach?”

  “I’m not tel ing you who it is,” Melanie said. “It doesn’t concern you.”

  “It does concern me. You’re my wife. You’re carrying my child.”

  Melanie poured herself a club soda. What would she do about Josh? Would she go to him tonight? Would she tel him? Was Melanie prepared to go back with Peter? She felt like the answer should be no, but he was her husband. Was she wil ing to raise this child alone, as a single parent, without a father?

  “I don’t know what I’m doing,” Melanie said to Brenda and Vicki. “And I’m going to ask you to respect that. I’m playing this by ear. I’m going to hear what the man has to say for himself. I’l think about it. I’l make him go home tomorrow.”

  “Okay,” Vicki said.

  “And there’s something else I want to ask you.”

  “What?” Brenda said.

  “Please don’t tel Josh that Peter came here.”

  “Why not?” Brenda said.

  “Why not?” Vicki said.

  They were both looking at her.

  Melanie took a sip of club soda and fervently wished for some vodka.

  “Al the things I’ve said to Josh about Peter, he’d feel like you two do, but he’s young, you know, and he’s a guy. He won’t get it.”

  “You have feelings for him,” Vicki said. Her eyes were so dead-on certain she could have dril ed holes through a two-by-four. “You have feelings for Josh.”

  Brenda’s expression bloomed with what looked like childish delight. “You mean feelings feelings?”

  Melanie could feel her face turning the color of the tomatoes in the Caprese salad. She forced a laugh. “For God’s sake, Vick. Would you please give me a break?”