Loss of Innocence

by Richard North Patterson

  Whitney weighed her answer. “Yes, if you’re calling Peter smug. He’s one of the kindest people I know.”

  Ben poured them both more wine. “And generous enough to let somebody else get drafted in his place. But Peter aside, I don’t hear a rousing defense of privilege.”

  “I won’t defend Peter or myself,” Whitney said evenly, “or a world we didn’t make. All I can do is try to become a halfway decent human being. But whatever I am, I’m not accountable to you.”

  To her surprise, Ben smiled at this. “Fair enough, Whitney. I don’t want to spoil your lobster.”

  Using a nutcracker and small fork, he separated the tail and meat from shell, placing them on her plate. Then he served her salad and put a cup of drawn butter between them. They ate in the glow of the fire, its warmth cutting the chill of descending night. Content, Whitney watched the stars appear in the darkness over the water, listened to the faint susurrus of waves splashing on the sand.

  After a while, Ben told her, “What I should have said is that I won’t turn into one more guy who pulls the ladder up after me, forgetting who lent me a hand. Too many people still don’t get the chance that I had.”

  “I agree, Ben. That’s what you should have said.”

  He held up his hand. “That was a semi-apology, okay? So let me ask a simple question—how many blacks and Jews came to your parents’ home? Except for those favorite mealtime companions, Uncle Ben and Aunt Jemima.”

  Whitney gave him an arid smile. “Are you trying to prove that you’re incorrigible? As I’m sure you know, blacks don’t live in Greenwich, and there weren’t many at Rosemary Hall or Wheaton. I did have a Jewish friend in college, if you’re still keeping score.”

  Whitney paused there, remembering a classmate saying indulgently about her friend, “Lisa doesn’t seem that Jewish to me.” Lisa had later confessed to Whitney that she worried about being stereotyped. Though Whitney had reassured her, Lisa had been right to worry; her subsequent engagement to a guy from Brown raised a stink within his family, culminating in their stiffly worded request that any children be raised as Episcopalians. Whitney had been dismayed; though there were no Jews among their closer family friends, she had never heard a trace of anti-Semitism from either of her parents. “Actually,” she continued, “Lisa encouraged me to tutor in Roxbury. Maybe that seems like naïve do-gooding to you, two white girls spending a couple of hours in the ghetto before returning to the cloistered halls. But at least we did something.”

  Ben’s expression changed, becoming thoughtful and even conciliatory. “You’re right, Whitney. No one’s responsible for where they’re born, only for what they do. For myself, I’d have happily traded places with you or your fiancé. Feel free to call me on it.”

  The surprising concession softened Whitney’s defenses. “And vice-versa, Ben. But without taking shots at a guy I love, who you don’t even know.”

  Ben batted away a stray cinder. “A last question, then. Did Peter applaud your forays into Roxbury?”

  Once again, Whitney considered her answer. “If it matters to you, Peter respects me enough to support anything I do.”

  From the glint in his eyes, Ben caught her syntactical evasion. “But has he ever asked what you want, or taken an interest in your writing? Or does he assume that all you need from life is to be married?”

  Whitney did not know what stung her more—Ben’s assumption that he knew the answers, or the questions themselves. “I don’t want to talk about Peter,” she said stiffly. “I don’t know why you do.”

  “How quickly I’ve fallen from grace,” Ben said in mock dismay. “All I’m really wondering is what you want for yourself.”

  At first Whitney did not answer. The final stanza of the Wheaton Hymn sounded in her mind:

  A hundred years pass like a dream

  Yet early founders still are we

  Whose works are greater than they seem

  Because of what we yet shall be

  In the bright noon of other days

  Mid other men and other ways.

  The future was open, the hopeful words had said to her, Whitney’s to write for herself. But perhaps her future was already written. “I don’t know yet,” she admitted.

  In the light of the fire, Ben studied her. “You’ve still got time,” he said, and left it there.

  That night, unable to sleep, Whitney took Couples to the library, and began reading in the light of a standing lamp. To her surprise, Charles emerged from the bedroom in robe and slippers, headed for the kitchen before he spotted Whitney.

  “Hi, Dad. When did you get home?”

  “A few hours ago. I decided to start the weekend early.”

  He did not say why, and Whitney recognized the abstracted look he wore when there was something on his mind. Instead, he asked, “What do you think of the book?”

  “Too soon to tell, except that Updike’s a wonderful stylist. I stop to reread a sentence, and wonder if I could ever write anything that perfect.”

  Charles gave her a veiled look. “The language is fine, I’m sure. But I understand that the story is elegant smut—one act of adultery after another. You might have chosen something a little bit more uplifting.”

  What was this about, Whitney wondered. “It’s just a novel, Dad.”

  “No doubt I’m a bit musty in my tastes. This is a free country, after all, where adults can read what they like.” Her father sat across from her. “Still, I’ve often thought that people’s lives are defined by the thoughts they choose to entertain. But I wonder if books like this cause people to consider doing things they otherwise wouldn’t.”

  Watching his face, Whitney sensed a second, wordless conversation lurking beneath the first. Mildly, she said, “I hope you’re not including me.”

  Solemn, Charles appraised her. “Of course not, Whitney. You’ve always had a sturdy character, as well as a fine mind. It’s just that a society is defined by what the more educated deem acceptable, whether in art or film or—in this case—a novel that elevates infidelity.”

  Whitney gave him a deflective smile. “I won’t know if I’ve become wanton until I finish the book. Then I’ll tell you how I turned out.”

  His smile in return was measured. “Please don’t, Whitney. I like you too much as you are.”

  Without saying more, Charles proceeded to the kitchen.

  Whitney put down the book, pondering the recesses of her father’s mind. Did his core philosophy, focused on predictability and order, exist to suppress something in human nature that he deeply feared—whether personified by demonstrators, leftists, or a novelist who dared to write so explicitly about adultery and despair? But there was no one to whom she could express those thoughts. Except, perhaps, for Benjamin Blaine, and that would feel like a betrayal of her family and, even worse, of Peter.

  Two

  The next day dawned warm and clear. Whitney got up eager to test her leg in a tennis match with Clarice. It was good to be young, she thought; somehow this reminded her to wonder about her sister. Checking her watch, she called Janine.

  The phone rang for a long time. Whitney was about to hang up when her sister answered, “Who is it?”

  Her tone sounded off, groggy yet anxious. “It’s Whitney, Janine. Are you feeling okay?”

  “Whitney,” Janine repeated, and her voice became lifeless. “I had an all-day photo shoot, then I stayed out late. Call me some other time.”

  “Okay,” Whitney began, and heard the click of her sister hanging up.

  She found her mother sitting on the porch, sipping coffee as she gazed out at the dewy grass and, beyond it, the swath of ocean visible through the trees. It was Anne’s favorite time, with the house still quiet, the day untouched by the disorder of normal life, when she could lose herself in unspoken reveries and, Whitney was sure, remembrances of her mother and a childhood that, in the filter of time, had become flawlessly secure. Whitney sat beside her, saying hesitantly, “I haven’t heard anything from Janin
e lately. Have you?”

  “Of course.”

  “I was just wondering why we haven’t seen her more.”

  Putting down her cup, Anne kept gazing toward the water. “I miss her, too. But she’s busy with photo shoots, and her social calendar sounds fuller than ever. That doesn’t leave her much time to visit.”

  This cool recital, Whitney sensed, was designed to close the subject. “Think there’s anyone special?” she asked.

  “Not that I know of, Whitney. It’s more that so many men keep asking her out. Her usual problem of traffic control.”

  That this sounded like a catechism enhanced Whitney’s concern for Janine. “Just wondering,” she said. “I should go change for tennis.”

  Breeze rippling her blond hair, Clarice drove them to West Chop with the top down on her Fiat convertible, radio tuned to Janis Joplin singing “Me and Bobby McGee.”

  “There’s something wrong with Janine,” Whitney told her. “When I called her this morning, she could barely speak. It was like she’d fallen down a mine shaft.”

  Clarice turned down the main street of Vineyard Haven, still sleepy at this hour of the morning. “Had she been drinking?”

  “Her voice was slurry enough. But to me she sounded more anxious and depressed. All she said was I’d woken her up.”

  “At nine o’clock in the morning? What a shock. This is Janine we’re talking about, Whitney.”

  “I think she’s in trouble,” Whitney insisted. “But no one else does. More and more it seems like my mother’s world depends on airbrushing unpleasant thoughts. Even my dad’s. Last night he found me reading Couples, and gave a lecture on how books about adultery destroy the social fabric. Like if I read about it, I’ll do it.”

  Clarice glanced at her. “What do you suppose that’s about?”

  Whitney thought she knew. But she did not want to say so; perhaps she was more like her mother than she wished. “I don’t know, really. Except that it upset him.”

  Clarice gave her a second, more narrow-eyed glance, then shrugged. “So read it in your bedroom,” she advised.

  Passing the lighthouse, they arrived in West Chop. Shaded and well maintained, the tennis court was surrounded by the large and venerable houses of families like the Brewsters who, for generations, had gazed out at the water from their private enclave. Reflecting on her conversation with Ben, Whitney realized that everyone she knew there was Protestant and privileged. “Out of curiosity,” Whitney asked, “do you know any Jews who live here?”

  Clarice gave her a querying, amused look. “I’m not a demographer, Whitney. But are you sure that’s even allowed?”

  Without awaiting an answer, she took her place on the court.

  They rallied for awhile, allowing Whitney to determine that she ran well enough to play. Once it began, their match was competitive as always—whereas Clarice was swift and graceful, Whitney was dogged and more consistent, scrambling to return the ball until Clarice hit some stylish but erratic stroke just out of bounds or into the net. Within forty minutes, Whitney had won the first set six to four.

  “I wouldn’t call that pretty,” Clarice groused mildly. “But you’re amazingly persistent. Some days it feels like I’m playing against a backboard.”

  More pleased than she should be, Whitney chose not to mention her throbbing leg. “Why don’t we rest up, Clarice. I know this can’t be easy for you.”

  They sat on a shaded bench, two young girls in white tennis dresses on a fresh summer morning, content in each other’s company. “So,” Clarice asked, “is the wedding falling into place?”

  “Pretty much. It’s more afterward that I’m wondering about. I’ve been thinking about some sort of career.”

  “What does Peter say?”

  “Not much. He wants my parents’ life—kids, a place in Greenwich, weekends at the club or on the Vineyard, trips to Europe in the summer, the occasional dinner and play in Manhattan . . .”

  Listening to herself, Whitney started laughing as Clarice did. “What drudgery, Whitney. Putting one foot in front of the other until you die, with children tugging at your Chanel ensemble who’ll be even cuter and smarter than you and Peter.” She placed a hand on Whitney’s shoulder. “There’s only one solution, dear. Get yourself sterilized, then take a job in some office, working in a cubicle beneath a bank of fluorescent lights as you await the unpredictable thrill of being fondled by the moron you have to work for. Not to mention spending time with the real people you’ll meet in the subway, many of whom won’t mug you. Let me help you with your résumé.”

  Whitney laughed again. “You’ve thought about this, I can see.”

  “I’ve had to,” Clarice said glumly. “My parents are insisting on it.”

  “So what about using your brain?”

  Clarice gave her an incredulous look. “Outside of academia? How many places do you know where women get paid to think? All I’m saying to you, Whitney, is that the charm of all too many jobs depends on not having done them. At Wellesley, I went to a lecture by Betty Friedan, quite possibly the most shrill and unpleasant woman I’ve ever seen . . .”

  “So my mother claims,” Whitney interjected. “She says Friedan’s a feminist because she’s ugly.”

  “I’m not sure about that one. But she’s certainly not getting by on her looks.”

  “Is Janine?”

  Clarice shot her a curious look. “Back to her again? You don’t have to be ugly to be a mess, though it probably helps. Personally, I think that women should be allowed to try whatever they like. It’s just that you can’t repeal human nature. Women like Friedan are going to liberate the rest of us to work like dogs, plus do all the things we already do until we’re gobbling uppers just to keep ourselves going. Do you really think men are going to start raising kids, as opposed to coaching Little League on weekends? Good luck.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” Whitney allowed. “But I keep thinking about Karen Claymore, my psych professor at Wheaton. She insisted that sexual predestination was more a matter of conditioning, and that society shapes girls from birth to believe that it’s our inherent nature to tend to men and kids. Professor Claymore wasn’t against marriage—she just argued that what kind of marriage you have is a choice like any other, but that we’d been raised not to think we had one.”

  Clarice’s gaze turned skeptical. “That’s hardly novel,” she said crisply. “So give me credit for having thought about this one, too. Maybe some women will have great careers and be blissfully happy—far be it from me to get in their way, and it would be nice if men didn’t either. But I think the only way most career women won’t get stuck doing two jobs is not to have kids.

  “Most men want them. So what you’d get in the end is a lot of single, unhappy women with plenty of time to consider their regrets. Compare that to where we are now. We’ve been ‘stuck’ with a role that, by and large, is a better deal than men have. Or haven’t you noticed that they’re the ones who keel over from heart attacks after too many years spent as ‘man, the hunter,’ earning the money that allows their widows to mourn them without having to work?”

  “Didn’t turn out so well for Peter’s mom, did it? She’s pretty unhappy,”

  “That’s still better than how it turned out for Peter’s dad. He’s pretty dead.” Clarice sat back, clearly pleased with her argument. “Most women’s biggest job is to find a guy who’s reasonably attractive, hell at work, and pleasant enough at home, who’s also an adequate lover and doesn’t get sloppy drunk in public. You, Whitney Dane, don’t ever need to worry about that much. You and Peter have your dad to catch you before you fall.”

  Clarice was no visionary, Whitney thought, but she was a sharp observer, and dead practical. “You should write your own book, Clarice. The Anti-Feminist Mystique.”

  “Oh, I prefer to keep my wisdom to myself. It preserves my guise of innocent wonder when some guy is explaining to me how the world works.”

  The remark, Whitney realized, evoked her
mother’s advice about concealing her own opinions behind attentive listening. “I’ll remember that,” she said. “Speaking of male wisdom, did you read where the Pope condemned every form of birth control except the rhythm method?”

  Clarice rolled her eyes. “Thank God we’re not Catholic. What’s that old song, ‘I’ve got rhythm, I’ve got my girl, who could ask for anything more’? But what can you expect from a middle-aged virgin who looks like an accountant.”

  “Not much,” Whitney agreed. “As my dad would say, ‘if you don’t play the game, don’t make the rules.’ But I wonder if this Pope thinks God wants thousands of kids in Africa or Latin America starving to death.”

  Turning sideways, Clarice studied her friend. “You’re becoming very serious, I have to say.”

  “Am I? Most of this stuff doesn’t touch us, I know. But it hasn’t been that great a year, has it?”

  “So far it has for you.” Clarice paused again. “Forgive me, but I’m wondering if some of this comes from Ben. You’ve been spending enough time with him.”

  Nettled, Whitney retorted, “Now you’re sounding like my dad. Expose me to a different thought, and I’m a different person. Incapable as I am of thinking for myself.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it’s just coincidence,” Clarice said with a dubious smile. “But have you mentioned any of these thoughts to Peter?”

  This time it was Whitney who paused. “Not really, no.”

  “Then maybe you should, Whitney. He’s the one you’re marrying, after all.” Clarice stood, shortcutting the conversation. “Let’s finish out the set, best friend. I plan on running you ’til that leg of yours screams for mercy.”

  Later that afternoon, Peter flew out for the weekend.

  After dinner, he lay beside her in the chaise longue, tie unknotted, his air of fatigue underscored by the weariness beneath his eyes. Kissing him, Whitney murmured, “You look tired.”

  “I just need some sleep,” he acknowledged. “I worked late the last two nights. There’s still so much to learn.”