Leaving Sophie Dean

by Alexandra Whitaker

  Incredulity moved Sophie to speak at last. “A little holiday?”

  He glanced away uncomfortably. “There’s no point in upsetting them unnecessarily. We can let them know gradually, over time.” Then, with renewed vigor, “It’s them we have to think of, Sophie. The good of the boys.”

  Sophie stared. “You must love her very much.”

  “She has nothing to do with it. If our marriage had been a success, no third person could have made any difference. The problem is us, Sophie, you and me, and this wretched automatons’ life we lead. Let’s not look for a scapegoat, shall we? She’s beside the point.”

  Sophie spoke slowly, trying to work it out. “But… if that’s true, why did you leave me pictures of her?”

  Mercifully for Adam, the front door burst open and the boys dashed in, Matthew announcing excitedly, “Daddy, Marion has a new cat named Trudy! She has scratchy paws!” To illustrate, Hugo struck a pose with his fingers curled like claws.

  Adam laid a hand on top of each boy’s head. “That’s wonderful, boys.” To Sophie he said, “I’d better get going. Don’t wait up. I’ll… be back late.”

  Blankly, she watched him leave. Then she sank into a kitchen chair, and Matthew climbed onto her lap, chattering unheeded about Marion’s cat, while Sophie grappled with the knowledge that her husband, Adam, had just left to see his lover, and she, his wife, knew it, and there was nothing to stop him, and nothing she could do about it, because all the rules had suddenly changed. Adam could walk out of the house now and have sex with someone else, while she stayed here and made dinner for the children they had decided to have together—and now all of that was somehow all right. Because the deal was off. There was no more agreement. His fingers had been crossed behind his back all along. “Mommy,” Hugo said, “I’m hungry. What’s for supper?”

  The evening routine lay ahead, ineluctable. Dinner, bath, pajamas, books (half an hour’s worth), then bed (kiss, kiss, door ajar, night-light on). From now on, Adam’s life would be almost completely different. But her life—incredibly—would remain almost exactly the same.

  Except, of course, that she would be alone.

  * * *

  Each time Adam stepped into Valerie’s apartment, he felt himself a different man, and a man he vastly preferred: sophisticated, sexy, clever, and keen. With Valerie, Adam felt like a winner, eager to tackle new work, capable of great achievement. Her ambition was contagious, as was her real enjoyment of the spoils of hard work. That’s all there was with Valerie: work and pleasure. So refreshing to live that way, so sharp and crackling!

  Whereas at home… Oh, God, with Sophie, Adam felt harassed and inadequate. Work, to Valerie, meant only work on architectural projects. But work in the Dean home also included household maintenance and child care—chores of which, whether or not he actually pitched in, Adam was uncomfortably aware. The execution of such tasks was unpleasant enough; the guilty disquiet of avoiding them was more than anyone should have to bear. So discouraging to be unable to enjoy a drink after work, all because you have a nagging feeling you should be making a kite! And the less Sophie complained about shouldering most of the burden, the more of a heel he felt, which, if it is true, as some say, that we love others for how they make us feel about ourselves, was a big strike against Sophie. Her willingness and good cheer worked very much against her. Yes, work, at home, was endless and ungratifying, and as for “pleasure”… well… Jaunts had to include the children and were usually geared to them. It took forever to get out of the house, what with the lengthy packing of bags to provide against every contingency and the last-minute drinks and pees, and no sooner were they under way at last than it was time to stop again for more drinks and more pees. Progress was slow, the distance covered little, and when stock was taken at the end of the hectic, messy day, the success of the excursion was rated by such things as “the look on Matthew’s face,” ephemeral in the extreme in Adam’s view, but sufficient satisfaction, it seemed, for Sophie. Adam would come home dropping with that peculiar kind of exhaustion one gets from moving too slowly, like being trapped in a crowd of shuffling old ladies on a long museum tour. And was the day over? No! There were still the children to catch, feed, wash, clothe, read to, and tuck in, that inexorable routine, the parents’ ball and chain.

  Adam sank gratefully into Valerie’s sofa, noting with approval the large number of breakable or dangerous objects placed down low in this house of adults. This evening he was in the mood for listening to Bach and sipping whiskey, but the knowledge that he could, if he wanted to, suddenly dash off to a child-unfriendly place like the opera lent a tingling sense of possibility to the promise of a quiet evening at home—this last being yet another thing not to be had chez Dean. Doing something and doing nothing are the two things you can never do when you have young children. You can neither achieve anything nor relax. Days are crammed full of hectic activity yet utterly empty of worthwhile content. Adam was brooding on these matters, weighing his two lives, reassuring himself of the wisdom, the inevitability, of his decision and yet feeling ill at ease and obscurely angry. He watched Valerie poring over some architectural drawings at the table. She raked a lock of hair behind her ear and narrowed her eyes in concentration. She was still wearing the sleek black dress and stockings she’d worn to work. Her only concession to being home was that she had kicked off her shoes and messed up her hair by tugging at it while thinking. It was one of the many things Adam loved about her, that she didn’t change clothes after work. She felt perfectly at ease in her elegant, sexy clothes, dressing as a matter of course in a way that for Sophie would constitute “dressing up” for a party or a rare night out. Poor old Sophie in her T-shirts and jeans, skirts and sweaters. Pretty, of course. Adam sighed and poured himself another drink. Pretty and practical. “Well scrubbed.” Whereas Valerie… chic, confident, conquering. And sexy as she was, she was also refreshingly masculine, in her aggression, her ambition, her willingness to take risks, to make spur-of-the-moment decisions and shoulder the consequences. Her boldness, yes, that was attractive to Adam, but equally so was her vulnerability, the fearful child that still dwelled in her and needed his protection and reassurance. Such wonderful extremes of toughness and tenderness, so breathtakingly seductive when combined. Valerie was richly and darkly layered, with startling contrasts concealed in her depths. Sophie had no layers. Sophie was homogenized, wholesome goodness through and through, efficient, considerate, kind. Adam’s eyes drifted back to Valerie, and he marveled that this sleek and complex creature was now his own. But he also felt… uneasy. No other word for it. In spite of his self-congratulatory thoughts, he was inclined this evening to brood.

  Valerie looked up from her work to gaze at Adam, her prize, settled on her sofa as if he belonged there, which of course he did now. She considered his familiar face—his high, flat cheeks and long mouth, his furrowed brow and wavy hair, graying slightly—with a proprietary feeling that was new. He was looking sweetly sad and pensive, poor baby, frowning into his whiskey glass, as well he might on the night he had left his wife and children. If he had been in the mood to celebrate, he wouldn’t have been the man Valerie loved. She knew better than to intrude on his thoughts with annoying babble meant to cheer him up. In a while she would go to him and they would talk quietly about the serious events taking place in their lives. Until then she would leave him to reflect and to admire her profile. She was conscious of looking rather fetching as she sat there, intent on her drawings, occasionally biting her pencil like a schoolgirl. It was not the moment to interrupt his thoughts, and, more to the point, she was busy, putting the last touches on a project that had occupied her heart as well as her mind for the past months.

  She had started it a few weeks after the beginning of their affair, when she was at home alone and feeling the first twinges of the other-woman syndrome: jealousy, self-pity, and resentment. At this rate she would soon be moping about having to spend Christmas alone, the classic mistress’s lament. It wasn’t that Valer
ie felt a deep need to be the one to wash Adam’s socks; on the contrary, she was alert to the dangers of numbing domestic routine, having seen its effect on her parents’ marriage. She had never blamed her father for deserting them; it was her mother she despised for being so dull and dowdy that she was incapable of holding on to the man Valerie so desperately needed in her life. Nor had she resented her father’s mistress; there was nothing wrong with a single woman’s testing the strength of the marriage bonds of the attractive married men around her. If those bonds were solid, she would get nowhere—fair enough. And if they were flimsy, they deserved to be broken. Adam had tumbled into her arms, proof that their affair was destined. No, a guilty conscience wasn’t Valerie’s problem, and neither was a craving for cozy domesticity. It was simply that she wanted more.

  More attention, more time, more company. At first, secrecy had had its thrills, but there was something undignified about it, and it was frankly inconvenient. The inequality of their relationship bothered her; he had another whole life away from her, whereas she had nothing that excluded him. She gave all of herself; he gave a small part. She didn’t relish sinking into the role of sulking mistress, so she had set to work on a project designed to lift her spirits: sketching the dream apartment—completely imaginary and therefore unfettered by considerations of space and cost—in which she and Adam would someday live. It was crazy, she knew, but still wonderfully consoling, and the drawings served as a springboard for dozens of fantasies about their future life together. Work always cheered her up, and as the floor plans began to take shape, her enthusiasm and determination grew. It even crossed her mind that she might bring about some white magic: If the apartment she designed were good enough, Adam would leave his wife and come to live in it. It was a relief to feel she was actively helping things along, if only by voodoo. And if she could do white magic, why not black? One evening she imagined that each time she set her pencil to paper, Adam would experience another feeling of disillusionment with Sophie and his thoughts would stray longingly to her. With the aid of the magic house plans, she would loosen the grip of his present life on him and pull him, slowly but irresistibly, toward her.

  So it was natural that on Adam’s first evening in her house as her very own man, Valerie should turn to her house plans—now perfected in nearly every detail—and glory in their victory. During all those months, she had never mentioned them to him, partly from embarrassment, partly superstitious fear that talking about them might eradicate their power.

  She tapped the pages straight and glanced through them one last time, feeling shy all of a sudden. It was a simple apartment, really; lots of daydreaming had been necessary to spin out work on it for so long. It was light and airy, mainly open plan, occupying the top two floors of some charming Back Bay building. Downstairs, the larger space included a living area, a dining area, and a kitchen, and the smaller space combined a bedroom, a dressing room, and a bathroom, all flowing together en suite. One of Valerie’s convictions was that a bathroom should be a room of good size and a pleasant place to spend an evening, alone or à deux, with music and pictures and space around the large bathtub for setting down books and drinks. From the living area, a staircase led up to another open space above, this one an immense architecture studio with exposures on all four sides as well as skylights. Sitting on top of the world with views all around them, they would feel like gods, so creation would take place as a matter of course. They would each work at one end, close enough for a sense of camaraderie but distant enough not to contaminate each other’s creative aura. The studio opened onto a long balcony overhanging a terrace accessible from the living space downstairs, and both looked out over the surrounding rooftops. Valerie judged the apartment to be nearly perfect in terms of spaciousness and elegance, and also practicality—built-in storage space ran along both sides of the entire length of the one interior wall. However, as an architect, Adam would also want to make some contribution, naturally enough, so she would defer to him on a couple of questions with obvious answers. Tact, it was called.

  “About staircases, Adam, how do you feel about a broad, curving open tread? I think that gives such a gracious, airy feel. A staircase should be a focal point, don’t you think—the spinal column of the house and all?” She smiled. “Or would you prefer something dark and cramped?”

  He frowned. “What?”

  “Come and look at this, darling.” Here we go. Silly to be so nervous.

  He stood behind her and peered at the plans. “What is this?”

  “It’s our ideal future home.” She felt such need of his approval that it was a struggle to keep her tone casual. “What do you think?”

  “It’s what?”

  “Our home! Where we’ll live someday. You and me!” She had spoken rather sharply, so she added a little laugh.

  He frowned and studied the drawings more closely while she held her breath. But far too soon, he wandered away. “We’ll need a room for the boys,” he said over his shoulder. “They’ll be spending time with us, you know.”

  “Well, of course!” She struggled to hide her consternation. “I… I wanted to get your ideas on that.”

  “A lot of wasted space in that bathroom. Could put it there.”

  Oh, right, wreck the bathroom and the whole flow of movement and light, to say nothing of their privacy. And what, dared she ask, would a boys’ bedroom look like? Bunk beds, plaid sheets, and dinosaur posters, perhaps?

  But… this was not the moment to contradict him. “Mmm,” she said, in an arcing tone that might have meant, By golly, I guess we could put the boys’ bedroom there!

  But then again, it might have meant anything.

  * * *

  Sophie sat, still at the kitchen table, in a state of narcotized bemusement. The children had wandered off to play, come back to inspect the kitchen for signs of dinner and, finding none, wandered away again. This had happened several times. The thought that she had to make dinner ran through her mind repeatedly, but without sparking off the least action on her part. She sat looking at the bare tabletop in dazed amazement at her inability to move. It was the first time since she had become a mother that she had sat doing nothing when something needed doing. And slowly the realization came to her that she could not do it. She could not make dinner. What was more, and this was more puzzling, she could not make herself care. The children, my children, are hungry, she told herself, trying to instill a sense of urgency strong enough to overcome her inertia, but instead she laughed out loud. Her weird laughter made Matthew apprehensive. He and his brother had been standing quietly at the door for some time, watching her. “Hugo’s hungry,” he said finally.

  “Then sit down,” Sophie said gaily, “and we’ll eat!”

  They sat and waited. “What?” Matthew asked eventually. “What is there to eat?”

  “Well… we’re going to…” Sophie’s voice died away as she hunted for inspiration and found it. “Have a picnic! That’s it, a picnic. Here’s how we’ll do it. You can take turns going to the fridge and taking out something you want to eat. Hugo, you go first. Anything you want, but just one thing at a time.” Hesitant at first, they quickly caught on to this interesting new game, and in minutes the table was piled with food and the children were enchanted. “Okay,” Sophie said. “Now we eat.”

  “But we don’t have plates.”

  “We don’t have forks!”

  “It doesn’t matter on a picnic. Look.” She scooped a pickle out of a jar with her fingers and crunched it between her teeth. “See?” They did see, and they busied themselves building elaborate sandwiches while she looked on, smiling dreamily.

  At bath time she knelt beside the tub and splashed them with both hands, hard, laughing. Amazed by this infringement of the rules, they splashed back until she was drenched. Then, following their long-established tradition, once the shampoo was well worked in, she twisted and shaped their lathered hair into foamy horns and held the hand mirror up so the little devils could admire themse
lves. It was only having horns that made hair washing bearable. Last came the anxious-making part of the bath: rinsing out the shampoo. Fearful but obedient, they tipped their heads well back, and she carefully poured water from a pitcher over their heads. The rule was that if a trickle got into their eyes, they were to shout, “Eye! Eye!” and she would shriek and fumble hastily for a towel to dab their faces, pretending to be in a panic that always made them laugh. The bath ran its normal course, ending, that evening like every other, with Hugo’s solemn proclamation, “Bath is over.” Then she bundled their firm, slippery, wet bodies into towels and hugged them to her tightly.