Leaving Sophie Dean

by Alexandra Whitaker

  “But how do they— Oh, I see!” Adam laughed and went over to touch the ladder that served as access to the upper level. It slid on a runner, like the kind used in libraries. “This must be great fun.”

  “Yes, they love it. And look at this. Like Murphy beds, except they’re desks. You just unfasten the catch, and the panel comes down—see?” There was one of these on each of the remaining two walls, staggered so that when the boys were working back-to-back, their chairs wouldn’t touch. “And when you don’t need them, they fold up flat against the wall to make extra play room. Ingenious, eh? I bought it all ready-made, and they came and installed it.”

  “Brilliant. Who gets the top bunk?”

  “They alternate weekends.”

  He nodded. “They must be delighted. You’ve made excellent use of this space. But where will you work?”

  “Well.” She snapped the light off and led him back into the kitchen. “In here for now.” She pointed to the futon set up provisionally under the window. “When I get my license, I’ll have to rent work space somewhere.” Maybe in L’s building, or maybe Rose or Jean would know of a place. She would find something, she knew. Problems of that size didn’t worry her anymore. “As a wise friend once told me, one problem is just a problem, but if you line up two problems in the right way, they often point toward a common solution. I paraphrase somewhat—my wise friend didn’t really understand her own adage, but that’s the sense I make of it. In this case, problem one: My apartment, which I adored and didn’t want to leave, was too small for both my children and my work. Problem two: Working from home was risky. Solution? Work elsewhere and use that room for the boys. Simple, right? But I was still blocked by two false assumptions. One, I was convinced that the room was too small for both children, and two, I thought I couldn’t pay two rents. I solved the first problem with ingenuity and the second… well, that’s easy. If I can’t work from home—or live at work—then I have to pay two rents. I was wrong to think the other option existed, so I adjusted my givens. I’ll just have to find somewhere not too expensive. And work very hard to pay for both!” She knelt down to smooth the cotton sheet covering the futon and arrange the flat pillow and few cushions around it. “Anyway, I like the idea of going out to work. As you said, leaving the house in the morning… having colleagues…” She patted the futon. “Take off your shoes and lie down here.”

  But he was roaming around examining things. He studied the meridian charts, the hairy cactus, the children’s drawings on the walls, the titles of the textbooks on her desk. At the glass door to the porch, he paused. “May I?” She nodded, and he stepped out and stood for some time in the moonlight. When he came back inside, he closed the door quietly. “This is a lovely place,” he said seriously. “It has a very good feeling. I’m glad you kept it on.”

  “Yes. So am I.”

  They stood facing each other for a moment, she looking at ease and he rather out of place. Then she said in a pleasant professional tone, “Have you had shiatsu before?”

  “You know I haven’t.”

  “No,” she said calmly. “I don’t know that. Well, you may feel tired afterward, and you’ll need to drink plenty of water to help eliminate the toxins. You may find you have vivid dreams tonight. In any case, take it easy tomorrow.” She studied his posture, his tongue, and his pulse, then made him take off his shoes and lie down on the futon faceup so she could diagnose his hara. It all confirmed what she had already guessed: weak kidney yang and a need to bolster chi. “All right. Now roll over onto your stomach.” He did so gingerly. “Turn your head—that’s right.”

  She knelt beside him, rubbed her hands together gently, favoring her injured left, and began by placing it comfortingly on his back. She moved through the routine smoothly, keeping reassuring contact with the mother hand while the child hand went seeking places of kyo and jitsu, emptiness and fullness, along his Bladder channel. She kept her hara open to his, using her energy to adjust the flow of his. Gradually, he relaxed and grew more receptive. When he turned onto his side, she rotated his arm to ease the shoulder, then hooked her fingers under his shoulder blade and leaned back, lifting it away from the spine. She did the Triple Burner and Small Intestine channels down his arms. He hummed appreciatively, then lay on his back while she did the Kidney channel along the insides of his legs, and finally she wrapped her hands in a silk scarf to work on his face and head. She ended the session by resting her hand on his hara and lifting it off slowly. “Now I’m going to ring a bell,” she said. “I want you to follow the vibrations for as long as you can.” She struck a pair of Chinese cymbals together, and a clear, sweet note lingered a long time in the air. Adam’s face looked lined, unshaven and peaceful; he was nearly asleep after another strenuous day. She slipped on her shoes, stepped out onto the porch, and leaned against the railing, breathing in the tepid night air.

  It was a mild night in May. The children would be out of school soon. The summer lay ahead with its promise of buckets and spades. The moon was bright, and so were the streetlights in the park, greening the leaves around them. She couldn’t quite see Adam’s house, but she knew it was there, just off to the left, and she could see a maple lit by what must be light from his bay window. It was comforting to think of her children asleep so close by—yet sad, too. On the other side of the park were Florence, Mercy, and Jean. They formed a triangle across the park: Sophie, her children, and her friends. And another triangle would be formed by Sophie, her children, and her work. Someone had said to her—Florence?—that a three-legged stool is best because it never wobbles. A tripod, three sturdy legs with a good, wide base: home, work, children. Rock solid. The succulent plants in their pots glowed palely, looking prehistoric in the moonlight. She reached out and touched the smooth, spiky-edged leaf of one that looked like a starfish.

  And there was Henry.

  There was Henry, too. She couldn’t think of him without smiling, and she had called to tell him so. He had been out, so she’d left a message: “Henry, my friend, I would like you to meet my children. How about a picnic next week?” Sophie, her children, and Henry; that made another triangle. And looking across the rooftops, she felt sure that she would become more widely and deeply connected over time, with links to more friends, and to her children’s friends, to new clients, new colleagues, and their friends, forming a network of interlocking triangles that would spread out over the city. And she would be in its center, safely anchored. A slight breeze wafted the scent of a night-blooming plant through the darkness.

  Adam’s voice came through the open door. “Good night.” There was the slightest inflection in it, the hint of an invitation to stop him from going. “Good night,” she answered quietly, without looking around. She heard the door open, then click shut, and she imagined him going along the hall, down the three flights of stairs, out the door, turning right, past two doors, turning left, across the street, and along the end of the park to his door on the left: a hundred and four steps home to where their children lay sleeping.

  * * *

  “So what now? I get stuck with the lonely-woman-at-the-top bullshit role? That hackneyed convention? Fuck that.” The evening sun shone on the rice-paper shade, and from around its edge yellow rays sliced into the room, striking Agatha’s coffee table and making the two glasses of red wine on it glitter. At one end of the white sofa, Valerie sat slumped, her arms crossed over her chest, and at the other, Agatha was curled up in a sympathetic position.

  “What’s Masterson like?” she asked, thoughtfully sliding a clean ashtray across the table to within Valerie’s reach.

  But Valerie seemed not to notice. “Oh. You know.”

  “It’s my fault. That ultimatum… I should never have made you do that.” The words produced a pinprick of pleasure in Agatha, but not the need to indulge in triumphal crowing. She thought her friend was looking thin and drawn and in need of protection.

  “No,” Valerie said. “It was time I got out of that situation. It was sordid being
with a man who went home to his wife every night, pretending I was glad I didn’t have to wash his socks. No, I did it because I thought you were right. I still do.”

  “I’m glad.”

  Valerie eyed her friend. “Look, it just so happens you were right this time, but it still counts as meddling in my affairs, so now it’s my turn. I get to play deus ex machina in your next affair.”

  “No thanks. You’re not screwing up this one.”

  “What, are you seeing someone?”

  “You probably don’t remember, but that night you had the crisis in the hotel, ages ago, I had a date?”

  “You did?”

  “Yeah, but I told you it didn’t matter, and instead of going out, I talked to you for an hour to calm you down. You were so upset about Adam.”

  “So what happened?”

  “I called him, but his phone was switched off, so I went late.”

  “And he was still there?”

  “No. He’d left.”

  “Just proves he didn’t deserve you.”

  “I was an hour and a half late to the restaurant! No one would have waited. I called the next day and apologized. I explained that my friend was having a crisis in her love life, and he said I would do better to look after my own love life.”

  “The nerve.”

  “No, I think he was right.”

  “Oh do you?”

  “Anyway, we’ve been seeing each other ever since.” Agatha smiled and sort of hugged herself, looking, Valerie thought, very smug. Or—damn it, why did she always have to be so bitchy?—maybe Agatha was just happy.

  “Really? Well, well. You’ve been keeping very quiet about this. So. What’s he like? Tell all. Starting with the physical.”

  Agatha smiled in that inward-looking way of lovers that excludes the rest of the world. “I think he’s cute.”

  “Uh-oh. ‘Cute’ is usually code for ‘chubby and balding.’”

  But Agatha just laughed, invulnerable in love.

  “Yes? Come on, more details. Age?”

  “Forty-four.”

  “Married? Divorced?”

  “Single.”

  “Forty-four and single? What’s wrong with him?”

  “God, Valerie, you might as well ask what’s wrong with us!”

  “We’re not forty-four. Not yet. But okay, I’ll rephrase that. Why do you suppose he never married?”

  “Well, there are several things. A difficult mother, for one.”

  “Okay, I get it. A mama’s boy.”

  “Not anymore. Mama died. Wasn’t it considerate of her to die while I’m still of childbearing age? Just.”

  Valerie looked closely at her friend for the first time since she’d arrived. Then she studied the room. There was a “new look” of some kind going on. “So this is serious?”

  “I think so. I hope so.”

  “And your latest gimmick? You’re now—what? I’m looking, and I’m noting the roughly woven brown clothing, the wispy hair swept back in rustic combs. I’m registering wildflowers wilting in folksy jam jars—we’re, what, tree hugging now? We’re talking some kind of Return to Gaea?”

  Agatha threw back her head and laughed. “I guess you could say that! What I want now are Real Things. Genuine Things. No doubt this will turn out to be my most superficial phase of all!” Laughing at herself like that, Agatha looked suddenly very pretty.

  “Does this guy have an interesting job?”

  “Not especially. But I don’t mind. What I’m looking for is a kind, intelligent man who cares for me and who’s ready to start a family.”

  “Oh, Agatha, not that! Kind and intelligent are fine, but what ever happened to sexy, dynamic, and brilliant? And a man who cares for you? What’s wrong with adores you? Worships you! Agatha, it’s not too late! You don’t have to panic and settle for second best.”

  “But it’s not second best. That’s what I’ve come to realize. It’s what I want. And it’s a lot. Think about it: a kind, intelligent man who really cares about you and wants a family. That’s everything! We’re not teenagers anymore, to be sitting around dreaming up meaningless lists of superlatives to describe the movie star we’re going to marry someday. This is real. Arthur is real.”

  “Arthur?”

  “This is Life. This is Real. Not just sitting alone in my apartment pretending things, playing to an audience that isn’t there. This is what I want. A real man, real love, warm babies to snuggle.”

  A vision flashed into Valerie’s mind of herself as the favorite “spinster aunt” of Agatha’s children, thoughtfully included in their family gatherings so she wouldn’t spend holidays alone. Funny old Auntie Valerie, bearing gifts, everyone kind to her, the fifth wheel, poor thing, she was once so beautiful. She felt a geographic shift under her feet, like the separation of two continents, their friendship groaning and creaking and slowly drifting in a new direction, she who was once the leader growing caustic and shriveled, passed up by the vigorous wife and mother, glowing with womanly fulfillment. “Am I allowed to meet this paragon?”

  “Sure.” Agatha took Valerie’s hand and squeezed it.

  Valerie hesitated, then returned the pressure. “I see. So we’re not going to be two gals catting around town this summer, drinking and whoring, now that my affair has ended. What a disappointment. Think about it, Ag—picnics out at Tanglewood listening to the symphony orchestra, cannoli at the Vittoria, running down to Newport for the weekend…”

  “I can cat around town. I’ll just pass on the whoring.”

  They sipped wine in silence, and then Valerie said, “You’re not very observant, are you? I spotted those jam jars, but you haven’t noticed anything new about me.”

  Agatha’s sharp eyes raked her friend from her haircut down to her shoes.

  “No, you’re cold,” Valerie said. “It’s not anything I have, it’s something I don’t have.” Smiling, she wiggled the two first fingers of her right hand. Fingers that were normally holding—

  “You’ve quit smoking?”

  Valerie nodded, still smiling. “‘I don’t smoke,’ is what I say, not ‘I quit’—I’m doing this thing right.”

  “I can’t believe it! Congratulations! But my God, why?”

  “Matthew. He was worried about me, and there’s something about a child telling you not to smoke that…” She stopped, laughed, and wiped a tear from her eye. “When even a five-year-old knows it’s dangerous and stupid, it’s time to act. And hell, I’m almost forty. I’d better start taking care of myself—doesn’t look like anyone else will. It was meant to be a surprise for Matthew, but then… Well, I decided to quit anyway.”

  “I’m amazed! But you smoked like a chimney. Isn’t it hard?”

  “Shit, no. I can do anything.” She changed her position on the sofa and also the subject. “I’m happy for you, Aggie. I really am. You and… Arthur.” Then she made an unflattering transition in her mind on the topic of “unlikely people who are finding partners” and said, “Oh, big news! You’ll never guess who’s getting remarried.”

  “Adam? He’s going back to his wife?”

  “Oh. No. Not that I know of. Although he might as well. You know, she’s probably a very nice woman, actually.”

  Agatha opened her mouth in delighted disbelief. “Do you mean that?”

  “Yeah. But go on, keep guessing. Who’s getting married? Give up? My mother.”

  “You’re kidding! That’s great! Who’s the guy?”

  “I don’t know. But here’s the thing, she’s invited my father. So she’s known all this time where he was. Wants to rub it in his face, I guess. Not that he’ll come to the wedding, of course. Not that I care if he comes or not.” She held up her hand to block any comment from Agatha. “And I know what you’re going to say. That I have ‘unresolved father issues.’”

  “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  “Yes you were.”

  “I wasn’t. But… do you?”

  “I knew it! I knew you were going
to say that. Oh, go on, open another bottle, why don’t you?” Valerie rubbed her hand through her hair, ruffling it up. “I don’t know, Ag, I guess I’m just drunk and morose and pissed off, but this game of musical chairs… I mean all this finding-a-partner stuff. The music goes on and on, and I’m dancing around, but someday the music is going to stop, and we know there are more people than chairs! What’s going to happen in the final scramble? God, even you’ve got a chair now. No, wait, I didn’t mean it like that. You know what I mean—my best friend, the person I’ve done everything with up to now.”

  “I’m not married yet, you know,” Agatha said in the voice of a woman already planning Valerie’s maid-of-honor outfit.

  Valerie searched her friend’s face. “What if I get left standing? What if the music stops and there are no more chairs? For the first time in my life, I’m realizing that could actually happen! To me! To smart, beautiful me!”

  “It could happen,” Agatha said, and Valerie felt her stomach lurch with cold fear; she had been so sure that Agatha would deny it. “Anything could happen. Your life could take any direction, any day. Just make up your mind that whatever happens, it’ll be something good. Convince yourself of that. Right now. Use willpower to decide that everything is going to work out fine.”