‘Sit, talk,’ he said.
She allowed herself to lurch very slightly as she sat down in the heavy wooden armchair in front of the desk, her skirt rising, just as she’d practiced, to reveal the razored skin just above her knees.
His eyes absorbed everything, from the lurch to the scabbing-over tail-ends of the cuts.
She hated every aspect of this encounter: the play-acting, the necessary deceit, his calculating aspect, his long-suffering demeanor. Keep it together, she told herself. She was fighting for the right to live her life. Just remember you’re doing what needs to be done.
She could tell that he smelled her alcohol-tainted exhalations, and his eyes kept returning to the cuts. It was all going according to plan. He was taking the bait, just as she’d anticipated he would.
‘Are you drunk, Faith?’ he asked, showing no anger, only curiosity.
‘Oh, no,’ she said quickly, then dropped her eyes, adding, ‘I just had a small drink for courage.’
‘Courage for what?’
‘Because I need to talk to you. It isn’t easy.’ So true. She vowed she would never make anyone feel the way he made her feel; she would never be so oblivious to what was right in front of her.
‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Talk to me.’ He sat back in his chair, hooking his thumbs under his red suspenders, a display of expansiveness combined with skeptical interest. ‘Tell me what’s got you so nervous.’ She couldn’t help but marvel at the mannerisms he’d acquired over the years, as if he’d seen too many second-rate actors playing doctors in made-for-TV movies. There seemed to be nothing authentic left of him. He was putting on his own performance here. They were two actors without an audience, each trying to upstage the other. She would have to be the more convincing one.
She swallowed, and took a deep, shuddery breath that was genuine. ‘I need a place of my own, Stefan. And I need to be closer to school. Commuting every day . . . it’s hard.’
‘It’s a half-hour drive each way. How hard can that be?’
‘I-95 is a nightmare. You’d have to experience it to know just how much of a nightmare it is what with the truck traffic and everyone speeding.’ He rarely did any highway driving but she could tell he was unimpressed by this argument, so she shifted direction. ‘I need a place of my own.’ She kept her eyes on his. ‘I want a place of my own.’ Don’t you cry! she warned herself. Don’t give him the satisfaction of seeing you crumble.
‘I see. What you’re saying is you want to live on your own.’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘And what’s brought this on, all of a sudden?’ So patronizing. For a few seconds, she wanted to lean across the desk and smack him, jolt him into reality, into awareness. He was still in there, somewhere. He was; he had to be. If this current persona, this replica of his gelid unyielding mother had subsumed the original Stefan, Faith had no chance of reaching him.
She was experiencing a sudden rise in her body temperature and had to take a few moments to remain calm. ‘It’s not “all of a sudden,”’ she said quietly. ‘I’ve wanted this for a long time.’
‘So why haven’t you said anything?’
Again, she said, ‘Stefan, it’s not easy to talk to you.’ Her tone was too sharp. She brought it down a notch. ‘It’s not easy to talk to you, or your parents, but you in particular because my relationship is with you, not with them. The thing is, anything I say in this house could wind up in a book. It’s already happened once. Knowing it could happen again makes me self-conscious and nervous.’
‘It shouldn’t,’ he said reasonably.
God! There it was again: the lack of empathy. ‘Maybe to your way of thinking it shouldn’t, but it does. It was hard enough when I was a little kid living with just one doctor and his wife’ – she felt a sudden pang, missing Monica – ‘but it’s really tough with three doctors. I feel as if I have no privacy.’
‘Of course you do,’ he argued. ‘You have your own suite.’
‘I’m not talking about rooms, Stefan. I’m talking about my life. I need my own place and control of my own money. I don’t even get to see the financial statements. I have no idea what I’ve actually got.’
He leaned forward at this, elbows on the desk, chin resting on his folded hands, eyes narrowing slightly. ‘It’s substantial. I don’t know that you’re capable of handling . . .’
Sensing what was coming, needing to derail him from going in that direction, she said, ‘Excuse me for a minute,’ got up and walked out of the room. She went to the liquor cabinet in the living room and took another swallow of the Scotch, shuddered at the burn of it going down, then returned to the ‘library.’ Three rows of reference books and a stack of journals, plus the numerous foreign editions of The Stolen Child hardly constituted a library. Why couldn’t he just call it his office?
‘What was that?’ he asked, as she slipped back into the chair.
‘What was what?’
‘What did you just do?’
‘I had another drink. I needed it. Talking to you . . .’ Abandoning the pretense all at once, needing to know, she asked, ‘What happened to you, Stefan? I remember the first time we met, when I was at the hospital. You were nice to me; you were sweet to me. We sat on the floor together and played a game.’ Her voice wobbled and tears were dangerously close to the spilling point. ‘I know it was part of the analysis but that doesn’t matter. You were a thoughtful man, someone kind, someone who listened to me. I really don’t know you now.’
Appearing embarrassed, as if being reminded of his younger self was a burdensome bit of his evolutionary history, he gruffly pointed out, ‘You were a small child.’
‘Yes, I was,’ she agreed. ‘But I haven’t changed – I haven’t been allowed to change. I just got older. You’ve changed, though.’
‘What are you suggesting?’
‘I’m not suggesting. I’m stating a fact. You’re not a kind or thoughtful person anymore. You’re Doctor Lazarus, co-author of a best-selling book about that child – who just happens to be me. But I’m not the resident stolen child anymore. I’m grown up, I’m a person!’ she cried, her wobbly voice betraying her. ‘I want my life! I don’t want to be constantly watched, in case I say or do anything of interest, something book-worthy. I just want to be left alone, to let the past be the past.’
‘You’re drunk,’ he said quietly, a measure of sadness entering his tone.
‘Maybe,’ she allowed. ‘Probably. I’m not happy, Stefan. Drinking makes it all more manageable.’
He sat studying her for a time, as she fought to maintain a grip on her emotions. If she lost it and went to pieces, he might never let her go. She couldn’t be sure she was getting through to him. It was like psychological surgery.
All at once what had taken place more than a dozen years earlier in the pediatric interview room came back to him in its entirety, every detail crisp, vivid. And he remembered how deeply ashamed he’d been of his arrogant assumptions, and how tender that tiny damaged child had been. She’d comforted him; she’d patted his shoulder and told him it was all right.
And what had he done for her since then? Nothing really, beyond providing the basics: room and board, an education, health and dental benefits – as if she were no more than a live-in employee. But back then he’d helplessly allowed her to minister to him and he’d grieved for the terrible losses she’d suffered. And subsequently, when he’d brought her home after each hospital stay, he was saddened by the physical damage that had necessitated three rounds of surgery and her resulting inability ever to bear children. She’d been stolen and badly harmed. Yet throughout it all she had remained a clever, caring child, eager to learn, able even to laugh.
Gazing at her now, realizing that she had also suffered at his hands and those of his parents, he wondered how he could have forgotten that initial meeting. How had he managed to misplace his recall of the tidal emotion she’d aroused in him, and the sudden knowledge that he had very little to bring to the table? The child had more lif
e experience than he did; she had more understanding of pain, of betrayal, of the often casual cruelty of people, than he did. She was fearful yet remarkably brave and truthful. He’d known at their first meeting that he was not up to the job of dealing competently with her. Yet he’d gone forward regardless, sensing that he could profit from his involvement with her. And he had profited. In truth, he had made much use of her, just as her kidnappers had. Only the manner of use was different. But, use was use. Indisputable. And he’d been rewarded with international recognition and a third of the substantial income derived from the perennial bestseller he’d penned with his parents. The only honorable thing he’d done was to put half his share of the income from the book into her trust fund.
But early on self-interest had blinded him. And his parents had always been blind, even to each other. They co-existed under forbearance, probably because few other people would have tolerated either one of them. They were cold, clinically detached people who claimed to live lives of the mind. They were disdainful of those who lived emotional lives, which was why they were teachers and not practicing psychiatrists. The cool intellect was God. And that belief rendered them incapable of being of therapeutic value to others.
They should never have become parents, he realized now. They had no patience – not with each other, with their students, or with him. As a youngster he’d learned not to seek them out with his hurts or problems. Until she died when he was eleven, he went upstairs to his grandmother, his father’s mother, for soft Russian-accented words of consolation and understanding, for gentle hands, warm embraces, the scent of Chanel No. 5, and a welcoming lap and illicit sweets. He never fully recovered from the loss of her and even now she sometimes came to him in dreams from which he awakened quietly bereft, with a deep ache of longing in his chest.
He’d never loved his parents the way his few friends loved theirs. He respected and feared their authority, admired their austere but handsome features, and their academic accomplishments. So he’d worked hard to win the approval of his ever-elegant, stately mother (hair in a careful knot, cashmere sweaters, pearl necklaces, dark suits with slim skirts, low-heeled pumps on long, narrow feet) and his perpetually frowning father (short-back-and-sides with a touch of brilliantine, Brooks Brothers button-down shirts under Shetland pullovers, gray flannel slacks and navy blazer, Bass loafers) and ultimately he’d succeeded – to a degree – by sacrificing this girl to their inspection. And they went avidly at his offering, almost drooling at the tasty morsel he’d brought into their lives.
She had become a permanent reference source in the house. Not a person. She had taken over his position as the observable resident specimen. But to her credit she had never capitulated to his parents the way he had. Always polite, always accommodating but always keeping a little distance, she had never shared her innermost thoughts with them. She had learned at a very early age to conceal herself in plain view. She had gone to Connie in much the same way he had gone to his bubbe.
And now he also realized with a jolt of understanding that Faith was the only person in the household who did genuinely live a life of the mind. His parents were poseurs, generally respected but almost universally disliked by their peers. And he’d abandoned his practice to join up with them, acquiring props and mannerisms en route: the beard, the suspenders, the abrupt and dismissive manner of dealing with people. No wonder Faith found it hard to talk to him. He’d been so busy attempting to emulate his parents that he’d lost most of his best qualities. He had become the polar opposite of his grandmother’s beloved and lovable boychik.
He looked at Faith now and experienced again a strong degree of the heartbreak that had overwhelmed him years ago in that interview room. He was indebted to this girl and felt now a sudden, powerful sense of obligation to her.
‘Faith,’ he said softly, ‘I think you’re right. I think you do need to have a place of your own. And I’ll agree to give you what you want if you’ll do something for me.’
Instantly hope-filled, aware that he’d undergone some sort of transformation, she said, ‘What?’
‘I’d like you to go for residential treatment.’
She blinked slowly. This was not unexpected and very reasonable, given the extent of her performance. She had convinced him. But more than that she’d managed to call him back – perhaps only temporarily – from that place he’d gone to soon after he’d brought her home to the cozy little house he’d shared with Monica. ‘Where?’ she asked.
‘I know of a good place upstate, near Kent. I’m confident I can make a phone call and get you in. If you’ll do the program and get yourself sober, I’ll arrange to sign off on the guardianship and as executor of your trust fund.’
‘How long would I have to stay there?’ she asked, hoping not to miss any school. She was trying to do her BA in two and a half years. She couldn’t afford to lose any credits.
‘I think it’s two weeks, maybe three. I believe you need twenty-four hours without drinking before they’ll accept you. That would mean the day after tomorrow. But I’ll know more after I phone up there and speak to someone in admissions. Will you do it?’
‘What about your parents?’ she asked. ‘Won’t they have something to say about it?’
‘Actually, no,’ he answered. ‘I’m your legal guardian for another few months, but that’s merely a technicality. My parents have no legal standing where you’re concerned. I am responsible for your well-being and, frankly, I don’t think I’ve done too great a job of it. I’d like to try to make it up to you and this would be the first step. Will you go?’
It was an apology. She could scarcely believe it, but she certainly wasn’t going to reject it. All at once he resembled the man who’d broken into tears in that room with all the mirrors; she remembered how surprised she’d been, only in the past day or two having ever seen grown-ups cry. ‘What kind of place is it?’
‘It’s upstate in the mountains. They have an excellent track record. And if we can get you in right away, because it’s coming up to the Christmas break, you won’t miss more than a few days of classes, if any. If you’ll let me, I’d like to drive you up there, get you settled.’
‘Okay,’ she agreed, reasoning that it couldn’t possibly hurt her. As long as she was out of this house, away from his parents, it was a major step in the right direction. ‘I’ll do it. But will you promise me that if I go there and complete the program you’ll let me take charge of myself when I’m finished?’
For the first time in years, he smiled at her. He was suddenly present, no longer posturing or performing. ‘I will put it in writing and have it notarized,’ he promised. Then, the smile dimming away, he said, ‘It’s the least I can do. I think I’ve done you more harm than good. It’s . . .’ He shook his head sadly.
‘I think you meant to do good.’
For the second time in his experience with her, he was choked with sorrow for the losses suffered by this misleadingly frail young woman. ‘I’m sorry, Faith,’ he said. ‘I never intended to make you so unhappy. Somewhere along the way everything got very mixed up.’
‘You should get your own place, too, Stefan,’ she said sagely. ‘Maybe you’d be happier.’
He could only stare at her, once again able to see the old, sympathetic soul gazing out at him through the dark windows of her eyes. ‘I’d forgotten what a sympathetic and generous person you are,’ he admitted. ‘I won’t ever make that mistake again. I hope you’ll allow me to go on being a part of your life.’
‘Of course I will. You’re the only parent I’ve ever known.’
He couldn’t respond to that or he risked breaking down, so he addressed the practicalities. ‘I’ll continue to pay your school fees, the cost of your stay for treatment, and all your expenses,’ he added. ‘So don’t worry about any of that.’
‘Thank you, Stefan. I appreciate it.’ Everything inside her had lifted, was rising buoyantly. She was going to be free. More than that, the man she’d first known had reappeared and wa
s looking at his surroundings with visible dismay. And she knew with certainty that he was going to move out, too. She and Stefan were going to leave his parents on their own to figure out how to live alone again.
FIFTEEN
Hay’s eyes were caught and then helplessly kept returning to the young girl alone at a table at the far end of the barn. She didn’t look old enough to be there, but of course she had to be. The age limit was eighteen. Long brown hair and shapeless black clothes gave her a frail, waif-like appearance and she had a sorrowing aura that relentlessly drew his attention.
He couldn’t help noting that she waited until almost everyone had been through the food line before she came down the length of the room to the serving window. Up close he studied her pale, delicate features and deep brown eyes, the glossy dark hair that fell forward from a center parting and partially concealed her face. This, he thought, was a child in hiding. He felt immediately protective of her, touched by her state of distraction.
‘How about some of this perfectly roasted chicken?’ he asked, drawing her attention.
Faith tuned in to see a big, bearded fellow smiling at her. In a food-splattered apron, with a blue-printed kerchief tied over a red-brown ponytail, he looked like a cheerful lumberjack. He had clear grey-green eyes, warm with kindness.
She looked down at the aromatic array of food and said, ‘Yes, please.’
‘White or dark?’
‘Either is fine, thank you,’ she answered.
‘Excellent. And some nice buttery mashed potatoes with a hint of dill?’
She couldn’t help returning his smile. ‘Yes, please.’
Encouraged, he asked, ‘Perhaps a soupçon of green beans?’
Still smiling, she said, ‘Oui, merci, monsieur.’
‘Il me fait plaisir, mademoiselle.’ He made a demi-bow, saying, ‘Hayward, à votre service.’
Where is the Baby? Page 15
