The Last Time They Met

by Anita Shreve

  —Sex makes you ravenous, he said, and immediately hated himself for it. Reducing what they’d had moments earlier to an experience she might have shared with any man, might daily share with the man named Peter.

  She understood the slip and lightly corrected him. That wasn’t sex, she said.

  He sat beside her on the bed and wanted to make love again. Wanted to touch her shoulders and feel between her legs. Would a honeymoon be like this? he wondered. He didn’t know, not ever having had a true one of his own, Regina weeping almost constantly for the loss of the baby just the week before the wedding. A kind of wake it was. The grieving, however necessary, badly timed. Though truth to tell, he’d been relieved, too aware of pretense.

  —You promised me a walk, she said, touching him.

  ______

  They walked through the town hand in hand, looking at the Islamic carvings and the Swahili silver jewelry, seeing neither the carvings nor the jewelry, but only the past, the recent past, the wife or the husband of the other, imagined marriages, houses and apartments never lived in, and once, poignantly, a future with a child, though the future was a blank to them, unknowable and unimaginable. He could not stop himself from thinking only one day and only one night, and was on the verge, once or twice, of crossing the line between what was likely and what was possible. But did not, for fear that any plan that involved the hurt of others would frighten Linda off. It was a calculus problem he couldn’t solve — how to be together without catastrophe — and as with calculus, which had been his nadir, he felt his brain go hard and empty with resistance.

  They had lunch at Petley’s, neither of them hungry, ordering too much food — pweza; supa ya saladi; kuku na kupaka (lobster cocktail; watercress soup; chicken in coconut sauce) — lingering after most of the other diners had left, staying long after a confused waiter had taken away their barely touched plates. They sat with too many drinks (she surprisingly overtaking him), until he looked up and saw that the help were waiting to leave for their breaks. He stood, slightly woozy from the alcohol (really four scotches?), and suggested they walk to Shela, an insane idea in the middle of the day after the drinking, with no shelter to speak of along the way. When what he really wanted to do was go back to the bedroom with the jasmine blossoms ground into the pillows and sleep with her body pressed close to him.

  They followed hand-lettered signs for Shela and caught a ride on a military truck that made its way through sand-clogged roads. They sat on benches at the back of the truck, and briefly she fell asleep with her head in his lap. One of her shoulders was burned by the time they had arrived at the beach, the scarf having lost itself at a jeweler’s counter or at Petley’s. They sat on the verandah of Peponi’s, the only beach hotel, and drank water and ate grapefruit — hungry after all — the sense of fog in the brain dissipating in the shade.

  —How did you get here? he asked, having been too preoccupied to have imagined her arrangements.

  —I came up from Malindi.

  —That must have been an adventure.

  She looked away, perhaps knowing the question that would come next even before he did.

  —Why Malindi?

  She hesitated. Peter is there, she said.

  That she had been with Peter on the coast should not have been remarkable at all — no more remarkable, say, than the fact that he had left Regina only that morning — but it disturbed him nevertheless.

  Linda did not elaborate. She took a sip of water. It was bottled, but the water at the museum house hadn’t been. In her thirst, he remembered, she’d drunk nearly a pitcherful.

  —That’s why you have to go back tomorrow? he asked, knowing better than to ask. The answers would hurt no matter what they were, the only acceptable answer being that she would never leave him.

  But she, perhaps wiser in this regard than he, or seeing the future more clearly, said nothing. And asked no questions of her own. Her hair, which had come loose when they had made love, had been put into a twist again, and he saw, from the inexpertness of the hastily made knot, how painstakingly she must have prepared for their reunion.

  —It couldn’t be helped, she said.

  Jealousy squeezed his chest. Did you sleep with him last night? he asked, shocking himself with the question. She crossed her arms over her white linen dress. A defensive posture.

  —Thomas, don’t.

  —No, seriously, he said, unable to give up what even a fool could see should be given up. Did you sleep with him last night? I just want to know.

  —Why?

  —So I know where I stand, he said. He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, the shirt having been soaked through on the walk. Across from him, a couple were drinking Pimm’s. He envied them their easy boredom. So I can know the parameters, he said.

  She looked away. There are no parameters.

  —So you did sleep with him, Thomas said sullenly, gazing into his water glass. Ashamed or afraid of the truth, he wasn’t sure. Distracted, as he’d been all afternoon, by her body. The way, now, her breasts rested on her forearms.

  —It was the only way I could arrange it, she said. He noticed that there was a sheen of sweat on her brow. Don’t let’s do this, Thomas, she added. We have so little time. She uncrossed her arms and sat back in her chair. She put her fingers to her forehead.

  —You have a headache? he asked.

  —A bit.

  —Do you love him?

  The question, having waited in the wings, wanting the limelight now.

  —Of course I love him, she said impatiently, and then paused. Not in the way I love you.

  —How do you love me? he asked, needing endless reassurance.

  She thought for a moment, picked a piece of lint off her dress. Choosing her words carefully.

  —I think of you constantly. I imagine a world in which we can be together. I regret not writing to you after the accident. I lie awake at night feeling you touch me. I believe we were meant to be together.

  He drew in a long breath.

  —Is that enough? she asked.

  —Oh, Jesus. He put his head into his hands. Looking at their table, the slightly bored couple with the Pimm’s might have thought it was he who had the headache.

  She reached across and touched his arm. In one fluid motion, he seized her hand. What will happen to us? he asked.

  She shook her head back and forth. I don’t know, she said. Perhaps he was hurting her. It’s so much easier not to think about it.

  He let go of her hand. We could have found each other if we’d really tried, he said, challenging her. It wasn’t totally impossible. So why didn’t we?

  She massaged her temple with her fingers. Maybe we didn’t want to spoil what we had, she said.

  He sat back and ground the cigarette, barely smoked, under his foot. Yes, he thought. That might have been it. But, then again, how would they have known, at seventeen, that it was possible to spoil love? He remembered them together — in front of the cottage, at the diner, walking the empty streets of Boston.

  —What? she asked, noticing his incongruous smile.

  —I was remembering when I used to make you tell me what you’d said in Confession.

  —That was awful, she said.

  —This is awful, he said.

  He watched her take a sip of water — the movements of her delicate jaw, the contractions of her long throat. Beyond her was the white beach, an ocean so bright he could barely look at it. Palm trees rose high above them, and from open windows, gauze curtains billowed outward with a snap and then were sucked in again as if by a giant lurking in the shadows. It was a striking hotel, the only one in Shela. The only one in all of Lamu, his editor had said, with a decent bathroom.

  He slipped another cigarette from its pack and lit it. He was smoking too much, eating too little. We take life too seriously, you and I, he said.

  She pulled the pins from her hair and, in a perfectly ordinary but at that moment extraordinary gesture, let her hair fall the l
ength of her back. He watched it sway as it settled. The surprising abundance of all that hair springing from a knot no bigger than a peach hurtled him back through the years.

  —It’s what I’ve always loved about you, she said.

  —Other people might just fuck and be done with it. Enjoy the fuck.

  —We enjoyed the fuck.

  He smiled. So we did.

  He let his gaze shift slightly toward the beach. Something had caught his attention, something he hadn’t noticed before: at either end of the bathing area, the beachgoers were nude. A man with saggy buttocks had his back to him and was speaking to a woman lying on a blanket. He could see her hair, but not her body.

  —Was it ever easy? he asked.

  —You mean light?

  —I mean not serious.

  —No.

  He rubbed his face. Sunburn had tightened his skin. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. They were wasting precious moments together. He wanted to return to the house, where they could make love again, but he knew they might have to wait until it was cooler. Perhaps there was a military truck returning to the village.

  —The one thing I miss, he said, is music.

  —You don’t have any tapes? she asked.

  —I had tapes. But they were stolen. The tape recorder, too. I wonder what’s popular right now.

  They sat in easy silence. A dhow skimmed the horizon. Ancient. Unchanged for centuries.

  —What was Rich’s visit like?

  —Oh, it was wonderful, apart from the fact that he got sick with malaria. We’d told him to take the pills in advance, but, I don’t know, he’s only sixteen.

  —Is he OK?

  —Yes. He’s recovering in Nairobi.

  —Are you making any progress with Ndegwa? she asked.

  —Well, there’s the embassy party at the Intercontinental. Will you come?

  —I don’t know.

  —You’d come with Peter? he asked.

  She glanced away. She seemed exhausted. The bus from Malindi would have been grueling. He remembered a long trip to Eldoret that he and Regina had once taken on a bus, and how the driver had stopped so that all the passengers could get out to piss. The women, including Regina, had squatted, letting their long skirts cover themselves.

  —You never had a problem with the letters? she asked.

  —No, he said. I loved them.

  —I find them frustrating, she said. Inadequate.

  He sat up, a sudden anger straightening his spine. How could you? he asked, tossing his cigarette onto the cement floor.

  She flinched, startled by the non sequitur, the sudden change of tone. How could I what?

  —Sleep with Peter.

  —Sleep with Peter?

  Thomas refused to retract the question. He thought it a reasonable one: how could she, after that Sunday in Njia, be with another man?

  He combed his hair with his fingers. He needed a bath. Jesus, he must stink. An ugliness that had no place at that table, a stench more sickly sweet than the open sewers of Lamu, was suffocating him. He made an effort to breathe in the ocean air.

  —You expected on the strength of one meeting after nine years apart that I would tell Peter our marriage was over? she asked, her voice conveying her incredulity.

  —Yes, he said. Basically.

  —I can’t believe you’re saying this.

  —Why not? he asked. Would you walk away from this now? Just tell me you could go back to a life with Peter and never see me again.

  She was silent a long time.

  —So, he said. Then.

  She put her fingers to her forehead. He saw that she had gone deathly pale.

  —Are you all right? he asked.

  —I need to lie down.

  ______

  It was the water or the lobster or the drinking or the walk in the heat or the ridiculously painful questions he’d been asking her. She’d grown so pale so quickly that he thought she might faint. She said, Please, and he didn’t know if she meant please stop talking or please help me. He did both. She leaned her weight on him and let him help her inside. But once inside, she lurched away, spoke rapidly to a middle-aged blonde behind a desk, and then disappeared around a corner. Thomas stood in the middle of the small, trim lobby wondering what had just happened.

  —Has she been ill? the woman asked. British accent. Polka-dot dress.

  Thomas shook his head.

  —Pregnant?

  The question rattled him. It was a moment before he could respond. I don’t know, he had to say, admitting that he might not know her that well.

  —What did she eat?

  —Here? Grapefruit and water.

  —Well, it’s unlikely to have been the grapefruit. The water is bottled. Anything earlier today?

  Thomas thought about their lunch at Petley’s. Chicken, he said. And then he remembered. Lobster. She had lobster cocktail.

  —Where?

  —Petley’s.

  —Oh, the woman said, as if that settled it.

  But had Linda actually eaten the lobster? He tried to remember. And how could either she or he have been so foolish as to have ordered lobster in the first place? Never eat shellfish that you didn’t know positively was fresh, they told you in the training sessions.

  —Let me see to her, the woman said.

  He waited on a camelbacked couch and watched bathers come and go in varying states of undress. One woman had tied a kanga at her breasts and was clearly naked underneath, the cloth barely covering her. An elderly gentleman in a pale blue seersucker suit sat beside him and said, by way of a pleasantry, Lovely day.

  —Yes, it is, Thomas said, though he didn’t believe it. Many words might apply to the day — momentous; heart-breaking; wrenching — but lovely was not among them.

  The man’s eyes watered some. He had high color and white hair, and Thomas thought the words Old gentleman. A peculiar smell of age, masked by cologne or hair tonic, seemed to emanate from deep inside his body. His cheeks, blotchy pink and red-veined, might have to be described as rosy. An elderly woman entered the lobby, and the old gentleman stood, waiting for her. She walked with slow steps, her back slightly stooped. Her white hair had been carefully combed and pinned, and she wore long ropes of pearls over a peach-colored silk blouse. She had the high waist of middle-age, but still there was a waist. Her mulberry pumps moved slowly forward in short steps.

  She took the old gentleman’s arm, and Thomas noticed that he put his hand over hers. Together they walked out to the verandah. Were they widowed? Were they married?

  Christ, he thought, turning.

  Another man, nearer his own age, dark-haired and good-looking, took a step backward into the lobby from the verandah. He seemed to be trying to take a picture of the ocean. For a moment, he fiddled with his camera, pressing buttons and trying levers; but then the camera, with a life of its own, popped open, surprising him. The man extracted the film from the camera and tossed the now useless canister into the wastebasket.

  The blond proprietress returned from the bathroom and went directly to her desk. She unlocked a cupboard.

  —How is she? Thomas asked, standing.

  —A bit peaky, the woman said. Thomas wondering if this might be an example of British understatement. She poured a brown liquid into a tiny paper cup.

  —What’s that? Thomas asked.

  —Oh, said the woman, turning. Best not to think about it.

  Pure opium, Thomas thought, deciding to think about it.

  —Is there a doctor we could call?

  —No, I shouldn’t think so, the woman said. You’ll want to get her home, though. Not tonight, but first thing in the morning. We have a provisions lorry that goes into the village at six forty-five A.M. Get you there in time for the seven-thirty to Nairobi.

  But she’s not going to Nairobi, Thomas thought.

  —In any event, the woman continued, still holding the spoon in her hand, you’re in luck. (No, I’m not, Thomas thought.) A man an
d a woman who came separately have decided to share a room.

  —Optimistic, Thomas said.

  —Yes. Quite. But it leaves a room free.

  —Thank you. Is it ready now?

  —Take the key, the woman said over her shoulder as she walked to the rest room. It’s in the box there. Number twenty-seven. I’ll bring her in.

  Implicit in the instructions: She wouldn’t want you to see her now.

  ______

  The room was surprisingly simple and appealing. Done almost entirely in white. White walls, white bedding, white curtains, a khaki-colored sisal rug. A dressing table with an ivory skirt. The lack of color drew the eye through the windows to the ocean, to the turquoise and navy of the water. A good room to be sick in, he reflected. Easy on the eye. Though it was impossible not to think of how it might have been: a night in that room with Linda feeling well. Feeling happy.

  He walked to the window and examined the view. Could they ever be happy? he wondered. All their meetings — assuming that there would be any meetings at all — would have to be furtive, a framework in which neither of them could be truly happy. And if they allowed the catastrophic to happen, could either of them live with the consequences? What chance for happiness then?

  At a table not far from his window, the elderly man in the seersucker suit gazed with rheumy eyes at the woman across from him. No one would doubt that he loved her. Thomas might have drawn the drapes, but he was reluctant to shut out the tableau of the older couple, who might be secret lovers themselves. They seemed reassuring, a good omen.

  It would be easy to say how unfair it had all been. Yet it was he who hadn’t driven to Middlebury; she who hadn’t written to him that summer. Why hadn’t he broken down doors to get to her?

  —I’m so sorry, Linda said behind him.

  —Don’t, Thomas said, going to her.

  She averted her face, unwilling to be kissed, even on the cheek. She sat on the bed. The British woman, who had helped her in, set open bottles of mineral water and Coca-Cola on the dressing table.

  —Give her sips of the Coca-Cola, the woman said. It will help to settle her stomach. Though I’d be very surprised if she didn’t sleep now.