Antonia Lively Breaks the Silence (24 page)

After leaving the sitting room, Antonia went to pour herself another glass of wine, when she noticed a part of a sheet of paper lying under the door to what she knew was Wyatt's study. She kneeled down, picked up the yellowing page, and flipped it over gently to find this:

“Okay, so now you've told me everything,” I said. The sun was just beginning to climb into the sky, the starlings just beginning their operatic tunes in the trees. “What do you expect me to do with it?”

The literary critic slowly rose from his chair, went to the railing, and looked down at the pool. “If you write the story exactly as I told it to you, it will make your name,” he said. “Then maybe you'll be able to buy yourself a real pool, one that sits in the ground.” He grinned. “Maybe you'll even get away from this town and move back to the city. I know I would if I could.”

I laughed, although I found nothing amusing in Hiram's proposal. “You want the world to know what you did, and you want me to write it,” he said. “You want me to—”

“I want you to write it because I can't,” he said, turning around. “I'm giving you this story, Walter. If you don't want it, I'm sure I can find someone else who does.”

I looked at the sky curving into brightness as the sun continued to journey over the horizon. From the trees, the starlings sang a deafening, unbearable tune with cheery abandon. I had never liked the birds, this town, or this house. Though I still loved Cecelia, I had never much liked my life with her. “If it doesn't sell, I'm coming after you,” I finally said.

“If it doesn't sell, you only have yourself to blame,” Hiram said.

The man is right, I thought, and I burned suddenly with the story I would tell.

Even after Antonia had finished reading this last page, the scene between Wyatt and Henry—who else could Walter and Hiram be but them?—continued to tumble through her head. She wanted more, to find out what came before. She took a step toward the door, her fingers already reaching for the knob, when she heard Catherine's car. Quickly, she laid the page back where she'd found it and hurried out on the deck with her wine. A few minutes later, Catherine appeared, saying, “I hope you don't mind, but I just don't feel like cooking. I bought one of those premade gourmet lasagnas. I'm heating it up,” and she sat down in the lounge chair beside Antonia. The air was sticky and full of gnats and the crickets sang in the brittle grass. A string of bats kited above them as Antonia's head filled with questions she didn't dare ask. Oddly silent, Catherine shifted on her lounge chair, then all of a sudden turned to her, and said, “Henry will be out of here by the end of the week. I promise.”

“Oh, Catherine,” she said, “I appreciate that, but he doesn't have anywhere else to go. You don't have to take sides.” Yet, of course, she had to take sides, and they both knew it.

“I'm, well, I'm glad you're handling all of this so well. If it were me, I'm not sure I wouldn't have fallen completely apart.”

“Oh, I did that already,” she said, laughing. “I'm sure I'll fall apart again, too, but for right now, I'm just enjoying what I have.” She glanced absently at the cottage, remembering the first time she'd laid eyes on Henry, how excited and overwhelmed with desire she'd been. She felt the pull of the story again, the worm in her gut. “Bad things happen. It's why I write, to make sense of it all. Like what happened to your husband,” she said. “He was such a talent.” Catherine said nothing. “I often wonder what else he might have written if he hadn't taken his own life,” she said, worrying that she was overreaching. “I'm sorry. You don't want to talk about him.”

“No, I'd rather not,” she said, falling silent again. Then, “Look, Wyatt might have been my husband, but I don't—well, I don't think he liked me very much. I mean, it happens sometimes, I know it does, but to find out the—” She stopped herself from continuing. “Sometimes there are things you just never want to know, Antonia.” Turning to the young woman, her eyes were wide when she added, “My suggestion to you is that you leave Winslow. Get away from here and don't come back. You have the means. If I had the money, I'd probably leave, too.”

“We could go on a trip together. My treat,” Antonia said, smiling. “Where would you like to go?”

“Some place far away, where there aren't any writers—no offense—or literary critics,” she said. “Someplace cool, like the Himalayas, or Iceland, just for a couple of months until summer's over.”

Catherine smiled, which warmed Antonia's heart. She wanted to do her a kindness, because she liked her, but also because she knew that it would further cement the woman's trust in her. So when Catherine brought up the bookstore and Harold's troubles with her, telling her that her job was in total jeopardy, Antonia said, “How can I help?”

“I think if I could show him how dedicated I still was—because I am—if I could bring in a big name to give a reading, then he might trust me again and—”

“Then why don't I give a reading?”

“Oh my God,” Catherine said, giggling. “I didn't know how I was going to ask you. I mean, I thought it was probably the last thing you'd want to do. You have no idea what a relief it is to hear you say you'll do it.”

“Anything for you,” she said, glancing behind her into the house. She still longed to satisfy her one true desire—to read everything that came before page 298 of Wyatt's manuscript—though she knew that she would have to wait for another day.

“I think the lasagna's probably ready,” Catherine said, rising.

Yet as she followed her into the kitchen, Antonia's appetite vanished, and she felt her stomach churning. She was unaccountably nauseated and wanted suddenly to lie down. Lie down and never get up again, she thought. “Hey, would you mind if I took a rain check on dinner?”

Catherine looked at her with disappointment. “I understand,” she said. “If you're feeling better later, come back over. We can talk about your reading. I was thinking midweek, so I have a few days to prepare.”

At the door, Antonia reached out and hugged Catherine tightly, as though she never wanted to let her go. All at once, she didn't care anymore about the woman's past with Henry, about Henry's past with Wren, about Henry's past at all. All at once, she no longer wanted to be the writer she was but the girl she used to be, who knew nothing about anything. All at once, she craved nothing more than to have walked right past Catherine's house that June afternoon, walked right past it without ever stopping. She had never meant for any of this to happen. She had never meant to hurt anyone.

“Thank you again, Catherine,” she said, her eyes filling with tears.

“Oh, now don't start crying again, or you're going to make me cry, too,” she said. “Do you want me to walk you home?”

“No, I think I'll be fine,” she said.

As she crossed the yard, though, Antonia imagined her uncle Royal leaping out from the bushes, waiting for her on the veranda, even already in the house. From across the street, she studied the house's dark windows, the motionless curtains, the stillness that had settled over it. Nothing moved, though she knew everything was alive, beating as her heart beat. She flew to the front door, and then she was in her house, locking the deadbolt, the gray, stale air full of the traces of grayer, staler cigarette smoke. Once safely inside, the wave of nausea passed, her stomach settling as she unlocked the study door, and went into the room, though she stayed only long enough to make certain that nothing had been tampered with.

In the kitchen, she pulled out the expensive champagne that she and Henry were to have shared a week ago tonight. As she slid her hands down the cold, curved bottle, she imagined that it was her body and that her hands were Henry's. Then she was crying again, even as she popped the cork, which ought to have sounded like the auspicious beginning to her new life—the pop of the paparazzi's cameras, the pop of her success. Instead, it sounded like what it was, just a cork going off in an empty room.

After pouring champagne into a glass, she sat at the kitchen table, the sky beyond the windows as black as she'd ever seen it. She raised her glass into the air and recited, “Champagne for my real friends, real pain for sham friends.” The critics had already praised her as being the voice of her generation, though the words rang hollow in her ears now. Still, she repeated the words aloud and slowly gave in to the idea, as she gave in to the idea of the future. Someday, several years from now, long after she'd moved away, she imagined returning to Winslow and going to the bookstore to see Catherine, who would no doubt still be working there. She thought about the unlikely conversation they might have over an unlikely dinner. “How can you sit across from me and tell me that you were ever my friend?” Catherine would ask as Antonia dragged on her cigarette. “Friends don't act the way you do. They don't vandalize cottages, writing messages on walls just to see how someone will react. What kind of person are you?”

I'm the kind of person who won't stop until I get the whole story. That's the kind of person I am, Antonia thought. People keep far too many secrets from one another, hurtful, terrible secrets, but I'm glad they do, because without them I wouldn't have a career. Without them, I wouldn't have a thing to write about.

I
T WAS WELL
after midnight when Antonia awoke from a dream in which she'd just won the National Book Award. She had given her speech, thanking her mother and father who were in the audience. Though she hadn't seen her own face in the dream, she knew she was middle-aged and turning gray. Suddenly she sensed that older self in the bedroom with her, leaning over her, judging her. Yet the moment she turned on the lamp by her bed, the woman vanished and took the last of the beautiful dream with her.

A Tale of Two Soldiers

_____

Linwood, in his bed at the motel, had been dreaming, too. Now he was awake and stood at the balcony railing, staring at the liver-shaped pool below, thinking about her, always about her, Antonia, and about his brother, the idiot, and the agreement they'd made. Property, he thought, that's what all this nonsense has been about. What belonged to Royal, and what he thought Linwood had stolen from him. The moon came out from behind a cloud and transported him back to 1968, and Sturgeon was putting his pistol away, saying, “Breathe a word of this, boys,” and Linwood knew then he'd have no trouble killing them. Daybreak and they were heading back to Fort Benedict, the sun hot, the air rotten. He still tasted the brandy on his lips, and when he looked down, he saw the dried blood on his fingers, her blood, and he tried to wipe it on his fatigues but it wouldn't wipe away. Royal was in the backseat, passed out.

Linwood thought about how he'd joined the army to see the world, to get out from under their old man and the piss of poverty. He'd wound up at Fort Benedict, near Savannah, on the heels of his brother. Only seventeen years old, he'd cried secretly into his pillow. He had been skinny, frail. He had gotten into fights, but Royal had been bigger and fearless. No more fights. No more tears. Suddenly he had become a man. Off base, the girls had flirted with him, and he had flirted back. One night, they'd gone to a bar and there was Sturgeon, his command sergeant, talking to this young blond thing, such a sweet little face, though barely any breasts. Thirteen years old if she were a day, though she talked older, moved older, too. The four of them had driven out to some abandoned farm. In the cabin, she lay down so willingly on the mattress, too willingly, Linwood had thought. Sturgeon had watched. Didn't even touch himself, just stood and watched from the shadows. Royal fucked her a few times; then it was Linwood's go. “Your turn,” Sturgeon had said. The girl was already bleeding when he kneeled over her and Royal was handing him the brandy. “Courage, my brother,” he said. “Do it,” the girl said, her eyes vacant. He rolled her over, so as not to see her eyes, and he did it because that's what he'd been brought there to do. They watched him and Royal cheered him on, even as he watched the tiny constellation of moles on the girl's back. When he'd finished, he rolled off her and vomited.

Halfway back to the base, Linwood had leapt out of the jeep and run.

Now, years later, that night still haunted him, always had. The interstate curved past the motel, and tomorrow Linwood hoped to join it. If he made it through tonight, that is. The pool shimmered, the black water beckoning. No, he thought. No. Back in the room, he put on the TV, a distraction against calling Antonia and telling her what he should have told her when he'd had the chance. Now he only had what was left of her, her stinking novel. After settling on the bed, he flipped to the dedication:
To all the men in my life who pushed me and to the others who caught me on the way down.
Which was he? There was a quote from Virginia Woolf, whoever she was:
For the truth is (let her ignore it) that human beings have neither kindness, nor faith, nor charity beyond what serves to increase the pleasure of the moment. They hunt in packs. Their packs scour the desert and vanish screaming into the wilderness
. Amen, he thought. Amen. He flipped the book over to her picture and there she was, his little girl. He read the first page, and Sylvie was back and he saw her vividly again. He'd built a room around her and visited this room from time to time, just to make sure she never escaped. Yet thanks to his brother, she had, and Antonia had gotten it all wrong. I should have told you sooner, he thought, reaching for a pen. Your mother knew. Now you should know, and he removed the book jacket, flipped it over, and began to write on the white space. The words didn't come easily, but they came, and the Linwood of tonight kept trying to quiet the Linwood of then, who jabbered away in his head:
It was you who raped and killed her. Now, out there is the water, and you can save yourself. Forget the truth. No one cares about it.
Before he sank to the bottom, however, he would put it all down. He wrote it the way he'd lived it. He filled the white space, and had to find more, some paper in the room's desk drawer. He wrote until the pen ran dry, and he had to get another. He wrote until his fingers ached, until he filled every inch of available space. Then he started writing in the novel itself, in the margins. Outside, the sky lightened. He got up, went to the window, and looked down at the pool, the sun reflecting on the surface of the water. From his pocket, he pulled out the earring and pushed it through the hole, wincing from the familiar, excruciating pain. His fingers were bloody and trembling, and he washed them clean before reading over what he'd written.

This story was the last thing he would ever give her.