Counterpointe (46 page)

“I didn’t handle it well.”

“You’re obviously better now, though?”

“Once I finally got out of bed and started tutoring men and boys with real problems. Compared to what they face, my being unable to dance is a minor difficulty.”

“Not to you.”

“True, but I made it worse than it needed to be.”

“You learned something from the experience, though.”

“Yes. I did.”

Their eyes met and her heart contracted. Rob had lines at the corners of his eyes she’d not noticed before and his temples were brushed with silver.

The waiter placed their entrées in front of them, and they ate slowly, continuing to talk. Clare asked Rob to explain how he studied the plants the
payé
told them about. She listened carefully to his answers, then asked more questions, and although Rob’s work was complex, she could understand it when she made the effort to do so.

What an odd suggestion on Rob’s part—to pretend they’d just met. It was working, though. Such a huge relief to let go of the past, for even one night.

After dinner, Rob drove her home and walked her to the door. She unlocked it, then turned to thank him.

“My sister and her husband own a boat. Would you like to go sailing with me?”

“Yes. I would.”

“Good. Are you free tomorrow?”

She nodded.

He set a time, leaned in and kissed her cheek, then turned and walked to his car. Bemused, she climbed the stairs to her bare apartment.

Sunday dawned with clear skies, warm temperatures, and brisk breezes—perfect sailing weather. During the drive to the Cape and the loading of supplies aboard the yacht, Rob and Clare continued to play the getting-to-know-you game.

When they cleared the harbor, Rob turned to her. “Would you like to steer?”

She jumped up and took her place at the helm while he moved around the boat, turning cranks to extend the sails, then he came and stood beside her. After a moment, he pointed. “Try to keep us lined up with that spit of land.”

She wondered if he’d deliberately echoed what he’d said and done the first time they’d gone sailing.

Possibly.

She was reminded of other sails with Rob. Days when the wind thrummed in the rigging and the sun turned the bow wave to crystal. After her injury, sailing had been the only activity that eased her heart. “I used to sail.” She watched him out of the corner of her eye. “I’ve missed it.”

“Why did you stop?”

“The man who took me had to go away...to save himself.”

His lips tightened. He balanced on the balls of his feet as the boat heeled from the swell. “Save himself from what?”

“From me.”

Rob’s eyes were invisible behind dark glasses, but his mouth was tight.
 
For a time after that, neither of them spoke.

When they returned to Falmouth in the late afternoon, Rob suggested driving to Provincetown for dinner, which was how they’d often ended such a day in the past.

In the Provincetown café, Clare slid into the booth across from Rob, noticing how clear and calm the day on the water left his eyes. It had worked that way for her as well, leaving her with a pleasant lassitude, due in part, perhaps, to the game.

But as relaxing as it was to leave the past behind, it had to be faced eventually.

Grand pas de deux - Coda

Last movement of the grand dance for two

“I believe I owe you one,” Clare said, after the waitress dropped off coffees and the dessert menu.

He raised his eyebrows in question. “For what?”

“Marge Velez.”

Damn
. His hands tightened on his cup. So the woman hadn’t kept her mouth shut. Or was Clare simply fishing for information?

She stirred her coffee, looking at him. “I ran into Edward Devaney, and he said the most curious thing to me about telling you Marge Velez was the best.”

She stopped speaking. He kept his head down, focused on his mug.

“Why did you do it?” Clare’s voice was soft, but clearly she wasn’t going to buy any half-assed attempts to say he didn’t know what she was talking about.

A mistake not to ask Devaney to keep quiet, but he never expected Clare and Devaney’s paths to cross. In honor of their new openness, he decided to tell her the simple truth. “I met a young boy in Peru. The son of the Machiguengan man who was teaching me about the jungle. One day, Tatito was attacked by a wild pig. His father was also injured. I had to carry the boy back to the village. He died in my arms.”

Swamped by memory, he stopped to reorder his thoughts. “When you told me about Tyrese, it reminded me of what it was like not being able to save someone. I’m glad it worked out.”

Clare laid a hand on his arm. “It was a wonderful thing to do.”

“Please don’t say anything to anyone else.”

“Why didn’t you want me to know?”

That was the rub. “I didn’t want you to think...well, that I had no faith you could solve your own problems.”

“Even though, in this particular instance, I couldn’t.”

“You’d already turned me down, but when I read that ballerina/Bull Shark piece, I wanted to stick a spoke in Hortz’s wheel. Selfish impulse. I didn’t expect you’d ever find out.”

“I don’t believe it was selfish. Did you ever meet Hortz?”

“Devaney said his nickname is Hortz’s ass.”

Clare laughed. “Thank you for that. It’s perfect.”

“I have another question. I want to know if you like the ballet?” She’d asked Rob that question before, the first time they’d gone out. Then, he’d smiled and said with her help, he was working on it. This time he didn’t smile.

“I used to. I don’t anymore.”

“Why not?”

He gazed at her steadily before looking away. “I once knew a principal dancer. I saw how the ballet treated her after she was injured. I hated it after that.” His voice held a deep undertone of anger, but he wasn’t angry with her. Or maybe he was. For going back.

“You weren’t there.” The words pushed their way out.

“I wasn’t where?”

“At the benefit.” She sucked in a breath. “I was afraid...that my ankle might give out in the middle, or that it wouldn’t, but my dancing would be...that people would pity me. Then I realized if you weren’t there, nothing else mattered.”

“I was there.”

Her head came up and she stared at him.

“I’ll never forget it. You were... Your performance...it...” He stopped, took a deep breath, raised his face to hers. “It made me cry.”

For a time they met each other’s gaze across a short gap of table.

“You always took care of me and I took it for granted. As if it were my due. I don’t think I ever thanked you, at least not properly.”

He reached out and touched her under the chin, then smoothed the corners of her eyes with his thumbs, wiping away the wetness. “It was never a hardship doing anything for you, and you showed me in all kinds of ways you were grateful.”

“But when I was injured, I kept kicking and screaming instead of buckling down and dealing with it. Until you said ‘enough’ and went away.”

“I...I couldn’t stay.” His voice was flat, his face shuttered. “It wasn’t my finest hour either.”

“I understood. Your leaving was necessary. It forced me to stop hiding from life, you know.”

“You must hate me.”

“Oh, no, Rob. I’ve never hated you. How could I?” She looked down at her plate. “After I started going to Hope House, I realized everyone has problems, some large, some small. Some huge. What matters is how a person deals with them, and I made a mess of it.”

“You’re being too hard on yourself.”

“No. No, I’m not. I had a chance. To be courageous. I blew it.”

“It took awhile, but you figured it out.”

She shook her head.

“It took courage to dance for the benefit.”

She ducked her head, looking away from the blaze in his eyes. “No. It was—”

“Admirable. Difficult. Brave.”

“I’m glad you came.”

“I would have hated to miss it.”

They sat staring at each other.

“You folks decide on dessert yet? We’ve got fresh cherry pie.”

“Sure. Bring us one piece, two forks.” When the waitress left, Rob smiled at her. “We’ve been working hard. We deserve a treat.”

Driving back to Boston, they didn’t talk much. Clare tuned the radio to a country music station then sat back and dozed, occasionally waking enough to visualize combinations of steps to fit the music. When they got to her apartment, Rob walked her to the door. He bent his head and kissed her briefly on the mouth. She wanted more than that fleeting contact. She wanted his arms around her, holding her tight against him. She wanted...she took a breath and curbed her desire.

It was good Rob wasn’t forcing the pace. The work they were doing, sorting through the past, explaining, asking forgiveness, forgiving, was complex. Best to finish before they took any other step.

Tuesday evening, Rob took Clare to dinner at Legal Seafoods in Chestnut Hill.

“I don’t have any furniture yet,” she said, as they finished eating. “How would you like to spend a few minutes window-shopping with me?”

Of course. It was what he should have done when they first married. Gone with her to choose things for the apartment. Instead, he’d handed her a checkbook.

In that, he’d been following his father’s example, but he now understood that a home should reflect both people living there.