Fathermucker (30 page)

“You
think
she's having an affair, or you
know
she's having an affair?”

“I think. But I'm pretty sure. I mean, I'm almost positive.”

“With
who
? That's what's been bugging me all day. I can't figure it out. At first I thought it was with Chad—her old boyfriend from college, this asshole tennis pro—but then Stacy left me a message that sort of put that notion to bed. No pun intended. Now I think it might be Rob . . . you know, Rob Puglisi, our therapist?” Her eyes betray nothing. “But the truth is, I have no idea. Because frankly, I find the whole thing kind of shocking. So, I mean, who is it?”

Sharon takes a deep breath. Her eyes drift to her fingers, which fondle the stem of the glass.

“And
please
don't tell me you don't know, or you can't say.”

“Soren,” she says finally, as the scythe comes down with a thwack.

“Soren? Soren Knudsen?”

“Yes.”

My breathing is so tortured that for a moment I think I might hyperventilate, but I'm able to pull myself together. Curiosity is all that's preventing me from fainting. Soren Knudsen! Well, he
was
out drinking last night with someone other than Peter Berliner, probably Bruce Baldwin, although I'm not sure; either way, he lied to Meg. And Soren is a handsome, charming, artsy, and—although I'm loath to admit it—sexy motherfucker. Chicks dig Euro-dudes. Seventy-three chicks, in his case. (Seventy-four, counting Stacy.) Furthermore, his sex life is unsatisfying, something his wife has not been shy about broadcasting. And if it
is
Soren, well, that would also explain why Meg doesn't know anything.

But how could he have gotten loopy with Stacy last night if Stacy is in Los Angeles? Unless . . . unless she
isn't
in Los Angeles. Do I have any proof that that's where she is, other than her worthless word? I call her cell phone, not the hotel—I don't even know which hotel she's staying at, come to think. She drove
herself
to the airport. Maybe she and Soren both took the week off work, repaired to that B&B in northeastern Dutchess County I read about in
Hudson Valley Magazine
, and have spent the last five days fucking like bunny rabbits while Meg and I mind the store. It's not beyond the realm of possibility—although, let's face it, it's certainly in possibility's outer suburbs. I'm not sure I buy it.

I wind up asking Sharon the same question I asked that asshole cop. “Really? Are you
sure
?”

“No. But I've seen them together a lot. At odd times. In weird places. Did you know they had lunch last week at the Bonefish Grill?”

I shake my head. I drink more wine, although my stomach would rather I didn't.

“You know how it is. No one from New Paltz hangs out in Poughkeepsie. They probably figured they wouldn't bump into anyone they knew. But I was meeting one of my girlfriends from Vassar, who lives out there, and I saw them. They didn't see me, but I saw them.”

Stacy and Soren both work in Poughkeepsie—my wife for IBM, Soren for the
Journal
—so it would make logistical sense for them to have lunch. But why would she not tell me about it?

“A few weeks later,” Sharon continues, “I saw them again, at the bar in the Grand Hotel. It was five thirty in the afternoon, happy hour. They were cozied up in one corner. They weren't just sitting there like friends. They were really close; their knees were touching. That time, they
did
see me. And both of them turned white as a sheet. I'm guessing Stacy didn't mention that to you.”

“No,” I tell her, after another long guzzle of shiraz. “No, she didn't.”

“I've also seen her leaving his house. I know she's friends with Meg, but she was there to see
him
. I could tell.
He
walked her out to her car, not Meg, and his arm was draped on her shoulder, and she was sort of leaning into him. And that night, I happen to know that Meg was out with Cathy DiLullo.”

“That was, what, two weeks ago?”

“Yeah.”

“I remember that. Stacy said
she
was going out with Meg and Cathy DiLullo.”

“Well, she was with Soren.”

My glass is empty. Sharon pours me a refill, then tops off her own glass. Neither of us moves to drink. Neither of us says anything. Outside, a car screams down the hill, a sudden crescendo in the nocturnal symphony of crickets and owls, and slams on its brakes. Deer in the road, probably. Lots of deer up here, especially at night. Hazard of country life. Inside, the only sound is the dueling noise machines, white noise and train, from the upstairs bedrooms. My heart dies silently.

“Like I said, I don't know for sure. But I have a good eye for this sort of thing.”

“Are you cold? I'm cold.”

“I'm fine.”

“It's cold. Let me turn up the thermostat. Hold on.”

I'm right—it
is
cold. Sixty-six degrees on our digital thermometer. This explains my sudden but all-consuming chill. I crank the heat up to seventy. The furnace rumbles to life beneath me, just as something ill rumbles in my belly. I lock myself in the bathroom, and I barely make it to the toilet before torrents of purple acid erupt from my throat. Again it comes, then a third time, and when the contents of my stomach are emptied sloppily into the bowl, I dry-heave four or five times, just to be sure.

My body is trembling as I drag myself to my feet; my cheeks flash with heat. I flush away the wine-dark spew, wipe away the residue with fistfuls of Charmin, and flush again. I empty the spray bottle of Lime Mate; the pungent citrus scent almost makes me wretch again. I wash out my mouth with Cool Mint Listerine, spit violently into the sink. I run hot water over my hands until the heat is too much to handle.

God, I look like shit. Two days of stubble accentuating the double chin, like rows of puny shrubs on the side of a bulbous mountain. Unfathomable tiredness in my eyes. No wonder Stacy cheated on me. Soren is a rock star by comparison, a Danish Daryl “Duke” Reid. And it's not like he and I are pals exactly. I've always found him a bit standoffish, if not outright cold. I always attributed this to his Danishness, but maybe there's another reason; maybe he didn't want to get too chummy with the cuckold schmuck whose wife he had designs upon.

When I return to the living room, Sharon is carving a hunk of cheese, piling it atop a cracker. “Sorry,” she says, her mouth full. “Didn't really eat any dinner.”

“That's what it's there for.”

“How are you? Are you . . . are you okay?”

“I guess.”

“You should have more wine.”

I shouldn't, but she pours what's left of the bottle into the two glasses, and I take a sip. It goes down easy, and it stays down. Thank God.

“I shouldn't have told you. It's just . . . I've
been
in that position. And I really wish someone had told
me
.”

The hint of a past, a chequered backstory. As I suspected: Sharon has secrets, and unlike most of New Paltz, manages to keep them.

“No,” I tell her. “I'm glad you did. I mean, I'm not
glad
, but I prefer to know. I would've found out sooner or later. The last thing I want is to be Peter Berliner, everyone staring at me like I'm a fucking leper. The last one to know.”

“Cynthia,” she says. “Jesus.”

“You can maybe forgive someone for cheating on you. I can see that. But humiliating you in front of the whole town? That's not something you come back from.” I start, my body snapping to attention like a senior officer walked into the living room. “You didn't tell anyone else about this, did you?”

“Of course not.” She slides a touch closer; our knees glance. Her skin is warm beneath the stockings. “Even David doesn't know.”

“Good. Thanks. Really. I appreciate your discretion.”

“Oh, I'm very discreet.”

I can feel the emotions churning again, deep in whatever overtaxed recess of my body feelings are generated from. Anger, sadness, grief, frustration, disbelief—maybe even a smidgen of relief, now that I know the
darkest hour before the dawn
truth. Can they all be explained by chemicals, feelings? I don't hold with that. Emotions have to be more than a cocktail of amino acids and neuro-transmitters, a dry martini that can be shaken-not-stirred in some laboratory off the New Jersey Turnpike. Have to be. But if feelings
are
a cocktail, mine, at the tail-end of this interminable day, is a batch of Everclear punch some frat boy cooked up in a trash can; strong shit; you have to pour the juice in first, or the grain alcohol will eat through the plastic bag.

I don't want to feel anything right now. I don't want to rage, I don't want to cry, I don't want to puke again. I want to be numb. I take another hit of wine. “Was it David?”

“Was what David?”

“The one who cheated on you. The one no one told you about.”

“God, no. David would
never
do that. My husband's a rock. That's why I'm with him. That's what he provides. David supports me, not just financially but emotionally. He makes me feel safe.”

“Must be nice.”

“Like everything, it's a trade-off.” She uncrosses her left leg from her right, crosses her right over her left. Now I feel her toe—she's doffed those shiny black pumps, made herself comfortable—on my calf. “I love David, I love him very much, but I don't know if I'm
in
love with him. I don't know if I ever was, really. I was in a very dark place when we met. He saved me. Without him . . . ”

She goes to drink, but her glass is empty, as is the bottle. We killed it quickly.

“I have another bottle, I think,” I tell her. “Let me get it.”

“I really shouldn't,” she says.

“Oh, right. The opening.” I'm suddenly desperate for her to stay. I don't want to be alone right now. I know the breakdown's coming. The towers have been hit, but they haven't collapsed yet. And collapse they will. No way around it. This is too big. The news is too grim. I want to prolong the darkness indefinitely. I want to keep talking, I want to keep drinking. The wine will stave off the abyss. For now. “Are you okay to drive?”

“Probably not.”

“I could make some coffee.”

“You know what? To hell with it. Get the bottle.”

The fine shiraz of St. Hallet
patron saint of drunks?
has impaired my McDonald's-lunch-rush efficiency. Like Briar Rose and the spindle, I prick my finger on the tip of the corkscrew while peeling off the label. Fortunately it doesn't bleed, although it smarts. The corkscrew itself goes into the bottle crooked, so the cork breaks apart, pieces falling into the wine (Columbia Crest merlot; nothing fancy). When I finally manage to extract it from the neck, purple droplets rain all over the counter. I hurry back to the living room, stepping on a lost Lego brick as I approach.

Finally I make it back to the sofa. I pour two glasses—my aim is even worse now; wine sloshes off the rims onto the coffee table, where it is absorbed by a loose page from a
Shades of Light
catalog—and slide in beside her, a touch closer than before.

“Wine,” she sighs. “I don't know how I'd manage without it.”

“I'll drink to that.”

The Columbia Crest is not as good as the Aussie shit, but I'm in no condition to play sommelier. Without food to soak it up, the wine has gone right to my head. Yeah, I'm a bit loopy. Which only makes me want to keep drinking, so full-blown loopiness can be quickly achieved.

“What are you going to do?”

“I don't know. Talk to her, I guess, and go from there.”

“It's hard,” says Sharon. “I know it's hard. But if you live in denial, I mean, you wind up . . . you wind up like Peter Berliner.”

“Please please
please
don't tell anyone, okay?”

“I would never.”

We fall silent for a moment. Sharon cuts more cheese. I nibble on a cracker.

The noise machines duel, the crickets and owls continue their night-music. The wine and cheese ease my stomach. And the Headless Whoresman, his job done, seems to have disappeared.

Finally, Sharon breaks the silence. “I understand wanting to have sex with other people. I don't even think it's that big of a deal, as long as it's done openly and honestly—and as long as you don't fall in love.”

My (admittedly impaired) sense is that she's speaking from experience.

“Well, apparently my wife has fallen in love with Soren Knudsen.”

“Maybe, maybe not. It could cut the other way. It could wind up making her love you more.”

“Yeah, I don't think so.”

“Think about it. The unknown commodity, the forbidden fruit, the greener grass on the other side: all of it serves to inflame desire. You're attracted to someone, you sleep with them, you get it out of your system. It's never as good as what you imagine it will be. Not that you should run around shagging anything that moves, like that Felicia Feeney. But there's so little in this world that's emotionally and physically satisfying in the way that sex is. Why deny yourself the pleasure?”

“Well, how about because you swore not to?”

“Wedding vows,” she says, “seem a bit outmoded to me. A bit patriarchal.”

“That's the Vassar talking.”

“Or the wine.”

We honor its mention with another gulp.

“You want a more pragmatic reason?” I tell her. “Fine. Here are three: disease, pregnancy, not embarrassing your kids. I can't even
imagine
what Cynthia's son, the oldest one . . . ”