Heart of the Matter (2 page)

Of course, Kate was way out of her league. Handsome, in an androgynous sort of way, slender and athletic, she was too glamorous to ever notice someone like Ellen. Kate had a powerful magnetism onscreen and off, and she oozed sex in both contexts. All Ellen had ever managed to say to her was “hello” or “nice weather we’re having.”

She got up off the couch and trudged into the kitchen to take out the leftover Chinese from the night before. After dumping the contents onto a plate, she covered it with plastic, shoved it into the microwave, and punched in a few minutes. As she poured herself a glass of wine, General Beauregard, her brown tabby, jumped up onto the counter and pressed into her.

“Hey, Beau.” She petted him gently. “Are you hungry, my little pumpkin, hmm?”

A loud motor was his only response and she opened a can of cat food, emptying half of it into his bowl on the floor. He leapt down and devoured his dinner.

“My God, you’d think you hadn’t eaten in days instead of this morning.”

The ping of the microwave interrupted her conversation, and she carried her meal and wine to the living room where a stack of papers waited. Normally her teaching assistant would grade these undergraduate papers, but Jenny was busy trying to finish her own graduate work by the close of the spring semester. Besides, Ellen loved to read the papers of the American history survey class she taught to freshmen and sophomores. Hopefully a few of them would go on to advanced study in American history, her area of expertise, and she might spot them early on.

She ate a forkful of Kung Pao chicken and picked up the paper on top of the stack. After a while, her thoughts drifted back to Kate and she wondered if the newscaster would arrive home at her usual hour. Ellen glanced at the time on the DVD player and saw it was almost seven thirty, when Kate usually returned to change and leave again. She always looked devastating and Ellen assumed she went out on dates. Maybe she could glimpse her through the peephole in her door.

“Oh, geez, get a grip,” she chastised herself.

Having polished off the Chinese and downed the remnants of her wine, Ellen took the remaining papers into her bedroom. She placed the stack on her nightstand and was about to undress when her doorbell rang. Surprised at the late-night intrusion, she hurried to her door and peered through the peephole.

She momentarily froze, stunned to see her handsome neighbor on the other side, then quickly threw open the door. “Hi,” she exclaimed a little too brightly.

“Good evening,” Kate said. “You had a package sitting outside your door.”

Ellen glanced down to see a small box that Kate held. “Oh! Yes. Thanks for letting me know.” She took it from Kate and waited expectantly; for what, she didn’t know.

“Well, good night.” Kate backed away and headed to her condo.

Ellen stood in the doorway, still holding the package and wishing she could think of something to say. Should she invite her in for a drink? No, too obvious. A cup of coffee?
Shit, I used the last
of it this morning.

The sound of Kate’s door closing jarred her from her thoughts.

It was too late now. Sighing, she retreated into her condo and shut the door, leaning back against it. She closed her eyes and thumped her head back and forth against the door.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.

General Beauregard rubbed against her shins and meowed. He could always make her feel better and she bent down to pet him. She glanced at the package, recognizing the return address. A colleague at Princeton had sent her an advance copy of his latest biography of Lincoln. He wanted to know what she thought of it, and she was curious to see what he could possibly say that was new about the beloved president.

Scooping up Beau in one arm, the box clamped to her side with the other, she returned to her bedroom and tossed both on the bed.

She undressed, turning on her closet light to grab her nightgown off the hook just inside. As she stood naked in front of the full-length mirror on the back of the door, she frowned at the image.

She had gained more weight this year. Her breasts were full and heavy, her hips round, and her belly further from flat than ever.

Her skin, however, was still smooth and unwrinkled, belying her forty-two years, and she could still find her hipbones—after a bit of searching. She was what her mother would politely call a “full-figured” girl. Her sister, Joan, would simply say “fat.” She sighed unhappily at the thought of her thin, petite sister.

Joan was married to an orthopedic surgeon in Baltimore and had two kids and a dog. She had exactly the kind of life their parents had envisioned for both of them, but only Joan had managed to achieve.

She seemed to have it all, but still found an inordinate amount of time to criticize Ellen—about her single status as well as her weight.

Ellen always tried to convince her she was a lesbian and would never change, but Joan simply ignored her. She could get nothing but women because of her weight, Joan argued, and if she got into shape some great guy would snatch her up.

Ellen surveyed her figure in the mirror again. She knew this wasn’t the body someone of Kate Foster’s caliber would ever find attractive, let alone sexy. She imagined the tall, willowy blondes Kate probably went for, draping themselves over her arm at a gala function. Ellen chuckled at the thought of taking her to a faculty party with everyone dressed in their tweeds and cheap suits, discussing the unglamorous topics of their latest research.

She jerked the nightgown over her head, concealing from view the body she no longer recognized. Inside, she still felt like the twenty-five-year-old grad student she had once been, lithe and athletic. Nearly twenty years of research sitting in front of a computer or cocooned in books had taken their toll. As had the countless years of pizza and beer—quick and easy take-out—with other PhD candidates in her department to get them through their program.

Once she could have eaten like that and more because back then she would always play tennis or jog. But with her workload and now the impending sabbatical, which would mean more research sitting in museums and libraries, she saw her future predictably unfold in increased clothing sizes. She silently vowed that this year, this sabbatical, she would make time for exercise and eating right.

❖

Kate drove along the inner loop of the Beltway, cursing the idiots who couldn’t drive in good weather, let alone when a little rain fell. Glancing at her watch for the umpteenth time, she swore again. She would be later than she thought, but at least she had called ahead and told Paula she would be there as quickly as she could. Paula’s obvious disappointment had only made Kate more anxious. Paula was clearly not a patient woman, and Kate didn’t want her to change her mind. She never liked to hurry a seduction, and the mere thought of what she would do to the willowy blonde caused her heart to flutter.

A large semi passed her on the left, spraying water onto the Porsche’s windshield. Kate flipped the wiper switch to high and watched as the truck driver signaled to switch back into the lane in front of her. She slowed to let him in, conceding that big trucks always had the right-of-way when it came to little Porsches. She never wanted to try to prove who was stronger, although if the traffic had been lighter she would have definitely proved to him who was faster.

The taillights flashing bloody red first alerted Kate that something wasn’t quite right about the truck. And the quiet, proverbial lull before the storm really struck her; she saw everything as if standing outside herself. The semi jackknifed onto its side and a white SUV careened out of control to avoid hitting it, rolling over and smashing into the concrete highway divider. Another car collided with the SUV, a dark sedan of some sort.

Intellectually she knew that all of this occurred instantaneously, but everything moved in slow motion. By the time the events registered, it was too late for her brakes. She crushed the pedal nevertheless, a reflex, nothing more, because she intuited that her reaction would be useless.

She endlessly slid on the wet pavement as metal crunched and glass shattered. Then all went black.

Ellen nodded as students dropped their midterm exams on the lectern and filed out of the classroom. She told them all to have a pleasant weekend and that she would post grades on her office door. Once they had left, she gathered up the papers and headed for her office, making her way down the hall to the history department, located in Georgetown University’s Intercultural Center.

Ellen, a tenured professor of American history, specialized in the nineteenth century, specifically the Civil War. She was one of many professors in the department but the only one leaving on sabbatical this year, courtesy of NEH and Guggenheim Foundation grants. Ellen had received her PhD from the University of Virginia and had been fortunate to be born and raised in the cradle of the Civil War. Working at Georgetown let her remain in the area so that even without her approaching sabbatical, she could visit many of the sites she had frequented since childhood.

Ellen walked into her office and put the stack of exams on her desk. She stuck a Post-it Note on the answer key, asking her assistant Jenny Nelson to get them back to her as soon as possible, then finished tidying up her office. Not much was out of place; she merely had to attend to last-minute paperwork.

She had filed the last of her work when a light tap on the door drew her attention. Linda Cohen, professor of medieval studies, stood expectantly at her door. Plump and vivacious, Linda was Ellen’s colleague and closest friend. Despite her constant dishevelment and seeming lack of interest in her outward appearance, Linda possessed a brilliant mind and a quick sense of humor.

“School’s out for the week, teacher. Are we ready to party?” Linda danced a little jig of excitement. “And you have no reason to say no this time, missy. There’s nothing left for you to do until Monday. Tonight it’s all about you and the possibility of meeting Ms. Right. What do you say to Italian first, then Rosie’s?” Ellen groaned. She hated going to the bar but couldn’t think of a good reason to avoid it this time. She disliked the dating scene, disliked the social pretense of making small talk, all the while knowing that some stranger merely wanted to get her home in bed or, worse still, wasn’t interested in her at all. She sighed. “Italian sounds fine.”

“Wonderful. How about Janice and I meet you at Al Tiramisu at seven?”

Ellen nodded. She might as well go, but she couldn’t help shake her head at her friends’ deviousness. Linda and her partner Janice knew Italian was her favorite.

❖

Ellen rummaged through her closet trying to find something fashionable that still fit. Disappointed to find that one of her favorite blouses refused to button, she flung it to the floor with disgust.

General Beauregard sniffed it curiously, then stepped on it, making a delicate pastry of it with his paws. Finally settling on a pair of black slacks and tan blouse, she again faced herself in the mirror.

“Well, it’ll just have to do.”

If no one liked her for who she was, then screw them. She made a face in the mirror at her false bravado and grabbed a black sweater off a hanger. It had been unusually warm that day but she knew the evening would be cool and, besides, the black sweater tied strategically over her shoulders also managed to hide her imperfections. She picked up her purse off the kitchen table, opened her front door, and nearly collided with someone in the hall.

“Oh. I beg your pardon,” Ellen exclaimed, reaching out to steady the slight figure.

At first she thought she’d grasped the arm of a stranger, but she was appalled to find herself staring at Kate Foster. She almost didn’t recognize her. An ugly red gash crossed her cheek diagonally from the left bridge of her nose down to the lower tip of her left ear. The stitches stood out like black spiders, frayed and angry, giving Kate’s face a singularly crawling effect. Ellen couldn’t speak, the pain in her heart almost unbearable. Her throat constricted and hot tears rushed to her eyes.

“Oh, Kate,” she whispered.

Without thinking, she reached up to touch Kate’s cheek.

Flinching visibly, Kate jerked her arm from Ellen’s grasp and lowered her head, keeping the left side of her face out of sight.

Before Ellen could think of something to say, Kate stumbled to her condo and slammed the door behind her. Ellen stood where she was, aching to comfort her.

When she had first heard of Kate’s accident, she couldn’t believe it. But the newscaster had been certain it was indeed Channel 5’s anchor who had been involved in a six-car pileup on the Beltway.

Not knowing what else to do, Ellen had sent Kate flowers in the hospital. She had thought about visiting her, but didn’t want to intrude. After all, they barely knew each other, and Kate probably didn’t even know her name. Since then Ellen had kept a close eye at the peephole, hoping to glimpse her returning home. She hadn’t expected to run into her so soon.

My God, her face
.

Her mind was filled with images of Kate—Kate, striding purposefully into her condo that night, only to emerge in a stunning outfit with a look of anticipation. Kate eight days later, almost unrecognizable, the hollow eyes, the gaunt cheeks.

Ellen withdrew a tissue from her purse and dabbed the corner of her eyes. Though her makeup was light, she didn’t want to smear her mascara, an indication to Linda and Janice that she’d been crying. The subject was too raw right now for discussion. She took the elevator down to the first floor and headed for the restaurant a few blocks away. She barely registered the traffic on Connecticut Avenue or the already crowded sidewalk around Dupont Circle filled with Friday-night diners. When she reached Al Tiramisu, she spotted her friends at a table against the wall. The lights were dim, thank goodness, and she forced a smile as she approached. Linda and Janice greeted her with the usual jokes and teasing, like this was just another day.

But it wasn’t just another day, and she was more disturbed than she cared to admit. Seeing what Kate had been through, her life changed instantly by events outside her control, had stirred Ellen.