Manhattan Lullaby (3 page)

Bradley decided not to push it. “How was your day?” He said too cheerfully, stifling a yawn.

“Obviously not as tiring as yours,” she said over her shoulder. There was no mistaking the sarcasm.

“Sorry.” He yawned again. “I must have walked twenty blocks. The cold air makes me sleepy.”

“In that case, I guess I'll have to start shutting the bedroom window at night.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” She was getting closer to telling him what was bugging her and he braced himself.

“
Noth-ing
,” she said tersely and turned off the element under the pot.

Now he knew he was really going to be in for it. Two “nothings” and a scarcely veiled reference to their sex life—or lack of it. Look out!

From the other end of the kitchen came a squawk followed by a whistle. “Chester's hungry,” she said to Bradley, pouring the contents of the pan into a small plastic dish. She blew on it for a minute to cool it down a little. “Here, give him this, would you?”

Realizing that the dinner she had been cooking was not for him, Bradley became a trifle irritable. If he couldn't have sleep, he at least wanted to be able to count on having food. “He's your guest, you feed him.”

“Pardon me for asking.”

“Well, it's disgusting. He keeps barfing all the time.”

“He's not
barfing
. He's regurgitating his food. They do that for their mates, and he thinks that I'm his … well, you get the idea.”

Bradley grimaced at the thought. “Great. I'm about to marry a woman who's been two-timing me with a bird,” and he walked out of the kitchen.

He lay down on the couch. He could hear her talking softly to the parrot. “Stupid bird,” he muttered to himself. Janie and her animals were beginning to get on his nerves. But then, these days, everything was beginning to get on his nerves. He figured it might be a chemical imbalance brought on by an excess of hormones, which had been brought on by an excess of—well, never mind. But he wasn't sure. In any case, he wasn't about to go to a doctor to find out. He wasn't going to start telling the whole world what he had been doing.

After a few minutes Janie came into the living room. “Are we having a fight?” she asked, sitting on the edge of the couch next to him.

Bradley shook his head. He didn't mind having an argument, but he didn't want to have a fight. Not just before the wedding. “No. I'm sorry I was late. I just went out for … a while to get some air.” In the kitchen Chester squawked again and flapped his wings. “And to get away from him.”

“I'm sorry, he won't be here much longer. Dolly's picking him up Thursday afternoon. I know he's been driving you crazy. But the advertising agency thought that if he was with me—you know, one on one—I might be able to get him to say it right. The client is getting impatient. Chester is their new spokesbird. He's the center of their whole spring campaign. And I'm the only one he'll respond to.”

Bradley felt a pang of guilt. She was working hard for the two of them and all he could do was complain. “And why not?” he said, taking her hand in his. “Parrots are supposed to be very intelligent birds.”

“Are we making up?” She smiled and leaned over and placed a kiss softly on his lips. At first he kissed her back. But then she slowly began to increase the pressure of her mouth on his. He recognized the signs and slowly he eased her away from him.

She looked puzzled and hurt. “Bradley … why don't you want to make love to me anymore?”

This was the moment he had been dreading. What could he say? Not the truth, that was for sure. He decided to take the offensive. He hated to do it, but at least it would cool her off until he was able to show her how much he loved her. “Maybe I don't find the smell of flea powder to be an aphrodisiac.”

“That's not very nice!” She wrenched her hand from his.

He realized he'd gone too far and he reached for her again. “Just kidding.”

“No, you weren't.” She brushed his hand away. “Something's bugging you, isn't it. I mean really bugging you. Is it something to do with the wedding? Have you changed your mind about … us? Why won't you—”

But before she could finish, Chester took a sweeping dive through the kitchen door. “Mountain Hartz!” he screamed as he sailed over their heads and landed on the top of the bookcase. “Mountain Hartz!”

“That's what's bugging me. I have to listen to that all bloody day long.” Bradley sat up. “No more bringing your work home with you when we're married. I'm going to have to put my foot down.”

Janie stood up. “Is that right? Well, you don't seem to mind my bringing my paycheck home, and that”—she pointed to Chester, who was busy digging his toenails into the mahogany—“is part of where it comes from.”

Bradley clenched his fists. “You just can't leave it alone, can you? Can't let an evening go by without reminding me which one of us is the breadwinner around here?”

“I'm not
reminding
you. I'm just stating a fact. We agreed when we moved in together that I would work and you would stay home and take care of the house. That's what you wanted. But now you seem to resent it.”

“We agreed that you would
work
. We didn't agree that you would become the Charles Lazarus of the pet industry.”

She moved away from the couch and then turned around to face him, one hand on each hip. “Oh, so it's not the fact that I bring home the bacon that's bugging you. It's how much bacon I bring home. You've never been able to handle the fact that I'm a success. You can't stand it that I made P.E.T. Inc. into a multimillion-dollar-a-year business. Admit it.”

“All right, fine, I will. You're absolutely right. I can't stand it!” Bradley jumped to his feet, a rush of adrenaline providing him with a sudden surge of energy. “I can't stand coming home to an empty house while you're out giving pet parties, or opening pet restaurants and pet spas or thinking up some new pet product to market to the public.” He strode out into the kitchen and she followed. “I can't stand going to cook myself a pathetic and lonely little dinner and only finding this!” He threw open two of the kitchen cupboards. All three shelves in both cupboards were stocked with cans of Pet Party Purée, The Gourmet Feast for Yuppie Puppies.

“The Yuppie Puppie food is what paid for this house!” cried Janie defensively.

“There you go again. Rub my nose in it. Or maybe you'd just like to hit me with a rolled-up newspaper!” And with that Bradley stormed out of the kitchen, down the hall and into the bathroom. He slammed the door and locked it. An argument had been his alternative to stave off an unwanted bout of lovemaking. But this had gotten a little out of hand. They had both said a lot of things that they had managed to avoid saying, until now. Maybe he had gone too far.

Janie banged on the door. “Bradley? Come out of there!” She heard the tap go on and then the shower. “Bradley!”

Suddenly the door flew open. Bradley stood there with a towel knotted tightly around his waist. In his right hand he was holding a large blue bottle. “Would it be asking too much for me to find a bottle of Prell, or maybe some Fabergé Organics, or even one of those generically branded shampoos, anything, anything but Snow-Coat?”

“I told you I bought the company. I—” But before she could finish, he slammed the door again and locked it.

“I use it!” She shouted against the sound of the running water.

“Mountain Hartz!” shrieked Chester as he glided down the hallway and landed near her feet.

Half an hour later Janie was lying on the far right side of the big double bed and Bradley was clinging to the left edge. The lights were out, the window was open and the silence was oppressive, broken only infrequently by the rustle of feathers from Chester's perch near the door.

After a few more minutes of this Bradley felt a warm foot insinuating itself next to his and then a hand snuggling up beside his neck.

“I'm sorry,” they said in unison and then, “It was my fault.”

They both laughed softly in the darkness. Janie moved closer and started to stroke Bradley's neck and then his face.

“Hmm, that feels nice,” he murmured sleepily.

She kept on stroking his face, pressing herself full-length against him.

“Hmm …”

Her hand dipped around behind his right ear and she gently scratched the line of his hair.

“I'm a human, not hound,” whispered Bradley.

“Sorry,” she whispered back, and her hand traveled lower.

Silently Bradley cursed himself for complaining. She was getting into very still waters.

Gradually Janie infiltrated her hand down under the waistband of his pajama bottoms, stroking the smooth skin of his belly and then the more heavily pelted area of his upper thighs. In the dark, Bradley stifled a yawn. Her hand moved ever lower, her fingers searching and exploring, intent on reaching their goal. He felt like his moment of truth was just a couple of inches away. And then out of the night came the call that saved him.

“Hartz Mountain,” muttered Chester under his wing. “Hartz Mountain.”

Janie sat bolt upright, the heel of her palm digging into Bradley's crotch. “Did you hear that? He said it. I heard him. He said ‘Hartz Mountain' as clear as anything.” She flung back the covers and jumped out of bed. She switched on the light and ran over to the bird. “Good boy, Chester. Good boy!” she said, stroking his viri-descent head.

“Good boy,” said Bradley, and then under his breath, “Thank you.”

Chapter Three

Solly S. Berman, M.D., lived on the Upper West Side in a tall, narrow townhouse that breathed elegance from every one of its long, narrow windows. Like its occupant, the building was old, but old in the manner of fine antiques—it had the worn, lived-in look that only comes from years of loving use by the same owner.

It was a plush house in a plush neighborhood, a circumstance that afforded Dr. Berman an equally plush clientele. And as his practice was primarily devoted to treating the urban wealthy, his work focused for the most part on maladies resulting directly from that status, afflictions that owed their existence to an overindulgence in a variety of substances and underindulgence in almost any activity not required to administer them. And since Solly Berman was very good at correcting and controlling the side effects of urban wealth, he had become over the years a very wealthy man himself. In fact, if there had been a
Fortune
500 for doctors, his name would certainly have appeared high up on the list.

Needless to say, Maxine was more than a little impressed when she stepped out of the taxi in front of 133 West 73rd Street. You might be able to hide the full extent of your wealth behind the polyester anonymity of a jogging suit, but real estate was always a dead giveaway. Now she knew with certainty that the information the research department had dug up was indeed accurate. Dr. Solly S. Berman was not just an elegant, refined, fadingly handsome man. He was a catch. And even though she had made a point of telling her ex-husband that she wasn't expecting anything other than a pleasant evening from Dr. Berman, if something more permanent were to develop, well, she wouldn't exactly run screaming into the woods.

As she mounted the twelve steps to the front door her pulse quickened. Maybe dating again wasn't going to be so bad after all. Visions of romantic champagne-encrusted evenings danced before her eyes. Maybe she would be one of the lucky ones who married “up” the second time. One of those second wives who had the world laid gratefully at their feet by indulgent older husbands. Why not? It could happen. To a certain degree it had happened to her ex-husband Harry's second wife.

Harry thought that Joyce walked on water—when she was in town. Maxine knew this because whereas she had cooked for him every single night for twenty-five years, with Joyce he ate out. And, whereas she had washed and ironed and scrubbed the collars of his shirts until her nail polish was ruined, he now sent his shirts out to the laundry. Apparently he even thought it was just a charming idiosyncrasy that Joyce defined iron only as a mineral, not an appliance. Maybe Dr. Solly Berman would be her ticket to that point of view. If getting divorced had taught her one thing, it was that anything was possible.

She rang the bell and finished her personal pep talk while she waited. There was no rule in the book that said you could date only men who earned less than your ex-husband, was there? And so, like any normal divorcee in the same position, she allowed herself to wonder fleetingly what it would be like to be the next Mrs. Dr. Solly S. Berman.

Solly S. Berman answered the door himself. Maxine was a little disappointed by this until he explained that tonight was Bartholomew's night off so they would be fending for themselves. Bartholomew? She was impressed anew. Anyone who had someone named Bartholomew working in their house acquired an added measure of interest.

He took her coat and she admired the hallway, the giant gilt mirror with the tiny fat cherubs cavorting in the corners and the obviously expensive Qum carpet that lay in a casual expression of exquisite good taste across the marble-tiled floor.

“Rachel always said a hallway should make a good first impression,” he explained as he came and stood beside her. “You look lovely tonight, Maxine.” And gently taking her arm, he guided her into the similarly splendiferous living room.

“Rachel was your wife?” asked Maxine, more out of politeness than interest.

He nodded sadly and then asked, “Would you like something to drink?”

Maxine thought for a moment. She wasn't much of a drinker. And even though a gin and tonic with a wedge of lime would have hit the spot right at that moment, she decided that sherry was more appropriate. It went with the decor.

“Sherry would be nice.”

“Sweet or dry?” asked Solly, sounding pleased as he went over to a set of sparkling decanters nestled unobtrusively on a tasteful brass and glass trolley.