Secret Lives (44 page)

She made up the folding bed in the little
room next to her mother's old room and filled the small pine
dresser with the clothes she'd bought. She ate a few meals with Lou
and Kyle and slept at Lynch Hollow on a couple of nights, trying to
ease the tension of being with them so it wouldn't overwhelm Cassie
on her arrival. Staying here again would not be difficult. She'd
had years of practice relating to Kyle and Lou on a purely
superficial level. She knew how to keep her distance from them.

She missed Ben on those nights at Lynch
Hollow. In the middle of one particularly hot night she threw on
her robe, drove the winding black road up to his cabin, and climbed
into his bed. They made love in the breathless air of the cabin,
the damp sheet twisting around their bare legs. Afterward he told
her she was crazy to leave an air-conditioned house on a
ninety-five-degree night just so she could sleep with a man already
on the verge of heat prostration. And she replied that soon Cassie
would come, soon she wouldn't be able to sleep with him at all, and
they both grew very quiet. When Cassie arrived, everything would
change.

One night while she was at Lynch Hollow,
Michael called. At first she thought he was stoned. He was so
low-key, so soft and slow. But after speaking to him for a few
minutes she knew it was acceptance she heard in his voice. He was
no longer on, no longer trying hard to win her affection. He asked
her questions about Ben, questions to help him understand her
attraction to him, and she was careful to be honest in her answers
without revealing Ben's past. He was glad she was happy, he said,
and with a pang of guilt she knew he cared about her enough to mean
it.

“Nina's furious,” he said. “But I told her
it's your life and she should butt out. But God, when I think of
you not living down the street from me anymore…I miss you, Eden.
I'm lonely as hell without you. Can I still call you every once in
a while?”

“I'd like you to.”

“Ben won't get jealous?”

“He's not the jealous type,” she said,
although she realized she had no way of knowing that for certain.
She had lived with Ben in a cocoon, not in the real world.

When she got off the phone she sat still for
a long time. That had been the first real conversation she'd ever
had with Michael. The first one in which she felt like they were
two people talking with one another, rather than two characters
rehearsing their lines. His bravado, his slick, masculine image was
no more real than the character he'd played in Heart of Winter. She
felt a tenderness for him that was new. The next time she spoke to
him she would tell him to nurture that soft, open part of himself,
to let the women he met see it. He wouldn't be lonely for long.

Wayne arrived with Cassie that Friday
evening. All day Eden had felt an anxiety she couldn't label. She'd
had lunch with Ben on the footbridge over Ferry Creek and had not
been able to eat.

“You're not in competition with Wayne,” he'd
said. “This isn't a popularity contest.”

She nodded, knowing Ben had zeroed in on the
source of her nervousness.

“I won't plan on seeing you for a couple of
days,” he said.

“Why not?”

“You and Cassie need some time to get to know
each other again without a stranger around.”

She hadn't thought of that, but once he said
it she knew he was right. She wanted Cassie all to herself for a
while.

Cassie was sick when she arrived. Wayne
carried her out of the car just as dusk was falling. Her hair was
longer, a dark patch of silk on Wayne's shoulder. She looked limp
and liquid in his arms.

“Hi, Mommy,” she said in her sick-little-girl
voice.

“Hi, baby.” Eden kissed her cheek. It was
hot.

“She hasn't felt too well the past couple of
days,” Wayne said as he carried her into the house. Eden trotted
alongside, lugging the kitten in its little kennel and trying to
make out Cassie's features in the dim light. “April and Lindy had a
stomach thing and I guess she has a touch of it. The mountain roads
didn't help.”

He carried Cassie upstairs, where a stuffed
koala bear perched on the pillow of the folding bed. Kyle must have
put it there before he and Lou went out for the evening. Eden moved
it to the dresser and pulled down the covers.

“Her pajamas are right on top in her
suitcase,” Wayne said, but Cassie had already tugged the covers to
her chin, and her eyes were closed. Eden felt a stab of worry,
followed by disappointment that this evening would not go as she
had planned. There would be no long and loving talk with Cassie
tonight.

“Sorry to bring you a sick kid,” Wayne said.
“She's been fine all summer.”

She took his words personally—Cassie was fine
as long as she was with Wayne. But when Wayne bent down to kiss his
sleeping daughter good-bye, when he stroked Cassie's hair and
whispered, “I love you, sweetheart. I'll miss you,” she felt a
little twist of love for him.

He stood up again and looked around him.
“This is where you grew up?”

“Yes. Well, downstairs. It was different
then. Not nearly so nice.” She walked him downstairs and showed him
around the house. When they reached the kitchen, she poured him a
glass of iced tea and they sat at the table.

Wayne looked good. He had a sunburn across
the bridge of his nose, a little more gray at his temples.

“So.” He grinned. “Who's the guy you painted
the Big Apple red with?”

He'd seen the tabloid. “He's a friend of
Kyle's.”

“Are you…Do you have something going with
him?” She nodded and couldn't help her smile. He smiled back.

“Is he an archaeologist?”

“Yes.”

“What's he like? Is he divorced or what?”

“Now you're getting nosy.”

“Well, I think I have a right to know
something about him if he's going to be around Cassie.”

“I don't recall you asking my permission
before you started sleeping with Pam.” She was immediately
contrite. She lowered her eyes. “I'm sorry.”

“No, I'm sorry.” Wayne set down his glass.
“I'm not proud of how I handled things back then. And I didn't mean
to be intrusive just now. If he's a friend of Kyle's, that says
enough. I was never really comfortable knowing Cassie was hanging
around Michael Carey.” He stood up. “When do you go back to Santa
Monica?”

“I don't think I will. Ben needs to stay on
the East Coast, so I'll be staying myself for a while.”

Wayne's jaw dropped; then he smiled. “I like
this guy better all the time. If you're living here I could see
Cassie more often, couldn't I?”

“We can probably arrange that.”

“What about your career?”

“I'll work it out.”

She walked him out to his car. He looked up
at the dark bedroom window before getting in. “She's been afraid of
the dark lately. Maybe you could get a night-light for her? She's
been looking forward to seeing you. The important thing is for us
to keep telling her we both want her, we'll both always be there
for her.”

“Of course.” Eden hurt for him. She knew how
it felt to drop Cassie off and drive away.

“She might be a little homesick for a few
days,” Wayne continued. “Let her call if she wants to. You can use
my work number during the day.”

“I'll let her call all she wants. And Wayne?”
She set her hand on his arm as he slid behind the wheel. He looked
up at her. “I think Cassie's lucky to have you as her father.”

He stared at her a moment before he smiled.
“You've changed,” he said.

“I know.”

She lay in her mother's old bed, the bed she
had been born in, worrying that Cassie might wake up in the middle
of the night to find herself alone in a strange room. Finally she
got up and brought Cassie and the stuffed koala into bed with her.
Cassie's forehead was cool now, and she drifted in and out of sleep
as Eden changed her into her pajamas. Cassie settled into the
pillow, clutching the koala as though it had been hers for a long
time. Eden drew the covers over both of them and was immediately
enveloped in Cassie's scent, subtle yet unmistakable, and she
pulled her daughter closer to breathe her in.

–
39–

In the morning Eden sat in the wicker rocker
and studied her daughter. Cassie slept heavily, compressing the
pillow and mattress as though she weighed two hundred pounds
instead of forty-one. She was not a classic beauty and probably
never would be. Not like Bliss who, if only for a few seconds,
stole your breath away. But Cassie was irrepressibly cute. Even
asleep there was an impishness in her turned-up nose and full
cheeks, the suggestion of a smile at the corners of her mouth. Her
dark bangs were spiky and short, and Eden recalled Wayne telling
her that Cassie had taken it upon herself to cut her own hair the
week before. For the first time, Eden was grateful Cassie resembled
Wayne and not herself. She didn't have to wonder where Cassie got
her nose or her eyes. She wanted no reminders of Cassie's ancestry
or her own.

Eden walked over to her closet and took a
pair of shorts off their hanger. Her back was turned on her
daughter for just an instant, so she was startled when Cassie said,
“Whoever is this?”

She turned to see Cassie sitting up in the
bed, grinning, holding the koala up for inspection. Her hair was a
mass of wispy brown tangles except for the bangs that stood
straight up above her big brown eyes. She was beautiful. Eden
climbed back on the bed and hugged her.

“It's from Uncle Kyle.” She tried to comb
Cassie's bangs into place with her fingers, but it was
hopeless.

“Is Daddy still here?”

“No, honey, he had to leave last night.”

Cassie jumped out of the bed and ran to the
window. She gnawed at her lower lip with her small front teeth as
she looked outside. “I thought I heared his car.”

Eden felt a flash of insecurity, as though
she wasn't at all certain she could remember how to take care of a
child by herself. “It must have been your imagination. He said to
tell you he loves you and he'll miss you and he can't wait until
the next time he gets to see you. We can call him later if you
like.” She walked over to the window and laid her hand on Cassie's
cool forehead. “Are you feeling better this morning? Do you want
some breakfast?”

“Yes.” Cassie marched around the room in her
yellow shorty pajamas, examining everything, touching Eden's
familiar comb and brush set on the dresser, taking a few seconds to
look at her own picture on the night table. She'd always awakened
this way, immediately alert, exploratory, checking out her world.
It reassured Eden. She knew this child.

“Where's Stuart?”

“Stuart?”

“My kitten.”

“Oh. I left him in the kitchen for the night.
But we can move his litter box up here today. What will you name
your koala?”

Cassie looked at the koala lying on the
bed.

“April,” she said. “It's from Uncle
Kyle?”

“Uh huh. Do you remember Uncle Kyle and Aunt
Lou?”

“Sure, silly. Aunt Lou rides in a
wheelchair.”

“Great, that's right. You have a good
memory.” She pointed Cassie in the direction of the bathroom. “Come
on, let's get dressed and go down to breakfast.”

The table in the kitchen was set for four and
laden with pancakes and blueberries, fresh-squeezed orange juice,
and wedges of cantaloupe. Cassie had seen Lou and Kyle only three
times in her life—two brief visits in New York and once last year
in California. Eden imagined that the visit last year could be the
only one clear in Cassie's memory. Cassie had been distressed by
Lou's missing leg, which she'd searched for under the furniture and
in the closets, making Eden extremely uncomfortable, although Lou
herself seemed amused.

Once Cassie was born, the obligatory visits
with Lou and Kyle became more tolerable. Cassie provided the
entertainment, something for the four adults to focus on other than
the strain that existed between them. Now at the breakfast table
Eden knew this would be the case once again. The tension that had
filled the house since she'd learned Kyle was her father floated
high above them, too high to be much of a threat. It lost its
charge with Cassie in the room. Eden felt it up there, a good, safe
distance above her.

Cassie seemed to have adjusted easily to the
overnight upheaval in her life. She was her usual, unshy self,
fully aware of her ability to charm. She relished being the center
of attention, and Lou and Kyle made an appreciative audience. She
babbled about her month in Pennsylvania, April and Lindy, the
swimming pool, and Stuart, the plump gray kitten. She was an
expressive child, her face a mirror for her words, and Eden watched
her from a new perspective—one born of a month's deprivation.

Lou leaned close to Eden. “She's going to be
an actress for sure."

Eden felt deflated by the idea. Wearing the
mask was not the life she would choose for her daughter.

Cassie looked up at the shelf above the sink.
“What's that?” she asked, her eyes so huge that the whites showed
all around the nearly black irises.

Eden looked up to see a ceramic plate in the
shape of a flounder.

“It's a serving plate for fish,” Lou
said.

“Why, it's exquisite,” Cassie said and they
all laughed. She was definitely on this morning.

“I was hoping that you and I could go fishing
one day while you're here,” Kyle said.

Eden had a sudden memory of Kyle taking her
fishing. She must have been no more than Cassie's age, and she
remembered sitting with him on the bank of the Shenandoah, the
fishing line damp and taut beneath her fingers.

“Today?” Cassie asked.

“That's up to your mother.” Kyle looked at
Eden.

Eden had wanted Cassie to herself today, but
they would have plenty of time together over the next few weeks.
“That would be fine,” she said.