The Descendants (32 page)

Alex gives me an urgent look and I return it:
What am I supposed to do?

“I love this old house,” Alex says, looking at me again, urging me to do something.

“Yes,” I say. “Great old place.” I look into the windows at the expanse of the parlor. “I haven’t been here in a while. My great-aunt used to live here, you know.”

Brian could be, at this moment, the angriest man alive. I could have called him. I could have done this differently, but his reaction is what I came here to see. “I wonder if the inside has changed much. If they did something with that rough wood. We used to stay here a couple weeks in the summer as kids, and Cousin Hugh, he’d always get splinters from touching the walls.”

“I could show you around,” Julie says.

“Or, Brian,” Alex says, “you could show my dad around, and Julie and I can talk about love.” The two women smile at each other.

“Hey, that would be great,” I say.

“Sure,” Brian says. “But it’s not like I live here. You’re welcome to just…” He must have received a look from his wife, because he stops talking. He opens the door for me and I walk in. Alex shakes her head at me and I don’t know what it’s supposed to mean and not knowing makes my heart race. I look at the back of Brian as though an answer is pinned to his dark blue T-shirt.

“Here it is,” he says, sweeping his arm out at the open and warm room. The walls have been papered. The ceiling beams look lighter than I remember.

I walk to the far side of the room and have a seat in the koa rocking chair. None of the furniture in this house is comfortable. It all belonged to the missionaries, and our guesthouses all seem to be storage bins for the old settees and daybeds, the sewing baskets, the Hawaiian quilts and mosquito netting. The home across the street by the church still has the same stove and Dutch doors, a butter churn, bootjacks, and whale-oil lamps. The ceilings are low, the stairwell narrow and precarious, and the house has a roof like a pilgrim’s hat.

Brian has his hands on his hips. It’s amusing that he swept his arm out, displaying the room. I wonder if he’s a funny guy.

“So, Brian. As I said, I understand if you want to talk to her alone. There’s nothing I can do about the rest of it. So, I’m here. I’m telling you that I know about you and I know she loved you and that you were going to…” I wave my hand in the air, indicating whatever they were going to do after they left us. “You’re welcome to say goodbye. The doctor stopped artificial breathing yesterday. She has about a week, maybe longer.”

He looks like I’ve tricked him, like I really wanted to see the inside of this house.

“How did you meet?” I ask. “I’m curious.”

“I can’t do this,” he says.

“Believe me,” I say. “Neither can I.”

“Did you come here for me?”

“Yes, I came to get you. I got everyone else who was important to her, and you were up.” I ask again: “I can’t very well ask her all of the details, so I need to ask you. I want to know. How did you meet?”

“I thought you said you came here just to tell me. That it was all you wanted to do.”

“I’ve changed my mind,” I say. “How did you meet?” I was right. He is spotless. His hair is slicked back, the top strands thick with gel, and now I like the fact that I haven’t shaved. I like that there’s salt on my skin and hard alcohol on my breath. I wish I had one of Sid’s cigarettes. That would look even better.

“At a party,” he says. After releasing the words, he sits down on the daybed to the left of me. I feel like telling him to get off the bed. It’s my bed.

“What party?”

“Just a party. A Super Bowl party.”

I know exactly what party he’s talking about. Last year’s Super Bowl. New England vs. Carolina. But for me it was
State vs. Doreen Wellington.
Trial next day. I’d be up all night. Joanie home at six
P.M.
, in a great mood, then by the end of dinner angry at me, impatient with Scottie. “Must we always have fajitas on Sunday? I mean, really.”

I asked her about the party, wondering if something happened there that upset her.

“It was the best day I’ve had in a long time,” she said. “I had a really good time.” She had a sad look on her face.

Why do I remember this? The sad face, the fajitas?

“The party at the Mitchells’,” I say.

Brian nods, looking at me as though I’m an annoyance. “Yes,” he says. “That’s the one.”

I rock the chair back and try to angle it so that I face him. I place my wineglass on one of the arms, something we were never supposed to do.

“Does that help?” he asks. “Knowing that?”

“Hey,” I say. “I’m doing you a favor here.” I take a sip of my wine. “Get a better attitude.” He takes a drink of his wine. “Do you have any beer?” I ask. “I can’t drink this.”

“Me, neither.” He gets up to retrieve something else. I rock in the chair. I have an upper hand that’s so high. I close my eyes for a moment, feeling comfortable even in this hard and slippery chair. The air is warm but not stifling or humid, and in this house, I feel I have people behind me, Great-aunt Lucy, Hugh’s grandparents and parents, people who loved me, though they’re dead now. Brian comes back with the beer, and when he hands it to me, we look at each other and for a moment he’s just a guy giving me a beer, and maybe in his eyes I’m just a guy taking a beer. I was planning on giving him my wineglass, but I set it on the floor instead.

“So then what?” I ask. “You rooted for the same team? You liked the way she looked? You were amazed that a girl could be so cool, could watch football and know what she was talking about?”

“We’re still on this,” he says.

“Some women dress sexy or get breast implants. Joanie watched football, raced boats. It was her way to get men to like her. It’s not that amazing.”

He looks into his beer.

“How did you get the nerve to ask her out?”

He shakes his head.

“No, I’m serious. I really want to know what makes a person cross that line.”

He doesn’t answer and I know he never will. He looks toward the window across the room. I follow his gaze and see his wife. Her expression is incredulous and thrilled, and then I hear my daughter laugh. Julie takes a sip of her wine. The sight of Julie talking to my daughter saddens me. Even though Alex seems to be truly enjoying herself out there, she’s deceiving Julie. We all are.

“I’ve heard about your new business opportunity.” I keep my eyes on the window. “Joanie worked hard to get me to like Don. Quite a plan you had.”

“It’s not what you think,” he says.

“What do I think? How do you know what I think?”

“You think I’m ruthless,” he says. “That I was plotting something. I think that’s what you think. Me and Joanie. It just happened.”

“Nothing just happens,” I say.

“But it does,” he says.

“So, when you found out her connection to me, did you decide then to commit the adultery, or were you already committed? Did you ask her to sway me? Because, boy, she was hot for Holitzer. That doesn’t just happen.”

He doesn’t say anything. He looks at the window again, ignoring my questioning face. I take a long sip of beer. I see Julie opening the grill and poking at the burgers with the spatula. It occurs to me that she must have lit the grill, something that sort of astounds me. She doesn’t seem so delicate, so foolish, anymore.

“Look,” I say. “I’m glad she was in love, I guess. I’m glad you made her happy. This must be hard on you. Finding out like this.”

He’s still looking outside. Alex and Julie are standing with their backs to us, looking out at the bay. I realize his tactic—he’s not responding, which makes me talk endlessly, backtracking and forgiving him without his having to sweat.

“Was she going to leave me?” I ask.

I don’t expect him to tell me the truth, or even to answer, but he says, “She would have. But it wouldn’t have happened.”

“Why? Because of Scottie, or what? You were afraid to tell Julie?”

“No,” he says. “I wouldn’t leave Julie because I love Julie.” He leans forward a bit, and a new expression appears on his face. “Please don’t tell her,” he says. “Please. I don’t know what I’ve done.”

Here is the anguish I came to see, yet it’s not over my wife or over my discoveries, and something dawns on me that I never considered.

“Did she love you?” I ask.

He nods and lifts his beer to his mouth. A watery circle has appeared on the leg of his pants.

“Did you love her?” I ask.

He takes a long sip and brings the beer back down, lining up the base of the beer with the halo of water.

“You didn’t love her.” I need to say it again: “You didn’t love her.” I hear the surf collide with the shore, and a breeze full of salt and seaweed moves into the room.

“You just used her,” I say. “To get to me.”

He lets out a sigh. “No. I didn’t try to get to you. It was an affair. An attraction. Sex.” He checks my face to see if I’m angry. “She suggested everything beyond that, and I went with it.”

His shoulders drop, and it’s like we’re playing charades and he’s finally performed in a way that has led me to the right answer.

“And then you’d get rid of her after the sale,” I say. “I guess things worked out great for you. Her lips are sealed, and you don’t have to deal with dumping her.”

“I wasn’t even trying to use her for a connection!” he says, standing up. “She was consumed by it. I never asked her to help me. I never asked her for anything.” He walks the length of the bed, then walks back, looking up at the ceiling.

I can see this happening with Joanie. She takes on projects that aren’t hers to take. She molds. I think of Alex and myself, even, her desire to make us over. I stand up, too, and walk toward the window but stop in the middle of the room. “That poor girl,” I say. My wife was the fool. She will never know how bad it was. For the first time ever, Joanie seems weak to me.

I look at Alex’s profile. She turns her head and sees me, and I get this chill.
That’s my daughter watching me,
I think.
I made her, that girl there.

“So I guess you don’t need to say goodbye.”

“I love Julie very much,” he says. “I love my family.”

“I love my family, too.” I walk back across the room. I hand Brian my empty beer bottle.

“Should we—” He gestures toward the screen door. “Do you have anything else to say to me?”

I shake my head.

“Shouldn’t you be with her?” he asks.

“Yes,” I say and walk to the door, passing pictures of my ancestors hanging on the walls, their creepy and moody daguerreotypes. I pass my great-great-grandfather, who looks affronted and merciless. As I pass, I imagine his somber dark eyes following me.

Brian goes to the kitchen to throw away the bottles and put the glasses in the sink. I swing the screen door open and exit the house.

“Thanks for having us,” I say to Julie Speer.

“Thanks for stopping by,” she says. “I feel I know you so well after today and after Alex’s stories.” She gives Alex a private smile.

“I feel I know you well, too,” I say. I look at Brian through the screen door, his face alert and searching. “We have a lot in common, I think.” I take her hand and give it a little squeeze.

She holds on to my hand, her palm damp, then slides away gently. “Bye, Alex,” she says. “Maybe we’ll see you on the beach tomorrow.”

“Have a good night,” Alex says. She walks down the steps and onto the dark lawn. The sky has filled with stars, the moon thin like a splinter.

As Alex walks away, I turn to Julie once more and kiss her. I lean in and part my lips and kiss her. Because I want to, because she is Brian’s, because we’ve suffered a similar fate, because I want her to like it, because I want her to feel insulted, confused, annoyed, defenseless, happy. Because I want to.

I don’t look at her eyes when I pull away, but I look at her lips, and the tip of her tongue peeks out to wipe me away. Without saying anything, I turn and leave her and her family behind. As I walk out to the beach, something in me loosens, and it’s not because I’m relaxed. It’s because something in me has given up and failed, returning with nothing to give.

34