The Prize (29 page)

“I'm sorry. Oh, I'm so sorry.” She reached toward him and touched his arm and tears filled his eyes and she leaned in and hugged him, as if his grief for Tess could be absorbed in her grief for her father, as if his guilt for sleeping with Julia could be absolved, as if all could, somehow, be well. He held her tighter.

“I wanted to tell you,” he said into her hair.

She moved away and narrowed her eyes. Her face changed from compassion to confusion, as if she'd then taken in the full meaning of what he'd said.

“Why are you telling me this now? I don't get it. Why couldn't you tell me?”

“I couldn't tell anyone.”

“Anyone? Is that who I am?”

“Holly, it was like all the lights went out. I felt so ashamed.”

“For what?”

“I don't know. It wasn't rational.”

“I feel sorry for you. And her. And her poor family. But I can't hear this now. How can you tell me this now? When my father . . .”

She looked at him and shook her head. She started for the stairs, then hesitated for a moment. “Edward. What other secrets are you keeping from me?” Before he could answer she turned away.

On the surface it didn't make sense—that he hadn't told her before, that he did tell her, now, in this moment, when her father was dying. Why hadn't he told her? Because in him he held Tess's memories and if he revealed them they would not be as precious. Because if he talked about it, it might justify the pain and he did
not want the pain to lift and be relieved of his guilt, which, in turn, would relieve his grief. His father used to say that what you couldn't control, you had to identify before it broke you to pieces. He didn't know why he hadn't told her. It wasn't out of malice or mistrust. It was a way of punishing himself. Or because after all these years—was Clara right?—he still couldn't face that Tess was really gone.

He watched from his window as Holly climbed into her SUV. She swiftly pulled out of the driveway. He got up and, unsure of what to do, took from the desk drawer a pack of cigarettes. He opened the window and blew out the smoke, aware that with each exhale he was infesting his family's home with its fumes, that his daughter would be home soon and he didn't want her smoking. His BlackBerry trembled in his pocket. He took it out and watched it vibrate in his hand.

“Hey,” he said. “Jimmy?”

“I'm in trouble, man.”

“What is it? What's happened?”

“Lucinda. She found out about Melody. She called me at home.”

“Shit, Jimmy.”

“Lucinda threw me out of my own house.”

“You sound bad. Have you been drinking?”

“Of course I'm fucking drinking. My marriage is over.”

“Jimmy, what can I do?”

“I'll call you tomorrow. Belinda's back.”

“Who the fuck is Belinda? Jimmy?”

The phone went dead.

H
E LISTENED TO
the start, stop, and hum of the refrigerator as he waited for Holly to come home. After dinner and homework,
Annabel had gone to bed. He nursed a thumb of scotch in a coffee cup. He looked up at the big orb of the kitchen clock. It was like an eye watching him. He would stop the thing with Julia. They had found themselves together in a foreign country when they were both vulnerable. He hadn't meant for it to go anywhere. Something about her had taken away his reason and clouded his vision. He had to get hold of himself. He was a faithful man. He loved his wife and their life together. He wasn't like Jimmy. He looked again at the clock ticking the minutes off as if in agreement with his reasoning. Minutes before midnight Holly's car came up the drive.

She walked in looking a few years older than when she'd left, unbuttoned her coat and left it in a heap on the kitchen stool, and began walking toward the stairs.

“How's your father? I've been calling the hospital to check in.”

“He's in intensive care. We'll know more in the morning.”

“Did you eat? Can I make you a sandwich or some eggs?”

“I ate with Mom at the hospital. How's Annabel?”

“Fine. Sleeping. About this morning. I'm sorry,” he started.

She looked through him coldly. “I need to focus on Daddy.”

Her bitterness took him by surprise, as if having hoped for it and reasoned against it during the hours she was away he imagined she'd already forgiven him. After she left the kitchen it felt cold and drafty. He poured himself a glass of water. His head ached. He reached for the Advil in the cabinet above the sink and downed three. A rancid odor came from the trash can when he opened it to toss the paper cup. The bag was full; he'd forgotten to take it out. He tied the bag up to tamp down the smell, then opened the back door and walked outside into the rash of wind and cold. The wet leaves seeped into his socks. He came back into the house and
washed the smell of rot off his hands and took off his socks. He put on the teakettle. He'd make Holly a cup of milky tea, which she liked before bed. He waited for the kettle to whistle and then he poured the boiling water over a bag of Earl Grey and added just the amount of milk that she liked. He still thought that maybe he could make up for what he'd done. He slowly walked upstairs. Outside the door of their bedroom Holly had piled blankets and a pillow. He poked his head into their bedroom. The room smelled of the lavender lotion she rubbed on her arms before bed. The cozy room with its thick carpet and creamy drapes drew him. Though many nights, restless and uncomfortable, he had preferred to sleep alone, he felt suddenly shut out and longed to be near her. She came out of the bathroom, and then walked into the bedroom and he handed her the cup of tea like an offering.

“I shouldn't have unloaded on you like that. Not when you're worried about your father.”

She looked at him and placed the mug on the nightstand. “Thank you for the tea. But I can't do this now. I can't even think about it.”

She climbed into bed and then she shook her head, as if to say no, and motioned with her hand for him to go. He closed the door and picked up the pillow and blankets from the floor.

5 CONNECTICUT

I
T WAS THE
middle of March. The clouds huddled in, dark and brooding, ready to take everything into their devouring shape-shifting form and break open. He waited for the storm. The air turned moist and cool. It pimpled his skin. He took in the darkness and then slowly the air warmed, the clouds broke apart, and the storm did not come, which was almost worse than if it had.

A month passed. Holly's father was still in intensive care. Holly received a call about a stray litter of newborn kittens found in a field. The mother cat had been killed by a fox. She fetched the kittens, and instead of taking them to the refuge brought them home to care for them until they were big enough to be adopted out. She kept them in a basket lined with a blanket in their heated garage. After a long day at the gallery, eager for her company, maybe a glass of wine together, he found her in the garage feeding the baby kittens milk from a baby bottle. She barely looked up at him. She stroked the kitten, not yet the size of her hand, and pressed her lips to its fur.

Retreating to his study, he opened an e-mail from Julia. She'd read a piece about Swartzman, one of his artists, in
Bomb
and was curious about his upcoming new work. He wrote back that he'd read a short piece about her commission in Vienna in
Art News
. She said she'd been reading “Ode on Melancholy.” It was inspiring her new work.

He took down his copy of Keats and read the ode. “But when the melancholy fit shall fall / Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud.” He smiled. It made him feel connected to her. It was enough. He told himself that they could still be close friends and not jeopardize each other's lives. He told himself a lot of things.

6 CONNECTICUT

H
OME WAS NOW
a foreign country. Annabel, suddenly a full-blown teenager, secretive and private, an earbud in one ear, the other dangling, a strange, dazed, love-induced look to her face. When her friends were over the room crackled with their energy. Holly barely acknowledged him. She waltzed through the sunroom and kitchen, touching the soil in her pots of ferns and jade to see if they needed watering. At breakfast she executed the crossword puzzle with concentration and intensity, as if she were amending the Constitution. Annabel slumped in the kitchen chair next to her, spoon-feeding cereal into her mouth, buried mercurially behind her laptop. His back was to them as he took the last sip of his coffee at the sink before heading for the train, the glare of morning sun showing cracks in the thinning plaster and the indentations of its inevitable ruin. Though he felt at the core that he was responsible for his sudden alienation, he was at a loss how to win them back.

“How about we barbecue when I get home tonight?” he suggested. The estrangement was unbearable. Neither of them spoke for a moment.

“Mom?” Annabel said, annoyed.

“What is it, honey?”

“Dad's talking to you.”

“Oh, I didn't hear,” Holly said, putting down her pencil.

“He wants to know if you want to barbecue tonight.” Annabel looked up from her screen—the paradox of puberty, one minute his little girl and the next a teenager with a chip on her shoulder—and said, “Jesus. You guys are freaks.”

“Sure,” Holly said, not raising her eyes from the puzzle. “If that's what you want to do. Edward, what time will you be home tonight?”

“Around seven.”

“See you then,” Holly said, and put down the crossword puzzle and went upstairs. He followed her, opening the bedroom door to find her in front of the oval mirror combing her hair. He stopped to look at the strands of gold in her locks and the gentle slope of her nose, and her dark eyes in the mirror. Aging had made her beauty more substantial. She looked back at him coolly.

“Holly,” he began.

“No, Edward,” she said, brushing her hair in fierce strokes. Her voice trembled. “You can't tell me something like that and expect it to be all okay.”

“It's been weeks now. We have to talk about it. We have to talk.”

“No.” She continued to brush her hair. “It's amazing how we sleep side by side, eat our meals together, and I didn't know maybe the most significant thing about you aside from your father's death. I've thought about it a hundred times. It feels like a betrayal.”

He felt as if the lid of a rusty, stubborn can had been pried open. He held up his hands as if to say something, but he didn't know what to say. How could she not understand how painful it had been for him to keep it from her all these years?

He had forgotten a proposal he was working on for an exhibit, so before he left for the train he went back upstairs to his study. He
found the proposal and put it in his bag. Next to it was his father's copy of Keats's poems on the desk where he had left it. He thought about Julia. She would understand. He felt like one of those dogs he saw every morning when he passed the neighbors' yard, locked up in a pen, roused, wanting to burst out. What had he been telling himself? Holly had shut him out or he had shut her out and it was too complicated to put back together. He could give up his will and let it happen and see what this new life might bring him. Maybe he'd been wrong to be protective of his family and private life. He wanted to bust out of himself. He wanted to see her pale arms and long throat and beautiful breasts that he'd glimpsed once or twice in the twilight of a hotel room but had reviewed and rewound in his mind more times than he could count. He could almost taste her. Why always this need to protect himself? The desire was unbearable. He felt in that moment that he might break if he did not see her. He wrote a note and put it inside the copy of Keats.
Meet me at the Peninsula this afternoon at three
, the note said. He would have his assistant messenger it to her studio as soon as he arrived at the gallery. It was simple. He could be a man who'd send a note to a woman that he was completely and utterly in the thrall of and not hold back or look the other way. He witnessed uncompromising passion all around him. It was the inspiration behind the art he saw and loved, the books he read, and the music he listened to. He'd read once that an artist must commit himself to his project as if he were committing himself to love. Why shouldn't he too surrender? By saying no, wasn't it inflating the importance of the thing itself? He had to know if it was real. He felt certain that his ache was the same as that which had inspired the look he saw of the girl in the Vermeer painting, the one with the pearl earring. All through the
train ride into the city he held the book in his hand and looked out the window and envisioned her face and nothing else. Nothing but a face and a mouth and a hand and he could have everything.

S
HE ENTERED THE
hotel room. He saw her dark hair with light streaks and full body and tender eyes and wanted her more than he'd ever wanted anything.

“I am glad you sent the book,” she said with a smile, her hair unhinged from a barrette she held in her hand. “I feel lost without you.”

There was no time to pull back the sheets or dim the lights, or undress. It was three in the afternoon and the little light from the afternoon pushed its way through the curtains the way he pushed his way into her. The minute he saw her they were all over each other, both having given up the idea that they should not.