The Whole World Over (47 page)

The party lasted till one o'clock. The two dozen guests left as a group,
perhaps hoping somehow to pool their warmth against the winter night.
Walter hugged them all gratefully before sending them out the door.
The snow had stopped, but the wind persisted, and they wrapped their
collars up around their cheeks, pulled knit hats down over eyebrows,
wincing and bracing themselves. Already, Walter's memory of specific
conversations was fragmentary but bright: the stained-glass-window
effect of all the best parties.

Walter had just collapsed on the velvet couch, assuming that he and
Ben were now alone, when the door to the men's room opened.

"I'm not sure I've ever been the last guest left standing." McLeod
blushed faintly.

"It's a compliment," said Walter. "I thank you."

"Please, don't get up." McLeod looked around. "One doesn't appreciate
the small touches when a restaurant's filled—as yours so often is."
He examined an antique rectangular platter that hung on the wall; it
had been glazed with the image of several spotted rabbits running
through grass. The detail was lovely, though Walter couldn't help thinking
that these helpless, adorable creatures, in the artist's eye, were about
to be pounced upon by a vicious pack of hounds.

"You should publish a cookbook," said McLeod as he pulled on his
coat. He looked reluctant to leave, but Walter did not invite him to linger.
Walter wanted to have a brandy with Ben and recollect the evening in the
solitude he had to accept as his fate yet again.

"A cookbook? What, you mean by Hugo?" Walter laughed. "I'm
sorry. I don't mean he isn't outrageously talented, but we're more of the
upscale-diner mind-set. None of this Mad Mario showmanship—orange
clogs and Bermuda shorts fit for Babar, sweetbreads garnished with
squash blossoms stuffed with cheese from the milk of Angora goats who
live in the Pyrenees. Litchi sorbet veined with coconut milk and honey
from Crete." Walter shivered. "Spare me."

"I know what you mean," said McLeod, "but lately I've noticed
that's the sort of recipe book we're selling—what you call the diner
mind-set. People want to cook closer to home. If they want Escoffier,
they go out. I had a customer the other day who said she wanted a book
with recipes for deviled eggs and Welsh rabbit. I hadn't a clue what she
meant."

"Ah, right up our alley," said Walter. "But I'm no idiot. If I coaxed
Hugo into a book, I'd lose him to some Idaho ski lodge where they
charge twenty bucks for s'mores."

"S'mores?" McLeod wrapped a long dark scarf around his throat.

"Oh my dear, how long have you lived in this country? You are a
babe in the culinary woods till you've had s'mores."

"Do you serve them?"

Walter laughed again. "You know, that's not a bad idea. Seems I'm
obliged now to make them for
you,
my friend. But not in the dead of
winter."

"Springtime then."

"You supply the campfire, we will oblige," said Walter.

McLeod nodded and smiled, but still he did not leave. "May I ask
you, Walter, what in the world is 'crimonitely'? An obscure sort of mineral
or antique motorcar?"

At first Walter thought he was serious, and then they fell to laughing
almost at the same instant.

"I haven't laughed so much in ages as I did this evening," said
McLeod. "Thank you."

"Me neither," said Walter.

"Thank you for inviting Emily too. She needs a wider world."

Walter yawned. He was curious about the puppy woman but had
not a pebble of energy left. "You are welcome," he said, and struggled
to his feet, apologizing that he had to boot his last guest out into the
snowdrifts.

After closing the door behind McLeod, Walter looked around, realizing
that he'd forgotten about T.B. The dog was nowhere to be seen. Ben,
who came out from the kitchen, saw his panic and said, "Cousin Brucie
left with the potheads."

Walter groaned and returned to the couch. "Without his coat." He
asked Ben to bring him the brandy he'd been craving, and the two of
them sat down together and joked about s'mores. The party had been a
success. People had gone home happy and sated: with food, with lively
silly talk, with the kind of companionship that, however brief, replenished
the inner streams as they yearned toward the sea. "Heavens to
Betsy," said Walter to Ben, who was putting another log on the nearest
fire. "I think I just caught myself thinking in Roy Orbison. I
am
getting
old."

"
VIETNAM IS THE NEXT FRONTIER.
I'm sort of ashamed to
say so, but the thought of going over there all by myself is just
terrifying."

"Nothing terrifies you, Joy. Nothing I've ever seen."

"Oh, put me in a roomful of angry teamsters and I am a fish in
water," she said. "Correction. I'm a
hammerhead
in water. But this is . . .
this would be like parachuting into the Arctic Circle wearing a bikini."

"You'll do fine," said Alan. "You do everything fine."

"Yeah? How about find a nice guy and settle down? Even a not-sonice
guy and settle down."

"Maybe settling down isn't really for you, Joy."

Alan recognized the silence of exasperation. His heart quickened; he
wanted so desperately to have Joya completely back on his side, the sister
whose provocative loyalty he must learn to stop taking for granted.

"Alan, you've seen how I live. I
am
settled down. I'm settled down
alone.
"

"I'm sorry."

"Oh, for God's sake stop walking on tacks. You're reminding me too
much of Mom." She paused. "Oh God. How is Mom?"

"She likes her physical therapist, but she's as pessimistic as ever.
She acts like my going out west will be the end of her life. She's started
talking about where she wants her ashes spread, how cremation will
spare us unnecessary expense, how dying sooner than later will save us
money."

Joya sighed. "That's our mom. She probably
will
die sooner when she
finds out she's going to have an Asian grandchild. If I go through with
this. She still lives in about 1963. In her world, the Beatles are still a
bunch of scruffy boys in a Liverpool garage."

"You'll go through with it," said Alan. "And she'll be thrilled."

"Enough Mom talk," said Joya. "Listen, speaking of moms, I have to
go. Feely-mealy group of single mothers who want to adopt. My lawyer
recommended it, so I go and grit my teeth. I'm glad you called."

Alan had spoken to Joya only three times since his misbegotten trip to
San Francisco, and neither of them had ever mentioned her false
drunken assertion that she had betrayed him to Greenie. During their
initial truce, back in January, she had listened quietly, never interrupting,
as he told her about his confession. The only thing she said, after he
finished his tale, was "Christmas Day? Wow, Alan, they say the holidays
make people do irrational things, but you take the cake."

Whatever sins he had committed, however much penance he had yet
to fulfill, both women had forgiven him. He would not lose sight, he
told himself, of just how lucky he was.

"Joya," he said before she hung up, "what if I could go with you—to
Vietnam, or wherever it is you have to go? We could be terrified
together."

AS IF TO PROVE THAT HONESTY
was the best policy, that telling a difficult
truth could be like opening all the windows of your house on the
first day of spring (as he used to tell patients before it became too
painful to hear himself say), Alan felt a new resolve. He had given his
patients nearly two months' notice and was guiding them through discussions
of how they felt about his move. He had given each of them an
appropriate referral for continuing therapy after he left.

The one patient Alan really did not want to leave behind—and it puzzled
him—was Stephen. Stephen was healthy and rich and found his
work exciting. Stephen had countless friends, two active still-married
parents who loved him "anyway" (as he put it), two godchildren, and a
dozen fellow board members on two separate not-for-profit arts organizations
who revered his opinion. Stephen had fine looks, a semblance of
youth, a resilient ego, and a decent sense of humor when he wasn't
pissed off at the world.

But people, as Alan had once reflected to Greenie, were not at all like
recipes. You could have all the right ingredients, in all the right amounts,
and still there were no guarantees. Or perhaps they
were
like recipes, he
pondered now, and the key to success was in finding the ingredients you
had to remove, the components that turned all the others bitter, excessively
salty, difficult to swallow; even too jarringly sweet. He had seen
Greenie clarify butter, wash rice, devein shrimp, and meticulously snip
the talons from artichoke leaves.

April first, he told Greenie—by which time his mother should be
soundly on her feet again. He would be there, lock stock and barrel, or
dog and baggage, on the first of April. Their earthly possessions—yes,
even her big, obscenely pink chair—would follow. When he had made
his declaration, early in February, she had uttered a small noise that
clearly expressed surprise but sounded almost like a cry of pain, the
reaction to very
bad
news.

She had exclaimed, "Oh, just a couple of months!"

Alan was amused. " 'Just'? Are you scolding me or teasing me? I know
I've taken my time, but this is the way I had to do it. You know me."

"Yes," she said. "I do."

"So I thought I'd tell George, if he's there."

"Not yet," she said. "I mean, I don't think you should tell him yet.
You know how he is with too much anticipation. Two months is an eternity
for him."

"If you ask me, he's extremely patient for his age." As if in contradiction,
George piped up in the background, demanding a story. It was
later than Alan had thought. "Let me talk to him for just a minute,"
he said.

"I'm in my pajamas." George sounded out of breath. "Daddy, is
Treehorn there?"

"Treehorn's sleeping. Do you want me to wake her up?"

George hesitated. "No. She needs her sleep for running."

"Just like you," said Alan. "So tell me what story you're reading with
Mom tonight."

"The one about the pet wave."

"Pet what?"

"Wave, Daddy. It's the boy who gets a wave at the beach and takes it
home to keep, but it gets mad and turns into monsters and the cat gets
really scared even though it likes the fish and then the dad has to take it
back in a quilt. Like a big icicle. Then the boy is going to get a cloud for
a pet. And that's the end. Actually, you don't get to see him bring the
cloud home."

"A pet wave. Sounds like trouble."

"It
is
trouble, Dad. That's the moral in the story."

"I haven't seen that book. Is it from the library?"

"No. It's from Charlie."

"Oh," said Alan. "Is Charlie a friend of yours from school?"

"No, Charlie is Mommy's friend, only he's my friend, too." In a rush,
he said, "I have to go now, my feet are cold, good night."

"Charlie's that guy from my hometown I told you about." Greenie
was back. "The water lawyer."

"A book about a pet wave from a water lawyer?"

"Ha ha," said Greenie.

"It sounds like a very weird book," said Alan, "but at least it's a
departure from horses."

"You know," said Greenie, "there's nothing wrong with George's thing
about horses. You should see his classmates. They're obsessed with these
weird Japanese trading cards or these put-together space warriors that all
have futuristic weapons. I think it may be the age of obsession, that's all."

"It's fine. I didn't mean we had to worry. George seems great." He
heard George clamoring for his mother once again, for his story. "Go,"
he said. "Call me later."

But she didn't, and he wasn't surprised. Though his confession had,
perversely, given him a certain relief, Alan was—not so perversely—
afraid to bring up the subject of Marion's child. He had faith that Marion
would be in touch with him soon. Her upright husband had basically
promised she would. (Whom could you trust if not a guy who cured
cancer?) And she lived in Berkeley, the land of spiritual and sexual freedom,
the land of counter-bourgeois truth-telling, did she not?

He had decided that he would give her six months before he tried to
speak with her again. He had told Greenie as much, and she had replied
that this was absurd—if, in fact, he was the father. (Yes, she insisted,
genes did make you a father; to hell with some New Age logic protesting
otherwise.) But Greenie also understood that aggression would probably
backfire. They had discussed all this in the first conversation they
had on the phone after Christmas. The conversation had been almost
alarmingly calm, even cool. Alan had reasoned that what made it easier
than their late-night agonizings together in New York was a matter of
proximity: how much less complicated not having to see (and react to)
each other's facial expressions, not having to worry about whether or
when they should touch each other.

STEPHEN WORE THE SMILE
of someone with a happy secret. He took
off his pale green jacket, doubled it with care, and laid it over an arm of
the couch. He adjusted the pillows and lay down. "Guatemala!" he
said, in a tone of surprise, just as his head came to rest. "So I have just
found out that even single guys can adopt babies from Guatemala. Isn't
that fabulous news?"

"That's great," said Alan.

"And my friend Roberto's been telling me all about the home-study.
It's really more paperwork than anything else, he says. You don't have
to be Erma Bombeck or even Mel Gibson to pass. He said I'd do fine; I
can just be myself."

"Mel Gibson?"

"You know: the arch-conservative dad with big bucks, religion, and a
certifiably female Stepford spouse."

"Well, one out of four's not bad."

Stephen laughed. Since he had started doing research on how to go
about adopting a baby, he came to Alan's office filled with energy and
excitement, even joy. That joy was like a great iridescent bubble, Alan
knew, gorgeous but delicate. Either it would deflate gradually, to a more
realistic size, as Stephen did all the necessary work, or he would find
that his passion for a child was only masking his heartbreak—in which
case the bubble might burst.

Alan felt uneasy. He had believed, in his gut, that Gordie would
return to the relationship. He had no idea whether Stephen could have
convinced Gordie to become a parent, but he had seen the two men as
more than simply used to each other. They had seemed right for each
other,
good
for each other, perhaps as much "in love" as two people
together that long could be. Or was Alan projecting assumptions and
wishes about his own marriage onto these men?

Just the week before, Stephen had declared that he knew he was
finally getting past Gordie. "Not
over—
that takes much longer," he
said. "But something remarkable happened yesterday. I saw him, on the
other side of Sheridan Square, walking along with this big Swedish-looking
guy. Not the restaurant guy, but cut from the very same mold.
How well we always knew our weaknesses! Only mine were less pernicious,
I like to think."

"Merely walking along with someone doesn't—"

"Oh please. I know what Gordie looks like when he's . . . I know the
look he's got when—" Stephen stopped short. "You know, I've been
dreading that kind of coincidence for months. Seeing him with someone
else. I was sure I'd drop dead if that happened, dissolve in a puddle like
the witch from Oz.

"The amazing thing was that I could see him with that big hunk and
think, mostly, Poor Gordie. I wasn't pissed off and sad and jealous; I just
felt like he must be going through this . . . I don't know, he must really
be
flailing about.
I was more . . . embarrassed for him. I thought, Oh
this is so foolish, Gordie, you're smarter than
this,
there's no
there
there,
honey! I could even hear myself sort of talking him down, the way we
always used to whenever we . . ."

Stephen let out a brief sob of laughter. "You know where I was
headed? I was taking Skye to that movie about Iris Murdoch, and we
were in such a rush that not till I was watching the movie did I really
realize that I had
seen
him, seen him with another man, just like that. So
I'm processing it, thank God in the dark, and of course, what movie is
this? Not some action thriller, not some skin flick, someplace I can lose
myself, but a sensitive, weepy, romantic
film
where this devoted crusty
old guy takes care of his dear lifelong partner, and there are flashbacks
to how they met and how madly they fell in love and all the compromises
they made and . . ."

Alan heard another sob. He waited for Stephen to collect himself.

"Well!" A deep breath. "I always assumed we'd end up like that, old
and devoted, with lots of friends but in the end relying on
ourselves.
For
a long time, you know, before we were sure we'd made it through, that
we were going to escape with our health as so many people did not;
well, for a long time I also envisioned exactly that—one of us nursing
the other right to the bitter end."

Both Stephen and Alan were still for a few minutes, one thinking, one
waiting. Stephen's arms lay folded on his chest, which rose and fell
slowly as he breathed. "But you know what?" he said, almost inaudibly
at first. "When I got out on the street with Skye, I felt like I did the last
time I was tested. Free. Purged of something." He craned his neck to
make eye contact with Alan. "Really."