Together Alone (28 page)

Harvard Square was filled with people. Most were far more casually dressed than they were, but that was part of the fantasy, too. Sunday afternoon strolling was the epitome of romance. They walked in a bubble of elegance, aware always of something simmering at its core.

It was outwardly innocent, walking and talking, but there were periods of walk without talk, when Carter held her hand or hooked her arm through his. At those times she realized how in step with each other they were. There was no impatient striding, as she imagined there would have been with the marathoner, but a comfortably matched gait. It felt right to Celeste, the prelude to a destined something, even sweeter than she had dreamed.

In time, they found themselves in a cafe with cappucino royales, and when they began to feel the liquor, Carter suggested stopping at a small restaurant several blocks over for something to eat. The restaurant was Indonesian. Celeste was content to hide her ignorance by letting him do the ordering.

Afterward, she couldn’t have said what it was that she ate, because the place was dark, their corner intimate, and her thoughts a long way from food. She nibbled on whatever arrived, and watched Carter do the same, but all the while she was remembering the marathoner and his neuroses, the doctor and his scheduling, the vet and his shyness, and she gloated silently, thinking, “I knew it would be like this, I
knew
it would.”

At the end of the meal, when he offered a husky, “My place is right down the street,” she didn’t think twice. She had been waiting too long. She wasn’t waiting a minute longer.

Darkness had fallen by the time they reached the house, a small frame structure that proved to be nearly as spectacular as the art gallery had been. It had been gutted and rebuilt with a dearth of walls and a keen eye for angle and line.

Guided only by the glow of the street lamps spilling through windows and Carter’s hand on her back, Celeste climbed the open stairway to a landing that extended far enough to allow for a huge platform bed.

The only pause she felt had to do with the magnitude of the moment. Carter was a dream, the embodiment of everything good and strong and caring in a man.

Piece by piece, he removed her clothes until she stood naked before him. He didn’t touch her then, or kiss her, but simply looked at her body while, piece by piece, he removed his own things.

Celeste felt the chill of the air on her skin, but it only heightened her arousal. Her body was swollen, her insides throbbing and wet. By the time he discarded his shorts and applied a condom, she was dying for what she had seen.

“Lie down,” he whispered.

Breathing fast, she did, and raised her knees when he came between them. The reward was golden. He filled her with a pulsing strength that took her from one orgasm to another, dream upon dream, pleasure after pleasure. It didn’t occur to her that she didn’t know his last name, or where he had grown up, or what he did to keep his body in shape. He inspired trust, and she gave it.

• • •

The moon played in and around the clouds over China Pond Road. It splintered through Brian’s windowed wall and fell in silvery shards across everything in sight. Brian had long since put Julia to bed and was sprawled on the sofa, wishing Emily were there, when the telephone rang. He bobbled the receiver before getting it to his ear.

“Yeah.”

A high voice, alarmed but distinctive, said, “Detective? Detective, I need your help. Something’s coming out of the pond. I don’t know what it is, but it keeps lifting its head, higher each time. Something’s out there. I know it is, but I don’t know what it’s going to do. You have to come. Come
quickly
.”

Brian sighed. This wasn’t the first such call he’d had. There had been three in the past week, each one a false alarm. “Is it the Haffenreffers’ dog again?”

“No. It isn’t a dog. It’s something else.”

“Maybe a deer. I saw one in the woods the other night.”

“It is not a deer. I know what deer look like, and this isn’t that.”

“What does this look like?” he asked, patient in deference to Myra’s age.

“It has a long neck, a very long neck and a very small head and eyes that glow.”

“That glow.”

“Green,” she said.

Brian scrubbed at an eye with the heel of his hand. The monster had never glowed before. “Someone’s playing a Halloween prank.”

“No, no, no. This isn’t a costume. It’s real, and it’s dangerous, and it’s after my willow. I have to go outside and do something to stop it. I’d wake up Frank, but he had a very long day. Will you come, Detective?”

The last thing Brian wanted was to go out in the cold. But Myra was old and widowed, like his mother, and although his mother was more lucid, more social, and more active, he still made the link.

He sighed. “Sure, Myra. I’ll be right there.”

He stepped into his sneakers and pulled on a jacket, then checked on Julia. She was dead to the world. So he trotted down the stairs, and jogged down the driveway and across the cul de sac to Myra’s front door. When she didn’t answer his ring, he went around back. The moon appeared long enough to show her on the bench under the willow.

He sank down on the other end and tucked his hands in his pockets for warmth. “It’s a chilly night, Myra. You shouldn’t be out here.” She was wearing a coat. Still.

“I have to be.”

“Why?”

She seemed taken back by the direct question. “Because.”

He studied the pond. Its surface was a glassy reflection of bulbous, moon-fringed clouds. “I don’t see anything here.”

“No. It’s below now.”

“A monster.”

“It’s been here for years. I kept telling Frank, but he wouldn’t listen. But it’s
there
, and I can’t
stand
it.”

“A monster. With glowing eyes.”

She took a breath and seemed to steady herself. “Well, I don’t know if the eyes are glowing. It just seems that way sometimes.”

In a soft voice, he asked, “Myra, is Frank buried here?” It seemed one logical explanation for her fixation on the area, particularly if she had been so controlled by the man in life that she couldn’t accept his death.

“Here? Oh, no. He’s on the other side of town. The
monster
is buried here.”

“Buried?”

“In the water.”

Brian’s eyes skated over the water’s surface to the trees at the far side. He didn’t see a thing. “You said it was after the willow. Why do you think so?”

“The willow’s roots go right to the water. The thing will pull and tug until it sucks the willow right underground.”

“But why would it want the willow?”

“Because the willow protects us.”

Brian turned sideways. He looked Myra square in the eye, giving the emphasis to his words that he kept gentle in his voice. “There isn’t really a monster.”

She stared at him.

“Nothing’s going to dig up your willow.”

“Someone
has
to.”

“Why?”

She looked confused. “I don’t know.”

“Come.” He drew her up. “It’s too cold for you here. Let me bring you inside.”

“But I’ll only have to call you another night. He’s out here. I saw him.”

“Well,” Brian said, “you’ll call me another time, then.”

“But you won’t be able to do
anything
once the ground freezes.”

He slipped an arm around her shoulder and guided her up the stairs. “I’ll be here, Myra. You’ll call me, and I’ll come right over.”

With that promise, she allowed herself to be shown into the house.

E
MILY DROVE TO BOSTON WITH THE HIGHEST OF
hopes the following Friday. She was thrilled to be seeing Jill, and nearly as excited about meeting her friends and learning her favorite haunts. She wanted to be able to put faces with names, wanted to be able to visualize the reading room of the library, the dining hall, the student union. She wanted to be able to picture every little detail when Jill called on the phone.

Doug was another matter. She was nervous. Much rested on the weekend, on the precious little time when they would be alone. She needed to see if there was any feeling for her left in him. If not, their marriage was doomed.

When the skyline of the city appeared on the horizon, she remembered the last time she had made the trip. She and Jill had been holding hands, fearing the unknowns ahead, dreading the moment of parting. They had been focused on Jill’s college experience. Emily hadn’t had a clue about the shifts her own life would take.

This time around, Jill was waiting outside the dorm, running to the curb with a huge smile when Emily pulled up. Emily was teary with happiness at the sight of her daughter the college student, laughing, holding Jill tightly. Then there were the introductions, because no less than five friends had been waiting with Jill, and a mini-tour in advance of the full one for Doug.

Emily had arranged to meet him at the hotel at five. He didn’t arrive until five-thirty, and if it hadn’t been for Jill’s nervous looks at her watch, Emily wouldn’t have minded. She loved being alone with Jill, without having to be alert to Doug’s needs.

Doug was buoyant enough when he arrived to compensate for the delay. After a brief stop upstairs while he changed clothes, they headed back to the campus.

Friday night consisted of dinner in the dining hall, a concert by the college’s three singing groups, and a reception at Jill’s dorm. It was late by the time Emily and Doug returned to the hotel. High on the goodwill of the evening, Emily was perfectly happy to climb into bed and fall asleep. When she awoke the next morning, Doug was out.

“Gone running,” said the note he left on the pad by the phone, though it didn’t say when he had left or how long he would be.

Emily showered and dressed, then sat in an arm-chair and waited anxiously. They were meeting Jill at ten. She didn’t want to be late.

It struck her that Doug was late a lot. He never used to be. She wondered if he was late for work, too, or whether it was just home things that he had grown so lackadaisical about.

She didn’t ask, because he returned sweaty and out of breath, with just enough time to get ready, and then they were swept up in the day’s events, so that she didn’t think about it until later that night, when it no longer seemed critical. He had been with them for the entire day. He had been a good sport through tours, lectures, a luncheon, a football game, dinner at a restaurant with Jill’s closest friends and their parents, and several hours of dorm-hopping to meet and spend time with others. He had been friendly. He had been personable.

Granted, he didn’t spend much time talking with Emily. She suspected he knew more about the daily lives of some of the people he had met that day than he did about hers.

But Jill was happy having him there. If she was aware of his lack of attentiveness to Emily, she didn’t let on.

Emily lay in bed that night, curled on her side with her back to Doug. She didn’t know if he was sleeping and neither asked nor slid back until their bodies touched. She was quiet. She kept her breathing low and even. Though the weekend was supposed to be a time of marital regeneration, she did nothing to suggest she wanted to make love. And she felt guilty as hell.

It was hours before she fell asleep. When she awoke, Doug was out running again. She was relieved and, therein, felt more guilty than ever.

Doug was her husband. She should want him. But she didn’t. He was a stranger to her. If he had been one of the fathers she had met yesterday, she would have smiled and exchanged surface pleasantries, then moved on without a backward glance.

Jill was their only link.

The more Emily thought about it, the more frightened that made her. People who liked each other as little as she and Doug did, usually ended up divorced.

Divorced. God, she
hated
that word.

But it made sense for them. Particularly in light of Brian. If Emily, who prized fidelity so highly, had slept with another man, something was
really
wrong with her marriage.

Divorce made sense.

Still, she fought it.

Feeling jittery, she bolted out of bed and hurriedly dressed and packed. Doug returned just as she finished, as sweaty and breathless and short of time as he had been the morning before.

Wishing she could put it off, but knowing it was now or never, she followed him into the bathroom. “Can we talk?”

He set his running watch down by the sink. “I’m late.”

“We never talk, Doug. I think we need to do something.”

To his credit, he didn’t start in with condescending looks, or ask why she was trying to ruin a fine weekend. He didn’t pretend not to know something was wrong. Instead, neutrally, he asked, “Like what?” and, bending over, began washing his face.

“Like see a counselor.” It was a last ditch effort. She couldn’t think of anything else.

She had to wait until he had straightened and was reaching for his shave cream before he said, “Why do you want to see a counselor?”

“Because our relationship stinks. We can’t talk.”

“We can talk. We just don’t.”

“Okay. Same thing.”

“No, it’s not. If we choose not to talk, we choose not to talk. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“There is if we’re both innately social, and we are, Doug. We talk with everyone else, just not with each other.”

“That’s the nature of our relationship.”

“I want to change it.”

“Fine. Go to a counselor.”

“I want
us
to.”

He finished lathering his lower face and reached for his razor. “I’m not seeing a counselor.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a waste of time and money.”

“Not if it improves our relationship. Don’t you want to do that?”

“I don’t think our relationship needs scrutiny.”

“You think it’s good?” she cried. “Doug, we go separate ways. We rarely even pass in the night. We share Jill. Period.”

He systematically stroked away one strip of shave cream, then another.

“Is it Daniel?” she asked with her heart in her throat.

“No.”

“It’s natural to be thinking of him, with Jill gone.”

“I’m not.”

“Then what?”

“How the hell do I know?”

“What’s on your mind?”

“Right now? Getting ready in time.”

“Doug. This is important.”

He rinsed the blade. “Don’t nag. There’s nothing I hate more than a woman who nags.”

Emily closed her mouth, but the injustice of his criticism had her reopening it the next minute. “What’s happening with us isn’t right. Life should be opening up, not closing down, now that we don’t have the everyday responsibility of kids. Don’t you want something more out of life?”

“Like what?”

“Like
living
. Smiles. Laughter. Fun.” She pictured Brian, with whom she had all of that, and felt guilty. Her guilt intensified when she realized that she was looking at Doug in only the skimpiest of running shorts, and feeling nothing.

“I have those things,” he said in an offhanded way.

“With work, but what about a woman?” she blurted out. “Don’t you want a woman?” He was a normal, red-blooded male. At least, he used to be. Now he wasn’t even asking for sex.

He hadn’t in a while, and even then, Emily had had the feeling that he wanted it when she didn’t to punish her. Now he had lost even that urge.

She hadn’t lost the urge, as Brian had so eloquently pointed out.

“I have you,” Doug said illogically.

“But we don’t have fun together, not just us two. We don’t touch. We don’t make love. Don’t
you
want that?”

He rinsed the blade again. “If you were that desperate for sex, you could have told me.” He shot a look at his watch. “It’s a little late now.”

“God, Doug,” she breathed, amazed at his coarseness, his
ignorance
, if he thought she still wanted him, what with the lack of love.

The lack of love. That was it in a nutshell. She didn’t love Doug. He didn’t love her. They had no business staying together.

Except for Jill.

Except for the fact that Doug did rely on those few hours home between trips.

Except for the house they shared.

Except for Daniel.

Emily turned and left the bathroom, wondering if Doug ever thought about those things. She wondered if he ever thought about divorce. She wondered how he could
not
think about it.

She was still wondering hours later, heading west on the turnpike, toward Grannick. She was feeling blue, anyway. Leaving Jill had been hard, even knowing that Thanksgiving was only eighteen days off. Leaving Doug had been easy. That was upsetting Emily no end.

The familiarity of Grannick failed to settle her. Nor did the haven of the dark house at the end of China Pond Road. She saw lights on above the garage. It was all she could do not to go there.

But being with Brian meant closing her eyes to problems that had to be faced. She wished she knew what to do.

Flipping lights on as she went, she carried her suitcase up to the bedroom and unpacked. Then, wanting to lift out and savor the weekend’s good times, she took refuge in Jill’s room. There was comfort here, a sense of love, at least. She sat on the bed and hugged Cat, remembering not so much the weekend just done, but fun times she and Jill had had here at home in years past.

Her eye roamed the room. It was a teenager’s room, messy as was a teenager’s way. Yes, she had dusted—gingerly—but the mother in her itched to sort through the basket of magazines and toss out the oldest, to do something with the single red prom rose that stood dead in its bud vase, to wade through the papers and books piled on the desk. But Jill wanted things the same, and Emily knew that was going to be a tall order when it came to Doug.

So she kept on hugging Cat, swaying a little in time to a lullaby that drifted back from years before. She remembered singing it to Jill. No. To Daniel. It had been his favorite. She had sung it to him every night, sometimes three or four times when he cried for more. His eyes would grow heavier with each round, until the final, “Mo-a, mo-a,” was little more than a dazed murmur. Daniel sleeping, had been a hauntingly innocent sight.

Feeling chilled, she went to the closet, reached into Jill’s sweater basket, and pulled on the first one she touched. It was a ratty cotton thing that had been wisely left behind, but it was fine for Emily. She wasn’t fussy. She much preferred sweaters with history to ones with panache.

The basket was filled with such time-worn sweaters, tossed in with a general abandon. Thinking that there might be others to borrow—no, she was not cleaning the closet—she took out the next one, shook it straight, and gave it a once-over. She held it close for a minute, breathing in Jill and the comfort that brought, before folding it neatly, setting it aside, and reaching for another. She didn’t think she would use this one either, so she folded it and put it carefully on top of the first. The next one in the basket, a teal heather, looked more promising. She pulled it out. That was when she saw the folded paper that lay on the bottommost sweater.

Setting the teal heather aside, she unfolded the paper. It was something Jill had written for English class the spring before. Emily didn’t see a grade at the top, didn’t see any marks on the page. For that matter, she didn’t see the wear and tear that usually came with being crammed into a notebook and carried to and from school. The paper looked clean and crisp, as though it had just emerged from the Imagewriter.

“Seeing Things,” was the title. Emily began to read.

“All my life I’ve been looking forward to going to college. My parents met there and always talked about the fun they had. After looking at lots of different schools, I applied to the ones I liked. I was lucky. I got into my first choice. Same with my best friends. We were all excited. In April my college had an open house for the students who had been accepted. I signed up to go and was matched up with a girl there who would take me around with her.”

Emily remembered it clearly. A nervous, but very excited Jill had taken the bus into Boston on a Thursday afternoon.

“The girl, Jessica, was cool. She met me at the admissions office and took me to dinner with her at the dining hall. That night, there were parties in the dorm. The college kids had been told they weren’t supposed to drink with the pre-frosh, but there was some beer anyway, not enough to get drunk on, just enough to feel like we were in college. I had a ball.”

Clever Jill. She hadn’t told Emily about the beer.

“The next morning Jessica took me to classes, but by lunchtime we’d had enough. She suggested we walk to a favorite cafe of hers for lunch with some of her friends, and we did.”

Yes. The Harvard Bookstore Cafe.

“After lunch, we walked on Newbury Street. It was neat. I loved the shops and the people. I come from a college town and never thought of Boston as being one, but it did feel like it there, because there were college students all over. One of the other pre-frosh bought some things in one of the stores, and then we all went for yogurt. Finally we had to start back, so that I could get my things and take the bus home. We crossed over Commonwealth Avenue, walked another block, and were crossing the next street when I saw him.”

Emily frowned.

“He was coming out of one of the townhouses, wearing a business suit that I had seen many times before, and I thought that it was an awesome coincidence that he was doing business here at the same time I was visiting, because I wouldn’t have to take the bus home after all. ‘My God,’ I told my friends. ‘There’s my father!’ I was just about to call out to him when a woman followed him out of the townhouse. She was carrying a little boy. As I stood there watching, my father took the little boy from her and held him. He wrapped his other arm around the woman.”