Unlovely (30 page)

Claudia remained in that aspect,
dry-eyed and staring, her thoughts racing and disordered, until an employee
stopped by the table to ask if she could clear Mrs. Tomlinson's dishes. Claudia
nodded dumbly. Then, realizing nothing was to be gained by remaining at the
shop any longer, she gathered her purse to leave.

She drove back to the campus much more
slowly than she'd driven away from it earlier in the afternoon, preoccupied and
stunned by the recent exchange. It was all so baffling. Why would Mrs.
Tomlinson be so cruel as to pretend such an important conversation between them
had never taken place, to "forget" her role as matchmaker? Was
Claudia actually supposed to believe that Peter, in all these months, had never
shared a single detail of his romantic life with his mother? Impossible. What
was going on?

A horrifying thought: had Claudia, in
fact, imagined the whole conversation at the luncheon? Sometimes the mind plays
insidious tricks. Perhaps it had been a dream.

No, she would have to be insane to make
it up, to have every detail etched into her memory, and she wasn't insane. She
was a
summa cum laude
graduate of a major university; she was a German
instructor at an exclusive school; there had never been a whiff of impropriety
or scandal surrounding her. A crazy woman couldn't function in the world
without some obvious signs of her craziness, could she? No, she couldn't.
Claudia was unmistakably sane. She had a good, reliable memory.

The only reasonable explanation for the
events of the past hour (besides the theory that Mrs. Tomlinson was purely
evil, which Claudia did not wish to believe) was that the older lady was very
ill indeed, and that her mind was going. Claudia remembered Mrs. Tomlinson well
from that lunch on the lawn; she had been gracious, kind and warm. The Mrs.
Tomlinson who appeared at the doughnut shop that afternoon and had spoken with
such cold hostility was radically altered from the one Claudia recalled. That
had to be it. There was something terribly wrong with Mrs. Tomlinson and it was
affecting her faculties. The young female voice that answered the phone this
morning may very well have been a nurse. Maybe even a hospice nurse.

Claudia's panic began to subside once
she had this epiphany. This made sense. This was an explanation she could
accept.

Claudia, compassionate soul that she
was, even began to feel sorry for Mrs. Tomlinson. It must be hard for her to
live in the twilight. She probably didn't go out much anymore; it was likely a
dangerous business whenever she had to interact with people. Who knows how many
of her friendships had been ruptured, how many relations had been wounded by
Mrs. Tomlinson's acid tongue? Of course, it wasn't her fault; Claudia and all
of her other victims had to forgive any unkindness from her quarter. Who knows
what ability to self-edit had been impaired? Still, it was hard to take.

Claudia's thoughts turned to Peter. It
must be very difficult to see his confidante slipping away like that. He was so
close to his mother, (really almost unnaturally close). It was all tragic, and
Claudia's heart pinched in sympathy for him. It could certainly explain some of
his recent erratic behavior and, more specifically, the way he'd cast Claudia
away like a used tissue.

She allowed herself to feel sorry for
him for the space of one exit to the next, then shook her head in
consternation. Yes, it was hard for the Tomlinson family, but it was time to
suck it up. Claudia had certainly had her share of difficulties. What defines
us as human beings is how we handle setbacks. How was Peter reacting when the
storms buffeted his ship? Was he triumphing over adversity, or did he succumb
to it, wallow in it?

When Claudia was brutally honest with
herself, she realized she was disappointed in him. If all she surmised were
true, then Peter wasn't handling these crises at all well, and he wasn't
behaving like the kind of man with whom she'd want to be involved. He was
behaving like a child. Claudia had expected more of him.

She felt herself vacillate – perhaps she
wasn't being fair. He was just a man, after all. Sometimes men shove their
emotions down deep instead of dealing with them, and then all that negative
energy gets transferred onto people who had nothing to do with the original
stressor. That was very possible. The more Claudia thought about it, the more
sense it made.

As she sat waiting at a red light about
two miles from Jameson, pondering her predicament as the moments ticked by, she
was struck with yet another epiphany. Why was she putting herself through all
of this? She had been spending so much time trying to make a good impression on
Peter – she had worried herself sick about not measuring up to some mysterious
standard he held, making sure she was always captivating in her dress and
conversation, submitting herself to an audience with the dowager empress herself
– that she had stopped thinking about herself and her own needs. Did Claudia
want to continue spending all this time and energy to make things work with
Peter? Was he worth it? He was emotionally immature, certainly. Did Claudia see
enough in him to sacrifice any more of her life helping him develop into the
man he should be? Peter was exceptional in many respects, but maybe there was a
reason he was still single at forty. Maybe he was not the catch she'd thought
he was.

As she pulled into her parking space
near the residence, Claudia was still in turmoil. She returned to her rooms
exhausted, kicked off her shoes and threw herself on the couch. The past week
had been ghastly. She just couldn't continue like this.

The next afternoon, as the last of her students filed
out of the classroom, Claudia looked up from her desk to see Peter standing in
her doorway. This was unusual; Peter rarely made his way to the foreign
language hall. Despite the deep misgivings that she'd been experiencing with
regard to Peter's character, she felt a thrill of pleasure when she saw him
standing there. He looked as handsome as ever, with his well-tailored jacket
and tie, his tasseled loafers shining against the hard wood floors. She could
smell him even before he walked in.

"Peter. What a surprise. I imagine
you're here on some sort of official school business, since we're no longer
friends with one another," Claudia muttered as she set her planner
parallel to her stapler.

"Actually, no. This is a personal
matter." He walked into the room and stood by the blackboard.

Claudia looked up again. "Oh,
really? Perhaps you'd like to shut the door, then."

Peter smiled wryly. "Under the
circumstances that would seem unwise."

"Pardon?"

"I don't want to give you the wrong
impression, Claudia, or anyone else who might be passing by. I want us to speak
only in a public setting. I've learned that I need to be very, very clear with
you."

The muscles tensed in Claudia's back and
neck. Her stomach was in a knot. She purposely slowed her breathing and
reminded herself that Peter was not an emotionally balanced person.

"Very well, then. Lay it all out
for me," she replied tonelessly.

"I called my mother last night, and
she told me about your visit with her."

"Really? I must say I hadn't
expected that. She left me with the impression that she wasn't going to speak
to you about me." Claudia paused and smiled cynically. "Or did you
bring me up to her? She says you never do that, but I've recently been given
cause to question her memory."

"After a little prodding, she
confided in me. When I called her she sounded very upset and I wanted to know
why."

"Oh, I am sorry to hear that. She's
ill, isn't she?"

"She was very upset," Peter
repeated. "She related your conversation with her. I have to tell you,
there was much in it that came as a surprise to me."

"Oh?"

"Claudia, again, let me be clear:
you and I have never had any sort of romantic relationship. We have never
shared any intimacies, physical or emotional, any kind at all. Please hear me:
I do not find you attractive in any way. I have never wanted to be with you. As
well, my mother has never wanted us to be together. She has not been planning
our wedding."

Claudia pressed her lips together and
allowed the words to flow over her and by her, refusing to hear what he was
saying. He was not himself. He wasn't thinking straight. He wasn't lying on
purpose, he was lashing out, because he was afraid for his mother and afraid of
living a life without her.

"Further, you've put me in the
position of defending the character of a woman whom I barely know. Contrary to
what you told Mother, Vanessa was not throwing herself at me; she was not
flirting with me; she was completely professional. She did not tell me stories
about you. The only thing she told me was that you gave her to understand that
you and I were practically engaged. She actually apologized to me for creating
problems in our relationship!"

Claudia watched Peter through lowered
lids. He was turning red. He was literally turning red. She began to fear him a
little. He seemed to be losing control of himself.

"Understand something, Claudia, I
wouldn't be up here at all if it weren't for your calling my mother. Of all the
stupid, delusional things to do. My mother?"

"I shouldn't have called your
mother," Claudia conceded. "Had I known that she was ill, had I known
her state of mind, I would never have done it." She shook her head
ruefully. "You know, much of this could have been avoided if you had been
up front with me. You never told me she was ill, and you should have."

"I should have told you about
–?" Peter began before Claudia put up a hand to halt him.

"Please allow me to continue. You
were not present for the conversation I had with your mother several months
ago. You have to choose whose word to believe: mine, or your mother's. It's
natural, and even commendable, that you should side with your mother. Don't get
me wrong – she's
not
telling you the truth – but it's understandable
that you would wish to believe her. If you didn't believe her, you would have
to admit that whatever it is that's made her ill has begun to affect her brain.
It's hard to accept cognitive changes in people we love."

"Claudia, I have no idea where
you're going with this, but –"

"Peter. You've had your opportunity
to speak. Please allow me mine. I will be brief."

Peter closed his mouth, but his eyes
flashed dangerously.

"I would be lying to say I wasn't
disappointed. I'm disappointed about what has happened to us, of course. It
seems apparent now that whatever hopes we harbored for a relationship are lost.
Please don't protest to the contrary; you can say there was never a chance for
us to be together, but you can't convince me of it. Believe me, I have examined
our relations over and over again, and I'm not an idiot, whatever else you may
think of me. I know when a man is sexually attracted to me, and say what you
will, I recognized it when we were together."

Claudia paused to give Peter the opportunity
to acknowledge her point. He remained silent and didn't move a muscle, except
for a tremble along his jaw line. He didn't even blink, which was somewhat
unnerving, but it was too late to turn back now.

"Anyway, it seems that this isn't
going to work out for a host of reasons. Your mother, Vanessa's lies (it was
gallant of you to defend her – even at my expense!), but again, I'm no idiot. I
lived in residence with her; I knew her better than you did."

Claudia paused again before moving on to
the difficult part – the part where she burned this bridge.

"Peter, you were right. You were
right for the wrong reasons, but still, you were right. You are nowhere near
ready for an adult relationship with a mature woman. I don't know, maybe you
never will be. Most men are ready by the time they're forty, you seem to have
an abnormally prolonged adolescence. I do know that I don't have the time or
the energy to continue nurturing this thing between us, when you seem set on
thwarting it. So, if you have something you need to talk to me about that is
work-related, by all means say it. If you have anything else to say, I beg you
to keep it to yourself. Is that clear? Perfectly clear?"

Peter stared daggers. They bounced off
Claudia's impenetrable armor.

"Are we done then?" Claudia
asked, meeting his eyes with cold confidence.

"Yes, I suppose we are," Peter
snapped.

"Excellent. Good bye, Peter. And
do, please, shut the door behind you."

Claudia listened as his footsteps
receded in the hall. When she could hear them no longer, she ran to the
restroom and threw up in the sink.

Having arranged to have Claudia spend the year in her
in-law apartment, Melanie offered to make the trip to the Jameson School to
gather a few things from her rooms there. Sylvia was worn out with worry and in
no shape for the trip; Tony didn't feel comfortable picking through his
daughter's things. As well, there might be a little cleaning to be done, and
Melanie thought herself better suited to the task than the
Milfords
.

The assistant headmistress led Melanie
to Claudia's rooms.