What I Did for Love (10 page)

Preoccupied with thoughts of Bredon, not wanting to talk to any friends because I was so restless over him, I decided to order a meal from a nearby Turkish restaurant, a new, upscale place that quietly packaged and sent out prepared meals to people in our vicinity. Many people did not want to go to a restaurant at the end of a long day, nor to cook, nor order from a place that did only takeout. And I wanted to go to church, I wanted to attend evening prayer services at St. Mary’s if they had one tonight, and whether or not there was a service, to light candles, and pray, and think. But first I called Marilisa.

“Please,” I said, “come take the roses. Their scent is gorgeous, but now I’m getting a headache from them!”

Of course she knew better. “I’ll come for them now. Do you mind if I keep them in my apartment?”

“Yes, keep them,” I said, play-acting cheerful indifference, not fooling her one bit. Neither of us wanted to waste the beauty of those flowers.

She was there and gone, with the roses, within ten minutes.

As I was about to call the restaurant on my land line, the phone rang with a caller ID number and no name. It was the local 212 area code, and I wondered if it were a friend whose name was not in my phone’s directory. Generally, I wait for the message to begin, and I have told everyone, “If you don’t talk to my machine, you don’t talk to me.” Anyone who had any of my phone numbers knew this. Robo-calls hung up when the machine came on. I resented phone calls most of the time, intrusions, unless I
had planned a call with a friend. Which is why I turned my ringers off most of the time. But I had forgotten that all ringers on all phones were operating because I had been waiting for Bredon’s call.

The message recording started: “Dray, this is Rand.” And he waited. When I did not pick up he said, “Dray, please, I want to see you. Please pick up.”

It made my heart pound to hear him, and the chemistry of him affected me, but I also resented his backing out on Bredon, I didn’t care
what
pressure his family put on him.

“Dray,” he said again, “please pick up. Just for a moment.”

I picked up the receiver and held it to my ear. My body was warm, excited all on its own by his voice. I waited silently.

“Dray, can I see you?”

My mouth was dry. I said, “I can’t.”

“Because of Bredon.”

“Rand, the old saying not to mix business with pleasure, seems to be good advice. I can’t see you.”

“But you’d see me if I’d said yes to Bredon and the deal.” His voice was hard and sad.

“Rand, the situation is impossible. Please don’t ask. Monday night was wonderful. That’s why I picked up the phone at all. But I can’t…”

He cut me off. “Just see me. For a little while. You know you’re attracted to me. You know I find you wildly exciting. I love what we had on Monday.”

“Yes, it was wonderful, but I can’t, it’s not something I can do, Rand, I’m sorry.” But I wasn’t sorry. It was a lie. I make no apologies for putting my brother first. Still, Bredon said Rand promised to reconsider. I wondered. “Rand, I’m going to hang up now.”

“I’ll call you later,” he said, his voice dispirited and angry and sad, all those.

I was upset and restless, because the chemistry of his voice
still affected me, and I pulled on nondescript “college student” clothes, jeans, t-shirt, light hoodie, walking shoes over white socks. I stuck my little phone in one pocket, and my flat wallet with its neatly slotted credit cards, cash, ID, and special house key, in another jeans pocket. I pulled a fragrant handkerchief from a small drawer. It had been a major joke among my friends, as it had been among my mother’s friends, that we used these rather than tissues. Only when I had a cold did I forgo them.

I quickly tied my hair back, put on a baseball cap and dark glasses and slipped out the back entrance. I had a feeling that Rand would come here and try to see me. He had enough clout and power to get past most of the barriers in the lobby. Avoiding the possibility I exited through a service door to a short alley, onto the side street, and began making quick strides in the city rush hour, walking downtown at a brisk pace toward the Times Square area and St. Mary’s. As I blended into the crowds on the sidewalks and at the crosswalks, I looked so ordinary, like any other girl. It was wonderful to breathe easy, to be anonymous.

The long walk calmed me, the passing crowds distracting my mind so that I had to concentrate on navigating among the flow of people. In the theatre district I walked past the oddly assorted souvenir shops, taverns, garages, side-street boutique hotels to the mid-street where St. Mary’s stood, the flag high on a flagpole in front. I ran up the few steps and through the main doors. Inside, all was peace and beauty. The organist must have been rehearsing for a concert or a sung Mass, along with a couple of choristers who were singing different lines in Latin. The effect was soothing, the world continuing, the business of worship being perfected.

I moved quickly and with little footfall along the northern aisle of the church, its beauty as always inviting yet another discovery of its art, statuary, symbols, all candlelight and low electric lights, statues in their side-altars, marriage chapel, baptistry, to the Lady Chapel, my favorite. There I lighted some
candles, symbols of things religious and holy, the light of Presence, and pulled neatly folded flat bills from my wallet to stuff in the offering box. I sat and thought of Bredon, saying a prayer for his safe arrival and successful bargaining, remembering our parents, letting my mind empty of everything but the feeling of being in a holy place. I stayed an hour, my mind clearing, calmer. I realized that I was very, very hungry. The evening prayer service was short, and when it was over I began my return walk, cautious whenever I saw one of the many black cars that carried Rand and so many of the people we knew as they came here for plays and restaurants.

I stopped at a small convenience store that only stayed open this late because with summer, the many tourists made late hours worthwhile. Most delis and small food stores in commercial areas of the city specialized only in breakfast and lunch on weekdays, and did not open on weekends since there were no workers to patronize the stores. The mid-town area with theatres and hotels was different. Tourists might buy snacks, and hotel guests would stock up on munchies and snacks for their rooms. Many deli patrons were hotel guests wanting something light to eat that did not have the high hotel price tags attached. The counterman made up a sandwich for me, the inimitable New York hard roll holding thinly sliced cheeses and meats, lettuce for crunch, all wrapped in an envelope of heavy waxed paper. I took a can of seltzer from the refrigerator case and ate while I walked along Central Park West, sipping the seltzer through a straw poked into the tab hole. It felt wonderful to be eating and drinking at last.

My walking meal finished, I hailed a cab, carrying the food wrappers and soda can with me for recycling. I had the cab stop a block away from my building, and let myself in the back way, a quick wave to one of the janitors who thought all young people were sneaky-crazy but harmless, and so he ignored me.

The message light blinked on my phone. I knew the number
now. “Please, Dray, please meet me. Tonight if you can, or tomorrow. I miss you. Please let’s talk.” Rand’s voice was courting me, yet angry. It was one thing to negotiate in a business deal, but I was sure he was used to getting the women he wanted. Rich men become more “beautiful,” the richer they get. If after Monday Rand felt ill-used, well, so did I, on Bredon’s behalf. The phone rang as I finished hearing the message. It was Rand again. I picked up, saying nothing.

“Dray, please say something.”

“Rand, hello. I just got back in. And I’m very tired,” and realized as I said it that it was true, despite all the sleep I’d had today. I think my anxiety over Bredon was draining my energy, and I had prayed so intensely for him in church, I had felt light-headed between emotion and hunger when I was done.

Amazingly, he understood. “You’re a sleepyhead, or so I’ve been told,” he said in a new voice. “So, get some rest. But I’ve been thinking about why you won’t see me. I have a thought that may change your mind.” And now Rand’s voice grew hard. “I want to talk to you about the deal with Bredon. Please see me.”

“Rand, if word goes out that you’ve pulled out of the deal with Bredon, and then people see us together, I’d be – and feel like – the world’s biggest traitor. I won’t do that.”

His voice was harder now. “Interestingly, I actually understand how you feel,” he said, a stripe of anger and irony in his voice. “That’s why I want to see you. I have some thoughts about the deal. And us.”

“I’m seeing someone else,” I lied.

“Really.” A sarcastic slash of a word, six letters like a knife. “Listen,” he said, “I just want to talk to you. Just meet with me, just once.”

My silence was thick with my reluctance and conflict. I was wishing I could just cry or scream, I wanted him so much. But he heard only the reluctance, and I could almost feel his anger increasing. “Meet me,” he insisted, his voice now like steel.
“Come to my private house. Tomorrow, two o’clock.” And after a slight pause he said, tauntingly, “Your brother will benefit.”

His voice had turned cruel, maybe the voice his enemies heard, and my body was in collapse over his tone, and then my own anger rising, adding to the maelstrom of my emotions. I was feeling sick to my stomach, a headache starting to take hold like a vise. His indifference to my love for my brother, using that love to get me to talk to him, to
benefit
Bredon, how dare he. He wanted to play this game with me? All right, let’s see what cards he held.

“Benefit my brother,” I said, repeating his words in a voice like ice. “How would that be possible, exactly?”

“In a way that I will set out in detail exactly,” he answered, imitating my own arctic tone.

“Isn’t there somewhere else we can meet?” I said, wary. With cameras everywhere, with the many people who knew us by sight, I did not want to be seen entering his private park or his house. Word would surely get back to Bredon, and who knew how many other people. The professional gossips had ears on the streets, and the media would snake into our lives again.

He seemed to realize my concerns but I realized that he had his own concern for privacy. If he was going to help Bredon, he was going to have to deal with his suddenly risk-averse family. “My house is the one place I can be absolutely sure we won’t be overheard,” he said.

My mind explored other possibilities frantically – use one of our family cars, use a hired car, rent a car, take a train to some public place where I wasn’t known, but every one of those alternatives had its problems with being followed or seen or discovered. I decided to use a disguise such as Bredon and I had used to escape reporters after the air crash.

“Are you going to stand by your commitment to Bredon?” I asked, stalling.

“That’s what we’re going to discuss.” If his voice were any
colder, I would be a cube of ice.

I gave in. “All right, two o’clock tomorrow, at your house. Your security camera won’t recognize me, but it will be me. Whoever you think it is, just open the gate.”

Now he was wary. “Are you going to send someone else?”

“No. It will be me.”

After spending the next couple of hours fretting over Bredon and the whole crazy situation with Rand, I finally fell asleep. It was like the way I slept after our parents were killed, when the doctors had given me powerful sedatives to get me to sleep and to keep me asleep. My body had fought the drugs, which were supposed to suppress some REM sleep and dreams. Instead, more often than not, I would waken from nightmares. The doctors finally figured out a sleeping pill regimen, and a drug cocktail, that could give me about seven hours’ rest. Finally. It took them a couple of weeks to get to that solution, Bredon beside himself with his own grief and worry over me. Tonight I had dreams, not nightmares, my unconscious playing out a surreal and lopsided world, absurd, skewed, cryptic, elements of Balthus puzzles in them, and the saints consoling me.

Bredon wakened me on Thursday with an early call. He sounded upbeat. His first meetings had gone well, though no firm commitments were in place yet. I could not tell if he was deceiving me, or himself, or if there really was hope in these investors. But his voice was strong, and he was getting ready to go to sleep himself. He was over nine thousand miles away, and on the Equator, and I felt so lonely for him.

“What are your plans for the day?” he asked.

“I’m going to hit the museums, I think. I’m still enjoying the novelty of being on vacation from school, and Robin isn’t back yet, so I’ll do city exploring on my own.” I often did this, no surprises, and no mention of Rand.

“What about your other friends?” he asked offhandedly, a pretended lightness.

“I may call Dina to see if she’s back in Westchester. She went away with her parents right after school closed. She’s probably looking for down time too.” My voice was chatty, girl talk-y, avoiding seriousness. But my heart was still troubled over my brother. I sighed, quietly, and thought I heard him sigh too. We two children, each other’s beacon. “Oh, Bredon, I can’t wait for you to get home!”

He laughed, relieved, interpreting my sigh as missing him, which it was, and more. “Sunday night, Sis, but I’ll be flying in late.”

“However late, call me.”

“Okay. But fair warning. The following Tuesday morning I go out again, this time for a week.”

“More investors on this deal?” What was he doing, I wondered.

“No, they’ll be site inspections, making sure all the offices and support staff are in place.” He was positive, reassuring. But
he did not say he had the money commitments he needed.

“Okay,” I said, keeping my voice light. “Sunday night.” I hung up and said a dozen fervent prayers for my brother, begging my parents to watch over him.

Returning to the everyday, hungry, I checked in the refrigerator; butter and eggs were there along with the heavy cream I loved in my coffee. Happily, Marilisa had left some fresh rolls on the counter, so breakfast was an easy task. I ate and thought and planned, and when I finished, I turned on the “don’t come in” light, then engaged the special door locks, front and back entrances, that even Marilisa did not know about. Bredon had had these installed when no one was about on my floor, using skilled men who owed him favors. Bredon did not elaborate on who the men were, or what favors had been done. I knew not to ask.