1965

8 years later 

It had been eight years since I'd spent any time with Jeff. It seemed that once we were divorced, he divorced himself completely from me. He had the money to make arrangements for drivers to pick up and drop off the children. I no longer had any desire to engage with his social circle. In fact, it wasn't until I met friends of my own –writers, artists, actors—that I found the strength to start a new life. These friends, who were still in my life, were the first group of people that I'd chosen as friends. Growing up, like most children, my childhood companions were naturally those who were there, being raised in my neighborhood. I went from that world to Jeff's. I'd never been myself in his crowd and during our five year marriage, I never made a real friend of my own.

I had been correcting student papers. I was teaching English at a Junior college. I enjoyed it very much. It gave me yet another perspective on my life, a growing prism with many facets. I would have never known all of the possibilities for my life if I hadn't followed an often painful and circuitous path to where I'd ended up. Jeff had been a part of all of those choices, and for what it was worth both the good and bad experiences with him had led me to a fulfilled place. Sometimes in the afternoons as I dressed for teaching class in the evenings, I'd stop and look at myself in the mirror. It seemed I was always comparing what I had with what would have become of me if things had gone the way they were supposed to.

I was sitting on the couch in our front room. The room held so many memories because the children had still been young when I moved there with them. The front room, the space I was in, had been the center of our family for almost eight years. We'd moved from the country estate with over 40 acres of property much of it gardens I'd created. We'd had a nanny and a housekeeper, both went their separate ways after the divorce. That was all right with me, our new home was much smaller and suburban. It was on a cul de sac in a middle class neighborhood outside of Chicago. It was quaint, the kind of place Ozzie and Harriet would have lived in. And, sometimes I'd felt like one of those television programs with the perfect family, except for one thing. I didn't have a husband. I had the children nearly all the time. They went to Jeff's every other weekend, but often he missed visits because he and his wife, Anna were on vacation or otherwise engaged. I was sure that they lavished them with things when they were there. I knew Clara had a closet full of clothes; she brought back most of them because they were so nice and stylish. She'd tell me Anna took her shopping and had even had outfits made especially for her. Jeff had bought Jeffery a car when he turned 18. It wasn't too ostentatious but it was brand new. Charlie received few things from them. I knew it was mostly because Charlie had rejected them and their gifts for so many years that they'd stopped trying. Jeff and Anna lived in a penthouse in Chicago. That was the life he was accustomed to and the few times I'd seen him with his wife at events, it appeared that she had moved into her role seamlessly and effortlessly. Sometimes I missed Jeff and sometimes I felt jealous seeing them together. She was so much better for the role than I had been. She was so perfect that it made me feel inferior sometimes. Not always. The truth was I'd rejected that role. I didn't want to be a wealthy wife. I didn't like the aristocratic, intellectual parties; still it was hard not to miss him.

I read the same paper over and over, losing track of my thoughts each time I tried. I was too tired to read. I looked around the house. I loved the front room. It was a long rectangle; it had a fireplace to one side. That space was dedicated to our sitting area. It was in the front of the house, so I could see outside to the street from where I was sitting on the couch. I'd hung long tapestry drapes. When I pulled them closed at night, it created a warm feeling of comfort and safety. I had bookshelves built into the back wall. They ran the whole length of the room and was full of poetry and literature. There was still a shelf on the bottom with many of the children's books: Dr. Seus, Bobbsey Twins, The Little House series. All of my children were avid readers and I'd find them spread out in different rooms of the house immersed in a book.

The other side of the front room, towards the back of the house was big enough for a piano. It really was just for aesthetics. The only one of us who played was Clara and she'd quit six years before when she was just 12. I kept it all those years; a baby grand looked so pretty in that space. There were floor to ceiling French doors around two sides. The bookshelves continued back there and I'd put an oriental rug under the piano. We had house plants and several paintings, two of them Jeff's.

The kids were out. They were all teenagers: Clara was 18; Charlie 17 and Jeffery 16. Sometimes it seemed so strange to me that was the mother of children who would be going off to college. All exept Clara. She was supposed to take classes at the University of Chicago and then transfer once she found a school she was interested in. Jeff and I both, separately of course, had taken her on tours of different colleges, but she was only half-interested. She wouldn't apply anywhere so I suggested she take classes until she was ready. She didn't commit to that either. It was both surprising to me and not. When she was younger she had been so mature and studious. She'd sit out in the garden, even at a young age, painting or drawing, perfecting her work. But, in the last year a darkness had begun following her. It was frightening me. It was around that time that she'd lost interest in academic pursuits. She worked at a record store downtown and spent time with kids I'd suspected were doing drugs. My other two—Charlie and Jeffery—were moving along into a new phase of their lives. Charlie was going to Colombia in the fall to study law. He would be a perfect lawyer. He'd always been so smart and persuasive. He was also defiant and strong willed, particularly towards Jeff. It seemed the two of them naturally disliked each other. Well, I say that but really it was Charlie who knew the extent of Jeff's abuse of me. They had all heard the screams and crashing but we had a nanny who ushered them out so they rarely saw what he was doing to me. Instead, it was a ruckus sounds of physical violence and the evidence on my face afterwards. During the periods of abuse—when we lived out on the estate with no where for me to go—my face was often bruised and swollen. The children who were 8, 7 and 5 at the time, lived with fear and uncertainty. It was Charlie, though, who had been there at the lake when Jeff had suspected me of having an affair with his friend Ed. I'd tried to run away but he found mea at Ed's lake house. He showed up while Charlie and I waited for Ed to take us somewhere safe. Jeff showed up and he was there to kill me. He was so full of rage, there had been no reasoning with him. Charlie was in the car with me as Jeff pointed a gun at my head through the windshield. I was lucky to survive. I was lucky I had enough wits about me to gently step on the accelerator and bump Jeff with the car enough to pin him between the one Charlie and I were in and the other car in front of us. I was most fortunate that the gun had been knocked out hand and landed just out of his reach on the hood of the car. So there we were face to face with just a sheet of glass between us. His eyes were penetrating. I had been afraid to look at him. When I turned to look in the back seat where I'd told Charlie to lay down on the floor, I saw my little boy staring through the windshield at his father. The look on his face had been part fear and part hatred.

There was a knock on the door. I hadn't been expecting anyone but it wasn't completely out of the ordinary for one of my neighbors on the street to stop by and ask me a favor. I did the same with them whether it was watering the lawns when they were out of town or borrowing some milk, that was how it had been since I first moved into the house. I felt like a grass widow, alone with three children but no one treated me with anything but respect.

When I got to the door I was startled to see Jeff standing there. . Once the divorce was final he divorced himself from me completely. In all the time we'd been separated he had never once so much as dropped the children off at the curb Instead he spent the money to have a driver pick them up and drop them off. He had never been in my house and I'd never been in his. Seeing him there, I felt my heart drop. I didn't know if something bad had happened. That was how bad news had always been delivered to me—every single tragedy—suddenly, appearing in my life and then ruining everything. There was only one thing left in the world that could have destroyed me again. It was if something were to happen to one of my children. Over the years, there would be nights when I was unable to sleep, over and over contemplating the infinite grief should over losing one of them. I intuitively understood how the heartache would become a living force, deepening and folding in on itself.

"What is it?" I asked before saying hello. He knew of all of my loses in life. In fact, during most of the years we'd spent together I'd often told him how alone in the world I was; that he was the only person left who loved me.

"Everything's fine, Eve. No one's hurt." It had been so long since I'd been that close to him. It caused a sadness, almost a yearning in me. I realized seeing him standing there, that I missed him. Even after all those years.

"Well, what is it then?"

"I'm here for Clara. Will you let her know I'm here?"

"She's not home. Why are you here for her?"

"She asked me to come."

"But why?"

"Eve. For God sake I don't know."

We both stood looking at each other through the open door. "You have no idea?"

He shook his head. "She wanted me to pick her up here. She wanted me to take her on a drive somewhere and talk to me about something." He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket. "Is it all right if I smoke?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. Why don't you come in?"

"If it's just the same, I'll stay out here."

I knew I was looking at him with disapproval. I shook my head. "My God, you can't even come into my house and wait for Clara like a—"

"To be honest I'd rather not." He lit his cigarette.

"Well you can't sit out here on my porch. My neighbors will call the police. Besides, you can just as easily wait in here. I'll fix you a drink."

His eyes met mine. I didn't know why but his cool tone hurt my feelings. Not that I expected any reunion to be full of ease and friendliness. I must have been that his behavior towards me was evidence that he really had gotten over me, as self-centered as that sounded. Just as soon as a hint of longing crossed my mind it was met with a genuine dislike for him.

"Come in, really you can wait in here."

"All right." He walked into the foyer and it seemed another hurdle in front of us. "Really Eve. I can wait here. I'm sure she won't be long."

I kept my eyes on him and didn't say anything. For a fleeting instant there it was. Something in the way he looked at me, as if I were fragile and he didn't want to hurt my feelings.

"What time did she say she'd meet you?" I walked into the front room and he followed behind me.

"7:00." I looked up at the clock on the mantle. "It's 7:00 now."

He nodded.

"Here sit. Can I fix you a drink?"

"What are you having?" When he said it, I placed it. His coming here and my being alone in my comfortable but not grand home reminded me of when we'd first met. I'd lived in my parents' old craftsman in a small neighborhood in Oregon. During our affair he'd come to the house and we'd make love or spend time in my garden. The first time he visited, it was to speak with me about a floral arrangement I was doing for his mother's funeral. When he'd walked into my house—not a proper thing for me to let him do at that time—I was so taken with having him, a sophisticated, handsome man, show interest in me that I obliged him. Back then he'd said, "I don't want to put you to any trouble, whatever you're having." The truth had been that I wasn't having anything. I was doing it for him.

I smiled at him. "Scotch?"

"All right. That would be nice."

I brought his drink to him and put an ashtray in front of him. I had to move the students' essays I had been reading.

"Correcting papers?" He took a deep drag and inspected me from the chair across from the couch where I'd sat down.

"That's the first thing you say to me in all these years?"
"What should I say to you Eve?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I suppose that's fine. Why not?" I shook my head, took a sip of my scotch. "Yes. I'm correcting papers."

He nodded. "To be honest with you. I don't like being here."

"That's pretty apparent. Why don't you like being here?"

"It's hard." He leaned forward and put out his cigarette. "Do you like teaching?"

"Very much." I drank down some more scotch. I realized I was drinking fast. When I looked at his glass I saw that he was too. "May I have one of your cigarettes?"

"I was wondering if you'd quit."

"Is that why you didn't offer me one?"

"No. I just didn't think of it, to be honest." He stood and picked up his coat that he'd draped over the back of the couch. He removed a cigarette from the pack and handed it to me. He lit a match and held it close so I could light my cigarette. Then he shook it out and put it in the ashtray.

"Did you tell me why you don't like being here?"

"I did. It's hard to be around you."

"But you're coming to Charlie's graduation party on Saturday." I had been wondering if they would make it. It would have been the first time he'd come to my house.

"We were planning to."

"I'd hoped so. Anna RSVP'd." It was so awkward. "It's so unbelievable to me that he's going to college. It is bittersweet."

"When does he leave?"

"He wants to go in July and find a place. I almost had this fantasy that you would take him up to New York. That the two of you could get to know each other."

"I know my son, Eve."

I must have rolled my eyes or showed some other sign of dismissal.

"Why did you look at me like that?"

I turned my head and stared at him for a moment. "You haven't spent any time with him for as long as I remember."

"Eve. We both know the kid hates my guts."

"I wouldn't say that."

I noticed his scotch was almost gone. "Do you want another? I'm not sure she's coming but you are welcome to wait a little longer."

"Where did she go?"

I opened my eyes wider as if I were impatient with one of my children. "She made plans with you. I don't know where she is all the time."
"You don't know where she is?"

I stood up and picked up the bottle of scotch. I walked over to him. "Should I know?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know what mothers are supposed to do these days."

"Do you want another?" 

"Sure why not."

Once I'd refilled mine and put the scotch back I sat again on the couch across from him. I was starting to feel the alcohol. I had begun to invest myself in talking more with him. I was honestly wondering if he would open up to me. Maybe it was the scotch, but I wanted to see if he still had any affection for me. Not sexual or even intimate, but after all those years together I wanted some evidence that I still meant something to him. Even if it was just as the mother of his children. I had the sense that he wasn't going to surrender any hint at his feelings for me—if any existed.

We had been talking for a while, a relaxed familiarity had woven itself into our small talk. It wasn't exactly as it had always been. At that point, it was like visiting with an old friend.

"Pretty remarkable, don't you think?" He looked at me and his expression was neutral.

"What is?"

"All of the things you've done since we separated. College, graduate school." He let out a deep breath, looked around uncomfortably before meeting my gaze. "It's very impressive. You've changed. I'm assuming you're a full-fledged socialist by now? A Marxist?"

"I'm sure that's a joke but I don't know what you mean."

"Just wondering if you've worked your way up to Marx and Engels? When you left me you were reading Simone de Beauvoir. Sartre. All that."

"That was ten years ago when I was trying to make sense of our marriage."

"I've been meaning to thank Miss de Boivoire for ruining my marriage."

"Thank?"

"I was being sarcastic."

I remembered reading Second Sex with my writing group. I had to admit I'd never thought about womanhood that way. Her analysis of wife, mother—any role women played in society—resonated so much to me. She made me see it wasn't something inherent in women that lessened their value. It was how they were defined by men and male institutions. It was ironic that Jeff blamed the book, even in jest. He'd already started up with Anna by then. We had already agreed to end our marriage because of the events at the lake.

I smiled at him and shook my head. It was a false smile one that I'm sure he read after all those years of knowing me. I was telling him I could see through him. I looked down at the tapestry fabric on the couch, traced a pale green flower that was almost indistinguishable from the mint colored background. I looked up at him again. He had been staring at me.

"And here I was, just about to offer you another drink."

Somehow that was it. He offered me a genuine smile. It was a sort of relief. I wanted to feel our connection, our friendship. He shook his head, "Really Eve, you can't blaming me disliking Simone Beauvoir."

"Do you want another? I doubt Clara's coming so it would be to catch up with me." I held up my hand, "Don't feel obliged though."

He rubbed his neck and let out a deep breath. "He looked at his watch. Sure. I'll have another." I poured us our third. I peered at the clock. It was almost 8:30.

"Do you want some pretzels or—"

"No. No thanks."

I was serious again "Why did Clara call you?"

"I don't know."

"You don't have any idea?"

"No."

"Don't you think she's been acting—she's been worrying me. I know she's smoking grass. I'm sure she's drinking."

"I have no idea. I never got that impression."

We sat quietly for a moment. I could hear the clock on the mantle ticking. I noticed the sound of a car passing then lights of the headlights brighten the room for a moment. I took another sip.

I put my legs up on the ottoman and stretched my toes under my stockings. I noticed him glance at the skin showing below my skirt. I watched him and his eyes met mine for a second. I felt a current run through me.

"Are you still writing poetry? He asked.

I shook my head. "Honestly, I only wrote when we were breaking up."

Ever since he'd looked at me while I put my legs up, I found myself in between two places. One was the obvious, sitting right across from him engaged in small talk. The other was a feeling. It was having him right there. A man I had been so comfortable touching, flirting with. Having him reserved with me as if I were an acquaintance of his. Then, my mind returned to his glance on my body. Then, it rolled around some more. He was a womanizer, of course he'd taken the opportunity to look at my legs when he could. Then it was more of the same, wondering if it was about me. And all of these ideas sat in between the words we spoke to each other.

""Really. Why was that?" he asked.

"Why was what?"

"Why did you only write poetry when we were splitting up?"

"It's hard to explain. Only someone like Joan would know what I mean."

"What would Joan think about it?"

"She'd say she understood. That our marriage was complex. It would take some—" I smiled at him, "some strong metaphors to decipher it."

"Joan sounds very smart." There was a long pause. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry you don't write anymore. I though you were good."

"Thank you. What have you been working on?" I asked him. I used to sit with him and listen to him describe his latest series, or ideas for a collection. When we were young, I'd pass time with him in the garden while he sketched. Sometimes hours, just us. I'd read or just daydream in the shade, while he sat with a sketchbook and colored pencils. His drawings were beautiful. He'd take them back to his studio and paint large, impressionistic renderings from the detailed, realistic drawings. His exhibits were yet another elaboration, often breath taking as well.

He looked at me and shook his head. "I'm not working on anything. I haven't been inspired for a while."

"Really? I always thought you had an abundance of ideas. An abundance of muses." That was a reference to the young, pretty student's he'd slept with during our marriage.

He took a deep breath and let it out. His eyes stayed fixed on mine. "I've been curating some old pieces. I'm thinking of writing a book."

"Well, that's inspired."

He grimaced. "Not really." He examined me. "Maybe you should get into another bad marriage—you know-- to re-ignite your creativity."

"Maybe you should."

He raised his eyebrows.

I admonished myself. Forced the image of Jeff and Anna into my thoughts to try and regain my senses. I wanted to remember that he was married and I'd made the same mistake with him once before and it had gotten me into trouble; but, when I summonsed the image of Jeff and his wife, I grew jealous. The few times I'd seen them together --I realized once I'd had three scotches—I'd felt that she'd taken my place. It made me feel terrible even after all the time apart from him. I felt hurt even though I'd had someone for most of the time we'd been divorce. Matt and I were engaged. Despite all of those facts, there was Anna. His wife. She was perfectly beautiful, a strong resemblance to Audrey Hepburn. There she was, always sitting beside Jeff. I remembered them at Ed's wedding. She looked stunning. She had on a diamond and emerald tennis bracelet. It hung loose on her thin wrist. I felt bad that he'd given her such an expensive present. I'd remembered when he'd given me such tokens. I'd noticed it because she'd had her hand on Jeff's arm while he was speaking to the other men at the table. She kept an interested expression but no one, not even Jeff had acknowledged her. When Jeff and I were together, at first, I had been like her. I'd done the same but, by the time I was her age I was growing tired of being an ornament. Instead of hanging on to his every word, I'd move to another group, have my own animated conversations, sometimes with men. I remembered when I did, his eyes always followed me. He would look to find where I was in the room. He'd keep his gaze on me while he spoke politics or philosophy with the other men.

"You know what I was just thinking?" I asked him.

"What's that?"

I tried to refrain from letting the words I wanted to say out of my mouth and instead say the words I should say but as it always with alcohol I didn't. "Do you want to know what I was really thinking or more small talk?"

I could see him almost smile and he narrowed his eyes for a moment. I knew that a subtle intimate communication was rising between us. I could tell our familiarity was being restored.

"Better stick with more small talk." He didn't smile but his tone suggested he was comfortable with my suggestiveness. I told myself he could have left at any time if he'd wanted. I imbued all sorts of meaning into the fact that he chose to stay and talk with me. I leaned back on the couch.

"Well, first of all, I think I may be drunk."

He nodded. "I'm starting to get that impression." He smiled.

I put my hands in my hair and shook it a little. I smoothed it back and then let go. "I guess I don't get company very often."

"No? What happened to that poet you were seeing."

"Playwright. Matt."

"Matt" he repeated and when he said it, it looked like he'd just taken a bit of spoiled food. "That's right."

"Why do you say it like that?"

"You said you don't have company. I was wondering why your boyfriend doesn't come over."

"He was my fiancé you know."

He laughed a little. I knew it was because I was getting drunk. "OK," he was still smiling. "Your fiancé."

"We broke up. Very recently."

"I'm sorry to hear it. Why was that?"

"Because I didn't want to marry him."

"Why did you get engaged then?"

I crossed my arms and looked at him. "Are you getting drunk too?"

He nodded. "I am."

He took a sip of scotch. He was slowing down; holding the glass more than drinking. He stared at me for a long, uncomfortable moment. I could see he was becoming less guarded. It seemed like he was studying me, that he was thinking something about me.

"These are your students papers?"

"Yes."

"Are they any good?"

I raised my eyebrows at him and squinted one eye. "What do you suppose?"

He looked up at me as though he were seriously considering my question.

I laughed, "What is it?"

"I'm thinking about it. Do I think freshman papers on—what was the topic again?" He lifted one and read the title of the essay "Treatment of Female Servitude in Kate Chopin's The Awakening." He looked at me and smiled. "That sounds just like you."

"I didn't write the paper." My desire returned; it was pressing on me, it was becoming a physical experience. It felt like too much, but at the same time I was enjoying the restraint.

"Hmm. But you're exploiting young minds with your subversive ideas." He examined the paper and read aloud, "I pondered and contemplated the issues of patriarchy and women's intellectual and personal freedom in the 19th century." He put it back down on the coffee table. His eyes met mine and stayed fixed. His smile faded.

"What are you thinking?"

"Do you want to know what I'm really thinking or more small talk."

I let out a heavy sigh. "That's a hard decision but I think I want more small talk."

"Let me see. All right. I've been reading Carl Jung. Are you familiar with his ideas? Archetypes and all that??"

"That's not really small talk. More like a psychology class."

He closed his eyes for a minute. "I think I am drunk, I can't remember how to small talk."

"OK. Tell me what you were really thinking."

"I was thinking...you're still very beautiful. I was thinking about when I first met you. How you took my breath away every time I looked at you." He shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe that's why I was thinking of Jung. I always thought of you as the feminine ideal."

I looked towards the piano and examined the way the light was reflected in the panes of glass on the French doors. It felt so much like when he used to visit me at my home in Sellwood. In fact, it was the scotch too, but I almost thought I was back in time. So much emotion had risen up in me, I wanted to ask him stupid, selfish questions. I wanted to ask him if he still loved me. If he loved me more than Anna.

"Your being here, in this house reminds me of Sellwood." I said.

"I was thinking the same thing. Maybe that's why I'm so sentimental. You have a pretty house. It suits you."

"Thank you."

"I'm glad our kids were raised here." He said.

"I'm surprised you'd say that. I didn't think you approved of that aspect of their upbringing. I thought you felt I didn't raise the according to your family's expectations."

"I'm sorry I made you feel that way—Were you really engaged to that guy? I could have told you he wasn't your type."

"He was my type on and off for six years."

He laughed, "on and off?"

"I don't know what you're implying. I was engaged to him. That's pretty serious."

"Why didn't you marry him then?"

"You're crazy." I said. "Maybe we shouldn't get so serious." I covered my mouth and yawned.

"Are you tired? Should I go?"

"No. Don't. I never get to see you." I knew when I said that, it was outside of the realm that I needed to stay in. Then, I made it worse, "I miss you sometimes."

He stared at me without saying anything back.

"I am not suggesting that I've been pining over you." I said with a straight face.

He laughed, "you're drunk, Eve."

"I am. But also, I'm just trying to tell you that I'm--" I held up my hands. "No. it's true."

"What is?"

"That I miss you sometimes. I have a lot of friends now. I was engaged—I told you that, didn't I?"

He rolled his eyes and shook his head. "This's the third time."

"So." I took a deep breath and let it out. I was trying to make a joke but it came out wrong. "You really have to stop badgering me about my engagement to Matt. Why don't we talk about something else?"

He shook his head.

"I meant for that joke to be funnier than it was."

I liked how he looked sitting there. His eyes had faint wrinkles at the corners, but still full of affection for me. He had a way of making me feel he was absolutely enchanted with me. He looked like his old self too. He was wearing a white shirt and a tie. I wondered why he was still wearing work clothes. Maybe he had come straight from teaching.

He feigned seriousness. "No, honestly it was funny." He maintained a flat affect. "I got the joke. You were twisting things around—saying I was bringing up your engagement when really you were the one." He kept a straight face despite his teasing.

"That's exactly it. You did get it." I took another sip.

"Maybe you should slow down on the scotch."

"I can make that decision."

"When are the kids getting back?" He looked up at the clock on the mantle.

"I shrugged my shoulders. "What time is it now?"

"It's almost nine."
"They're curfew's not for a couple of hours."

"Oh good." He let out a long breath, then met my gaze.

"I'm glad you feel that way." I felt a little sloppy but told myself I wasn't behaving too badly.

He examined me for a moment. "You know, Ed and I have a game we play. When we go out for drinks after work."

"Do you really?"

"We do." He didn't elaborate.

"Are you going to tell me what it is? What you and Ed do?"

"We just started it, you have to be a little drunk to play."
"We're a little drunk, aren't we?"

He smiled at me. "Ed and I go out for martinis and play 'the honesty game' with each other."

I shook my head and took another sip of scotch, "I've never heard of that game."

"You and I have had a couple of drinks," he stopped and waited. When I didn't say anything, he continued. "We could play it too."

"I don't mean to be unkind."

"But..."

"It sounds a little suspect. I'm just trying to be honest."

This time he laughed, "Oh God Eve, I don't remember you like this." He took a sip of his drink. "At all. All right then. Are you ready? I just want you to know, it can be brutal. I'll go first to show you how it's done. Ready?" He looked at me.

I nodded.

He squinted his eyes, "Eve, are you a communist?"

"Why do you keep asking me that?"

"It's a joke, but Eve. You have to answer the question honestly. Just Yes or No."

"No."

"Are you a communist?"

"Eve you can't ask the same questions as me."

"Answer the question."

He feigned serious consideration of my question. "Maybe. I haven't decided yet."He stared for a moment in the direction of the piano, thinking. Then he turned to him, "Are you glad I came over tonight?"

"Yes."

"Do you enjoy summers in Chicago?" I asked.

"What kind of question is that?"

"Answer the question."

"Yes I do." He rolled his eyes. "This is a very different game with you than with Ed. It's my turn." He said, but then didn't say anything for what seemed like a long time.

"Hurry up. You're making me feel self-conscious."

He held my gaze. I saw something shift in his eyes. "Are you still attracted to me?"

I felt myself grow flush. I looked down.

"You don't have to answer that. I'm sorry. I was just trying to be funny. It didn't come out right."

"Yes." I let out a breath, brought my glass up to take a sip but then brought it back down without drinking any. "Is it my turn?"

He nodded.

I looked up thinking. "I want to ask you something but it is completely selfish and wrong. Honestly." I paused and was almost able to stop myself, but I couldn't, "if I weren't drunk I wouldn't ask, and I will be upset with myself for asking when I think about it tomorrow."

"Go ahead. It's the honesty game. It's brutal."

"You won't be mad at me?"

He shook his head, "no."

"Do you care more about Anna than you did me?"

"No."

"Did you care for me more—when we were married?"

"I'm sorry Eve. You can only ask one question at a time and it's my turn." He smiled at me affectionately. I liked his undivided attention.

"Did you like being with that playwright more than me?"

"No. OK. Can I repeat the previous question that I was disqualified for?"

"No."

"Are you happier with Anna?"

He looked away for a moment and back at me. "No," he whispered.

"Is it still my turn?" I asked.

He recovered. "No. It's not still your turn. It's mine." He looked up and then back at me, He stared at me intently.

"Go ahead. I'm ready."

"Do you still love me?" he asked.

I didn't know why, but hearing him say that caused a pain to rip through me. I looked down and could feel myself starting to cry.

He moved and sat next to me. He leaned down and said, "I'm sorry Eve. I shouldn't have. I'm sorry."

I looked up at him, my eyes were still wet. "Is it my turn?"

He laughed and moved a piece of hair back from my face. "I miss you, Eve."

I took a deep breath and held it for a moment. I exhaled, started to say something but just shook my head. I put my glass on the table. He studied me closely. I recognized the way he was looking at me. It seemed very much like when he used to sketch me, when I was young in my gardens or in the dim light of my bedroom. I felt faint. I was pulled into the current between us. I moved closer to him. I stared at him for a moment, he didn't move. Instead he just kept his eyes on me. Holding the tension between us.

I kissed him, then I whispered, "There it is. The truth."

When I pulled back, he had a look I remembered. His blue eyes had suddenly turned intent. He'd gotten older, but he looked even more handsome to me. For a moment I imagined him as he had been when we were first married. The white shirt, sunglasses, tan. His hand on my lower back leading me back to the car or down to the beach. There was one summer day when we went out to the shore, just the two of us. I'd been unpacking our picnic lunch and he just stared at me. I was probably 26 or 27 at the time. That would have made him about 35 then. I had looked up at him to ask him what kind of sandwich he wanted. He was staring at me and I'd felt my heart stop. I'll never love anyone but you. He'd told me. Then he said come over here, Eve. He was sitting on the blanket and I'd kneeled next to him and leaned down and kissed him. I still remembered the scent of the sea on his skin.

He touched my arm. His hand on my skin caused me to lose my breath. "Eve," When he spoke my name, it heightened my desire. "I don't like being around you because it makes me miss you. Eve, when I see you at the kids' functions, I can't get you out of my mind for days afterwards."

"I didn't know that." I felt frightened because I was aware that I was unleashing something dangerous. It had been caged for almost a decade. I knew I wasn't going to stop myself and the moment I succumbed, I'd be back in that same dark hell. Whatever happened to me after that, would be my own fault.

"I don't want you to do anything you don't want—" I offered.

"I want you," he whispered. "I always want you." He put his hand on my neck, then traced my jawline. He ran his thumb over my lips then back to my neck. I wanted him to kiss me, but he didn't. "Tell me," he whispered.

"Tell you what?" I felt like I wouldn't be able to get enough air.

"Why you want me after all this time?"

"I don't know, but I do."

Finally, he kissed me. I felt myself growing breathless.

He pulled away a little and stared at me.

"What should we do now?" I asked. I was trying to imply we should go to my bedroom. I wanted to make love to him.

"I want to dance with you, he said. "Why don't you put some music on so I can dance with you?"

I was breathless. "That's what you want to do? Right now?"

"I do."
"All right." I stood and straightened my skirt. I looked at him before I walked over to the other side of the room, "Don't I seem perfectly sober? I mean if you didn't know me?"

"No." he smiled at me and drank the last of the scotch in his glass.

I walked to the side of the room with the piano. I let out a deep breath as I stood in front of the shelf with the records and player. I stood and thumbed through the albums, sliding one out and then putting it back. I was about to turn to him and ask what I should put on when I felt him standing behind me. He moved my hair and kissed my neck.

"What should I play?" I whispered.

He leaned closer to me. I could feel his breath on my skin. I could feel his warmth against me. I wanted to turn abound and kiss him, I wanted to take him to my bedroom and make love to him, but for some reason I suppressed the impulse. I slid out a Miles Davis album. "Don't you like this?" I asked. I started to turn but he kept his arms around my waist so I couldn't.

"That's my record." He said, he moved my hair to the side again. "Why don't you put play round about midnight?"

I was breathless. It was too much. "I don't think I can put the record on the turntable right now," I whispered. "I know can't." I let my body relax against his. I turned my head to the side while he kissed my neck.

He stopped and put his cheek next to mine. He spoke quietly against my skin, "you can." Then his lips grazed my neck again. I tried to remove the album from the jacket, but I felt dizzy. I had on a sleeveless sweater. He moved his hands over my bare shoulders and then my arms.

"Honestly, I can't concentrate," I said to him. His hands were back on my waist. I felt my breathing grow irregular. I closed my eyes for a second. "I'm going to faint."

"You're not going to faint. I promise."

"I want to make love to you," I finally confessed.

"You will." He said.

I placed the record on the turntable, and carefully dropped the needle on the right track. I turned to him.

The sound of the saxophone started up, up and he pulled me close to him. My feelings of desire turned. I felt so intimate with him. I closed my eyes and listened to the slow, methodic sounds. We moved to the music and at one point he lifted my hand to his lips. I looked at him. I wanted to tell him I loved him but I was sobering up and I wasn't sure that was true. I closed my yes and kept my head against his chest. I loved feeling his body next to mine. I loved the way he smelled.

After the music ended, I took him into my bedroom. He stood behind me as I undressed. He unzipped my sweater and helped guide it over my head. By then I was trembling. He kept his hand on my bare back as kissed my neck. Then he unfastened my bra and slid it off my shoulders. I turned to him and ran my hands through his hair. "Why are we doing this?" I whispered.

He raised his eyebrows and smiled. "Your body is so beautiful." He kissed my shoulder and then my neck.

Making love to him was exactly as I remembered it. It always left me with the same confusion. I felt as if it were ours, only ours. I didn't really believe that it was any different with other women, but I wanted to think it was something about me that made it that way; so intensely passionate. I wished I knew. I honestly wished I knew how he behaved when he made love to other women. It made me doubt his words, the way he looked at me. I supposed it was just part of the seduction, but I didn't know.

He kissed my neck and then my lips. "Eve," he whispered, "I hope you aren't offended, but I noticed you've learned some new things."

"Don't say that." I teased but really I was embarrassed.

"It's true."

"Well, there's a sexual liberation going on." I looked up at him hopefully.

He was beside me and touched my cheek with two fingers. "Look at how beautiful you are. You still take my breath away."

"It's hard," I whispered. "It's too hard."

He nodded.

"When I see you or hear about you from the children. I feel like there's something wrong with me."

He looked at me intently. "Why would you feel like that?"

I could feel the sadness rise up in me. I'd never spoken it before, but it was there. Why would this man that I'd loved for so long have beaten me? How could he have hated me so much? I had knowledge that although he hit his first wife, he'd never done the things to her that he did to me. How could I draw out such loathing in him?

"God, Eve. You look so sad. What is it?"

I could feel tears forming. "I've felt so terrible the few times I've seen you with your wife. She is so beautiful and it's not that—I don't care if I'm so beautiful anymore—it's that she is what I couldn't be. She is what you wanted me to be. You move so perfectly together. I know that I chose not to be that kind of wife, so...but then when the children come home from your house—"

"—shhh. Eve. Things aren't always as they look. You know that."

"Things aren't good with you and Anna?"

He looked around and then back at me. "I don't know how to answer that"

"Then don't."

"Eve. Things are easy with Anna. Of course they are. There is never any conflict. She does everything I want."

I raised my eyebrows and bit my lip. I thought about how opposite things had been with us. There had been constant conflict. I closed my eyes and the tears fell.

"Darling," he wiped the tears from my eyes. "It doesn't mean I'm happy, just because things are easy. I never wanted you to leave me. You know that I asked you to stay with me that whole year before the divorce was final. After that I just stayed away." He kissed me softly on the lips. He turned back to me and moved my hair away from my face, "Don't cry. Eve. For better or worse." He smiled, "You're the one I love."

I felt my heart drop. I closed my eyes and the truth was pounding in my mind. It was there and it was a poison that released itself in my veins. "If I am—why would you do the things you did? You hardly loved me at all the last year of our marriage. We were only married two years before things went really bad. The whole second year you were having an affair with Suzanne, right in front of me. At parties, you would look across the room and watch me as you spent time with her. Do you do that to Anna too? Or do you treat her as if she's the special one. Do you give her that position in the company of your friends?"

I could feel him withdraw a little, "Eve. Please don't ruin this. I don't know what to say to you. I just told you I loved you, I still want to be with you-- immediately you attack me."

"How did I? I just want to know why-- you remember don't you? You'd come home and tell Elise to take the children out of the room—"
"Eve. I don't want to revisit this."

"But how can I believe that I'm the one you love? Do you hit Anna?"

"Jesus Eve."

"I'm only asking because it would help me make sense of it. If you hit her too, then I wouldn't be responsible."

He stared at me for a long moment. I thought he would say something, admit to it or even blame me. I took in a deep breath and when he didn't respond I could feel myself starting to cry again.

"Eve. Stop doing this." He sighed.

"Please tell me why," I whispered.

"We had a passionate marriage. Things sometimes became physical. That's why."

"Do you hit Anna?"

"That's none of your business."

"I know it's not, but I'd like to know."

"My marriage is none of your business, Eve." At that he got out of bed and started to get dressed. "I don't like where this is going."

He quickly put his pants and socks on. I rose too and put on my robe. I tied the belt tight. I stood in front of him as he put on his shirt.

"Jeff, I hate you for what you did to me. I want you to understand that I can't love you. If you think for one minute I'm going to pass your abuse off as a passionate marriage, you're crazy." My demeanor had gone from hurt to vengeful in a matter of seconds. Of all the things I could have said to him, I knew that saying I hated him was the worst. For whatever reason saying I hated him had always sent him into a rage. I knew he wouldn't do anything there and then. He wouldn't hit me. I kept my eyes on him.

"I know what you're trying to do." He said.

"What?"

"Don't be such a bitch Eve."

"What do you think I'm doing? Trying to push you to see how much it would take for you to strike me?"

"Jesus Christ. You're crazy."

"All I want you to do is to acknowledge what you did to me."

"What?" I could see his eyes had grown cold. He moved closer to me. I could see how heavily he was breathing. His face was flush. His posture intimidated me but I didn't move. "Acknowledge what, Eve?" He pressed.

"You see? You have no feelings." I moved away from him. "You don't have any feelings at all."

"I'm sorry I hit you Eve. I always will be, but our fights were heated. Look at us right now. Do you think Anna would ever speak to me the way you do?"

"I could care less how she speaks to you."

"The thing is Eve. You do care. She can do something you couldn't and you care a hell of a lot. You care so much you slept with me tonight out of jealousy."

"I'm glad you find your wife so obedient and wonderful! It's a compliment for you to say I'm not like her. I just wanted to know why it was so easy for you to hit me and not lay a hand on her. That's all." I was breathing heavily. I was so angry I couldn't even stand to look at him. "And, I never wanted to do those things for you! It's disgusting."

He assumed a patronizing rational tone, "Eve. The fact is, you're not capable of being a wife like Anna."

"Fuck you."

A silence descended. It was there between us. I noticed my breathing was rapid and my whole body was taught with anger. "You just told me that I was the only one you loved."

"So I did. Well, I take it back."

"You're so childish. You're going to take back telling a woman she's the only one you've ever loved?"

"Eve. Listen to yourself."

"No. You listen to yourself."

He shook his head and looked at me as if I was completely irrational. I was about to respond when a figure in the doorway, caught my attention. I stopped and saw saw Clara standing there.

Immediately my demeanor changed, "Darling, how long have you been there?" She had a look of disgust on her face. I started towards her. "Clara, darling."

She turned and rushed out of the room. Jeff had picked up his tie and was stuffing it in his pocket. He started towards the door. "I have to go home."

I reached for his arm and held him back. "No. You need to help your daughter. She looks terrible. She wanted to see you about something. She wouldn't have asked you to come here if it wasn't important. She needs you."

He took my hand as if it were a dirty cloth and lifted it from his arm. "This is your problem." He said then left the house.

I tightened my robe and walked to Clara's room. I knocked gently on the door. "Clara Darling. Let me in." She didn't say anything but I slowly pushed the door open and entered. Clara was on her bed cross legged and smoking a cigarette. A record was spinning on her record player, she had the volume low but once I came into the room, I could hear The Doors Love me Two Times. I sat on the bed and looked at her. It dawned on me, right in that moment. Something was wrong with Clara. I should have seen it before, the changes in her. She went from a well-kept --almost too meticulous of a child-- to more and more ragged looking. I thought it was teenage rebellion. Maybe it was. But, her hair was now long and she brushed it out so it was frizzy. She wore a scarf around her head and the rest of her hair flowed out from under it. I looked into her eyes. They were dark, almost rabid.

"What are you doing, darling?" I asked her. I felt a terror for her safety. I felt something horrible was going to happen. Her eyes were glassy and her pupils were large. I stood and turned on the light. She looked up at me and I saw that her pupils were still large even with the light brighter.

"Did you take something?" I asked her.

"Why were you fucking dad?"

"Clara why did you want to talk with your father? What did you want to ask him?"

I could see she was going to cry, but she had the big sloppy gestures of someone who was drunk. I knew she wasn't drunk. I knew she was high on something. She waved her hand in the air, the cigarette precariously close to her face. Then she covered face with her hand. I noticed the large silver and turquoise rings. She shook her head.

"Clara. Look at me darling. What is going on?" I walked over and turned off the record player.

When she looked at me her mascara was running down her cheeks. I walked over to her. I stood next to the bed and she moved towards me and let me put my arms around her. I took the cigarette from her and put it in the ashtray. I sat down next to her. She cried for a while. Once she finished she looked up at me. She looked like the little girl I'd always known her to be.
"Tell me what's wrong." I said. I gently removed the scarf from her hair and smoothed it back. I wiped the mascara from under her eye. "you've been upset for a while. Did something happen?"

"Can I have my cigarette?"

I picked it up from the ashtray and handed it to her. She moved a little away from me on the bed and took a drag. "Why was dad in your bedroom?"

"Sweetheart—I don't know. He came to pick you up and we had some scotch and started talking. It was nothing."

She kept her eyes on me. I didn't like the way they looked. She appeared haunted, the large black pupils made her skin seem sallow and her hair looked brittle the way she had brushed it out. She had on a short white gauzy dress with an embroidered pattern around the neckline. She had on boots that went up to her knees.

"Here sweetheart , sit back."

She leaned back against the headboard as I unzipped her boots and slipped them off her feet one at a time. "Do you want to put your night clothes on?" I asked her

"I'm not tired." She said.

I nodded. I maneuvered the covers down around her and then up over her body. She put her cigarette out and pulled her hair back behind her. Her appearance scared me so much. I kept envisioning her as a skeleton or her skin pale and cold. It must have been the odd effects of whatever drug she had taken, making her appearance ghastly some how. Or it was intuition. I was so frightened for her. I wished she could skip this part of her life all together. Unlike with the boys, her teenage years were going very badly. I'd never have expected this to be Clara at 18. I didn't want to leave her that night. I bit my lip. "Can I stay with you for a little while?"

She nodded and then she looked up at the ceiling for a long time.

I pulled a chair over and sat down next to the bed. "Who were you with?"

She shook her head. " A bunch of people."

'Are you upset over a boy?" I asked.

She just laughed. "My life is not as simple as yours mother." She looked out the widow. In any other situation I would have responded to her insult.

I pulled the chair closer and put my hand on hers. I realized it must have been late. I wondered where the boys were. When they would get home. I turned and looked at her alarms clock. 11:00. Earlier than I'd thought, but the boys would be home soon.

"Something's bothering you."

"Maybe I'm just like my mother." She said and stared at defiantly.

"How are you like me?" I asked. Certainly I'd had periods of depression, poor judgment, but not so much since I married Jeff and adopted her. Most of those were in my history and happened for good reason. "In what way are you like me Clara?"
"Not you." She said. Her expression didn't change. "not like you." She looked like she was half alive. It was hard to even keep myself there next to her.

"You are like your mother? Your real mother?" I hated saying real as if I weren't her mother just because I'd adopted her not given birth to her. She was my child.

She nodded and then she closed her eyes for a moment, I could see she was holding everything back. The intensity of her emotion struck me with a powerful force. So much so that I stood up and took her hands in mine "what is it? Why are you so upset?"

I didn't know why but immediately my mind turned to Jeff. I felt as though it were his fault. Somehow this was his fault. Really, I was just so frightened.

"Maybe I'll do what she did." Clara finally said and burst out in tears. She lay down and rolled over on the bed.

"I don't understand. Are you pregnant?" That's what Jeff had told me. Margaret had died because she was pregnant and didn't want the baby. She went to have it taken care of and she got an infection. That was what killed her. "Is that it? Clara? Are you pregnant?"

She rolled over. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm sorry. I thought you knew. Your mother was pregnant before she died. That's how she died."

Clara sat up slowly. She was completely calm. More mascara had smeared under her eyes so she appeared to have dark circles. She kept staring at me.

"Did you know?" I felt worlds crashing. I'd felt in that moment as though I'd failed everything. How could I have never talked about this with Clara before? Or with Jeffery? I felt my heart sink, telling her this information under those circumstances.

"Is that what you think?" she asked. Steel cold. Like her father, I thought.

I shook my head and held up my hands. "that's what I was told."

"My mother killed herself."

A silence took me. I felt as though the sinister stillness was spreading from me into everything else. It was more than quiet. It was a tearing. A layer. Yet another layer of Jeff's lies. I had no idea what Clara was talking about and how this truth—if it were true—had been there in my life the whole time. It gave me a sickening feeling to have just been with Jeff again. That nausea linked back to my marriage. Our first night together. That was in their bed. That was Margaret and Jeff's house. Not mine.

"What are you saying, Clara?"

"She went into the bathroom and cut her wrists." Clara's voice had become monotone.

I suddenly felt freezing cold. My thoughts slowed down then picked up again. The word why was ever present, interrupting the frozen silence. "Why are you saying this?" I asked her, "why would you say such a thing? Why wouldn't you have said something before now?"

She didn't take her eyes off me.

I shook my head. I sat on the chair. "If it's true--I didn't know." It dawned me. She must have known because she must have seen it. She was five when Jeff and I were married. There would have been no other way for her to know. No one in that dreadful family would have told her or any of the other children anything. They were all content to make up a story and keep it there like a land mine in the middle of everything we said and did.

"Are you telling the truth Clara or is it the drugs?"

Was it true? Was that why I'd always thought of Jeff's first wife, Margaret, as an apparition. I'd even used those words. She was still there. An apparition.

I swallowed. My mouth was so dry. "How do you know?"

She kept looking at me, her stone statue gaze was melting. The little girl was returning. She shook her head and put her hand over her mouth.

I started to cry. "were you there, darling? Did you see something?"

"I was in the bathroom with her." Her voice sounded like a little girl's.

"You were in the bathroom with her?" I repeated. I reached down to touch her face. She turned back down and screamed into her pillow. I couldn't breathe. I felt as if I would faint. She was completely hysterical. I hated Jeff all the more for leaving her like this. This was why she wanted to talk with him. Away from the studio. Away from his house. She wanted him to take her somewhere. She wanted to talk with him about the truth.

I sat down next to her. I couldn't say anything for a time, her screams settled into sobs. I just rubbed her back. She had one arm to out to the side, holding on tightly to the pillow. I put my hand over it and she released her fingers from the fabric and intertwined them in mine. I was in shock. I was content to remain still, staring at the lampshade on the bedside table. The little glow of yellow around the top, dissipating down around the rim. My mind was trying to decipher what this new information meant. What would change if it were true that Margaret had killed herself? What has already changed just in hearing Clara say it? It seemed to me that it was obvious but I was too upset to recognize it. It seemed that the answer was right there in front of me. Then my mind flashed on Clara's words, "I guess I'm just like my mother."

"Clara," I said, urgently. "turn around sweetheart."

She rolled over and looked up at me.

"Are you thinking of hurting yourself." My blood grew cold as the words left my mouth. "Is that why you said you're just like your mother?"

"I'm tired mommy." She said. It sounded like the drugs again. Or maybe it was the trauma. She still sounded like a small child not a young woman.

"I want to stay in here with you tonight. I'm going to help you. I'll start tomorrow. I'll help you figure out what to do."
She nodded and turned over again. I slid into bed next to her and rubbed her back while she slept. I couldn't sleep. I just let her rest against me, her breathing calming but still punctuated with cries. I tried to comprehend why she would have said that now. Why not sooner. Why had she always acted so well-behaved, even happy? My mind flashed on one of the nights I'd tried to leave Jeff. It was after he'd asked me if I'd had an affair with Ed. He knew I was lying. That night he'd pulled me out of the car, choking me. I'd had Charlie in the back seat. I was going to leave with him and try to come back for Clara and Jeffrey. I hadn't adopted them yet. They weren't mine. They were Jeff's. I couldn't run away with them. My mind returned to the night I'd tried to leave. Clara knew I was leaving without her. I'd left her a note telling her I would come back. Telling her I how much I loved her. She was only 7 years old. When Jeff dragged me back she came to me and put her arms around my neck and kissed me. "If you leave me I'll still love you mommy."

My heart sank. I put my hand over my mouth to prevent sobbing. I closed my eyes and opened them again. I felt sick from all the scotch and cigarettes earlier in the night. I was dizzy and I felt faint. I realized it wasn't just the alcohol. Clara's mother had killed herself less than a year before I moved to Chicago to marry Jeff. She'd known about our affair all along. She knew about Charlie, Jeff's illegitimate son. I looked back down at Clara. I felt a horrible searing shame. I felt afraid for what I'd done. I loved this girl so much, but to think I was likely –at least part of the reason-her mother killed herself. To think I did the very same thing just a few hours before. I again slept with Jeff when he was married to someone else. I rubbed my cheek and kept my hand there for a second. I was absolutely in shock. My mind rolled it over and over but I couldn't understand, if it were true, how could Jeff had told me such a blatant lie? He'd told me she died of an abortion, an infection. He'd said that he didn't even know she was pregnant. She didn't want a child so she went by herself to have an abortion. Then she had an infection and that was what had killed her. I thought of the family photographs I'd kept for the children, there were quite a few early ones with Clara, only one or two photographs with Jeffery, he was less than two when she died. But there was an abundance of her and Clara. I tried to recall the black and white images, were they smiling? Was she relaxed and playful? Had being married to Jeff led her to kill herself? I thought about what Marian had told me—just before she moved away—she said that she'd only seen Jeff hit Margaret twice, never like with me. She thought it was because I was stronger and because I tried to leave him. Margaret was meek but she was also somewhat aristocratic according to Miriam. Then, it also dawned on me. All of these circumstances obviously things were off-kilter. How had I never seen beyond the thin veil that disguised something so terrible? Where were Clara and Jeffery's grandparents. Why were Margaret's parents never mentioned. They'd never sent a gift or card or visited the children. I didn't understand any of it. I had the strong desire to get dressed and drive over to Jeff's apartment. Knock on their door and wake them both. To force him to come outside and tell me the truth. I considered calling on the telephone. I looked back towards the window. Clara was fast asleep. The drugs must have knocked her out. I gingerly removed my arm from underneath her. I pulled the covers up and kissed her on her forehead. "I love you darling." I whispered.