“He wanted me to be there tonight, Harry…” She started to cry. “You were right.” She felt sick. He had almost destroyed her life, and she had been completely under his spell. And for what? A piece of ass? How sick was she? She felt sick thinking of it. She had never realized how deeply committed they were to their ideals, and it terrified her now to have known them at all. She was afraid that she might be taken in for questioning. And eventually she was, but nothing ever came of it. She was a student who had slept with Yael McBee. She wasn't the only one. She took her exams. She passed the bar. She was offered a job in the district attorney's office, as a prosecutor, and grown-up life began then and there. The radical days were past, along with student life, and living with Harry and Averil in their little house. She rented an apartment in San Francisco, and slowly packed up her things. Everything was suddenly painful to her, everything was over, finished, done.
“You look like a picture of cheer.” Harry wheeled slowly into her room, as she threw another stack of law books into a box. “I guess I should call you Madam Prosecutor now.” She smiled and looked at him. She was still shocked at what had happened to Yael McBee, and almost to her through him. And she was still depressed at the thought of what she had felt for him. Now it had all begun to seem unreal. They hadn't come to trial yet, but she knew that he and his friends would be sent away for a long, long time.
“I feel like I'm running away from home.”
“You can always come back, you know, we'll still be here.” And then he suddenly looked sheepishly at her. Tana laughed as she looked at him. They had known each other for too long to be able to get away with anything.
“Now what does that look like? What mischief are you up to now?”
“Me? Nothing.”
“Harry…” She advanced on him menacingly and he wheeled away as he laughed.
“Honest, Tan … oh shit!” He ran smack into her desk and she carefully put her hands around his handsome throat. He looked more like his father every day, and she still missed him sometimes. It would have been a lot healthier having an affair with him than Yael McBee. “All right … all right … Ave and I are getting married.” For a moment, Tana looked shocked. Ann Durning had just gotten married for the third time, to a big movie producer in L.A. He had given her a Rolls Royce as a wedding present and a twenty-carat diamond ring, which Tana had heard a lot about from Jean. But that was something people like Ann Durning did. Somehow she had never thought about Harry getting married.
“You are?”
He smiled. “I thought after all this time … she's a terrific girl, Tan…”
“I know that, you dummy,” Tana grinned, “I've been living with her too. That just seems like such a grown-up thing to do.” They were all twenty-five years old, but she didn't feel old enough to get married yet, she wondered why they did. Maybe they had had more sex, she laughed to herself, and then she smiled at him and bent to kiss his cheek. “Congratulations. When?”
“Pretty soon.” And then suddenly Tana saw something funny in his eye. It was, at the same time, both embarrassment and pride.
“Harry Winslow … do you mean to tell me that … you didn't…” She was laughing now, and Harry was actually blushing for one of the few times in his life.
“I did. She's knocked up.”
“Oh, for chrissake.” And then her face sobered suddenly. “You don't have to get married, you know. Is she forcing you to?”
He laughed and Tana thought she'd never seen him look so happy in his life. “No, I forced her. I told her I'd kill her if she got rid of it. It's our kid, and I want it, and so does she.”
“My God,” Tana sat down hard on the bed, “marriage and a family. Jesus, you guys don't mess around.”
“Nope.” He looked about to burst with pride and his intended walked into the room with a shy smile.
“Is Harry telling you what I think he is?” Tana nodded, watching their eyes. There was something so peaceful and satisfied there. She wondered what it felt like to feel like that, and for a moment she almost envied them. “He has a big mouth.” But she bent and kissed his lips and he patted her behind, and a little while later he wheeled out of the room. They were getting married in Australia, where Averil was from, and Tana was invited to the wedding, of course, and after that they would come back to the same little house, but Harry was starting to look for a nice place in Piedmont for them to live until he finished school, it was time for the Winslow funds to come into play a little bit. He wanted Averil living decently now. And he turned to Tana later that night.
“You know, if it weren't for you, Tan, I wouldn't be here at all.” He had told that to Averil ten thousand times at least in the past year, and he believed it with all his heart.
“That's not true, Harry, you know that. You did it yourself.”
But he grabbed her arm. “I couldn't have made it without you. Give yourself credit for that, Tan. The hospital, law school, all of it … I wouldn't even know Ave, if it weren't for you…”
She was smiling gently at him and she was touched. “What about the baby, is that my doing too?”
“Oh, you jerk.…” He tugged at the long blond hair and went back to his future wife, sound asleep in the bed where their baby had been conceived. His “creativity” had paid off, and Tana smiled to herself wistfully that night as she fell asleep. She was happy for him, for them both. But she suddenly felt so alone. She had lived with him for two years, with Averil for half of that, it would be strange living alone without them, and they would have their own life … it all seemed so strange … why did everyone want to get married … Harry … her mother … Ann … what was the magic about that? All Tana had wanted was to get through law school, and when she had finally had an affair with someone, he had turned out to be some wild nut, and had wound up in jail for the rest of his life … it was mystifying as she fell asleep … she didn't have any of the answers, not then or when she moved out.
She moved into a pleasant little flat in Pacific Heights, with a view of the Bay, and it took her fifteen minutes to get to City Hall in the secondhand car she bought. She was trying to save everything she could to go to Harry and Avail's wedding, but Harry insisted on giving her the ticket as a gift. She went just before she started her new job, and she could only stay in Sydney with them for four days. Averil looked like a little doll in a white organza dress, and nothing showed yet at all. Her parents had no idea that there was a baby on the way, and Tana even forgot about it. She forgot everything when she saw Harrison Winslow walk towards her again.
“Hello, Tan.” He kissed her gently on the cheek and she thought she would melt. And he was as he had always been, charming, and debonair, sophisticated in every possible way, but the romance that had been stopped so long ago was not destined to be revived again. They talked for hours, and went for a long walk late one night. He found her different and more grown up, but in his mind, she would always be Harry's friend, and he knew that no matter what, in Harry's mind, Tana would always belong to him, and he still respected that.
He took her to the airport when she left. Harry and Averil had already left on their honeymoon, and he kissed her as he had so long ago, and every ounce of her soul reached out to him. There were tears rolling down her cheeks as she boarded the plane, and the stewardesses left her alone, wondering who the handsome man had been. They wondered if she was his girlfriend or his wife, and they watched her curiously. She was a tall, pretty blonde, in a simple beige linen suit, with an assurance about the way she moved, a proud way she held her head, and what they didn't know was that inside she felt frightened and alone. Everything she was going back to was going to be new all over again. New job, new home, and no one to share it with. She suddenly understood why people like Ann Durning and her mother got married. It was safer than being out there on your own, and yet, it was the only way Tana knew by now, as the plane headed for home.