“Wow! Steven, that's fabulous!” And he looked as though he thought so too when she kissed him. He allowed himself to have two drinks and he was still beaming from ear to ear when he walked her out to the car when she left for work, and he told her he'd have someone drop him off at home. He told her not to bother to come back to the party after work because he didn't think he'd stay long. And as she drove off, he waved, and went back to see his host again. For Steven, it had been a fabulous evening.
It had been less so for Adrian, and suddenly all she could think of, even in the midst of Steven's incredible opportunity, was whether or not she was pregnant. The idea tormented her all through the evening news, and she was still preoccupied on her way home, and then suddenly, with a quick swerve, she pulled into the curb and decided to stop at an all-night drugstore. Steven didn't have to know anything. She didn't have to say anything to him. But suddenly she wanted to know …and if not tonight …then sometime soon. If she bought the test now, she could do it anytime she felt brave enough. She could even do it while Steven was in Chicago.
She bought the kit and had the druggist put it in a brown paper bag that she shoved deep into her tote bag, and then she got back in the Porsche again, and drove back to their apartment.
Steven was home when she arrived, in bed, half asleep, but with a look of supreme bliss on his face. He was sure that he was on his way to Chicago to make the deal of a lifetime.
AND IN HIS CONDOMINIUM, STARING OUT THE WINDOW into the darkness on Saturday night, William Thigpen looked anything but blissful. He had written for a while, bought Chinese takeout for himself, he had called his kids in New York, watched TV, and he was actually feeling rather lonely. It was one o'clock in the morning by then, and he decided to take a chance and call Sylvia in her room in Las Vegas. She might be back by then, and at worst, he could always leave a message. The phone rang half a dozen times, and when no one answered it, Bill waited for the message operator to come back on, and when he did, it was a man with a gravelly voice and he sounded half asleep and all he said was “Yeah?” as Bill waited.
“I want to leave a message for the party in 402,” Bill said crisply.
“This is 402,” the voice growled, “whaddya want?”
“I must have the wrong room, I'm sorry …” and then suddenly he wondered.
“… you expecting a call from somewhere?” The gravelly voice asked someone in the distance, and there were hushed exchanges with a hand over the phone, and then suddenly Sylvia was on the phone, sounding very nervous. She would have been smarter not to take the call, but she hadn't figured that out, and she knew it was probably Bill calling from L.A.
“Hi …there's been a terrible mixup,” she started to explain as Bill almost laughed at the absurdity of the situation. “They forgot to reserve half the rooms, and four of us are sharing.” It was beautiful. It was a story worthy of his soap opera, and he was at the center of it, feeling as though he were watching someone else's life instead of his own.
“This is ridiculous …Sylvia, what the hell is going on?” He sounded like the irate lover, but the odd thing was that he didn't feel it. He felt stupid and as though he'd been had, but the truth was he wasn't even angry. All he felt was dumb and disappointed. They'd had something pleasant for a while, but it was more than obvious now that it was over.
“I …I'm really sorry, Bill … I can't explain it just now. But everything's gotten mixed up here …I …” She was crying and he felt like a complete fool just listening to her. He had caught her in the act and he was the one who wanted to apologize for being stupid.
“Why don't we talk about it when you get back?”
“Are you going to kick me off the show?” He felt sad for her as he listened. He wasn't that kind of man, and it hurt him that she didn't know that.
“That has nothing to do with this, Sylvia. These are two separate issues.”
“Okay …I'm sorry …I'll be back Sunday night.”
“Have a good time,” he said softly, and hung up. It was over. It should never have started, but it had, because he was lazy and she had been convenient, and so goddam sexy. She was a knockout, there was no denying it, and now she was knocking out someone else. And for a minute, Bill found himself hoping that the man with the gravelly voice made her happier than he had. He had very little to give the women in his life. He had too little time for them, and even less interest in getting hurt, and opening himself up to the kind of pain he'd had when he lost Leslie and his children. These arrangements were always easy, but they usually ended like this, or some similar scene. Someone wanted to move on, and the party ended. And he had known for a while that she had wanted something he couldn't give her. Time. Real devotion. Maybe even love. But all he had to offer was kindness and some fun, while it lasted.
He thought about her for a while, as he stood looking out at the night sky, and then toasted her with a club soda, as he went to bed, thinking about his life. He felt lonely suddenly, and sad that it had ended like this, with a phone call to Las Vegas.
He lay awake for a long time that night, thinking of the women in his life in recent years, of how little they had really meant to him, how uninvolved they all really were, how meaningless their relationships, how casual their sex lives, and as he fell asleep, he found himself thinking longingly of Leslie for the first time in years, and the kind of relationship they had once shared. It seemed like several lifetimes ago, and it was. He doubted if he'd ever have that again. Maybe you only had that once, when you were young. Maybe you never got a second chance at the real thing, and maybe in the end, it didn't matter. He fell asleep finally, thinking not of Sylvia or his ex-wife …but of his boys, Adam and Tommy. In the end, they were all that mattered.
SUNDAY FLEW BY IN A FLURRY OF PREPARATION FOR Steven's trip, interspersed with tennis games, and Adrian never touched the kit that sat hidden in her tote bag. She did his laundry for him, made lunch for him and the three friends he had played doubles with, and she said almost nothing to him, but he seemed not to notice. And that night, they went to a movie. She hardly heard anything that was said, and all she could think about, as they sat in the dark reading the subtitles on the Swedish film, was whether or not she was pregnant. It was crazy, in the past two days it had become an obsession with her, and yet she still wasn't that late. But for some reason, she had an odd premonition. She didn't feel sick and her body didn't seem to have changed, except in the ways it normally did when she expected her period. Her breasts were slightly enlarged, her body a little more bloated, she went to the bathroom a little more frequently, but none of it indicated any dire change. And yet, all she wanted now was for Steven to leave. She wanted him to leave the state so that she could find out in peace. She had to know, but she felt sure that if she did the test while he was around, somehow he would know what had happened. She didn't even dare do it after he had left for the airport on Monday. What if he came back? … if he had forgotten something …there she would be in her bathroom with a test tube full of bright blue water … if she was pregnant.
She still didn't really believe it could have happened to her, they were very careful almost all the time, but there had been one time …one time …almost three weeks before …three weeks …She thought about it all day while she was at work after Steven had left, and she rushed home after the six o'clock news, let herself into the house, ran upstairs, and set the kit up in her bathroom. She did everything it told her to do, and then she sat nervously, watching the alarm clock in her bedroom. She didn't even trust her wristwatch. If it turned blue, it meant …and it was a ten-minute wait …but within three minutes, the guessing game was over.