Robin’s teeth were chattering, though the morning wasn’t cold. “Can I come in?”
“I’m about to go to work,” Denise said.
“Five minutes,” Robin said.
It seemed impossible that she hadn’t seen the pistachio-colored wagon across the street. Denise let her into the front hall and closed the door.
“My marriage is over,” Robin said. “He didn’t even come home last night.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’ve been praying for my marriage, but I get distracted by the thought of you. I’m kneeling in church and I start thinking about your body.”
Dread settled on Denise. She didn’t exactly feel guilty — the egg timer on an ailing marriage had run out; at worst she’d hurried the clock along — but she was sorry that she’d wronged this person, sorry she’d competed. She took Robin’s hands and said, “I want to see you and I want to talk to you. I don’t like what’s happened. But I have to go to work now.”
The telephone rang in the living room. Robin bit her lip and nodded. “OK.”
“Can we meet at two?” Denise said.
“OK.”
“I’ll call you from work.”
Robin nodded again. Denise let her out and shut the door and released five breaths’ worth of air.
“Denise, it’s Gary, I don’t know where you are, but call me when you get this, there’s been an accident, Dad fell off the cruise ship, he fell about eight stories, I just talked to Mom—”
She ran to the phone and picked up. “Gary.”
“I tried you at work.”
“Is he alive?”
“Well, he shouldn’t be,” Gary said. “But he is.”
Gary was at his best in emergencies. The qualities that had infuriated her the day before were a comfort now. She wanted him to know it all. She wanted him to sound pleased with his own calm.
“They apparently towed him for a mile in forty-five-degree water before the ship could stop,” Gary said. “They’ve got a helicopter coming to take him to New Brunswick. But his back is not broken. His heart is still working. He’s able to speak. He’s a tough old guy. He could be fine.”
“How’s Mom?”
“She’s concerned that the cruise is being delayed while the helicopter comes. Other people are being inconvenienced.”
Denise laughed with relief. “Poor Mom. She wanted this cruise so badly.”
“Well, I’m afraid her cruising days with Dad are over.”
The doorbell rang again. Immediately there was a pounding on the door as well, a pounding and a kicking.
“Gary, hang on one second.”
“What’s going on?”
“Let me call you right back.”
The doorbell rang so long and hard it changed its tone, went flat and a little hoarse. She opened the door to a trembling mouth and eyes bright with hatred.
“Get out of my way,” Robin said, “because I don’t want to touch any part of you.”
“I made a really bad mistake last night.”
“Get out of my way!”
Denise stood aside, and Robin headed up the stairs. Denise sat in the only chair in her penitential living room and listened to the shouting. She was struck by how seldom in her childhood her parents, that other married couple in her life, that other incompatible pair, had shouted at each other. They’d held their peace and let the proxy war unfold inside their daughter’s head.
Whenever she was with Brian she would pine for Robin’s body and sincerity and good works and be repelled by Brian’s smug coolness, and whenever she was with Robin she would pine for Brian’s good taste and like-mindedness and wish that Robin would notice how sensational she looked in black cashmere.
Easy for you guys, she thought. You can split in two.
The shouting stopped. Robin came running down the stairs and went on out the front door without slowing.
Brian followed a few minutes later. Denise had expected Robin’s disapproval and could handle it, but from Brian she was hoping for a word of understanding.
“You’re fired,” he said.
FROM: Denise3@cheapnet.com
SUBJECT: Let’s maybe try a little harder next time
Lovely to see you on Saturday. I really appreciated your effort to hurry back and help me out.
Since then, Dad’s fallen off the cruise ship and been pulled out of icy water with a broken arm, a dislocated shoulder, a detached retina, short-term memory loss, and possibly a mild stroke, he and Mom have been helicoptered to New Brunswick, I’ve been fired from the best job I may ever have, and Gary and I have learned about a new medical technology that I feel certain you would agree is horrifying and dystopic and malignant except that it’s good for Parkinson’s and can maybe help Dad.
Other than that, not much to report.
Hope all’s well wherever the fuck you are. Julia says Lithuania and expects me to believe it.
FROM: exprof@gaddisfly.com
SUBJECT: Re: “Let’s maybe try a little harder next time”
Business opportunity in Lithuania. Julia’s husband, Gitanas, is paying me to produce a profit-making website. It’s actually a lot of fun and not unlucrative.
All your favorite high-school groups are on the radio here. Smiths, New Order, Billy Idol. A blast from the past. I saw an old man kill a horse with a shotgun on a street near the airport. I’d been on Baltic soil for maybe fifteen minutes. Welcome to Lithuania!
Talked to Mom this morning, got the whole story, made my apologies, so don’t worry about that.
I’m sorry about your job. To be honest, I’m stunned. I can’t believe anyone would fire you.
Where are you working now?
FROM: Denise3@cheapnet.com
SUBJECT: Holiday responsibilities
Mom says you won’t commit to coming home for Christmas, and she expects me to believe it. But I’m thinking no way could you talk to a woman who’s just had the highlight of her year truncated by an accident, and who otherwise has a shitty life with a semi-disabled man, and who hasn’t gotten to be at home for Christmas since like Dan Quayle’s vice presidency, and who *survives* by looking forward to things, and who loves Christmas the way other people love sex, and who’s seen you for all of forty-five minutes in the last three years: I’m thinking no way could you have told this woman, nope, sorry, staying in Vilnius.
(Vilnius!)
Mom must have misunderstood you. Please clarify.
Since you ask, I’m not working anywhere. Subbing a little at Mare Scuro but otherwise sleeping until two in the afternoon. If this continues, I may have to do some therapeutic thing of the sort that will horrify you. Got to regain my appetite for shopping and other non-free consumer pleasures.
The last thing I heard about Gitanas Misevicious was that he’d given Julia two black eyes. But whatever.
FROM: exprof@gaddisfly.com
SUBJECT: Re: “Holiday responsibilities”
I intend to get to St. Jude as soon as I make some money. Maybe even by Dad’s birthday. But Christmas is hell, you know that. There’s no worse time. You can tell Mom I’ll come early in the new year.
Mom says that Caroline and the boys will be in St. Jude for Christmas. Can this be true?