He said, “You look happy to be here.”
I said, “God, yes, I am. I am so happy!”
His face lit up. Happy begat happy. “Let me buy you a drink, happy girl.”
“Okay,” I said. It had taken five seconds, and I was his.
The band had yet to begin, so we talked. He told me Princeton, Upper East Side (renting), started his own business (head hunting, not as violent as it sounded, he promised). He said Bergen County, New Jersey, parents still married, one brother, one sister. He said jogging in the park, food and wine, New York Times crossword puzzle, poker on Wednesdays.
I told him Colchester, food editor at Glamorous Home, West Sixty-third Street (renting). I said New Canaan, Connecticut, parents just announced they were splitting after thirty years, one sister. I said jogging in the park, food and wine, reading, shopping, skiing, and the beach.
He said R.E.M., Coldplay. He said Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, GoodFellas. He said Hemingway, Ethan Canin, Philip Roth.
I said Death Cab for Cutie, Natalie Merchant, Coldplay. I said The English Patient, Ghost, American Beauty. I said Toni Morrison, Jane Smiley, Susan Minot.
He said, “Are we a match?”
I said, “You’re a man, I’m a woman. If you’d said your favorite movie was Ghost, I would have walked away.”
He said, “You have beautiful hair.”
I said, “Thank you.” This was a compliment I was used to.
When I introduced Michael to Rhonda a few minutes later, he stuck out his hand and said, “I’m Chess’s boyfriend, Michael Morgan.”
I swatted him. I said, “He is not my boyfriend.”
Michael said, “I’m her fiancé.”
The band started playing. I had heard that they were good, and they were good. Michael led Rhonda and me through the mayhem to the front row. That was when I got my first look at Nick. What to say? My heart melted away. He was beautiful in a brooding, rock-star way. He had light brown hair that fell into his eyes, which were blue. His nose was a little crooked, as if it had been broken. He was wearing a Death Cab for Cutie T-shirt. He was tall, though not as tall as Michael, but he was leaner and more fit. His voice was a mystery, it was textured and rich, husky at some moments and clear as a choirboy’s at others. At the time, I didn’t know he was Michael’s brother. I only knew he was the lead singer of the band, and he seemed focused on me. There was eye contact and I drank it in like cold water. He was singing a song that I thought must be called “Okay, Baby, Okay,” because those were the most oft-repeated lyrics, and when he sung those words, he looked at me. He sung them to me. Michael shouted above the noise of the crowd, “I think he likes you.” It was quite a position to be in: I had just met an amazing man custom made for my bright side, and I was face-to-face with a rock star who was sexier and more intriguing, a soul mate for my dark side.
Michael, to his credit, didn’t try to touch me while the band was playing. He was into the music; he knew every word to every song.
I said, “Are you a fan, then?”
He grinned. “You could say that.”
At the break, Michael said, “Let’s go backstage.”
“Backstage?” I said.
He said, “Nick, the lead singer, is my brother.”
“Your brother?” I said. His brother? It was either good news or it was bad news, I couldn’t tell which. If the lead singer had been anyone else, he would have disappeared from my life and the next time I saw him would have been on VH1. As it was, I was going to meet him.
Michael led Rhonda and me backstage. The band was sitting on the grotty greenroom sofas drinking bottled water and toweling themselves off. Michael shook hands with the other band members-Austin, Keenan, Dylan, we were all cursorily introduced-and then he hugged it out with Nick. Nick seemed much more interested in Rhonda and me.
“Which is yours?” he asked Michael.
“Chess is mine,” he said. “We’re getting married.”
Nick looked at me. I would never forget the way that look penetrated. And he said, “Bastard.”
Rhonda, never a shrinking violet, said, “But I’m free.”
Chess considered suicide on Tuckernuck: She could weight the pockets of her grandfather’s yellow rain slicker with rocks and walk out into the ocean. She could plug the tailpipe of the Scout with her Diplomatic Immunity T-shirt and start the ignition. There was a box of rat poison in the bottom of the utility closet. She could slit her wrists with the rusty corkscrew in the kitchen drawer; if she didn’t bleed to death, she would give herself tetanus. She was able to joke about it; that much was good. She was choosing to stay alive; that much was good. Each day, that was something accomplished.
She had five pages of her confession penned in the notebook. She tucked the notebook between her mattress and box spring, away from prying eyes.
Tate was happy. Upon their arrival, she had put on her bikini and run down to the beach. Now she was sitting on her unmade bed, dripping wet, poring through the musty book of flora and fauna she’d found on the shelf of the living room. Chess eyed the box of cheerful new linens her mother had purchased, and then she squinted into the rafters to look for the bats that had populated the nightmares of her childhood. She didn’t see any bats, but she knew they were there. Or they would come.
Tate said, “I just love it here. And I love it that we’re here together. This is home for me. This is more my home than my condo in Charlotte. Or even the house in New Canaan.”
The attic was cavernous, dusty, sour smelling, and hot. Chess unzipped her suitcase, which was the size of a coffin. Michael had not, thankfully, been buried in a coffin. He had been cremated and his ashes were placed in an expensive-looking mahogany box with brass fittings. At the funeral, his parents had jointly carried this box down the aisle of the church while everyone stood. Chess had been numb; before the service, she had taken three Ativan. It was the only way. Evelyn Morgan had invited Chess to sit with the Morgan family. This had taken Chess by surprise. In her drug-muddled state, she couldn’t figure out Evelyn’s motive. Did Evelyn feel sorry for Chess? Did she want to put on appearances by having Chess among the rest of the family, as though the breakup had never happened? Did Evelyn want to be seen as the bigger person? Was she the bigger person? Did Evelyn think that having Chess sit up front with the family was what Michael would have wanted? Had Nick lobbied on her behalf? Chess didn’t know, but she couldn’t bring herself to accept the offer. She sat on the opposite side of the church with her mother and father flanking her like the Secret Service. She was hoping for anonymity, but the people who attended the funeral were many of the same people who would have been attending the wedding. That was the first bad thing; people she didn’t know pointed at her and whispered, and Chess turned around, thinking there was someone important or noteworthy behind her, but it was her they were noticing. The ex-fiancée. The second bad thing was the eulogies. The preacher started off. He spoke about what a full life Michael had lived for someone who was so young.
“He had loved,” the preacher said. “And he had lost love.”