she stepped into the room that morning, she knew that her worst fear had come true. David was screaming in inarticulate anguish, having awakened to discover that his body had become a tomb—and that he was buried alive.
Mariah shuddered now at the memory of his cries, guttural and incoherent, and of the terror in his eyes as he searched hers for a sign of hope that this was only a passing nightmare. She had sat next to him for hours, rubbing his back and stroking his hair and holding his twisted body until his screams had subsided to choking sobs and then faded altogether.
In that time, she had watched a light in those newly conscious eyes flicker and die. She never knew whether the calm that finally settled on him was madness or some kind of divinely inspired state of grace. It didn’t matter, she thought, as long as it gave him peace.
It gave her none, however. Most of what was left of her husband—Dr. David Tardiff, nuclear physicist and ex-boy wonder, harmonica player and Wayne Gretzky wannabe, love of her life and father of her only child—had died that day. All that remained now was this sad shell of a man—that, and a hard angry fist in the pit of her being that was perpetually raised in defiance of the God or the fates that had allowed such a thing to happen.
Mariah glanced at her watch. “I have to go soon, David. Lins will be almost done with her practice.”
His head lolled on the headrest as he turned his eyes to her, their expression sad, wistful as always. But he held her gaze fixedly and then his right hand reached out to hers, resting on the arm of his chair. He grappled for her wrist. Her hand followed his as he moved it shakily into his lap.
“Oh, David,” she said softly. She rested her head against his shoulder for a moment, then lifted it. “Just a minute,” she whispered. She rose and went to the door, closing it firmly, regretting the absence of a lock. The room was a private one, but institutional privacy was a contradiction in terms.
The first time this had happened was one Saturday when she and Lindsay had taken him home to their condo overnight. It had been late in the evening. Lindsay had gone up to bed after helping her get David settled on the sofa bed in the living room and Mariah had been lying beside him, outside the covers, reading to him while soft music played in the background. She wasn’t sure whether or not he followed the words, but her voice and the music seemed to relax him, and he’d looked almost like a gaunt version of his old self, lying there under the quilt.
Suddenly, Mariah had glanced up and seen him watching her with an expression of acute longing in his eyes and she had known what he was thinking about. It had taken her breath away. No one had ever mentioned it during his long hospital stays, even though she had discussed with the doctors every other conceivable aspect of the prognosis for his physical and mental recovery. But she had understood all at once that whatever else was to be denied him for the rest of his life, some basic needs had not disappeared.
That night, she had done what she had to do to give him the comfort that only a wife or lover can offer—she had made love to him as gently and delicately as she knew how. And although he was unable to reciprocate, she had comforted herself with the memory of the hundreds of times he had held her and loved her. Then she had crawled under the covers beside him, rocking him and crying silent tears, feeling in her arms the familiar and yet awkwardly unfamiliar outlines of his body.
Now, sitting close beside him in his nursing-home room, she gave him comfort again and then held him for a while before she had to go. His eyes were closed when she left him.
Mariah stood at the top of the steps outside the front door, inhaling deeply to clear her lungs of institutional air, forcing her mind to make the transition back to life beyond David’s world. She closed her eyes briefly, then opened them again and started down the steps.
Preoccupied, she failed to notice the figure waiting under a tree next to the sidewalk. It was only when he said her name that she glanced up, startled out of her reverie. She narrowed her eyes to make him out in the shadows, then recoiled in surprise.
“Paul? Paul Chaney—what on earth are you doing here?” she asked, moving quickly from astonishment to instinctive wariness.
He came forward and they met at the bottom step. “Waiting for you.” He bent down and they exchanged busses on both cheeks, the European-style that transplanted Americans adopt awkwardly at first, then maintain as a lifelong habit as they come to appreciate the comfort of the ritual.
He pulled back and she studied him under the lamplight. He was tall, his lankiness emphasized by the soft, brown leather bomber jacket he habitually wore and was wearing now, the collar turned up. He had a full head of blond hair, graying at the temples, clear blue eyes and a photogenic face that could be earnest, penetrating or morally indignant as required in front of the television cameras. On air he dominated the screen, his presence imposing. Off camera, he also had what Mariah thought of as his helpless-but-comic puppy-dog shtick that he cultivated especially for the attractive and—preferably—rich and well-connected women that he seemed to attract like a magnet, all of whom seemed intent on nurturing him.
Based in Vienna, Chaney was senior foreign correspondent for CBN, the Cable Broadcast News network. In the three years she and David had known him there, Mariah had watched—appalled, amazed and ultimately amused—the succession of women he had trailed on his arm who had tried to sink their hooks into him. He had been too slippery for all of them, although an aggressive blonde who called herself Princess Elsa von Schleimann had looked for a while as if she might actually reel him in.
“What are you up to?” Mariah said. “I didn’t know you were back in the States.”
“Just got in yesterday. I’m working on a story.”
“What happened to the princess?” Mariah, anxious to mask her unease, hoped the question came across as mischievous.
Chaney seemed startled, then frowned. “Found herself a real prince, I guess.” They shuffled awkwardly, the old tension rising between them like a sudden fog. Finally, Chaney broke the silence. “How have you been, Mariah?”
She glanced away into the trees, her lips pressed tight. Then she sighed and turned back to him. “All right. My daughter’s doing better. She’s settled into a new school now, here in McLean, and she’s making a good recovery.”
“I’m glad.” Chaney glanced up at the front door of the nursing home. “And David? Is there any hope?”
Mariah shook her head slowly, watching the sidewalk as she crushed a dried leaf under the toe of her shoe. “If anything, he’s losing ground. He’s been having seizures from the scar tissue on his brain. For a while, he’d been able to type a few words on the computer, but now he seems to have lost even that.” She looked up as a sudden thought occurred to her. “Are you going in to see him, Paul? He’d like that—someone from the old days, from the team.”
Chaney smiled. He had been an honorary member of the Vienna Diplomats, the haphazard team of amateur foreign hockey players that played pickup games whenever they could find an opponent and get ice time on one of Vienna’s rinks.
“I already have. That’s how I knew you were coming—a nurse told me.” He moved closer, so close, she could smell the leather of his jacket. “Can we talk?”
How was it that Paul Chaney always managed to do this to her? Mariah wondered. Make her feel vulnerable and uneasy. On alert, her defenses aroused—against what, she was never quite sure. Something.
She mustered up an apologetic grimace. “Sorry, I can’t. I have to pick up Lindsay.” She glanced at her watch, half turning away already.
