with you?’ I replied. I was angry. I must have pouted a hell of a lot.”
“Here, let’s pause for a minute,” said Darby, stopping in his tracks. “That’s quite an opener.”
“It was,” stated Parker, resuming his walk. “Anyway, she became cold and distant after that. We began sleeping in separate beds. We stopped having dinner together. Each night she came home later and later. I could smell other men on her. Musk! Perspiration! The odor of cigarettes! Men would call. ‘O God, fellow! Sorry wrong number!’ Some would even leave a number for her to call back. Sometimes there’d be bruises on her arms and thighs, neck and wrists. She would sit in front of our dresser and stare at her small breasts or wrinkle her mouth in a wry smile. Then, one night she came home crying. She was sweating and scared. She went straight to the shower and stayed and stayed and stayed. ‘Are you all right?’ I asked. ‘I still love you,’ I said. ‘My God, sweetheart! What’s happened? I want to know. I want our marriage back. I want you again. Just you!’” Parker paused, inhaled a long breath; then fell silent.
The two men continued to walk. Parker kicked a fallen apple out of his path. It left a reddish-brown smudge on the toe of his running shoe. He inhaled another deep breath and released it slowly. “She never answered me. She just came out of the shower, still crying. I handed her a towel. ‘Please! Just leave me alone,’ she said. ‘Will you fix me a drink?’ ‘Gin and tonic?’ I replied. ‘Yeah. That’ll do. I need another towel for my hair.’ And so after that, we began having dinner together, and sometimes sleeping together. But no sex. ‘Just hold me,’ she’d say. ‘That’s all.’ And that’s all it’s been, even till now. I’m sure you don’t need to hear all this. Life’s a mess, isn’t it? I never thought it would happen to me.”
“Whatever, the hurt is still there. I know about it, too,” Darby added.
“Yes. Well! Here we are!” he exclaimed, as the two entered the Garden by the ginkgo tree. “I guess I’ll shower and have breakfast. Thanks for listening.”
“Chao!” Darby smiled. “It promises to be a beautiful day.”
Just then, Darby glanced up toward the house. Someone on the second floor had drawn the drape to one side. It appeared to be a woman in a gown. Upon seeing him, the person’s hand immediately let go of the curtain. Darby watched the drape settle back, as the hand disappeared. He wondered if it were Stephanie’s or Celeste’s. He guessed he’d learn soon enough.
Chapter 4
After Darby returned to the cottage, he browsed its library for whatever Garnett might have collected on depression, bipolar conditions, marital counseling, and personality disorders. To his consternation, very little caught his eye. Perhaps, Garnett housed them in his office. To his relief, however, he did find the eighth edition of Lippincott’s Professional Guide to Diseases. He pulled the volume off its shelf and perused the sections on “Sexual Disorders of Men.” He wondered if Parker suffered from a low libido or inadequate testosterone levels. None of those considerations, however, made sense. As for Celeste’s disinterest in Parker or compulsive desire for sex with other men, nothing in the book addressed the subject. Perhaps it was there, but he couldn’t locate it. He would have to consult more specific studies. Hopefully, Garnett’s library possessed a few. His field was philosophy, he reminded himself, or had been; Eastern religious thought, logic, and Western literature of a metaphysical nature. But now it was couples, the estranged and depressed he was being asked to assist, even to act as a consultant on private sexual anomalies. With a wave of angst in the pit of his stomach, he realized how inadequate his background for counseling of any sort. Still, as he mulled the matter, his task didn’t require him to “fix” anyone’s problem, only to listen. No one can fix another person’s problem, he assured himself. They have to do that on their own. Yet, he wanted to help.
Opening his laptop, he leaned back in the couch and stared down at its screen. He clicked on the document From Wittenberg to Weimar, but his mind rebelled against anything metaphysical. Stephanie’s image cried for his attention, along with Tunstan’s dilemma. Moreover, fall’s seasonal colors and azure skies begged for priority. Why not pick out a book and sit in the Garden and ruminate? Winds would soon scatter the Villa’s red and golden leaves, whirling them into rusty piles for Jon Paul, or Hettie’s husband, to mow under or rake away. He closed his computer, picked up a book, and slipped out the door.
As he entered the Garden, he caught sight of Stephanie, gathering apples in the orchard. A quality of enthusiasm emanated about her, an excitement in engaging in so simple an activity. She was dragging a large burlap sack and filling it with the choicest fruit she could find. Occasionally, she’d pick up an apple, turn it in her fingers, laugh and hurl it at a tree trunk. The rotten missile would disintegrate in a loud splatter. He laid his book down and walked in her direction.
“May I join you?” he called, as he slid on a slick core.
“Oh! You scared me!” she laughed with a startle. “Yes!” Suddenly she bent down, scooped up a mushy apple, and lobbed it in a playful arc toward him.
He dodged the slop as it splattered near his feet. He bent down and picked up an apple of his own.
Stephanie shrieked and ran toward the closest tree. Darby hurled it so as to miss her but, nonetheless, create a gushy splash. “Oh, gross!” she groaned as flecks of peeling struck her shoes.
For the next few minutes, the two lobbed a dozen or more overripe apples at each other. “Truce! Truce!” Darby finally called. “You win! Here, what are you doing with all these anyway? They’ll rot before you get them home.”
The word “home” suddenly brought a cessation to her smile. Her ebullient countenance fell. She stopped, looked down at her sack, and peered inside. “I’ve bruised them!” she muttered. “They’re just a brown mess! Look!” she exclaimed, as she turned the sack upside down and dumped its contents on the ground. Her faced turned sad and eyes glistened in the bright air.
“I’m sorry. Come, look, there are plenty of apples in the trees. They’ll last a lot longer. What you say?”
“Ok!” she replied. “Actually, Jon Paul sent me out. He said he’d make us a pie for supper, if I’d pick enough. But these are a pretty sorry lot.”
“Well! Don’t worry. Let’s get the firmest and most luscious we can.”
Her faced filled with smiles. Soon, the two filled the sack with a bulging load of firm red apples.
* * *
Lunch at the Villa was never more than a tray of sandwiches, chips, fruit, tea, soda, or water. Garnett had mandated the policy since assuming management of the Inn. Linda arranged the mid-day repast in buffet style in the dining room, and guests were free to serve themselves between noon and one o’clock. Darby carried his sandwich of tuna fish, pickle, and chips to the cottage and ate in the privacy of its nook, alone.
Afterwards, he turned anew to his “Weimar book,” but, once again, the pleasant October air and warm sunny skies lured him outside. For a long while, he walked about the grounds and up its exquisite driveway. Pausing, he stared back at the grand palazzo before returning to the Garden to meditate and read.
Someone had beaten him, however, to his favorite bench. Tunstan! The man looked up from a large book he held in his lap and motioned for Darby to come over. “I want you to see this!” he stated. “I want you to see what I mean, first hand.”
Darby peered down at a painting of the Mona Lisa. As he stared at the famous
