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CHAPTER 3
Val called the day before the Fourth of July holiday. “Come on over,” she said, her voice brittle with forced enthusiasm. “I’m having a barbecue. Just a few friends, you don’t have to bring anything. You need to get out of that house. Besides, there’s someone I want you to meet.”
The thought that she might want me to meet one of her computer dates scared me. I tried to sound appreciative. “Thanks, Val, but I already have plans.”
I could tell she was miffed when she answered. “Well, don’t say I didn’t try. You’ll be missing a great party.”
“I know. Thanks for thinking of me.” I hung up, wondering how she could have known me for six years without realizing I wasn’t a party person.
A month after that I sat down one afternoon to pay the bills and realized there wasn’t enough left in the bank to pay the mortgage for longer than three months. It was wake-up time. I had to go back to work.
I paced around my spotless house, arguing with myself over my next move. I had to get on with my life, that much was obvious. Decisions had to be made. One thing was certain—I didn’t want to go back to the health club.
What I needed was to put the past firmly behind me and start over. I wanted a new place to live, a new job, a whole new life. I’d wasted enough of the former one. I had a lot of catching up to do.
I went back to the kitchen table and studied the bank accounts and the bills I owed. It dawned on me then that I couldn’t put the past behind me until I’d dealt with it. I had a house I couldn’t afford to live in for much longer, and property in England that wasn’t producing one cent of income, yet had to be accumulating debts, like taxes and maintenance. It was time to sell them both.
I wondered where Brandon had kept all the papers on the cottage. His company had sent home his personal belongings from his office, but I still hadn’t opened the box. I went to get it from the spare bedroom, where I’d dumped it on the bed.
There wasn’t much in it except a few books, a little stand with his name tag on it, a few CDs of jazz music and a slew of receipts for his expenses, which I assume had been paid with his last salary check. Nothing that had anything to do with property overseas. No photo of me to stand on his desk. Trust Brandon to prefer gazing at his own name rather than a picture of his wife.
Having drawn a blank on that issue, I called Val, and after some hedging around, told her I wanted to quit.
“You’re not serious!” she said, sounding more upset than I’d expected. “So are you going to England?”
“No, of course not.” I tried to think of a diplomatic way to say it. “I just think I need something a little more rewarding if I’m going to make a career of it. I thought I might do something with children, maybe office work in a school or something.”
“Well, you can’t quit. You’re the best bookkeeper I’ve ever had. You know just as much about the business as I do. Besides that, you’re the only woman I know who isn’t into competing with me.”
“That’s because I’d lose. I’m sorry, Val. I’ll really miss you.”
“Hey, just because you won’t be working for me doesn’t mean we can’t ever see each other, does it?” Doubt crept into her voice. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
I wasn’t sure of anything right then, but I didn’t want to admit that. “Quite sure.”
“Have you decided what you’re going to do with the cottage in England?”
I was expecting the question, but not the sudden stab of resentment. “No, I haven’t. I’m sorry, Val. There’s someone at the door. I have to go.” When did I get so adept at lying, I wondered.
“Let’s have lunch,” Val said urgently. “Today. You’ve got to get out of that house.”
I muttered something about next week and hung up.
Determined not to fall back into that awful inertia, I took a walk in the park. The August sun had dried out the grass, leaving brown patches despite the sprinklers that must have worked overtime to compensate for the lack of rain. We were in midsummer already, and I’d lost the past two months in a haze of laziness and procrastination.
I sat on a sun-warmed bench and tried to empty my mind, to let the surroundings soak into me. Joggers loped along the curving path between the trees, dodging around the two elderly women engaged in what appeared to be an intriguing and highly amusing conversation. I couldn’t help wondering if I’d ever feel like laughing again.
In front of me, two little girls chased each other around the swings. Listening to their squeals, I envied their blissful ignorance of life’s brutal punches. How I wished I were a child again, with my whole life ahead of me and choices still to be made.
As I watched, one little girl fell on her knees and started to cry. Out of nowhere an elderly woman rushed toward her and gathered her up in her arms. The tug I felt then had nothing to do with being young and making choices.
If I hadn’t married Brandon I might have had grandchildren by now. I’d wasted so many years, and now it was too late. I’d never have a child of my own, never see grandchildren grow up, never know what it was to tuck up a child in bed and read bedtime stories, or watch a daughter walk down the aisle as a beautiful bride. So many wonderful moments I’d missed.
Brandon had told me shortly before we were married that thanks to a vicious bout of mumps in his teens, he was sterile. At the time it hadn’t seemed to matter that much. I was young, looking at a secure future, and vague thoughts of adoption had calmed the doubts. But then, as I matured, the mothering instinct had taken over.
Brandon absolutely refused to consider adoption, or any artificial means of having a child. Maybe if he’d given me the affection I’d needed, opened up to me, let me in to that private world he’d guarded so zealously, I could have found comfort in that. As it was I found other compensations—in my job, and eventually in music and in books, just as I had as a child.
Now, thinking about how he’d deceived me, I was boiling with anger and regret for all the things I’d given up for him.
I had to stop wallowing in resentment. It wasn’t Brandon’s fault he was sterile. He certainly didn’t ask to die suddenly and leave me alone. As for the business with the cottage, I had no real reason to suspect him of cheating on me. I had no proof, and I should know better.
I was forty-six years old, and I still had a life to live. I still had time for choices, good or bad. All I had to do was find the strength to make them.
Fueled by my determination to move on, the following morning I tackled Brandon’s closet. The faint remnants of his cologne still clung to his suits, and the robe he always wore at night hung above his neatly placed slippers.
I lifted it from its hook and immediately a voice in my head wondered if he’d worn a robe when he was with her. No matter how hard I tried I couldn’t seem to get rid of my ridiculous suspicions.
Irritated with myself, I pulled suits, shirts, jackets and pants from their hangers and threw them in an untidy heap on the bed. I piled shoes, ties and underwear on top of them, then found a box of black plastic yard bags.
