Butterfly (62 page)

them, embarrassed to have overheard, and stunned to realize that it was the
wife
who was

leaving the husband for a younger man.

“Jessica? Do you know what you want?”

She looked at John. He was forty and very handsome. The restaurant’s candlelight did

nice things to his salt-and-pepper hair. “I, uh…” she began, opening up her menu.

John turned to the third person at their table, a man whom John was very anxious to

impress for business reasons, and said to him, “My wife likes to eavesdrop on private con-

versations.”

“I’m interested in human nature,” she said defensively.

John laughed. “Face it, Jess. You’re nosy.”

The waiter came up, a surfer type in Hawaiian shirt and tight shorts, and flashed

Jessica a flirtatious smile. “What’ll you folks have?”

He could work at Butterfly,
she thought.
He’d be perfect.

“Jessica?” said John. “We’re waiting. What do you want?”

She looked down at the menu. “I’ll have the prime rib, please, small cut, rare, with a

baked potato.”

“Do you want everything on that potato, ma’am? Butter, sour cream, cheese sauce?”

John spoke up and said, “Change that potato to tomato slices for the lady.” He smiled

at her.

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Kathryn Harvey

Her face burned. She looked away, pretended to be suddenly interested in the boats

out on the water.

Butterfly…

She hadn’t gone back. Not after her one wild evening with her fantasy cowboy. Part of

it had to do with being too busy—since the success of the Latricia Brown case, Jessica and

Fred’s phones hadn’t stopped ringing; the firm of Morton and Franklin was signing on

more clients than they could handle, so that now they were interviewing attorneys and

thinking of expanding their offices. But another part of the reason for her staying away

from Butterfly had to do with the way she had felt in the days following her encounter in

the Western bar.

The night with “Lonnie” had been fabulous. It had been just like her dream. And for

a while afterward she had felt light and airy and positively smug. But then, as the initial

euphoria wore off and she was operating in the real world again, she began to feel doubts

and uncertainties creep in. She experienced a kind of confusion over her feelings—to have

been made love to so fantastically, but by a man whom she did not love!—and also a little

fear. The fear, she knew, stemmed from guilt. Her old Catholic conscience, inculcated

into her from her earliest childhood by nuns and priests who had frightened her with

visions of Hell, suddenly came rushing back. She had done something sinful.

And so Jessica had found herself unable to return to Butterfly, and she decided not to

go back until she had sorted out her mind and heart.

“So, you must know a lot of famous people, Mrs. Franklin.”

She looked at the man across the table. For an instant she couldn’t recall his name. She

panicked. John would be furious. He had stressed to her the importance of this dinner,

the importance that she make a good impression because this man, who could bring a lot

of money into John’s firm, insisted that the people he dealt with were stable in their pri-

vate lives.

His name was Scandinavian…. She glanced at John before saying, “I’m afraid most of

my clients are what you would call behind-the-scenes people, Mr…”—she picked up her

mai tai and sipped it—“Mr. Rasmussen. Scriptwriters, agents, casting people—very few

of my clients are known to the public.”

The man laughed and said, “My wife is addicted to
Five North.
That Latricia Brown

certainly is a good actress. I read all about how you fought for her to stay on the show.”

Jessica could feel John’s displeasure rising. Although he sat comfortably in his chair and

casually stirred his cocktail, she could sense his annoyance. “Anyway,” she said, “my job isn’t

as glamorous as people think it is. Certainly we can talk about something more interesting!”

The two men entered into talk about marathon running, optimum cardiac outputs,

and a rival company while Jessica sat in silence doing exactly what was expected of her:

being John’s gracious and lovely wife.

And she wanted very badly not to be there.

“Tell me, Mrs. Franklin,” Mr. Rasmussen said when their dinners arrived, “what do

you think of this Danny Mackay? Think he’ll make it to the White House?”

“I’d like to see him there,” John said, answering for her. “And I think his chances are

looking good. We’ll certainly be voting for him.”

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271

“I don’t intend to,” Jessica said. “I don’t like Danny Mackay.”

John gave her a surprised look. “Since when have you been interested in politics?”

I’ve always been. You just assume that I’m not.

The young waiter came back and John declined dessert for himself and Jessica.

When they were finishing their coffee and John was paying the check, Mr. Rasmussen

turned to Jessica and said, “Say, do you think you could get Latricia Brown’s autograph

for my wife?”

Behind her, the couple who had been fighting abruptly got up and left the restaurant.

The wife was crying.

“John,” Jessica said as they drove along the Pacific Coast Highway. “John, I think we

should talk.”

“Sure, honey. What do you want to talk about?”

She looked out the window. A dense fog shrouded the highway; curves were treacher-

ous here, but John handled the BMW with ease. This stretch was particularly known for

its bad accidents.

“John, I’d like us to see a marriage counselor.”

“What?” He gave her a quick look and then had his eyes on the road again. He

laughed. “A marriage counselor! Whatever for?”

“I…I don’t think things are right between us.”

“Of course they are!” He patted her knee. “You’re just tired.”

“I really want us to go to someone, John. If I make an appointment, will you go with

me?”

“No. You’re the one who thinks we have a problem. You work it out.”

*

*

*

Jessica had known by his tone that the subject was closed. And she hadn’t wanted to

start a fight on that dangerous road. So they had driven home in silence, and she had gone

straight to bed while John sat up doing some paperwork. And now here she was in her

office, wondering why on earth she was so capable in this incarnation, so in control among

laws and courts and writs, while as John Franklin’s wife she was…well,
John Franklin’s wife.

Ken, her receptionist, came through with a box of doughnuts. When he offered her

one, Jessica put up her hand and said, “Not me!” But when he went away to put the box

in the small kitchen/lounge behind their offices, Jessica felt a sudden intense craving for a

doughnut.

She tried to work. She forced her mind along logical, legal tracks. She made phone

calls, dictated letters, did some research in their library. But those doughnuts kept coming

back into her mind.

She was hungry. Last night she had barely touched her dinner. This morning her

breakfast had been black coffee. Now it was nearly noon and she was starting to feel light-

headed. She went into the rest room, closed the door and bathed her face in the sink.

Then she stepped back and inspected herself in the mirror. This was one of her least flat-

tering suits, the one that John said made her look fat. And it did.

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Kathryn Harvey

But maybe it was because she
was
fat.

Jessica was suddenly alarmed. Was she gaining weight again? When was the last time

she had weighed herself? She turned this way and that, scrutinizing her reflection, dis-

pleased with what she saw. She thought of the doughnuts, of the apple fritter, in particu-

lar, that was large and crunchy and loaded with sugar. Her mouth watered. She was so

hungry.

Hurrying out of the bathroom, she went into the tiny kitchen, praying that Fred or

one of the secretaries hadn’t taken the fritter. Jessica saw the box on the table, standing

open. There were crumbs around it. She rushed to it and looked in.

Relief flooded her. The fritter was still there.

Taking a paper towel, she carefully wrapped the doughnut and brought it back to her

desk, where it would sit while she worked and anticipated eating it, putting it off until the

afternoon, when she would really enjoy it—

Jessica froze.

She stared in horror at the paper-towel bundle.

It was happening again!

Thirteen years ago, as a freshman at UCSB, Jessica Mulligan, starved and skinny, had

developed a grotesque ritual around doughnuts. She would go without eating for days,

then rush to the Student Union as soon as the fresh doughnuts were out, buy a dozen but-

termilk twists, hurry back to the dorm, lock the door, and devour all twelve, quickly, like

a criminal afraid of being caught. Then she would dispose of the napkin, clean the

crumbs off the floor, wash her hands and face and spend the next few days fasting, pun-

ishing herself for the binge.

A year in therapy, after her hospitalization for anorexia—where they had had to force-

feed her—had helped Jessica come to terms with her problem and learn how to keep it

under control.

Now here she was, years later, suffering a relapse.

She was suddenly very afraid.

“Fred,” she said, walking into his office. “Something’s come up. I’m going to take the

afternoon off. Do you think you can handle it alone?”

“Sure, Jess,” he said, giving her a long look. “Are you all right? You don’t look well.”

“I’ll be okay. If anybody should call with something urgent, well…I’m going to be

unreachable.”

She drove faster than was her habit, pulled into the first gas station and dialed

Butterfly’s number. Her message was brief. “This is Jessica Franklin. I’d like the same as

last time. Will an hour from now be okay?”

Then she went to Malibu, where she spent half an hour walking barefoot in the surf,

trying to find herself somewhere in the sand and wind and waves.

Intellectually she knew she was not fat. At five feet four inches, Jessica weighed only a

hundred and ten pounds. And yet, when she saw herself, in the mirror or in photographs,

she saw a fat woman. She was morbidly afraid of getting fat. It was time, she knew as she

dug her toes into the wet sand, to come to terms with that fear.

Jessica turned her face to the vast Pacific and squinted at the horizon.

BUTTERFLY

273

Back at UCSB, her roommate Trudie had devised a kind of game to help draw the

phobias out of Jessica and make her see them, confront them, and thereby find a way of

putting them to rest.

“What is ‘fat’?” Trudie had asked. They had been sitting in their tiny dorm room with

the door closed against the sounds of life and laughter in the hallway beyond and rain

pelting the window. “Tell me, Jess, how you see ‘fat.’ What is it to you?”

And Jessica had surprised herself with the litany she had suddenly recited. “Fat is self-

indulgence. Fat is lack of control. Fat is lack of intelligence. Fat is indecent. Fat is failure.”

She had broken down crying. “Fat is losing someone’s respect. Fat is losing their love. Fat

is letting your family down. Fat is—”

“Do you really
believe
all that?” Trudie had asked.

“I don’t know! My therapist says it’s fear of success that makes me do it. But that’s

backward. I’m scared to death of failure.”

Jessica hadn’t thought she would go back to Butterfly, had felt too guilty, too sly, and

feared John finding out. But now, as she followed the Butterfly attendant down the hall,

Jessica thought they would never reach the room at the end. She was incredibly excited

and anxious, desperate to be made love to by a man who didn’t withhold sex from her as

a punishment or give it to her as a reward. A man, in other words, who wasn’t John.

Jessica was stunned by her own thoughts as she went into Lonnie’s arms and let him

guide her around the dance floor. Why hadn’t she realized it before? John used sex as a

power tool—and now she was doing the same thing. Their fights always ended the same

way, with him breaking her down, destroying her, stripping her of identity and self-

respect and then, when she was completely voided, and repentant and in his power, he

rewarded her with his love. If she did not give in, he turned his back on her in bed. Never,

it seemed to Jessica now, in all their years together, had lovemaking had anything to do

with caring or giving or binding their souls as well as their bodies.

Her cowboy didn’t criticize her or talk down to her or humiliate her in front of others.

He made tender love to her on the floor, concerned that she was receiving pleasure, telling

her that she was beautiful, restoring dignity and self-esteem where, under the same cir-

cumstances, John would be taking it away.

It was then, as her fantasy lover possessed her, that Jessica came to the realization that

her life had to change, that things could not go on as they were. She was suddenly no

longer confused. Everything came crystal clear. She didn’t want to have to rely on a phan-

tom-cowboy to give her what she should find in an honest relationship with her husband.