Crossroads (16 page)

So they were married by a judge Jeff knew, and they flew to their private island the next day. And now Jewel had a chef, a maid, and a butler to wait on her. She woke each morning to watch the sun rise over a turquoise ocean, and flowers she’d never seen before perfumed the air outside her windows.

And at night, she went into a bedroom where the bed was piled high with white linen pillows and the sheets were trimmed with lace and Jeff took her in his arms and undressed her, and she lay down on the big beautiful bed and she . . . pretended. She pretended she loved the things Jeff did, pretended his caresses brought her to ecstasy, pretended to a passion she knew she would never feel. Then he fell asleep with his body wrapped around hers and she stifled the wish that she could have this big beautiful bed all to herself so she could really enjoy it. But that thought only lasted a second. Because Jeff was the reason why she was in this palace, and she certainly owed him a little playacting.

There was a breeze on the terrace, and the diaphanous robe Jewel had worn over her bathing suit wasn’t warm. And, face it, she could only look at sand and water and flowers for so long, before she started going out of her mind with boredom. Unlike Jeff, who was happily walking along the beach right now. She went back inside the cottage.

Jeff said he could stay here forever, but she couldn’t wait to get home. That was when her new life would really begin. He had promised that when they were back in Wrightstown, he’d throw away the blueprints for the home he’d wanted to build and let her start planning one to suit her taste with the architect. He was going to buy her a car, whatever make and model she wanted. He was going to spoil her rotten, he said.

There were times in bed at night when Jeff’s body was wound around her too tightly for her to go to sleep, when it was only the thought of all the spoiling to come that helped her finally drift off. Then there were other nights, when her last thought would be about Gwen Wright—introverted, timid Gwen, who had complained about being forced to go to Paris. Gwen, who had thrown herself away on a man who worked with his hands.
If Gwen could see me now,
Jewel would think.

Chapter Twenty-one

T
he air in Stan’s apartment was heavy this morning. It was funny how Gwen always thought of it as his apartment in spite of the fact that it had been her home since she’d married him four years ago. She sat up in their bed. It was late; Stan had already left for work, moving quietly so he wouldn’t disturb her. But she’d been awake; she’d just pretended to sleep so she wouldn’t have to talk. Now she looked around the bedroom which had been hers for four years. Had it really been such a long time? Such a short time? She’d lost track. The doctor said that confusion was normal, it was a part of the grieving process. She must give herself time.

Gwen got out of bed and walked to the bedroom window. If she looked directly below she could see a little piece of the courtyard behind the apartment building. This little patch of anemic grass and concrete was supposed to provide the residents with an outdoor oasis. Their other option for fresh air was the roof, where the management put out deck chairs in the summertime. But you couldn’t get much of a tan up on the roof because across the street was a big office building called The Amber, which blocked the sunshine for the greater part of the day. Not that Gwen ever went up to the roof. She hadn’t done that even before the tragedy . . . but she wasn’t going to think that. She wasn’t going to let herself dwell on the loss that had turned her into a woman who pretended to sleep because she didn’t want to talk. Not today. Today she was going to get dressed. And she was going out. Even though she was longing to crawl back to her bed and stay there.
Get dressed, Gwen, it’s a start.

She managed to get in and out of the bathroom, but the closet defeated her. Picking out clothes to wear was beyond her. There was a little boudoir chair on her side of the bed. She sat in it and closed her eyes. And, as it so often did now, her mind went back. Back to the wild and happy days she and Stan had spent in Paris. The days when her marriage was fresh and new as a shiny penny.

It had seemed so romantic, to be married in Paris. She was the one who had suggested it, and Stan had loved the idea. There had been a moment when she’d worried, because the only other time she’d seen the city she’d been with her mother and she didn’t want to be reminded of Cassandra on her honeymoon. It hadn’t happened that way, because Stan had insisted on paying for the trip. He had some money because he’d been saving up to buy the building that housed his shop, but even after they had raided his hard-earned savings they couldn’t travel in the style that Cassandra had afforded Gwen.

There had been no first-class airline tickets, no VIP lounges, and no palatial hotel once they reached Paris. Lunch was usually bread and cheese, and maybe a salad purchased in a shop and eaten picnic style. There wasn’t any couture shopping. There weren’t any expensive sight-seeing trips. Gwen and Stan had the streets and parks of the city, the bread and cheese, and at night, in the bed that was a little lumpy but angled so they could see the Eiffel Tower out of their window, they had each other. They had all the sweetness and the ecstasy that two people who were in love could give each other and it had been enough . . . no, much more than enough . . . to make the heart sing. Then they had come home.

*                  *                  *

Gwen opened her eyes. The room was getting too warm. There were no cross breezes in the apartment, and the only remedy for the heat was to close all the windows and turn on what Stan referred to as “the AC.” Gwen hated air-conditioning; the stagnant artificially chilled air was suffocating to her. Despite all her best efforts, the little rosebush that Stan had given her had died after a few weeks in the apartment, and she’d blamed lack of sunshine and the horrid “AC.” Stan didn’t mind air conditioning because he’d lived with it all his life, although he’d been trying to use it as little as possible lately for her sake.

But now Gwen had to turn it on or the bedroom would become unbearable. She’d get up and do it in a minute, she told herself. Right now, she was feeling a little tired. She’d rest her eyes for a few minutes first. And let her mind go back.

*                           *                           *

Gwen had seen Stan’s apartment for the first time when they came back from their honeymoon.

“This is it,” he’d said beaming with pride. And he’d showed her the four boxlike rooms with low ceilings that made up his nest.

Please God, don’t let him read on my face how I feel,
she’d prayed, and she’d tried to smile. The apartment was so small!The walls were so thin!

You shared a smaller space with him in the hotel in Paris,
she told herself sternly. But that had been a temporary situation, like camping out without hot water and electricity. One did that for fun knowing that eventually one was going back home. But these four rooms were to be her home now. And she wasn’t sure how to live in them. She wanted to do it, she wanted to be blissfully happy just being with Stan. But she was used to space. And privacy. And while she loved the nearness of her new husband, loved sitting next to him, or across the table from him, she knew there would come a time when she would want to read quietly without hearing through the thin walls the sporting event he was watching on the television.

To make matters worse, as she was trying to smile and nod enthusiastically, there came through the paper-thin walls the sound of their neighbors.

“How dare you, you son of a bitch!” screeched a shrill soprano.

“You don’t like it, get the hell out!” responded a furious bass. More curses and obscenities followed while Stan smiled ruefully.

“That’s the Hunters. I’m afraid they do that quite a bit,” he said. “You’ll get used to it. They’re not as bad as our upstairs neighbors were when I was growing up. Every Friday Mr. Newton would get his paycheck and he’d have a couple on the way home and then the fight would start. My brother and I had a pool going on how long it would last each time.”

He actually thought it was funny! And he was telling her to get used to it!

But come on, Gwen, isn’t this exactly the kind of snobbery and
elitism you wanted to get away from? You made fun of your
mother’s home that was so silent and ran like a well-oiled clock.
Don’t you remember you liked visiting friends whose parents broke
the dishes when they had a battle?
But visiting was the operative word. She wasn’t visiting these small rooms, and she was going to be living with the Hunters’ ongoing battle.

Gwen shifted in her chair—the upholstery was getting too warm; she was starting to sweat. Still, she stayed where she was. And remembered.

After they were settled in, there had been the matter of housekeeping. She, who had never vacuumed a floor, or scrubbed a sink, had to try to keep their home clean.

“Let me help you,” Stan said. “I’m very good at mopping and dusting. I’ve been doing it for a lot of years because I’ve been on my own.”

“You’re working so hard—and you wouldn’t have to put in such long hours if you weren’t trying to make back the money you spent on the Paris trip—and I have nothing to do. It’s only fair that I do the mopping and the dusting,” she said. “Besides, you may be good at housework but I can’t believe you like it.”

He grinned and took her in his arms. “I’m going to submit you for the Understanding Wife of the Year Award.”

But she quickly discovered she had no talent for domesticity, and even less interest. Cooking was a special nightmare, and there was no one nearby she could ask how to go about it. She knew Stan was hoping she’d make friends with some of the young women in the building, but most of them were single and racing out every evening after work to go to the restaurants and bars where they would—hopefully—meet young men. Those who were married were juggling jobs and children. Gwen usually encountered them in the basement laundry room on Saturday mornings where they complained to each other about the high cost of day care and the unreliability of baby-sitters. Gwen tried to think of something to say and usually failed. At such times the loneliness would threaten to overtake her, and when she was back upstairs Stan would find her crying over the sheets she was trying to fold. “If only we could bring Missy or Hank here—just for a few days,” she said once. But the building had a rule against pets. All Stan could do was hold her and tell her he understood.

But he didn’t understand—especially not about her longing for the outdoors. Stan had never had acres of woodland to tramp over; he’d never had his own refuge with a special stump to sit on hidden under the trees on the side of a hill.

“There’s a public park not ten minutes away from here,” he told her when she moved into the apartment. “Everyone says it’s a little bit of country right here in the middle of the city.” Gwen had tried to go to the park. She’d tried to tell herself that she didn’t mind the blaring of other people’s music, tried to make herself believe that the overfed pigeons strutting around were a satisfying substitute for the songbirds, chipmunks, and squirrels she’d loved watching. She just couldn’t do it.

Once, when she was indulging in a bout of the blues, she’d tried to choose the season in which she missed the land the most. Was it springtime when the hill behind the Wright house was alive with the fresh green of new buds and early grass and the sun that was still warming the winter out of the earth? Or was it summer when the cicadas buzzed lazily in the heat and the roses gave off a heavy perfume as they drooped, waiting for the afternoon rain? Was it the autumn when the red maples burst into flame and the oaks, ashes, and poplars followed with gold and orange and the air was crisp like the inside of an apple? Or was it winter when the snow covered the earth with its magic blanket of softness and embroidered white lace on the trees and bushes? After a day of torturing herself with thoughts like that, she vowed never to give in to them again. But the hunger grew more and more intense. And after a year she began to be afraid that the time would come when her sense of loss would be so bad that even her nights with Stan in their bed could not heal her.

*                           *                           *

Then, at the moment when she had started to despair, Cassie had stepped in. When Stan and Gwen came home from France, Cassie was remarkably restrained. There had been no recriminations and no lectures—Gwen was pretty sure she could thank Walter for that—and even after Cassie had toured Gwen’s new home, she had not uttered a disapproving word . . . although her pursed lips and the frown between her eyes spoke volumes. She had kept her silence for a year. But then she had invited Stan and Gwen out to the house for Sunday brunch.

“Why don’t you go without me?” Stan said.

“Mother wants both of us to come,” Gwen replied. “She said she wanted to talk to us about something.”

“She doesn’t like me, Gwen, you know that.”

“And you return the favor, dear!” Gwen had given him a playful kiss on the cheek, so happy she didn’t care that he was reluctant to go. She was going to escape the city for a whole long glorious day! The sun was shining, there were a dozen different shades of blue in the sky, from azure to turquoise, and she was going to see trees, and grass—acres of it.

*                           *                           *

Cassie had gotten down to business as soon as the omelets had been served. “Stanley, I want to buy a house for you and Gwen,”she said. The family was sitting in the dining room where Gwen could see her old refuge through the window, and she’d been drinking it in and thinking that the hillside had never looked more lovely, but when Cassie spoke, she turned in time to see Stan stiffen and she knew what was coming next. So did Cassie.

“Before you say no, hear me out,” she went on. “The house I’m proposing to buy is in a new development out here. You probably saw it from the road as you drove by; the construction is ecologically sound and the prices are reasonable.”

“It’s very kind, but no thank you,” Stan said.

But Gwen was remembering the development.
The houses are
small,
she thought,
but they are beautifully designed—rustic and
simple. And there is land around each of them. Real land!

“Gwen and I are planning to buy a house when we have enough saved,” Stan said.

“And how close are you to being able to do it?” asked Cassie

If the development is the one I think it is,
Gwen went on thinking,
and it has to be, because it is the only new one in the area, each
of the houses has almost an acre. There are trees that haven’t been
chopped down at the edge of each property line. If you owned one of
those houses you could imagine you were living in a forest.

“We would have the money for a down payment right now, but the landlord who owns the building where my shop is decided he wanted to sell, and I’m buying it. I have one more installment to go.” There was a defensive tone in Stan’s voice that Gwen had never heard before. “It was too good a deal to pass up.”

“Stanley, please, there’s no need to explain any of this to me,” Cassie said. “I’m not judging you, I simply want to give you a gift.”