Elena Undone (5 page)

“Think that’ll do it?” Barry rolled off her, lifted his muscular physique to the side. She made herself touch the tufts of hair at his chest, feeling a soft sadness for him that his beauty, his strong, healthy man’s body wasn’t more appreciated by her; that while she could notice other women eyeing Barry salaciously at the beach, watching his rippling muscles, for her it was simply flesh. His blondish, now graying hair, his taut nipples—none of it moved her in the way it seemed to move others. She had long since stopped wondering about her confusion…she just let it be. She had accepted after the first few years with Barry that she simply was defective in that department. But it didn’t need to ruin Barry’s enjoyment and she tried to be as connected to him as she could, given that her body always seemed outside of his reach. She was only thankful that Barry’s sex drive seemed nowhere near that of her friends’ spouses. The few times she had allowed herself to have conversations with Diana and some of her old college friends, she had to consider herself extremely lucky hearing about all the constant pawing and not so subtle hints to “do it,” and if they didn’t, well, then their partners couldn’t complain if they roamed elsewhere.

“Ahhhh.” Barry propped himself on his elbow, leaned over, nibbled Elena’s neck in postcoital bliss, then chuckled. “Maybe that’ll do the trick…what do you think?”

“Maybe.” And again she consciously touched his arm, stroking him gently, trying to convey a sense of warmth and love.

“God knows, it would be the best thing in the world for Nash to have a baby sister or brother. Get that kid out of his own self-absorbed universe.”

“Nash is not self-absorbed,” Elena stated categorically. More and more, Elena felt that her son was actually a brilliant but troubled teen who every day was finding their universe ever smaller, ever more filled with contradiction, growing ever more claustrophobic for him and his idealistic mind.

“El, every teenager is self-absorbed—it’s a qualification.” He was in a good mood, and nothing was going to take him out of it.

“Maybe,” Elena responded, then they both laughed.

“Except Tori,” they stated in unison.

“Well, Tori is the exception to the rule,” Barry observed, “thank God she found Nash—or Nash found her. Either way, we couldn’t do any better.”

Elena smiled. Whatever else, they both always agreed about Tori.

Elena was about to turn to get ready for sleep when Barry stopped her. “What about…” He didn’t finish.

“I’m fine…really,” Elena responded and before he could protest any further she snuck in a quick kiss. “Goodnight.”

She turned over. She could feel his body, waiting, a heavy waiting, and when he finally turned to go to sleep she breathed easily.

*

Peyton tasted her, felt her wetness in her mouth, felt the hardening, the early tremble and knew that Margaret, like clockwork, was about to come. As a matter of her own need for perfection, her desire to be the best at everything she undertook, she tried to tease Margaret a little longer, hoping that her orgasm would be better, stronger, and found a dim sort of satisfaction in feeling the thudding throbbing in her mouth about her chin and cheeks, hearing Margaret hiss that low throaty growl when she came and waited just the precise amount of time before she moved alongside of Margaret and held her, because that was what Margaret liked after lovemaking, for Peyton to hold her “so that I feel cherished.”

Later, Peyton lay staring at the ceiling in the bedroom, what had been her mother’s master bedroom, that Peyton had allowed Margaret to “spruce up,” because for her the room was “sparse and, well, ugly, Peyton.” When Peyton’s mother had turned over the house to Peyton and moved to her condo, Peyton had already determined that the room was going to be stripped of any fussiness and had decorated the extremely large room with nothing more than a small antique writer’s desk, and a triptych of paintings over her California King bed. These exquisite line paintings of three nude women in different states of languid repose rested strategically above the bed against the spackled gold walls. Other than that, a few bookcases and some office supplies completed the room. But Margaret felt the room was “too male” with Peyton’s dark blue bedding and “girly shots on the walls—penis envy much?” she had teased Peyton as she placed ferns, silk flowers and a multicolored Asian screen, one at a time after each returning visit, until Peyton almost felt like the room had been taken over, and the nights Margaret wasn’t there, Peyton preferred to sleep on her chaise lounge in the living room.

Margaret had semi-lived with Peyton for the past three years, subletting her own condo that she had bought as an investment, but also to keep as a safe haven. Margaret wasn’t like most lesbians Peyton knew. She traveled for her work an inordinate amount of time and she was firm about maintaining a sense of autonomy. This suited Peyton just fine as being a loner was her preferred status, which Peyton was pining for just as Margaret returned with a bottle of wine and two glasses.

“I really don’t care for any, but thanks Margaret.”

“Oh come on, Peyton. Live a little. It’s so grim here I could suffocate.”

“I just don’t feel like it.”

Long sigh.

“Come on, it’ll loosen you up. Let go of the stress of your mom for one night. Can you just do that?” Margaret poured a glass and handed it to Peyton. “Come on, a little sip…”

Peyton decided, what the hell, held out her hand—

KA-THUMP!

Peyton jumped immediately. Ran down the hall to her mother’s r0" motheroom where the nurse was struggling to pick up Peyton’s mom from the floor.

September 23

She was there and then she wasn’t.

Just like that. The finality of it was simply too much for Peyton to take in. She tried like hell to integrate the information into some kind of workable pattern in her head, but every time she thought it through her head started hurting.

She had almost fallen asleep, when she felt it. Something in the room. It wasn’t Margaret because she had already told Peyton she was going to a mutual friend’s birthday party “and since you won’t come with me, don’t expect me to be home early. I want to have some fun.”

It had been ten days since Peyton’s mother had fallen from the bed and broken her hip. She had been rushed to the hospital and after surgery, even though Margaret had begged to have her kept at the hospital, Peyton insisted on bringing her home. The doctor told her she wasn’t likely to hang on much longer, her systems were failing. Peyton was damned if she was going to let her mother die in the hospital and brought her back, spending most every moment that she could with her mother until Margaret had exploded two days earlier, “I can’t live like this!”

Peyton had looked at her then, and wondered if Margaret possessed an empathic bone in her body, but then realized it was she who was putting Margaret through an ordeal she hadn’t asked for and certainly hadn’t been prepared to undertake. Instead of yelling at her, she tried to let her off the hook. “No one’s asking you to.”

“Well you’ve sort of made the decision for me, Peyton, since I live here with you!”

“Christ, can you let it go?” Peyton blurted.

“Yeah, I’ll let it go. I’m happy to let it go, believe you me!” Margaret had spent the night with a friend, returned the next day, apologetic.

“Look, I’m sorry. I overreacted. I’m just so…so damn tired. And look at you. You’re exhausted Peyton…this is like some crazy kind of weird reverse punishment? I don’t know what you’re doing. Your mom was so terrible to you and I don’t know what you’re trying to prove.”

“I’m not trying to prove anything…I just don’t want…I just don’t want her to die alone…or afraid.”

Peyton woke from a dream. And she knew.

She knew before she got up, before she walked down the hall very slowly to her mother’s room, that when she got there something had changed.

It was almost midnight and the night nurse was already dozing off. Peyton had long since given up getting any of them to actually stay awake—hell, most of them worked double shifts to make ends meet, and the pragmatic side of Peyton knew that when her mother’s time .

As she approached her mother, she could feel her rustling about, but not in one of her maniacal attempts at escaping whatever was going on in her head. Her movements were deliberate, purposeful. And as Peyton leaned to her mother to ask what was wrong, her mother turned to her and in the dim glow of the table lamp, Peyton could see that she was absolutely lucid. She had something in her hand, and with what energy she had left pulled Peyton close to her.

“I...want you to have this...” Her voice was but a whisper. “Sit here with me…”

Peyton sat, even more dumbfounded when her mother grasped her hand. Her mother had rarely been affectionate with Peyton her entire life. Peyton held the dry hand in her own.

“Pey…Peyton...you...you were my...my sweetie girl... Always so brave. So controlled. I know…I know I made you that way, Pey…I know it was me…” Trembling and weak, Peyton’s mother transferred the object into Peyton’s hand.

“Mom...”

“Peyton…don’t…don’t make my mistakes…all the things I’ve told you...” Her mother began to shake her head, a glimmer of tears in her red runny eyes. “Don’t listen to me…what did I know…I just want…just want you to…be…”

She smiled painfully, closed her eyes, and her body slumped into the bed frame, peacefully. Quiet. Done.

*

Elena tidied up the dining room, then had sat to compose e-mails to the church staff about the new budget when Nash lumbered in to nab a glass of milk in the kitchen. She watched him through the arched pass way, took in his omnipresent skinny jeans that outlined his lanky body, his favorite blue hoody, that mass of curls she never tired of looking at, and his square-jawed face, and thought that more and more, every day, he was growing into a handsome boy-man, and that even though father and son did not see eye to eye on many things, much of Barry existed in their son. She watched as Nash mimicked the precise gesture of Barry’s when he was concentrating; a quick graze of thumb against an eyebrow, as if that motion were part of his DNA.

If Elena introduced Nash as her son and Barry wasn’t in the mix, she would always be met with a confused glance—how in the world did a boy so fair, so blond and blue-eyed come from her Indian-Spanish heritage? The only thing she had in common with Nash was that she was also tall and svelte, but he had none of her olive skin, nor her deep brown eyes, and chocolate brown hair. And as “vanilla” as Nash appeared, Elena was very clearly from Indian descent. But when Barry, who was tall, blond and blue-eyed, stood next to them, it became quite clear. Nash did have her full head of thick wavy hair, however, and she comforted herself that he surely had her heart. Before he could return to his room she called out to him.

Nash walked in, nibbling on a cookie, gave his mom a quick hug.

“Sit with me.”

“Mom, I’ve got to finish my homework.”

“Just for a moment.”

He considered, pulled up a chair, munching on his cookie. She put a hand to his hair and he leaned over and laid his head in her lap. He was still very affectionate with her as long as no one was around. They sat in companionable silence.

He finally said, “I know Dad’s asked you to talk to me, but I’m still not going.”

“Hmmm?”

“Do you even know what they’re doing?”

“Nash,” Elena sighed, “you know I can’t keep up with it all…if it isn’t one thing it’s another. What I’m asking you to do is to go, not for you—but for your father’s sake—”

“God, Mom…” Nash was about to get up, but Elena’s hand kept pressure on his head. He cleared his throat and then asked very seriously. “What about you, Mom? What’s your excuse for this sham…you don’t believe even half the crap Dad preaches.”

She let the pressure from her hand ease, allowed him to sit back up. She didn’t have an answer. She tried to put her faith in her god, not certain at all they come from the same heaven.

Nash saw Barry’s world in black and white. But she knew, in the larger scheme of things, that Barry could have done worse. At least he had found a way to keep himself happy and while he was at it, he was doing good things for those around him, for the world. Mostly. It was just so hard to remember who he had actually been in the beginning, divorced from the church and all its trappings. Who he had been when she first saw him, how she had felt about him back all those years ago in London, when she first laid eyes on him at the Royal Academy.

He had been cast as King Lear in one of the spring productions. She had sat in the third row of the tiny theater with a girlfriend who had a royal crush on him. As her friend prattled about all his “terribly attractive attributes” she began to actually notice him, his handsomeness, his powerful delivery, his gentle blue eyes, that he was the “perfect mix of virile manliness and gentle Southern boy yumminess,” as her friend had described.

It wouldn’t have been how she herself would have described him, but it was true. He
was
powerful in the role of the beleaguered king, but not because he truly held the depth of emotion poor Lear felt at all the betrayal around him and his despair, but because he connected well with his audience, he projected in a way that drew you in, and made you
want
to believe him. And in that desire to connect, the palpable feel of him wanting his audience to believe in him, Elena found a certain vulnerability in his performance both on and off stage that drew her to him.