Five Women (44 page)

Chapter Thirty-seven

S
UDDENLY
F
ELICITY REALIZED
that Eve had become her unwelcome and unexpected appendage. Ever since that night with Eben, Eve had started calling her at the office every morning as soon as she got in, and Felicity dreaded it. There was always the interrogation about whether she had seen him or heard from him, and Felicity's denials, and Eve's unasked for comments about Eben's risky character, a man who would not settle down, especially not with
her
, a woman he could not take home to his mother. (Felicity knew more about Eben's mother than Eve did: a woman who came after her son with a knife. Why would he care what she thought now that he was away from her?) Then came the repeated questions about the state of Felicity's marriage, and whether she had seen her lover. Felicity didn't ask how Eve had found out Jason's name; Eve could find out a great deal when she put her mind to it, and she obviously had. Felicity got off the phone as fast as she could, and then she told her secretary that if there were any more calls from Eve, she could not be disturbed.

She had been sneaking off to see Eben every day, and he called her constantly on her cell phone, talking about their grotesque childhoods, trying to search out the roots of their subsequent problems, sometimes reading his poems to her, always telling her he loved her. Felicity had never had such passionate sex in her life. The man was insatiable, and so was she now, addicted to him and her multiple orgasms, a woman who had been starving for affection and finally was more than filled. She was not bulimic anymore, food didn't matter, she was floating. But also Eben was romantic, he was kind, he was loving. He had held her all night, even in his sleep, that night they were together, and she wondered if it was this tenderness she needed more than the spectacular sex, if the protection and reassurance of his arms around her, her head on his shoulder, was what drew her to him the most. He was the closest thing she had ever had to a best friend, and compared to Eben, Russell seemed more domineering and harshly critical than ever and Jason seemed selfish and stingy with both his time and his feelings.

Jason had reappeared, of course, not knowing that everything had changed, and Felicity was avoiding him, which of course made him want her more. The attraction she'd felt for him, the obsession, had vanished like a puff of smoke. All those years when she had believed he was saving her marriage were over. Now she did not want her marriage to be saved.

Eben kept begging her to come to stay with him for a while in his house in the Hamptons, to take her vacation early, to be his. She called Gara, who she knew had a house there.

“I need to get away for two weeks. I'm going to take my vacation early. I want to stay with Eben, but of course Russell mustn't know, so could I say I'm staying at your house at the beach?”

There was a brief pause. “Do you think that's wise?” Gara asked.

“If you don't want me to, I'll understand . . .”

“No, it's not that. What if he finds out?”

“He won't,” Felicity said. “I'm going to leave him anyway. This is the first time in my life I've been really happy.”

“You should leave some things at my house in case Russell decides to surprise you.”

“I will, but he won't,” Felicity said. “He doesn't know how to find your house. He won't even ask. I know him. Russell is too macho to make a fool of himself.”

“I hope you're right,” Gara said.

Felicity arranged her vacation time with her office, explaining it was an emergency of a personal nature, and then she told Russell. “I'm going away for two weeks,” she said. “By myself. I want some time alone to think about our marriage. I've been miserable for a long time.”

He looked astonished—no, horrified—and unexpectedly vulnerable and in pain. “I didn't know you were that miserable,” he said.

“I'm going to Gara's house in Amagansett,” Felicity went on. “I need to be peaceful and away.”

“And what exactly are you going to think about while you're there thinking about our marriage?”

“Whether I can go on like this anymore,” Felicity said.

“You act like I was a monster,” Russell said. His voice was boyish and wounded, the sort of tone that would engender guilt, but she was beyond that now. He had hurt her too long and too often.

“You were.”

“What did I do?”

She sighed. “I can't discuss it now. I'm burned out and tired.” She knew he could see her resolve and he wouldn't try to hold her back.

“You'll give me your phone number, I hope,” he said.

“Yes.”

“And you're taking your cell phone?”

“Yes. But don't call me on it all day long the way you do. Otherwise it will be as if I never went away at all.”

“I won't bother you,” Russell said. “I called you only because I wanted to know you were safe. I still have to do that. I worry about you. It's dangerous out there in the world. I worry that you'll get mugged, that you'll be in an accident. . . . Baby, I hope you can solve this problem, whatever it is. I didn't even know there was a problem. You should have told me, but I know you, you keep things to yourself. I love you and I don't want to lose you.”

How sad his eyes were, how bewildered. Why had he never been this human before? She supposed she had to leave him to make him into a good husband, but she didn't want him anymore, good or bad, she only wanted to be free so she could start her new life.

“I know,” Felicity said. When she hugged him goodbye they both had tears in their eyes.

She knew now that sadness would be part of it, too, the tearing apart of two people who had become family, but as soon as she was in her rented car driving east on the Montauk Highway, she was happy again. Eben was in his own car, next to her, he on his car phone and she on her cell phone, and they looked at each other at high speeds and smiled and talked all the way. Outside their windows was the blue, blue spring sky, and the brown fields, the hidden seeds waiting to sprout into summer abundance. Soon there would be tomatoes and corn and sunflowers, and later his potatoes. The trees had green leaves now, again, and their future together seemed as fresh as nature.

“I love you,” Eben said on his phone.

“I love you more,” Felicity answered.

In his large brown farmhouse, they had sex the moment they walked in the door, and afterward he made lunch for her and they talked, and then they had sex again. They slept, and drove to the beach, where they made each other come wildly in the deserted dunes. The water was still too cold to swim, so they went back to his house where they took a shower together and had sex, and then she made dinner for him, and they talked more, about everything, and then they went to bed. She thought there must be something wrong with him, a man who had an almost constant erection—that he was a love addict, or a satyr—but she wasn't complaining. All night he would wake up, put it in, go to sleep, wake up, put it in, as a kind of reflex, as if he were doing it in his sleep, or in his dreams . . . or in hers.

Every day and every night were the same.

Sometimes they went to the movies, arriving separately and sitting in separate seats in case anyone knew him. Russell called once every day, at Gara's, where Felicity called in to retrieve the messages, and then she called him back with one excuse or another for her absence. Whenever they spoke he sounded beaten, tentative, melancholy. He never called her on her cell phone; she understood that had been their connection to each other when he had thought they were happy, and now it had too many memories. Felicity didn't know how she felt about him, and she didn't want to think about it. She knew now that very soon she would leave him.

“This will be our bedroom,” Eben said. “And this room I'll make into a private gym so you can work out. Would you like that?”

“Oh, yes,” Felicity said.

“This is my office, and this will be your office. We'll come here every weekend. During the week we'll live in my apartment.”

I'd like to redecorate that apartment, she thought, but she didn't say so. It needed more life and color. She knew that by this time next year she would be married to him.

She went to Gara's house once, just in case Russell wanted her to describe it to him. It was a sweet little house, and Felicity knew why Gara found it and the ocean it overlooked so restorative. While she was there, her cell phone rang. It was Jason. She winced.

“Why haven't you returned any of my E-mail messages?” he said.

“I'm away. On vacation.”

“With Russell?” He sounded panicked, thinking he had done something stupid by calling. “I didn't know.”

“With a girlfriend,” Felicity said. She didn't want Jason to know about Eben until she had left Russell and it was all acceptable. Maybe she would never tell him. She had not thought about Jason or wondered what he thought for several weeks. “But you shouldn't call anyway. I'll leave you a message when I get back.”

He understood it was risky and he was glad to back off. She knew he would never leave his wife, and she also knew that if he did she wouldn't want him.

“Oh, I don't want this vacation to be over,” Felicity sighed to Eben.

“Neither do I, but it won't be. We'll have more. I'll take you to the Caribbean in the winter. We'll lie on the beach.”

Just before they left to go back to the city Eben cut an armful of flowers for her from his garden, and then he got his camera. He took a photograph of Felicity standing on the lawn with the flowers in her arms, and called her “my faun.”

“My satyr,” she said, laughing, and then he let her take a picture of him.

Felicity wrapped the flowers in wet newspaper, but by the time she got back to the city they were dead. She felt sad, and missed him already. She pulled off one to press in her wallet as a remembrance, and left the rest in the car. Russell was waiting for her in their living room. She wondered why she had never noticed before how really old he looked. She knew she couldn't spend the night in his bed, that their marriage was over, and that she had to tell him tonight.

He offered her champagne, as if her homecoming were a celebration. She took some for courage. “How was your trip?” he asked.

“I thought about a lot of things. I made some decisions.”

“And?”

“Russell, I want a divorce.”

He looked as if she had hit him. She had tried to leave him before, but he had known she would come back. Now he knew she wouldn't, because she knew it.

“Don't,” he said. “Oh, don't. I'll make it better. Let's try to work it out.” He was actually in tears, this tough man, this old street fighter, the husband she had always feared; he was crumbling and she looked away so she would not have to watch him being in such pain, because it pained her, too.

“We'll have to go to a marriage counselor in any event, a few times,” Felicity said evenly, “in order to get the divorce more easily. I want a separation right now, so tomorrow we both need to get lawyers. Unless you want us to go to a mediator, which will expedite things. A divorce will take a separation of a year, but if we get a mediator they can run it through the courts in a few months. I'm going to sleep in the den tonight, and tomorrow I'll pack my clothes and get a hotel room. Then I'm getting my own apartment.”

“A marriage counselor?” he said hopefully. He had always adamantly refused to go, but now he sounded as if a marriage counselor would somehow save them. No one can save us, Felicity thought, but it will mollify him and I need someone on my side. She wondered if Russell had heard anything else she had said.

“Yes,” she said. “I'll try to get an appointment as soon as possible.”

There was nothing else to say. She couldn't look at his yearning eyes and told herself he was only being manipulative. He was a businessman, he worked with unions, with tough negotiators. He knew how to intimidate and back down and threaten and promise and close a deal. She knew what he did, and now she was going to try to emulate it. You can make the deal you want, Russell had told her once, only if you're willing to walk away.

She didn't even discuss money. That was how much she wanted to leave him. Besides, the lawyers or the mediator would do that. This was not the time to push Russell into a fight.

She slept in the den, the next morning she got a hotel room, and now she and Eben were free to see each other as much as they liked. Felicity was virtually living in his apartment, and on weekends she went to his house in the potato fields, where they continued their interrupted vacation. One weekend he had his blonde, green-eyed, eight-year-old daughter, Ondine, there, and the three of them watched Disney videos and ate takeout pizza. Felicity loved his daughter with all the frustrated motherly instincts she had been forced to hold back because of Russell's intransigence, and when Ondine asked her to tuck her in she knew the little girl liked her, too. She couldn't wait to have the child share their life more often, and she wanted more. . . .

“How would you like to have a little mulatto baby?” Felicity asked Eben one night, when they were having sex.

“I'd love it,” he said.

How happy she was. After all these years, she deserved it.

“So you left your husband,” Eve said on the phone.

“Yes. Finally.”

“I guess you think it's going to last with Eben,” she said in a nasty tone that meant
You are an idiot if you do.

“Eben and I are friends,” Felicity said. “He's been very helpful to me during this difficult period. He went through a divorce himself.”

“He'll never marry you. The word is out that you were cheating on Russell with him. There's gossip. I bet Russell won't give you any money. By the way, what have you done about Jason?”

“If there's gossip I'm sure you're the one who spread it,” Felicity