Reconstructing Amelia (28 page)

Everything ached as Kate sat down hard in her desk chair and reached to turn on the lamp. As she did, she noticed the picture of Amelia up on the shelf. Age seven, she was propped on her toes at the edge of the waves on one of their many trips to Coney Island. Arms outstretched, she was kissing the air. It had always been Kate’s favorite picture of Amelia. To her, it was proof that they had had a happy life together. That they had been a family with their own history and traditions. A tiny family, but one that had worked. Kate had made a lot of mistakes in her life, too many. She certainly hadn’t been a perfect mother either, but she had built something for her daughter that mattered.

“Why did you have to pick
that
girl, Amelia?” Kate heard herself say out loud. The worst part was how familiar her daughter’s choice had been, so similar to so many of her own. “She’s beautiful, I get that part. But she’s so, I don’t know, troubled. It’s not her fault—look at her mother. But didn’t you see it? I would have thought you’d see that.”

Kate hadn’t allowed herself to do this since Amelia died, talk out loud to her dead daughter. The thought of doing so had always made her feel unhinged. For some reason, it was a comfort now. Perhaps because she was already so undone.

“Whoever broke up with who or why, she was lucky to have you,” Kate said. “Anybody would have been. I hope you know that.”

Kate paused then, staring again at the picture. She wasn’t waiting for an answer, at least not exactly.

“You could have told me about her, too. You loving her would never have made me love you any less.”

Kate was still staring up at the picture when her phone rang.
DAD CELL
read the caller ID. Her father calling her? If it had been her mother, she would certainly have let it go to voice mail. But her father never called, certainly not from the cell phone he hardly ever used.

“Dad, what’s wrong?” Kate asked. Her parents were reasonably healthy, but they weren’t exactly young anymore. There was some staticky noise on the other end, but nothing else. Kate wondered for a minute whether her dad had dialed her number by accident. “Dad, are you there?”

“Oh, yes,” he said finally, clearing his throat. “I was momentarily distracted, apologies. I was taking a walk down to the lake, and I could have sworn I just saw a white-crested Elaenia. Of course, that’s not possible because that’s a South American bird, but—” His voice was filled with childlike wonder. Kate could hear him breathing harder, too, as though he was walking faster. “Let me circle back here and check. Bear with me for a moment.”

“Dad?” Kate asked, even though it sounded like he’d pulled the phone away from his ear again. “Dad?”

“Oh yes, sorry,” he said, returning to the phone finally. The awe in his voice was gone. “I must have been seeing things. I’m afraid birding might be a young man’s game, not that you’d suspect it from the demographic of that Galapagos cruise I was just on.” He cleared his throat. “In any event, your mother asked that I call and check in on you.”

“Mom asked that you call me?” Kate suspected her dad was making that up in order to keep some emotional distance. “I find that hard to believe.”

“The truth often is,” he said. “But yes, she asked that I make sure you were okay. She seems upset about the last conversation the two of you had. I didn’t press for details. You know I don’t like to get into the middle of things. But I did say I would call. Are you okay, Kate?”

“No,” she said, resisting the temptation to tell him what he wanted to hear, but having no real interest in sharing any details. She knew he didn’t really want details anyway. “I’m not sure I am.”

“Yes, well,” he said quietly. “I suppose some things never do get any better.”

It was the first time he had ever just let her bad feelings be. She’d thought for sure she’d heard him wrong.

“No, they don’t,” Kate said, her voice wavering.

“You know, your mother means well,” her father said more stiffly. He was treading into unchartered emotional waters, and his discomfort was obvious. “She doesn’t always know how to . . . Remember when we first came to New York to meet Amelia right after she was born? Did you know your mother cried all the way back to the airport because she was so worried about you?”

“I don’t think that’s why—”

“It is,” he said. “She didn’t cry again, that’s not your mother’s way. But on that day . . .” He took a deep breath. “So will you be okay? Can I tell your mother that?”

Her father was many things, but he wasn’t a liar. Kate wasn’t entirely sure that she believed this story about Gretchen racked with motherly concern, but at this very late date, she also wasn’t sure that it mattered.

“To be honest, I don’t know if I will be okay, Dad,” Kate said, her eyes filling with tears. She was so overwhelmed suddenly by sadness and regret, coming from infinite directions. “But you can . . . You should tell Mom that I will be.”

The Thistle Tavern was much busier at six p.m. on a weekday than Kate would have expected, but then she’d never actually been inside. It was just one of the many grown-up neighborhood spots she’d always wanted to visit but had never had the time to.

Inside, the tavern didn’t disappoint. It was filled with dark woods and muted brass, the menu etched on a big chalkboard above the bar and servers who—with their peekaboo tattoos and scruffy facial hair—looked as if they’d just walked off the set of an independent film. She saw Jeremy sitting at the short, crowded bar, his back to the door. He was nursing a beer and chatting with the sideburned bartender like the two were old college buddies, slipping effortlessly, as usual, into some stranger’s skin.

“Hi,” Kate said, interrupting them.

Jeremy turned and smiled brightly. He jumped off his stool and gallantly offered it to Kate. She took it only because it would have been more awkward not to. The bartender seemed disappointed, not so much that they were being interrupted, but that it was Kate who’d done the interrupting. Like he’d had higher expectations for whoever it was Jeremy had been waiting for. Kate looked down at her clothes, an old sweater, jeans, and overly practical weekend clogs. Her hair was pulled back, too, and she had on no makeup. Someone like Jeremy did deserve better, but it wasn’t as though it were a date. And Kate, as she was at the moment, was the best she could do.

“What can I get you?” the bartender asked, a little begrudgingly.

“A glass of white wine,” Kate said, not that she felt like having a drink.

“I’ll get you a list.”

“Oh, I don’t need a list,” Kate said. “You can pick it.”

“The most expensive one it is,” the bartender said, winking at Jeremy.

The stool next to Kate opened up, and Jeremy took a seat as the bartender was bringing Kate’s wine. They sat in silence until he was gone again.

“Did you not go into the office today?” Kate asked, motioning to Jeremy’s jeans and fashionably casual button-down.

“I ended up leaving early.” He shook his head and took a long sip of beer. “I needed some space. Some time to think.”

“About what?”

“Oh, lots of things,” he said, staring down into his drink as he worked his way up to saying something. “Listen, I know this is late in coming, but I wanted to apologize, Kate, for what happened between us, you know, back then. It was totally inappropriate for me to have that kind of relationship with you.”

Kate felt a flash of anger. She could not believe Jeremy was doing this now.

“You cannot be serious.”

Jeremy looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“You called me out here in the middle of everything else I’m going through to talk about you regretting the
one
night—no, one
hour
—we spent more than a
decade
ago?”

Jeremy looked wounded. He truly believed he was always at the front of everyone’s mind.

“I just wanted to be sure that you know I take full responsibility,” he said. “Especially now, I feel like— It’s important to me that you know that it wasn’t your fault.”

“My
fault
?” Kate laughed a little crazily. But then the situation was crazy. “Fine, I know it. Now, can I go?”

Jeremy frowned, then pulled a folded piece of paper out of his shirt pocket. He held it out to Kate.

She didn’t take it. “What is that?”

“It was on inside-the-law dot com this morning,” he said, as Kate reluctantly took it from him. “I’m having someone try to figure out who’s responsible, but that’s easier said than done.”

Kate looked down and read: “Slone, Thayer’s Jeremy Firth Beds Them Down Then Boosts Them Up.” Kate closed her eyes without reading any more.

“It doesn’t mention you by name,” he went on. “Luckily, it doesn’t mention anybody by name except me. And a lot of the details aren’t true. There’s all sorts of nonsense about sex in conference rooms and elevators and that it went on for years. But I think there could be enough in there that people might guess that some of it is about you.”

“Oh my God,” Kate said, tears rushing to her eyes. “What about Vera?”

“She hasn’t read it.” Jeremy shook his head. “At least not yet. Somebody will probably tell her eventually, though I’m not sure who’d want to be the messenger.”

He turned to look at Kate, then back down into his beer.

“I feel so—” She cupped a hand over her mouth. “Poor Vera. She’s going to hate me.”

“That’s not Vera’s style. She’ll definitely hate me, but not you,” he said quietly. Then he took a deep breath. “You should also know that the post mentions other women, too. They’re wrong on the details, but they’re not wrong that there were other women. I wish I could say otherwise.”

“I knew there were other women,” Kate said, feeling ashamed hearing herself admit it and annoyed with Jeremy for thinking she’d been naive enough to believe she was the only one. “Even back then I knew it.”

Knowing that Jeremy had slept with—was sleeping with—other female associates around the time they’d slept together had actually made Kate feel better. Somehow, it had made her less accountable.

“I’m not proud of the person I was,” Jeremy said. “But I’m different now. I’ve been different for a long time. I’ve been one hundred percent faithful to Vera for the past decade. I wasn’t always, but I’m a good husband now.”

Kate stared at him, her body rocking ever so slightly from the force of her pounding heart. What was it he wanted from her? Absolution? She had none to give. And she had more important things to worry about then Jeremy’s misdirected conscience. She needed to get out of that bar and away from him.

“I have to go,” she finally managed, shoving herself off the stool.

“Wait, where are you going?” Jeremy asked, jumping to his feet. “There’s something else we need to talk about, Kate.”

“No, there isn’t.” Kate said, brushing past him toward the door. “And I’m not angry, Jeremy, or upset, or whatever it is you think I am. But I never want to talk about any of this, ever again.”

Kate tried to breathe as she rushed away from the Thistle Tavern toward her house, but the burning in her lungs only pushed her closer to the edge of tears. She looked over her shoulder once to make sure that Jeremy wasn’t following her. When she turned back, the sidewalk blurred as she started to cry. She cried hard as she walked down crowded Seventh Avenue, a hand clamped over her grimace, tears streaming down her face as she wove past all the people staring at her. Her phone vibrated then in her pocket. Jeremy had sent a text instead of following. Of course he had.
I’m sorry, come back
.
I need you to understand
, was what Kate braced herself to read. Not that what it said would matter. She was done talking to him, at least for now.

Kate dug her phone out of her pocket and looked down at the message:

What’s he going to give you this time, slut?

Amelia

OCTOBER 21, 8:56 PM

BEN

any word?

AMELIA

none

BEN

give it time; she’ll come around

AMELIA

u don’t believe that

BEN

if she doesn’t then she’s stupid

AMELIA

thx

BEN

I mean it

AMELIA

I know; g2g not in mood to talk

BEN

ok c/u

OCTOBER 21, 9:18 PM

SYLVIA

dude, what is up?

AMELIA

nothing

SYLVIA

you looked seriously out of it at school

AMELIA

I have my period

SYLVIA

oh, bummer; I stalked Susan Dolan today

AMELIA

oh geez

SYLVIA

you know she goes and buys a big ass BAG of twizzlers at the rite aid after school and eats them ALL on the way home

AMELIA

gross

SYLVIA

she must barf them up too that skinny bitch

AMELIA

g2g; I don’t feel good

SYLVIA

ok; c/u ltr; get yourself some midol or some shit

OCTOBER 22, 2:01 AM

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bitch

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slut

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whore

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dyke

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die bitch die

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nasty skank

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carpet muncher

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queer

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lesbo bitch cunt

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homo

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dyke, dyke, dyke, die

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ho bag

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dirty skanky tramp

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fucking bitch I hope you die

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pussy lover

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lying whore

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we

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know

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where

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you

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live

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we’re

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coming

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for

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you