Secret Lives (27 page)

I can't look at Matt quite the same way now.
He sits in here—as a matter of fact, he's here right now—reading,
with those big innocent brown eyes that are not so innocent after
all. I will not be sleeping with him anytime soon, but I'm glad to
know this about him. I used to feel guilty, like I was depriving
him of something. Now I find he's been getting that something all
along.

October 29, 1949

Kyle has been home every weekend since
school started. He is driven. He's interested Dr. Latterly—who he
calls “Stan” now—in his “backyard dig.” He got Dr. Latterly to come
down here to visit Lynch Hollow and a more comical scene I'd never
witnessed. It was a Saturday two weeks ago, and Kyle and the
professor came to the cave. This man did not know what to make of a
woman typing with cotton in her ears and a gentleman (Matt)
reclined, reading, and smoking a pipe on the settee. Kyle and Matt
and I treated it all as normal. Dr. Latterly was a little shaken, I
think, but he was impressed with what Kyle and I have done here, so
now he's gearing his work with Kyle to our specific needs.

Easter Sunday, 1950

Matt brought the woman he is seeing to
Easter dinner. He has been dating quite a few lately, and making no
secret of it to me. Trying to get me jealous, I suppose, and it's
not working. Matt is viewed as one of the most alluring young men
around, as is Kyle, although Kyle is not here enough to take
advantage of that status. Kyle says he's not even dating much at
school, which I find hard to believe, but he is very caught up in
his professional pursuits these days, so I guess it's possible.

Matt's lady friend, Delores, is thoroughly
in love with him. I was fascinated, watching her watch him. She
tried to anticipate his every desire. It was revolting. I know Matt
doesn't return her love and adoration. I wonder if she knows about
the hussy he sees in Luray? A few months ago I told him I knew
about his sordid little side interests. He was at first mad at Kyle
for telling me and then pleased, I think, that he could speak more
openly with me about the women in his life. Our friendship is the
best it's ever been. I know he would like more from me, and I know
it is his caring about me that prevents him from getting serious
with anyone else, but I've told him we will never be more than
friends. I believe he's finally come to accept that.

November 10, 1951

Yesterday my tenth book was published and
Kyle and Matt and I drank champagne in the cavern until we were
punchy. I felt warm and satisfied and I started talking, saying way
too much. I said what a lucky person I was to have four loves in my
life when many women must settle for one, or less.

Kyle and Matt set down their glasses to
listen to me and I began ticking off my four loves. “My writing,” I
said. “The digs. My brother.” Kyle held his glass up to me in a
salute. “And my cavern.”

Well, I was quite satisfied with my little
speech and we finished the bottle and it wasn't until the buzz of
the champagne started to wear thin and we could feel the chill
settle into the air of the cave that I realized Matt had not
spoken. There was hurt in his eyes and I nearly vomited when I
realized why: I had left him out. How could I have been so mean? It
would not have hurt me to say I had five loves and included him. I
do love him as my dear friend, but the truth is that it never
occurred to me to name him, and it was certainly too late to add
him on as an afterthought.

“
It's cold in here,” he said finally,
standing up. “I'm going home.”

“
Not yet,” said Kyle. I could tell from
his face that he also knew what was bothering Matt. “We can all sit
in the house for a while.”

I should have said something then. Oh yes,
Matt, come sit in the house with us. But instead I got down on the
ice cold floor and began picking up the scattered pages from the
story I was working on.

“
I have an early day tomorrow,” Matt said
from behind me. I heard his footsteps on the floor of the cave and
then silence as he entered the forest.

I couldn't move from my place on the floor.
I stared at the pages resting there, thinking of how hurtful I
could be without even trying. Then Kyle knelt next to me. “Come on,
Katie,” he said. “Let's go in the house.”

“
I didn't mean to hurt him,” I said. I
think I was crying. Kyle smoothed my hair behind my ear. “I know.
He'll be all right.”

“
I should have thought before I
spoke.”

“
Shh.” Kyle sat on the ground behind me
and hugged me into his arms. He told me he'd talk to Matt for me
tomorrow, tell him how bad I felt, how it was an oversight, nothing
more. He kept talking like that, his breath sweet with champagne,
but after a while I stopped listening. My back was against his
chest, his cheek soft on my hair. Cold as it was, I could have sat
like that all night.

So today Matt informed me that he is now
engaged to Delores Winthrop. He told me this by note, because he is
so much like me, best able to express himself on paper. He
wrote,

Dearest Kate,

I have been foolishly hiding from the truth.
For so long I have kidded myself into thinking that you love me, or
at least had the potential to love me. It is something I wished for
so desperately, you cannot know. I admire you so—your beauty, your
spirit and ambition. I could easily put up with your “unusual”
ways. I am charmed by them.

I can't be angry with you because you have
never tried to deceive me about your feelings. The idea of you
loving me has been my own fabrication and you can't be held
responsible for what occurs in my tormented imagination. Last night
as you described your four loves and I was not among them, I knew I
must finally abandon my hope of having my love returned. Therefore
I have proposed marriage to Delores. She is clearly my second
choice, although I trust you will never tell her that.

I am nearly twenty-six and need to settle
down. I truly hope, Kate, that you find someone who can unleash the
loving woman I know is within you. I am sorry to have failed in
that task.

All my love, Matt

I wept as I read his note, but I know this
is best for him. I will miss his company so much. I am certain he
will never bring Delores to visit the cave with him. I could see
her looking down her nose at the suggestion, but she will make a
fine wife for him.

There will come a day when Kyle will also
want to marry. I hope she will be someone I can tolerate, not a
silly girl like Sara Jane or a holier-than-thou sort like Julia
from Georgetown. I'm not going to be jealous. She may share his
home and his bed but she can never steal from me the life-long
closeness I've had with him.

December 12, 1951

Kyle is to be Matt's best man and Delores's
sister Vanessa will be her maid of honor. Matt is being swept
quickly into their plans and every evening he comes to tell us
more. He seems to have no control over what's happening to him. The
wedding is planned for January 5th. I am less enthusiastic now
about his getting married because I can see he's not happy about
it. He looks like a man being sucked into quicksand. I want to
speak—or perhaps write—to him about this. I want to tell him not to
allow himself to be trapped in this way, but I know it is hardly my
place and it would be very unfair of me.

December 23, 1951

Matt broke off his engagement to Delores. He
came to the cavern last night and spoke very frankly with Kyle and
me.

“
I don't love her as I'm capable of
loving a woman,” he said. “She's put me off as a lover, saving
herself for marriage as if she's some great prize. I can respect
that, I suppose. I'd even be appreciative of it if I were truly
interested in her, but I'm not even excited by the prospect of
sleeping with her.”

Kyle and I sat very still while he spoke
because we'd never heard Matt speak with such candor.

“
I'm dreading our wedding night because
I'll be making love to Delores, but thinking of you, Kate.” His
face took on such color that he probably didn't even notice it in
mine.

“
I haven't been able to concentrate on
this wedding or work or anything because I'm so obsessed with
thoughts of you. If I married Delores I would lose you for good. I
can't bear to have that happen. I'd rather have the little bit I
have of you than nothing at all.”

A long silence stretched between the three
of us. I wanted Kyle to break it but knew he was looking at me and
I had no choice but to speak.

“
You have me on a pedestal, Matt,” I
said. “I'm never going to be a wife, to you or anyone else. I don't
think you should marry Delores if you're so unhappy about it. But
don't avoid marrying her on my account.” All the while I was
speaking my heart was galloping. I am selfish straight to the core.
I was glad of his decision. I want Matt here in the cave, but on my
terms. That's what he said a long time ago. “Everything has to be
on your terms, Kate.” He was right.

–
27–

She made chicken salad for their picnic
supper, taking her time, savoring the simple domesticity of the
task. She set the salad in the basket along with a bottle of wine,
a couple of peaches, crusty rolls from the Millers' bakery, and two
brownies Lou had baked that morning. Her actions were slow and
deliberate, and she knew she was putting off seeing Ben, putting
off hearing whatever it was he needed to tell her. Finally she
could procrastinate no longer. She put on a blue sundress—Michael
Carey's favorite—and set out for the site.

She'd spent the afternoon working on the
screenplay and it had gone very well. She could see Michael clearly
as Matt, especially now that she knew her father had a little of
the rake in him. She would have to ask Kyle to tell her more about
Matt's pursuits in Luray and Strasburg, how he had quenched his
thirst for Kate in the arms of other women.

She was perspiring by the time she reached
the site. Ben knelt in the third pit, in much the same position as
the first time she'd seen him. She stood still for a moment in the
burning sunlight, watching the muscles in his back contract beneath
his blue T-shirt as he brushed the ground. There was a stirring in
her body, a warmth that had nothing to do with the sun.

She called to him as she walked toward the
pit and he waved and climbed up the ladder. The front of his
T-shirt was soaked with sweat and he wiped his arm across his
forehead. “How about up on the bridge?” He nodded toward the
footbridge that crossed Ferry Creek. “Maybe there's a breeze up
there.”

They walked to the center of the bridge and
sat with their legs dangling over the edge. The water below was
black and silent as it cut through the forest to the hazy green
mountains beyond. Eden clung to the suspension wires as the
shivering of the bridge, and her vertigo, subsided.

“I used to play up here when I was a kid,”
she said as she unloaded the basket. The bridge had seemed as long
as the river then. She remembered running across it, alone as
always, stopping in the middle to pump her legs and make it sway.
“You know how kids love to get dizzy.” She handed him the bottle of
wine and a corkscrew.

He stared at the distant hills, holding the
bottle in his hand as though he had no idea why she'd given it to
him, and she realized he had said nothing to her since leaving the
pit.

She touched his shoulder. His shirt was damp
beneath her fingers and his body felt rigid, unfamiliar. She drew
her hand away. “Ben? Could you open the wine?”

He licked his dusty lips and turned to look
at her. “Let's talk first and eat after, okay?”

She didn't want to talk. She didn't want to
know what was draining the life from his face. And it was too hot
out here. She pressed one of the napkins to her face, her throat.
“I'm famished,” she said. “I'd just as soon eat—”

“Eden.” He shook his head at her and she knew
she was making it more difficult for him.

She lowered the napkin to her lap. “Is it
that serious?” she asked.

“It's extremely serious.”

She put the bowl of chicken salad back into
the basket and closed the lid. “All right.”

He looked out at the stream again. “I don't
know how to say this to you. I wish I knew a way to pretty it up.”
He set the bottle of wine down on the bridge and drew in a long
breath. “The reason I'm divorced, the reason I lost my job, and the
reason I can't see Bliss is that I was convicted of molesting
her.”

She frowned at him. “You molested your
daughter?”

“No.” He glared at her, then dropped his
eyes. “I don't mean to yell, I just ... No. I didn't do it. I was
convicted, but I'm innocent.”

Her body shrank away from him, ever so
slightly, but he didn't miss it. She saw him working at control,
the muscles in his jaw tensing, releasing.

“I didn't do it, Eden.”

“Why would anyone think you did?”

He sighed and wrapped his hands around the
edge of the bridge. His knuckles were white, the skin stretched
taut above them. “There was evidence…It was enough to convince them
that I had…Damn.” He turned his head away from her, ran a shaky
hand through his hair. “This isn't going to work. I don't know what
to tell you to make you believe me. Everything I say is going to
make it look worse.”

She wanted to stay calm, to still the gallop
of her heartbeat. She rested her hand on his arm. “Just tell me the
truth, Ben. Who do you mean by 'them'? Was there a trial? With a
jury?”

“Yes.”

She pressed her fingers to her lips as the
night before disintegrated in her memory. Had she actually slept
with him? “Twelve people heard evidence and decided beyond a
reasonable doubt that you were guilty?”

He turned to her. “I swear to you, Eden, I'm
the last person on earth who would hurt Bliss.”