The Affair (40 page)

I knew Lola enjoyed talking to Roger. Lots of women seemed to. Unlike most guys, Roger was at ease on the emotional plane.
Women found it refreshing. He had a way of drawing them out, getting them to talk about the kinds of intimate topics they’d
normally reserve for female friends. Just last month, for instance, when I was about to run next door to ask my neighbor for
olive oil, Roger advised against it. “She’s just had a D & C,
you know.” Actually, I didn’t know that. But how did he? Apparently this woman had confided to Roger that she’d been having
irregular periods. I couldn’t believe she had told him that.

Now I can believe it.

After we’d been engaged for about six months, Roger moved his things into my apartment. He’d write while I was in class. He
spent a lot of time alone there. At least I used to think he was alone.

“Did you know he used to pose for her?” Diana asked. No, I said, I hadn’t known. I was beginning to feel sick. Then I remembered
the Sunday morning that Roger and I joined her and Mike on the sun porch for herbal tea and scones. Lola had put one of her
nude figures—an extremely well endowed figure—right in the middle of the rattan table.

I joked that the man looked a little like Roger, the same high brow and clefted chin. “But there’s a
big
difference between you and this guy, isn’t there?” I said, giggling. No one else laughed. Still, I suspected nothing. I knew
I’d embarrassed him. I assumed that Lola, a fellow sensitive artist type, was feeling his pain.

It turns out Lola was feeling a lot more than Roger’s pain. “He told me all about that time on the porch, how you embarrassed
him with some comment about his dick.” Eddie put his hand up to his mouth, suppressing a laugh. “He also told me Lola was
playing with him under the table. And I don’t mean footsy.”

“What else?” I asked Diana masochistically. I had to know. Diana took another drag on the cigarette and stared at me. “Everything
else. With and without the swami.”

“What, you’re telling me Roger went both ways?”

“No, God no. I mean, sometimes the swami watched, and sometimes Roger watched.”

I felt a hard lump rise in my throat. I used to like Lola and Mike. I thought they were nice people. A little weird, maybe,
but nice. “So, how long did it last?” I asked Diana.

“It started a couple of weeks after he moved in with you. As far as I know, it lasted until you guys moved into your place
on Heath Street.”

“In other words,” I said, “it lasted until we got married.”

“Not exactly.” Diana walked to the bathroom and tossed the cigarette butt into the toilet. I heard a quiet sizzle as it hit
the water. Eddie looked at me. “Are you okay?” he asked. “I’m fine,” I lied. I wanted to grab the bottle of Merlot and bash
myself in the head. I’d been such an imbecile. I thought bitterly of our little apartment on Heath, how I’d decorated it with
frilly curtains and cheap prints from the Art Institute. Roger helped me stain a hope chest. It held our grandmothers’ table
linens and silver. We kept it at the foot of the bed. Everything was so new and full of promise. And I was the world’s biggest
sucker.

“Lola and Roger kept it up for a while,” Diana continued. “Three, four months after you guys were married.” Diana watched
me for a reaction. I refused to cry in front of her. “They only stopped when Lola and the swami moved to Sedona, except for
that time, uh …”

“Except for the time he went out to Sedona, right?” Roger insisted he had to go out there to “get the feel of the place” for
a new play. He never wrote anything even remotely related to Sedona. I’d heard enough. I was anxious to leave. I knew I’d
have to change the locks. I knew I’d have to call a lawyer. I’d have to find a job.
And I’d have to tell Petey. I stood up. “Thank you, Diana. My husband was a dog. You’ve made your point.”

“No, sweet love, not
was
a dog. Roger still
is
a dog. We’re not talking past tense, baby.” Diana hopped off the dresser and put her hands on my shoulders. “You’re not getting
it, are you? I haven’t even scraped the surface here.”

“Really, Diana. I don’t need to hear this.”

Now it was Eddie’s turn to talk. “Yeah, honey, you do. It’ll help you later, you know, when you start duking it out with the
lawyers. You’ll need all the ammunition you can get.” He was right, of course.

“Fine.” I reached into my bag and hunted for scrap paper. I pulled out a long cash register receipt and flipped it over. It
would have to do. “Okay. Keep talking.”

I grabbed the wine and filled my glass halfway. I battled a visceral impulse to soothe (or maybe destroy?) myself with alcohol.
I’d wanted to remain clearheaded, but I also wanted to numb out. I didn’t want to feel the excruciating feelings, not just
the anger but also the embarrassment. I remembered, bitterly, the time I’d driven Lola to the hospital when she had diverticulitis
and thought her intestines were going to rupture. I baked her cookies. I walked Berkeley, her Pekingese. She was my landlady,
but I’d also come to care about her. I’d been such a fool!

After Lola Jackson, Diana (now the archivist of my husband’s infidelities) explained that Roger took a hiatus from infidelity—two
years, give or take a few months. I remember those times as the best years of our marriage. Roger was fully present, physically
and emotionally. That was before we had a TV in our bed-room.
When I talked, he actually listened. There was a sense of our building a life together, not just in the material sense of
buying and furnishing a home, but also in the way we’d shared the same values and goals. We talked about starting a family.
We grew a small but productive vegetable garden. We took a cooking class together. And we joined the governor’s reelection
campaign, stuffing envelopes, knocking on doors … and then Roger grew remote, distracted.

“Then there was Jacqueline Leland. Or was it Lehman?” Diana asked rhetorically.

“Leland,” I said, staring at my hands. “Jacqueline Leland.” Jacqueline had been a local strategist on the governor’s campaign.
She was smart, wiry, blond, single. I once found them in the hallway giggling quietly, Jackie with her back against the wall
and Roger leaning inches from her face. I’d accused Roger of flirting with her, and he’d protested vehemently.

“She’s not even my type,” he’d insisted. “She’s too bony. And she has no chin!”

I looked up at Diana. “So—what about Jacqueline Leland?”

Diana reached for another cigarette, but Eddie stopped her. The smoke aggravates his allergies. She sighed, put the pack away,
and continued.

“He took Jacqueline to his parents’ cabin on the lake. The fire was her fault. Her curling iron, something like that.”

Oh God. That was the year his parents’ cabin, a sweet little place on a magnificent lake in Door County, burned to the ground.
Roger had said the furnace had exploded. His parents decided not to rebuild and wound up selling the lot. I was so disappointed.
I’d hoped it would stay in the family. I used to imagine
bringing our kids, and eventually our grandkids, there. One weekend during the campaign he drove up to get the cabin ready
for winter. At least that’s what he told me. He encouraged me to stay behind and help with a telephone fund-raiser. Now that
I think of it, Jacqueline had called me to ask if I’d direct the effort, and I’d been too flattered to turn her down. She
said I was a “gifted communicator.”

“They’d been together maybe a half dozen times,” Diana continued. “Mostly at night, mostly on the conference table.” I winced.
“Roger finally took her to his parents’ cabin after she started complaining about back problems. It ended after the cabin
burned down. Jacqueline knew it would scandalize the governor if it came out, so she dropped ol’ Rog like a hot potato. But
he recovered just fine, with the help of a cute little thing named Dara.”

Dara Rosario was Roger’s first intern. He’d advertised at the university for a writing major. He offered an unpaid internship—essentially
a gofer’s job—in exchange for writing advice. He said he picked her because he pitied her. She came from poverty, the only
one of nine children with any scholarly ambition. Dara was studious and quiet. But I remember noticing how her wardrobe seemed
to change as the months wore on. The dumpy flannel shirts and baggy jeans gave way to short skirts and skimpy tops. And suddenly
there was lipstick. She’d come to the house once a week, presumably to help him with filing and to clean his office. I once
found her perched on his desk while he typed. Her legs were open wide enough for him to glimpse her underwear, if he’d been
so inclined.

“Roger bragged about changing Dara’s mind about virginity,” Diana said.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“What I mean is, little Dara had strong views about preserving her virginity for marriage. Your husband convinced her that
sex was a good thing, a healthy thing. He gave her a good dose of feminist consciousness-raising. Told her the idea of virginity
was just another way of oppressing women.” Diana grabbed her cigarettes and lit up, shooting a defiant glare at Eddie.

“Baby, you have no idea how he relished the idea of popping that girl’s cherry. I never heard the end of it!”

My resolve to stay stoic had vanished. I lurched toward the bathroom and threw up in the toilet. I rinsed my mouth with water
and staggered back to the chair. Eddie was standing now. He held me for a long time while Diana smoked and watched us.

“I’m almost done,” she said, softly. “Sit down and keep writing.” I’d already filled up the back of the grocery receipt. Eddie
found an old invoice in his jacket pocket. Wearily, I uncapped the pen and poised it above the paper. “Go ahead,” I said.

For the next hour Diana recounted tales of stolen kisses and fondling, cyber sex, phone sex, and oral sex. And intercourse.
There were two actresses in
Basic Black
, the computer repairwoman, a camp counselor, a three-night fling at a writers’ retreat, and, of course, Alyssa. “I think
that covers everybody,” Diana said. “Wait. One more. There was this really crazy chick, a total sex freak. Met her at a gas
station. She was pumping gas and flashing her booty. I think they did it in the men’s room.” Diana stubbed out her cigarette
and chuckled. “She actually gave him her business card. Claire Something. CPA.”

I felt the blood crash behind my eyeballs, my stomach clench like a fist. I started to laugh, and then I was
sobbing. “I’m sorry, love,” Diana murmured. “I’m really sorry.”

It was a miracle I hadn’t contracted herpes or chlamydia. Or HIV. I closed my eyes and tried to feel gratitude. I desperately
needed to find one thing to be happy about. I couldn’t be happy about the imminent dissolution of my marriage. I was terrified.
But the prospect of living with Roger was even scarier. He had led a double life for years. He was a stranger to me.

It was 5
P.M.
when Diana finished recounting the list of Roger’s sexual conquests, and it was starting to snow. I looked through the stiff
curtains, out at the dreary sky and parking lot, and wondered whether I had the stamina to drive home. I thought about my
father. If he knew what I’d just discovered today, he’d probably dust off his old hunting rifle and blow Roger’s brains out.
Then I remembered that my father barely has the energy now to dress himself. My father was dying. My marriage was over. Where
would I possibly find the strength to pull myself out of bed tomorrow morning?

I stood up and put my jacket on. “Wait,” Diana said. “There’s something else I’ve got to tell you.”

I groaned. “No, Diana. I can’t. No more. Please.”

“But you’ve got to know this. It’s about Roger’s money. Walk out now and you’ll wind up penniless.” What more could Diana
possibly know? I would soon find out, but I’ve got no energy left to write.

’Til next time,

“I know you want to go. But we’ve got to talk about money.” Diana held me by the sleeve. “Listen. Roger’s a
rich boy, baby. He’s got money. And you’re entitled to it.”

“And I’m sure I’ll get it,” I said, pulling my arm away. “But that’s something for me and my lawyer to deal with, okay?”

Diana wouldn’t give up. “No, not okay. You have to hear me out. Please.”

I just wanted to get the hell out of there.

“I know this is the last thing you want to deal with now,” Eddie told me, “but if you don’t shake yourself out of this stupor,
honest to God, kiddo, you’re going to wind up flat broke.”

Diana stepped in. “Before I worked at the Center I was at Epstein Browne. Family law. You can’t imagine the stories I heard
around that office. It made me happy to be a bean counter, I’ll tell you. Disgruntled wives going around the house with chain
saws, cutting everything in half, the dining room table, the mattress. Husbands who poisoned the family dogs to get back at
cheating wives. People who’d sooner kill their own kids than go through a custody battle. It’s sick. I’m not saying Roger’s
about to hurt Petey, but I wouldn’t put it past him to do something really big, really bad. Especially when it comes to money.
Whatever he does, he’s set for life.”