All You Could Ask For: A Novel (16 page)

BEING ON A HORSE always reminds me of my father.

My mother is petrified of horses, always has been. She doesn’t care for animals at all. As I recall, she once told me if a cat looked at her in a particular way she would need to be hospitalized.

But my father loved horses especially, loved everything about them. There were stables less than a mile from our house when I was a girl, and I cannot count how many Saturday afternoons we spent there together, Dad and me. My mother would make us pancakes for breakfast and then—if it was a nice day—the two of us would walk, hand in hand, to see the horses. When I was little, we would ride together, me snuggled into place in front of him on the saddle. I can still smell the oil embedded in the leather and the ever-present poop from the stables and the aftershave my father used, all mingled together. If you asked me to describe my childhood, at least the best parts of it, I would describe the way those Saturday afternoons smelled.

I began to ride competitively when I was nine and continued until Dad went away. He encouraged me to continue but my heart wasn’t in it. Besides, even if I wanted to, Mother wouldn’t have allowed it. There was no way she was going to traipse from one stable to another, one horse show to another; she wouldn’t even allow my riding boots in the house. “They’ve been wading in the crap,” she would say. They remained in a plastic bag in the garage when I wasn’t wearing them.

When Marie and I got to Aspen, the first thing I wanted was to go riding. At Buttermilk Mountain, they offered horseback riding and private lessons. I suggested to Marie she try it.

“I don’t know, boss,” she said. “If it doesn’t have a motor, I’m not sure I can drive it.”

“Listen,” I told her, “first of all, as long as we are here let’s drop the title ‘boss.’ You’re here to enjoy yourself just as I am. Secondly, if you have never used a mode of transportation that doesn’t require a key to start, you are in for a day you will never forget.”

“Katherine,” Marie said, sounding frightened. “I barely know how to ride a bike. There’s no way I can ride a horse.”

I considered that for a minute. “All right, here’s the deal. On this trip, I am going to help you and you are going to help me. Before we go home, you are going to learn to ride a horse, which I will help you with, and in turn you will help me figure out what makes life worth living. When we have both succeeded—when you can ride a horse and I can answer that question—we’ll go back to New York.”

Marie was just staring at me. Then she blinked, and then blinked again, and then a few more times without changing expression. Finally, she said, “So you’re saying we might be here awhile.”

“That’s right.”

She looked concerned.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

“What should I tell Adam?”

Her fiancé, who also worked under me at the bank. Sometimes you can take advantage of things like that. “Tell him I said I need you here,” I said.

She thought a moment. “I didn’t bring that much stuff,” she said.

“Have you seen the stores in this town?”

“Katherine,” she said, “I can’t afford to shop in Aspen.”

“Let me handle that part,” I told her. “Your job is to figure out what makes life worth living. If you do, whatever it costs will be money extremely well spent.”

“Are you serious?” she asked.

I took her hand. “Dead serious,” I said.

Finally, Marie smiled. “Holy shit, Katherine,” she said. “This is going to be fun.”

THE HIKE TO CATHEDRAL Lake came highly recommended. Everyone in town suggested it for something scenic and challenging but reasonable for two in-shape women who aren’t accustomed to hiking at an elevation of eleven thousand feet.

On the first day we tried something shorter, as a warm-up, climbing up a dusty mountain trail called “Smugglers,” covered in rocks and patchy grass, with a view of the town that grew more spectacular as we ascended. From the peak we hiked across a pass and into a gorgeous meadow, bursting with sunflowers and grass as high as your waist, then down a challenging trail that crisscrossed over a roaring stream called “Hunter’s Creek.”

On the second day, we hit the mountain.

We had new boots, new backpacks, new water bottles, new sunglasses, and good attitudes as we drove the twelve miles up Castle Creek Road to the bumpy, rocky turnoff, right up to the trailhead. It was a few minutes after seven when we began, and we agreed to each go at our own pace and meet at the lake. The mountain air was cool and dry as sandpaper, but the sunshine on my face warmed me to my toes. When I reached the steep section of the climb, with eight switchbacks coming in rapid succession, I was in a full sweat. It felt good. Better than good, it felt wonderful. Even the ache in my back didn’t bother me, at least not nearly as much as it had been. It is one thing to perspire alone in your apartment, or in a dingy, crowded gym. It is another entirely to be out in the fresh air
doing
something that makes you sweat.

An hour into the hike, I was in love. I loved the rich green of the pines, the powdery white on the trunks of the aspens, the pale blue of the cloudless sky. I loved the way the air smelled, like sugar, if such a thing is possible, or buttermilk, sweet and fresh and clean. At first I had my earbuds in but I soon took them out and stashed my iPod in my backpack. The sounds of the rustling beneath my feet and the birds flying past and the chipmunks scurrying across the path were more than enough. It took a little less than two hours to reach the lake. It would take longer than that to fully describe it to you. The stillness of the water left my mouth agape. I suppose I have become accustomed to oceans and rivers, where there is a current and a rhythm, where the water has a sound. This water made no noise, it had no rhythm, it was stunningly, achingly still. I longed to throw a stone into it, so I did and then watched the ripples extend slowly as far as my eyes could see. And the color was unlike anything you could imagine. It was described to me as “emerald green,” but that is underselling: it was far richer than that, more vivid, a color so intense I could almost taste it. I could certainly feel it. You know a color has moved you when to
see
it is only the beginning of the experience.

Then there was a rustle and I remembered Marie. She came over by me, dropped onto her butt, and took a long sip from her water bottle.

“So,” I said, standing over her, “what do you think?”

“I’m spent,” she said. “Give me a minute to recover.”

That made me feel even better. Marie has got to be twelve or thirteen years younger than I, and in great shape, but there she was, on her ass, while I stood over her feeling strong.

“Let’s eat,” I said, and flopped down on a rock.

The serenity of the lake and the distant peaks, including Cathedral Peak at almost fourteen thousand feet of elevation, were blissful.

We had gorgeous lunches in our backpacks: gourmet sandwiches, vinaigrette potato salad, chocolate protein shakes, and oxygenated water. The food was like fuel, healthful and nourishing. When I was finished, I felt satisfied and strong, the way food is supposed to make you feel but almost never does. I need to spend more time at the tops of mountains, I thought. Food feels better up here. It tastes better, too.

When we had finished eating and were zipping the remains of our lunch into recyclable trash bags, Marie said, “Katherine, can I ask you something?”

“Of course,” I said, though I didn’t care for the tone of her voice. She sounded apprehensive, and I was in no mood to have my blissful state interrupted.

“Why don’t you have a man in your life?”

My heartbeat, which had slowed in the serenity of the mountains, resumed its New York rate. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

“Who’s to say I don’t?”

“I know you don’t,” she said. “And I always wonder why.”

Absently, I started digging about for flat stones. I used to be pretty good at skipping stones on a lake when I was a camper, I was pretty sure I could still do it.

“You know, things just have a strange way of working out,” I said slowly. And then I decided to be honest with her, because it felt wrong to be dishonest in the presence of the lake and the mountain, so I said, “I tell myself that my career makes it impossible for me to carry on a real relationship. But that isn’t actually true. I could if the circumstances were right. I guess they just haven’t been for a very long time.”

“Were you ever married?” Marie asked.

“Nope.”

“Ever close?”

I stood up, five or six smooth stones in my hand. “What’s with the third degree?”

Marie held up her hands, as if to pacify me. “I’m sorry, Katherine. I don’t mean to make you feel uncomfortable. It’s just that you told me we’re staying here until we figure out the meaning of life and that sounds pretty complicated. And while I know you really well, in some ways I don’t know you at all. For example, I didn’t know if you were divorced or anything.”

I guess I asked for this. “No, not divorced. Never married. Proposed to, once. Wasn’t the right man. Had the right man for a little while, then he decided I wasn’t the right woman and that was pretty much it for me.”

“You loved him?”

“Oh, god, yes.”

She smiled. “Now this is interesting,” she said. “He broke your heart?”

I tossed a stone. It skipped nicely across the top of the water. There was something very soothing about watching the ripples drift farther and farther away.

“Yes, he did,” I said, watching the water, my back to Marie. “He broke my heart.”

She paused. I could hear her breathing behind me.

“Go ahead and ask what happened,” I said. “I don’t mind telling you.”

And so she did, and I did. For the first time in the nearly twenty years since Phillip became Phil, I told someone besides a psychiatrist what happened, the insecurities and the lies and finally the night it ended. I never looked at Marie, I just kept skipping stones into the lake. When I was finished, I turned around and saw she had tears in her eyes.

“I’m so sorry that happened to you,” she said softly.

“Yes,” I said. “It rather sucked.” I took a few steps toward her and dropped down onto a rock. I put my arm around her shoulders. “But wait,” I said, “I haven’t told you the best part yet.” Marie looked right into my eyes, and I said, “I haven’t told you his name.”

“He’s someone I know?”

“Yes.”

Now she sat straight up. “Do I know him well?”

“Not as well as I do.”

She leaned in close and put her hands on my knees. “Oh my god, Katherine, who is it?”

I smiled. “Phillip Rogers.”

It took a second. No one ever called him by his full name anymore, even me. Then she got it and her eyes bugged out so wide I thought they might pop out of her head. She was blinking crazily and nodding and shaking like I’d just told her she’d won the lottery.

“You’re talking about Phil?”

“That’s right.”

“Our CEO?”

“That’s right.”

“Pardon my language,” she said, “but are you shitting me?”

“I shit you not, my friend,” I said, and stood up and brushed the dirt from my butt. “I shit you not.”

Marie sat in silence for a while, and finally she said, “It must be so hard for you in the office every day.”

“Sometimes I think it’s too much,” I said. “Sometimes I think I need to leave. I almost have, several times. He’s moved mountains to keep me, I’m not exactly sure why. I’d like to think it’s because he believes he can’t afford to lose me, but sometimes I think what happened back then has something to do with it, like he can’t let go, or he feels guilty. Or a little bit of both.”

“I don’t know how you do it.”

I laughed. “Well, maybe one of these days I’ll just up and get the hell out. Move back to Connecticut or maybe here.”

“You can’t do that,” she said, in a serious tone. “It would kill us all.”

“I’m sure the bank would survive.”

“I don’t mean the bank. I mean all of
us.
The women who work there. You’re an inspiration to us all.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “Most of them hate me.”

“No, they do not,” she said, punctuating her words sharply. “They love you, because the men fear you. You’re the only woman I’ve ever met that men are afraid of.”

She meant it. I could tell. “Well, that isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

“I’m sure it’s tough,” she said, “but we need you, boss.”

I strolled around a bit, looking at the earth, at the blue-gray stones, at the soft grass, at the shadows cast by the giant pines, at anything other than Marie. Then I looked up into the sky, took off my sunglasses, and let the golden sunlight warm my face. “Well, that feels good,” I said, my eyes closed. “I’m not sure it makes life worth living, but it feels good.”

BROOKE

I DIDN’T GET TO show him the pictures.

Not right away, at least. He attacked me before I could show him, before I could even mention them, before I could say anything at all, and that was fine. We’ve been married a long time; at this point our best communication is nonverbal. Like if we’re at a party and he glances at me and I give him that look that says: I’m done here, time to go home. Or if we’re with the kids all day and they’re bickering and Scott shoots me the glance that means: I need a half-hour of peace or I am going to have to sever one of my own toes. I know him, he knows me, our eyes can usually say every bit as much as our lips, sometimes more.