Counterpointe (19 page)

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to step on any toes...so to speak.” There was more than a hint of malice in Joyce’s smile.

It reminded Clare of Lisa, and was perhaps why she decided to not let Joyce get away with it. “That was quite good, actually. You’re very clever.”

Joyce blushed an angry red.

Likely it was a relief to everyone when the evening ended.

“So that was Joyce Willette,” she said as she and Rob cleaned up. “She’s very attractive.”

“She’s a barracuda. If you hadn’t come along, I might not have noticed until she devoured me.” He set down the stack of blue, green, and yellow plates and pulled her into his arms.

“You handled her perfectly.” He rubbed his chin gently against the top of her head. “I heard a rumor she interviewed at Michigan. If we’re lucky, and the stars are aligned, they’ll take her off our hands.”

“I bet she goes straight home and looks in her mirror, trying to figure out what you saw in me that you didn’t see in her.”

“Why would you think that?”

“Do you ever look at me, Rob?”

He pulled back slightly, his hands on her shoulders, frowning. “Of course I do.”

“What do you see?”

“The woman I love.”

“But my hair. It’s going white and I’m too thin.” The tears came before she could stop them.

“Clare, love, what’s this about?”

“I think something’s wrong with me.”

“What?” He rubbed her arms, giving her a worried look. “Are you okay? I noticed you hardly ate anything.”

She almost told him what happened to the casserole, but then she remembered, he’d had seconds. “I’m so tired all the time.”

He snuggled her against his chest. “Maybe you better go for a checkup.”

She was sorry she’d brought it up. She hated doctors. It was, after all, a doctor who kept insisting her leg would never again be strong enough for her to dance.

Rob looked up to find Greg Olson standing in his office doorway.

“Wanted to apologize,” Greg said. “For Saturday night. For bringing Joyce to your place. I had no idea.”

“I figured that.”

“I told her she stepped over the line. She didn’t like it.”

“Better watch your back.”

Greg frowned. “It also explains something else.”

“What’s that?”

“She’s made comments in the Tenure and Promotions Committee that your request for promotion to full professor is premature.”

“Doesn’t surprise me. She told me if I didn’t already have tenure, she’d do her best to ensure I didn’t get it.”

Greg smiled. “What did you do to her? Throw her over for Clare?”

“Exactly.”

Greg’s grin widened. “Damned if given the choice I wouldn’t have done the same thing. Don’t sweat the promotion. I’ll make sure you get a fair shake.”

“Appreciate it.”

“And I appreciate you giving me the chance to discover the real Joyce sooner rather than later.”

“Definitely my pleasure.”

Pregnant
. It had taken the doctor Rob nagged Clare to see only a few minutes to pinpoint the cause of her listlessness. Rob. She needed to be with him. To share what was happening to her, to them, but when she arrived at Northeastern, he was in class.

“When will he be finished?”

The assistant glanced at the clock. “Fifteen minutes. You can wait here, if you like.”

“Please. Can you tell me what room he’s in?”

Clare found the door to the lecture hall propped partially open. She peeked in to verify Rob was there, then she leaned against the wall to wait, listening to the flow of his voice.

“The toxicology case for Monday is that of a young female who appears to be in good health until she starts to lose significant weight. She complains of fatigue, difficulty concentrating, and shortness of breath. She walks with a slight shuffle. Nothing else remarkable shows up on physical exam. Okay, what other questions do you have?”

“Does she smoke, drink?”

“Smokes ten to twenty cigarettes a day, has an occasional glass of wine.”

“Diet?”

“Vegan, when she can muster an appetite. Eats mostly apples, core and all.”

“She’s not a horse, is she?”

There was a ripple of laughter. The students were obviously fully engaged and enjoying the class.

“What does she do for a living?” “Where does she get her water?” The questions and Rob’s answers continued, but Clare no longer listened to the words.

After several minutes, the hallway began to fill as students poured out of nearby rooms. Then Rob was there. “Clare? What are you doing here? Are you okay?”

She straightened, wincing when both ankle and knee twinged at the sudden movement. “I’m fine. I just...I was passing by.” She faced Rob and made sure her expression was serious. “You know, the woman you were describing to your class? Maybe she’s pregnant.”

Rob froze and looked at her intently before taking a deep breath and pulling her into his arms. “Thank God. Thank God you’re all right.”

Only in that moment did she understand how worried he’d been about her—a woman who’d lost too much weight, had no energy or appetite, and although she might no longer walk with a shuffle, her gait was slow and careful. Rob leaned back and continued to examine her, as if he’d forgotten what she looked like.

“So what was wrong with the woman? The one you told the class about?”

“Oh. Cyanide poisoning.”

“I thought cyanide killed you in like, five minutes.”

“If you take a big enough dose. She was poisoning herself slowly, with apple seeds and cigarettes.”

“On purpose?”

“Not on purpose. Clare, you’re happy about this, aren’t you?”

Clearly, he was. She leaned in to hug him, hoping he’d accept it in place of an actual answer, and was relieved when he took her arm and walked with her to his office.

As soon as they were inside with the door closed, he took her back in his arms. “So, when are we having this baby?”

“Late August.” And impossible to imagine on this freezing cold day the heat that would be baking the city into somnolence by then.

“You’re happy about it, aren’t you?” Rob tipped her chin and searched her eyes.

She couldn’t duck the question a second time. “It’s a huge surprise. I’m...still getting used to the idea.”

Rob didn’t seem to be having a problem adjusting. His lips stretched into a broad grin. “Guess it’s a good thing we have seven months then.”

Later, Rob would decide the slow downward slide of their marriage from happiness to despair began before Clare’s pregnancy, but at the time, he was certain it explained her poor appetite, growing indifference to her appearance, and lack of enthusiasm.

Then she lost the baby.

He knew she needed time to recover, but now, weeks later, she still wasn’t eating, was increasingly lethargic. He tried to hide his own grief from Clare, not wanting to add the weight of his sadness to her burden. Although, sometimes he wondered if she would notice if he grieved openly.

Then came the morning he found Mona had died in her sleep. He’d knelt to give the little dog a pat. She had gone deaf and didn’t always react when he came out of the bedroom. Today there was no response to his touch, no tongue swipe in greeting. The small body was no longer even warm. He wrapped Mona in a towel then went to tell Clare.

He sat on the side of the bed and laid a hand on her shoulder. “Clare?”

After a moment, she stirred and opened her eyes.

“I have bad news, love. Mona died last night.”

Clare blinked, then her expression changed to comprehension and pain. “No. No. She c-can’t have...”

He lay alongside her, holding her shaking body in his arms. Her tears soaked the shoulder of his shirt. She hadn’t cried, at least in his presence, after she lost the baby. So perhaps these tears were for both her losses.

He made no attempt to stem his own tears, and together, in each other’s arms, he and Clare wept.

“What are we going to do, Rob? We d-don’t have anywhere to bury her.”

“We can have her cremated, then the next time we go sailing we’ll take her with us and sprinkle her on the waters. Would that be okay?”

After a moment, still clinging to him, Clare nodded her head. He continued to hold her until she moved out of his arms. He waited while she dressed, then she went with him to the vet’s. Two days later, he collected the ashes, but by the time the weather was warm enough to go sailing, the rhythm of their life together had fixed into a new pattern.

Now, when he arrived home, not only was there no furry greeting from Mona, there was no scent of something delicious floating in the air. Dinner had become an endless series of frozen entrées smelling of damp cardboard as they heated in the microwave. There was also no kiss from Clare followed by her sitting with him, sipping wine, as they shared the details of their days.

He suggested she go to a therapist, something she repeatedly rejected. Finally, in desperation, he called Clare’s mother.

“Rob, oh my God, is something wrong?”

The panic in her voice was understandable given the last time he’d called her was after Clare lost the baby and was admitted to the hospital.

“No, no. It’s...I wanted to talk to you about Clare. Did she...that is, did you know Mona died?”

“Oh, what a shame. No, she never mentioned it.”

He could hear sympathy but also relief in his mother-in-law’s voice. “She does call you though, right?”

“Every Wednesday afternoon, like clockwork.”

“Did she ever talk about the baby?”

“She said she feels tired and sad. Do you think it’s more than that?”