Temptation (3 page)

‘Nice. Does our marriage counsellor have an ex-husband?’

‘Yes – and he ran off with a twenty-five-year-old yoga instructor.’

‘We’re obviously talking about an LA setting.’

‘I was thinking San Diego.’

‘Good call. The Southern California lifestyle without the LA baggage. Is the marriage counsellor dating?’

‘Relentlessly – and with disastrous results.’

‘And meanwhile, her clients . . . ?’

‘They’ll raise a smile, believe me.’

‘A title?’

‘
Talk It Over
.’

‘Sold then,’ she said.

I tried not to smile too broadly.

‘You know I can’t start work until after the second season . . . ’

‘Alison briefed me on that already . . . and that’s fine with me. The important thing is: I’ve got you.’

She briefly touched the top of my hand. I didn’t move it away.

‘I’m pleased,’ I said.

She met my stare. And asked, ‘Dinner tomorrow night?’

We met at her place in West Hollywood. As soon as I was through the door, we were tearing each other’s clothes off. Much later, as we lay sprawled across her bed, sipping a post-coital glass of Pinot Noir, she asked me, ‘Are you a good liar?’

‘You mean, about something like this?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Well, it’s only the second time it’s happened in the eleven years I’ve been with Lucy.’

‘When was the first time?’

‘A one-night stand back in ’99 with an actress I met in the book shop one night. Lucy was back east at the time, visiting her parents with Caitlin.’

‘That’s it? Your only extramarital transgression?’

I nodded.

‘My, my – you do have a conscience.’

‘It is a weakness, I know – especially out here.’

‘Are you going to feel guilty now?’

‘No,’ I said without hesitation.

‘Why’s that?’

‘Because things between Lucy and myself are now very different. And also . . . ’

‘Yes?’ she asked,

‘. . . because . . . well, because it’s you.’

She kissed me softly on the lips.

‘Is that a confession?’

‘I guess it is.’

‘Well, I have one too. Ten minutes after meeting you yesterday, I felt: this is the guy. I felt it all last night and all today as I counted down the hours to seven o’clock, and you walking through my door. And now . . . ’

She ran her right index finger down the curve of my jaw.

‘. . . now I’m not going to let you go.’

I kissed her. ‘Is that a promise?’ I asked.

‘Girl Scout’s honor. But you know what this means . . . in the short term, anyway?’

‘Yes – I’m going to have to start learning how to lie.’

Actually I had already started, having covered my first evening with Sally by telling Lucy that I was flying to Vegas overnight to do a little look-around for a future episode. Sally didn’t even mind when I used her phone at eleven to call home and tell my wife that I was happily ensconced in The Bellagio and missing her terribly. When I arrived home the next evening, I studied Lucy carefully for any telltale signs of suspicion or doubt. I also wondered if she had perhaps called The Bellagio to see if I was actually registered there. But she greeted me pleasantly, and didn’t drop any hints about my whereabouts last night. In fact, she couldn’t have been more affectionate, pulling me off to bed early that night. And yes, the guilt chord did ring between my ears. But its reverberations were silenced by an even louder realization: I was madly in love with Sally Birmingham.

And she was in love with me. Her certainty was
overwhelming. I was the man with whom she wanted to spend the rest of her life. We would have brilliant fun together. We would have great careers, wonderful children. And we’d never lapse into the passionless ennui that characterized most marriages – because how could we ever be anything but ardent about each other? We would be golden – because we were meant to be.

There was only one problem, though – I was still married to somebody else. And I was desperately worried about the effect that any future domestic decampment might have on Caitlin. Sally was completely understanding.

‘I’m not telling you to walk out now. You should only make that move when you’re ready – and when you think Caitlin’s ready. I’ll wait. Because you’re worth the wait.’

When you’re ready. Not
if
. An explicit
when
. But Sally’s definitiveness didn’t disturb me. Nor did I think events were moving too quickly after just two weeks. Because I shared her certainty about our future together. Just as I privately fretted about the pain and damage I was about to inflict on my wife and child.

To Sally’s credit, she didn’t once pressure me into leaving home. Or, at least, not for another eight months – by which time all my work on the second series was finished, and I had become completely expert in covering my extramarital tracks. When deadline pressure on the three episodes I was writing became particularly intense, I decamped for two weeks to the Four Seasons Hotel in Santa Barbara, on the pretext of needing to lock myself away for a concentrated work blitz. And work I did – though Sally spent one of the weeks with me, not to mention both weekends. When the show moved to Chicago for a week of exterior filming, I
decided to stay on for a few days afterwards to catch up with my old network of friends, though, in truth, that weekend Sally and I hardly left our suite at the W. Through careful juggling of our respective schedules – not to mention the use of a room at the Westwood Marquis – we were able to spend two lunchtimes a week with each other, and at least one evening at her apartment.

I was often amazed at just how good I had become at covering my tracks and inventing storylines. Granted, it could be argued that, as a professional storyteller, I was simply practising my craft. But in the past I had always considered myself an appalling liar – to the point where, a few days after my one previous extramarital encounter in ’96, Lucy turned to me and said, ‘You’ve slept with someone else, haven’t you?’

Of course, I blanched. Of course, I denied it all vehemently. Of course, she didn’t believe a word I said.

‘Go on, tell me I’m hallucinating,’ she said. ‘But I can see right through you, David. You’re transparent.’

‘I am not lying.’

‘Oh, please.’

‘Lucy . . . ’

But she walked out of the room, and didn’t mention the matter again. Within a week, my intense guilt (and my equally intense fear of discovery) had dissipated – cushioned by my silent vow never to be unfaithful again.

It was a vow I kept for the next six years – until I met Sally Birmingham. But after that first night at her apartment, I felt little guilt, little anguish. Perhaps because my marriage had become governed by the law of diminishing returns. Or perhaps because, from the outset of my romance
with Sally, I knew that I had never felt so ardent about anyone before.

This certainty made me an expert in subterfuge – to the point where Lucy never once questioned me about my whereabouts on a night when I was ‘working late’. In fact, she couldn’t have been more affectionate, more supportive during this time. No doubt our improved material circumstances had enhanced her affection for me (or, at least, that was my interpretation). But once I delivered the final drafts of my episodes, and began editing the four other scripts that had been written for the new series, Sally began to make increasingly loud noises about ‘regularizing’ our situation, and moving in together.

‘This clandestine situation has to end,’ she told me. ‘I want you for myself . . . if you still want me.’

‘Of course I want you. You know that.’

But I also wanted to postpone the final day of reckoning – the moment when I sat down with Lucy and broke her heart. So I kept stalling. And Sally started getting im patient. And I kept saying: ‘Just give me another month.’

Then, one evening, I got home around midnight – after a long pre-production dinner with Brad Bruce. When I walked in, I found Lucy sitting in the living room. My suitcase was by her armchair.

‘Let me ask you something,’ she said. ‘And it’s a question I’ve wanted to know for the past eight months: Is she a moaner, or is she one of those ice-maiden types who, despite the drop-dead looks, really hates the idea of anyone touching her?’

‘I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I said, trying to sound bemused.

‘You mean, you honestly don’t know the name of the woman you’ve been fucking for the last seven – or is it eight – months?’

‘Lucy, there is no one.’

‘So, Sally Birmingham is no one?’

I sat down.

‘That certainly gave you pause for thought,’ she said, her voice even-tempered.

I finally spoke. ‘How do you know her name?’

‘I had someone find out for me.’

‘You what?’

‘I hired a private investigator.’

‘You spied on me?’

‘Don’t play the moral outrage card, asshole. You were obviously seeing someone else . . . ’

How did she know that? I had been so careful, so circumspect.

‘. . . and when it was clear from your constant absences that this was something more than just a little ego-enhancing fling, I hired a private eye . . . ’

‘Wasn’t that expensive?’

‘Thirty-eight hundred dollars . . . which I will reclaim, one way or another, in the divorce settlement.’

I heard myself saying: ‘Lucy, I don’t want a divorce.’

Her voice remained steady, strangely calm. ‘I don’t care what you want, David. I am divorcing you. This marriage is finished.’

I suddenly felt a desperate fear – even though she was doing the dirty work for me, and instigating the beginning of the end. I was getting exactly what I wanted . . . and it scared the hell out of me. I said, ‘If you had only come to me at the outset . . . ’

Her face tightened. ‘And what?’ she said, the anger now showing. ‘Tried to remind you that we had eleven years’ history, and a daughter, and that, despite all the crap of the last decade, we’d actually come through and were finally living well.’

She broke off, on the verge of tears. I reached for her. She immediately pulled away.

‘You’re never touching me again,’ she said.

Silence. Then she said, ‘When I found out the name of your squeeze, do you know what I first thought? “He’s really trading upwards, isn’t he? The senior head of comedy at Fox Television.
Magna cum laude
from Princeton. And a babe to boot.” The private investigator was a very thorough guy. He even supplied pictures of Ms Birmingham. She’s very photogenic, isn’t she?’

‘We could have talked this out . . . ’

‘No, there was nothing to talk out. I certainly wasn’t going to play the poor little woman in some country-and-western song, begging her faithless husband to come on home.’

‘So why did you stay silent all this time?’

‘Because I was hoping you might come to your senses . . . ’ She broke off again, clearly trying to keep her emotions in check. This time I didn’t reach for her.

‘I even gave you a deadline,’ she said. ‘Six months. Which, like a fool, I extended to seven, then to eight. Then, around a week ago, I could see you had decided to leave . . . ’

‘I hadn’t reached that decision,’ I lied.

‘Bullshit. It was written all over you . . . in neon lights. Well, I decided to make the decision for you. So, get out. Now.’

She stood up. So did I.

‘Lucy, please. Let’s try to . . . ’

‘What? Pretend the last eight months didn’t happen?’

‘How about Caitlin?’

‘My, my, you’re finally thinking about your daughter . . . ’

‘I want to talk to her.’

‘Fine – you can come back tomorrow . . . ’

I was going to argue my case for staying the night on the sofa, and trying to discuss everything in the saner light of day. But I knew she wouldn’t listen. Anyway, this was what I wanted. Well, wasn’t it?

I picked up my suitcase. I said, ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I don’t accept apologies from shits,’ Lucy said and stormed upstairs.

I sat in the car for ten minutes, immobile, wondering what I should do next. Suddenly, I found myself on my feet, racing back to my front door, and pounding my fist against it, yelling my wife’s name. After a moment, I heard her voice behind the door.

‘Go away, David.’

‘Give me a chance to –’

‘What? Tell me more lies?’

‘I’ve made a terrible mistake . . . ’

‘Too bad. You should have thought about that months ago.’

‘I’m just asking for the opportunity –’

‘There is nothing more to say.’

‘Lucy . . . ’

‘We’re done here.’

I dug out my house keys. But as I tried putting the first one into the lock, I heard Lucy throw the inside bolt.

‘Don’t think about trying to get back in here, David. It’s over. Just leave. Now.’

I must have spent the next five minutes thumping the door again, pleading my case, begging her to take me back. But I knew that she was no longer interested in hearing what I had to say. Part of me was absolutely terrified at this realization – my little family, destroyed by my own vanity, my new-found success. Yet another part of me understood why I had travelled down this destructive path. I also knew what would happen if the door suddenly opened now and Lucy beckoned me inside: I would be returning to a life without edge. And I remembered something a writer friend told me after he left his wife for another woman. ‘Of course the marriage had a few problems – but none that were so overwhelming. Of course there was a bit of ennui – but that’s also par for the course after twelve years of togetherness. Fundamentally, there was nothing that wrong between us. So why did I go? Because a little voice inside my head kept asking me one simple question:
is this everything life is going to be?
’

But this recollection was superseded by a voice bellowing inside my head:
I can’t do this
. More than that, I thought: you’re so conforming to male cliché. And you’re also upending everything that is important in your life for a headlong dash into the unknown. So I fished out my cellphone and desperately punched in my home number. When Lucy answered, I said, ‘Darling, I’ll do anything . . . ’