The Deep End (35 page)

“Mom!”

“What’s going on here?” Paul asks as he and Lulu sit back down on the quilt, eager to join in the gaiety, aware that something has changed.

“I think Mom’s been out in the sun too long,” Robin remarks, but the words are full of affection and not scorn. Joanne reaches over and takes Robin’s hand in her own. Robin doesn’t pull away.

“So, what do you think?” he is asking after they have bid their daughters a tearful goodbye.

Joanne wipes a few leftover tears from her eyes and smiles. “I think it went well.”

“So do I. Robin seems to have come around.”

“She told me she was miserable for the first week, that she was determined not to have a good time, but that everyone was so nice to her, and there was so much to do, she couldn’t help herself. Plus, I think meeting that boy, Ron, funny his name is Ron,” she adds, noticing Paul wince, “he probably had something to do with her change of mood.”

“I never quite understood the point of having an all-girls’ camp if you’re going to have an all-boys’ camp right beside it,” Paul says, flipping on the windshield wipers.

“It was nice that the rain held off.”

“It’s going to be god-awful driving home though,” he tells her. “We’re driving into a real storm.”

“Are you hungry?” she asks him minutes later, the rain now pounding against the front window.

“Not really,” Paul answers. “I ate three hamburgers at lunch.”

“I was thinking that maybe we could stop at one of these lodges along the way for something to eat and wait until the rain lets up a bit.” She looks over at Paul, aware that he is staring at her, feeling her body starting to tremble. “We could have dinner … or something,” she adds, her voice breaking.

He pulls the car into the parking lot of the next motel. “Or something,” he says.

This is what she has been imagining these past few months, praying silently that she is not dreaming now. He is on her and over her and inside her and everywhere
around her, filling her and loving her and telling her that he needs her, and she is telling him the same things.

They have been here in this room, with its awful red broadloom and tacky deep purple bedspread, for several hours. The rain has stopped, but if Paul has noticed he has ignored it.

At first she was afraid, afraid he might find her ridiculous or pathetic, perhaps a combination of both, afraid how her body might look and feel to him after months of little Judy’s, but soon he was whispering how beautiful she was, and his hands were soft and reassuring and familiar, and they had forgotten nothing of what they had learned over the course of their twenty years together. They still knew where to touch her and how. Techniques of the heart, she thinks, something Steve Henry couldn’t understand. And soon any embarrassment or fears she might have had passed, and she was lost in the act of love she had been raised to believe it should be. After they were finished the first time, when she initially became aware that the rain had stopped and was fearful he might suggest that they leave, he had simply reached over and brought her to him once again, and they had made love a second time, and Joanne thought that this was the best time in all their years together.

And now he is inside her again, inside her and all around her, as they roll over, exchanging positions, laughing when they find themselves uncomfortably intertwined, finally lying sweat-drenched and exhausted in each other’s arms, his body arranging itself around hers for sleep. Joanne feels her own body slowly relax though she knows sleep will be impossible. But it doesn’t matter.
They are sharing the same bed. And when he wakes up, she will be beside him.

“Do you have a nine o’clock appointment?” she asks as he pulls his car into their driveway the next morning. It is almost nine o’clock already and he has to drive all the way back into the city.

“No, I told them on Friday not to expect me until after ten.”

Joanne feels a strange stab of anxiety. He told his office on Friday that he wouldn’t be in until ten on Monday? Had he known then what would happen between them? Had he been so sure? She dismisses the uncomfortable thought. It is irrelevant, after all. He obviously planned that they would reconcile this weekend; this is what he means. Why then does she feel so unsettled? Why has she felt this way since he pulled himself out of bed this morning and hurriedly showered and dressed, saying little on the drive back into New York, smiling guiltily in her direction only when he could no longer avoid her gaze.

Paul walks her to the front door, carrying the bags of items that the girls have sent back with them. Things they no longer need, Joanne thinks as Paul rests the bags on the doorstep.

“Do you have time for some coffee?” Joanne asks. Should she ask him now when he plans to move back in?

“I better not. I still have to change, shave,” he tells her.

“Will I see you tonight?” she ventures, the words sticking in her throat. Why is she hedging?

“Joanne …”

“What’s happening, Paul?” she asks when she can no longer bear the suspense.

“I hoped you’d understand about last night,” he begins.

“Understand what? I understand that we made love, that you told me that you loved me …”

“I do love you.”

“What else is there to understand?”

“That it doesn’t change anything,” he is saying and Joanne finds that she is backing into the doorway, trying to get away from his words. “Maybe I shouldn’t have let last night happen,” he continues, “but I wanted it to happen, and face it, Joanne,
you
wanted it to happen. We’re consenting adults …”

“What are you trying to tell me?”

“That what happened last night doesn’t change anything,” he repeats. “That I’m not ready to come home.”

“Last night …”

“Doesn’t change anything.”

Joanne begins fishing wildly in her purse. “I can’t find my keys.”

“I didn’t mean to mislead you.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me these things
before
we made love?” She flings her purse to the ground. It lands beside the bags of returned goods. Appropriate, Joanne thinks, hearing her voice rising in anger. “I can’t find my goddamn keys!” She buries her face in her hands.

“Joanne …”

“Just leave me alone.”

“I can’t leave you outside on the steps crying, for God’s sake.”

“Then find my keys and I’ll cry inside. You won’t have to watch.”

“Joanne …”

“Find my keys!” she screams.

Paul scoops up Joanne’s purse and rifles through it. Seconds later, he finds the house keys and hands them to Joanne. “I see you found your old set,” he comments absently.

Joanne grabs them from his hand, glancing at the keys she thought she misplaced long ago.

“It’s a wonder you can find anything in there,” he says, trying to joke.

Joanne fumbles helplessly at the front lock, unable to make the proper connection. Suddenly she feels Paul’s hand on hers, twisting the key in the lock for her. She hears it click, feels the door fall open. She stands in the doorway, unable to move as his hand withdraws. Mission accomplished, she thinks, time to make a clean getaway.

“Don’t you have to shut the alarm off?” he asks.

Joanne moves like an automaton to the alarm box as Paul lifts the various bags inside.

“I’m sorry, Joanne,” he offers when it becomes obvious that she will say nothing to make his departure an easy one. “I’ll call you,” he adds weakly.

Joanne says nothing. She waits until she hears his car pull away before stretching back with her foot and kicking the front door closed.

H
e is sleeping when Joanne enters the room.

Joanne stares at the old face, the withered body completely hidden by the gray-white sheets, the New York Yankees baseball cap temporarily dislodged and lying next to him on his pillow, revealing an egg-shaped head from which escape only a few stray gray-white hairs. She has never known him with hair, she thinks, recalling that even as a child, she can remember hair only at the sides of his head. This always felt right, natural. Grandfathers should be bald, she decides. Bald and overweight and jolly. How comforting our stereotypes are, she thinks, sitting down beside the sleeping old man and resting her hand across the stiff mountain of sheets. How much more pleasant than reality.

She is not used to Mondays. For the past three years, she has visited this room every Saturday when the halls are busy with family members paying their weekly respects to their not-so-distant pasts. She didn’t realize how still everything became during the week. It seems especially quiet here today. Except for nurses’ footsteps and the occasional confused cry emanating from a
patient’s open door, there is little sound. Like her grandfather, most of the elderly residents are asleep, though it is not yet one o’clock in the afternoon. She has come on her lunch hour. Ron told her to take the rest of the day off, to take all the time she needs.

He had only to take one look at her red, swollen eyes to know that she had been crying. Talk to me, he said, leading her out of the crowded reception room, away from the curious eyes of his waiting patients, and into the one examining room that was still empty. He said nothing about the fact that she was late, asked her only what was the matter. She broke down again—has she ever stopped?—and told him everything that happened between herself and Paul, waiting for him to pass judgment. Instead, he took her in his arms and held her. Take the rest of the day off, he urged, I can manage. And they had both laughed. All right, he quickly amended, I
can’t
manage—take a long lunch. Take as long as you need, he repeated gently.

But she couldn’t eat lunch, couldn’t swallow, couldn’t stop the newly reactivated, seemingly endless stream of tears. And so she got into her car and drove, not sure where she was going until she saw the familiar institution, strolled the uncompromisingly institutional halls.

And now she is here, sitting beside an old man who has given her a wealth of memories, but who no longer remembers who she is. She isn’t sure herself anymore who she is, she realizes, looking around the room. What is she doing in a room with two sleeping old men, neither one of them aware of her presence? Joanne stares at the figure of Sam Hensley, thinking how exposed he appears without the combined presence of his daughter and
grandson. She is used to sharing her space with them. Another signpost vanished.

The old man’s eyes flicker open. As he stares at her, the many lines that fill his ancient face crease upward into a series of small smiles. “Joanne?”

“Grampa!” The tears, which Joanne has been barely managing to keep in check, return and spill down her cheeks. “You know me?”

He looks puzzled, straining to sit up.

“Here, I’ll help you,” she says quickly, moving behind him to prop up his pillows and free his arms from their starchy constraints.

“I think there’s something at the foot of the bed that you can turn,” he says clearly.

Joanne is instantly at the foot of the bed, cranking the handle to raise the bed so that her grandfather can comfortably assume a sitting position. The baseball cap on his pillow falls into his lap. He grabs it and places it on top of his head, his eyes merry, twinkling.

“We’re going to take the series this year,” he smiles, and Joanne realizes that his teeth are missing. He doesn’t seem to notice, and if he does, he doesn’t care. He looks like a dolphin, she thinks wondrously, her own smile stretching widely, some tears falling into her open mouth. “Why are you crying?” he asks.

“Because I’m happy,” Joanne tells him, realizing that this is true. He knows who she is. “I’m so glad to see you,” she says.

“You should come more often. Your mother comes every week.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I’ll try to …”

“I’m thirsty.”

“Would you like some water?”

“There’s a glass on the table.” He points to the bedside table on which rests a glass with a straw. The glass is half-filled with water.

“I’ll get you some fresh water,” Joanne offers, the glass already in her hand.

“No, this will be fine. I just want to wet my lips.” He sucks on the curved straw before returning the glass to Joanne. “They get dry. They never get the humidity right in this place. I’ve been telling them for years. Look at you,” he says suddenly, watching as she returns the glass to the small table. “You’ve gotten so grown up.” Joanne laughs, wiping more tears from her face. “How old are you now?” he asks.

“Forty-one,” Joanne answers.

“Forty-one?” He shakes his head. “That must make your mother … what?”

“Sixty-seven,” Joanne says quickly.

“Sixty-seven! My little Linda is sixty-seven. I can’t believe it. How’s your husband?” The questions come rapid-fire now, as if he knows he has only a short time to get them all in.

“Fine,” Joanne responds automatically. “He’s good.”

“And your children? You have how many?”

“Two.”

“Two. Forgive me, I sometimes forget. Their names …?”

“Robin and Lulu. Lana, really, but we’ve always called her Lulu.”

“Little Lulu, I remember. Do you have pictures?”

Joanne searches through her purse. “Just these.” She locates an old leather photo holder. “They’re a few years old.” She dusts off the plastic which covers the two
photographs. “They’re bigger now. Robin, especially, has changed quite a bit.” She pauses, checking to see whether her grandfather is still listening. “They’re at camp for the summer,” she continues when she sees that he is. “We were up to see them yesterday. They’re having a wonderful time. They send you their love,” she adds, and his smile broadens. “I’ll bring them up for a visit as soon as they get home. Would you like that?”

He nods, and the rim of his baseball cap slips down over his eyes. Joanne quickly adjusts it.

“Minnie bought me this hat,” he tells Joanne proudly, referring to Joanne’s grandmother. “Even though she was always a Dodger fan herself.” He closes his eyes and Joanne fears for an instant that she has lost him, that he has returned to his more comfortable world, but when he opens them again, they are still focused, almost mischievous. “Do you have time to play a few hands of gin?” he asks.