Through the Heart (30 page)

“How much time do you have?” I asked again.

“I don’t know,” she said, and I heard her voice getting thick. She put her lipstick away carefully as if that simple action needed all of her attention.

“We’ll find another doctor. Timothy and I will help with this. Don’t worry. Okay? We’ll be here for you.”

She looked up then—looked intently into my face and said, “If you really want to help, you’ll come home.”

I felt sick to my stomach.

“Of course I’ll come home to see you, and you can come to New York, if you feel well enough,” I told her.

“No, I mean move back home.”

This was it. This was the nightmare I had been dreading without even knowing it. I thought I was afraid of disagreements or unpleasantness but, no, it was this. This tidal wave of guilt. What are you supposed to do in this situation? I felt like the right thing to do would be to go back home and be there for my mother. Of course that was the right thing, wasn’t it? And yet, I couldn’t do it. I didn’t even need to think about it to know I couldn’t.

“I’ll be there for you, but I can’t move back home again.”

She fumbled in her purse and pulled out a tissue. But again she wouldn’t look at me.

Then, almost desperately, I said, “Mom, I’m getting
married
.” It was an appeal. I knew it as I said it. I wanted her to let me off the hook. I wanted her to tell me it was okay.

She didn’t. She was clutching the tissue when she said, “Nora, I don’t want to die alone.”

“What about Deirdre? Can’t Deirdre move in with you? Then you’d have the kids there as well. You wouldn’t be alone.”

“And I’d have no peace. Her kids scream all the time, and anyway Deirdre won’t do it. She doesn’t care. You know that.”

“But you two seemed to be getting along so well recently.”

“Deidre’s fine when you give her what she wants, but forget it if you actually need anything from her.” My mother took the tissue and blotted her lips.

“Did you ask?”

“Yes, I asked,” my mother snapped, tossing the tissue angrily into the wastebasket. “And if you can do one thing for me, I’m asking you not to bring this up to her. She didn’t think I should tell you at all, and the last thing I need on top of all this is a lecture from her.”

So that was the look my mother and Deirdre had exchanged when I picked them up at the airport.

It might be a terrible thing to think, but I wished that my mother hadn’t told me. During all the years I was home, I wanted so much to know what was actually going on. And now, I wanted nothing but
not
to know.

My mother recovered quickly from her little spurt of anger. She looked at me again, with that look I couldn’t bear.

“I need you, honey. I need you with me.”

“Mom, I . . .” and I couldn’t go on.

But she knew without me having to say it.

She turned on a dime, from pleading to vicious. “You think you’ve found it, don’t you? You think now you’re going to live happily ever after?” my mother said. “You’ve found Prince Charming, with looks and money and charm, and you’re just going to ride off into the sunset?”

“I just want a life.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that living with me was like a death. Is that what you’re trying to say?”

“No—”

But my mother wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise. “You don’t have to tell me. I know my life is like a living death. Ever since I had you girls, and you tied me down, and you took everything from me. You were why your father left. When you were born, you cried all the time, and he couldn’t take it. You took my life from me, and now you won’t even be there for me at the end of it. Forget I even asked.”

It had been a long time since I’d heard the story of how I was the reason why my father had left. She used say it to me all the time when I was growing up—that I was the reason my father left, that I was the reason she was all alone. It used to really upset me. I found it still did, but not enough to get me to change my mind.

My mother went on, “Just forget I said anything. And, for God’s sake, don’t say anything to your sister.”

As if she had been summoned, the bathroom door swung open and we both turned as if caught. Deirdre took one look at my face, and she knew. She rounded on my mother.

“Don’t tell me,” Deirdre said to our mother. “I can’t believe you did this. And
tonight
.”

I tried to smooth things over. “It’s okay. It’s fine. Really.”

“It’s not fine. It’s
not
fine,” Deirdre said.

“Stay out of this, Deirdre,” my mother said. “I swear to God, you stay out of this.”

“No way. I’ve had enough.” Deirdre was obviously furious. “I told you I’d keep my mouth shut, but it was on the condition that you didn’t pull something like this. You’re sick, you know that? You’re really sick.”

I broke in, “Deirdre, it’s okay. I know you were trying to protect me, but maybe it’s best that it’s all out now.”

“You don’t even know the half of it,” my sister said.

At that moment the bathroom door swung open again, and Timothy’s sister, Emily, came in.

“Wow, crowded in the bathroom,” Emily said in that way she had; the words were normal enough, but there was hostility beneath them.

Even my mother could hear it. “We were just going,” my mother said. And she looked pointedly at me.

“Yes, right,” I said. But as I followed her out, Deirdre grabbed my wrist.

“I need to talk to you,” she whispered.

“Okay. Later,” I said, but I was thinking that it was the last thing I wanted. My sister and I would probably just get into a big fight over it as well. I thought if I could, I would avoid her until after the wedding.

“Where have you been?” Timothy asked me, when I got back to the table. “You were gone for ages. I think I want to add something to the vows tomorrow—I want to put a five-minute cap on your abandoning me at dinner parties we’re hosting.”

He didn’t know that my mother had been trying to convince me to abandon him for a lot longer than five minutes. I decided I wasn’t going to tell him. Not tonight.

“I saved your tiramisu for you,” he said. “Well, most of it.”

I looked down. Someone had eaten half of it.

“Now I know why you wanted the tiramisu,” I said. “Didn’t you get one yourself?”

“I told you it was my favorite dessert.”

“You can have the rest of mine.” I pushed my plate toward him.

“No, you should have it. I think it’s the best tiramisu I’ve ever had.”

But then, somehow he did end up eating the rest. He was drunk, like everyone else at the dinner table at that point. I think I’d been on my way to nicely buzzed before my trip to the bathroom. But that had sobered me up, and after that I felt left out, the way you do when you’re sober in a room full of drunks. It was a relief when, soon after that, the party broke up.

Most of us ended up walking back to the B&B together, but on the way Tammy and Edward and Celia decided to get a nightcap. Timothy murmured to me that he was worried about Tammy and Edward, but I didn’t worry about that at all. I thought if anyone was at risk, it was Edward. It surprised me that Celia wanted to join them for a drink, though I didn’t really spend too much time thinking about it.

We all said good night. I could see that my sister was trying to catch my eye, but I avoided her, and Timothy was my bodyguard; he walked me to my room. Outside the door, we both stopped. I turned around to look up at him.

He touched my face. “I love you,” he told me.

“I love you too,” I said.

He kissed me and said, “Guess what?”

“What?”

“We’re getting married tomorrow.”

I smiled.

Then I went into my room and closed the door behind me. I lay down on the bed, still in my dress and shoes and coat. And I closed my eyes. I didn’t go to sleep. I just lay there.

I don’t know exactly how long, but it didn’t seem like a very long time before there was a knock at my door. The last thing I wanted to do was to talk to anyone right then, but I got up and went over to the door and opened it. I was sure it was going to be my sister. Or my mother. The last person I expected to see standing there was Celia.

“Celia, is something wrong? Are Tammy and Edward okay?” I couldn’t think of any other reason she’d come knock on my door that late at night. It’s not like we were good friends or anything. I’d met her only that one time, with Timothy and Marcus, for drinks.

She looked at me, and she had the strangest smile on her face. Then she said, “Come to Timothy’s room in about fifteen minutes. Don’t knock. The door will be open. Just come in.”

Then she turned around and walked away.

It might have sounded mysterious and cryptic, but it wasn’t. As soon as she said it, I knew.

I closed the door and went back over to sit on the edge of the bed. I checked the clock. It was three past midnight.

It was my wedding day.

I waited until the clock read eighteen past, then I got up and climbed to the upper floor.

I walked past Timothy’s room and down the hall, and I knocked at another door. It took a few minutes, but Marcus opened it, wearing a robe.

Then I said to him, “I think you should go down the hall to Timothy’s room and get your wife. You don’t have to knock. The door will be open.”

He just stared at me. At first I thought maybe he didn’t understand, and I was about to say it again, when he asked me, “Which room?”

I pointed.

He brushed past me and went to the door I had pointed to. He hesitated a moment before putting his hand on the doorknob, and I realized he was listening to something. A moment later it was louder, and I could hear it too. Then he turned the knob, went inside, and closed the door behind him.

Then there was silence. Just breathless, absolute silence.

Celia came out first. She was wrapped only in a sheet, and she was clutching her clothes. She was almost next to me before she saw me standing there. When she did, she stopped short.

“Why did you send
him
?”

I didn’t answer her.

“I wanted you to see,” she said. “If you saw, you’d understand. He doesn’t love you. He couldn’t do that with me and still love you.”

She waited for a moment for me to say something, but I just looked at her. And finally she turned, took another few steps to the door of her room, and disappeared inside.

It took longer for Marcus to appear. But eventually he came out too. He walked down the hall, and when he reached me, he stopped as well. He said, “I’m sorry Nora.”

I don’t know why he said that. He didn’t have anything to apologize for. But I guess that’s just what people say when they don’t know what else to say. Then he disappeared inside their room as well.

I walked down the hall to Timothy’s room. The door was slightly ajar, so I reached out and pushed it open.

Timothy was sitting on the edge of the bed in his boxers. His head was down, but he raised it when I came in and he looked at me.

He didn’t say he was sorry. He just said, “Nora.”

Just my name. Just like that.

I closed the door behind me. There was a chair over by the window. I walked to it and sat down.

He followed me with his eyes. When I sat, he said, “You’re not going to marry me now, are you?” He looked hollowed out.

“I don’t know,” I told him.

“You don’t know . . .” he echoed. “So there’s still a chance?”

“I don’t know,” I said again. It was the truth.

There was a long silence.

Then he asked quietly, very quietly, “Do you love me?”

When he asked me, I simply asked the question of myself. And I was surprised at the answer I got.

“Yes,” I said. “I love you.”

It was so strange. I didn’t understand it. But I loved him more than I ever had.

I watched him as I said it. Would my words have any effect? They were just words, after all. How can you give someone else a feeling in words? It’s like trying to capture a symphony by describing it.

“Nora . . .” he said.

I waited for what else he was going to say.

There was a long pause, and he said, “Please. Please.”

Please what? He didn’t say. And I didn’t ask. I knew some questions didn’t have an answer.

I stood up and walked over, and I kissed him on the forehead. Then I left.

 

 

 

 

It sounds like it would be an awful experience—to have your best friend walk in on you having sex with his wife. And I can’t say it was pleasant, but because it was Marcus, it wasn’t as bad as you might think.

Marcus was true to form. He was not someone who pretended to be one thing most of his life, and then turned into another in a crisis. I had never seen Marcus anything but collected, and now I think I never will.