“Caleb.”
I glanced down at my mother. She had been a good mother to my brother and me. Good enough to leave my father when she saw how damaging his influence on us had been. To others she was not a particularly kind woman, but I understood that. She was verbally cutting and critical. It was common among the wealthy. I never expected her to embrace Olivia. But, I had hoped for a less trite reaction. Maybe even forced happiness for my sake. I was growing weary of her pronounced cattiness.
She placed her hand on my arm again, squeezing lightly. “I know you think I’m shallow. I probably am. Women in my generation were taught not to think too deeply about our feelings, and to do what needed to be done without dissecting it emotionally. But, I am more perceptive than you think. She will be your destruction. She’s not healthy.”
I gently removed her hand from my arm. “Then let her destroy me.”
Chapter Eleven
I take Cammie home first. When she steps out of the car, she kisses my cheek and holds my eyes for a second longer than is normal. I know she’s sorry. After all these years of Olivia and me, how can she not be? I nod at her and she tucks her lips in and smiles. When I get back in, Olivia is watching me.
“Sometimes, I feel like you and Cammie speak without speaking,” she says.
“Maybe we do.”
The rest of the ride is quiet. It reminds me of our drive back from the camping trip, when there was so much to say and no courage to say it. We’re so much older now, so much has happened. It shouldn’t be this hard.
I carry her bag upstairs. She holds the front door open for me when we get to her floor, so I step past her and walk into the foyer. Once again I feel Noah’s absence. It feels like she’s been living here on her own. The air is warm. I can smell traces of her perfume in certain spots. She turns on the air conditioner and we move into the kitchen.
“Tea?” she asks.
“Please.”
I can pretend for a few minutes that this is our house and she’s making me tea like she does every morning. I watch her put the kettle on and get the tea bags. She rubs the back of her neck and tucks a foot behind her knee while she waits for the water to boil. Then she carries a glass jar of sugar cubes and a small milk jug to the table and sets them down in front of me. I turn away and pretend I wasn’t watching her. This pierces my heart a little bit. We always said we’d have sugar cubes instead of plain sugar. She fetches two teacups from the cabinet, stretching on her tiptoes to reach them. I watch her face as she drops four cubes into my cup. She stirs it for me and pours in the milk. I reach for the cup before she pulls her hand away, and our fingers touch. Her eyes dart to mine. Dart away. She drinks her tea with only one cube of sugar. We find the tabletop increasingly interesting as the minutes pass. Finally, I set my cup down. It clinks against the saucer. There is a storm brewing between us. Maybe that’s why we are savoring the calm. I stand up and take both of our cups to the sink. I wash them and set them in the dry rack.
“I still want you,” I say. I surprise myself by saying this out loud. I don’t know if she’s having the same reaction because my back is to her.
“Fuck you.”
Surprise, surprise.
She can’t hide from me with her dirty mouth. I see how she looks at me. I feel the sting of regret when our skin accidentally touches.
“I built you that house,” I say, turning around. “I kept it even after I got married. I hired a landscaper and a pool guy. I’ve had a cleaning service go in once every two months. Why would I do that?”
“Because you’re a nostalgic fool who only lets go of the past long enough to marry another woman.”
“You’re right. I am a fool. But, as you can see, I’m a fool who never quite let go.”
“Let go.”
I shake my head. “Uh-uh. This time you found me, remember?”
She turns a little red.
“Tell me why you called me.”
“Who else do I know?”
“Your husband, for one.”
She looks away.
“Fine,” she finally says. “I was scared. You were the first one I thought to call.”
“Because…”
“Goddammit, Caleb!” She slams her fist on the table and the fruit bowl wobbles.
“Because…” I say again. Does she think she scares me with her little temper tantrums? She does a little.
“You’re always wanting to overtalk everything.”
“There is no such thing as overtalking something. Lack of communication is the problem.”
“You should have been a shrink.”
“I know. Don’t change the subject.”
She bites on her thumbnail.
“Because you’re my hiding place. I go to you when I’m messed up.”
My tongue twists, knots, freezes. What am I supposed to say to that? I never expected that. Maybe more swearing. More denial.
Then I go nuts. Really crazy. It’s the tension of wanting her and wanting her to admit that she wants me.
My hands are behind my neck as I pace her small kitchen. I want to hit something. Throw a chair through the glass box that is her condo. I stop suddenly and face her.
“You leave him, Olivia. You leave him or this is the end.”
“The. End. Of. WHAT?” She leans over the counter; her fingers splayed out like her anger. Her words punch. “We’ve never had a beginning, or a middle, or a f**king minute to be in love. You think I want this? He hasn’t done anything wrong!”
“Bullshit! He married you and he knew you were in love with me.”
She draws back, looks unsure. I watch her walk the length of her kitchen, one hand on top of her head, the other on her hip. When she stops and faces me, her face is contorted.
“I love him.”
I cross the kitchen in two seconds. I grab her upper arm so she can’t get away and lean down until I’m right in her face. She has to see truth. My voice sounds more animal than human; a growl.
“More than me?”
The light drains from her eyes and she tries to look away.
I shake her. “More than me?”
“I don’t love anything more than I love you.”
My fingers tighten on her arm. “Then why are we playing these stupid games?”
She rips her arm away from me, her eyes flashing.
“You left me in Rome!” She shoves me and I stumble back. “You left me for that redheaded bitch. Do you know how much that hurt? I came to tell you how I felt, and you walked away from me.”
Olivia rarely shows her hurt. It’s so unusual I’m not sure how to deal with it.
“She was unstable. Her sister shot herself. She swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills, for God’s sake! I was trying to save her. You didn’t need me. Ever. You made a point of showing me that you didn’t need me.”
She wanders over to the sink, picks up a glass, fills it with water, takes a sip and throws it at my head. I duck and it hits the wall, shattering into a thousand pieces. I glance at the wall where the glass struck, then back at Olivia.
“Giving me a concussion is not going to solve our problems.”
“You were a f**king coward. If you had just talked to me that day in the record store, without the lies, we wouldn’t be here.”
Her shoulders — which a second ago had been tensed in battle stance — go limp. A single sob escapes her lips. She reaches a hand up to catch it, but it’s too late.
“You got married … you had a baby…” Her tears are flowing freely, mingling with her mascara and tracking black across her cheeks. “You were supposed to marry me. That was supposed to be my baby.” She drops to the sofa behind her and wraps her arms around herself.
Her tiny frame is racked with sobs. Her hair has cascaded over her face and she bends her head with the purpose of veiling her face.
I go to her. I scoop her up and carry her over to the counter, setting her down so we’re eye to eye. She is trying to hide behind her hair. It’s almost to her waist again, like it was when I met her. I pull the hair tie from her wrist and divide her hair into three pieces.
“Is it weird that I know how to do a braid?”
She laughs in between her crying and watches me. I tie off the braid with the hair tie and flip it over her shoulder. Now I can see her.
Her voice is raspy when she speaks. “I hate that you always make jokes when I’m trying to feel sorry for myself.”
“I hate that I always make you cry.” I rub little circles on her wrist with my thumb. I want to touch her more, but I know I shouldn’t.
“Duchess, it wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I thought that if we had a clean slate…” My voice trails off because there is no such thing as a clean slate. I know that now. You just embrace your dirty slate and build over it. I kiss her wrist. “Let me carry you out. I’ll never let you touch the ground. I was made to carry you, Olivia. You’re f**king heavy with all of your guilt and self-loathing. But, I can do it. Because I love you.”
She has her pinky pressed against her lips as if she’s trying to hold everything in. This is a new Oliviaism. I like it. I pull her pinky away from her lips, and instead of dropping her hand I lace my fingers through hers. God, how long has it been since I’ve held her hand? I feel like a little boy. I fight back the smile that is trying to take over my face.
“Tell me,” I say. “Peter Pan…”
“Noah,” she breathes.
“Where is he, Duchess?”
“He’s in Munich right now. Last week, Stockholm, the week before that, Amsterdam.” She looks away. “We’re not … we’re taking a break.”
I shake my head. “A break from what? Marriage or each other?”
“We like each other. Marriage, I guess.”
“Fuck, that doesn’t even make sense,” I say. “If we were married I wouldn’t let you out of my bed, never mind my sight.”
She pulls a face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“There are guys like me out there, and I wouldn’t let them get near you. What’s he playing at?”
She’s quiet for a long time. Then she blurts:
“He doesn’t want children.”
Estella’s face blurs my vision before I ask…
“Why not?”
She shrugs; trying to pretend like it’s nothing. “His sister has Cystic Fibrosis. He’s a carrier. He’s seen how much she’s suffered and he doesn’t want to bring children into the world with the risk of them having it.”
I can see how much it bothers her. Her mouth is pinched and her eyes are darting around the tabletop as if she’s searching for a crumb.
I swallow. This is a touchy subject for me too.
“Did you know that before you married him?”
She nods. “I didn’t want children before I married him.”
I stand up. I don’t want to hear her talk about how Noah made her want things that I couldn’t make her want. I must look sulky because she rolls her eyes.
“Sit down,” she snaps. “I see you still play footsie with your inner child.”
I walk to the floor-to-ceiling window that circles her living room and look out. I ask the question I don’t want to ask, but I can’t not know. I am jealous.
“What changed your mind?”
“I’ve changed, Caleb.” She gets up and comes to stand next to me. I glance at her and see that her arms are crossed over her chest. She is wearing a long sleeve, grey cotton shirt and black pants that sit low on her h*ps so that a few inches of flesh are exposed. Her hair is loosely braided over her shoulder. She stares out at the traffic that is zooming below us. She looks badass. I smirk and shake my head.
“I never felt worthy enough to have babies. Duh — right? I have all those super cool daddy issues.”
“Aw, man. Are you still working through those?”
She grins.
“Little bit here and there. I can have sex now.”
I c**k up one corner of my mouth and narrow my eyes. “I’m pretty sure I cured you of that.”
Her eyelashes beat so rapidly they could blow out a match. She chews on her lip to keep from smiling.
I tilt my head back and laugh. We both get such a kick out of making each other uncomfortable. God, I love this woman.
“You did though,” she says. “Despite what you think, it wasn’t because of your bedroom moves. It was what you did to get me back.”
I raise my eyebrows.
“The amnesia?” I’m surprised.
She nods slowly. She’s still looking out the window, but my body is pivoted toward her now.
“You’re not that person … the one who lies and does crazy things. That’s me. I couldn’t believe you did that.”
“You are crazy.”
She shoots me an annoyed look.
“You broke your own moral code. I figured if someone like you would fight for me, I might actually be worth something.”
I look at her earnestly. I don’t want to say too much, or too little.
“You are worth fighting for. I haven’t given up yet.”
Her head snaps up. She looks alarmed.
“Well, you should. I’m married.”
“Yeah, you got married, didn’t you? But, you only did it because you thought we were over — and we’re not over. We’ll never be over. If you think that little piece of metal on your finger can shield off your feelings for me, you’re wrong. I wore one for five years and there wasn’t a day that went by where I wasn’t wishing it were you.”