26
“I’M DESPERATE TO SEE YOU,” Luke said.
Dying to see you was a cliché, but desperate gave her pause. That sounded sincere. She must be desperate herself to be taking Luke’s call in the bedroom, with Russell and the kids only a few yards away, but it was Valentine’s Day, after all. Luke was visiting his daughter up at Vassar; he was calling to tell Corrine he wanted to take her away the following weekend.
“Can you at least tell me our destination? I can’t just run off without saying where I’m going.”
“Let’s say winter wonderland. Pack some warm clothes. And your birthday suit.”
“What are you—twelve years old? I mean, who even says ‘birthday suit’?”
“Deeply smitten middle-aged men, apparently.”
“I can’t just disappear for a whole weekend.”
“Why not?”
“Because I have a family.” Even as she said it, she was thinking more about logistics than about morality, wondering if she could pull it off.
After they hung up, she called Casey, who had a house in Connecticut, where, theoretically, they might spend a girls’ weekend.
“I can’t believe you lecture me about Washington and now you want me to be your alibi for a dirty weekend with Luke.”
“First off, I didn’t lecture you. I just told you I didn’t want to get in the middle of it.”
“Well, if you get Washington to call me, I’ll cover for you.”
“Are you blackmailing me?”
“Please, Corrine. You, of all people, should know how it feels.”
Corrine hated having her situation conflated with Casey’s. But she did need her help.
That night they had dinner at Bouley, their traditional destination on February 14, only a few short blocks from the apartment, although their transit was complicated by the residual ice and snow of Tuesday’s storm.
After they’d settled into their usual table, the sommelier handed Russell the wine list while she examined the menu, looking for greenery and simplicity amid the elaborate compositions, oblivious to the inevitable and incessant wine talk, which to her was like the chatter of starlings. She was stirred from her reverie when Russell said, “I had lunch with Washington.”
“How is he?”
“Not great. But I’m assuming you already know that.”
“Well, yes, I guess so.”
“So you knew about this thing he was having with Casey?”
“At some point, yes, she confided in me.”
“I can’t believe you never told me about this.”
“It was in strictest confidence.”
“I’m your husband. We’re not supposed to have secrets.”
“Oh, come on. You don’t have any secrets from me?”
“I can’t think of any.”
“I doubt that.”
“And this involves my best friend.”
“All the more reason not to tell you. I’m sorry, but I was in a terrible position.”
“I felt like an idiot. He just assumed I knew.”
“Well why didn’t he tell you if he’s your best friend? You speak to him practically every day. What the hell do you two talk about, anyway? Sports? Recipes? Indie rock bands? This is what never ceases to amaze me about men, this masculine code forbidding any discussion of emotions, or anything that’s actually important.”
She’d delivered some variation of this speech a hundred times, but at this point she could see it was effective.
“We wait until it’s important,” Russell said, though his indignation seemed largely rhetorical at this point—the argument driven more by inertia than conviction. “And maybe he assumed that I’d be judgmental, that I wouldn’t approve.”
“So how is he?”
“He’s chastened.”
“He should be.”
“He’s staying at the Mercer while she mulls things over. You know, I honestly thought he was over this kind of shit. I mean, there comes a time where you settle into the life you’ve chosen and accept its boundaries and limitations.”
As sensible as this sounded, it also seemed sad and defeatist—as if long-term monogamy was ultimately a function of exhaustion.
“I take it Tom doesn’t know,” he said.
She shook her head.
“Poor bastard,” he said. Then, after a moment of silence: “I’m famished. Let’s order.”
—
Russell ordered a marc after dinner and spread his arms out across the top of the booth in a posture of intoxicated satiation. He was just slightly slurring his words. “So how’s Casey holding up?” he asked, returning to the earlier subject.
“She’s pretty freaked-out,” Corrine said. “Actually, I was thinking about going with her up to Litchfield next weekend, if it’s okay with you.” She hadn’t known she was going to say this until the opportunity had presented itself. It was almost scary how accustomed one could become to deception.
“What am I going to do with the kids all weekend? I’ve got a lot of work.”
She’d hoped this wasn’t going to be hard; at the same time she could feel a kind of imminent relief in the prospect of Russell’s resistance, a sense of the decision being taken out of her hands, of being saved from herself.
“Well, I suspect Washington will have the kids for at least one day that weekend and he probably needs to entertain them somehow. You two could team up.”
He swirled his glass, examining the amber liquid before taking a swig. “Okay, I guess,” he said. He was seldom happier than when savoring a digestif after a good meal.
“How goes the Kohout book?” she asked, suddenly feeling generous, trying to change the subject before he changed his mind, to be curious and open-minded about a matter over which they’d previously clashed.
“It’s good, so far. Very compelling. I’m still waiting for the final pages.”
“Aren’t you publishing in, what, three months?”
“God and Phillip willing.”
“You sound worried.”
“There’s a lot riding on this. A hell of a lot.”
She reached across the table and took his hand. “It’s going to be fine,” she said, hoping this was true. “You’ll make it work.”
—
She felt tense and anxious after they put the kids down, wondering about Russell’s intentions and her own desires. Sex was practically mandatory on Valentine’s night; even when they’d been in a winter drought, they’d almost always rallied for the occasion. It had been many long weeks since they’d consummated a sloppy coupling on New Year’s Eve, and while she didn’t feel like initiating proceedings tonight, she was open to suggestion, to a reinvigoration of their dormant romance. She told herself she was willing to give him a chance to change her mind about going off with Luke next weekend. When, after reading a manuscript for half an hour and turning out the light, he kissed her chastely on the cheek and said good night, he unwittingly sealed his fate.
—
As the date of her rendezvous approached, Corrine grew increasingly concerned about the weather; a snowstorm was forecast to move in the night before her departure. “Don’t worry,” Luke said. “A little snow won’t hurt us. Even if commercial flights are canceled, we’ll be able to take off from Teterboro.”
“What if I can’t get there?”
“I’ll send Brendan. He’s an ex-cop and he’s got a Suburban that can climb Everest.”
A few days later, after taking the kids to school, she returned to the loft to wake Russell and finish packing. Having slept badly, he was in a lousy mood, cranky about everything in the newspaper, including Obama’s surging prospects against Hillary. “I mean, what do we really know about this guy?”
“We know he opposes this disastrous war, which Hillary voted for.”
“Based on faulty intelligence,” Russell said.
“We all operate from faulty intelligence,” Corrine said, not entirely certain what she meant at first, but suddenly convinc
ed it was a good description of the human condition.
“I still don’t understand why you’re driving into a snowstorm.”
“Casey’s driver says we’ll be fine. He’s an ex-cop.” This was actually true; the Reynes, like many of their peers, including Luke, employed retired cops as chauffeurs, in no small part to avail themselves of the privileges and perks those gentlemen enjoyed. But now it occurred to her that Russell might be tempted to call Casey or Tom to check on her. In a panic, she called Casey from the bedroom. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Tom’s in Dubai, and he doesn’t know or particularly care where I am. As for Russell calling me, if it happens, I’ll dodge the call and let you know he’s looking for you.”
“I’m suddenly imagining every way I could get caught. Not to mention I’m flying off in a blizzard.”
“Live dangerously,” Casey said. “If I sit next to one more dinner partner who asks me where my kids go to school, like I did last night, I’m going to jump out the window.”
Corrine called Luke and asked, “Are we really doing this?”
“Absolutely. I just talked to the pilot. He says we’re good to go. And Brendan’s waiting for you downstairs.”
Russell grudgingly accepted a kiss on the cheek. “I think you’re crazy.”
“I’m doing it for Casey,” she said. Could she really be someone who lied this easily? “She’s going through a rough time.”
Luke’s driver was indeed waiting on the street, brushing the snow from the hood of his Suburban.
“Do you really think we’ll be okay getting to Teterboro?” she asked.
“No problemo. You just leave that to me, miss,” he said, closing the door behind her.
Brendan might have been fearless, but other drivers were creeping and sliding and fishtailing in the snow, slowing their progress toward the tunnel. When they finally reached the Jersey side, they got caught in a long line of cars backed up behind a jackknifed tractor-trailer. By the time they arrived at Teterboro, the snow was falling with a vengeance—the wipers snapping back and forth like twin swords fighting off the barrage—and she couldn’t see how they could take off, her disappointment tempered by relief. Maybe it was for the best after all. Maybe it was a sign.
At the entrance, the driver intoned the magic tail number into the intercom and the gate rose slowly to admit them. She’d been here a couple of times with Casey and Tom, but the idea of flying on a private jet still seemed unreal to her. She remembered some stupid joke of Tom’s, to the effect that if you had a tail number, you’d never be lacking for tail. At any rate, she wasn’t likely to run into anyone she knew out here.
Luke was waiting inside the terminal, looking winter weekend–ready in a navy turtleneck and a leonine shearling coat. As they kissed, he nearly squeezed the breath out of her, and she felt her scruples thawing.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“Surely we’re not actually going to fly?”
“Nothing to worry about. Just a few inches of snow.”
At that point a pilot walked over, introduced himself and asked if they were ready.
“Do you really think it’s safe?” Corrine said.
“We’re fine,” he said, “but I think we’d better get moving.” It seemed to her that he sounded less confident than Luke.
“Let’s do it,” Luke said, taking her hand.
They followed the pilot out across the snowy tarmac to the plane, the luggage following along behind on a cart.
The interior smelled of new leather and aerosol. The cabin was just tall enough for her to stand in the narrow aisle, though Luke had to stoop. She settled into a beige leather seat.
“Was there ever a point,” she asked, “at which you woke up and said, ‘Holy shit, I can’t believe how much money I have’? Or is it just a gradual acclimatization? Do you just get used to it?”
“Both,” he said. “You do get used to it, but sometimes, some days, you look around and can’t believe this is how you’re living. Today, right now, would qualify as one of those moments.”
Instead of taking the compliment, she brooded on the implications. “Do you think the pleasure one takes in material well-being is like passion, that it eventually fades?”
“Who says passion has to fade?”
Before she could point out the inevitability of its fading, the pilot came back to instruct her on the safety features of the jet.
“Hope you don’t mind—I’m going to be flying the plane,” Luke said after the briefing. “But it’s a short flight, and we’ve got a great copilot.”
This revelation only served to reawaken her fears. “Luke, are you sure we’re not being reckless? Besides, I don’t even know where we’re going.”
“I wouldn’t risk your safety for the world. And you’ll like our destination.” He kissed her and followed the copilot to the cockpit.
It was strange, Corrine thought as they lifted off, being the only passenger on a plane. She wasn’t sure she was the kind of person who could learn to be comfortable with wealth. Or was it just that she’d never had the chance to? She’d spent most of her life on the Art and Love team.
—
Less than an hour later they descended through the clouds over a landscape of downy white hills, the serenity of the view providing a stark contrast to the violent bucking of the plane as they approached a small New England town, Corrine clutching the armrests, wondering if this might, in fact, be the end, the final reckoning for her dishonesty and disloyalty, for sins past and those not yet committed. PRIVATE JET CRASH: LOVERS KILLED EN ROUTE TO TRYST.
The bumpy touchdown came as a blessed relief.
“Welcome to Vermont,” Luke said, emerging from the cockpit.
“I thought we were going to die.”
“What, that little patch of turbulence?”
“Were you always this—”
“Unflappable?”
“I was going to say reckless. Or maybe heedless. I was going to say ‘Were you always such a reckless asshole?’ ” Even as she said this, she remembered that he’d run toward the towers that day while others were running away.
“If I were risk-averse, I’m sure my life would be very different,” he said with evident relish.
—
An SUV was waiting for them just beyond the ramp. Luke signed for it, shook hands with the pilot and tipped the man who loaded their bags into the back.
“Are you ever going to tell me exactly where the hell we’re going?” she said as they drove out through the gate.
“Wouldn’t you rather be surprised?”
“I guess I’m not really an adventurer at heart. I like to know what’s coming around the corner.”
“Well, I’m grateful that you were adventurous enough to come along with me.”
“It’s totally out of character, I assure you.”
“Good.”
“Can you at least tell me what that big obelisk was that I saw while I was praying for my life to be spared? Or was that a hallucination?”
“That was a monument built to commemorate the Battle of Bennington during the Revolutionary War.”
“I got into Bennington,” she said, “but I decided it was a little too far-out for me.”
“I dated a Bennington girl once,” Luke said. “She was a real wildcat.”
“I want to hear about all the other girls in your life.”
“It’s not like this huge list.”
“Then it’ll be easy for you to tell me.”
“I don’t pretend to be an expert, but in my experience when women say they want to hear about their romantic predecessors, they don’t really mean it.”
“I’m not like those other bitches,” she said.
“Indeed you’re not.”
—
After driving south through the valley for ten minutes, they got off the highway and followed a road up into the hills, turning into a long driveway that culminated in a rambling white farmhouse with green shutters that crowned a sno
wy hilltop. A decrepit red gambrel-roofed barn came into view behind the house as they shimmied up the driveway, the tires spinning and spitting snow.
“I can only assume you have a golden retriever waiting to complete the picture.”
“I don’t even know if you’re a dog person.”
“I’m a ferret person, actually. Though I grew up with terriers.”
“I didn’t know there were ferret people.”
“We like to root around, uncovering things and bringing them to light.”
He pulled up in front of the house and said, “Shall I carry you over the threshold?”
“That might be premature. Where are we, anyway?”
“Pownal, Vermont. A friend’s house.”
“It looks as if we’ll have plenty of privacy.”
The interior had a shambolic, layered quality that suggested decades of slow accretion, faded and frayed carpets, surfaces covered with books and magazines and journals, shelves sagging with the weight of more books, treasures and oddities, split logs and newspapers stacked beside the brick fireplace. Off the living room was a small overstuffed library. The master bedroom had a fireplace, wallpaper in a trellis and vine pattern, a telescope and a four-poster bed that almost touched the low, sagging ceiling.