Olivia

  "Why not?" Daddy demanded.

  "I'm just not."

  "Of course you are. You're an attractive young lady with enough to satisfy any good man."

  "Olivia's not even engaged," she pointed out quickly.

  "Olivia's developing a career at the moment. She'll be right behind you, I'm sure," Daddy insisted. He gazed at me and then quickly shifted his eyes back to Belinda. "I'd like you to give this serious

  consideration, Belinda. The young man would like to court you," Daddy followed with those eyes of intimidation, his shoulders rising.

  "Court me?"

  "Romance you," I said with a small smile. "Get you to fall in love with him."

  "That's exactly right and you'll fall in love with him, I'm sure," Daddy insisted. "How could you not? He's good-looking and very intelligent. He'll make you a devoted husband."

  Belinda looked totally confused and I was enjoying every moment of it.

  "It's the best thing that could happen to you, my dear, and it will help the family a great deal. Does everyone agree?" He looked at Mother.

  "Yes," she said. "I think it would be fine for Belinda to get married."

  "So do I," I chimed. Belinda looked like she had been struck in the head. She gazed at Mother and Daddy and then at me before looking down, a strange smile on her face.

  "I don't know the first thing about being a wife," she said. "I can't cook, sew, clean, keep books and I don't have any patience for children."

  "Really?" I said. "That's really too bad considering you almost had one."

  There was a dead silence.

  "We're not supposed to talk about that," she finally said.

  "So don't," I followed. "Mother, you can put down that I agreed with Daddy. Carson McGil would make a wonderful husband for Belinda and it would help our family. I know we've been in a negotiation with his father for most of the year."

  "Belinda? Will you agree to let him come court you?" Daddy asked.

  Belinda looked at the ceiling and sighed.

  "I suppose," she said. "But if he doesn't like me, don't blame me," she added.

  "Then it's settled," Daddy said. "I'll get back to him and he'll call you. He's a fine young man, distinguishing himself in his business. Don't throw away a good opportunity for yourself," Daddy warned.

  "We could have an old-fashioned sort of wedding, a ceremony behind the house, couldn't we?" Mother asked.

  "I don't see why not," Daddy said. "Why don't you work up a preliminary guest list, dear, and as the time draws closer, we'll review it."

  "How can you plan my wedding? I didn't fall in love yet!" Belinda exclaimed.

  "To be honest, Belinda, love is something that happens after a wedding, real love that is," Daddy said.

  "Just keep thinking of what you can do for the family and you'll see, it will all work out for the best." He clapped his hands and declared the meeting over.

  Belinda was numbed by Daddy's

  announcement. A part of her wanted to be outraged and indignant that such an important aspect of her life would be dictated to her; but then there was that vain face smiling back at her from her mirrors, fanning the flames of her ego by convincing her that she was so worthwhile a catch, men would come to her father to plead for the chance to get her to fall in love with them. I realized quickly that she saw it as a form of an audition. If Carson didn't work out, there would soon be someone else knocking on the door.

  "I really feel bad that Daddy expects I will marry before you do, Olivia," she told me that night. "It's almost as if my beauty is a curse, I suppose."

  "That's all right," I said swallowing back my laughter. "I'll survive."

  "Carson has become a very nice-looking young man. Have you seen him recently?" she asked.

  "No, but I don't get out as much as you do, Belinda. If you say he's good-looking, I'm sure he is."

  "Daddy's so worried about me," she muttered. She thought a moment. "I'll try and see what happens," she concluded with a sigh so deep, I thought she would deflate and collapse.

  "Do that," I said.

  Satisfied now that she was dating Carson because she wanted to, Belinda welcomed him warmly when he came courting. Carson was an only child, spoiled and protected from the day he was born. His parents decided he would attend private schools from kindergarten on, and so he knew few of the young people in the community. I had met him on two different occasions and found him stuffy and conceited.

  He was somewhat effeminate with his long eyelashes, his very long, soft hands and his slim, sixfoot one-inch frame. He had dark brown hair, greenish-brown eyes and perfectly shaped lips. I thought he had a better complexion than most girls I knew. I knew most would kill for his eyelashes.

  The second time I met him, I told Mother I thought he had been brought up by a textbook. Everything he wore always matched perfectly. He always said the right things, the proper things. In short, he was nearly the diametric opposite of Belinda, which made the prospect of such a union even more amusing to me.

  However, Belinda enjoyed being the center of everyone's attention now, and especially enjoyed leading Carson about on an invisible leash. She beamed when he opened doors for her and pulled out her chair for her at dinner. She was even more flamboyant than usual when she was brought to restaurants or gala affairs in his Rolls Royce. Now that she was being courted by such a gallant prospect, she insisted she needed more expensive clothing and real jewelry. Daddy put up very little opposition when Belinda and Mother went on one of Belinda's frequent shopping sprees to Boston so she could have just the right thing to wear to some event Carson was taking her to.

  From what I could see, Carson was dazzled by her. Most of the girls he knew or pursued were not impressed by him, despite his perfect behavior and good looks, yet here he was winning the heart of one of the town's most beautiful, eligible young women. Belinda saw where and how she could take advantage of him and soon was treating him more like a golden retriever, sending him on errands, having him fetch this and that, making him jump with a look or a gesture.

  And when he asked her to marry him, giving her a diamond big enough to pop eyes, she waved it about like a flag, never sitting without pressing her palm to her cheek so the ring was obvious to everyone around her and never wearing gloves.

  Mother began to plan the wedding and Daddy felt like he had succeeded in reaching the most important goal of his life: soon, soon, Belinda would be another man's responsibility. As for Belinda, she surprised me by her apparent enjoyment of every aspect: the announcements in the social columns, the invitations to the formal dinners, the adulation and attention.

  "I'm finally respectable," she told me one night. "And you thought it would never be."

  She laughed and went off to prepare to go to dinner with Carson.

  However, something gnawed at my walls of complacency until suspicions began to slip out and tickle my imagination. I watched Belinda and Carson together more closely. Yes, he doted on her, but Belinda usually got bored with someone like this quickly, I thought. She was tolerating him more than I would have expected. She was being too cooperative for Daddy. Something, the little voice inside me warned, was amiss.

  The truth was I often gazed at her and Carson and thought to myself she could devour him in minutes. She teased him often; she made him do silly things; she laughed at things he said and whenever she kissed him, or stroked him with affection, it resembled the affection a sister might give a brother. Certainly, they had not reached the stage of love Belinda was accustomed to reaching in a relationship, I thought. I doubted that they had been to bed and when I asked her about it, she laughed and told me, "Carson believes a man and a woman should not sleep together until they're married."

  "And what did you say to that?" I asked.

  "I told him that's what I believe," she said.

  "So he believes you're a virgin?"

  "Olivia! Of course he does. Why shouldn't he?"

  Why shouldn't he? I thought. I'm sure your name's on ba
throom walls, dear sister. What about your old boyfriends and the one who made you pregnant? Carson didn't know any of these boys of course, and if he heard them say anything about Belinda, he wouldn't believe it anyway, I thought, and for that matter, he wouldn't frequent the places where Belinda's name could be written on the bathroom walls. He was perfect, and believed that Belinda was too. Maybe he wanted so much for her to be true, he made himself believe. Everyone, I concluded, chooses his or her own version of the truth, fits it to his or her own image of how things should be, and throws back those aspects that don't fit as easily as throwing back small fish. The only reality was the reality we accepted.

  Despite this explanation for Carson's behavior, it still didn't satisfy my musings concerning Belinda. Why was she being such a good daughter and such a perfect fiancee? Daddy wanted to believe she had changed; she had come to some realizations about herself and her life and she had grown up, practically overnight. Daddy was yet another person choosing his version of reality, I thought.

  The wedding was planned for the spring. Not a day went by now that Mother didn't consider, discuss or investigate some aspect of the affair. It was going to be one of the most elegant and extravagant weddings on the Cape, and Belinda would be the star. She wallowed in all of the attention, stacking catalogues of wedding dresses, samples of materials, pictures of hair styles, shoes, flower arrangements, dresses for bridesmaids, all of it in her room. Caterers, designers, arrangers, were parading in and out of the house weekly, making their presentations and answering questions. The event took over our daily lives and became the sole subject of conversation at dinner and at Daddy's family meetings. It was truly as if the world now revolved around Belinda, her happiness and her wishes. The princess was about to become a queen.

  Despite all this, all the reasons why Belinda should be and apparently was very happy, I remained skeptical. Her tolerance of Carson continued to bother me. This was the longest she had been with any one man, especially one who wasn't yet a lover.

  True, her social life was a whirlwind of activity. There wasn't an event, an affair that Carson didn't propose they attend, and for each, Belinda had to make special preparations. It did take over much of her life, enough to get her away from the office and fill her days. Daddy was never as happy and Mother was very relaxed as well.

  "Ain't it grand?" Daddy said one day. "A year ago we thought she was going to be a lifelong disaster, going from one tragic event to another, and now . . . now she's going to be a real Cape Cod lady, huh?"

  "Yes, Daddy," I said. "I hope so."

  "Don't be so dark, Olivia. When things are planned as well as this was, they usually work out. Just do your homework," he instructed, "and you'll always do well."

  I smiled and nodded to make him comfortable, but in my heart, I was nowhere as convinced as he was. And then, one March night, my suspicions justified themselves vividly, too vividly for me to stomach.

  I was still awake when Carson brought Belinda home early from a charity affair in North Truro. Daddy and Mother had gone to bed because Daddy had a bad cold and Mother was feeling like she was about to come down with one herself. I watched some television and then went up to read. I had only my small night lamp on. The house was quiet. I heard Carson's Rolls pull up and I heard Belinda get out and be escorted to the front door. She came in and up the stairs very quietly. I poked my head out as she was passing.

  "What's wrong?" I asked.

  "I have a bad stomachache," she said. "Cramps. My period's coming, and besides, they were just making speeches. I fell asleep twice! I'm so tired. I'm going to sleep."

  I nodded at the typical Belinda answer and watched her go into her room. I read a little longer and then put out the light. As I drew the covers up to my chin, I heard the floor creak outside my door and then distinctly heard someone going down the stairs. Curious, I rose and peered out just in time to see the top of Belinda's head disappear below the steps. I thought she had probably gone down to get herself something for her cramps. I felt like a glass of milk myself and threw on my robe. When I got downstairs, however, she was nowhere to be found. In fact, the lights were off in the kitchen.

  However, I noticed the rear door was slightly open and I went to it quickly and stepped out on the landing. At first I saw no one and then I caught sight of her moving rapidly over the beach toward our boathouse. She was practically running. Why was she going there this time of the night? I wondered.

  I went back to the foyer at the front entrance and got one of my jackets out of the closet. Then I returned to the rear door and followed after Belinda. We had a larger, grander boathouse than most other people because of Daddy's original enterprises, his boats and activities. A few years previous, before Daddy turned his den into an office, he had taken a part of the boathouse and turned it into a small office furnished with some file cabinets, a desk, some tables and chairs and a sofa. The walls had cork boards covered with data about the weather, fishing and lobster traps.

  The night sky was streaked with thin, veil-like clouds, but the half moon was bright enough to penetrate any obstacle and illuminate the ocean and the shore. About a dozen yards from the boathouse, I thought I heard the sound of laughter and then spotted a small light in the office window. It was coming from the oil lantern on the desk. Drawing closer, I listened harder and thought I recognized the other voice, a male voice. It turned my heart into a small parade drum. For a moment I could barely breathe. I sucked in some air and stepped up to the window.

  At first, I saw nothing, no one. Then I spotted them on the floor because the glow of the small lantern made their naked bodies- glitter. I pulled back, feeling as if I had been punched in the stomach. No, I thought. It can't be. How can it be? It's a dream. I'm standing out here in a nightmare of my own making. I'll close my eyes hard and then open them and be back in my own bed, snug.

  Of course, I wasn't. I was there beside the window. The wind had picked up and the surf crashed on the rocks below. Slowly, I peered through a corner of the window again. He was above her, his hands on her breasts, his back arched, his face turned in my direction. She had her arms around his waist and her legs raised and wrapped around him. He opened his eyes and I was sure, by his expression, he saw me looking in the window.

  I didn't wait to hear him cry out. I turned and ran all the way back to the house, coughing and sputtering when I reached the wooden steps up to the yard. I was dry heaving. My stomach felt like it had been turned inside out.

  Then I looked back because I heard the sound of a door in the boathouse being opened. I saw him standing there, silhouetted in the moonlight, looking in my direction.

  "Nelson?" I heard her cry. "Come on back. Come on. There's no one there. I don't have all night."

  "All right," he said, lingered a moment and then returned to the office.

  I took two deep breaths, held my hand to my heart to stop it from pounding a hole in my chest, and walked back to the house. I was so soaked with my own sweat, I felt as if I had fallen into the sea. I made my way to the front, hung up my coat, and returned to my room. There, I pulled off my nightgown and went to the bathroom to shower. I put on a different nightgown and crawled back into my bed, pulling the blanket up to my chin.

  My heart thumped dully under my breast. I lay there, my eyes wide open, convincing myself I had indeed been outside and I had indeed seen them in the boathouse. This was no dream, no nightmare of my own making.

  In two months, I thought, she was supposed to be married to Carson McGil in a ceremony that would take place only yards from where she lay making love with the only man I loved.

  I heard Belinda return to her room, but I didn't get up to confront her. Instead, I pretended I knew nothing when we both met at breakfast the next morning. She rattled on and on to Mother about how boring the event had been and why she had to come home early.

  "I never heard you come in," Mother told her. "Did you hear her, Olivia?"

  I looked at Belinda.

  "Yes, I he
ard her come home," I said quickly. Belinda smiled.

  "I had to take something for my cramps and fell right to sleep myself," she said. I stared at her, but she didn't notice.

  "I have to get to work. We have a lot doing today," I said and left the house as quickly as I could because I felt if I remained a moment longer, I would scream out what I had really seen and who knew what that would do to Mother. I shuddered to think what would happen when Daddy found out.

  As I turned down Commercial Street, I saw Nelson Childs and his father come out of The Sea Loft, a popular breakfast place. They shook hands and Nelson started toward his shiny red car. Impulsively, I turned into the space behind his car and he looked up, surprised. When he saw me, his smile of confusion faded and his face turned deathly serious. Then, he caught his thoughts in midair, flung them into the back of his mind, and smiled again, his hand up in greeting.

  I rolled down my window.

  "Good morning," he said stepping up to my car. "I just had some breakfast with Dad."

  I could see from how nervous he was that he suspected he had seen me in the window the night before.

  "I think you and I should have a little talk, Nelson."

  "Talk?"

  "About last night," I said firmly. His lips quivered and his eyes filled with trepidation.

  "Last night?"

  "Why don't you just get into my car?" I suggested. He nodded and went around quickly to get in. For a moment we both sat there silently.

  "I heard Belinda leave the house after she had come home from a date with Carson. I was curious, so I followed her to the boathouse."

  "Oh," he said. He looked ahead. "I thought it was you."

  "I'm disappointed in you, Nelson. You know you're having an affair with a woman who's engaged to be married soon, and a woman, I might add, who isn't very bright. She's my sister and I love her, but I recognize her failings. She's not sophisticated when it comes to male-female relationships."

  He started to smile.

  "I don't mean she's not a good lover. I'm sure she is . . . quite the lover, but she's been in trouble before, bad trouble. You have no idea how bad," I continued, relentless now. "My father has had more than his hands full rescuing her from one disaster after another, but this is one that threatens the very foundation of our family and I won't let it happen."