“Twenty-seven.”
“Marianna—!” David glared at her in furious confusion. “How can he be twenty-seven? For God’s sake, he could have a son that age!”
Her look was patient. “Yes; he could,” she said.
“Oh, for—” David hissed, disgusted at himself. He felt like an idiot. A classic demonstration of cliche thinking, he thought He’d been immersed in video dialectics far too long. Crossing the studio, he sat beside her. “And the woman in the painting?”
“My mother.”
“Mrs. Brentwood.” Revelation flooded through his mind. It hadn’t been an actress she’d resembled at all. “You do live on the bluff then.”
Marianna nodded.
“Why did you tell me you didn’t? Never mind; I know. You weren’t sure you wanted to know me.”
She shook her head. “That wasn’t the reason.”
“What then?”
“I didn’t want you to meet her.” Marianna’s shoulders bowed. “But now you have.”
She sounded so defeated that, on impulse, David put his hand on hers. “It doesn’t matter,” he assured her.
“It doesn’t?” Marianna looked up eagerly. “Nothing’s changed?”
He started to reply, then checked himself; he’d consider that part later. “Tell me why your mother tried to make me think you’re a—” He finished with a scoffing noise; the very word affronted him.
Marianna looked at him intently. He hoped she wasn’t going to mention that he’d changed the subject. “Why did she?” he pressed.
“To frighten you away.”
David noticed that his hand was still on hers and drew it back. “Why?” he asked.
“So I’d be alone again.”
“I don’t understand.”
Marianna averted her face. “She hates me, David,” she said. “She’s hated me so long that—” She shook her head. “—I can’t remember when it started.”
“Why should she hate you?”
Marianna looked distressed. “What can I say that won’t make me sound terrible?” she asked. She faced him. “She’s my mother, David. I don’t want to speak against her.”
“She’s spoken against you.”
“I know, but—” Again she shook her head. “She isn’t normal. The things she believes …”
“About the dead?”
Marianna shuddered. “Please.”
“I’m sorry.” David patted her back, then drew his hand away skittishly as the urge to stroke her rose in him. He felt his stomach muscles tensing and resisted it; he knew exactly what that meant now. “Why does she hate you?” he asked.
“Because I’m young,” she said. “Because—” Her expression grew tormented. “—She says I have the beauty she lost.”
David winced. The picture was depressingly complete now: A beautiful but selfish and vindictive woman resenting her own daughter for reminding her that she was growing old; jealousy begetting hatred and, at last derangement That was what he’d seen revealed in Mrs. Brentwood’s eyes, heard trembling in her voice—a spiteful malevolence boiling in the depths of her.
“Did she frighten away Terry Lawrence’s son?” he asked.
“Probably,” she murmured.
David frowned. “Why do you live with her then?” he asked.
“I have to.”
“Why?”
She stared at her hands. “I’m afraid, if I leave, she’ll—”
“Kill herself?” he provided after several moments.
Marianna closed her eyes. “She’s sick, David. She’s so very sick.”
Suddenly she pressed against him. “Hold me, please,” she begged. He hesitated as she clung to him. “I need you. Please don’t be afraid of me.”
“Afraid?” His laugh was stricken. “Good God, you don’t still think I’m afraid of you?” He put his arms around her. “Marianna.” Poor, unhappy child, he thought. That’s what she was; a child in a woman’s body, earthbound in the far more grievous sense that she was bound to the carnal, seeking to derive all comfort and enjoyment from her flesh. Dear God, he thought unhappily, and he, with his own world of problems, had been fool enough to enter hers. She needed so much help and understanding, so much love, that even the lifetime of a younger man devoted solely to her welfare might not be sufficient. As for him—
He closed his eyes and felt the familiar assault of guilt. How irresponsible is the flesh, he thought; how negligent and greedy. He should never have begun with her. By doing so, he’d only made the tangled pattern of her life a little more disordered.
He tightened as she rubbed against him. “Love me, David,” she whispered. “Make me forget.”
“No.” He spoke without thought.
Merianna sat up quickly, looking at him in dismay.
“I mean—” He broke off, feeling sick with fault. “It’s not enough to just forget your problems, Marianna. You have to solve them.” He felt contemptible for speaking this way; still, it was the truth. “You have to face reality, and—”
“No!” She cried out with such explosive vehemence that David felt himself recoil. “I won’t! I won’t!” She glared at him, the hatred in her face appalling him. Until that moment, he had never truly known the meaning of the phrase: “his blood ran cold.”
“I want your body,” she muttered, “I want to forget.”
David stared at her dumbly, aware—for the first time it seemed—that she was virtually a sealed book to him. Her reaction had been so abrupt so violent and unexpected that, at once, he was afraid of her again. She’s mad, he thought. He felt, somehow, incredulous at his position. What in God’s name was he doing here?
“Oh, David.” Obviously, she’d noted his expression, for her tone was pained, repentent now. He shivered as she took his hands. “I’m sorry, darling. Please forgive me.” She kissed the hands and held them to her cheeks. “It’s only that I love you so, I lose my mind when you reject me.”
“Marianna—”
“Please make love to me, David.”
He couldn’t speak.
“I’ll make it nice for you. Here; feel how soft I am.” She pressed his hands against her breasts. “You know I’m yours. Do anything you want with me.” She pulled back. “Here, I’ll take my sweater off so you can see them.”
“Marianna, no!” He spoke through clenching teeth, his eyes closed tightly. Nausea billowed in his stomach. Even now, he wanted her; God in heaven, even now. Jarring to his feet, he hurried for the door, then stopped and turned. “I’m leaving, Marianna. I’m going home with my wife.”
He drew in faltering breath. “I feel ashamed for having made your life more painful than it is already. For having used you to—absolve my own shortcomings. I apologize most humbly to you. But I have to leave. My responsibility is to my marriage. I wish I could help you, but I can’t You need much more than I could ever give.”
They gazed at each other in silence. She is a ghost, he thought the pitiful ghost of what she might have been. “Please don’t hate me,” he said. “I never meant to hurt you; that I swear.”
He felt himself begin to tighten as she stood and walked across the studio. She stopped before him. Unaccountably, she smiled; the smile that had bewitched him. “I don’t hate you, David,” she said cheerfully. Rising on her toes, she kissed his cheek. “Have a good trip.”
He watched her as she moved away, a mixture of emotions wresting him—sorrow and remorse and, in spite of everything, disappointment at her casual farewell. He heard her voice repeating, in his mind: It’s only that I love you so, I lose my mind when you reject me. If she’d really meant it, how could she—?
He closed his eyes, grimacing. Vanity of vanities, he thought. Sighing, he waited for the sound of the closing door. When it came, he opened his eyes, listening to her footsteps on the stairs. Impulsively, he moved to the door and opened it. He heard her walk across the living room. The front door closed. He was not prepared for the burst of pain it caused him. He was going to miss her. She was ill. It was no
thing but infatuation. His decision was the right one. Nonetheless, he’d miss her. What was that phrase from Cyrano? How well it applied to her. That wind of terrible and jealous beauty blowing over me—that dark fire, that music …
He whispered, “Marianna.” Then, “Goodbye.”
He was waiting in the living room when Ellen returned; as she opened the door, he rose from the sofa. Ellen stopped and looked at him in curious surprise. He swallowed. “Hi.”
She didn’t answer.
David hesitated, gestured toward the sofa. “Sit?”
Without a word, she crossed the room and settled on the sofa. He sat beside her.
Silence. David drew in strained breath. “Let’s go home,” he said.
Ellen watched him guardedly.
“It was a mistake to come here.”
“Maybe not.”
He started. “What?”
“Would we be better off if nothing had been said?”
He sighed, then, after several moments, shook his head. “No; it’s better they were said. But … well, they are said now, the problem’s in the open. Can’t we settle it at home?”
She didn’t speak.
“This place isn’t right for it,” he said. “It’s true: you can’t go home again.”
“Is that what you think we were trying to do?”
“Yes.” He nodded slowly. “I think we somehow had the feeling that what we’d lost might still be here in Logan Beach.”
She looked at him a while before she lowered her gaze. “Perhaps you’re right.”
“Then let’s go home.”
“Home.” She spoke the word as though it represented some impossible goal. David took her hand. “We can work it out,” he said.
“But will we work it out?” Her look was one of pleading. “Or will we just … settle back in?”
He shook his head. “We couldn’t if we wanted to.”
“You sound almost disappointed.”
“No.” He smiled dejectedly. “Well, maybe a little. It was peaceful.”
“And unreal.”
“I guess.” He looked at her inquiringly. “You don’t regret the change at all then?”
“I regret that it came so late,” she said, “I regret that we held it back.”
David took his hand away, a wave of discouragement oppressing him. “You make it sound as if our marriage has been a fraud.”
“I don’t mean to.” Ellen’s tone was milder now though not placating. “It’s only in the past few years that the pretending grew painful. Which brought on Julia.” She sat up straight. “As I said before: probably, I’ve put it all too harshly. All I wanted to convey was that we had a problem that couldn’t be ignored any more.”
“All right.” He nodded once. “We won’t ignore it anymore. We’ll solve it but at home, not here.”
Ellen looked disturbed. “Can’t we even start here?”
“I don’t think so.” David held himself in check. “It’s—distracting, unfamiliar.”
She didn’t reply and he wondered, almost fearfully, what she was thinking. “Is that unfair?” he asked. “To want to settle it in our own home?”
“You don’t even want to talk about it here?”
“Right now, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Well—sure; of course. I don’t mean we have to board the plane in twenty minutes.” He didn’t dare press any harder for fear that his anxiety would seem undue. “I just mean, I think we ought to leave some time today; go home, really get to work on this.”
Ellen sighed. “If you feel it’s that important.”
“Well—” If there was some alternative, he thought. He brightened as it came to him. “Look, we don’t have to go back home immediately, if that’s what bothers you. We can go some other place—”
She interrupted. “What would be the point of that?”
David felt himself tightening. “Well—” He shrugged. “So we wouldn’t have to hurry home.”
“But—” She gestured with exasperation. “Why not here then? This is where it all—opened up.”
He drew in shuddering breath. “I just don’t like it here.”
“Why? Because it opened up here?”
“No.” He looked distressed. “Well, maybe; I don’t know.”
Ellen sighed defeatedly. “Oh, David.” She stared at her hands. “Is it really the location that bothers you?”
He didn’t understand.
“Or is it the problem? Is that what you want to get away from?” She looked up. “Permanently, I mean.”
David closed his eyes. There seemed to be a dreadful weight across his shoulders and he let them slump beneath it. “Do you?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. Silence filled the room.
“I don’t know,” she said, finally. “I feel … extraneous, somehow. As if I’ve served my purpose and it doesn’t really matter what I want anymore.”
He looked at her in pained surprise; he’d never heard her sound so lost before. He wanted to take her hand again, console her; but something kept him from it.
“The more we talk,” she said, “the more I get the feeling that our marriage, in the last few years, has been like an unsuccessful game of charades—each of us trying, in vain, to guess what the other was trying to convey.” She turned to him. “Even so, I never felt as far away from you as I do right now.”
He watched her stand and move across the room. She stopped at the foot of the stairs. “I’ll go up and pack,” she told him in a tired voice. “We’ll go back to Sherman Oaks. We’ll see about a divorce.”
He shuddered. “No.”
She looked at him in silence. He began to wonder, vaguely, if his eyes were going bad, she seemed to shimmer so before him. “No,” he murmured. He shook his head, staring at her through a gelatinous film.
She seemed to drift across the room to touch his cheeks in wonder. “David?”
“No.”
“You don’t want it that way?”
“No.”
“You want us to go on?”
He had only the strength to stretch out his hand for her.
“David.” Suddenly, she was beside him, in his arms, her arms around him, her cheek pressed to his, her tears spilling across his face.
“Don’t leave me, El,” he begged.
“I won’t, I won’t.”
“I need you. Please don’t leave me.”
“David. Oh, my sweetheart; David, David. I won’t leave you. Not if you need me, never if you need me.” She kissed his face and lips with joy.
David pressed his face into her hair and held her tightly. This is right, he thought; the rightness of it seemed to bathe his mind and body with a healing warmth. This is my love, my heart. How could he have doubted it? It was so clear. The passion he felt for her was so entirely different from that which he had felt for Julia, certainly for Marianna. This, too, was physical; yet, somehow, it transcended flesh, adding to it, the dimension of his mind; perhaps, his soul.
That’s it! he thought. The realization struck him with awe. That was the solution, the combination, the Answer: to lend meaning to the body’s appetite by giving it the motivation of unselfish love, expressing spirit through flesh. He’d thought of it before but now he knew it. He trembled at the concept—so violently that Ellen looked at him anxiously.
“What is it?”
“Nothing.” David clung to her. His laugh was broken. “Nothing? My God, everything!” He shook his head, astonished. Was this inspiration? Was this the feeling of the self release which he had read about? His body seemed not gone, still with him but securely in its place now, not dominating any more, not the control but the instrument to be controlled; on it he could play whatever music he chose. He shut his eyes, feeling dizzy. Surely, this euphoria could not go on.
It didn’t. Like a dazzling mantle thrown across him, then removed, the feeling lifted, gone beyond him. He could see again. He looked at Ellen. “Wow,” he said.
&nbs
p; “Wow?” She smiled.
“I just went cosmic.”
“I don’t—”
“—Understand? Neither do I but it was great” He held her close. “And it was all because of you. I don’t know how but it was.”
Whispering his name, she clung to him. “I love you so.”
“Oh, I more than love you,” David said. “I exist because of you.” He kissed her lips. “Whatever that means; don’t ask me, I don’t know. The feeling’s gone. I had it though and it was marvelous, it really was. I wish the same for you.”
He stood and drew her up. Reality was back again, everything in proper place. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s get our stuff and head for home. There’s a lot to do.”
“All right, darling.”
They moved for the stairs, arms around each other. “Look at us,” she said. She brushed the tears from David’s cheeks, her own. “A couple of boo-hoos.”
“We were crying with love,” he said. Remarkable, he thought. Until this moment, he would never have believed that he could speak such words and not feel self-conscious. Now, he only thought how true they were. “It’s going to be all right,” he said. “We’re going to find the answer.”
“I want to find it,” Ellen said. “With you.”
“Oh, definitely with me. That’s in the books.” He kissed her lightly on the cheek.
They started up the stairs. Amazingly, his step was buoyant; he didn’t feel exhausted anymore. “Here, blow your nose,” he said, holding up his handkerchief.
“I can’t get over it,” she said. “Here, I thought that everything was over: that you didn’t love me, that you wanted to leave.”
“I do love you,” he said, “I’ll never leave.”
Her arm drew tight around him. “Don’t.”
“Never.” He believed it too. It was incredible how positive he felt; how secure. Another cliché phrase, he thought; abused but apt: It was as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. That was how he felt—disburdened, confident. There wasn’t even a twinge as they passed the studio. That was finished; a destructive yet enlightening episode. He did not regret it now except to the degree that it had injured Marianna.
He smiled. “One good thing; we’ll be there when the baby comes.”
She nodded, smiling. David looked at her more closely. “Talk about me,” he said, concerned. “You look tired yourself.”