Through the Heart Page 10

  That day I wasn’t too late, and I was able to catch the bartender just as Marcus’s beer was arriving.

  “A Stella, please,” I said.

  Then I turned to Marcus. He had ordered a Peroni. “Who orders Italian beer?” I demanded.

  “I think you stayed too long in the Midwest,” he replied.

  “That’s very geographically prejudiced of you. I think the trading floor might be rubbing off on you.”

  Marcus was a trader at Goldman Sachs. I think everyone has heard the stories of the macho trading floor, the cursing, the hamburgers for breakfast, the pornographic e-mails that make the rounds of nearly every computer. Traders take pride in being incredibly politically incorrect.

  Marcus was an exception. He had organic granola for breakfast every morning. He never cursed. He was the only man I’ve ever known who didn’t admit to watching porn (though I’m not sure I believed him). If it sounds like Marcus was a bit of a prig, you would be right. But he was a prig against the grain. No amount of teasing about his granola and the perfectly pressed dress pants he wore to work every day ever seemed to ruffle him. He probably got more porn in his in-box every day than the rest of the trading floor combined, from people who were trying to yank his chain. But he just deleted it without a word. I had never seen Marcus upset. Come to think of it, in some ways Marcus reminded me of me—which is probably the reason I liked him.

  “I was thinking we might grab a table today instead of eating at the bar,” Marcus said.

  I knew what that meant. His wife was going to join us.

  I said, “I can’t stay for dinner tonight.”

  “Come on, Tim. You always do this.”

  “If I always do this, then why are you surprised?” I asked him.

  “You’re my best friend. I would like you to get along with my wife at least well enough to have dinner with her.”

  “Okay, if it was your idea, I’ll stay,” I said. “Was it?”

  Any other guy would have lied to get what he wanted. But Marcus just smiled and shrugged. “Okay, escape if you want.”

  “Why do you let her push you around like this? You know women don’t respect men they can boss around.”

  “So now I should take marital advice from the perpetual bachelor?”

  He had a point.

  “The thing is, women like to be included every once in a while in the guy events, otherwise they get suspicious,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t put up with it.”

  “That’s obvious. And that’s also why you’re a lonely, miserable bastard,” he told me.

  “Better than a smug bastard,” I said.

  Marcus had just gotten married the year before. Even I had to admit that his wife was perfect: American father, French mother, grew up in Europe, summers in the States, gorgeous, smart as a whip, and a successful artist. Her paintings sold for a fortune. Exotic, talented, completely self-possessed—and there was no way in hell I was having dinner with her and Marcus.

  “She’s going to think you don’t like her.”

  “I don’t care what she thinks,” I said.

  “I have to tell you, Tim, I don’t envy the women who date you.”

  “I’d be worried if you did.”

  “Very funny. But I actually think that’s part of the reason Celia wanted to come.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “Well, she feels left out of our Fridays, so a couple of weeks ago I told her some of the stories—”

  I groaned. “No, tell me you didn’t.”

  “What?” He pretended like he didn’t know what I was talking about.

  “Marcus, what did you tell her?”

  “Nothing really. Just some stories. Like that blonde last month who came up to us—”

  “Oh, good Lord.”

  “It’s okay. I’m not even sure Celia believed me. I think she wanted to see for herself.”

  “That’s it. There’s no way I’m going to be put on display like some sort of zoo creature,” I told him. I stood up just as the bartender came back with my beer.

  “You’re not even staying for one beer?” he asked.

  There was something about the way Marcus was looking at me. I sat back down.

  “Okay. I’ll stay for one beer.”

  His face cleared, and he said, “Good, because I wanted to tell you about the rumor I heard today.”

  “What’s up?”

  Working on the trading floor, Marcus always did have the best stories.

  “I don’t even know if I believe it. And there were no names attached, but I heard someone has been fudging the books and is about to get busted. And I’ve heard it’s big.”

  “How big?”

  “Billions.”

  “Billions? Someone is pulling your leg.”

  “Maybe. But the source is pretty solid.”

  “Who is it?”

  He just smiled.

  “Come on, spill it,” I said.

  I think I would have gotten it out of him, but Celia arrived before he could finish. I had my back to the entrance, but I knew she’d come in from the faces of the men farther down the bar who were facing the door.

  Marcus got up from his seat. He still did that—got up when a woman arrived or left. I stayed seated. She came around me and kissed Marcus. Then she turned to me and gave me a frosty smile. “Hello, Timothy.”

  “Hello, Celia.”

  She gave me an air kiss. “How are you?”

  “Good. Good. You?”

  “Not bad. Working on my next show. I have one at a new, bigger gallery coming up in the spring.”

  “That’s great. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks.”

  She eyed me.

  I smiled at her. It was a smile calculated to annoy her. And it worked. I saw it in the way her face froze.

  Marcus did too.

  “I was just telling Tim about a crazy rumor,” he said quickly

  “Is that right?” she said, obviously not interested at all.

  I said, “I have to get going, but, Marcus, you can tell me the rest of it on Monday.”

  “So you’re going?” Celia said.

  “Yeah, I’m heading out.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” she said.

  Marcus and I looked at each other—and he shrugged apologetically.

  This is what it was like to be married. Where was true love, outside of books and movies and songs? If I was tempted to believe, all I had to do was look at Marcus. He thought he’d found the perfect woman. And I knew better.

  THE INVESTIGATION

  A CONTROVERSIAL VIEW OF VICTIMS

  Victims may also play a role in their homicide . . .

  In about 55 percent of all homicide cases the victim

  and killer knew one another, and the homicide often

  arose out of conflicts in their relationship. Lester

  and Lester (1975) point out that victims may be as

  strongly motivated to be killed as their killers are to

  kill. Viewed in this light a homicide may not be an

  isolated event; it may be an expression of an integral

  pattern of a relationship. An additional feature of the

  victim-precipitated homicide is the fact that in this type

  of homicide one can see a close relationship between

  suicide and murder.

  —From The Human Side of Homicide by Bruce L. Danto, John Bruhns, and Austin H. Kutscher

  Nora

  What Nora Did After Timothy Left Kansas

  The disaster that was dinner with Timothy happened on Tuesday. The rest of the week was an eternity.

  Then I came home on Friday to find Deirdre and my mother sitting in the kitchen. Together. And they weren’t fighting.

  When I pushed open the door, they both looked up at me like I was the last person they expected to see. I don’t know who they thought it might be.

  I was annoyed. I’ll admit it. I was annoyed, even though I’d be
en trying for the last three years to get my sister and my mother to sit in the same room without fighting. For the last three years, I seemed to be the only one who was aware of the fact that they might not have much more time left to spend time together. I would have thought I’d be ecstatic to walk in and discover my mother and my sister deep in conversation. But I wasn’t. The moment I walked in the room and saw them I realized I didn’t just want them to make up—I wanted to be the one who brought them together.

  It didn’t help that my mother took one look at me, turned to Deirdre like she was her best friend, and said, “Call me later.” Then she stood up and left the room without another word or even a glance at me. Apparently, the time since Tuesday night didn’t feel like an eternity to my mother.

  My sister said, “You’re home early.”

  “Actually I’m not. This is the time I get home. I didn’t know you were coming. Where are the twins?”

  Deirdre seemed almost embarrassed. She couldn’t quite look me in the eye when she said, “A friend of mine is looking after them. And, actually, I need to get back. It’s later than I thought. I lost track of the time.”

  “You’re going now?”

  “Yeah,” and she got up and pushed her chair in as if to prove it. “I just came by to see Mom,” she added awkwardly. “See how she was doing.”

  The fact that she tried to explain what she was doing there only made me more suspicious. Deirdre never bothered to explain herself.

  “That’s a first,” I said.

  “So?” There was an edge to her voice—her way of warning me that if I kept on in this direction I was going to have trouble.

  “I’m just saying it’s a new thing.”

  “Maybe I’ve come before and you just didn’t know it.”

  That made me stop and think for a second. It was true I had no idea what happened here during the day. And if I’d been five minutes later, and Deirdre had left, I never would have known she was there at all.

  Then I remembered our conversation the Sunday before. I felt a little guilty that I’d been so immersed in my drama that I’d completely forgotten her problems. But once I remembered her money issues, I realized what Deirdre must have come back for.

  “So did you find out if Mom has any money?” I asked.

  “I didn’t come back for money.”

  I didn’t believe her. “I thought you were about to lose your apartment.”

  “Yeah, well, Boyd came through. He’s giving me enough to get by.”

  “You were so sure he wouldn’t help.” It was my way of saying I didn’t believe her.

  She shrugged. “I was wrong. So sue me.”

  “So you didn’t ask Mom for any money at all?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  We were both standing—since I’d never sat down and she had gotten up as if to leave—and now it felt like we were facing off. But for once I didn’t feel like backing down.

  “Well, maybe because I’ve been footing the bill, I’m deep in debt, and I’m kind of curious if she was telling me the truth.”

  Deirdre rolled her eyes as if that was just the most ridiculous thing she ever heard, but I guess she decided to humor me because she said, “Okay, fine, then yes, I asked her for money. But she told me the same thing she told you.”

  “Did you believe her?”

  Deirdre finally erupted. “God, I don’t know. I’ve got enough problems—I don’t need to worry about yours, okay?” Then, abruptly, “I’ve got to go.”

  And that’s exactly what she did.

  The weekend brought another trip to Kansas City for chemo session number six. But this one was a silent trip. I was still enemy number one, according to my mother.

  Sunday was a wasteland.

  I was waiting for Monday.

  It came and went. And the week slid by

  Another Monday came and went.

  And another.

  It got bitterly cold. The wind blew down from the Canadian steppe. We had our first snowfall, just a dusting. Then we had a real early season blizzard that closed down the streets for a day.

  My mother started speaking to me again. I don’t even know when. It came as a gradual thawing as the world around us froze.

  I didn’t see Dan, and I didn’t even have to avoid his car. I wondered briefly if he might be avoiding me now. But then I asked myself if I cared, and the answer was no, so I didn’t think about it again.

  Life went back to normal. My heart had long stopped racing every time the door to the coffee shop opened. What had happened with Timothy was almost like a story in a book I’d read—he was like a character I’d dreamed of but who wasn’t quite real. Though isn’t that what all our loves are?

  How can I call him a love? Love after five minutes in a diner and a painful hour sitting across a table from each other not speaking?

  Well, why not?

  Timothy

  Another Family Dinner and a Visit

  from His Sister

  At the first family dinner after I got back, the theme was red. My mother loved to match: red tablecloth, red napkins, red flowers, red wine, beet salad, rare steak, red velvet cake.

  It wasn’t just the table and the flowers and the food. She also wore red. She was dressed in a red Chanel suit. And that wasn’t the end of the matching either. She also liked to match designers. Chanel suit meant Chanel shoes and Chanel belt and Chanel bag and Chanel scarf and Chanel coat.

  A man shouldn’t know these things.

  It turned out that she chose the color specifically for me. She announced it at the beginning of dinner. She tinged her wineglass and said, “This night is to help everyone understand the position we are in now as a family. Unfortunately, thanks to Timothy, we are now in the red.”

  I hadn’t told her about what had happened that week. I’d been saving it.

  She turned to me. “Timothy, do you have anything to say to that?”

  “Yes,” I told her. “I’m afraid I have bad news.”

  Her lips pursed, but she looked almost perversely pleased. My mother does love a good tragedy, once she embraces it. Who doesn’t like the image of himself, or herself, suffering terribly? Not the actual suffering, mind you. Just the image of it.

  “I’m afraid, after this week you’ve chosen the wrong color.”

  “The wrong color?”

  She wasn’t pleased anymore; she didn’t understand, and she didn’t like that.

  “It should have been black,” I told her.

  “Black?” There was a long pause as she took that in. “You mean . . .”

  “It was a good week,” I said,

  “Why didn’t you tell me this before?” she demanded, sounding almost angry.

  If I had been expecting her to be happy, I might have been disappointed. But I knew that she wouldn’t be. She didn’t like surprises, my mother. Even good ones.

  I also knew that she couldn’t resist the idea of money—it turned her giddy. So her bad mood would only last until she saw the spreadsheet.

  “Do you have a printout for me?” she asked a second later.

  I reached under my chair for my folio and pulled out the weekly report I’d put together.

  She had her hand out waiting, and I gave her the paper.

  She took it, looked at it, and smiled. Then she started grilling me. She wanted a blow-by-blow account of every successful trade. That took us through the appetizer and into the main course. But when she heard I had taken profits and had pulled back, she went from giddy to furious in a second.

  “Just when we have a chance to actually make some money, rather than simply making back what you lost, you get scared?” she demanded. “I honestly don’t know what I was thinking, putting you in charge of managing the money. I would do it myself, if I had more time.”

  I looked over at my father. He was silently cutting the last of his steak (rare and very red). He didn’t even look up. It was actually my father who had put me in charge. And he might let my mothe
r have her way in all other things, but he would never in a million years let her take over managing the money. That was understood.

  Eventually, when we got to dessert, my mother moved on from me to the rest of the family, but she didn’t have enough time to really rake them over the coals. It gave me another reason to feel good—I felt like I had spared them.

  But, as is so often the case, other people often don’t see things the same way. My sister, for one, didn’t see it quite in the same light, which I discovered a few weeks later when she came to see me in the office.

  My sister never came to see me in the office. Or maybe I should amend that—my sister never came to see me at all. I had never thought about it much, but we had no real relationship. I sat with her at the dinner table every week, and I heard about what she was doing from my brother Edward, but when we saw each other, she and I rarely even exchanged more than hello and a polite kiss on the cheek. And it had been that way for as long as I could remember. In the family order, it was me, and then Andrew came a year later. Then my mother took a few years off before having Edward and then Emily. I was five years older than Edward and just over seven older than Emily. I went off to college when Emily was eleven, so I wasn’t there for the years she spent in and out of hospitals and clinics for the eating disorder that set in at puberty.

  I have to admit, other than having a laugh about her crazy marriages, and thoroughly enjoying the fits my mother had over her, I never really thought about my sister. She might as well have been a stranger. In fact, she was.

  I got my first sense of this when my secretary, Marie, knocked on the door of my office and told me Emily was outside and wanted to see me. I swear to you, for a good ten or fifteen seconds, I searched my memory for an Emily I had slept with and who might have gone so far as to find out where I worked and shown up there. Then I realized that she meant my sister Emily. That’s how unexpected her visit was.