“How are you guys?” She hugged Zoe, smiled at Griffin. Her face was weary and beautiful. He wanted to kiss her full on the mouth.
“How are you?” Griffin asked, starting the car.
“I’m okay.” Too quick, Griffin thought.
“My place is about ten blocks away,” she said. “Left out of the lot and then straight.”
“How much tips did you get?” Zoe asked.
Ellen reached inside her purse, pulled out a Baggie full of coins. “Would you like to count it when we get home?”
“Wow, you got a lot!”
“Yeah, folding money, too, but that’s in my wallet.”
Griffin stole a look over at them, their two heads together over the nickels, dimes, and quarters. He saw some pennies, too, but in his mind he made them Ellen’s before she started her shift. He didn’t want anyone putting down such an insignificant amount to say what they thought of his wife.
The door to Ellen’s apartment was at the back of a large white house. After she unlocked it, they stepped into a tiny living room furnished with a green tweed sofa, a pole lamp, and a battered coffee table. A kitchenette was off to the right, separated from the living room by a long, off-white Formica counter. In the center of the counter were picnic-sized containers of salt and pepper and a small pile of paper napkins. Two bar stools sat before the counter, covered by tufted black plastic. There was a percolator coffeepot on the stove and a new white wall phone looking, by comparison, elegant. And that was all. There were no flowering plants, no soft pillows, no framed pictures, none of the things he knew Ellen believed were essential. He ached for the emptiness he saw here, but Zoe was excited. “This is it?” she asked, climbing up on one of the bar stools. “This is the whole thing? Cool, it’s like a clubhouse!”
“Well, there’s a little bedroom and a bathroom,” Ellen said. “But this is an apartment, Zoe; it’s not big, like a whole house.”
“Where’s the bathroom?”
“You want to see?”
“Yeah!” Zoe hopped off the stool and followed Ellen to a closed door. It opened onto a huge bathroom, considering the size of the rest of the place. There was a claw-footed bathtub and a pedestal sink. Griffin stood at the doorway, watching Zoe examine the feet of the tub. “It’s so deep! Is it really a bathtub?”
“I take baths in it every night,” Ellen said. Griffin saw the razor in the soap dish, a bar of pink soap. There was the shampoo she used, and there was a flowered bottle of bubble bath. Ah yes, Ellen had a lover. And the tub was big enough for two.
He remembered the first time he’d bathed with Ellen. He’d sat behind her, wrapped his arms around her as she lowered herself gingerly down in front of him. Her back was to him; her long black hair hung nearly to her waist in those days. He’d watched her hair blossom outward in the water, then cling to her when she rose up higher in the water. “Don’t feel my fat,” Ellen had said, pushing his arms away from her stomach. “You’re not fat,” he’d told her, and had kissed the back of her neck gently until she had relaxed against him. They’d soaped each other—lazily, at first, and then with extreme intention.
“Can I take a bath?” Zoe asked.
Ellen laughed. “Now?”
“Yeah! Can I?”
“Sure. Let me put the plug in for you—it’s tricky.”
“Hey, it has a chain!” Zoe was peeling off her clothes, watching wide-eyed as Ellen turned on the faucets. What the hell was she so happy about? Griffin wondered.
After Zoe was in the bathtub, Ellen and Griffin went into the living room together. Ellen sat at one end of the sofa and Griffin at the other, the distance between them measured and sharp. “She didn’t bring anything but underwear and one outfit,” Griffin said. “She insisted on it.”
“That’s okay,” Ellen said. “I’m glad she seems so…excited to be here!”
Griffin looked around the room. “I hadn’t imagined it like this.”
“Not exactly House Beautiful, huh? But things cost a lot.”
“I’ll help you, you know,” Griffin said.
She stood up, went into the kitchen. “I know. Thank you. But I need…it’s important that for once in my life, I take care of myself.” She reached up into the cupboard. “Want some tea?”
“No, thanks.” He came into the kitchen, walked up close to her. A piece of hair had come loose from her ponytail, and he moved it gently, tucking it behind her ear.
“I’m a mess,” she said. “I should change clothes.”
He wondered if he were allowed to see this anymore, then realized immediately that he was not. She was telling him to go.
“I’ll just say goodbye to Zoe,” he said, and she nodded quickly.
Zoe was leaning back in the tub, her arms behind her head. The water level was up to her chin. When she saw Griffin, she sat up excitedly. “You can go swimming in here. Want to see?”
“Well, actually, Zoe, I have to get going. But you have a good time, okay?”
Zoe’s face changed and she stood up quickly, dripping and shivering. She wrapped her arms around herself. “I want to come out.”
“You don’t have to come out.”
“I want to.”
“Well, let me just get you a towel first, okay?”
“Okay.” Her teeth were chattering.
“Sit down!”
“No.”
When Griffin came out of the bathroom, he found Ellen bending over a cupboard in the kitchen. “I’ll get her,” she said. “I’ve got the towels right here.”
“Ellen, I want to tell you something.”
She stood, wary.
He cleared his throat. “It’s just that…I’m proud of you. Okay?”
“You are?”
“Yes.”
“Well…for what?”
“For being you. For…I just am.”
She smiled. “Thanks, Griffin.”
“Ellen? One more thing.”
She looked at the closed bathroom door. “Is it quick?”
He swallowed, spoke softly. “Yes. It is.” He walked over to her, looked down into her face and kissed her gently. “I love you. I want you back. I will always want you back.”
She moved away from him, put her hand to her hair in confusion.
“That’s all I wanted to say. You don’t have to say anything back.”
Outside, he sat in the car for a long time, thinking. Then he drove away, through the sleet that had begun falling. He hated weather like this, this unsettling mix of something that was neither here nor there.
Chapter 21
Griffin was at a stoplight when he realized something had been different about Ellen. It was her hair: It had been itself again, lightly streaked with gray. He felt a small rush of happiness, a kind of pride, as though her coming back to her natural color were something for which he could take credit.
The light changed and he started forward, thinking about her upturned face when he’d kissed her. Her mascara had been slightly smudged. He smiled, thinking about how, despite her attempts to apply makeup perfectly, Ellen almost always suffered this imperfection, but his reverie was abruptly interrupted by the thought of Peter seeing that same smudge and having the permission Griffin now lacked to do something about it, to tenderly rub under her lid, saying, “Here. Let me fix this.” Ellen would hold still, childlike, trusting him. When he was finished, he would kiss her lightly and say, “There you go,” and the simple exchange would be charged with sexuality. He knew that. He remembered.
Tomorrow, Zoe would meet Peter. What would she think? What if she liked him, found his youth and his job exciting, a welcome change from the dull familiarity of her father? Some weeks would pass, and then it might happen that Zoe would say that Mommy was going to marry Peter and wasn’t that cool? And oh, by the way, could she live with them? Because she and Peter were fixing up a car together and this way they’d have more time. Peter let her help all she wanted and he did not yell at her when she goofed up. He treated her like a partner.
&nbs
p; Griffin’s stomach began hurting, a vague, dull ache. His daughter was going to meet his wife’s boyfriend, and he was going home to an empty house. He couldn’t recall the last time this had happened. Since Ellen, someone had always been there for him to come home to.
He let himself into the house, and went to sit in the darkened living room with his coat on. What should he do? Call Donna? Go to a movie? A sports bar? He didn’t recognize this life he was living; he didn’t know how to negotiate it.
In the kitchen, he flipped on the light. Slinky appeared, meowing, and rubbed against his leg. He reached down to pick her up, but she wanted no part of it—she leaped immediately from his arms. “Okay, okay,” he said, and went to the cupboard where her food was kept. “This is what you want, right?” She sat still, watching him. He took out a package of food, rattled it. She stood, her back arched in pleasure, then padded to her bowl and sat down. He put the food in her dish, then got a Heineken out of the refrigerator and sat beside her while she ate. “So,” he said, after a long swig of beer. “How was your day?”
The cat ate noiselessly, her tail wrapped neatly around her feet.
“See any mice? See any other cats?”
One flick of one ear.
“Want to go out with me tonight?” He stroked the cat’s back, scratched behind her ears. “Want to stay in? Want to order an anchovy pizza and listen to Cats?” She finished what was in her bowl, got up, and walked away. “Hey!” Griffin said. “Where are you going?” She looked back, briefly, then continued on her way.
Why did they even have a cat? What good were cats? What they needed was a dog. A huge slobbering dog whose eyes glazed over with love every time he looked at you. Maybe he’d go out tonight and buy a puppy, tell Zoe it was an early Christmas present. A Newfoundland. A Saint Bernard. A Great Dane. All three.
But there was no one to take care of a dog anymore. Or of him.
He opened the refrigerator and stared. Then he opened the phone book. He’d get an extra-large pizza, extra sausage, extra cheese. He’d eat, and then he’d get the hell out of here.
He called and ordered dinner, then went into the basement in search of the paper-bag turkey Zoe had made in school when she was a first-grader. They always put it out for Thanksgiving, and he certainly wasn’t going to stop now.
In the furnace room, where holiday decorations were stored, he found a large cardboard box marked THANKSGIVING/XMAS. Inside, at the top, was a wreath made of eucalyptus leaves and curling grapevine that Ellen had bought last year. Not that Griffin had wanted her to. When she’d shown it to him, he’d said it was too expensive, meaning he didn’t like it. Uncharacteristically, she had bought it anyway, had marched resolutely up to the cash register and pulled out her checkbook.
Normally, Ellen asked him about buying nearly everything but the groceries, and normally, when he said he didn’t think so, she’d go along with it. It occurred to him now that there must have been hundreds of times that she’d wanted something he’d vetoed. With some reluctance, he remembered a time recently when Ellen had shown him a watercolor she’d wanted. She’d seen it in a tiny store in their neighborhood the day before, and had asked him to come and look at it with her. He’d gone, but he’d hated the thing, had realized from a few feet away that he wouldn’t want to buy it: apricots in a green bowl, really. He’d wrinkled his forehead and said, “Are you kidding?” And Ellen had looked quickly at the store owner, apologized, and walked out. He’d followed her, saying, “Well, come on, Ellen, you didn’t really like that, did you? I mean, if you really liked it, let’s go back and get it.” Ellen hadn’t looked at him when she’d said, “Forget it. Let’s go and eat.” “Did you really like it?” he’d asked again, and she’d said nothing. They’d gone to eat at a restaurant he chose.
Well, so maybe he was having a bad day. People had bad days! People made mistakes, were sometimes insensitive! She could have said something, she should have said something! All those times he now knew about, when she was feeling sad, or angry, or whatever the hell it was, she could have told him. He was not an idiot. He was not without compassion or empathy. She didn’t give him a chance.
He went to the wall phone in the laundry room. Ellen, he’d say. Jesus. I just realized. He would apologize in a general way, tell her that if she came back, it wouldn’t be like that, he would make room in the relationship for her half of things. But he would also tell her to own up to her mistakes. Yes, this would get things going in the right direction. Fair was fair; truth was truth.
The line was busy. Didn’t she spring for call waiting? He’d pay for her to get call waiting—it was a necessity. He dialed again—she might have just been finishing her conversation, and had now hung up. Busy. He tried the cell phone, but there was no answer. He stood thinking about who she might be talking to, dialed yet again. Busy! Damn it, didn’t she realize that there might be some emergency? Who the hell was she talking to?
But maybe it was Zoe, talking to Grace, her new hobby. Yes. It could be Zoe. Only probably it was not. Probably it was Ellen talking to Peter, who was acting as if everything she said was of great interest to him.
He went back to the box and continued to unpack. Here were the ornaments that Ellen and Zoe had made together out of bread dough—Zoe’s big-headed Santa, her gigantic yellow star, Ellen’s miniature Christmas tree, decorated with cinnamon candy. He went to the phone again, dialed determinedly. But when it rang, he hung up. He had too much to say.
Back at the box, he stood still, unwilling to take anything else out. It was unbearably sad, he couldn’t do it alone. He’d have Zoe help him; she’d make it fun. He closed the box back up, stashed it in the corner, then thought of Ellen or Zoe answering the phone only to hear a hang-up. Maybe it had frightened them.
He dialed the number again, and when Ellen answered, he said, “That was me, just now. That hung up. That was me. I didn’t want you to be scared, thinking it was some…I just decided not to call. Because, you know, it was nothing important. It could wait.”
“Griffin?” She wasn’t afraid; she was amused.
“Yeah. I started to call you, but it can just wait. It was nothing, really, so I hung up. But I thought it might scare you, a hang-up…. I’m repeating myself, aren’t I? You know what? You know why I think it is?” He laughed. “I think I’m nervous!”
“It’s okay.” Her voice was warm.
“Who is it?” he heard Zoe ask, in the background. His daughter, at his wife’s house. It was impossible.
When Ellen told her it was her father, Zoe said, “Let me talk to him!”
And then there she was, breathing into the phone. “Dad?”
“Hi, sweetheart.”
“This is Zoe.”
“I know. How are you?”
“Dad, guess what?”
“What?”
“It just started snowing, and it’s going sideways! Did you see it?”
“Not yet. I’m in the basement. I was getting out some Christmas decorations, but I think I need some help. I think I’ll wait for you.”
“Okay. Are we getting a tree?”
“Of course!”
“Because Mommy’s not.”
“Well, she can share ours.”
“Are we getting it soon?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay.” She breathed into the phone again, then asked, “So what are you doing now?”
“Well, I thought I’d watch a little TV, maybe go to bed early.”
“Oh.” A pause, the breathing. And then, “I’m going to meet a friend of Mommy’s tomorrow.”
Not this. Not now. “Okay, good, Zoe. So, I’ll see you soon!”
“Do you want to talk to Mommy again?”
“No, not necessary.”
“Don’t you want to say goodbye?”
“You say it for me, okay?”
He heard the phone drop and Zoe yelling, “Moooommmmy! Dad wants to say goodbyyyyyye to you!”
When Ellen came to the phone, Griffin
said, “You know, I was just unpacking some of the Christmas decorations.”
“Uh huh.” She waited.
“And I…Well, I found the wreath I gave you such a hard time about buying.”
“Yes. You did give me a hard time about that.”
“I want to tell you that I’m sorry about that. It really is a nice wreath.”
“Yes, it is.”
“And I’m sorry I made such a big deal out of it.”
“Oh, Griffin, what—Okay. Apology accepted.”
“I’m going to hang it up on the front door.”
“Good.”
“Ellen?”
“Yes?”
“I’m glad your hair is back. I mean, I’m glad you stopped coloring it. It isn’t you.”
“Isn’t it?”
Was she challenging him? Or really asking?
“I don’t think it’s you,” he said.
She sighed. “It’s just a rinse. It washes out. You have to keep putting it on all the time, and it’s expensive.”
“You don’t need it. Because you’re beautiful. Do you know that? You are so beautiful.”
“I have to go, Griffin. Thanks for everything.” She hung up.
He turned out the basement lights, and went back upstairs. He could not stay here. He couldn’t breathe. He’d leave money for the pizza in an envelope, tell the person delivering it to eat it himself. Then he’d head for the mall. He would buy Zoe a Christmas present. He would buy Ellen one, too. She was still his wife.
Even from the parking lot, the mall looked beautiful. Through the glass doors, he could see people bustling about. It would be warm and busy and full of distractions—he would feel better. He’d buy some lights for the tree; they needed more. Maybe all white this year. But Ellen liked the colored ones—he’d get more of those. Last year, Ellen had strung the lights on the tree, then plugged them in and discovered that half of them didn’t work. She’d taken them off the tree and spread them out across the rug, waited for Griffin to come home and diagnose the problem. As he’d walked over to take a look, she’d said, “Maybe you plug it into itself.”
He’d looked up. “Pardon?”