Emperor of Ocean Park

CHAPTER 43

“Where have you been?” asks Kimmer in a tone that I cannot at first identify. I have been home perhaps five minutes. Finding no one on the first floor, I came upstairs, kissed a slumbering Bentley good night, and walked into a storm.

“I… had a meeting with Dean Lynda. And then, well, I told you I might have to work late. The draft of my paper is overdue, remember?”

“I called your office, Misha. Three times.”

“Maybe I was in the library.” I do not know why I am being so cagey.

“You never go to the library.” My wife is sitting up in bed, extra pillows propped behind her, work strewn over the blankets as she flips through the channels with the remote. Her eyes seem puffy, as though she has been crying, but she does not look at me. “Or, when you do, you get in trouble,” she adds.

“The truth is… I went for a walk.”

“A walk? For two hours?”

“I had a lot to think about.”

“I’m sure.” But there is a catch in her voice. What is going on?

“Kimmer, are you okay?”

“No, I am not okay!” she flares, rounding on me at last. “My husband, who has lately been acting crazy, can’t be found for two whole hours! Two hours, Misha! Did it ever occur to you that I might worry?”

I cross to the bed, sit next to her, try to take her hand. She snatches it back. “No, I guess not. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry. You’re sorry. ”

“What do you want me to say, Kimmer? Tell me, and I’ll say it.”

“I shouldn’t have to tell you what to say.”

“Look, darling, I’ll apologize to Jerry. I was out of line. I know that.”

“There’s nothing going on with Jerry. There never was! Why can’t you just believe me when I tell you these things?”

Because you have lied to me before. Because a man called the house looking for you and said baby, a fact I have yet to mention to you. Because you and I once cheated on Andre, so you and somebody else could be cheating on me. Dr. Young is right, so right!

“I believe you,” I whisper.

“Oh, Misha.” Her voice breaks. And, quite suddenly, the tears flow. I am stunned. I have not seen my wife cry since the night Bentley was born. At first I am not sure how to react. I put my arms around her. She writhes free. I hold her again, pulling her close, and her head finally settles against my chest.

“Kimmer, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“Were you… were you with somebody else, Misha? Because I could understand it if you were. I’m such a bitch.” Jealousy? From Kimmer?

“No, darling, no. Of course not. I told you, I went for a walk.” Which is the truth but not the whole truth. Even now, I am not ready to tell her where I walked. I do not want her to think I am crazy.

“Misha, Misha,” she whispers, lightly punching my chest. “Misha, what happened to us? It was so good. It was so good.”

I shake my head. I have no answer. “I love you,” I breathe. I am stroking the back of her neck, the way she used to like, and her pain seems to be subsiding. “You know there’s nobody else in my life but you and Bentley. And please don’t call yourself names.”

“Why? I am a bitch. I’m horrible to you. You should leave me. You would if you had any sense.” And then more tears. I think of my encounter with Gerald Nathanson, his anger arguably previous to mine. Maybe he and Kimmer ended their affair (if there was one, if there ever was one), and she is unhappy about it. But my wife’s pain at this moment seems more profound, and, besides, the little slice of macho competitiveness I usually try to cover up is unwilling to accept that she would weep over Jerry when she has me.

“Come on, darling, what is it? Tell me.”

Kimmer shakes her head. I stroke her neck some more. She whispers something. I can’t quite hear it. She says it again, louder. And, for a moment, I am as crushed as she is.

“Ruthie called. She… she said the President picked somebody else.”

“Oh, Kimmer. Oh, honey, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.” She sniffles, wipes her face on the sleeve of her long nightdress. “I guess it wasn’t meant to be.”

“You still have me and Bentley,” I murmur. “It’s not your fault the President didn’t pick the best candidate.”

“That’s right.” Kimmer tries to smile. “I knew I shouldn’t have voted for him.”

My eyes widen. “You voted for him?”

She manages a shaky grin. “I told you I flipped a coin.”

“I thought you were joking.”

“Well, I wasn’t.” She kisses me suddenly, then whispers something inaudible against my lips. She says it again, louder: “Don’t you want to know who he picked?”

“Uh, sure. Okay.” Actually, I do not, especially if, somehow, the resilient Marc Hadley has found a way to rescue his candidacy. But I am bound to hear sooner or later, so I might as well hear from my wife.

“Lemaster Carlyle.”

“What!”

“Lemaster Carlyle.” She laughs, harshly this time, then coughs, and a few more tears burst through her self-control. “Oh, that snake. That snake! I know you think he’s like the best thing since sliced bread, but I think he’s just a snake in the grass!”

Despite my wife’s pain, I have to smile at the way the rest of us outsmarted ourselves. When Ruthie told Kimmer that two or three of my colleagues were in the running, we stopped at Marc Hadley. When Ruthie told Marc that the President was interested in diversity, Dahlia and Marc stopped at Kimmer. And there all the time was Lem Carlyle, at the intersection, a colleague and diverse, fitting both descriptions yet unexpected; good old Lem, waiting patiently on the sidelines for something to go awry-a charge of plagiarism, a crazy husband, anything-lurking and lurking like… well, like a snake in the grass. At least now I know why he has lately seemed so nervous around me.

“I can’t believe it,” I finally whisper.

“Liberals for Bush,” Kimmer reminds me.

“Oh, right.”

“Maybe it’s for the best,” my wife suggests, but neither of us can think of a reason why. So we do what used to be one of our favorite things instead. We walk down the hall with our arms around each other and stand in the doorway of Bentley’s bedroom, gazing at him in wonder. We say a little prayer of thanksgiving. Then we go back to our room and put Casablanca in the VCR, and Kimmer eventually brightens a bit as she gets into reciting her favorite lines. But her eyes have closed by the time Ingrid Bergman goes to the bar to beg Humphrey Bogart for the letters of transit. I turn off the tape and Kimmer opens her eyes at once. “Are you sure there’s not another woman?” she asks. “Because I need you right now, Misha. I really do need you.”

“I’m sure.” Maxine flits briefly through my mind, but I push her away. “I only love my wife,” I tell both women, truthfully. “And my son.”

“And your father.”

“Huh?”

Although my wife’s tired eyelids have resumed their droop, her full lips curve into a smile. “You love that old man, Misha. That’s why you keep searching so hard.”

Love? Love the Judge? This is, tragically, a concept I have not previously considered. Maxine said she knew I couldn’t stop chasing the arrangements. Now Kimmer is saying the same thing. “Maybe so,” I finally say. “I’m sorry. I just want to know what happened.”

My wife seems to understand. “No, no, it’s okay, honey. It’s okay.” Her eyes have drifted closed again, and her voice is starting to slur. “I understand, Misha. I do. But promise you’ll come back to us.”

“Come back to you from where?”

“From Aspen,” Kimmer murmurs. She yawns.

“Aspen?”

“Oh, come on, Misha. I’m not gonna be a federal judge. That’s over. So you might as well go see your Uncle Jack.” She opens one eye, winks, then closes it again. “Just say hello to the FBI for me, okay?”

“Uh, okay.”

“Bastards,” she mutters, and is asleep. I sit awake for a while, stroking her back, on the one hand confident that she loves me after all, on the other wondering who phoned the house and called her baby.

Two weeks.