The remains

Chapter 5

Michael faced me.

“What’s this all about, Rebecca? What’s going on here?”

I shook my head, ran my hand through my hair as if to say, Nothing . But I felt something snap inside my brain. I felt my heart begin to pound and Molly’s soft voice filled my head.

“ Tell him the truth.”

But I couldn’t do it. Like a screw that had rusted over time inside its solid metal bolt, the secret was too entrenched. Even if I tried to tell Michael, I feared that all I might possibly manage would be to open my mouth with no words coming out. So what did I do instead? I just stared at him, with a frowning, puppy dog face of my own.

“You all right, Bec?” he asked after a beat. But we’d been married after all. We’d shared intimacy after intimacy. It was true, he loved me and despite my anger for what had happened during his binging crazy period, I still loved him too. With that clearly in mind and heart, I knew that he knew that I was holding something back. Something that once revealed might forever alter the way he perceived me. The way he perceived us. Or what had been us.

I knew how much my silence must have been hurting him.

Seeking a distraction I picked up his near empty Pepsi can, handed it to him, then made my way back into the kitchen to toss mine into the recycling bin. Outside the double-hung window over the sink the rain picked up in intensity. This storm was definitely going to be an all-nighter.

“You hungry?” I offered, suddenly hoping that Michael would say yes; that maybe after a couple of hours and some hot food in me, I might loosen up that rusted screw, begin to spill the details of a three decade old secret.

But instead, he entered the kitchen and tossed the empty can into the blue recycle bin next to the trash container. Having him next to me in the kitchen made me think about a time when the bin might have been filled with a dozen empty beer bottles and the mortgage was three months overdue.

But then it also reminded me of something wonderful.

Michael and I, during our first year together, sitting outside the Cafe Deux-Magots in Paris on a bright, cool, early spring afternoon. On one side the St. Germaine-des-Pres church and on the other the Seine, lovers and thinkers slowly walking the cobble walk that bordered its left bank. Both of us dressed in leather jackets and scarves, drinking cappuccinos and smoking cigarettes, our eyes never tired of looking into each other’s faces, our knees touching under the little round table and on occasion the tips of our fingers touching and that wonderful electric shock sensation that went through our bodies each time it happened. Michael was on his way to becoming a famous novelist and I was going to be a famous artist and together we were going to be the toast of Paris and New York.

Eight years later, I was standing inside the open refrigerator door of my north Albany apartment. I was looking at the food and thinking that now there was only one person to cook for instead of two.

“What’s so important you can’t stay for dinner?” It was a question I posed against my better judgment. Not because I knew what he might say in response. But because I was afraid of what he might say.

He pursed his lips.

Here it comes.

He inhaled. “I, uh, have a date,” he mumbled with a quick nervous bob of his head.

So there it was: bang, pow, right smack in the kisser.

I would have gladly cut off my right pinky finger not to look affected, even if I was feeling a lump of lead lodge itself in my sternum.

“You okay, Bec?” he said yet again. This time with even more concern in his voice.

What I wanted to say was this: whose home do you use for a studio? Who do you need to be close to in order to be creative?

Instead I proceeded to plant the fakest smile you ever saw on my face.

“I’m fine.”

“You sure?” he asked. “Cause you’re acting more than a little weird. The ‘Listen’ stuff and all.”

I shook my head, put back one of the two Pepsi cans and shut the fridge door… a little more forcefully than the actor in me would have preferred. I needed him to leave. But he just stood there, brown eyes beaming into me.

“What are you going to do tonight?” he smiled.

“Bed early,” I said through clenched teeth. “Big class tomorrow.”

But if I had said, Nothing, I have no life, it would have sent the same exact message.

Michael leaned into me, giving me a peck on the cheek. He shot out of the kitchen, grabbed his leather jacket and his beret and put them on.

“By the way,” he said. “What does Franny call the painting?”

“’Listen’.” I said, following him around the corner into the living room.

“Come again?” he said. The question gave me pause until I realized Michael thought I had asked him to listen. As in, Listen up!

“Meaning,” I clarified, “that’s what Franny calls the painting, ‘Listen’.”

Michael laughed, as though suddenly understanding the punch-line to some silly joke.

“No kidding,” he said. “Maybe there’s something to your vision after all.”

I tossed him a smile. Yet another fake one.

“I hope you don’t think me a jerk for dating,” Michael said, as he opened the back door and stepped out onto the stone terrace in the rain. “You’re free to date too you know. Test the waters a little. Who knows, maybe in the end, seeing other people will bring us back together.”

I bit down on my bottom lip.

“Isn’t it pretty to think so,” I said, closing the door behind him.