The War of the Roses

8

He didn’t move out in the morning. He was too disoriented. To avoid another confrontation, he got out of the house at six, before anyone had risen, and slipped into the surprisingly nippy morning. He always walked to the office.

He never took the Ferrari to work. Besides Barbara’s Ford station wagon, they didn’t own another car except, of course, for Eve’s Honda. And whom could he trust with such a work of the automaker’s craft? The Ferrari lay tucked in its cozy wrapper, in the garage, like a rare gem. As he walked to work, even on the coldest days, it gave him pleasure to know it was there, sweet-tuned and ready just in case. He took no pleasure in the knowledge today.

He hadn’t slept. He wasn’t used to the high, canopied Chippendale bed in the spare room across the hall from their bedroom. It had looked so inviting and comfortable when they bought it. It was too high and too hard. They had furnished the room strictly for guests, with a beautiful Hepplewhite secretaire of figured satinwood decorated with marquetry, a mahogany dressing table, and a japanned commode. On the floor was a round Art Deco carpet and draperies that matched its beige field. The room, he decided was too showy for comfort.

From his tossing and turning, the sheets had bunched and parted from the mattress, which added to his discomfort. Yet he refused to straighten them out, perhaps out of some masochistic desire to be punished for his marital shortcomings, whatever they were.

This phenomenon – it seemed the only way to label it – was not an uncommon experience among his acquaintances. ‘She just upped and said, "No more marriage." Like her whole persona had been transformed. Maybe it’s something chemical that happens as forty gets closer.’ He had heard it said in a hundred different ways.

‘It’s endemic,’ he decided, heading down Connecticut Avenue, almost at a jog, until, breathless, he found himself leaning against the fountain rim at Du-Pont Circle. It was there that the realization hit him. He was on the verge of starting a whole new life for which he was totally unprepared. And in lousy physical shape to boot, he thought, noting his labored breathing. Perhaps he would have been better off with a heart attack.

Sometime near dawn he had run out of explanations, having traced his life with her from the moment he had first clapped eyes on her in the parlor of the rickety Barker house in Chatham. Cribb and Molineaux. They had finally joined the two on their wedding night.

‘Let them do all our fighting for us,’ Barbara had told him then.¹

The story had worn well over the years, although in the darkness and the new circumstances, the punch line had lost its humor. Once, the auctioneer’s error had come from providence. Now, once again, it seemed merely stupid. If the pair hadn’t been broken, Oliver might have been spared this.

He had, Oliver told himself, been a good and loving husband. He had nearly offered ‘faithful’ to complete the triad but that would have discounted his two episodes with hookers during conventions in San Francisco and Las Vegas when the children were small. My God, she has everything she could possibly want, he had railed into the night, sapped finally by the exhaustion of his disorientation.

What confused him most was that he had not been warned. Not a sign. He hated to be taken by surprise.

‘You look a mess,’ one of his colleagues said to him cheerily as Oliver passed his office in the corridor. A jogger, the man was always the first to arrive. Oliver had not wanted to be observed, since he knew his demeanor told his whole story. He had seen it a number of times himself, the unshaven, abject figure in the rumpled suit and curled collar arriving before seven, another marital victim of the sisterhood’s rage.

‘Don’t say another word,’ he had admonished the innocent colleague as he lunged for his own office and plopped helplessly into the swivel chair behind his desk. In a silver frame, Barbara stared back at him, offering a Mona Lisa smile. He flung the picture into the waste-basket. He could not remember how long he sat there, blank and empty, wanting to cry.

His secretary, Miss Harlow, a jolly, middle-aged lady, came in and almost immediately saw Barbara’s picture in the wastebasket.

‘I need lots of kindness this morning,’ he said.

‘So I see.’

‘And a doughnut with my coffee from now on.’

‘Jelly or plain?’

‘I’m not sure,’ he admitted, looking up to face her misty eyes. ‘And don’t try to cheer me up.’

Soon after she left, Harry Thurmont called. Oliver had secretly hoped the call would be from Barbara, contrite and apologetic. He knew Harry, a divorce lawyer, only casually. People called him the Bomber. His heart sank.

‘She’s retained me, Rose,’ Thurmont said. His voice had a gleeful note.

‘I guess you’re as good as any,’ Oliver said gloomily. He was annoyed that she had wasted no time in getting herself legal counsel. He realized he would have to do the same.

‘I think if you’re reasonable we can work things out,’ Thurmont said.

‘I’m really not ready to talk about it.’

‘I know. And I’m real sorry. Believe me, I tried to talk her out of it. That’s always the first step. That’s what they teach us at law school. I’m afraid she’s adamant.’

‘No give at all?’ he muttered into the mouthpiece, instantly sorry for letting his anxiety show. ‘None,’ Thurmont replied.

‘I don’t care. I haven’t cared for a long time,’ she had said. It was still impossible to believe. ‘Suppose she changes her mind.’

‘She won’t.’

‘What makes you so sure?’ he asked testily.

‘It’s gonna be a nut cutter,’ Thurmont said abruptly. ‘Better cover your ass.’

‘As bad as that?’

‘Worse.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘You will.’

‘When?’

Thurmont ignored the question.

‘You’d better get yourself your own man quick time,’ he warned. His tone was ominous.

Oliver nodded to the empty office. He knew the cardinal rule of the legal profession. Only a fool acts as his own lawyer, especially in a domestic case.

‘Maybe if things cooled down a bit…’ he began, being wishful again. Thurmont chuckled. It was the cackle of a predator and Oliver hung up. He looked at the phone in its cradle for a long time, wondering if Barbara had told the children. With shaking fingers – he had to rub them to get them to do the job – he dialed his home number. Ann answered.

‘She’s gone to the French Market with a new batch

‘Well…’ He started to say something. You’re not part of it, he wanted to assure her.

‘Is there anything you’d like me to tell her, Oliver?’

‘Lots,’ he answered. ‘Mostly bad.’

‘I’m sorry.’

It wouldn’t be long, he was certain, before his wife turned her against him. The children as well. But why? If only he had some real clue to his crime. Perhaps, then, the punishment would be acceptable.

He asked one of his recently divorced colleagues for the name of a good divorce lawyer. The man, Jim Richards, answered instantly.

‘Harry Thurmont.’

That’s hers.’

‘You poor bastard.’

He shook his head and looked at Oliver sadly. ‘Run for the hills. He’ll take your eyeballs.’

‘I doubt that,’ Oliver said. ‘I expect we’ll be quite civilized about it.’

‘Civilized? Harry Thurmont isn’t civilized. You’re in the jungle now.’ He thumbed through his phone book. ‘Try Murray Goldstein. He’s in the building. He’s an ex-rabbi. You’ll get lectures and lots of sympathy. You’ll need it.’

‘All she wants is out,’ Oliver muttered. ‘That’s what they all say.’

He made an appointment for the same day – professional courtesy. But before he left the office he tried Barbara again, just to make sure he hadn’t dreamed all this. She answered the phone.

‘Still mad?’ he asked gently. At what? he wondered. Hell, he thought, you don’t just throw your life away. He was willing to forgive.

‘I’m not mad, Oliver.’

‘And you’re still’ – she was making him say it -’thinking about divorce.’

‘Didn’t Thurmont call you?’

‘Yes, he did.’

‘It’s not a question of mad. We have a lot of practical details to iron out. The District has a no-fault provision.’

The legalese angered him. So she was already getting educated.

‘God damn it, Barbara,’ he began, feeling his chest heave. The memory of his hospital stay invaded his mind. ‘You just can’t do this.’

‘Oliver, we went over that last night.’ She sighed.

‘Have you told the kids?’

‘Yes. They had a right to know.’

‘You could have at least waited for me. I mean I don’t think that’s quite fair.’

‘I thought it was best they hear it direcdy from me, with all my reasons.’

‘What about my reasons?’

‘I’m sure you’ll offer your own explanations.’ She paused. ‘We’re not going to have needless custody problems, Oliver?’ Her calm reasonableness irritated him. He felt burning begin again in his chest, a spear of pain. He spilled two Maalox tablets into his palm and chewed them quickly.

‘I guess not,’ he said, confused.

‘Why disrupt their lives? I told them that we were going to live apart, but that you’d still be easily accessible. I assumed that. You are their father. I hope I didn’t overreach.’

‘I don’t want them to suffer,’ Oliver said lamely, feeling the palpitation subside. He swallowed repeatedly to get rid of the chalky taste in his mouth. She’s torpedoing my life and making me a party to it, he told himself. He felt helpless. Utterly defeated.

‘So that’s it, then?’ he asked. His ear had been groping for a single shred of contrition. He hadn’t found a minute sign of it. Her response to his question was silence.

‘If only I had been prepared. Seen a sign. Something. I feel like I’ve been shot between the eyes.’

‘Don’t get melodramatic, Oliver. It’s been disintegrating for years.’

‘Then why didn’t I ever see it?’

‘Part of you probably did.’

‘Now you’re a psychiatrist?’ He had no urge to check his sarcasm. If she were in the room at that moment, he was certain he would have hit her. He wanted to smash her face, obliterate those innocent Slavic features, gouge out those hazel eyes, surely mocking him now.

‘Bitch,’ he mumbled.

‘I expect you’ll be coming by for your things,’ she said calmly.

‘I suppose…’ What more was there to say? He dropped the telephone into its cradle.

‘Fini’,’ he whispered to the empty office, putting on his rumpled jacket and going out to keep his appointment with Goldstein.

Goldstein had a benign, Semitic face. He talked like a rabbi, an idea embellished by diplomas in Hebrew lettering hanging next to his law degree. He had a fringe of curly black hair, ringing a broad, shiny bald pate, and thick horn-rimmed glasses behind which droopy-lidded eyes offered lugubrious comments on the human condition. He wore a white-on-white shirt, Yemeni cuff links, and a striped Hermes tie. He lit up a large cigar as Oliver settled into a soft chair at the side of the desk.

Goldstein was rotund, with puddles of chins, and his fingers were short and squat as they tugged daintily at the cigar. Staring out from the top of a low bookcase was a framed picture of what was undoubtedly the Goldstein menage in younger days, three rotund children and an obese wife.

‘I hate divorce,’ he said, shaking his head and directing his gaze to the family portrait. ‘Broken families. A shanda. I’m sorry. It means a "shame" in Yiddish.’

‘I’m not too pleased with it myself.’

‘Whose idea?’ Goldstein asked. ‘Hers.’

Goldstein shook his head and blew smoke clouds into the air. He looked contemplative, sympathetic, wise. Oliver pictured him in a beard and skullcap, dispensing solace. A priest would have inhibited him with vague, unspoken guilt feelings. What he needed most was confession. Confess what? He felt his mind begin to empty in a long stream-of-consciousness narrative heavily larded with justifications, recriminations, and revelations, all of which seemed designed to give Goldstein a distorted, self-serving, self-pitying portrait of his eighteen-year marriage.

Goldstein listened patiently, puffing and nodding, his cigar dead center between his lips, his fat fingers cast in a delicate cathedral.

When he was finished, Oliver popped a Maalox into his mouth. The ex-rabbi destroyed his cathedral and put his smoldering cigar into an ashtray. Nodding, he stood up, reached for a yellow legal pad, and began to shoot questions at Oliver.

‘Is there another man?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Whoever thinks so? And no other woman?’

‘None.’

‘And joint property?’

‘The house, of course, and all the antiques and other possessions in it. That’s where we put everything we had. I’d say the house might fetch at least a half a million, with probably another half – or more – in antiques. God, did we lavish love on that place.’ His eyes misted.

Goldstein noddedj as if he were a psychoanalyst listening to a patient unreel his life.

‘What are you prepared to settle for, Mr. Rose?’ Goldstein asked, the gentleness gone.

‘I’m not really sure. I haven’t had time to think about

it. I really don’t know. I don’t think the kids will be a problem. I earn a good living. I want them to be comfortable. I’m prepared to offer reasonable support.’

‘And the house?’ Goldstein asked.

‘I don’t know. Say half the value. After all, we did it together. Half of everything is okay with me.’

‘You want a good divorce settlement or do you want to be sentimental? If you want to be sentimental, then you shouldn’t get a divorce. In fact, I would rather you didn’t. I hate these situations where children go from pillar to post like punching bags. Children are supposed to be a brucha.^’ He looked at Oliver and shook his head. ‘A blessing.’

‘Look, Goldstein. It’s not my idea.’ He felt the blood rise in his face.

‘I understand.’ Goldstein flapped a pudgy hand. ‘You must be calm. Don’t excite yourself.’ Oliver felt him taking charge.

‘I know what that means,’ Oliver huffed. ‘You want it short and sweet. No problems. No headaches. A nice fat fee.’

‘From your mouth to God’s ears.’

‘I hope she feels the same way.’

‘Never be sure,’ Goldstein said. ‘It is the first rule of domestic law. Never be sure. Divorce makes people crazy.’

‘Well, it won’t make me crazy,’ Oliver muttered. ‘If it’s meant to be, then let’s get it over. You just proceed along the fastest track.’

‘There’s a waiting period for a no-fault divorce in the District of Columbia. Six months if the parties don’t contest. That’s the quick way. If there’s problems, there’s a year wait. A divorce you get either way. But the property settlement is separate. It could go on and on. If it goes to court, there’s more waiting. A judge decides.’ Goldstein bent over, blowing smoke. ‘All judges are putzes.’

Oliver nodded. It was going too fast. ‘It won’t come to that.’

‘You hope.’

‘We’re reasonable people.’

‘That was yesterday.’

‘I know lawyers. They can fuck things up. They call Thurmont the Bomber.’

‘Personally, I have mixed feelings. A court battle can help make me an even richer man. I have a loving devoted family, Mr. Rose.’ He looked longingly at the picture of his rotund children and obese wife. They are all going to college now. I have a very large house in Potomac and a maid that lives in, two Mercedes, and I go to Israel twice a year. Harry Thurmont has all these things and, in addition, an airplane and a house in Saint Thomas and he’s always very tan, which means he gets away often.’

‘I don’t need the lecture, Goldstein. I’m also a lawyer.’

‘The worst kind. You need the lecture more than a plumber. We can chop up your estate like scavengers and leave you nothing but the bare bones.’ Goldstein’s cigar had gone out, and Oliver caught a whiff of his bad breath.

‘All right, you’ve scared the shit out of me, Goldstein. I already told you I want to settle this amicably. No hassle. I detest the idea of anyone getting rich from my misfortune.’

Goldstein relit his cigar, puffed deeply, and exhaled smoke clouds into the atmosphere.

‘I’ll talk to Thurmont and get back to you,’ Goldstein said, getting up. ‘From here on in, we talk to your wife only through Thurmont.’

‘And I pay for both?’

‘I don’t make the rules.’

‘Just the money.’

‘I don’t make the divorces, either.’

‘But it wasn’t my fault,’ Oliver protested.

‘It was mine?’

Oliver, sorry now he had engaged Goldstein, was more confused than ever.

‘Have you moved out yet?’ Goldstein asked as Oliver rose.

‘No. Perhaps tonight. I can’t seem to manage it.’

‘Why not?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Oliver replied, wondering about his candor. ‘It’s my nest. I can’t seem to fly away. It’s my place, Goldstein. My orchids. My wines. My workshop. My Staffordshire figures are there.’

‘Your what?’

‘Little porcelainlike figures, beautifully painted. There’s a cobalt blue -’

‘I don’t understand this, Rose,’ Goldstein interrupted.

‘I don’t either. None of it.’ Never in his life had he been racked with such indecision. He searched Goldstein’s eyes for direction. Through droopy lids, they stared back lugubriously. Their look depressed him.

‘I need time,’ Oliver said after a long pause.

‘Time we got.’

‘Have we?’ Oliver asked. It seemed his first rational thought of the day. ‘I just threw out nearly twenty years.’ He felt too overcome to continue. ‘When you speak to Thurmont, call me,’ he muttered as he left the office, not certain of his destination.