Chapter Seventeen
Let me know when you’ll be out of the house. I need to get some things.
Such was the nature of her communications with Gerald these days. No frills. Ellie had been living with Joy for weeks now, and she had to say, she didn’t miss Gerald. Nope. The man who’d talked about her in such a skewed way? The man who’d been flirting with and confiding in another woman, sharing secrets about their life, intimating that he was a poor, neglected husband while his work-obsessed wife just glided through life?
She didn’t miss that asshat at all.
She did, however, miss the old Gerald. The pre-iPad Gerald. His humor, his thoughtfulness, his devotion, his friendship, his style of fatherhood and grandparenting. She missed their ridiculously good sex life, though the thought of that right now made her queasy. Had he ever fantasized about Camille Dupont when they were making love? If so, she’d castrate him.
She hadn’t told anyone but Joy and her sister. She and Grace had met for lunch in Falmouth, and Grace had been so kind and sympathetic. But there’d been a note of gratification in Grace’s voice and expression, as if she’d been waiting for this moment, when Ellie and Gerald were proven to be plain old married people, not the golden couple. An expectation finally realized. Grace’s husband was horrible, and now, finally, Ellie’s husband was, too.
Grace had been putting up with Larry and his infidelity for decades. Oh, she never had any solid proof, she always said, and she didn’t want any. To know would force her hand, and Grace didn’t want to start over. Didn’t want to “air their dirty laundry,” as Mom would say. He was a good provider. They had their rhythm, their marital flow. “Larry’s distracted lately,” Grace had said six or eight times in the past thirty-some-odd years. That was her code for what was clearly cheating behavior. But Grace stayed, neither she nor Larry quite miserable enough for divorce.
“I don’t think you should’ve moved out,” Grace had said over lunch. “Your odds of divorce just skyrocketed. It’s pretty hostile, Els. An act of war.”
“I am at war,” Ellie said. “I’m defending me. I’m Ukraine, just sitting there, minding my own business, and he’s Putin, deciding to launch a strike against our marriage. You’re damn right, I’m hostile.”
“But what’s your endgame?” Grace had asked. “Don’t you want to patch things up and stay married?”
“I don’t know. I really don’t.”
“Then what will you do, Ellie?” Grace was more upset with her ambiguity than with Gerald’s little sidepiece.
But Joy…Joy seemed to understand. “You really just want to time travel back to before he started messaging that slut,” she said as she sipped a margarita, petting Connery, who was splayed in her lap, belly exposed for rubbing. “To right before he took that first step, so you could see what he was thinking.”
“Yes. And I could behead him right then and there. Use his life insurance.”
Joy laughed. “Here’s to beheading.”
Today, Ellie was at Long Pond Arts, currently locked in her office, once again chafing with energy and simmering rage, which had replaced the stunned hurt and fear she’d felt initially. She’d been letting Meeko earn his keep, honestly not caring how well the gallery did this summer. She had bigger problems. She went there to check in, to paint, to do a lap around the rooms, maybe eat lunch in the courtyard. Otherwise, she’d been driving a lot. Riding her bike. Sitting on a beach, staring at the water. But she missed home. She wasn’t sure what exactly she needed there, but she wanted to see her house, minus Gerald.
Her phone dinged. How much longer are we going to not talk, honey? Can we see a marriage counselor?
Not ready for that. When will you be out of the house so I can stop by?
I’m working at urgent care in Orleans. You could go now. I’ll be back at 7:30 or so.
Oh, so now he was able to work? Yes, she had instructed him to do just that, but it was irritating that a meltdown had been required to get his head out of his ass and see that she was worried about money.
She grabbed her bag, told Meeko she was leaving and walked out into the bright July sunshine. Said hello, nodded, smiled to tourists and locals alike.
“Ellie!” cried Jane, who worked at Preservation Hall. “Where have you been? We were hoping you’d do one of your wonderful classes this summer.”
“I’m afraid I can’t this year, Jane. Good seeing you, though.”
She kept walking, not breaking from her fast, hard stride. Well, well, well. She’d said no. Good for her. Winnie, her toughest child, would be proud of her. Tough in the good sense…not battered by insecurity or fear, just a straightforward badass.
She’d been avoiding the kids, texting them rather than calling, because they knew something was off. She saw Lark in passing, and often. That young man she’d had with her the other night, the firefighter, felt like a huge shift in her daughter’s life, but Ellie knew better than to comment on it. She’d gone to Addie’s the other day to see the girls, and Addie had sniffed around like a bloodhound until Ellie told her to stop. Harlow was giving her space in a most annoying and sensitive way, and Robbie didn’t seem to care too much, though he sent her a nice photo of a two-masted schooner. Thought you might like this, Ma. That was it, but still. Sweet (and unusual) of him to think of her.
She turned onto her street. In a town where each house was prettier than the next, the Smith household was a bit of an eyesore. Sort of a nothing style, the kind the 1970s had been famous for. Not a Cape, not a Colonial, not a bungalow, not modern…just a rather uninspired house they’d only been able to afford because it had needed so much work. New roof, new septic, a sump pump in the basement. They’d had plans to do more renovations—the beautifying kind—but they’d never gotten around to it.
She immediately saw that the lawn mower was out of the driveway. Gerald would have to get a sticker for that. Likewise, the rotted portion of the fence had been removed, and there was some new wood lying on the ground. The branch in the backyard had been cut up and stacked for firewood.
So what? He’d managed to finish a few things. Atonement chores, like Robbie when he was a little boy. He’d get in trouble for a bad report card or for ruining something of Winnie’s or for sneaking out, and suddenly his room would be clean. Fixing the fence did not erase the fact that her husband had been deceitful.
She went inside. The house was tidy and still, and the smell of home made her chest ache. Their aging cat, Buster, had died in his sleep over the winter, and suddenly, she missed him horribly, his creaky little meows and bony back. Tears flooded her eyes. Sweet little Buster.
Home. The family room, with its rather ugly, squat fireplace and cheerfully crowded bookcases, the kitchen with its cheap Corian countertops and mismatched chairs. The electric stove they’d always meant to replace with gas. The mudroom, which had once burst with coats and boots and backpacks, now a place for old newspapers and, when she was living there, whatever had to go back and forth to the gallery. To the left was the half bath, with its blue toilet and blue sink. She’d let the girls paint it when they were in middle school—coral, for some reason. It hadn’t looked good then, and it didn’t look good now. She’d asked Gerald to paint it at least three times in the past few years, and he said he would, and nothing ever happened. She stopped asking, because what was the point? She figured she’d do it someday when Gerald went away for a weekend. Which he never did, not without her.
Husbands seemed to become toddlers after a decade or so of marriage. You had to direct them, arrange playdates for them, be their friend, entertain them. Do you think you can paint the bathroom this weekend? No? You don’t want to? Okay, then. Why don’t you call Matt and see if he wants to shoot some pool at the Governor Bradford? No? Don’t you think that would be fun, honey? Please? You want me to play with you? Oh. Okay.
That was the truth. The other truth was that Gerald was her best friend, the person she most admired, the only one who really knew her, every insecurity, every bad moment, and loved her anyway. Her biggest fan, and the one who broke her heart. Because make no mistake…her heart was cracked right in half, a jagged, ugly break that she wasn’t sure would ever heal.
She went upstairs. As the eldest, Harlow had always had her own room. Addie and Lark had shared another until college, and Winnie and Robbie had been roomies until Harlow left for college, when Robbie was, gosh…eight?…at which point, Winnie got Harlow’s room. It seemed so long ago, all those kids under the same roof, like a happy dream whose details were fading.
And here was the primary bedroom. Their bed was under a skylight, which had fogged with age and poor installation. A giant bureau, since they lacked a closet. Pictures of the kids and grands and the two of them on the walls.
Their bed. Tears filled her eyes and spilled over. They still fell asleep touching, after all these years, just a foot or a hand, maybe. Whenever she had a bad dream, she’d reach out for his solid shoulder, which had grown hairier and rougher over the years. He had always made her feel safe. Everything will work out. That was his motto. Was that true now? Would they work things out?
“Hello? Gerald? Are you home, son?”
Her father-in-law, famed for stopping by without checking first.
“Hi, Robert,” she called. “I’ll be down in a second.”
She went into the bathroom and blew her nose, splashed some water on her face, then headed downstairs. “Hi. How are you, Robert?”
“Elsbeth! How wonderful to see you!” He was nattily dressed, as always—linen trousers, a crisp white shirt, a vest. He opened his arms for a hug, and she gave him one. Robert was everything her own father was not—kindhearted, well read, thoughtful, sociable. Only Gerald had an edge where his father was concerned.
“Can I make you something to eat?” she asked.
“I just came from the Ice House,” he said, “where I had the biggest salad of my life, Ellie! There were hard-boiled eggs in it, and bacon, and cheese, and it was wonderful. But I could use something cold to drink, if it’s not too much trouble.”
“No trouble at all,” she said. She opened the fridge, then glanced at her watch. Four thirty. “Want a gin and tonic?”
“Oh! How deliciously indulgent! Yes, please. I feel like a naughty schoolboy, having a cocktail with a pretty lady, and before five at that.” She smiled and poured them both a healthy slosh of gin, added ice and poured the tonic on top.
“I don’t see any limes, I’m afraid.”
“We will have to soldier on without them, in that case. Thank you, my dear. Is my son around?”
“He’s taking a shift at the urgent care center in Orleans,” she said. “He’ll be back about seven thirty. Is everything okay?” She sat across from him at the table.
“That’s what I was going to ask him, as a matter of fact,” he said. “But I think I’m quite lucky to find you here instead, because you are the one I’m worried about, dear Ellie.”
“Oh.” She took a sip of the drink—the tonic was flat. “Um, thanks.”
“You’re still not living here?”
“No. I’m staying with Joy.”
“A lovely woman! So interesting and colorful, and those eyelashes! She’s like an exotic bird, don’t you think?”
Ellie laughed. “That’s a good description.”
Robert sipped his drink, his gentle blue eyes kind. “Ellie, if it’s none of my business, please say so, but do I need to have a strongly worded conversation with my boy?”
There were those tears again. “He’s a senior citizen, Robert. I’m afraid he’s past the age of parental lectures.”
“Nonsense. If one’s parents are alive, a lecture is always an option.” He looked at the table and traced a knot in the wood. “I’m under the impression he’s been careless with you, Ellie. Am I wrong?”
Should she be talking to her father-in-law about this? Why not? It wasn’t like her own parents would offer anything valuable. Robert had been a rock for two-thirds of Ellie’s life. She should be allowed to talk to him. “No, you’re not wrong. And ‘careless’ is the perfect word.”
“Irredeemably careless?” he asked, wrinkles deepening as he frowned.
“I don’t know.” A tear slipped out, and she dashed it away. “Robert, how did you and Louisa do it? Sixty-seven years of happiness seems impossible.”
“Well, my dear, of course we had our difficult times. I worked in Boston five days a week, don’t forget. She was essentially a single mother.”
Yes, it was Gerald’s chief complaint about his father. Robert had only become a devoted family man after Harlow was born, a far better grandfather than he’d been as a dad. “I remember,” she said.
“And this was in the day when infidelity and flirtations were very much part of the landscape.”
She blinked. “Did you…never mind. I withdraw the question.”
“No, I never did,” Robert said. “But there were many times when she and I were unhappy with each other. I wanted to raise Gerald in the city, and she insisted on staying here, and so we were a family divided. I called every night and came home every Friday afternoon, but it was challenging. There were months at a time when things were strained. We always found our way back to each other, though.”
Ellie nodded.
“No marriage is perfect,” he said. “But you and Gerald have made yours close to that. Until now, it seems?”
She swallowed. “Let’s just say his attention…wandered. Nothing actually happened. Just a lot of secret conversations and a lunch or two. Then he ended it.”
“What an idiot,” Robert said. “What do they call that these days? An emotional dalliance?”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Well, he’s a fool.” Robert’s face looked strange, since he rarely was anything but happy or struck by wonder.
“Thanks, Robert.”
“Is he taking the appropriate steps to come crawling back to you?”
She laughed, surprising herself. “Yes, I guess he is. I just…don’t know if I want him back.”
Robert shook his head. “Love is so fragile,” he said. “It cracks a thousand times throughout the years. But what I’ve found, Ellie, is that if you glue it back together, it gets stronger. More durable if less shiny, shall we say. And you and Gerald have had a very shiny marriage.”
She nodded. “Yep. That’s true.”
He reached over the table and took both her hands in his. “I’m on your side,” he said. “People say not to take sides, and to that, I say, ridiculous! There’s right and there’s wrong. I’m on the side of right. Whatever you choose to do, Elsbeth, your old father-in-law loves and admires you.”
She gave a wet laugh. “This is why the kids worship you, Robert. We’re all so lucky to have you.”
“I’m not sure my son will agree, once I take him to the woodshed. I’m generally against corporal punishment, but at the moment, I could be swayed.” He squeezed her hands, then let them go. “I must head out, my dear. Frances and I have a date. We’re learning about astronomy! I’ve always wanted to recognize the constellations, but with these old eyes, time is running out!”
That was the magic of Robert Josiah Smith. Ninety-one years old, and the happiest, most optimistic person she knew. Ellie had always felt she was a happy person, too. She was tired of feeling this way…hurt, angry, sad. Time to take action.
After Robert left, she went back upstairs, grabbed a few more clothes from the bureau, washed the glasses and, after thinking about it for five minutes, wrote Gerald a note.
Let’s set a date and discuss next steps.
Her marriage wasn’t bulletproof, she thought, and it had taken a direct hit. It was in critical condition, but it wasn’t dead yet.