41. Jeremiah
JEREMIAH
The photograph arrives while I am folding Otto’s blanket. Someone has finally taken down the terrible sign above the diner where Dax and I used to eat after work. For years the last letter has hung backward. Now the whole thing is on the pavement, propped against a trash can.
I know exactly what Dax would say.
I have his conversation open when he calls.
“Have you seen it?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“They’ll put up something tasteful. That’ll finish the place.”
I laugh. It is so easy that for a moment I forget the phone contains months of messages I no longer know how to answer.
“We should go before they ruin the food,” he says. “Tuesday?”
I rub the edge of the blanket between my fingers. It is September. Yesterday Zelda stood beside me in the restaurant garden with cake on a napkin and a hand that would not quite stop shaking.
“I don’t think so.”
“Jeremiah. We can have dinner.”
“Can we?”
He lets out a breath. “I’ve been meaning to call about the lunch.”
I put the blanket down.
“Candace shouldn’t have come. We told her that. But you didn’t have to put the whole marriage on the table again.”
“I chose to speak.”
“You could have said the message was out of context.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Then perhaps you could have let her answer for it.”
I can still picture the yellow sign through the window above our usual table.
“She did answer. You heard her.”
“And then she sat there eating cake while everybody canceled Candace’s work, ruined her business.”
The small ease of the first minute is gone. I am angry with him. I am angrier that I let myself want it so badly.
“She wanted to stay at her friend’s lunch. There was nothing wrong with that.”
“I’m not saying there was.”
“You just did.”
He goes quiet. Then he says, “Suri says she’s not sure about marrying me until I take that video down. As if I’m responsible for what happened in your marriage.”
“You’re responsible for filming Zelda and keeping it up after you knew it was false.”
“I didn’t call to have this argument again.”
“Neither did I.”
There is a click at his end, a glass being set down. I know the sound of his kitchen counter. I know which cupboard he will open next.
“So Tuesday?” he says. “Leave the wives out of it. Like we used to.”
I close my eyes.
“No. No Tuesday. No private dinners where we pretend this is just an awkward subject we can avoid.”
“You’re throwing away all those years.”
“I know how many there are.”
My voice has gone rough. I clear my throat before I finish.
“I’ll be civil when we see each other at Suri’s. But I’m not keeping a place for the old version of this, where I tell you things that I should be keeping between me and my wife. You still want me to help you blame Zelda.”
“That’s your answer?”
“Yes.”
He hangs up.
For a while I hold the phone against my ear. Then I put it down and pick up the blanket. I fold it twice, unfold it, and try again. Otto does not care whether its corners meet. I cannot seem to make them meet anyway.
I remove the dinner reminder I have kept on my calendar for years. There is no satisfying feeling when it disappears. I look at the empty space for longer than I meant to.
I don’t call Zelda.
The next morning, at her apartment, Otto objects to the bottle I have chosen. Zelda offers him the other one. He accepts it with the solemnity of a man whose complaint has reached the proper department.
“They’re identical,” I tell him.
“He has standards.”
“He has a campaign.”
She smiles, but it fades when her phone sounds. Her hand goes to it at once. She reads the screen, then puts it down without answering.
“Suri?”
She nods. “Checking again.”
“What would you like to do?”
“Go to the park. I want to get out.”
We take the blanket. The air has cooled, and Zelda tucks a corner around Otto’s legs before we sit on the bench. A little later she goes to buy water. When she returns, she holds one bottle against her cheek before handing it to me.
“I can still hear it,” she says.
I wait.
“My voice. The bit before ‘married.’ I keep thinking I should have sounded stronger.”
“You were talking to your friend.”
“I know.” She sits down. “I know that. It doesn’t stop me hearing it.”
Otto catches the red bird on his blanket and loses it again. Zelda reaches down, moves the wing within reach, then leaves him to try.
“And I liked the lunch,” she says. “I keep remembering that too.”
“The kitchen story?”
“The look on her face when he said the kitchen was adequate.”
She laughs once. I see how tired she is when the laugh is over.
“You look as if you didn’t sleep either,” she says.
I turn the water bottle in my hands.
“Dax called. We won’t be having those dinners anymore.”
“Because of the lunch?”
“Because he still wants a version of it I won’t give him.”
She looks at me. “You liked him.”
“I did.”
I could tell her about the diner sign, the calendar, the way I nearly said yes. Instead I take the cap off my water and drink. She has lost eleven years of a friend herself. I don’t need her to make mine easier before she has got through the afternoon.
Her shoulder touches mine. Neither of us moves away.
On the blanket Otto gets a finger beneath the bird’s wing. His expression of astonishment is so complete that Zelda leans forward to watch.
“There you are,” she tells him softly. “You got it.”