41
claire
A week before Christmas, I drop Josh and Jordan off at my parents’ house and drive to Daniel’s.
The sound of music greets me when he opens the door—something by Coldplay—and he smiles when I cross the threshold. When I shrug out of my coat he looks me up and down slowly, and smiles.
“Whoa,” he says, whistling appreciatively. “Where have you been?”
His compliment puts a smile on my face. I’m wearing a black pencil skirt, very high heels, and a tightly fitted, feminine version of a man’s white button-down shirt. “I went to a holiday open house today. One of my bigger clients. Very swanky. Champagne in the afternoon. I had half a glass.”
“You look very nice,” he says softly.
“Thanks.”
“How long has it been since you ate?” he asks.
I glance at my watch. It’s a little after six thirty. “A while.”
“Should we go now?” Daniel asks. “I know it’s early, but we’ll probably be able to get a table somewhere without too much trouble. I would have made a reservation, but I wasn’t sure what time you’d need to eat.”
I’m glad he didn’t make a reservation. That would have made this feel too much like a date. And it is certainly not a date. But how would I feel if Chris went out to dinner with a female friend? It suddenly occurs to me that there’s a good chance that Chris is going out to dinner with a female, maybe a coworker, someone on his team. He’s never mentioned it, but I’ve never asked. This possibility simultaneously consoles and worries me.
“Bella Cucina?” I ask. I’m in no mood for a crowded, noisy chain restaurant.
“I was going to suggest that,” he says, smiling at me.
Daniel is wearing a black V-neck sweater. He’s paired it with jeans but they’re nice jeans, dark, not the faded and worn kind that he prefers. He grabs a coat and helps me back into mine and we drive to the restaurant. The light dusting of snow that meteorologists have been excitedly predicting all day has started to fall and after Daniel parks the car he extends his arm for me to hold on to so I won’t slip in my high heels. “Maybe I should have insisted that I drop you off at the door again,” he teases.
“Not necessary,” I say. Besides, it’s nice holding on to Daniel’s arm.
There are more patrons tonight than there were when Daniel and I came here for lunch. Thankfully we don’t have to wait long and soon the maître d’ leads us to one of the wedge-shaped booths in the corner that allow diners to sit next to each other instead of across from one another.
“Would you like me to take your coats?” she asks.
We hand them to her and then a waitress takes our drink order—a glass of wine for Daniel and sparkling water for me—and we open our menus.
“What sounds good to you?” Daniel asks.
“I’m not sure.” After a few minutes I decide on the salmon and Daniel chooses the shrimp and linguini. The ambience is more romantic tonight, with dim lighting and candles burning on every table. A quick scan of the room yields no familiar faces, and I relax a bit. I won’t have to introduce Daniel and have any “it’s not what it looks like” conversations.
The waitress brings our drinks, and when she leaves, I lean back against the low, padded leather seat rest. Daniel takes a drink, looks at me, and smiles, resting his arm along the back of the booth, near my shoulders. There’s a small jazz trio in the corner and the sound of instruments being tuned rises above the diners’ conversations and the clinking of silver and glassware.
Our entrees arrive and while we are eating, a well-dressed gentleman approaches our table. The proprietor, I presume.
“How is everything?” he asks. “Is there anything I can bring you?”
Daniel and I praise the food and tell him that we don’t need a thing.
He smiles and says, “Wonderful. Enjoy your evening.” Before he goes he turns to Daniel and says, with a slight bow and flourish of his hand, “Your wife is very lovely.”
Daniel’s smile falters, but he recovers almost immediately and says, “Yes, she is. Beautiful, in fact.”
I could say the proprietor was being assumptive, but I am wearing a wedding ring. To an outsider, Daniel and I look like a married couple, and I am, perhaps, enjoying the quintessential best of both worlds: husband, albeit absentee, and handsome, attentive companion.
I look at Daniel and whisper, “Thank you.”
He nods and turns away to take a drink of his wine. The waitress returns, clears our plates, and asks us if we want dessert. We both say no and she leaves the check.
“Please let me get this one,” I say.
Daniel shakes his head and smiles. “No.” He pays the bill and we walk through the restaurant toward the glass doors of the entrance, Daniel’s hand resting heavily on the small of my back. The weight of his touch sends a delicate shiver up my spine. We retrieve our coats and he helps me into mine, and when we step outside the cold night air almost diffuses the romantic vibe we had going in the restaurant. Almost, but not completely. Large snowflakes are still falling and once again Daniel gives me his arm to hold on to. He opens my car door, waits until I’m seated, and then closes it. He walks around to the driver’s side and slides behind the wheel, then starts the car and turns the defrost on high.
“Thank you for dinner,” I say.
He puts the car in gear and says, “Anytime, Claire.”
When we return home Daniel lights a fire in the fireplace. It’s wood burning, not gas like the one at my house.
“I love that smell,” I say, inhaling deeply and listening to the tinder crackle as it ignites.
“Can you stay for a while?” Daniel asks.
“Sure.” There’s nowhere I have to be. No one waiting on me. I kick off my shoes, which have begun to hurt my feet, and sit down on the couch, tucking my legs up under my skirt. The logs catch and the flames grow higher.
“Do you want something to drink?” Daniel asks. “I’ve got some Snapple in the fridge.”
“I’ll get it,” I say. I walk into the kitchen and take a glass out of the cupboard, then fill it with ice. Daniel opens a drawer and removes a corkscrew. There are two bottles of wine on the counter, both red, and he selects one and opens it, then pours himself a glass. I grab a diet peach Snapple from the fridge and follow him back into the living room, setting down the bottle next to his glass of wine on the coffee table. He leaves the room and when he comes back in he’s holding a gift bag.
Oh, shit.
“Is that for me?” I ask. I didn’t buy him anything. Why didn’t I buy him something? I should have seen this coming from a mile away.
“I saw it in the store window when I walked by. It reminded me of something you said once, so I bought it.” He sits down beside me and hands me the bag.
I open it. Inside are two wrapped presents. One is wrapped in gold and the other in silver. The small boxes are roughly the same size and I don’t know which one to open first. Daniel does, though, because he points to the silver one. “You shouldn’t have,” I say.
“Just open it,” he says.
I tear off the paper and smile when I lift the lid of the box. It’s a rubber bracelet, like the Livestrong ones and the hundreds of copycats that followed. It’s pink and it has the medical alert symbol and says DIABETES in capital letters. “You remembered.” I slip it onto my wrist.
I open the second box. It’s a small round sterling silver pendant hanging from a silky black cord. It’s exactly what I would have chosen if I’d been asked to pick out a gift for myself. Large chunky jewelry looks out of proportion on my small frame, but the dimensions of the delicate silver disk fit me perfectly.
“Do you like it?” he asks.
“I love it.” I take it out of the box and undo the clasp, then hand it to Daniel. “Take the other one off and put this one on me, please.” Turning around, I lift up my hair and Daniel leans in, removing my medical alert necklace and replacing it with his gift. The disk rests in the small dip between my breasts and when I turn back around his gaze lingers there. “It’s beautiful,” I say. “Thank you.” I hug him, the way I always do when someone gives me a gift. It catches him off guard and he finally realizes what I’m doing and tries to hug me back at the exact same time that I pull away. Really, it’s almost comical. You’d think that we don’t know how hugging works.
“You’re welcome,” he says, gathering up the scraps of wrapping paper. He goes into the kitchen to throw it away and when he returns he says, “Music or TV?”
“Music, please.”
Daniel crosses the room and hits the button on the stereo, scanning through the channels. “Holiday favorites?”
“Yes,” I say. “That would be perfect.” He sits back down beside me, takes a drink of his wine, and places the glass on the coffee table. I’m suddenly aware of how close we’re sitting, and how completely alone we are. I’m slightly worried that my active participation in our late-night phone calls has given him the wrong impression, some kind of green light. But he’s been a perfect gentleman this evening and my instincts tell me he will continue in the same manner. Daniel doesn’t seem like the type of man who would lay his cards on the table without knowing exactly what the outcome would be.
I take a sip of my drink and place the bottle back down on the table next to his. A yawn escapes before I can stifle it with the back of my hand.
“Tired?” Daniel asks.
“A little. It’s been a long day. And it’s so nice and cozy in here. Makes me sleepy.” Daniel’s house reminds me of the starter home Chris and I bought when we were newly married. Ours was also a ranch and had the same arched entryways and hardwood floors. I love my current home, but sometimes I miss that first house and all that it signified: the untarnished and unchallenged beginning of my life with Chris.
I wander over to the built-in bookcase that reaches from floor to ceiling on one wall of the living room. If it were my home, I’d fill the shelves with decorative accessories, my collection of hardback books, and framed photos, but Daniel doesn’t utilize the space much. There’s a clock and a few pieces of mail. A magazine. His home lacks a woman’s touch, but maybe he likes it just the way it is. I look up and three photo albums on the highest shelf catch my eye. I have to stand on my tiptoes to reach them and I pull down one of them, its cover dusty, and crack it open. The album must be from Daniel’s college days because the first picture I see shows him wearing a sweatshirt with the letters of his fraternity house on it. He’s holding a beer, surrounded by at least ten other guys doing the same. I sink to the floor, the album in my lap, and smile. “Fraternity brothers?”
He nods his head. “I did some serious partying with those guys.” He sits down on the floor beside me, drinking his wine, and watches me flip through the pages. There aren’t many pictures and most of them are shoved in haphazardly, as if he couldn’t be bothered to slide them into the individual pockets.
“Are there any pictures where you’re not drinking beer?” I ask. “Or holding a beer? Or standing beside a keg of beer?”
“Probably not,” he answers.
I laugh when I notice Daniel’s floppy, middle-part hairstyle, and I can’t help but tease him. “Tell me, how influential were the Backstreet Boys in shaping your look back then?”
“Very funny,” he says. “I’ll have you know I got a lot of attention from the girls with that hair.”
“I’m sure you did,” I agree. The truth is, it didn’t detract from his looks, not in the least. But if anything, he’s more attractive now, as if each year that passes only improves his appearance.
I stand up and swap the first photo album for the next—this one even dustier. The first picture is of Daniel and a girl. She has blonde hair and she’s wearing it in a shoulder-length, fully layered style just like I wore in the nineties and that neither of us would be caught dead in today. Her eyes are blue, not brown, yet the resemblance is such that we could be sisters. She’s sitting on Daniel’s lap with a red Solo cup in her hand. They appear to be laughing, as if the photographer snapped the photo at just the right time. Midjoke. Page after page of Daniel and the blonde girl follow: pictures of them in formal attire, in jeans and sweatshirts, and two full pages of them enjoying a tropical vacation.
When I reach the end of the album the blonde girl is still in it. In one photo they have their arms around each other and she’s wearing a diamond ring on her left hand. Engagement photos. It hits me suddenly that I’m looking at Daniel’s ex-wife. “Is this her?” I ask.
He nods, his eyes a bit glassy. I’ve never even seen him tipsy before, but he’s well on his way.
“What’s her name?”
“Jessica. Jessie.”
I come to the end of the album and stand to retrieve the last one. The cover of this one isn’t dusty at all. Daniel goes and sits on the couch, knocking back a big drink of wine. I sit down on the couch next to him and open to the first page. There’s a picture of Daniel in a cap and gown at his college graduation, and several more when he completed his training at the police academy. One of him as a rookie policeman, in full uniform. The next photos are from his wedding. I look at them silently. Jessie looks beautiful, the big hair now smoothed into a low chignon with flowers surrounding it. Daniel’s wineglass is empty and he heads to the kitchen for a refill. I flip past the wedding photos and think that maybe this was a bad idea. He probably doesn’t want me looking at pictures of his other life, but he’s too polite to tell me not to.
I flip to the next page and the pictures on it take my breath away.
Jessie is very, very pregnant. She’s smiling and Daniel is sitting beside her, his hand on her stomach, fingers splayed as if he’s trying to encompass all that’s inside of her in one handful, which would be impossible because she is clearly full-term. Time stands still and yet speeds up as I turn the pages, and my sense of foreboding increases. Daniel sits back down on the couch, but he’s not watching me; he’s staring off into space, very still.
On the next page a smiling baby, cradled in Jessie’s arms, wears a blue cap and looks minutes old. Now I know whose photo is in the frame on Daniel’s dresser. The images that follow—Jessie holding the baby, Daniel holding the baby, and one of Daniel kissing the baby’s forehead—bring tears to my eyes because I know where this is heading. Feel it in the pit of my stomach and yet I can’t look away.
There are pages and pages of pictures and then suddenly there aren’t.
I close the album and set it on the coffee table, blinking back the tears. “What’s your son’s name?” I ask.
“Gabriel.”
“That’s a beautiful name.” I don’t ask any more questions. If I’ve learned one thing about men, it’s that if Daniel wants to share, he’ll share.
“He died of SIDS when he was three months old,” Daniel says, and when he looks at me I see the mournful expression on his face.
“I’m so sorry.” Tears fill my eyes and I scold myself because they won’t help anything, but I can’t stem their flow. I wipe my eyes and will the tears to stop, which only makes them multiply.
Daniel begins to speak. “I came home late. There was a multicar accident on the parkway and I’d been up most of the night tying up loose ends and submitting paperwork. I checked on Gabriel when I got home. He was just getting over his first cold and hadn’t been sleeping well, but he seemed fine. I went to bed and the sound of Jessie screaming when she went in to get him the next morning woke me up. We called an ambulance right away, but he was already gone. She just kept screaming, and I will never forget that sound.”
I look at Daniel and the sorrow I see in his eyes cuts me to the quick. “I’m so sorry,” I say. The problems Chris and I have faced suddenly pale in comparison. It’s one thing to lose a job, but losing a child is life altering. Incomprehensible to me.
“We buried him and we tried our best to get on with our lives. But Jessie just couldn’t. We had a huge fight one night and she admitted that she blamed me. She said maybe if I’d picked him up when I came home that night he might not have died. But the doctor told us it would have been nearly impossible to pinpoint the exact minute he stopped breathing.”
I nod but don’t say anything. Daniel doesn’t need me to tell him that it wasn’t his fault. That it was a tragic accident. I’m sure he’s heard every variation of those sentiments.
“We stayed together for another year. Went to counseling. Talked about having another baby. But she was just so angry, and I was the nearest thing to it. I told her I’d let her go, so she could find someone new and start over.”
“Did she?”
“I don’t know.”
He looks so incredibly sad. Overwhelmed by my need to comfort him, I ignore the warning bells clanging in my head that this is a very bad idea, and I reach out and put my arms around Daniel and lay my head on his chest. He doesn’t do anything at first. His heartbeat pounds under my cheek and his breathing speeds up, but his hands remain at his sides. Finally, he wraps his arms around me, and after a few minutes he seems calmer.
“Do you still love her?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says.
He holds me tight and one of his hands slips under the back of my blouse. He rubs my skin in a circular pattern with his fingertips. It feels amazing. My brain is sending all kinds of fight or flight signals, but the light pressure of his touch eventually dispels my anxiety, and I tell myself that there is nothing even remotely sexual about this situation, at least not to me. After a while, I lift my head off his chest.
“Stay with me for a while,” he says.
I’m suddenly exhausted, and the fatigue runs bone deep. It’s as if the weight of his words is more than I can handle; I can’t imagine what it’s like to be the one to say them. The temperature in the room feels as if it’s dropped ten degrees, and the cold surrounds me. “Okay,” I whisper.
Daniel reaches over and flicks off the lamp on the table beside the couch. The firelight is the only thing that illuminates the room. Daniel shifts me, so that my head is in his lap. He strokes my hair.
“Do I remind you of her?” I ask.
“You remind me of the good parts,” he says. He notices my shivering and the soft fabric of the throw blanket settles over my body. “Better?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know about me?” Daniel asks.
Right before I fall asleep I say, “No.”
• • •
When I wake up the room is dark and it takes a few moments for my eyes to adjust. My head still rests on Daniel’s lap and his arm is thrown across my shoulders. The guilt arrives full force. I may feel completely disconnected from Chris, but falling asleep at another man’s house, no matter what the circumstances are, is a significant transgression. I sit up and glance at my watch. Almost 3:00 A.M. I’m completely wide awake and all I can think about is leaving.
Daniel stirs. “Claire?”
“It’s okay. I’m going home. Don’t get up.”
He gets up. The last dying embers in the fireplace emit a soft glow and Daniel turns on the lamp so I can find my shoes, cell phone, and purse. He helps me into my coat and I don’t know what to say, so I hug him tightly. He hugs me back until I finally pull away.
“I have to go.”
He slips on his shoes and walks me to my car. The snow has stopped falling and the winter sky looks clear. The air feels crisp and cold.
“Be careful,” he says. “Watch the roads. They might be slick.”
I hear something in his voice, but I can’t identify it. Melancholy. Longing. Regret. Or maybe he’s just tired.
“Text me so that I know you made it home safely.”
“I will.” I drive away, feeling guilty, conflicted, and empty.