Chapter 11
Carla shook her head. "Hey, think about it this way-would we be having this conversation if I hadn't started it?"
"Probably not," Teresa admitted.
"Definitely not." Carla put her arm around Teresa's shoulders. "It's okay-you just need a little pus.h.i.+ng, that's all. And Jeff may not know how."
Teresa stared out at the dark beach, avoiding her friend's eyes.
The door to the studio opened and the noise of the party poured out. "Carla," a man called. "I've been looking all over for you."
Carla dragged Teresa back into the party, and for a while she drank wine and pretended to have a good time. The party ended at around two, and Jeff drove the rental car back to Carla's apartment. Carla was a little drunk and a little high. She rode in the back seat, humming along to the tunes on the radio. Teresa felt depressingly sober, despite the wine she had drunk.
At the apartment, Carla unfolded the sofa bed and then went to her room. As Teresa was undressing, she caught Jeff watching her intently. "What's up?" she asked him.
He shrugged. "I was going to ask you the same thing. Is something wrong?"
She kept her face carefully neutral. What could she say? She didn't know how to talk to him, she didn't know where to start. She felt shut out of his life and divorced from her own. It all sounded like accusations, and she didn't want to get into it. "I'm fine," she said. "Just tired, I guess."
"You've been working hard. But it seems like your work is going better, isn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess so." She shook her head. "I just don't want to talk right now, okay?"
"Fine." He turned away. "If that's what you want."
It was what she wanted, but she found herself wide awake, lying beside Jeff and listening to his rhythmic breathing. Though she was tired, she couldn't drift off to sleep. She got out of bed and went to the kitchen. Carla's light was out. Teresa sat at the kitchen table and then, on a whim, picked up the phone and dialed home.
When Ian's face appeared on the screen, she immediately felt better. "Hi, Ian," she said. "I just called to see how you were doing. I missed talking with you."
"It's nice to hear from you. I missed you, too."
"Sure you did."
He studied her calmly. "I did. You're the most important person in my life. When you're not here, there's an empty place."
"Thanks."
Ian smiled. "My pleasure. Did you have fun at the party?"
"Yeah, I guess. I realized how much I missed my friends out here. It was great to talk to some other artists about my work. I wish I knew more artists out in Arizona."
Ian hesitated. "There's an artists' cooperative in the Flagstaff area. I have the address on file."
Teresa grinned. "Sometimes I think you have everything on file. I'll take a look when I get back. But not right now. Right now, I just want to talk. Heard any new jokes lately?"
They didn't really talk about anything important-they just chatted about this and that-but she felt better by the time she hung up.
Jeff was lying still when she came back to bed. She sat on the edge of the fold-out couch, ready to slip under the covers.
"Who were you talking to on the phone?" he asked her softly.
She froze. Light from a street lamp filtered through the curtains. His features were smudges of shadow, unreadable in the dim light. "I thought you were asleep."
"I've been awake for a while now. I felt you get up, and I couldn't go back to sleep." He sat up in bed, and the shadows on his face s.h.i.+fted. He was silent for a moment, and then he spoke. "We've got to talk."
"About what?" she said, keeping her tone light.
He was quiet, and she wanted to run away. "I've been leaving you alone too much," he said. "Because I wasn't there when you needed me, you found someone else." It was a simple statement of fact, not an accusation. "You're seeing someone."
"No, I'm not," she said. She turned away from him, folding her arms protectively across her chest.
"You're in love with someone else."
She tried to feel angry with him, indignant at his accusations, but the anger wouldn't come.
"I've been so caught up in my own work that it took me a while to notice, but these days, when I talk to you, you're thinking of someone else. You get up at night and don't come back to bed until morning. You've got secrets-sometimes I'm afraid to ask you the simplest question. When I do ask-about your work, about your day-you answer in a word or two, and I'm afraid to ask again. We used to talk about your work -but you don't want to anymore."
She wished she felt angry. Anger would protect her from the great sadness that threatened to overwhelm her.
"Who is it?" he asked.
She shook her head. "No one."
He waited, watching her face. "Someone you met at that gallery opening," he said. She didn't respond. "I don't have to know," he said at last. "But you have to tell me-are you leaving me?" He put his hands gently on her shoulders. She tensed at his touch. "Talk to me, Teresa."
She would not look at him. "I don't know. I don't think so. No-no, I'm not leaving."
He put his arms around her. "I don't want to lose you. You have to talk to me. Please."
"I can't talk about it," she said. "I don't-" Her voice broke.
"Do you still love me?"
She could feel the beating of his heart as he embraced her, the warmth of his body against hers. "Sometimes," she said. "But sometimes..." She put her hand to her face, trying to hide her tears. She did not want to cry. "Sometimes, I feel like you don't even see me. I feel like I'm not even there. You think you can go away when you want and come back when you want, and I'd still be there, just waiting. You can't do that. I need..." She shook her head, upset by the burst of words. She had lost control. Her protection was gone. He could see how weak and stupid she really was. She had always known that it was dangerous to reveal herself.
"I'm sorry, Teresa. I'm sorry I wasn't there when you needed me." He rubbed her
"I'm sorry too," she said. She felt his body pressed against her. It seemed like a long time since he had held her close. She s.h.i.+vered in his embrace.
He stopped rubbing her shoulders. "You're cold-I can feel you shaking. Come on-get under the covers."
She relaxed enough to lie down on the bed, and he pulled the blanket over her. His body was warm. With a corner of the sheet, he dried her face.
"What happened in the past doesn't matter. I don't care about all that. But you've got to tell me when you're mad at me, you've got to tell me what's going on. Promise me that."
"I'll try." She closed her eyes, but knew that he was still watching her.
"And I'll try, too." He paused for a moment. "Suppose I took some time off from work. We could drive down to Santa Cruz and spend a few days by the ocean. Can you afford the time off?"
She opened her eyes and looked at him. "Yeah, I could use a few days off-but what about your project?"
"They'll do without me for a few days. They'll just have to." He watched her, his eyes steady. "I think we both need a vacation."
"All right," she said at last. "I'm willing to give it a try." She felt spent, drained. She lay in his arms, and finally she slept.
On the drive to Santa Cruz, she felt awkward at first, as if she and Jeff were strangers on a first date. She kept smiling and making light conversation: "Isn't the weather nice?" "I wonder if it'll rain." "Do you suppose we'll hit much traffic?"
Half an hour into the drive, Jeff glanced over at her and said, "It's okay, Teresa. You don't have to make small talk." She bit her lip, suddenly silent. He reached over and took her hand. "Look-I'm not mad at you. Are you mad at me?"
She considered the question. No, she wasn't angry. Confused maybe, but not angry. "No, I'm not mad."
"Then let's just relax." He squeezed her hand. "Why don't you tell me about how your piece for Santa Fe is going? I'd like to know."
She started telling him about the sculpture. At first, she was nervous, but she had relaxed by the time they got to Davenport, a small town just north of Santa Cruz. That night, they stayed at an old Victorian house that had been converted to a bed-and-breakfast inn. The house was perched on the cliffs above the ocean, and Teresa insisted on leaving the bedroom window open, despite the cool ocean fog. From the room, she could hear the pounding surf. They made love, and she fell asleep in Jeff's arms.
The next morning, he brought her breakfast in bed and suggested that they drive home, rather than fly. "Last time we drove, we were in too much of a hurry. I've never shown you the parts of the desert I really love," he told her.
She had her doubts about the trip. Her memories of the drive from San Francisco to Winslow were of long bleak stretches of highway. But Jeff was so enthusiastic she kept her reservations to herself. She had almost forgotten what he could be like when he wasn't working. All the intensity that he had been focusing on his work was now concentrated on her. "All right," she agreed. "We can drive."
The trip took seven days, with many stops and detours along the way. They wandered among the twisted trees of the Joshua Tree National Monument. They visited the ruins of an Indian pueblo, strolling among the remains of walls that marked where rooms had once been, and startling lizards that were sleeping in the sun. They hiked out to see Arizona's biggest natural rock bridge and climbed on ma.s.sive sandstone boulders.
Late in the afternoon of the sixth day, they sat together on the flat, sun-warmed surface of a boulder the size of a school bus. It was quiet, but not silent, Teresa realized. A raven flew over, its shadow rippling across the rocks. It called once, and she heard the rustle of feathers as it cupped its wings to land on a distant rock.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Jeff said.
"It always just seemed hot to me," Teresa said. "Hot and empty and uncaring."
"No, you got it wrong," he said. "This land has its own kind of power. I find myself listening to every rustle of leaves, hearing the hiss of sand blowing over sand, noticing the way the light changes during the day. It focuses my attention, and I see things I'd normally overlook, hear things I would normally ignore. It changes in subtle ways. Each day is a little different. I think it's beautiful." He took her hand, and they sat together until the sun started to set.
That evening, one day's drive from home, she called Carla from the motel, just to let her know that everything was going fine.
"Jeff and I both have to get back to work," Teresa told Carla. "But things are much better between us. I just hope it lasts."
"What about Ian?"
"I don't think that'll be a problem."
Carla shook her head. "You know, you haven't changed a bit. You always were amazed when you found out that some ex-lover was carrying a torch for you. You always seem to expect them to vanish without a trace when the love affair is over."
"Ian won't carry a torch," Teresa said. "He's not built that way."
Carla shrugged. "Have it your way. But you may be surprised."
When her alarm went off at six, Teresa woke to find herself alone. Jeff, as usual, was gone, and Ian did not greet her from the monitor in the corner. She waited a moment before turning off the alarm, wondering if Ian would notice the noise and say good morning, but he did not appear. She was not sure if she was disappointed, relieved, or both.
As she got out of bed she noticed for the first time the sounds coming from the kitchen. She pulled on her robe and walked down the hall.
Jeff stood in the middle of the kitchen, his back to her, the calm eye in the middle of a hurricane of activity. Coffee steamed from the coffee maker on his left, eggs sizzled in a pan on the stove behind him, and four pieces of brown toast sat patiently in the toaster to his right. He was intently sawing a grapefruit in half.
Teresa stared in amazement. "What's this?"
Jeff turned around. "Breakfast." He smiled. "I hope."
"Breakfast?" She could not remember the last time Jeff had eaten breakfast with her before leaving for work.
"Yeah, you know, the meal you eat in the morning." He cut another section of grapefruit. "I noticed that you'd set your alarm for early today, and I figured that we both have to eat, so I thought I'd surprise you." He put down the knife and grapefruit and grabbed a mug from the counter. "Coffee?"
"Sure." Teresa took the mug and settled down at the table. Jeff prepared breakfast as he did everything else-carefully, methodically, precisely. He worked at the counter in front of him for thirty seconds or so, rotated one stop, worked at that counter, and so on around the circle. Somehow it seemed to come out right.
In a few minutes, Jeff set a plate in front of her and sat down across from her.
She did not know quite what to say. She was used to talking to Ian in the morning, not Jeff. Ian, however, did not appear. "Jeff?"
He put down his fork and looked at her. "Yes?"
"This is nice, but don't you have to get to work?"
"Yeah, in a little while. Breakfast just seemed like a nice way for us to get to spend a little extra time together. That's all." He sipped his coffee. "I mean, don't get too used to it, okay? I'm not saying this will be a regular thing, but it seemed like a good idea at the time."
They ate in silence for a while. Teresa felt vaguely bribed, or catered to, but Jeff was making an effort. Several times she almost spoke, but each time she stopped herself. Twice she found Jeff staring at her when she looked up from her plate. He seemed to want her to talk, but he did not press her.
Finally she decided that maybe he really was trying, and that maybe she could try a little more as well. "Jeff, how much of this is real?"
"What do you mean, real? Is the food that bad?"
"No jokes. I mean, how much of this"-she waved her arm to take in the kitchen"-is real, and how much is just some attempt to pacify me."
"Pacify you? I don't want to pacify you. I just want to be happy with you. Sure, this is all pretty convenient, coming right after our trip and all, but at least give me a little credit for trying. I won't make breakfast every day, that's for sure, but I'll try to be around a lot more. No-I will be around a lot more." He leaned closer. "Teresa, I have to start somewhere."
Teresa put her mug down. She reached across the table and took his hand. "You're right. You have to start somewhere, and so do I." She kissed him lightly. "The food is wonderful, and so, sometimes, are you. I do appreciate it." She leaned back in her chair.
As they ate, they talked about simple things-what she wanted to get done on the sculpture, his plans for the day, her knowledge that something that she could not quite put her finger on was still wrong with the piece. When they were done eating, she rinsed the dishes, and he loaded them into the dishwasher.
Jeff stopped when he was almost out the door on his way to work. "Teresa."
She came over to the door. "Yes."
"You really are good at what you do, you know. I'm not trying to say that this isn't a difficult piece, maybe even your hardest yet, but I'm sure you'll figure out what's wrong with it." He hugged her for a moment and, as he held her close, said, "You will."
She kissed him. "Thanks."
She watched for a moment as he got in his car and started it, and then she closed the door and headed toward the bedroom. Only when she was back in the bedroom, getting dressed, did Ian appear.
"Good morning, Teresa."
"Good morning, Ian." She pulled on a sweats.h.i.+rt, unwilling to look at him. She was, she realized, as uncomfortable as she had been when she talked with him for the first time. She sat on the bed and looked at him. "What do you think of the desert, Ian?"