Chet Williamson - Reign

Now, as her plane landed at the Philadelphia Airport early Friday afternoon, she felt quite weary, anxious only to see Dennis again, to have him put his arms around her in the car so that she could go to sleep as Sid drove them both home. But when she went to the baggage area, she found only Sid, who shook his head sadly, as if he knew what she had expected, and was sorry. "He said he didn't feel up to the drive," Sid told her.

"He sounded all right on the phone the other night," she said, trying to keep the hurt and disappointment out of her voice.

"I don't know, Robin. I mean, the doctors can't find a thing wrong, but…”

“I still think it could be Epstein-Barr."

Sid shook his head. "Doc Chandar says it's not the yuppie flu, and he's not the only one." He reached out and grabbed one of Robin's Banana Republic bags from the carousel. "I think once we get started with the show, he'll come around. Something to keep him occupied."

"That's what I thought about the theatre. But he's been holing up in our suite so much… there's the other one." Sid grabbed the bag at which Robin was pointing, and they started toward the parking lot.

The drive to Kirkland took forty minutes, and Sid had to wake Robin after he parked the car. She stretched and rubbed her eyes, lightly smearing her liner, but did not fix it, thinking that she would have access to a rest room before she saw Dennis again. Indeed, she would be surprised if he was not sitting in the chill air of their balcony, steeped in lethargy.

The thing she did not expect to find was Dennis sitting in the office suite, laughing and talking animatedly with John Steinberg and an older woman she did not recognize. It was the first place she had gone on not finding Dennis in their apartment, and as she entered, Dennis was sitting on the sofa with the stranger, his back to Robin. John was the only one of the three to see her come in, and he wiped tears from his eyes and gave one final chuckle before he acknowledged her presence.

"Robin," he said, "welcome back. We're just swapping old war stories."

When Dennis turned, she knew that something had changed. He looked surprised to see her, but there was something else there, something that she did not immediately recognize because she had never seen it on Dennis's face before. He looked, she slowly realized, guilty. And when Robin looked in turn at the woman on the couch next to him (not touching, but close, yes, close), she thought she saw the same emotion (but less obvious, oh yes, this was a cool one).

"Hello, darling," Dennis said. He stood up, hugged her, and kissed her, but she was aware of a self-consciousness about his action, as though he wished he did not have to do so. Dennis was a marvelous actor, as she often told him, but she knew him intimately enough to know precisely when he was acting, and now was one of the infrequent times. Nevertheless, she responded to his kiss with more passion than she would have otherwise, pressing herself against him with the wary tension of an animal marking its domain against interlopers.

She broke away then, and looked at the woman. "I don't think we've met," Robin said, unable to hide the smugness in her tone, the subtext of See? This is my man.

Too smug, Robin thought as John Steinberg leapt into the conversational breach like a handler separating pit bulls. "Of course. Let me make the introductions. Robin, this is Ann Deems, our new production assistant. Ann, Robin Hamilton, Dennis's wife, as you may have surmised from the warmth with which they have just embraced."

Was there a dig in that? Robin couldn't tell, but she didn't think so. It wasn't like John to bait her. Other than an ironic aside from time to time, he had never unleashed his witty but savage cruelty upon her. She realized that she must be looking for things to irritate her, and that thought made her even more irritable.

Ann stood up, smiled and nodded. "I'm delighted to be working here, Mrs. Hamilton. It's such a wonderful building."

"Oh, it's home," Robin said, trying to smile as warmly as she knew how. "And please, call me Robin."

"One big happy family, that's us," said Steinberg.

"I'm sorry I didn't come along to meet you," Dennis said, a hand on her shoulder. "I was feeling a little off today."

"You seem all right now."

"Yes, well, John wanted me to look at a few things here, and we got talking, and…"

"And," Steinberg continued, "laughter being the best medicine, we decided to set the lad right in time for your arrival home."

"Well, thank you. I appreciate it." She put her arm around Dennis's waist. "It was nice meeting you, Ann, but if you'll excuse us, there's so much that I want to catch up on with Dennis. All right, darling?"

"Sure," he said. "Let's go up. It's good to have you back again."

Is it? she thought, but only smiled and left the room, Dennis following her.

When they were in their suite, the first thing she did was to hand him a script of Craddock and put the cassette they had made in New York in the tape deck. As the first song began to play, the composer's reedy but not unpleasant voice piping over her commanding piano playing, Robin sat next to Dennis on one of the sofas and put her arm around him.

They listened for a few minutes, Dennis nodding his satisfaction, smiling at the occasional lyrical bon mot. As the first song ended, Robin finally spoke. "Did you know her before?"

"Who?" He was good, but not good enough to fool her.

"Ann Deems. She seems very nice."

"Well, yes, I did know her, oh, years ago."

Robin felt something heavy in the pit of her stomach. "You never mentioned her before."

She felt him shrug. "Why should I have?"

"You seemed to be very friendly."

" Jesus, Robin! Is this an interrogation? I knew a lot of people before I met you!" He pushed her away, and with the action, all the anger seemed to go out of him, leaving him confused and pale. He shook his head, it seemed to her, as though he had no understanding of his previous outburst. "I'm sorry," he said. "I don't know what came over me…"

"No," Robin said, struggling to keep her own anger in check. "I don't either."

"I knew Ann… I knew Ann Deems when we started A Private Empire back in '66. We dated a few times, here in Kirkland, that was all. She applied for the job, she was qualified, she was hired – I didn't even know about it until later."

Robin knew she had gone too far. The jealous wife was a role she had never played before, and did not want to play, and she regretted it, as she regretted the hurt look on Dennis's face. Maybe she had been wrong about what she had sensed in the office suite. Maybe Dennis had just been surprised to see her, and she had imagined the rest. Robin could be very imaginative.

"I'm sorry, darling," she said, putting her arms around his neck and pressing herself against him. "I'm not jealous, really. I was just curious, that's all. I know that I have no reason to be jealous." She rubbed her hands down his back, cupping his buttocks. "God, it seemed like I was away from you a long time."

He was smiling now, his eyes halfway closed, and his own hands ran up and down her sides. She moved away from him just enough to allow him to caress her breasts. "I missed you too."

"Let's go in the bedroom," she whispered, following the words with a soft lick of her tongue just behind his left ear. She would make him forget that Ann Deems had ever existed.

Their lovemaking was impatient, urgent, and both reached orgasm quickly. After the final kisses, Dennis drifted to sleep, but Robin's thoughts were too full. She looked at the clock, saw that it was only two-thirty, and, although she knew she would have benefitted from a nap, arose quietly, dressed, and walked down the stairway to the second floor, from which she went to the mezzanine of the theatre.