Даниэла Стил - The Affair

“What are you doing?” she said to him in a harsh whisper when the girls finally left the pool to change for dinner. She was about to follow them, to oversee their baths and wash their hair, but stayed to talk to him. “Are you insane? What are you doing here? Or what am I doing here? How do you think the girls are going to feel after a weekend like this when we tell them we’re separated? We’ve been lying to them for two months. And you’re having a baby with another woman.”

“They deserve to have some happy times with the two of us. And it’s not over between us yet, Nadia. I still love you.”

“Stop saying that, for God’s sake!” Nadia looked furious and had tears of rage and sorrow in her eyes. “You have a mistress, you’re having a baby with her. Why do you want to confuse everything? Our girls will never trust us again.” He was breaking her heart. She was trying to let go of him, in her heart and in her mind, and a weekend like this just reminded her of how it used to be, and could never be again.

“Why won’t you leave things open for a while?” He looked like a schoolboy who had been scolded and truly didn’t understand the harsh punishment he felt she was meting out to him.

“I’m not a car you can just park somewhere, and our daughters aren’t toys for you to play with whenever you want. My mother tells me you’re doing an interview for Mode with Pascale. The whole damn world knows about your affair, or will shortly. Meanwhile, you’re lying to our daughters and confusing the hell out of me. This isn’t a game, Nicolas, it’s our life. Or it was. It’s nothing now, except a joke you’re playing on us and a nightmare.”

“I’m not joking. I love you, Nadia,” he said with tears in his eyes too. The moment was intense. “I don’t know what happened. I went crazy, I’m still crazy. I care about Pascale, but I love you. She’s fireworks on the Fourth of July. You and I are real. We’re forever.”

“No, we’re not, ” she shouted at him, since the girls weren’t around. “Nothing is forever, and certainly not our marriage, not now. I saw a lawyer last week,” she added, lowering her voice.

“So did I,” he responded, and she looked shocked. He hadn’t mentioned it to her before. Nor had she.

“Are you filing for divorce?” she asked him.

“No. I just don’t want to do anything dumber than I already have,” he said. “He told me that as long as I have not abandoned our family residence, we’re not separated and you don’t have grounds for divorce.” She realized then that he wasn’t as crazy as he looked at the moment. “I have not moved out. I’m not going to. I want to see this through with Pascale until October, and then come back to you. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll stay with her until the baby, and then I swear, I will never do anything like this again.”

“I don’t believe you,” Nadia said angrily. “And I’m supposed to sit around quietly for the next few months while the two of you show off and give interviews? You are insane.” She looked as though she hated him for a minute. “Why is everything always about you? And we’re the wreckage you leave in your wake. Stop it, Nicolas. This is not a game. It’s my life.” She got up and left the pool area then, and hurried back to the house, while he sat staring into space in the deck chair for a long time. He was terrified to lose Nadia and the girls, but he felt he had to see it through with Pascale until after the baby. He couldn’t leave her pregnant, and the baby was his child too. Pascale called him at that exact moment, as though she was psychic and had picked up his vibes. He didn’t want to talk to her but took the call anyway. He felt torn in half.

“How’s it going?” she asked, sounding relaxed.

“Okay, most of the time. It’s a little tense,” he said with a sigh. He didn’t want to explain it to her. She thought he should just walk away from Nadia and not look back. The way she would have.

“You should have come to Ramatuelle with me. The house is full, the weather is gorgeous, and the fireworks will be fabulous tonight.” There were plenty of fireworks between him and Nadia at the moment. He understood why she was upset, and he felt pulled between the two of them. “I miss you,” Pascale said, sounding instantly sexual and he forced himself not to think about it. Not here. “The two of you fighting all the time is why I never want to get married. It doesn’t seem like fun to me.” She laughed when she said it, but Nicolas was in a serious mood, after being with his family all weekend and seeing Nadia’s suffering at close range. And he could see her fury too.

“This is incredibly difficult for her,” he said sympathetically, well aware of what he was putting her through and deeply sorry about it. Pascale had no empathy for her, or even for him and the guilt he felt because of her.

“Don’t forget we have the interview with Mode next week,” she reminded him, and changed the subject back to herself. “I just bought a new dress for it, see-through white lace, I can wear it over a bathing suit. I look like a madonna in it.” She was conscious of her striking, sensual beauty and used it to her advantage whenever possible. It was her secret weapon and so far always worked on him. But not tonight. He was upset about Nadia, and what he was doing to her.

“You’re too sexy to be a madonna.” He was surprised they were including him in the interview, with his mother-in-law as editor-in-chief, but he was a big name. They were assigning one of their most important photographers and had begged Nicolas to participate. They wanted to do it at the rented house in Ramatuelle, and Pascale had agreed without consulting him. They wanted photographs of them together. “I’ll come down on Monday, the day before the interview. I’ll give them a few minutes, but I won’t do the whole interview with you.” He couldn’t do that to Nadia, and he didn’t want to. “I need to do some work this week,” he said, sounding stressed. He had hardly written a word in the last two months. His new novel was half finished, sitting on a shelf. He couldn’t concentrate on anything these days except Pascale and Nadia. “Nadia and the girls are leaving for L.A. in a few days, so I can stay down South with you for the next few weeks.” He felt like a bouncing ball.

She reminded him that she was going to the wedding at the Hotel du Cap the next day, hoping to make him jealous, but he wasn’t.

They hung up and he went back into the house then, feeling depressed about the situation. They had bought sausages, fruit, and salad for a simple country dinner. Nadia and the girls were in their rooms when he walked in. He was staying in a small study off the main bedroom, but the girls had no idea he wasn’t sleeping in the master bedroom. He wondered if Nadia was right, and it wasn’t fair to keep things hidden from them. He kept hoping there would be some kind of resolution, but there wasn’t. It unnerved him that Nadia had seen an attorney. This was the first he had heard of it. He had gone to a lawyer to make sure he didn’t make any glaring legal mistakes that would deal a final death blow to their marriage. Nadia had gone to see a lawyer to find out what those mistakes were and what grounds she had to end the marriage. Their goals were no longer the same. They were in direct conflict, like everything about their life.

Nadia and Nicolas were quiet at dinner, and the girls chattered on. Laure wanted to decorate a shoebox with the seashells she’d collected, to make it a jewelry box for her mother. And Sylvie wanted to know how soon they would go to Disneyland after they got to L.A. They provided some distraction during the meal. Their father took them outside to throw a ball with them afterwards, and Nadia went to her room. She called Venetia in Southampton, who said it was blistering hot there, wished Nadia a happy Bastille Day, and asked how things were going with Nicolas there for the weekend.