Douglas Kennedy - Five Days

‘My wonderfully quirky and original son will probably say something ironic and knowing like, “Way to go, Mom.” I think he’ll like you as well.’

‘Even if I am not the bohemian he aspires to be.’

‘You write. You’ve changed your life. You love his mother and make her supremely happy. Trust me, he’ll be cool with all that.’

‘You’re so lucky having a son like that — talented, clearly sensitive and emotionally smart.’

I put my hand on his arm and squeezed it, saying:

‘I know you’re thinking about Billy right now.’

‘I’m always thinking about Billy. The fact is, there is nothing I can do about Billy anymore. His future is in the hands of the state. He is now so thoroughly institutionalized — and so personally lost — that I can’t see him rejoining his family, let alone society, for the foreseeable future. And yes, that tears away at me all the time. But I’ve also learned to accept that there are certain situations that cannot be put back together again, that are beyond redemption, let alone a happy ending. Like my marriage. And alas, like Billy.’

‘You know you can count on me when it comes to helping you through anything. And you must always tell me everything when it comes to Billy or anything else in your life.’

‘Just as you know, when it comes to Ben and Sally, I am always with you. And I certainly hope Ben manages to continue to lift himself out of that bad place he found himself in.’

‘Curiously, I am coming to believe that his breakdown might mark the beginning of the makings of a much stronger, more independent young man. I think, like all of us, he had the illusion that someone else can fill in all the psychic gaps and holes within you. But what I sense is that, in the wake of his collapse, he’s started to realize perhaps the toughest and most important lesson you have to learn as an adult is that no one but yourself is responsible for your happiness. Just as you are not ultimately responsible for anyone else’s happiness.’

‘And the other great truth behind what you’ve just said is that you have to want to be happy in order to be happy,’ Richard said. ‘I think, for years, I simply accepted my domestic unhappiness as my due — part of the infernal compromise I made. And now. ’

‘Now we can do this all differently. Now we can rewrite the rules of our respective lives.’

It did somewhat bemuse me, hearing myself say such things out loud. Just as I was so conscious of the hugely direct way Richard and I were expressing our love for each other. ‘I have never made love like that before.’ Take it out of context and you think it’s this side of treacly. But isn’t that one of the great wonders of falling in love; the way you start articulating emotional truths in such an unabashed, un-self-censored way? My father once admitted to me after my mother died that he had always had great difficulties telling her, ‘I love you’; that even though theirs was a good marriage, he rarely could bring himself to make that sweeping, crucial declaration on even an irregular basis. Dan was cut from the same reticent material. (Did I subconsciously choose him because he so mirrored my father’s emotional distance?) That, in turn, made the impassioned articulation of feeling between myself and Richard so revelatory. Here was a man who wanted to tell me how much he loved me at every opportunity.

‘“Life can change on a dime,” as my grandfather used to say. Far too much, I should add. But still. how to explain all this?’

‘Love. in all its manifest indisputability.’

‘Now you are showing off,’ I said, laughing. ‘But I still like the sentiment. Especially as it is so true.’

Richard glanced at his watch.

‘Just coming up to ten a.m.,’ he said. ‘I’m going to call the realtor and make the offer on our apartment.’

‘You are amazing, Mr Copeland.’

‘Not as amazing as you.’

He went into the bedroom to collect his cellphone. I used this opportunity to do something I was dreading: turning on my own phone and discovering what messages were awaiting me. I found my bag, dug out the phone, hit the power-on button, and listened while, in the next room, Richard was already speaking with the realtor. The price he would pay was two-forty-five. No negotiation. This offer was on the table for forty-eight hours, no more. His tone was perfectly pleasant throughout — but he was also making it very clear that he wanted to close this thing fast and with as little encumbrance as possible. What struck me so forcibly was the confidence in his voice, the sense of being reasonable, yet authoritative. Which also struck me as immensely attractive and reassuring.

There was another thought behind all this: The man I love is buying an apartment for us. Yesterday he talked about moving to Boston in ‘the next life’. Today the next life has actually begun.

An apartment for us.

Us. What a lovely pronoun.

Bing. The telltale tone informing me I had text messages.

Actually just two messages. Both from Dan. The first time-marked 6:08 last night:

Sally’s headed off with her friends to Portland. Thinking about tackling the railings on the front porch tomorrow. You’re right, they really could use a paint job. Hope you’re having an OK evening. D xxx

Did I feel a stab of guilt when I read this? Yes and no. Yes because, yes, I had stepped outside my marriage and had slept with another man. No because Dan’s text was just another attempt to put a band-aid on what had been a slow, but steady, bleeding dry of any emotional connection between us. And it made me think: A man I just met two days ago can’t stop telling me that he loves me, and my husband of over twenty years can’t ever bring himself to make that declaration. Because he truly doesn’t feel that.

The next text from Dan was marked 10:09 last night.

Hoped to hear from you before getting to bed early. Still trying to get my body clock adjusted for the four a.m. wake-up call on Monday. Why didn’t you call/text tonight? Everything OK? D xxx

Is everything OK? Actually, falling in love has made everything beyond OK. It has changed the landscape of my existence. But if I indicated now that ‘we need to have a serious talk’ — a hint that things between us had, as far as I was concerned, reached the endgame phase — I knew that he might start bombarding me with calls or texts today. And I wanted this day with my love to be free of such interference. There would be seriously trying days ahead with Dan; a rite of painful passage I’d have to negotiate, and help him through as well (though I already sensed that his initial shock would be usurped by rage when he knew that I was in love with another man). But for now.

Hi there. Girls’ night out yesterday evening with three radiologists. A little too much wine ingested. Am suffering bad head this morning. Remember my friend Sandy Nelson? Working at Mass General in Radiology. She’s asked me over for dinner to her home in Somerville tonight.

In the recent past I would have read through even the most benign text to Dan several times over before dispatching it — because I had become so super-conscious of my husband’s ability to find grievance in even the most seemingly straightforward of words. But this morning I just hit the ‘send’ button on my phone, while hearing Richard next door tell the realtor:

‘So if you can get a yes from the seller today I can come in and see you at your Mass Ave office tomorrow at nine a.m. to sign the paperwork, and arrange my bank to transfer the deposit — a deposit that will be refundable if my surveyor finds something very wrong with the place. But that’s not going to happen, right? OK, I’ll keep my phone on this morning and afternoon. But tell the guy, the offer is non-negotiable. And as you know, I’m a cash buyer.’