Elin Hilderbrand - The Island

She made herself a cup of tea and arranged the hyacinths he’d brought in one of her cut-glass vases. She was floating. The perfect life, she decided, would be a life filled with first dates like this one. Each day would contain electric promise, a spark, a connection, and desire.

God, desire. She had forgotten all about it.

She undressed and climbed into bed with her steaming mug of tea. She picked up the novel her book club was reading, then set it down. She was levitating like a magician’s assistant. She closed her eyes.

The phone rang in the middle of the night. Three twenty, the clock said. Birdie sat straight up in bed. Her bedside light was still on. The tea was cold on the nightstand. The phone? Who called at such an hour? Then Birdie remembered her date and she filled with warm, syrupy joy. It might be India calling to find out how the date had gone. India kept ridiculous hours. Ever since Bill died, she had suffered from mind-blowing insomnia; she occasionally went seventy-two hours without sleeping.

Or the call was from Hank, who had, perhaps, not been able to sleep.

Birdie grabbed the phone.

A woman, crying. Birdie knew immediately that it was Chess; a mother always knew the sound of her child crying, even when her child was thirty-two years old. Birdie intuited the rest of it right away, without having to hear one lurid word. It crushed her, but she knew.

“It’s over, Birdie.”

“Over?” Birdie said.

“Over.”

Birdie drew the covers up to her chin. This was one of her defining moments as a mother and she was determined to shine.

“Tell me what happened,” she said.

Michael Morgan was six foot six, clean cut, and handsome. He had sandy hair, green eyes, and a smile that made others smile. He had played lacrosse at Princeton, where he had graduated summa cum laude with a degree in sociology; he was a whiz at crossword puzzles and loved black-and-white movies, which endeared him to people of Birdie’s generation. Instead of taking a job at J.P. Morgan, where his father was managing partner, or going to Madison Avenue, where his mother oversaw the advertising accounts for every smash hit on Broadway, Michael had taken out a staggering business loan and bought a failing head-hunting company. In five years, he had turned a profit; he had placed 25 percent of the graduating class of Columbia Business School.

Chess had met Michael Morgan at a rock club downtown; Birdie couldn’t remember the name of the place. Chess had been at the bar with a girlfriend, and Michael had been there to see his brother, Nick, who was the lead singer in a band called Diplomatic Immunity. This was how young people met each other; Birdie understood that. But unlike the other young men that Chess met socially, she and Michael Morgan got serious right away.

The beginning of Chess’s relationship with Michael Morgan coincided with the end of Birdie and Grant’s marriage. When Birdie and Grant met Michael Morgan for the first time, they were, technically, separated. (Grant was staying in a room at the Hyatt in Stamford. This was before he rented and then purchased the loft in South Norwalk.) Chess knew her parents were separated, but Chess wanted Birdie and Grant to meet Michael together as a unit. Birdie balked at this. It would be awkward; it would be what amounted to a date with Grant, whom she had so recently and unequivocally asked to leave her life. But Chess insisted. She believed that her parents could be civil and congenial to each other for one night on her behalf. Grant was open to the idea; he made a reservation for four at La Grenouille, their former favorite restaurant. Grant and Birdie drove to the city together; it wouldn’t make sense not to. Grant smelled the same; he was wearing his khaki suit and one of the Paul Stuart shirts that Birdie had bought for him, and the pink tie with the frogs that he always wore when they went to La Grenouille. Birdie remembered having the reassuring yet sinking feeling that nothing had changed. The maître d’ at La Grenouille, Donovan, greeted them as a married couple-he had no idea they’d split-and showed them to the table they preferred. On the way to the restaurant from the parking garage, Birdie had filled Grant in on Michael Morgan. He and Chess had been dating for three weeks.

“Three weeks?” Grant said. “He got an audience after only three weeks?”

“This is it, I think,” Birdie said.

“It?” Grant said.

“Just be nice,” Birdie said. “Make him comfortable.”

Chess had looked beautiful in a flowery lavender dress, and Michael Morgan was stunning in a charcoal suit and a lavender-hued Hermès tie. (They had color-coordinated their outfits! This struck Birdie as cute at first; then she worried that they were secretly living together.) Chess and Michael Morgan looked like they had just stepped off the pages of Town and Country. They looked like they were already married.

Michael Morgan greeted Grant with a strong handshake; he kissed Birdie’s cheek. He gave them both that brilliant smile that made them smile. (That square jaw, those perfect teeth, the light in his eye-he was magnetic!) Birdie had gone into that dinner feeling very jaundiced about romance and relationships, but even she had been won over by Michael Morgan, and by Michael and Chess together. Michael had beautiful table manners, he stood when Chess rose to use the ladies’ room and when she returned, he told Grant and Birdie about his business and plans for future growth in a way that was both impressive and pleasingly self-effacing. He appreciated the wine, he drank scotch with Grant after dessert, he thanked both Grant and Birdie profusely for the meal, he praised them for bringing up a beautiful, smart, accomplished daughter like Chess. What was not to like?

So what Birdie heard over the phone surprised her. Chess had broken the engagement. Chess had been out to dinner at Aureole with her friend Rhonda; from there, she and Rhonda had gone to the Spotted Pig for cocktails, and then on to a nightclub. Chess had left the nightclub without telling Rhonda. She had walked sixty-seven blocks uptown to her apartment (Birdie shuddered at the danger of it) and had called San Francisco, where Michael was with candidates interviewing for the head of a prestigious tech company. She had called off the wedding. Michael was flying home in the morning, she said, but it wouldn’t do any good. The relationship was over. She would not be getting married.

“Now wait a minute,” Birdie said. “What happened?”

“Nothing happened, ” Chess said. “I just don’t want to marry Michael.”

“But why not? ” Birdie said. She wasn’t naive. Had Chess taken any mind-altering drugs while she was at the club? Was she still feeling their effects now?

“I don’t have a good reason,” Chess said. She started to cry again. “I just don’t want to.”

“You don’t want to?”

“That’s right,” Chess said. “I don’t want to.”

“You’re not in love with him?” Birdie said.

“No,” Chess said. “I’m not.”

What could Birdie say?

“I understand.”

“You do?”

“I support whatever decision you make. I love you. If you don’t want to marry Michael Morgan, we will undo all the wedding plans.”

Chess exhaled. She hiccuped. She whispered, “God, Birdie, thank you. Thank you.”

“Okay. Okay, now,” Birdie said.

“Will you tell Dad?” Chess asked.

“Me?” Birdie said.

“Please?” The tears threatened. “I just can’t do it. I am not strong enough.”

What Chess meant was that she didn’t want to do it. Who in their right mind would want to call Grant Cousins, whose job it was to intimidate everyone from the at-home investor to the SEC, and tell him that he may have wasted $150,000 on things like hand-engraved invitations and a floating island in his ex-wife’s backyard pond? Birdie was aware that her greatest flaw as a mother was not holding the children fully accountable for their actions. She had never made them do the dirty work. When Tate, at age six, stole crayons from the five-and-dime, Birdie hadn’t marched her back to the store to confess to Mr. Spitko, the owner, as she should have. She had let it slide with a lecture and had then put five dollars in an envelope, which she slid under the door of the five-and-dime after hours.