Danielle Steel: Fine things

“Are you kidding?” She laughed. “My mother already cries talking about it.” He was still thinking of marrying her, but he hadn't said anything to her. He surprised her on Valentine's Day with a beautiful little diamond ring he had bought for her, with money his grandparents had left him when they died. It was a small, neat emerald-cut solitaire, it was only two carats but the stone was impeccable. The day he bought it his chest felt tight he was so excited all the way home. He had swept her off her feet, kissed her hard on the mouth, and thrown the red-wrapped box in her lap with a careless toss.

“Try that on for size, kid.”

She had thought it was a joke, and laughed until she opened it. And then her mouth fell open and she burst into tears. She had thrown the box back at him and left without a word, as he stood with his mouth open, staring after her. Nothing made any sense to him, until she came back to talk about it late that night. They both had rooms, but more often than not, they both stayed in his. It was larger and more comfortable and he had two desks, and she stared at the ring in the open box on his. “How could you do a thing like that?” He didn't understand. Maybe she thought the ring was too big.

“A thing like what? I want to marry you.” His eyes had been gentle as he reached out to her, but she turned away and walked across the room.

“I thought you understood … all this time I thought everything was cool.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means I thought we had an equal relationship.”

“Of course we do. What does that have to do with anything?”

“We don't need marriage … we don't need all that traditional garbage.” She looked at him disgustedly and he was shocked. “All we need is what we have right now, for as long as it lasts.” It was the first time he had heard her talk like that and he was wondering what had happened to her.

“And how long is that?”

“Today …next week …” She shrugged. “Who cares? What difference does it make? But you can't nail it down with a diamond ring.”

“Well, pardon me.” But he was suddenly furious. He grabbed the box, snapped it shut, and threw it into one of his desk drawers. “I apologize for doing something so innately bourgeois. I guess my Scarsdale was showing again.”

She looked at him as though with brand-new eyes. “I had no idea you were making so much of this.” She looked puzzled by him, as though she suddenly couldn't remember his name. “I thought you understood everything …” She sat down on the couch and stared at him as he strode to the window, and then turned to look back at her.

“No. You know something? I don't understand anything. We've been sleeping with each other for over a year. We basically live together, we went to Europe together last year. What did you think this was? A casual affair?” Not for him. He wasn't that kind of man, even at twenty-one.

“Don't use such old-fashioned words.” She stood up and stretched, as though she were bored, and he noticed she wasn't wearing a bra, which only made things worse. He could suddenly feel his desire mounting for her.

“Maybe it's just too soon.” He looked at her hopefully, led by what he felt between his legs as much as what he felt in his heart, and hating himself for it. “Maybe we just need more time.”

But she was shaking her head. And she didn't kiss him good night as she walked to the door. “I don't ever want to get married, Bern. It's not my bag. I want to go to California when we graduate and just hang out for a while.” He could suddenly just imagine her there … in a commune.

“What kind of life is 'hanging out'? It's a dead end!”

She shrugged with a smile. “That's all I want right now, Bern.” Their eyes held for a long time. “Thanks anyway for the ring.” She closed the door softly as she left, and he sat alone in the dark for a long, long time, thinking about her. He loved her so much, or at least he thought he did. But he had never seen this side of her, this casual indifference to what someone else felt, and then suddenly he remembered how she had treated her parents when he had visited them. She didn't really seem to care a whole lot about what they felt, and she always thought he was crazy when he called his folks, or bought his mother a gift before he went home. He had sent her flowers on her birthday and Sheila had made fun of him, and now it all came rushing back to him. Maybe she didn't give a damn about anyone, not even him. She was just having a good time, and doing what felt good at the time. And up until then he had been what had felt good to her, but the engagement ring did not. He put it back in the drawer when he went to bed, and his heart felt like a rock as he lay in the dark thinking of her.

And things hadn't improved much after that. She had joined a consciousness-raising group, and one of the subjects they seemed to love to discuss most was her relationship with Bernie. She came home and attacked him almost constantly about his values, his goals, his way of talking to her.

“Don't talk to me like a child. I'm a woman, goddammit, and don't you forget that those balls of yours are only decorative, and not too much so at that. I'm just as smart as you are, I've got just as much guts …my grades are just as good …the only thing I don't have is that piece of skin hanging between your legs and who gives a damn anyway?” He was horrified, and even more so when she gave up ballet. She kept up with the Russian, but she talked a lot about Che Guevara now, and she had taken to wearing combat boots, and accessories she bought at the army surplus store. She was particularly fond of men's undershirts, worn without a bra, with her dark nipples showing through easily. He was beginning to be embarrassed to walk down the street with her.

“You're not serious?” she asked when they talked a lot about the senior prom, and they both agreed that it was corny as hell, but he had admitted to her that he wanted to go anyway. It was a memory to save for another time, and finally she had agreed with him. But she had shown up at his apartment wearing army fatigues open to her waist and a torn red T-shirt underneath. And her boots weren't genuine military but they might as well have been. They were perfect replicas sprayed with gold paint, and she laughingly called them her “new party shoes” as he stared at her. He was wearing the white dinner jacket he had worn to a wedding the year before. His father had gotten it at Brooks Brothers for him and it fit him perfectly, and with his auburn hair and green eyes and the beginnings of a summer tan, he looked very handsome standing there. But she looked ridiculous and he told her so. “That's a rude thing to do to the kids who take it seriously. If we do go, we owe it to them to dress with respect.”

“Oh for chrissake.” She threw herself on his couch with a look of total disdain. “You look like Lord Fauntleroy Christ, wait till I tell my group about this.”

“I don't give a damn about your group!” It was the first time he had lost his temper with her over that and she looked surprised as he advanced on her and stood towering over her as she lay on the couch, swinging her long graceful legs in the fatigues and gold combat boots. “Now get off your ass and go back to your room and change.”

“Screw you.” She smiled up at him.

“I'm serious, Sheila. You're not going in that outfit.”

“Yes, I am.”

“No, you're not.”

“Then we won't go.”

He hesitated for a fraction of an instant and strode to the door of his room. “You. Not me. You won't go. I'm going by myself.”

“Have a good time.” She waved, and he walked outside fuming silently. And he had gone to the dance alone and had a lousy time. He didn't dance with anyone, but he stayed there purposely to prove a point. But she had ruined the evening for him. And she ruined graduation with the same kind of stunt, only worse, because his mother was in the audience. When she came up on the stage, and once she had the diploma in her hand, Sheila turned and made a little speech about how meaningless the token gestures of the establishment were, that there were oppressed women everywhere in the world. And on their behalf, and her own, she was rejecting the chauvinism of the University of Michigan. She then proceeded to tear the diploma in half while the entire audience gasped, and Bernie wanted to cry. There was absolutely nothing he could say to his mother after that. And even less he could say to Sheila that night, before they both began packing up their things. He didn't even tell her how he felt about what she had done. He didn't trust himself to say anything. They said very little, in fact, as she got her things out of his drawers. His parents were having dinner with friends at the hotel, and he was joining them the next day for a luncheon to celebrate his graduation before they all went back to New York. But he looked at Sheila now with an air of despair. The last year and a half seemed about to go down the drain. They had stayed together the last few weeks out of convenience and habit. But he still couldn't accept their separation. Although he had made plans to go to Europe with his parents, he couldn't believe they were through. It was odd how passionate she could be in bed, and how cool everywhere else. It had confused him since the first day they met. But he found himself completely unable to be objective about her. She broke the silence first. “I'm leaving tomorrow night for California.”