“It's a long story, but she's doing really well.” As she said it, she suddenly realized they were halfway through their lease, and she felt sad. She loved living with them. Maybe when their current lease expired, they'd find another house. None of them seemed to be going anywhere. Maybe they would live together forever. Four spinsters in a house. The only one finding true love these days was their father. And Annie seemed to be doing well with Brad. And she liked the boy Candy had met on the plane. Her love life and Sabrina's were in the tank. Her own had been for years. She had a reality show instead.
“You said your sister had an accident. What happened?” He seemed to be interested. Maybe he was only curious, but talking to him was pleasant. He seemed like a nice guy. He was intelligent, good looking, and had a relatively important job.
“She lost her sight. It was very dramatic for her. She's an artist, or was. She's doing special training at the Parker School for the Blind.”
“How strange,” John said, sounding pensive. “One of my brothers is deaf, and we all sign. He was born that way. It must be a huge adjustment for her to lose her sight.”
“It is. She's been amazing. And very brave.”
“Does she use a guide dog?” he asked with interest.
“No.” Tammy smiled. “She hates dogs. We have three here, the rest of us all have one each, but they're little, or two of them are. My older sister has a basset named Beulah. She suffers from chronic depression.” He laughed at the vision.
“Maybe she needs a shrink,” he said, joking with her.
“We have several of those too.”
“That reminds me. Now tell me the truth about Desiree Lafayette. Did she used to be a guy?” Tammy laughed out loud.
“I've always wondered that myself.”
“She sounds like a stripper.”
“She'd probably love that. She wants me to get her a wardrobe, designed specially for her by Oscar de la Renta. I haven't had the guts to ask him yet. Or the budget.”
“I'm sure it could be arranged.”
“I hope not.”
They laughed about the show for a few minutes, and he repeated his invitation for lunch. He suggested a restaurant that she liked. It sounded appealing, and it was nice to get out of the office for a change. She didn't do it often, she was usually too busy putting out fires to stop and eat. They made a date for one o'clock the next day.
The others asked her who it was when she hung up and came back into the room.
“Someone from the network I keep running into at meetings. He invited me to lunch,” she said noncommittally.
“That sounds like fun,” Sabrina said with a sad smile. She hadn't gone out since she and Chris broke up a month before. All she did was work and come straight home. She didn't have the heart to do anything else. All she'd done was think about him since he left. She missed him horribly. And she hadn't heard a word from him. She kept thinking about the beautiful ring. And the proposal that had terrified her. She wasn't as brave as her dad. Or as foolish. She didn't see how his marriage to Leslie could ever work. But she wished him well. Even though she thought the way he had gone about it was a huge disrespect to their mom. But she loved him nonetheless, and she was relieved that they had talked. At least the lines of communication were open again. That was something at least. But like the others, she was worried about how his marriage to Leslie would impact them, and their relationship with their dad.
Tammy met John Sperry for lunch the next day. He was intelligent, interesting, and she liked him. He had a million projects in the works, lots of interests, played a lot of sports, loved the theater, was ambitious about his job. He was extremely close to his family, and thirty-four years old. It appeared to both of them by the end of lunch that they had a lot in common.
“So what do we do next?” he asked her as they left the restaurant. “Dinner or another lunch?” Then he had a different idea. “How about tennis at my club on Saturday morning?”
“I'm a lousy player,” she warned. But it sounded like fun.
“So am I,” he admitted. “But I enjoy it anyway. We can have lunch at the club afterward, or somewhere else, if you have time.” He was starting slow, and she liked that too. She didn't like men who took her out to dinner once and tried to rush her into bed. And she would be perfectly content if they just wound up friends. She didn't have many friends in New York. All of her friends were in L.A., and she never had time to see them anyway.
She was in good spirits when she went back to the office and he called her the next day just to say hello. He sent her an interoffice memo with a joke in it, and she laughed out loud at her desk. He was a nice addition to her life. Not a bolt of lightning, which she didn't want. It was more like a quiet entrance of someone solid into the room. She felt his presence, but it didn't shake her up or unnerve her, which felt much more comfortable to her. And he wasn't on any unusual diets, and didn't belong to any cults. That in itself was a marvel.
She said very little about him to her sisters. Their contact didn't warrant it yet. She came home happy and relaxed on Saturday, tired after a game of tennis, which he had won easily. He played much better than he said, but she had held her own. And afterward they'd had lunch and gone for a walk in the park. It was still cold, but not too much to enjoy a walk. She ran into Brad and Annie on their way out as she got home. Brad was taking her to some sort of tactile conceptual art exhibit he had read about that he thought she'd enjoy, and they were chatting animatedly. He wanted her to do another lecture at the school. He thought she should do a museum series, or one about the art in each city in Italy she had visited. Her memory was excellent, and there was much she could share with her fellow students.
“Where've you been?” Annie asked her. She looked happy with Brad, and Tammy was pleased to see it. Candy was at Brown for the weekend again, visiting Paul. It was the second weekend in a row.
“I played tennis with a friend,” Tammy said easily. “Is Sabrina home?”
“She's upstairs. I think she's getting sick. She sounds awful.”
Tammy nodded. Sabrina had looked sick since New Year's Eve.
“Have a good time, you two. See you later.”
“We won't be back till late. We're having dinner after the exhibit.”
“Good. Have fun.” Tammy was smiling to herself as she walked into the house. Annie looked so radiant with Brad, and they looked so comfortable together. Everything about it seemed right. She was happy Sabrina had won the bet.
She walked upstairs to check on Sabrina, and found her lying on her bed in the dark. She suspected she wasn't sick, but depressed. Tammy hated to see things end with Chris. He was such a good man, and had been so good to Sabrina for so long. It was a shame she had such an aversion to marriage. If ever she had been inclined to get married, Chris would have been the right man. But apparently she just couldn't. Sabrina seemed to prefer losing him to marrying him.
“How're you doing?” she asked Sabrina gently, and her older sister shrugged. She looked pale and tired and worn out, with dark circles under her eyes. The breakup hadn't been a liberation, as some were. It had been a major loss, and still was. She had been mourning him for a month.
“Not so great,” Sabrina said, and rolled over to look up at the ceiling. “Maybe Dad is right. Maybe you have to take chances in life, and risks. But I just can't see myself married to anyone, ever. Or having kids. It's so much goddamn responsibility, and way too scary.”
“You take care of all of us,” Tammy reminded her. “You mother all three of us, especially Annie and Candy. What's the difference if it's your sisters or your kids?”
“I can tell you guys to take a hike.” She smiled ruefully. “You can't do that to your kids. And if you screw it up, you fuck them up for life. I see it all the time at work.”
“You should have been a wedding planner instead of a divorce lawyer. It would have been better for your future.” Sabrina smiled in answer.
“Yeah. Maybe so. Chris must absolutely hate me. He was so sweet with the ring that night, but I just couldn't do it. Not even for him. And God knows I love the man. I wouldn't mind living with him at some point. I just don't want the paperwork. It's too big a mess to undo it if you have to. This way, if you want out, you say goodbye and that's it. You don't need a buzz saw to pull your lives apart.”
