chair.
“Here, take a load off”
I poured her wine and lit a cigarette. She took a sip and leaned her head back in the Adirondack. I was grateful she didn’t want to clink glasses. Instead we just sat there and worked on our drinks for a few minutes, pretending to be hypnotized by the restless splendor of the Little Peconic Bay.
“I have to admit I was a little surprised you never wanted to talk to me again,” Amanda finally said, easing right up to the crux of the matter.
I was grateful to have the Peconic to look at, though I’d have been happier if a distraction like the Loch Ness monster or a flying saucer had suddenly presented itself. Instead I had to be content with the coming sunset lighting up the edges of the miniature bay waves, throwing off a warm glint in contrast with the cool blue of the troughs in between.
“Didn’t have that much to talk about.”
“Takes a lot of reticence to fill up eight months.”
“You had a lot to work out.”
“Alone, as it turned out. It’s common knowledge that women love to go through wrenching personal experiences on their own, with no help or support from people they thought cared about them. It’s a female characteristic. Steely resolve to go it alone. Take it like a man, so to speak.”
“I told you I always end in disappointment.”
“You did. And you never lied to me,” she said.
“I never did.”
“But I lied to you,” she said. “That’s what you’re saying.”
“It’s not what I’m saying. Though you did lie to me, since you mention it.”
She had been looking at me, but now got distracted by the Little Peconic Bay.
“The last time I saw you was in the courtroom,” she said. “Roy was giving his statement. He kept looking over the prosecutor’s shoulder, at the back of the room. I followed his eyes and saw you.”
Roy Battiston was Amanda’s ex-husband. He’d tried to scam her out of her inheritance, among other things, but I got in his way. Amanda might have been mixed up in those other things, I never worked it all out. Roy would have given her up, probably, but the deal I cut with him made that impossible. I don’t know why I played it that way, exactly. I never worked that one out either.
“I had nothing else to do that day” I told her. “Too much time on my hands. That’s why I started working for Frank Entwhistle. That and no money”
“You left without a word. I waited outside the courthouse for an hour, thinking you’d just gone off to buy a pack of cigarettes and you’d be back.”
I couldn’t help my eyes from drifting over to her bare ankle, which was connected to an agreeably fashioned calf and long muscular thigh, and then on up to her face, still partially concealed behind a pair of wraparound sunglasses.
“You look good.”
She tore herself away from the Peconic and shook her head at me.
“I’m trying to talk to you about the most difficult and painful things imaginable and you tell me I look good. You never told me that before.”
“I didn’t. But I thought it. So that’s kind of like a lie. A lie of omission.”
“It’s my nice yellow dress.”
“The dress is doing its part,” I agreed.
“That’s why I bought it.”
“Good choice. Fashion standards are high out here on Oak Point.”
“You’re avoiding and deflecting. Again.”
“I think the grandifloras almost all the way in bloom. Early this year.”
I whistled to Eddie, who was out on the breakwater asserting dominance over the local waterfowl. He trotted over and sat down in front of Amanda, looking expectantly.
“Your fault,” I said to her.
“Must be love.”
“Stomach love.”
He stood and wriggled up close to put his head in her lap, challenging further the capacity of the yellow dress to conceal the tops of her thighs.
Amanda mussed around with his ears.
“I tried to reach you at the hospital after they blew you up. But they said you didn’t want any calls.”
“I wasn’t blown up. Just blown around a little.”
“You and your lady friend.”
“Jackie Swaitkowski’s her name and she’s my lawyer.”
“I thought Burton was your lawyer.”
“He’s my friend. Jackie’s my friend and my lawyer. Come to think of it, Burton’s your lawyer.”
“Only because of you. To get me through the divorce and estate settlement. You can imagine how complicated that was. He did it because you wanted him to look after me.”
“I never told him to.”
Eddie caught sight of something moving out on the pebble beach and bolted after it. Amanda got up and followed him, bringing along her wineglass. I stayed put so I could watch the way the breeze brushed her thick hair all the way to one side and messed around with her dress. I remembered the first time I saw her walk across a beach, coming toward me against the wind. It was the first time I saw her whole face. Something about it dislodged a critical component inside in my brain. My better judgment, maybe, but that’s what happens when your brain dislodges.
“I’m a fool for coming here,” she said, back from the breakwater and standing in front of me.
“Too late for that.”
“Too late?”
“Regret and self-incrimination. They’re disallowed. Oak Point regulations. You’re permitted to avoid and deflect. Even lie by omission. But you’re not allowed to come out here, looking like that, and move in like you own the place, even if you do, and start angling for sympathy and understanding with idiotic throwaway lines like that.”
She whipped the last mouthful of wine on the ground and pointed the glass at me, anger gathering around her eyes.
“Can I refill that for you?” I asked before she could say what she was about to say. She stood frozen for a few moments, then relented. I picked up the bottle as she held out her glass.
“It’s easy to see why people stay clear of you,” she said.
“I’m working on that. Trying a little self-improvement.”
“Let me know if it takes,” she said, sipping her wine and slowly lowering herself back into the Adirondack.
We put our heads back and silently watched the evening settle like a velvet blanket over the bay. The conversation from there was blessedly superficial and free of disturbing undertones, and the drinks blunted whatever ambition either of us had to journey into more treacherous territory, so when the sun finally dropped below the horizon she went back to her house and I went into mine to get some sleep, however tortured with remorse and tangled in conflicting impulses it would have to be.
ELEVEN
WHEN I HEADED UP research and development for one of the world’s largest industrial companies, I took some adolescent comfort in knowing I could kick the ass of any other division head. To say nothing of senior management and the board of directors, with the possible exception of Jason Fligh, who like many brilliant black
