No Witnesses

throat sounded constricted as he said, “I think maybe I’ve created an image of me rather than risk showing you the terrified boy who’s actually inside here.”

“I don’t want to bore you,” she confessed.

They caught hands, and they walked until the water turned gray and the wind slowed to a calm.

He said, “If this is going to happen, the work is ahead of us, not behind us.”

“Agreed.”

“And you’re prepared for that?” he asked.

“Probably not. But I want it.”

“You know what we’re saying?” he challenged.

She did know. She squeezed his hand. He held hers tighter.

“I’m terrified,” he admitted.

“Me too,” she answered.

“Uncle Owen?” Corky wore a pale yellow nightgown. She had always called him this, though Owen had confessed to Daphne that he hoped to hear the D word one of these days.

“Yes, Love?”

Corky was half-Peruvian, previously Owen’s niece, and now his legally adopted daughter. Owen’s sister and her husband had met an eighteen-wheeler in the passing lane of I-84 five miles outside of Bliss, Idaho. “My sister died in Bliss,” Owen had said. The driver of the truck, who had started his run in Chicago, was discovered to have been pumped full of amphetamines. But apparently not enough. He had fallen asleep at the wheel with a trailer of washing machines driving him through the guardrail in time to find Corky’s parents passing an RV. His brother-in- law had left no clue to his past in Peru, claiming once while quite drunk that his family had been butchered because of politics, but never saying anything more. Adler, his sister’s closest friend and confidant, had put up a fight to keep Corky when it had been discovered no legal guardian had been named, no will left. He had won by taking the case to the Idaho Supreme Court, and had adopted the girl on her sixth birthday.

“I’m going to bed now,” the girl said.

“Not without a hug you’re not.”

The terrace stones were still warm from an afternoon in the sun and felt wonderful on Daphne’s bare feet. The pool would be warm, too, and she had an urge to take her clothes off and go for a swim.

Corky tiptoed over to Owen and gave him a warm hug and kiss. Somewhat nervously, she asked Daphne to tuck her in, which Daphne took as a great honor.

“Do you like it here?” Corky asked her as they reached the child’s room.

“I like being with you and your dad.”

“I mean here-this house.”

“It’s a nice house.”

“I like it because Owen’s different.”

“Different?”

Daphne stood by as Corky brushed her teeth and washed her face. She was a little adult, the way she tended to herself. Then the child dove into bed, pulled up the covers, and said, “At home he’s tired, isn’t he, Daffy?”

She felt a lump in her throat as she answered, “Yes, Cork, he’s very tired. He works very hard.”

“I can tell because he doesn’t play with me as much.”

“But he loves you as much.”

“I don’t like it when he’s tired.”

“No.”

She gathered up all her courage and asked, “Are you coming to my birthday party?”

“If you invite me, I will.”

“I’m inviting you now.”

“In that case, I would love to come. Thank you.”

“Promise?”

“As close to a promise as I can.”

“Monty the Clown is coming,” she informed her as an added enticement.

“Well, then! How can I resist?”

Corky liked that; she squinted and blushed. Daphne stroked the child’s hair, wondering if she would ever have any children of her own, wondering if she had the strength and courage for it. The hair felt soft, her skin smooth and creamy.

Daphne returned to the patio, and without a word, began to undress.

“Things are looking up,” Owen said.

Looking him over, she said, “Yes they are, aren’t they?” She enjoyed that her body had such an effect on him. She carefully laid her blouse and pants and bra over the chair. By the time she stepped out of her underwear, the air felt chilly to her, and gooseflesh raced over her skin.

She ran across the lawn to the pool, hesitated at the pool’s edge, and dove in. The sensation was astonishing. For a moment there was no outside world, no poisonings, no job to return to in the morning.

He caught her from behind, and she spun around and wrapped her legs around him, and they hugged tightly. “I feel like we’re hiding from the parents,” she said. Owen felt very strongly about limiting Corky’s exposure to the physical side of their relationship. Daphne was a friend, not a lover, and though she understood this, she questioned both its sincerity and her own position in Owen’s life.

He met eyes with her and asked, “Do we do it?”

Her throat caught and her eyes stung. This question had nothing to do with his arousal, which was substantial at the moment. It had to do with permanence and commitment. With promises, both kept and broken. Heartache and joy. A lifetime together. The question seemed to have escaped him spontaneously, and she worried he might be flooded with regret. He rarely spoke spontaneously. She allowed him time to retract the question, but he made no attempt to do so. His hands held her firmly on her hips.

He had his own way about doing things. He had nibbled around the edges of proposal several times, testing the water. And she had been conveniently noncommittal, believing that that was what he wanted of her-and seeing the fallacy of this, always in hindsight, tonight she braved to be honest. She held her breath. Their buoyancy seemed to rely on her answer. For a moment, all the world was perfectly still despite the electrifying shrill of the chorus of summer insects.

They never took their eyes off of each other, and neither blinked.

Daphne nodded and said softly, “Yes, we do it.”

“Good,” he said. The moment felt awkward to her. He looked as frightened as she felt.

It was done. She was engaged, she realized.

She did not squeal and hug him. She did not kiss him. It was not the way Owen Adler sealed a deal, and she wanted this deal consummated. Her left hand grabbing for the pool’s edge, her legs still locked around his waist, she pulled from his careful grip and leaned far away from him, precariously off-balance, and quickly extended her hand to him. He saw it and grinned. With both of their heads beginning to sink in the water, with both of them laughing and their eyes, like alligators’, barely breaking the surface, their right hands found each other, and they sealed a life together with a handshake.

She let go her left hand, and together they sank, holding hands, bubbles rising from their laughter, her legs still entwined around him. She thought that happiness was like this pool of warm water, that the water enveloped them both, and that to be submerged in this kind of shared happiness, even for a moment, made all the other moments insignificant.

And as they broke their hold and exploded to the surface, grabbing for air, she was glad for the water and the darkness, for together they combined to mask her tears.

FIFTEEN

“Ain’t no skin off my neck,” the man with a bad limp said. The freight elevator clanged loudly to a stop and he