The Bay at Midnight

“Thank you, dear,” I said to her.

“Is he your boyfriend?” she asked, grinning.

“No way, no how,” I said as I moved past her in Ross’s direction.

“Hello, Ross,” I said to him, my voice as neutral as I could make it. I really wanted to yell at him. I wanted to say Why are you bugging me, you old goat?

“I’d like to chat a bit,” he said. “I’ll get some lunch and then could you sit with me, please?” “I don’t think we have a thing in the world to chat about,” I said. I picked up a dirty tray from a nearby table, emptied the wrappers into the trash bin and set the tray on top of it. I was glad to have something to do so that I didn’t have to look at his face as I spoke.

“Please,” he said. “I drove all the way from Lakewood.”

Well, whose fault is that? I thought. But there was something so pathetic about him that I gave in. “All right,” I said. “You get off your feet and I’ll get you something to eat. What would you like?”

“I’ll get it myself,”he said, still the prideful man I’d once known.

“Fine,” I said. “You get what you want and I’ll sit with you for a while. I don’t have long, though,” I added. “I’m working, you know.”

He moved toward the line, which was not long, since we were in between the breakfast and lunch crowds.

I wished that more of the tables were dirty or that there were some toddlers to watch in the little play area, but there was not much to absorb my attention as I waited for Ross to get his food. I chatted with my acquaintance from Holy Trinity again until I saw Ross leave the counter with his tray in his hands, the cane over his arm. I thought of helping him, but in spite of my distaste for the man, I didn’t want to bruise his ego any more than it had already been bruised by age and circumstance.

When he reached a table in the corner, I walked over and sat down with him. I was keenly aware of my young fellow employees giggling about us behind the counter, probably imagining the budding of a romance between their grandmotherly co-worker and this old geezer.

“So,” I said, “did Ethan ever say anything to you about how that lunch went with Julie?”

“Just that it was nice to see her,” Ross said. He had not unwrapped his burger and seemed to have no intention of doing so, but he lifted his cup of coffee to his lips and took a sip.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” I asked.

He didn’t seem to hear me. “Do you look back at any of your life with regret, Maria?” he asked.

I had to laugh. “Of course I do,” I said, then lowered my voice. “My relationship with you is one of my major regrets.”

He looked down quickly, fingering the napkin on his tray as though it suddenly needed his attention, and I thought I’d hurt him with my words. I felt a twinge of guilt for that. He was not an evil man. Maybe not a bad man at all, although I’d certainly voted against him when he ran for governor; it doesn’t pay to know too much about your politicians. I knew he’d gone on to do some very good things with his life. I knew he’d represented poor people in court. I knew he had strong values and had put his money where his mouth was on more than one occasion. As I sat there studying his too-thin face and the web of wrinkles around his pewter-gray eyes, I wondered if my regret had more to do with my own weakness than with anything he had done. I was not sure. When it came to Ross, I always ended up a little confused about my feelings.

“I don’t blame you for feeling regret, Maria,” he said, raising his eyes to me. “And I just want to offer you my deepest, deepest apology for ever having hurt you in any way. There are so many things I did wrong…” He looked out the window next to our table, where a couple of young boys dodged the cars in the parking lot on their skateboards. “To start with, I was a covert bigot, adopting my parents’ prejudices as my own. I let them rule me. Own me. I should have stayed with you, out in the open. I was a fool for that.”

Whew. Did he plan to go through his crimes against me one by one, waiting for my forgiveness after each apology? That I couldn’t bear. The truth was, his words were not enough. Nothing would be enough. And I did not regret his breaking up with me when I was so young and stupid; I only regretted that I’d allowed the relationship to continue in its clandestine form. I could see, though, that the only way to get rid of him now was to accept his apology. If that eased his emotional pain, I would just have to let that happen.

“All right,” I said. “Thank you for telling me that.”

He looked surprised, then smiled. “You are beautiful,” he said. “I mean…I’m not trying to be…to flirt.”

That’s good, I thought. An old man flirting was not a pretty sight.

“I mean,” he said, “you’re not only physically beautiful, but a beautiful person as well.You always were. And I…didn’t handle your kind nature very well, did I, and—”

“Ross, no more, please.” I felt the Egg McMuffin I’d had for breakfast begin to rise in my throat. I couldn’t do this. “We’re done with this conversation. I forgive you for any and all transgressions, imagined or real. Now please, just get on with your life. And I need to return to work.”

I stood up, feeling his eyes on me as I walked through the restaurant toward the rest rooms. I needed to escape, not only from him but from the inevitable questioning I would be facing from my co-workers. I splashed water on my face, swallowing hard over and over again to get that McMuffin back where it belonged, and when I emerged from the rest room, I saw that Ross had gone, leaving his tray with its untouched burger and nearly full coffee cup for me to clean up.

1939

I was never able to tell my parents the truth about my breakup with Ross. How could I tell them that Ross’s parents—our next-door neighbors—had forbidden his son to date me because I was the daughter of an Italian immigrant? How that would pain my mother! So I told them that he and I had decided we wanted to date others for a while to be sure we were right for each other. I knew my parents thought that was strange; we had seemed an ideal couple to them. On a couple of occasions, they caught me crying and questioned me, wanting to make sure the breakup was my idea and not just Ross’s. I assured them I had been in agreement with him.

I returned Ross’s ring to him, and when the other kids in our gang expressed surprise, we said that we’d simply realized we weren’t ready for a steady relationship. My girlfriends did not quite believe that excuse, and although I would usually confide just about anything to them, I could not tell them the truth. It made Ross look weak and shallow. Still in love with him, I wanted to protect his exalted image to our group of friends.