“She knows that’s not true,” Anne said.
Ned returned with an empty glass. “What’s not true?” he said, an overflow of anxiety in every syllable. Surely Anne heard it, too.
But she did not. “That I’m tough,” she explained, handing the bottle to Francie. “Mind filling Ned’s glass?”
That forced them into proximity. Ned held out his glass. Their eyes met briefly; his filled with pain, then went blank. Francie poured. Their hands, so familiar with each other, almost touched and even at that moment seemed right together, like perfect lovers in miniature, at least to Francie. The two hands right, and everything else wrong.
“Thank you,” he said. And: “Cheers.” He wasn’t good at this, but she was worse.
“Cheers.” She made herself say it, too.
They drank. Francie tasted nothing, wasn’t even conscious of the wetness.
“It happened on the last point,” Anne was telling Em. “Two-six, seven-six, six-love.”
“So you didn’t choke?” Em said.
“Em!” said Ned.
“But Mom always chokes in the big matches. She says so herself.”
“Couldn’t this time,” Anne said. “Francie doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”
“Oh, but I do.”
“Don’t listen to her, Ned. She’s very modest. Why, I didn’t even know about her job till just the other day, a job I’d die for.”
Another silence.
“Oh?” said Ned at last.
“Tell Ned about your job, Francie.”
“It’s nothing, really.”
“Nothing! Francie buys all the art for the Lothian Foundation.”
“Oh?” said Ned.
“Is that all?” said Anne. “ ‘Oh?’Men, every time-right, Francie?”
“It’s not a big deal,” Francie said. “In fact, there’s a committee, and-”
“Mom’s an artist,” said Em.
“I know,” Francie said. They all turned to the still life behind the desk lamp. Grapes. And here was the girl, in the room, as though she’d stepped out of oh garden, my garden: a wild card.
“You should see the one she did of Dad-it’s much better. I’ll get it.”
“I-”
But it was too late. Em was flying up the stairs. They watched the long Day-Glo laces of her sneakers flap out of sight.
“She can be a bit wild sometimes,” Anne said.
“She seems like a great kid,” said Francie.
“She is,” said Ned, his voice suddenly thick. Anne shot him a glance. He cleared his throat, drank from his glass, perhaps a bigger drink than he’d planned, because a red trickle escaped from one corner of his mouth, ran diagonally down his chin. He didn’t notice, but Anne did. “Ned,” she said in a half whisper, and mimed a cleaning-up motion, another domestic detail-a wifely detail-that made Francie writhe inside.
“Excuse me,” Ned said, wiping his chin.
And then Em was back with the portrait.
“Really, Em,” said Anne, “I don’t think Francie-”
“It’s all right,” said Francie. She gazed at the painting. So did Ned and Anne, while Em gazed at them. Francie’s eye couldn’t help seeing things. Ned’s sensuality, for example, one of his most obvious characteristics, was completely missing. And perhaps because of the immobility of the pose, and the way his body almost filled the canvas, like Henry VIII in Holbein’s portrait, Anne’s Ned appeared more powerful than in life, even dangerous. She’d missed him, not entirely, but by a lot, yet somehow the resemblance was still astounding.
“Well?” said Em.
“I like it very much,” Francie said.
“Think it’s worth anything?”
“Em!” This time they said it together, husband and wife.
“Is it for sale?” Francie said.
“Of course not,” Ned said. Too quick, too emphatic-and Francie knew at once that he was afraid she might do something crazy, like make an offer, the way she’d called IntimatelyYours. Anne noticed: Francie caught her giving Ned a look; he caught it, too. “I wouldn’t want to part with it, is all,” Ned said. “But it’s not my call.”
Anne smiled at him. He smiled back, another faltering smile, even more false than the first, but Anne appeared to miss that.
“You like it ’cause it makes you look cool, right, Dad?” said Em.
“Right. Cool, that’s me.” He tousled her hair. She made a face. Anne laughed.
Francie set her glass down on an end table, not softly.
“Yikes, ” said Anne. “We’re keeping you. ”
“Not at all,” said Francie. Em was staring at her.
“Mind giving Francie a lift, Ned?”
“A lift?”
“To the tennis club-her car’s there.”
“Not necessary,” Francie said. “A cab will be fine.”
“I wouldn’t hear of it,” Anne said.
“No, really,” Francie said, and reached for the phone. Anne covered the receiver with her hand. Their fingers touched.
“You know where it is, Ned?” Anne said. He nodded. “And we’re out of milk, if you get a chance.”
“Thanks for the drink,” Francie said, moving toward the door.
“Thank you,” said Anne. “For driving me home, for being so kind, for everything.” She started to get up.
“Don’t,” Francie said.
But Anne did, hardly wincing at all. “See? It feels better already.” She leaned forward, kissed Francie on the cheek. “We’re going to win this thing.”
Em gave her mother another surprised look. Ned held the door. Francie walked out: a cold night, cold everywhere, except the spot that Anne’s lips had touched. That burned.
“And to celebrate we’ll get together for dinner,” Anne called after her. “The four of us.”
They drove in silence, down the block, around the corner, both staring straight ahead.
“The four of us?” Ned said, speaking quietly, as though there were still some risk of being overheard.
“You and her,” said Francie. “Me and Roger.”
“God.”
Francie sat up straight, hands folded in her lap. What was there to say? She felt Ned’s eyes on her.
“It’s so incredible,” he said. “It almost makes you believe there’s some God. Or anti-God.”
Francie said nothing.
They rounded another corner. Farther now from home, Ned’s voice rose to conversational level. “I thought I was going to have a heart attack,” he said.
“It was horrible.” Francie knew that the full horror of it wouldn’t be apparent for a long time: a series of little revelatory bombshells awaited her.
Ned licked his lips. “I know. But…”
“But what?”
“But looking at it rationally, what does it change, really?”
She gazed at him. “I beg your pardon?”
He shrugged. “This just adds the visual component to what you already knew. I have a wife. That wasn’t a secret. Now you’ve seen her. It could be worse.”
“How?”
“Suppose she’d been your sister, for example.”
