The View from Here by Deborah Mckinlay & Deborah McKinlay

Author:Deborah Mckinlay & Deborah McKinlay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Soho Press

SIX

ISLEPT LATE AND ate breakfast alone except for the younger children playing nearby. I had almost finished when Howie, sitting on the side of the pool with his feet dangling, suddenly looked up warily. Patsy was at the glass doors, holding a coffee cup. She came out and, without encouragement, took the seat opposite me.

“I think I may owe you an apology, Frankie,” she said, cradling the coffee in both hands and looking at me directly. She was paler than usual, and the skin under her eyes was thinned by mauve shadows.

I looked at her, not knowing what to say.

Seeming to take my silence for a rebuke, she dropped her head.

“Things have just been rather…difficult,” she said, “for some time now. For Richard and me.”

“I’m sorry.” I put my coffee down. There was real sadness in her voice.

“Well, you know…marriage.” She raised her shoulders and flashed a wan smile. “Actually, I guess you wouldn’t, would you?”

“I guess not,” I replied, smiling too, though a bit of me resented the remark.

She rested her elbows on the table. Inhaling, she rolled her head sadly from side to side.

“Hudson,” she said, “was a mistake.”

It was a level of confidence that I wasn’t prepared for. Mild shock must have registered on my face, but, if so, she went on anyway, apparently not noticing.

“If there was only Howie, I might have just, well”—she flipped her hand and sighed—“made a decision. I don’t know. It’s all complicated enough already, without a baby.” There was a pause. Then she said, “There are other people involved.” She looked up at me, holding my gaze for a long moment, as if I might say something, or know something, of great importance. Then she shook her head, dispelling the idea. “Anyway,” she said, with a deliberate lift of tone, “the point is, with all this going on, I say things sometimes, especially on top of a few martinis, that I don’t mean. So I’m sorry if—”

“Let’s just forget it,” I interrupted.

She smiled, and nodded, and got up, and went over to the pool. Howie, tentative, watched as she walked absently toward him.

“Do you want to see me swim, Mom?” he asked in a small voice as she neared.

“Sure,” she replied, sitting and letting her feet drop over the mosaic tiles into the tealy blue of the water.

Patsy had a full absolution. Sally, arriving at the pool later that morning in a strapless sunbathing outfit, simply laid her book on the table and said, “Good morning.”

“They got off all right, then?” Bee Bee asked, midway through her first cigarette. The hollows under her eyes were more pronounced than Patsy’s.

“Oh, yes. I assume so. Mason’s briefcase was gone when I woke up.” She laughed and looked toward Patsy, who spoke matter-of-factly.

“Uh-huh. I heard them leave.”

I was listening with mounting apprehension. Who had left? Sally had referred to Mason’s briefcase, but Mason could not have left. Could not possibly have left. Not without talking to me. The sun had begun to turn white, and in the fresh heat a prickly sensation crept across my skin.

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