Golden Girl(53)

JP smiles up at Amy, grateful for this compliment about his ex-wife. Amy sits on the far corner of the bed and sifts through the photographs. Where has he been hiding these? She thought she had checked out every nook and cranny of the house. This is a treasure trove of images of JP’s life before Amy: Vivi and JP in front of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center, Vivi falling forward on ice skates, Vivi drinking hot chocolate with a dab of whipped cream on her nose. There are wedding photos—Vivi’s dress was an off-the-shoulder snow-white satin gown with a nipped-in waist and a full three-quarter-length skirt poofed by tulle underneath. It’s not Amy’s taste at all but Vivi, of course, looks radiant with her cute pixie cut and her dramatic red lips. Savannah, her maid of honor, wore a dowdy Laura Ashley print; this must have been before Savannah made her switch to neutrals, or maybe this dress was the reason for the switch. There are pictures from various travels—a deserted beach, a hole-in-the-wall restaurant in some far-flung, dusty town, a ski slope, Big Ben, the Colosseum, the Sydney Opera House, Vivi in front of a cityscape that is either Toronto or Seattle, Amy is afraid to ask which. There are the new-baby pictures—Vivi in a bed at Nantucket Cottage Hospital with Willa, then with Carson as Willa grumpily looks on. There are Christmas pictures (one of the babies tucked under the tree like a present) and Thanksgiving (Vivi, JP, two of the kids, Savannah, Lucinda, and Penny Rosen). There are Nantucket summer photos—picnics on the beach at Fortieth Pole, striped bass on the line; Vivi lying across the bow of Lucinda’s sailboat, Arabesque; JP and Vivi at the Galley for dinner; Vivi in a beach chair with a blanket draped over her in Lucinda’s front yard as fireworks are shot off a barge in the harbor on the Fourth of July.

Amy’s heart dissolves a little more with each photo; she never had to witness the home she wrecked before this moment.

Wow. It’s a lot, as people say.

Of course, what JP doesn’t have pictures of is Vivi being condescending or dismissive or too busy to properly tend to her marriage. There aren’t pictures of the fight they once had when Vivi threw a glass that shattered against the tile floor and woke the children. Vivi and JP’s marriage broke up for a reason, and though everyone believes that reason was Amy Van Pelt, they had been unhappy long before Amy stepped into JP’s wineshop. Amy is worried. Now that Vivi is dead, that narrative might be rewritten; Vivi might be remembered as a saint whom JP wronged by falling prey to temptress Amy. She decides to play devil’s advocate, see what happens.

“You two look so happy in this picture,” she says, holding up a shot of Vivi and JP at Carson’s christening. They’re standing at the altar, the baby balanced between them, their expressions manic.

“Carson had colic,” JP says. “We were up all night, every night with her. Those are two exhausted people right there.”

“You two should have stayed together,” Amy says frankly. “I would have quietly disappeared so you two could have given it another shot.”

“Vivi didn’t want to give it another shot,” JP says. “She threw in the towel.”

“Well, in her defense, you cheated on her.”

“Yeah, but…”

“Yeah, but—what?” Amy swallows despite the rock-hard lump in her throat. “Yeah, but you didn’t mean it? Yeah, but it was a mistake? I was a mistake? I was nothing more than a strategic move on the chessboard?” These thoughts, Amy realizes, have been lurking in the swampy depths of her mind for ten years.

“Amy, please,” JP says.

“Please what?” she says. Please don’t be ridiculous is what she wants him to say. Our love is real, our relationship is strong, we have not been dating for ten years and living together for three just because I needed a warm body by my side.

“Please can we not talk about this right now? We probably should have a talk at some point, but not tonight. I don’t have the energy.”

Amy is stopped by this. They should have a talk at some point? What does that mean? She thinks of the ring box in JP’s dresser drawer. Maybe the talk he’s referring to will include, finally, a proposal. But somehow, she doesn’t think so.

“I bought a bottle of the Cliff Lede,” she says. “And some nice steak tips. I have that potato salad recipe I want to try. It has a bacon dressing—”

“I won’t be here for dinner,” JP says.

“What?” Amy says. She takes a nice long drink of her wine, but it has no more effect than if she were drinking pink water. “Where are you going?”

“I’m having dinner on Union Street,” he says. “At Savannah’s. She invited me when she drove me home from Vivi’s reception, and tonight was the night that worked for both of us. I should have told you this morning, I’m sorry.”

Amy knows to ignore her base instincts. She smiles. “Not a problem. The steak tips can wait. I may call Lorna and see if she wants to grab a bite at the Gaslight.”

“Good idea,” he says. Then he adds, “Thank you for being understanding; I appreciate it. This can’t be easy for you.”



Amy gets into the outdoor shower where she cries hot, ugly tears and wails into the sumptuous white Turkish towels from Serena and Lily that JP insists on. She has a glass of the Cliff Lede resting on the changing bench—the steak tips could wait, but that beautiful cabernet could not—and the second she shuts the water off, she drinks lavishly. She isn’t sure how to triage her pain. What hurts the worst? JP is going to Savannah’s for dinner, where the two of them will talk about Vivi—memories that have nothing to do with Amy. Amy will, for the two or three hours that JP is on Union Street (at Entre Nous, a house so divine it demands envy), be erased. JP’s utter devastation and his regret as he pored over the photographs is another kind of pain. And his flat declaration that they should talk is worrisome, to say the least.