Girls of Summer(7)
Stunned, she didn’t answer. Couldn’t.
“You see? You’re just another overweight mom stuck in the sticks, living off my money and not earning it, frankly. I don’t think you really even like sex. You were willing in college, I’ll admit that, and you were such a novice, it was fun. But once you had your children, you were done. I want to be with someone sexy, uninhibited, enthusiastic, who’s willing to let me do whatever I want.”
“Erich, stop.” Her heart sped up. Quietly, she said, “It sounds like you have a…a mistress.”
“I think of her as a lover.”
“I suppose she speaks several languages.”
“As a matter of fact, she does. She’s half Iranian, half Spanish.” Erich sighed. “Look, Lisa, we had a good run. You can’t help being the way you are. Let’s be adults and move on.”
Lisa held tight to her dignity so she could respond in a cool, rational, sophisticated way. “Yes, let’s.”
Juliet was eleven, Theo was nine. Lisa was forty.
two
In the divorce, Erich Hawley gave Lisa full custody and legal assurance of generous child support and college tuition. The wonderful old house with a large yard on a quiet street in the heart of Nantucket was already in her name.
Lisa gave Erich his freedom, and he took it, vanishing to Europe and Asia and who knew what other countries.
For a few years, she tried to pass on the news of their father’s important life to her children, but when it became obvious that Erich had no time for any kind of relationship with his children, she stopped trying. She was hurt that Erich had no interest in his children, their children, but more than that, worst of all, it broke her heart for Juliet and Theo to have no father in their lives. In an emergency, of course, she could always call on her mother and father, but that wasn’t really the same. She faithfully attended ballet recitals, swim meets, school plays, soccer games. She called every Saturday night “Movie Night,” and ate pizza with them while they watched Shrek or Stuart Little or Harry Potter movies. She traveled off-island with them to Boston to see The Nutcracker at Christmas, and several times she took them to New York to see a Broadway show and the Guggenheim (they’d loved the spiral ramp) and the Empire State Building. They spent Christmas and Thanksgiving and the children’s birthdays with her parents, and Juliet and Theo seemed happy, or at least not emotionally ruined by the lack of an attentive father.
It was Lisa who was emotionally ruined. In the very beginning of the divorce, she was too busy to face the pain and humiliation that lay in her heart. As time passed, and the children seemed cheerful and stable, as she painted Juliet’s bedroom lavender and papered Theo’s room with Luke Skywalker and Chewbacca, her own feelings began to emerge, slowly, insistently, and then all in a rush, suddenly, like water bursting a dam.
She had not been enough. She hadn’t been beautiful enough or exciting enough or cosmopolitan at all. She’d never thoroughly mastered French, she could never in a million years look like Audrey Hepburn, and after she had kids, she’d missed as many social events as she could, wanting simply to be at home.
What had she been thinking to marry Erich? What had possessed him to marry her? She’d been sure she’d loved him, and certain that he’d loved her. Brilliant Erich didn’t make a mistake in choosing her…she’d simply been less than he thought she was.
Revelation after revelation bloomed from her heart like storm clouds, darkening her view. She was short—well, five foot five. She could pinch more than an inch of fat. She was smart, but not smart enough, not driven—when she resigned from the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Karen Weninger took her place and within a year published an entire book on Mary Cassatt.
And more, and worse, while she’d been married to Erich, some of her close hometown friends had moved away. Rachel, her best friend forever, was still on the island, and even though she worked with her husband in a local legal firm, she always had time to talk to Lisa. Often they went out for a girls-only drinks and dinner.
Her parents still loved her, and thank God for them. More important, they doted on their grandchildren and often asked one or both of them to come for the weekend, staying overnight. Lisa knew her parents expected her to get out there, to go to parties and really anywhere that single men might be.
She couldn’t do it. Even the thought of flirting with a man was terrifying. She spent her free nights alone in her house with a romantic comedy on the television and a bowl of popcorn in her lap. And she knew very well that the salt on the popcorn would make her bloated, but she ate it anyway, defiantly.
“You’re getting fat,” Rachel said, one evening when she forced Lisa to join her for dinner at a quiet restaurant.
“Thanks. Thanks very much.” Lisa thought she’d hidden her weight beneath a loose summer dress, but Rachel had been her best friend forever. There was very little she could hide from Rachel.
“Stop it. I’m not trying to insult you. I’m worried about you, Lisa.” The waiter approached. Lisa waved him away. “It’s been what, two years now, and your social life is limited to your parents, your children, and me.”
Lisa lifted her chin defiantly. “I’m content with that.”
“No, you’re not. I think you’re afraid.”