Becoming Mrs. Lewis(85)
It was true—we had to try, but I very well knew that our love was a fog or wind that could be more felt than seen, slipping in and out of the cracks of Jack’s Greek-word categories. There was no pinning it down, and if I forced him to define it, or us, I was afraid I would lose the magic altogether. I reveled in the unfolding, and I kept guard as well I could over my own heart, watching carefully for the interlopers of fantasy, for the thieves of obsession and possession.
That afternoon the weather had lifted and we sat in my tiny garden, the tulips I’d planted months before bent and subdued by the morning rain. I’d wiped off the two metal garden chairs with a kitchen towel, and we sat with tea.
“To be outside again,” I said. “It might be the cure for all ills.”
“Quite possibly.” Jack pointed to a folded rectangle of paper in my hand. “Is that for me?”
“Well, it’s not for you, but I want you to read it.”
“Ah, I thought it more corrections to my work. I’m not sure I could stand much more of them.”
“Cat’s whiskers, Jack, I don’t correct but improve. Part of me is worried that I was meant to be your Max Perkins instead of an author myself.”
“Foolishness,” he said and held out his hand. “A poem?” He took the folded paper from me.
A quick-flash image of offering him my sonnets set me back; my breath caught in my chest.
“No,” I said. “It’s far from a poem, but maybe a grand piece of fiction.”
Jack opened the folded paper, which had arrived days before from Miami—where Bill had moved to be with Renee—to Belsize Park, London. It’s one thing to know of one’s divorce—agreed upon with full custody for me and visitation for him, along with sixty dollars a week in alimony and child support—and another to see a sheet of paper that reads vinculo matrimonii (dissolved marriage). Bill and I had written to each other, agreed upon the terms, and yet the accusations inside the decree were disgusting and heartbreaking. I hadn’t expected them, and all the more it socked me in the gut.
Jack read slowly, adjusting his spectacles, and once in a bit his eyebrows rose above his glasses. Every line or two he would burst out with a sentence.
“‘The plaintiff alleges the defendant has been engaged in literary efforts and has a desire to be an author or writer and is overwhelmingly ambitious and desirous of furthering herself in this field.’” He seemed to spit the words, Bill’s words, into the air. “Is he writing a complaint or spewing envy? Hogwash.”
He continued reading, and then his head lifted with moist eyes. “Joy, this is rubbish.” He glanced down again to read out loud. “‘She continually and continuously indulges in alleged excitable and ungovernable displays of temperament and apparently lives in an artistic dream world.’”
“Yes,” I said and sipped my tea. “I obviously live in an artistic dream world as I raise our children, write, and work.” I pointed at the paper. “It gets worse, if you can believe it.”
“I don’t know if it can.” His eyes shifted down to the paper.
While Jack read my divorce decree, I watched two red robins settle on my bird feeder and peck away at the seeds.
“And then there’s this.” Jack’s free hand slapped the edge of the chair. “‘The defendant feels that her artistic career is much more important than her domestic career, life, and duty to her husband and family.’” His hand was so tight on the document it began to crumple beneath his fingers. “How did you live with this? It is degrading.”
“Yes, it is and it was. But I’m here now, Jack. Right here.”
His cheeks grew redder, his mouth tighter. “Joy. He states here that he begged you to live happily with him and the children but that you refused to do so.”
“Well then, there it is,” I said, lifting my teacup. “Now who lives in a dream world?”
“This is such drivel and so smarmy. All wind and piss.”
I leaned forward, my hands on my knees. “I should have done the filing, and then I could have lodged my complaints. But I know he’s missing his sons, and I’m sure he’s lashing out at me.” I exhaled and felt the tension twist below my belly. “I don’t think I can trust his child support and alimony unless I hire my own lawyer to ensure he makes good on it.”
“Then you must.” Jack lifted his teacup, a dainty flowered one I’d found at the flea market, but he didn’t take a sip before setting it back down. A swallow spun above him as if circling in curiosity and then flew off.
“And these accusations,” I said. “It’s all because I was once such a submissive and acquiescing wife.” I tapped my finger on the divorce decree. “He doesn’t think I have it in me to fight, or he’s forgotten. But I won’t buckle under his rhetoric. I’ve done it for far too long. I feel as if I’ve jumped into a time machine and I’m back there, and Bill is drunk and the boys are cowering. I feel myself shriveling and scared, nervous and hopeless. I never want to feel that way again.”
“You shan’t,” he said and almost, God help me, almost took my hand. But he didn’t. He leaned back and lit his cigarette, a motion so familiar. “You have the strength, Joy. You always have. I don’t know anyone stronger.” His words carried such force that I believed him. He folded the divorce decree and handed it back to me. “As I said, rubbish.”