“Jesus,” Alison breathed, leaning forward to look more closely, her face pale. “If you won’t think of yourself, think of your children.”
“Oh, he wouldn’t hurt Daniel. And he only grabbed my throat,” Heather said, as if this were somehow better. “He didn’t hit me.” Like Viktor should get a medal for showing such restraint.
We were at Julie’s house after school, the four of us sitting around in her living room, while the kids were off playing in the toy-strewn family room, tucked out of sight down a hall.
“What did Dr. Banerjee say about the mark?” I said, mentioning the ob-gyn I’d recommended.
“She didn’t see it.” Heather readjusted her scarf so the bruises were covered again.
“Didn’t you have an appointment yesterday?”
She hesitated, before saying in a light voice, “Oh, I canceled.”
“So she wouldn’t notice?” Alison said.
“She would have reported it,” I said. “You should let her see because then it wouldn’t be you telling anybody, it would be her—she’s required by law to report abuse.”
“How would that help me?” Heather said. “If Viktor’s arrested, he could lose his job and then how would I support myself?” She spoke as if she’d be destitute and I wondered if this was something Viktor had threatened to keep her quiet. “There’s just a lot of pressure at work right now, but it won’t last forever,” she said. “He’s promised he’ll cut back on his hours.”
“Then at least move out until your due date,” Julie suggested. “What about your parents? Can’t you go stay with them for a while?”
“God no,” Heather said, giving a bark of laughter. She shook her head, clearly adamant. “I am never going back there.”
We knew Heather came from a small town in West Virginia, and once, maybe two years earlier, her parents had come to visit for Easter. I recalled running into them along Broad Street. They were in their early sixties, but had seemed so much older. They’d looked out of place, too, her father wearing a clip-on tie and a cheap sports coat as if someone had told him the town had a dress code, and her mother, a husk of a woman with traces of the looks that she’d passed on to her daughter—those cheekbones, the pale, catlike eyes—but the beauty obscured by a tight home perm and frumpy dress. I hadn’t seen them since and Heather didn’t talk about them much. Was she ashamed of them or was their absence from her life Viktor’s doing?
“Check into a hotel then,” Alison said. “One of those Residence Inns. Or what about renting a place? That might be nicer—cheaper, too.”
Heather shook her head. “I can’t.”
“Why not?” I said. “I’ve seen some great places online.”
Her face flushed and she looked away as she said, “It’s not about the place, it’s about the money. My cards are tied to Viktor’s accounts. Everything is in his name. Everything. He wouldn’t pay for it.”
I was stunned—I think we all were. I thought of all the times I’d seen her wearing a new outfit or off for another day at the spa and envied her financial freedom. I hadn’t realized it came with such tight purse strings and that she didn’t hold the purse. “You need to divorce him,” I said. “I can connect you with a great attorney. I’ll call her for you.”
“No!” Heather cried, before repeating it in a lower voice. “No. Thank you. But I already told you—I’m not leaving him, I can’t.”
“Don’t be so stupid,” I muttered.
“Sarah!” Julie was aghast.
“I’m sorry, but c’mon! We all think she should leave him.”
“It’s not our decision to make,” Alison said, but her voice was very sad. “It’s Heather’s choice.”
There was an awkward silence, and then Julie said gently, “Well, you’re always welcome to come and stay with me.” She smiled at Heather and took another sip of the green tea smoothies she’d made for everybody. I would have preferred some wine to help cut the stress we were all under, but apparently since Heather couldn’t drink, none of us would out of solidarity. I sipped my own smoothie, peering around at Julie’s house and wondering what it would be like to live there—probably like staying at a hotel, or a modern art gallery.
The first time I’d been to Julie’s, back when our older children were babies, I’d been intimidated by her ultramodern and immaculate house, a plaster-and-steel series of stacked cubes designed by an architect that she’d met when she’d sold him some investment property. “He studied with Philip Johnson,” she’d told me as she led me across pale hardwood floors enlivened here and there by colorful rugs that she casually informed me had been picked up when she and Brian vacationed in Turkey.
With the designer furniture and refined, minimalist décor, the house had not screamed kid-friendly, and I remember making a silent prediction that in six months the matching set of dove-gray modernist sofas and hexagonal glass coffee table would be covered with sticky little handprints and stains.
Fast-forward nine years and I was sitting on that same sofa, which Julie had recently talked about replacing, but only because she’d grown bored with the look; the dove-gray wool was still immaculate, the glass in the coffee table shining in a way that nothing ever did at my house. Of course, Julie’s secret weapon was the high-end cleaning service that came weekly.
“Thank you,” Heather murmured. “That’s very nice of you to offer.”
“You can stay with me, too,” Alison said. “Although given the clutter at my house I think I’d take Julie’s offer.”
“Ditto,” I said, an easy offer to make because I knew, we all knew, that Heather wasn’t going to accept.
We were silent for a moment, sitting around the gas fireplace, also ultramodern, a line of blue-tipped flames dancing above a row of smooth river rocks. A large abstract oil painting, done by some apparently “well-known” artist, hung above the fireplace, its violent red slashes always striking me as incongruous—as did the whole, cold house—with Julie, who was so warm, so down-to-earth, so bubbly.
“What if you told Viktor you need some time away to rest because of the baby,” Julie said. “Like you said, he wouldn’t want to hurt his own child.”
Heather looked up at us, mouth opening like she was going to say something, but then she closed it and looked back down, fiddling with the straw in her drink.
“What is it?” Alison said, and then her voice darkened. “Did something happen?”
Heather looked up, large tears welling in her eyes. “I haven’t told him.”
“About the baby?” I said, surprised. “Why not?”
“He told me he doesn’t want more children,” she said, swiping at her eyes. “He’ll want me to get rid of it.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’s not the case,” Julie said, rushing to embrace her. Alison and I exchanged a look as we joined them on the couch.
“You’re so kind,” Heather said, looking at each of us in turn. I’ll remember forever how she looked, leaning forward in her seat, her face luminous, hands clasped together on her knees, both intent and nervous, her lovely smile a little strained but sincere. “I’m so lucky,” she said, a word that was jarring given the circumstances. “I’m so lucky to have you for my friends.”
Again, she was the first to leave, making excuses that none of us believed. Daniel was engrossed in playing Hungry Hungry Hippos in the family room, and was so angry at being interrupted that he aimed a kick at the game, scattering the board and the pieces. I’m sure I wasn’t the only mother wondering if he’d inherited that temper from his father. And also just like Viktor, a few minutes later Daniel presented as a smiling and happy little boy, cheerfully trotting off to the car with his mother after she’d bribed him with the promise of a stop at the frozen yogurt shop if he came away quietly.