The One In My Heart

Then it was a matter of deciding which was more important: hanging on to my resentment or having my parents back in my life.

I like to think I chose correctly.

I sighed and set the phone on my chest, as if by doing so I could absorb some of the courage and wisdom that had guided him to the right choice.


TEN DAYS AFTER MR. SOMERSET’S heart attack, I received an unexpected call from him, inviting me to lunch at his house.

The address wasn’t far from Bennett’s apartment. I knocked on the door of the solid four-story brownstone. A smiling housekeeper let me in and took me to an elegant white-and-green living room, where Mr. Somerset was set up comfortably on the couch, with a swing-out table next to him on which sat a phone, a tablet, a laptop, and several books.

He tilted the table out of the way as I came into the room. “Thank you for coming, Evangeline.”

I shook his hand and sat down on a chair that had been pulled close. “I thought I’d find you neck-deep in Real Housewives.”

“If I had it on, my wife might never go to work. Tea, or would you prefer a glass of wine?”

“Tea would be fine.”

We chatted for a few minutes. Imogene and Prescott had both reached home safely. Imogene’s boyfriend, while he was in Manhattan, had actually asked for Mr. Somerset’s permission to propose. But no one thought anything would come of it: Imogene inspired proposals; she did not accept them.

The housekeeper returned with plates of salad, tea for me, and a tall glass of green smoothie for my host.

“Let me guess,” I said. “Kale, green apple, wheatgrass, kiwi, and maybe a few sprigs of basil.”

“You forgot ginger, matcha, and chia seeds.”

“That’s hardcore.”

“Tell me about it.” Mr. Somerset gave the smoothie a baleful look. “I used to insist I’d never blend my vegetables—I’d ignore them like a man. But it took only one near brush with death for me to change my tune completely.”

I raised my glass. “It’s a good new tune to sing. Here’s to your health.”

We talked about this and that as we polished off the salad and the grilled swordfish that followed. From time to time he glanced at the clock, but seemed to be in no hurry to get to what he wanted to see me about.

In fact, it wasn’t until we were halfway through the fruit salad served for dessert that he finally said, “Ben tells me I have you to thank for our reconciliation, for pushing him to stop waiting around.”

Ben, eh?

“I didn’t do anything. He was the one who uprooted his whole life and moved across the country for this one purpose.”

“Yes, that was humbling in the best possible way.” Mr. Somerset fiddled with a piece of pineapple. “When we came back from Berkeley, the time we severed ties, my wife didn’t speak to me for three weeks. Frankly she almost left me again, and might have, if we didn’t have Imogene to consider.

“But I’d been brought up to hold that a man’s word was his everything. So I believed I had no choice but to follow through with my threats of disownment. I thought he couldn’t do it. We knew he’d be getting some paintings when he turned twenty-one, but nobody knew whether they were paintings by actual artists or watercolors by some great-great-aunts that not even their own relatives wanted. Besides, three years is a long time when a boy is eighteen, and has to fend for himself when he’s been raised in the lap of luxury.”

His gaze strayed to his left. The couch had been placed before a large window. On the windowsill a Siamese cat slept soundly, next to a digital photo frame. The frame was at too oblique an angle for me. But Mr. Somerset caught my line of sight and turned it thirty degrees.

It was a family picture taken on a beach. Since everyone looked about twenty years younger, I had a good idea where they’d been. “Maui?”

“Yes, our last good vacation as a family.” He finished the rest of his green juice, and seemed almost to relish it. “Of all my children, Ben was the one who worried me the most. But he surprised us all by becoming far tougher and far more disciplined than I’d thought possible. He dealt fine with having no money. And he dealt pretty well too with all the later windfalls.

“He didn’t know it, but we were there at both his college and medical school graduations. I was proud of him, but too proud to admit that, especially after his attempts to take over the family firm.

“When he moved back east, my wife was convinced he wanted a reconciliation. I feared that a reckoning was coming our way instead. We’d walked away from him—I’d walked away from him. We weren’t there for the bad times or the good. We were just some people he used to know.”