After the Fall

KATE


“Seventeen,” I told him, after some quick mental calculation. There was silence. Outside, a light rain started to fall on the slate roof of Cary’s house.
“Seventeen?” he asked. Though it was too dark to see I felt him sit up in bed. “Are you sure?”
“Well, eighteen now, I suppose,” I replied, wishing we were at my place. We’d been going out for about three months, but almost invariably ended up staying at his house, which was bigger and had more food in the fridge. My own roof was tin. I loved lying under it at night when the rain was falling, the staccato patter of small drops and gurgle of water in the congested gutters lulling me to sleep. Cary’s roof was mute, and I imagine the spouting was cleaned regularly.
“And I’m number eighteen?” he persisted.
“Eighteen you are.” I giggled, sleepy despite the lack of aqueous sound effects. “Does that get you the key to the door? Or do I keep that for number twenty-one?”
“Kate!” he protested, reaching for the light. I tried to stop him, but wasn’t quick enough. Unrelenting glare filled the room.
I covered my eyes, though not before I’d seen the aghast expression on his face.
“What?”
“Eighteen! That’s a whole bloody football team.”
“So it is.” I was struck by the image, imagining my ex-lovers lined up for a team photograph, arms oiled and crossed, shoulders dipped menacingly toward the camera. The thought made me smile. “I wonder what position you’d be? You’re not really the full-forward type … maybe a wing. Can you run?”
“Don’t sound so pleased, for God’s sake.”
“Why not?” I asked, cuddling into him with my eyes still tightly shut.
“It just seems an unseemly number of … partners, that’s all.”
“Well, you asked. How many have you had then?” Suddenly curious, I peeped up through my fingers.
“Not that many, that’s for sure,” he said petulantly, staring straight ahead.
“How many?”
“Enough,” he mumbled.
“How many?”
“Five,” he said, then looked over at me as if he’d just revealed he had AIDS or liked country music.
“Five’s okay,” I said, covering my eyes again. “Turn out the light.”
“Okay? It’s not even a third of your total.”
“It’s enough for a basketball team. Besides, you seem to know what you’re doing.” I meant the comment as a joke, a compliment, but his face flushed and for a second I feared he was taking me seriously.
“Still,” I went on quickly, “there’s a lot you can learn, so let’s get started.”
I rolled over on top of him and kissed the faint freckles lurking above the bridge of his nose.
“Hey,” he protested, “I’m not finished talking.”
“I am, though,” I said, turning off the light. Cary tried to stop me but instead knocked over a stack of journals piled on his bedside table. They clattered to the floor, bringing the lamp down with them. With a great show of self-restraint he didn’t even jump up to retrieve them. Not immediately, anyway.
I’m still not quite sure what bothered Cary more: the actual number of my lovers or the fact that I’d had more than him. I hate that question anyway. What does it matter, as long as you’re both healthy and taking precautions and not messed up in the head about the whole thing? Still, when Cary asked I wasn’t as wary as I should have been. I really liked him—really, really liked him—and so I wanted to be honest. I’ve lied about sex before, and it never works out. There are some things you can lie about, but sex isn’t one of them. Sooner or later with sex you lose your composure, drop your guard and then it’s too late to pretend. So that doesn’t really do it for her. So he does like it if I dress like that.
The other thing was that Cary was four years older than me. Ergo, he probably assumed we would have at least been competitive in the numbers stakes, though I wasn’t surprised that I was so far out in front. Unlike me, Cary’s quite shy. He warms up beautifully, but he is a slow starter, and he’s not much good at making the first move. Years after we met he confessed that he’d been quite taken aback that I slept with him on our first date, and left to his own devices would have waited at least a month before trying his luck.
“Our second date,” I corrected him. “I didn’t sleep with you at the Cup.”
“Of course not,” he’d replied, looking slightly shocked. “We’d have hardly gotten away with it at a racecourse.”
I didn’t tell him, but I’d gotten away with worse. In the stands during a rock concert. At the courthouse, with a guy I met on jury duty. A racecourse would have been quite manageable.
But while I wasn’t going to deny it, I wasn’t necessarily proud of my tally. Most of it was fun, but some of it was silly, or dangerous, or because I was drunk. Even worse, at least twice it had been out of politeness, so I could get home or go to sleep without a scene. The actual number was immaterial; how many of those I had genuinely cared about would have been a better question.
So when Cary said five I was perfectly fine with it, even if he wasn’t. One would have been fine, fifty would have been fine, but five was just right. Knowing Cary, as I was beginning to at that time, he would have found out their full names and where they lived, something that couldn’t necessarily be said of all my conquests. He would have seen that they got home safely, sent flowers or called the next day. He would have made sure, as far as a man ever can, that they enjoyed the experience as much as he did. Or if he didn’t enjoy it, he would have let them down gracefully, tactfully, not let the phone go silent for weeks or start avoiding their eyes at the office. Five was too few not to have exercised some care in selection, some restraint, some integrity. Maybe I’m romanticizing things, but I think not. Five was perfect. Besides, I meant it when I said he knew what he was doing.



CARY


For all my initial reluctance I enjoyed marriage more than I expected: saying “my wife” in conversation, coming home to a place where she always was. We’d lived together for about a year before Kate pushed me to propose, but for some reason being Mr. and Mrs. made it different. Kate got rid of most of my bachelor furniture, planted an herb garden and painted the kitchen. When I asked her why she had never bothered with these domestic improvements before the wedding she hesitated and then blushed, something my wife rarely did.
“I wanted to be sure it was worth the effort,” she admitted. “That I wasn’t going to go off you and then end up not living here anyway.”
Note that she hadn’t allowed for the possibility that I might go off her, as she put it. I only laughed, used to Kate’s forthright ways by now. At least she was honest.
My father adored Kate from the moment they met. I wasn’t surprised—Kate was drawn to men, and vice versa. With the exception of Sarah, all her close friends were male. My mother, however, was more reserved, suspicious of Kate’s small frame and profession, worried about her own prospects of becoming a grandmother.
“She’s certainly different from your other girlfriends,” she told me as I scraped the plates after our first dinner together. “Opinions on everything! And working with bones—what sort of job is that?”
“She’s an anthropologist, Mom,” I replied, though Kate had already explained this.
“It’s too creepy for words, if you ask me—handling bits of dead people all day.”
“They’ve been dead for centuries,” I replied calmly. “She cleans the bones, figures out where they’re from and what they can tell her. It’s tricky work.”
My mother sniffed, unimpressed. “She’s not a career woman, is she? I should have guessed that she wasn’t the sort to be burdened by a family.”
That was my mother all over—one minute doubting Kate’s suitability as a partner, the next bemoaning the fact that she wouldn’t be providing grandchildren. We heard my father laughing loudly at something Kate was saying in the other room.
“Well, I hope you know what you’re doing, because you’ll have your hands full with that one,” she said, snapping the oven door shut as she removed the pudding.
I didn’t know, I wanted to tell her, but that was half the fun.
Fortunately the relationship improved from there. Kate learned to tone down her views and her voice when we visited, and my mother softened once she realized Kate was a permanent fixture. When I called to tell her we were engaged she seemed genuinely delighted, albeit as cautious as ever.
“I hope it’s not going to cost you a fortune,” she warned after some teary congratulations. “Girls these days have such romantic notions.”
This from a woman who named her only son after a movie star.
“It’s okay, Mom,” I reassured her. “It won’t be a big do.”
That was my hope, anyway—but, of course, I hadn’t reckoned with Kate.



KATE


“Why him?” Sarah asked me once, after Cary and I had been together for almost two years. For a moment I was offended, thinking she was doubting my choice. But her face, when I turned to confront her, was as guileless as porcelain, her voice tinged with interest, not judgment.
I sighed. It was a valid question, so why was it so hard to answer?
“Because I love him?” I ventured, the words sounding insipid even to my ears.
“Zzzt,” Sarah replied, imitating a buzzer. “Not enough information. Why do you love him?”
We were having lunch in Grattan Street, opposite the museum where I worked, sipping our coffees at an outdoor café in the March sunshine. I know it was March, because after four blissfully quiet months the surrounding tables were filled with students from the nearby university, and it had taken forever for our meals to arrive.
“Look at them,” I said to Sarah. “That was us three years ago. Do they realize how good they’ve got it?”
“Good?” she asked, glancing around. “We had to write a thesis, remember? And study for exams and not earn money and take a compulsory statistics course.”
She was right, and I’d been as keen to finish with school as the rest of our group for just those reasons. But, perversely, I wanted to argue with her.
“Don’t be so negative,” I said. “Remember how we’d go to the pub after lectures, and copy each other’s notes so we could sleep in, and sunbathe on the South Lawn in the summer?”
“It had its moments,” Sarah replied, setting her cup down. “But you still go to the pub, as far as I can tell. And now you can afford to without worrying about the rent. Besides, from what I remember you spent at least half those nights having screaming matches with Jake, or flirting with someone else to make him jealous.”
“Not half of them.”
“Near enough.” She shrugged. “That’s not what we were talking about anyway. Tell me about Cary.”
What could I say? Sarah knew him pretty well by this time, but that wasn’t what she was asking. Was it serious, she wanted to know, and what about him in particular made me stay, kept me interested? It was the same thing I had asked her when it had dawned on me that she and Rick were going to last, just as Jake and I were not.
“He’s sweet,” I ventured. “And kind, and thoughtful.”
“So’s your father. Not good enough. What else?”
I thought for a while.
“He cooks me dinner and picks me up from work if it’s raining.”
Sarah looked unimpressed, and I was uncharacteristically stuck for words. Instead of enumerating Cary’s many good points, I suddenly felt depressed. The sight of all the university students had made me feel old, had reminded me of Jake and that things fall apart no matter how much you wish they wouldn’t. Ridiculously, I felt tears bite at the corners of my eyes.
“Come on,” Sarah said softly, catching my mood. “What does he do that you love him for? Something your father wouldn’t.”
“He runs a bath for me when I’m tired.” I sniffed. “And he cleans it up afterward, and he has the sense not to bother me while I’m in there.”
“Good,” said Sarah, nodding her head. “And …”
“He doesn’t go to sleep straight after sex. He buys me lingerie, but not the slutty sort with bits cut out. He takes my side when his mother gets to be too much.”
“That’s important.”
“He lets me keep tampons in his bathroom cupboard without getting all squeamish about it. Remember how uptight Jake was about that sort of stuff?”
“Sure do,” she said, smiling. “Any more?”
I was warming to the task now. “He buys me popcorn at the movies even though he doesn’t eat it himself. He apologizes when we have a fight. And if I read a book and adore it, he’ll read it to find out why, even though I know he prefers those journals.”
After a moment I added, “He holds my head when I drink too much and throw up. I even threw up in his birdbath once and he didn’t get upset.”
Sarah laughed, and I suddenly noticed that the students around us had disappeared.
“He makes me feel beautiful,” I said quietly. “And kind of dazzling, as if he can’t believe he has me.” Then I took a deep breath for the biggest confession, one I was only just admitting to myself. “He looks after me. He strokes my hair when he thinks I’m asleep. He worries about me.”
“They all sound like perfect reasons to me,” Sarah said, proffering a tissue in case I was going to burst into tears again. But I didn’t need it. I felt light-headed, elated, justified. Cary was different from my previous boyfriends: a lot quieter, more introspective and reserved. Though they knew he was nice enough, every so often I sensed that my friends and family wondered exactly what it was I saw in him, how his smiling steadiness could interest me after the crashing highs and lows of my relationship with Jake. Sarah hadn’t asked to be convinced, but I saw that she was nonetheless, and the validation warmed me.
“He picks up after himself,” I continued. “He remembers our anniversary without my nagging about it for a week in advance.”
“Okay, that will do. I have to get back to work,” Sarah said, pulling on her jacket.
“He rings his parents regularly. He knows that foreplay doesn’t just mean undoing my bra.”
“Enough!” Sarah laughed, pretending to hurry away.
“I’ll e-mail you the rest,” I called after her. “He’s been a best man three times! He’s kind to small animals!” The waitress was staring at me, but I didn’t care. Her boyfriend probably expected her to wear crotchless panties.



CRESSIDA


I love hospitals. I’m sure that’s my father’s influence—how could it not be, when I remember accompanying him on ward rounds when I was only four? Still, I suppose I could have rebelled, the way children of alcoholics often turn into teetotalers, or vice versa. I didn’t. I love the buzz and hum of hospitals, their pulse and throb. I suppose stock markets or large manufacturing plants have a similar level of activity and purpose, but somehow it’s different when actual lives are at stake. A major teaching hospital has more energy than a theme park, and I’ve always found that exciting.
I realize this isn’t normal. The only other person I’ve ever met who truly understands this is Cary. We got to talking about it once when we were meant to be discussing my research. He told me that he’d fallen off a tractor when he was eight, then been taken to the local base hospital for X-rays.
“The minute I was wheeled through the sliding glass doors, I was hooked,” he told me, smiling bashfully and fiddling with his cuffs rather than meeting my eyes. “Everyone was rushing around, but they all knew exactly what they were doing and where they were going. It was so busy. Not like the farm, where you might sit on the harvester all day, or spend hours fixing the fence in the front paddock.” He finally looked up. “It was kind of thrilling, you know?”
I did know, and for a moment I felt a sharp pull toward this self-effacing man. He wasn’t dazzling, like Luke, but he was kind and patient, an involved and encouraging supervisor. He was gentle too. If my ideas were off track, or I hadn’t thought something through properly, he’d never scold, or even correct. “Maybe,” he’d say, where other supervisors might have stifled laughter or sighed to themselves, “but have you thought about it like this?” He’d guide, not push; suggest rather than tell. I knew he was married. I’d never met his wife, but I often thought she was a lucky woman.
Yet when I did finally see them together, it was Cary who acted as if he were the lucky one. Oh, Kate clearly cared for him; she was always touching him or teasing him, rumpling his hair or placing a hand on his thigh. But then she’d be off again, jumping up to call out to someone across the bar, or bent laughing with a girlfriend in a corner, never noticing the way his eyes followed her around the room. I mentioned it to Luke once.
“Did you see Kate tonight? She was everywhere.” We were lying in bed, dissecting an evening out, as couples often do.
“She’s certainly sociable,” he mumbled against my shoulder, arms warm across my abdomen. “Particularly when she’s had a few drinks.”
“When hasn’t she had a few drinks? But she’s like that regardless. Sometimes I wonder if I should talk to Cary about putting her on Ritalin.”
Luke laughed, though more in surprise at my criticism than anything else. “That’s not like you, Cress,” he said.
“Well, she is kind of … flighty, isn’t she?” I tried to explain myself. “You wouldn’t want her as your heart surgeon, for example. I’d be worried that if something more interesting came up she’d be straight out the door, the retractors still in your chest.”
Luke laughed again. “True. She’d look good in a nurse’s uniform, though.”
I stiffened and he stopped. I’d seen him flirt with her and I was used to that, but there was no reason to be doing so mentally in our bed.
Yet, I did like Kate. Those days we had at Cary’s house on the lake I actually got to know her a bit, we were left together so often when skiing, or while the boys fished. I’d never had the whole focus of her company before, and I enjoyed it more than I expected. She was genuinely funny, genuinely interested and interesting. I found myself opening up to her, knowing she wasn’t going to suddenly abandon me midsentence; to be honest, I think she paid more attention to me, knowing I wasn’t going to get paged away.
One day, while we lay on the beach, Kate asked if she could do my hair. I never usually bothered with it much—it was either down over my shoulders or up in a bun, with few variations. Not seeming to notice my hesitation, Kate rolled over and began stroking it, remarking on its color and texture. I think I flinched, but Kate can be persuasive. She went and got her brush and some gear, and for the next half hour I surprised myself by luxuriating in the experience. Her small hands were cool and sure, as deft and careful with my hair as with any artifact. While she weaved my locks into a complicated French braid she hummed and talked … gossip, something about the book she was reading, a few bars of a popular song: chatter that demanded nothing other than my being there. I felt totally relaxed for the first time in months. Later that day, when Luke saw my hair, he loved it, and I almost loved her for it. For an hour that afternoon she’d been the big sister I might have had if mine hadn’t always been studying.
We saw even more of them after that Easter. Kate was incurably sociable, always marshaling us into catching up at the movies or a bar, or ringing to invite herself over when Cary was away and the silence of their house got too much. I missed Cary on those nights. He balanced our foursome, and I always felt easier when we were all together. Without him there the talk grew more personal, more daring, Kate and Luke trading jibes at lightning speed or leaning across me to banter with each other. I could barely get a word in, though they seemed to enjoy having me there as an audience.
Similarly, I know Luke met up with Kate and Cary when I was at work. Why not? I should have been pleased he wasn’t waiting at home, watching the clock, maybe sulking a little if my shift went overtime. I bet Kate loved those nights. She craved attention; two men hanging on her every word would have been her idea of paradise.
When I found myself thinking that way I’d feel bad. I did like Kate, and it wasn’t as if I didn’t trust her. I was just a bit wary. She was never malicious, but she was careless. Kate is the sort of person who is always forgetting where they put their drink down at a party and wandering off to get another, so that by the end of the night they’ve left a trail of half-empty glasses in their wake, and don’t even notice the wastage. I wondered if she misplaced friends as easily.



KATE


And then we got married. Actually, first we moved in together and, when this still hadn’t ruined things, a year later I nagged him into marrying me. To tell you the truth I was surprised I had to ask, and a bit put out that my romantic fantasies of bended knee, sparkling gems and declarations of undying love never came true. But delayed gratification is not my thing—once I make up my mind I hate mucking around. Cary, on the other hand, prefers every possible outcome to be explored and quantified, like the genetic profiles he constructs for the expectant parents who consult him in his job. And I still got my sparkling gems and his undying love, so I can hardly complain.
We were married in October under a pewter sky, which opened as soon as we had said our vows. I’d been worrying about the weather all week, but on that day there could have been a cyclone and I wouldn’t have noticed. Cary cried when I came down the aisle, and again as he made his speech. Otherwise he smiled from start to finish, seeming to forget his insistence that he couldn’t possibly enjoy such a large wedding. That’s the main part I remember, and that it was still pouring when we consummated the thing hours later. The wind picked up, and I think there was hail. But inside, wrapped in our marriage bed and Cary’s arms, I felt warm and protected and safe.




LUKE


I had been married ten minutes when I first saw Kate. At the time I didn’t even know her name, and wouldn’t find it out till the photos came back. Still, I don’t suppose I’m the first groom to encounter a surfeit of strangers at his nuptials. Weddings are for women, and I’d happily abdicated responsibility to Cress and her mother pretty much from the moment I’d proposed. Of course, Cress was too busy at work to do much more than look at a few magazines, so I suppose I should be grateful that someone was available to talk to caterers and fold napkins.
Anyway, we’d said our vows and paraded back down the aisle. I remember feeling as you do after anesthesia—everything was exceedingly bright and excessively loud and happening in slow motion and double speed at the same time. It was April, a beautiful autumn day, and as they threw open the doors at the back of the church so we could stand on the steps and greet our guests, I couldn’t believe the colors outside. The blue of the late-afternoon sky, the russet of the leaves just starting to turn, the gold of Cress’s hair and the unfamiliar ring on her left hand. I’d put that ring there, but I had no memory of doing so. The photographer called instructions, Tim jerked at my tie, and nothing seemed real. I was elated, triumphant, but everything unfolded as if I were an observer, not there at the center.
Cary came over to offer his congratulations, kissing Cressida and complimenting her on her dress. At the time Cress was doing her fellowship project under his supervision, and we’d met a few times when I’d come to meet her after work. He’d never said much, but seemed nice enough. Cress, anyhow, was grateful for his assistance and had insisted we invite him to the wedding.
“Really?” I’d asked when she told me. “But I don’t even know him.”
“That doesn’t matter. He’s been such a help that I just want to thank him.”
“Are you sure this is the best way? Most guys would prefer a case of beer,” I said—astutely, as it turned out. “Besides, after you’ve finished your research you’ll probably never see him again, and he’s hardly going to want to get all dressed up to spend the night with strangers.”
“I’ll see him again,” said Cress, adding his name to the list we were arguing over. “I’ve known him since I was a student, on and off. That’s longer than I’ve known you.” She looked up and smiled, a happy smile full of excitement and plans and confetti. “And there will be plenty of people there from the hospital he knows. Plus his wife, of course.”
Now the man in question was shaking my hand. We hardly knew each other, so it was a brief exchange, just time enough for me to glance at a dark-haired girl behind him and mentally process that it must be the wife Cress had mentioned. Then someone else was pushing forward to congratulate me and the church bells were ringing, notes splashing over one another like children playing in puddles. Cary and his wife had moved on, and I couldn’t hear what anyone was saying.
Fortunately, as the night went on my numbness wore off, and after a few beers I was thoroughly enjoying myself. Cressida looked astounding, ethereal yet regal, the tiara that held her veil resembling a crown. If such a thing is possible she looked almost too beautiful, and I was afraid to touch her until after the photos were over for fear of disturbing the picture perfection of it all. Tim gave a mercifully bland speech, proposed the toast and then the dancing began. Five or so numbers in I was steering a bridesmaid around the floor when I spotted Cary’s wife dancing with a colleague of Cressida’s. She was wearing cream, which was perhaps why I noticed her. Women hardly ever wear white to a wedding—perhaps they think it’s reserved for the wedding party, or they’re afraid of being compared with the bride. Cary’s wife obviously had no such reservations. Her dress had a slit in the back, and the colleague, quite drunk, was trying to slip his hand into it. She was laughing and shaking her head, but not removing herself from his grasp, or even wriggling away from that hand. I don’t know where Cary was; I didn’t see him dance with her once that night.
After the requisite five hours our reception was over, and the guests formed a circle to say their good-byes. I’d strenuously objected to this bit, but for once Cress had been adamant. She wanted to speak to everyone who had come to the wedding, she told me, and this might be her only chance to do so. I ended up doing the same thing, kissing all those maiden aunts on prickly cheeks, exchanging pleasantries with relatives and partners I would no doubt never see again. When I got around to the hospital side of the circle Cary did the right thing and thanked me for the invitation. His wife was a little less formal, regarding me quizzically when I went to shake her hand.
“So,” she said, laughing, as if this were all some great big joke. “Have a nice life, I guess.”
Her candor was so disarming that I had to laugh too. Then Cary joined in, and just for a second the three of us stood there, laughing together, understanding but still enjoying the artifice of it all.
Six weeks and a honeymoon later the photos came back. Cress and I had had a great time vacationing in Malaysia on a tea plantation, and already the wedding seemed to have taken place years ago. It was almost a shock to recognize Cary’s wife, still laughing, in a group photo of Cressida’s medical friends.
“Who’s that?” I asked, sliding the photo over to Cress, who was agonizing over what should go in the album.
“Umm … Cary’s wife. You know, my supervisor,” she replied distractedly. “Kate, I think her name is.”
“She seemed like fun,” I ventured.
“Mmm, he’s lovely too. Maybe when my project is finished I’ll ask them over to dinner as a thank-you.”
“I thought the wedding invitation was his thank-you?”
“That’s not very personal, is it?” Cress asked. She had clearly forgotten our conversation before the big day. “And I’ve still got another six months or so to go, so I’ll want to do something then.”
I rolled my eyes, but not so Cress could see. My short experience of marriage had already taught me that sometimes it’s just easier to hold your tongue.



CARY


As a student, Cressida was a bit of a disappointment. Not to Steve, of course, who practically started panting when I told him she’d be working with us for a while. I’d also been pleased when she’d approached me for supervision on her fellowship project, though for different reasons. I remembered Cressida as a conscientious and careful medical student, and looked forward to her bringing those qualities to our research.
It wasn’t that she was no good: far from it. Her lab work was thoughtfully designed and carried out, her reports turned in on time. In the years since I’d first attended meetings with her Cressida had developed a textbook clinical manner: concerned without being overinvolved, able to mix inquiry and empathy in equal parts. She certainly had the skills for the work; it was just that her mind was elsewhere. The timing was to blame, I guess. When I agreed to her doing her project in the department she was going out with Luke. By the time she actually started at the beginning of the new academic year they were engaged. Then came the wedding and the honeymoon and weekends spent house-hunting rather than writing. In the end, what should have taken six months dragged on for over twelve, till we were both sick to death of it. I think we published the results, though I can’t remember. Funny how important that seemed at the time.
Actually, it bothered Steve more than it bothered me. “What is she doing?” he’d moan whenever Cressida’s weekly lit review was a day late on his desk, or a meeting had to be canceled so she could attend a dress fitting. “You’re too soft on that girl,” he told me more than once, with an irritation that I suspected was owed to pique that she was so transparently crazy about someone else than any concern for our tenure. I don’t think I even replied. For one, I enjoyed having Cressida around the place. She was smart and pretty and a welcome change after years spent hunched over microscopes with only Steve for company. And she was so darn happy that it made you smile just to see her. When we weren’t discussing genetics it was Luke, Luke, Luke. “I’ll leave you two to pick out your china patterns,” Steve would mutter in disgust, stalking out whenever conversation veered toward the conjugal. Cressida would look momentarily abashed, then carry on with an apologetic smile.
I knew how she felt. Kate and I had been together for about six years at that stage, married for two, and listening to Cressida’s chatter took me back to the early days of our own relationship. I’d remember those first few months of living together, the excitement I’d feel as my headlights picked out our house at the end of the day. How I’d find myself accelerating into the driveway in my eagerness to get inside. How I’d hurry up the path beside the lemon tree, driven by a desire that was part sexual, but mostly just a need to see Kate again. My key would fumble in the lock and then like a child playing tag I’d be home, safe, with the world shut out behind me. Inside Kate would be humming as she prepared dinner or flicked through a magazine, and she’d look up laughing at my abrupt entrance, then kiss me with lips that tasted of the apple she’d been eating or the basil she’d just added to our dinner. Cressida was now caught up in the same manic delirium, but having been such a willing victim of it myself, how could I complain? In fact, I think I enjoyed the reminder. Half a decade later I was still very much in love, but I no longer sprinted up our garden path at the end of the day. That’s no failing: I defy you to show me anyone who does. In my book, familiarity breeds content; love plateaus but is none the less for that. It has to, or no one would ever get any work done.




CRESSIDA


My part should have ended there, at the hospital in my wedding gown. Maybe there could have been a postscript: two healthy children, respected in her profession, a long and happy marriage. But no more, and certainly not this. What could I possibly have done to deserve it?



LUKE


It just happened, I swear. That’s what I told Cress and the counselor, and I mean it. I admit there were a lot of lies, but that wasn’t one of them. How else can you explain such a thing? Sure, I was attracted to Kate, but I’ve been attracted to plenty of other women before without feeling obliged to kiss them in the middle of a dance floor in full view of their husbands. Or my wife, for that matter. Of course, there was alcohol involved, and I tried to blame it on that: a stupid, drunken gaffe. I think Cress believed me—what choice did she have? I almost believed it myself. That is, until I saw Kate again and realized that there’d been no mistake.



CARY


Kate sparkles; I don’t. She flirts; I don’t. She dances; I don’t. She’s an extrovert, and I’m not. But I wouldn’t say I was introverted, just that I’m neutral, naturally quieter, Belgium to her Brazil. Apart from that, I’ve always thought we were pretty well matched. Water finds its own level, my father used to say, and I believe that. I mean, we knew what we were getting into—we were together for four years before marrying, and she was the one who forced the issue then. On some basic level we must have been suited. Up until that night I thought we were perfectly happy. Maybe not perfectly, but more than most. Then suddenly she’s kissing someone who isn’t me. Is sparkling and flirting and dancing worth risking a marriage over?



KATE


What can I possibly say in my defense? That it was dark, that I was drunk or confused or premenstrual? That I was swept away by the music and the night and had no idea how it happened? No, I have no defense, but at least I can be honest. Of course it didn’t “just happen.” That’s not to say I expected it, but I can’t say I was surprised either. I knew Luke was attracted to me, though that was no big deal; in my experience, men like Luke are always attracted to someone. I was attracted to him too. Why wouldn’t I be? He was beautiful, and our both being married didn’t change that. Still, I could have pulled away. The signs were there. I could have stopped dancing, gone outside for some air or to find Cary. Could have, should have, but didn’t. Didn’t stop, didn’t think, didn’t want to.



TIM


I wasn’t there, though I heard plenty about it. It was a hospital function: a doctor that Cressida knew marrying a doctor whom Cary was friendly with. I thought that was kind of sweet, though Luke pulled a face when he told me.
“Big mistake to marry someone in your own profession,” he stated firmly, as if he’d majored in psychology and not creative sciences, whatever that is.
“Why?” I asked, no doubt naively.
“They’re bound to end up competing with each other. And even if they don’t, imagine being in the same place as your wife twenty-four hours a day.”
I reiterated that I thought it was sweet. Besides, wasn’t that the whole idea of marriage—to be together?
“Not that much,” he said, rolling his eyes.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think Luke ever planned to cheat on Cressida, or saw it as an inevitability. On the contrary, having made up his mind to get married, I’m convinced he took his vows seriously, and intended to honor them. Luke is basically an honorable man. Yeah, he’d cheated on women before, but he’d never made promises to any of them, never said things he didn’t mean. I’m sure he told them all they were beautiful or sexy or whatever it takes to get a girl into bed, but it wouldn’t have gone further than that. Cressida, he revealed to me once, was only the second girl he had told he loved. The first was when he was seventeen. “Surely that doesn’t count?” he had asked me, only half joking. “I wasn’t even old enough to vote.” I think Luke liked the idea that Cress was his only love, his grand passion. It made good copy.
Anyway, from what I understand, Luke, Cressida, Cary and Kate had met at Cressida’s thank-you dinner for Cary, then gone away together at Easter. “Luke seems to really like this couple,” Cressida had told me excitedly. I was pleased for her—I knew that wasn’t the case with a lot of her friends. Over the next six months their names came up quite often in conversation: “Kate and Cary met us at the restaurant”; “We played tennis with Kate and Cary.” Cressida threw Luke a surprise party for his birthday, and I was introduced to them there. Cary was reserved initially, Kate far less so. I noticed how Kate flirted with Luke, but by the end of the night she was also flirting with me, at least two of Luke’s brothers-in-law, and even the caterer. Cary seemed both resigned and relaxed about it. I watched him over the course of the evening, saw how he always kept a subtle eye on her as she bounced from group to group—not, it seemed to me, out of jealousy or fear, but simply because that was where his gaze was drawn. The last hour they spent together, curled up like kids in the corner of a sofa. Kate was quieter, tired; Cary, stroking her shoulder, appeared to have absorbed some of her energy, and we talked and laughed until Cress threw us out. I liked them.
I met the four of them for drinks a few times after that. Then Luke invited me to a fund-raiser for the hospital where Cress worked—it was a trivia night, and he wanted me on their team. But by the time the evening arrived the two couples were no longer speaking.



KATE


I used to think that there should be a rule preventing people from marrying until they were over thirty. Before then, I reasoned, you couldn’t appreciate it. Part of it was that you needed to see a bit of the world, experience different lovers and ways of loving, make sure that the grass wasn’t greener elsewhere. But mostly, I thought, you needed to know yourself: who you were, what you needed, the things you couldn’t live without and those you could. Thirty, it seemed, was long enough to have most of that worked out. Actually, I was twenty-nine and a half when I got married, but close enough.
I was thinking all this again as we stood around at the reception after Jane and Dan’s wedding. To tell the truth, I was feeling pretty smug. Chances are it was the champagne, but I remember feeling immoderately happy. As I’ve said, I love weddings, so there was that: the chance to drink, dance and dress up, sentimental songs, public declarations of love. Then there was Cary, looking smart and kind of sexy in black tie, squeezing my hand while the happy couple made their vows, telling me I looked great before I’d even put on any makeup. Work was going well; we had our own home and lots of lovely friends. Often at weddings I can feel a bit jealous of the bride and groom, envying them the romance and excitement of the day, that newly married rush before it all settles back into the comfort zone. Not tonight, though. Tonight the comfort zone was feeling particularly, well, comfortable. Watching the newlyweds, who looked so young, I congratulated myself. I’d married well, at the right time, and for love. I was grown-up and centered and content. Now all I needed was another glass of champagne.
My high lasted right through dinner and the speeches, then deserted me abruptly when the dancing began. I love dancing and wanted to join in. It’s awkward sometimes that Cary won’t. Not can’t, but won’t—he’s funny like that. Most of the time, Cary is the sweetest, most accommodating man I know, but when he makes up his mind about something, that’s it. At our own wedding he made me scrap the bridal waltz altogether. So I resigned myself to watching the dancing instead. Maybe I was jealous that I couldn’t be out there, or maybe it was just that the champagne was wearing off, but I started feeling melancholy. Unbeknownst to anyone, the newlyweds had taken tango lessons, and instead of the traditional stolid waltz, Latin rhythms snaked from the dance floor. All around me people were tapping their feet, jumping up from their chairs as if bitten, placing imaginary roses between their teeth. In the center of the floor, the bridal couple moved with confidence. They’d obviously practiced, for they danced beautifully. At the slightest pressure from Dan, Jane dipped; following her lead his arms spun or steadied her. Their feet met, touched, moved as if mirrored. Fingers converged, interlocked, then were released again. Together, apart, together, apart, their bodies turning instinctively toward each other at the end of each movement. I was spellbound. So engrossed, in fact, that I did not notice Luke’s approach until he was right in front of me.
“Shall we?” he asked simply, extending a hand.
I accepted without replying, hungry to dance and for who knows what else.
I’d hardly seen Luke all night; we were at different tables. Still, he’d caught my eye once, smiled and winked in the church before the ceremony started. I’d winked back, then immediately regretted it. We weren’t conspiring about anything. Remembering it now I felt uncomfortable in his arms, stiff and wrong-footed. But then the music started, and so did everything else.




CRESSIDA


I was in the ladies’ room, reapplying my lipstick, when the two girls tottered in, giggling and shrieking. Drunk, I thought to myself, glancing in the mirror while I uncapped a cinnamon lip pencil.
“I mean, did you see her?” the shorter one was saying as they took up a position at the basin next to mine. “How she has the nerve to wear something like that with her figure I’ll never know.”
“She probably thinks it makes her look thinner,” said the other, fluffing her hair, then sniffing covertly under one armpit.
“Yeah, well, it wasn’t working. That blond guy she was throwing herself at couldn’t have cared less.”
“God, who can blame her, though?” said the sniffer. “He was a bit of all right.”
My ears pricked up. I’m always overhearing conversations like this, and they inevitably turn out to be about Luke.
“I guess his attention was elsewhere. Did you see him just now? He was in the middle of the dance floor, kissing some girl.”
“Probably his wife,” said her friend, dousing herself with scent while her friend picked at her nail polish. “Lucky bitch.”
“Hey, from the way he was kissing her I don’t think it was his wife. Maybe he’s not even married.”
“I bet he is. Men like that always are.” They both laughed, spitefully, then left, heels clattering on the faux-marble floor.
I finished with the lip pencil, then hunted in my purse for my lipstick. My heart was hammering and my throat was dry, but I made myself complete the job. There was no reason to rush out there. Luke surely wasn’t the only attractive blond man at the wedding, and besides, he certainly wouldn’t be kissing anyone. I unscrewed the lipstick, then glanced distractedly at the tube. Painful Passion it was called, the bluish red of venous blood. How did they come up with these names? My hands shook as I filled in my lips.
The girls were wrong about one thing: it wasn’t the middle of the dance floor, but off to the left, in the shadow of some ridiculous potted palms. Still, it was Luke. I was so shocked that it took me a minute to realize whom he was kissing. Kate, with Cary nowhere to be seen, Luke clinging to her as if he were drowning. Or maybe it was the other way around. Whatever, it was definitely mutual and more than friendly. In fact, they almost looked as if they’d done it before, her dark head fitting smoothly under his fair one with none of the graceless fumblings that usually accompany first kisses.
Stupidly, I didn’t know what to do. I guess I should have raced over and torn them apart, but I hate scenes, and I didn’t want to draw any more attention to the whole horrible incident. Luke was kissing Kate. Kissing her as if he meant it, as my girlfriends would say, kissing her as if he weren’t married, kissing her as he’d never kissed me in public.
I think I sat down, though I can’t be sure. A minute went by, then another. Where was Cary? Why wasn’t he breaking this up? I should have looked for him, but somehow I couldn’t look away, riveted by the car crash that was suddenly my marriage. Eventually they stopped kissing, Luke opening his eyes abruptly as if he had been dreaming, blinking in the light, then spotting me instantly. He left Kate without a word and came straight to my side, but I was already on my feet.
“Get your coat. We’re going,” I ordered, searching in my purse for car keys rather than meeting his eyes. We left quickly, without saying goodbye. Halfway across the room I stumbled and he reached out to grab me, but I snapped my arm away as if he were poison. Over my shoulder I noted Kate still standing alone on the dance floor, looking foolish and lost.



LUKE


I was bored; that’s why I danced with Kate. Cress was talking medicine with her doctor friends at our table; their partners were talking golf or getting drunk. I was ripe for a diversion and I found it: Kate alone and looking wistful on the opposite side of the floor.
I don’t remember what she was wearing; I’m not sentimental like that. Blue, I think, though it should have been red. What I did notice as she stepped into my arms was that there was something bright caught in her eyelashes, glinting under the disco lights like traffic signals. I actually reached to brush it off, thinking it was stray confetti or a thread from her dress, but Kate caught my hand.
“Don’t. It’s meant to be like that,” she said, unembarrassed. “It’s mascara a friend gave me, with glitter in it. We don’t go to many black-tie events, so I thought I’d make an effort.” We started moving together in silence.
“I didn’t realize it was going to be quite so obvious, though,” Kate continued after a moment. “People keep coming up and touching it.”
I laughed, and spun her hard. Kate was a good dancer and kept her feet, unfurling in a graceful circle from my fingertips. Of course she had realized the mascara would sparkle and attract attention—that was exactly why she had worn it. I was tipsy and told her so. She shrugged, smiling, not at all offended, and I felt a sudden rush of affection for her. Cressida had real beauty, the sort of looks that are all about bone structure and good breeding. She had no need for anything as obvious as glittery mascara, and would have scorned it as ridiculous. Kate, by contrast, was merely pretty. But she was also daring and vivid and there was a glow coming off her that was more than just iridescent makeup. Besides, those lashes really were surprisingly long, and she was right to highlight them. She must have felt me looking and tilted her face up. Did she mean for me to kiss her? So many women have lifted their faces to mine in just such a way that my response was reflexive. I kissed her, the tango music dying in my ears. Her mouth was soft and urgent and our feet continued to move in time, at least initially. Once I remembered Cress and went to draw away, or at least thought of it. But I couldn’t seem to do so, trapped by the nip of a little eyetooth and Kate’s hands on the nape of my neck.




CRESSIDA


We hardly talked on the way home from the wedding. I drove; I always do after functions. Luke likes to drink, whereas I’m not fussed, happy to be the obliging spouse. I concentrated instead, paying strict attention to traffic signals and staying below the speed limit, refusing to allow my escalating anger to compromise our safety. The minute I’d parked, though, I felt it all flood in, and, surprising even myself, I reached across and hit Luke once hard in the chest, then again when he didn’t respond.
“Hey,” he said softly in the gloom of our garage, catching my wrists to prevent a third blow. “I guess I asked for that.”
“Damn right you did,” I spat at him, struggling to get free.
“Cress, I’m sorry,” he said with a sigh in his voice, oozing remorse. “I don’t know why I did such a stupid thing, or if you can ever forgive me. I didn’t enjoy it.”
“Well, you certainly gave a good impression of enjoying it. I thought someone was going to have to throw a bucket of water over the two of you. And in front of all my friends!” My voice cracked with fury.
“I know,” he almost whispered. “I can’t believe it myself. But it didn’t mean anything. I’ll never love anyone like I love you, Cress.”
And at that, inexplicably, all my anger was gone and instead I started crying. Luke let go of my hands and held me while I sobbed on his chest, in his lap, stroking my hair while he murmured that he had been drunk, caught up by the dancing, thinking he was with me. They were not terribly good excuses but I bought them, wanting so desperately for them to be true. As my tears ebbed he carried me inside, something he’d not done in years. He laid me gently on our bed, and lit a candle on the dresser. Slowly, softly, he made love to me, saying my name over and over, telling me how he loved me, how he needed me. In bed, Luke is always passionate, fervent, but this was a side of him I’d never seen before. He was tender, controlled, far more than he’d been when he took my virginity. Afterward he held me as if I would break, kissing my fingertips and my eyelids, repeating my name again and again. For all I had been humiliated and hurt, it was a magical night.
We slept in each other’s arms that night. Luke was repentant; I was forgiving. I told him that I never wanted to catch him so much as talking to Kate again, and he swore that he wouldn’t, protesting anew that he would never love anyone like he did me. A year later I suddenly remembered that promise, and winced at how I’d been taken in. He hadn’t vowed that he’d never love anyone else, just not love anyone in the same way. I couldn’t have been listening properly at the time, or I wouldn’t have missed the duplicity. Did he mean to deceive me, even back then? Or did his words just lead where his heart would follow?



CARY


I hardly ever get drunk, but I did that night. Usually Kate’s drunk enough for both of us, though in fairness it doesn’t take much, just a glass or two. But why am I being fair to Kate?
Though Steve’s my friend, I think he almost enjoyed breaking the news. “Cary!” he practically shouted when he tracked me down to the veranda of the reception center, where I was talking with some people from the hospital. They’d come outside to smoke; I’d left to escape being pressured to dance. “I think you’d better come inside,” he stage-whispered, tweaking at my sleeve.
“Why?” I asked, happy where I was.
“It’s Kate,” he urged, though now he really did drop his voice, and swallowed as if not quite sure what to say.
Immediately the tone of his voice made me panic. Had something happened? Was she hurt?
I rushed back into the reception fully expecting to see Kate unconscious in a corner or trapped under one of those implausible palm trees. But she was neither, and for a second I was so relieved that she was upright and well that I didn’t take in what was happening. When I did I felt as though I had been punched in the stomach. All the air suddenly left me, and I had a mental picture of my lungs shriveling like week-old party balloons. Steve was looking uncomfortable and backing away, the scandal suddenly not quite so tasty. I started toward the pair of them, struggling for air, but as I did Luke moved away himself, his back to me. Kate stood there, the dancing continuing around her, looking dazed and still beautiful in her turquoise dress. I felt tears push at my eyes and turned away in shame.
We didn’t leave, though I ached to. Instead, I carried on as if nothing had happened. I have my pride. Kate didn’t dance again. We stayed at the bar, she close to my side, uncharacteristically subdued and toying with a glass of mineral water. I ordered Scotch, which I don’t usually drink. The liquid burned my throat and reinflated my lungs till it seemed that I was almost breathing too much. Steve kept shooting me worried looks, but I stopped noticing after the first three glasses. I didn’t see Cressida or Luke again.
I’d intended to drive, but we went home in a taxi. Kate must have said something, must have apologized, but I can’t remember it. The night air sobered me up but also made things worse: clearer, sharper, altogether too large. At the front door I couldn’t find my keys. I searched for them with growing anger, then shook the door handle until the small panes of glass in it rattled. Behind me, the taxi backed out of the driveway. Its headlights lit up the scene for a moment and then were gone, leaving us in the dark. Furious at being locked out of my own house I raised one fist and knocked the glass out of the door.
I don’t really remember the rest. Kate had keys, of course, so we must have gotten in that way. I dimly recall us making love, or rather hammering myself into Kate while she lay unresisting in the darkness. Although I hadn’t noticed it at the time, I had cut my hand on the glass, and when I came to in the morning there was blood in our bed and on Kate’s body, smudged through her hair and across both breasts. She cried and I held her, apologetic in spite of myself. When she wiped her eyes she left a sodden trail of sparkles across one cheekbone, their light smudged out.
Later, I went to retrieve the car, still parked a street away from the reception hall. One of the side mirrors had been broken off, whether by accident or design I couldn’t tell. My head ached. I drove home through the Sunday-morning silence, occasionally, out of habit, glancing at the place where the mirror should have been. But there was only space, a blind spot that unnerved and misled.