Answered prayers

6

BRAD STAYED IN THE OFFICE UNTIL FIVE O'CLOCK ON Thanksgiving Day. The boys were in Africa, and Pam told him she was playing golf with friends. Their friends were coming at six o'clock, and they weren't going to eat dinner till seven or eight. She had invited forty people, at least half of whom he didn't know. And he didn't even bother to object. There was no point. Pam did what she wanted to. The only difference his objections made was that she prepared better arguments to convince him. But in the end, perhaps because of lack of energy on his part, Pam prevailed. He preferred to save his energy for bigger things, like his work.
He got a lot of paperwork done, and caught up on a number of things. And in a sentimental moment, he wrote a long letter to his sons, telling them how proud of them he was, and that he was grateful for them. They were both terrific boys. He admired their spunk in going to Africa for a year. They were working on a game preserve, tending to injured animals, and assisting animals that were somehow in trouble in the wild. And in their spare time they had volunteered at a church in the village. Dylan was teaching kids and their parents how to read, and Jason was digging trenches for a new sewer system. Their letters so far had been full of enthusiasm and excitement for everything they'd done and seen. It was an unforgettable experience for them. They were going to be there until July, and he had promised himself and Pam that he was going to take some time off from work, and visit them for a couple of weeks. But so far, he hadn't had the time. And neither had Pam. She was far less enthusiastic than Brad about going to Africa. She was terrified of diseases, accidents on a trip like that, and bugs. Her idea of adventure travel was flying to L.A. and staying with friends in Bel-Air.
She and Brad had done some traveling over the years, but never to exotic places, usually to Europe, or somewhere in the States. They stayed in luxurious hotels, and ate at three- and four-star restaurants. Pam loved going to spas, when she had the time, and playing golf with business associates, or clients she was trying to woo to the firm. Almost everything Pam did was geared toward advancing herself somehow, either socially or professionally. She rarely did anything just for the fun of it. She always had a plan. And was totally unlike Brad. He had no social ambitions, no desire to run the world, no need for enormous amounts of money, and the only real passion he had was for his work. The rest went over his head. Pam teased him about it sometimes, and had tried to show him the ropes to greed and success. They were lessons that, much to her chagrin, he had refused to learn. And since he'd gone out on his own, and left the firm, she'd given up. Most of the time, nearly always in fact, they each did their own thing, which was a relief for Brad. The work she put into her social and business life exhausted him. He didn't give a damn about showing off, being in the papers, or impressing people in her world.
Brad sealed his letter to his sons, and told them he sent them his love. They had only called a few times in the past four months. There were no phones on the game preserve, only radios that connected to nearby farms, and the local town. In order to call home, they had to go into town, and wait for hours at the post office for a phone and an outside line. It sounded like being on another planet to him. But at least they wrote occasionally, and so did he. Pam kept sending them care packages with vitamins and insect repellent, purchased by her secretary, and so far, all but two of the packages had been stolen or lost. Somewhere in Zambia there were postal workers or customs officers who were taking her vitamins, and no longer plagued by bugs. But he figured the boys were fine.
He thought of calling Faith before he left the office, but when he glanced at his watch, he realized that they were probably about to sit down and eat. It was a real bonus for him to have found her again. She was a piece of his childhood, his history, a memory of a happy time for him. Things had gotten complicated for him after college. His parents had gotten divorced, and he had always felt that the acrimoniousness of the divorce had killed them both. His mother had died of breast cancer at forty-three, after being obsessed with the things Brad's father had done to her, and his father had had a heart attack two years afterward. They had become and remained bitter, angry people whose only interest had been doing each other harm. His father had refused to attend his ex-wife's funeral, as a final slight to her, and in the end the only one it had hurt was Brad. He had vowed to himself that he would never marry. And when he met Pam, and dated her, she had had a hard time convincing him to get married. And when she finally did, after issuing a tough ultimatum to him, he was equally determined never to get divorced. He didn't want his sons to feel the same anguish he had, watching his parents' pitched battle to destroy each other. When he said “for better or worse” when he married Pam, he had meant every word of it. He knew then that no matter what happened later on, he was married to her for life.
It made him philosophical when their paths slowly began to go separate ways, and she disappointed him again and again. He knew he was a disappointment to her as well. He wasn't ambitious enough in her eyes, or interested in the same things. By the time the boys finished college, or even when they started it, Pam and Brad had no shared interests at all, and few friends they both liked. Brad's values were entirely different from hers, and the only joy they still shared was their sons.
Brad turned off the lights in the office, and got into the Jeep he used for work. He had a Mercedes parked in the garage at home, but he seldom used it anymore. It was the wrong signal to send out for a court-appointed attorney, or one doing mostly pro bono work, defending indigent kids accused of violent crimes. The Mercedes embarrassed him, and he'd been thinking of selling it, although Pam had just bought herself a Rolls. The difference in their cars seemed symbolic, to him at least, of their differences in all else.
He didn't delude himself that he was happy with her. He hadn't had any illusions about his marriage in a long time, but he was entirely clear that he wasn't going to do anything about it, and never would. And that was comfortable for Pam too. He suspected she had brief affairs from time to time, and he had gotten involved with a married secretary for two years. But eventually she'd gotten divorced and wanted a deeper involvement with him. He had never misled her about his plans, and they parted ways and she quit on good terms. And she had since married someone else. Brad hadn't been involved with anyone since, and that had been three years before. He would have been lonely, if he'd thought about it, but he didn't allow himself to. He simply accepted what was, and stayed submerged in work.
But talking to Faith had added another dimension to his life in the past two months. He had no romantic notions about her, on the contrary, she was sacred to him, and he cherished the friendship they had. She seemed to understand him perfectly, shared many of the same points of view, and her own loneliness allowed her to reach out to him in ways that others wouldn't have dared. And in his head, she was still like a little sister to him, and that made him interact with her in a totally chaste way. He loved what he felt for her, and what they said to each other. He loved helping her, and being there for her. He was determined to do everything he could to encourage her to go back to school, and he hoped she would. He felt as though he was of some use to her, and that made him feel good. She was, in every sense of the word, his friend.
Brad drove into the driveway just after six o'clock. He had intended to get home by five and get changed, but it had taken him longer than he thought to wrap up. He knew it wouldn't take him more than a few minutes to shower and change, and he was startled to find, when he let himself into the house, that they already had guests. They were standing in the front hall in black tie, and looked surprised when he walked in, in jeans and a sweatshirt.
Pam introduced him to a dozen people he had never met, and he disappeared to their room. They still shared a room, and a bed, although they hadn't made love in five years. It didn't bother him anymore, he had sublimated all his sexual urges into other things. And the only thing that had just startled him about the people he'd met was that they were in black tie. He had completely forgotten that Pam had made Thanksgiving a formal event this year, which seemed ridiculous to him. Thanksgiving, to Brad, was about families and people you cared deeply about, sitting around a table, or near a blazing fire. It only meant something if you shared it with people you loved, or good friends, not strangers in tuxedos and evening gowns, standing around, drinking champagne. But he had promised Pam he'd play the game, and he felt he owed it to her to try. He avoided most of her social events, either intentionally, or because he couldn't get away from work. So there were certain events he appeared at religiously, Thanksgiving, her Christmas party, the opening of the opera and the ballet every year, and the symphony if she couldn't find anyone else to go with her. He always encouraged her to try. He was in the living room half an hour later, in his tuxedo, looking handsome and well groomed, and to anyone who knew him well, bored to death. He was talking to her father about two new clients they'd acquired. They were major corporate entities, and had been a real coup for Pam, as her father said. He was inordinately proud of her. She had learned everything from him, her business acumen, her legal skills, her values, her ambitions, and her ability to get what she wanted in almost any circumstance, whether right or wrong. Pam was not a woman one could easily say no to, or who accepted being turned down. She was easily the most determined woman Brad had ever met. He had learned not to lock horns with her, whenever possible, and when necessary to avoid being stampeded by her, he just stepped aside. It worked better for him that way, and had allowed their marriage to survive. His love for her had been a casualty to the way she treated him, but even after his feelings for her had died, he made every effort to keep the outer shell of their marriage intact. The inside, the soul of it, had long since died.
“Do you want me to introduce you to the people you don't know?” Pam asked generously as she came to stand next to Brad, and slipped a hand into her father's arm, and he turned to her and smiled.
“I'm fine. Your father and I were singing your praises. You've pulled off some major coups recently, from what he's telling me. You're doing a hell of a job.” She looked pleased with his praise. Brad tried to give her credit whenever he thought it was deserved, although he didn't have a great deal of respect for the arena she competed in. She rarely returned the favor to him, and most of the time dismissed what he did, however important it seemed to him, or the rest of the world. She was also disturbed by Brad's influence over their sons. She thought their altruistic leanings were of no consequence, and she had been trying for several years to convince them to go to law school, and join their grandfather's firm. It would have been a huge victory for her. But so far, neither of the boys had been swayed, much to Brad's relief.
She was a pretty woman, though not in an overtly feminine way. She was tall, athletic, with a strong, sinewy figure. She played a lot of tennis and golf, and was in great shape. And she had brown eyes, and hair as dark as Brad's. She looked more like his sister than his wife. And people had often said she looked like him.
Pam drifted away then from where Brad and her father were standing. And Brad made a minor effort before they sat down. He introduced himself to several people, and had two glasses of wine to make the evening more bearable for him. He spoke to a woman who played tennis with Pam. She ran an ad agency Brad had heard of, but as he listened to her, his mind began to wander, and he finally left her to join a small circle of lawyers standing near the bar. Brad knew almost all of them, and had worked with two of them at the firm. They were nice guys and the conversation was easy and familiar, unlike the two women he sat next to, when they were finally seated at the table. Both were extremely social, and were married to men Brad had heard about and never met. It was exhausting trying to keep the conversation moving. And after dinner he was relieved to slip away. The living room was full of sated, happy people, drinking brandy. And most of them looked like they were planning to stay all night. Pam was engaged in a heated debate at that point, over some recent tax law that was of no interest to him. And the kind of law he practiced was of even less interest to them.
Brad felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him, as he slipped into his study, turned on the light and closed the door. He took off his black satin bow tie and dropped it on the table, and then sat down in his desk chair and sighed. It had been an interminable evening, and all he could think of was how much he missed his boys. He longed for the kind of holidays they'd had when they were little, when Thanksgiving still had some meaning to him, and it wasn't an excuse to invite forty strangers to the house. Pam used every opportunity to fill the room with people who were useful to her, rather than those who had real meaning in their life. Although there were precious few of those left, and he and Pam no longer shared common friends. His were defense attorneys and public defenders, hers were socialites and social climbers, and heads of corporations she wanted to lure to the firm. Brad knew that no evening was complete for her, unless she felt she had made what she referred to as a “score.”
He glanced at his computer and wished that he could e-mail Jason and Dylan and wish them a happy Thanksgiving. Instead, he typed in Faith's e-mail address in New York. It was nearly two A.M. for her.
“Hi… are you still up? How was your Thanksgiving? You probably won't get this till the morning. I finally escaped. A total zoo. Forty people for dinner, in black tie. One can't help but be impressed by the absurdity, and emptiness, of spending Thanksgiving in black tie. I missed the boys. That's what holidays are all about. What about you? Peaceful and pleasant? You must be happy to have the girls home. I envy you. I'm working tomorrow. Two new kids in jail, and a third I think the county is referring to me. What happens to these kids way at the beginning? It would be nice if they didn't need me, and just had happy, ordinary lives, whatever that is. I felt so stupid tonight spending Thanksgiving with a bunch of strangers, all dressed up like waiters. Pam loved it. Wish I could say the same. Sorry to complain. Just tired, I guess. Talk to you soon. And happy Thanksgiving by the way. Love, Brad.”
He shuffled through some papers on his desk, not wanting to go back out amongst the guests. He was planning to sneak up the back stairs and go to bed. He had a long day the next day. And Pam was used to his leaving parties early. He always did it discreetly, so as not to disrupt the guests, or make them feel they had to leave. He was sure that Pam and many of the others would be there till long after midnight. But he was delighted not to be in their midst.
He was just turning off the lights in his study, when his computer told him he had mail. He clicked the button, and saw it was from Faith. He smiled and sat down.
“Hi… nice surprise … I'm still up. Your Thanksgiving sounds very fancy. We were just the four of us, but it wasn't easy. It started out okay, the bird was good, everyone liked the dinner. And we got in a huge fight at the end of it about my going to school. Zoe shouted at her father, Alex had a fit, the girls got into an argument. Everyone went to their separate corners, and then both girls went out with their friends, and Alex went to bed. Zoe is home, Ellie is still out. The girls are furious with each other, or were, and Alex wouldn't speak to me after dinner. It's my fault really. He was dismissive about my going to school, and I lost my temper and snapped at him. That set him off, so he said some fairly harsh things, and Zoe leaped to my defense. I shouldn't have reacted in the first place, and then everything would have been all right. I should know better. I'm an adult for heaven's sake. He just hit a nerve, I guess. In the end, he said I should do what I want, but the implication was that if I screw up, I'm up shit creek. It's a victory of sorts, but not at the expense of the girls getting along with each other. They have so little time together, and dinner was a mess in the end. I hope they patch things up before they leave. Why do things always get so complicated? What happened to nice peaceful family Thanksgivings among people who love each other, don't get mad at each other, and say nice things? At least the girls were here. I'm grateful for that. Sorry to whine. I was trying to wait up for Ellie so I could apologize to her, but it's two A.M. and I'm going to bed. Happy Thanksgiving to you too, big brother. Love, Fred.”
It made him happy to read it, and he felt sorry for her. It sounded like a tense afternoon. At least he and Pam hadn't argued for once. He knew better, and did his best to avoid making scenes.
He was quick to type in a response to Faith, in case she had not yet gone to bed. But knowing how quickly he normally responded, she had decided to wait up for a few more minutes to see if she heard from him again. And of course, she did. Their e-mails were like a candy dish they passed between them, and neither of them could resist responding instantly, if at all possible, when they got the other's mails.
“Dear Fred, Sounds like a tough day. I'm sorry. But a victory too, if Alex gave you tacit ‘permission’ (I hate to acknowledge or endorse that he has that power over you) to go back to school. That's actually good news. The silver lining in this one. Sorry about the girls. Hard on them too, if Alex puts them in that position. If you're anything like you used to be, when you were soothing Jack and me during our occasional arguments, you are the ultimate peacemaker, and I suspect you still are. You can't fix everything for everyone, Fred. It's okay for them to disagree sometimes, or even to defend you against him. The important thing was that you were all together, and you stood up for yourself. That's good for them to see, even if it caused some dissent among the troops. They'll get over it. Most important, I'm thrilled he gave you the green light for school, if only because now you'll feel less guilty about it, and can actually do it. I think you should go to NYU law school next year.
“By the way, I keep forgetting to tell you. I have to come to New York in a few weeks. Right before Christmas. It's a national conference for criminal defense attorneys, and I thought I might pick up some interesting stuff. I'll only be there for two days, and I'll be pretty busy. Hope you can spare me a minute for dinner or lunch.” What he was most grateful for this time was that they had maintained contact. In fact, they had formed a tighter bond than they had had for years. He was determined not to lose sight of her this time, for old times' sake, for Jack's, and for his. And she was grateful for it too. “I'll give you the dates and the schedule when I'm in the office,” he continued. “It'll be fun to see you. Hope the weather isn't too miserable by then. I can't afford to get snowed in. Hard enough to get away for two days. Goodnight, Fred, it's back to school for you!!”
She smiled when she read it, and jotted off a few more words to him. “Thanks for the encouragement. You make the day seem like less of a fiasco. I've been upset all night over it. Can't wait to see you when you're here. I'll try to fit you into my busy schedule,” she teased him. “I'll have my secretary let you know what day is good for me. Seriously, I'm entirely at your disposal. Just tell me when. Goodnight, have a good day tomorrow. Love, Fred.”
He read it, smiled, and turned off his computer. It had been a long day, a boring evening for him, and a sad one for her. But at least they had each other. That was something. The cherished gift of friendship and brotherly love between two old friends. As far as Brad was concerned, it was what Thanksgiving was all about, and he was grateful for her.