“Thank you,” I said, meaning it, then changed my tone. “I guess you do know a little about art.”
“I was about to make a lame joke about a ‘private tour,’ but that would really sound pathetic now. So, I’ll go for it. Is there any chance, Joan Blakely, that I could see you again?” Sincerity, another quality my life had been lacking lately.
For one second, I wanted to say yes. This doctor in his blue suit looked uncomplicated and easily satisfied, not like Casey, who felt a million miles away these days, even when he was in the living room.
“Joan?”
No, now was not the time. “I’m married.”
“Oh. I didn’t see a ring. My apologies.”
“No!” I practically shouted. “Don’t apologize. I’m flattered. My ring is undergoing a few small repairs. But thank you . . . for asking.” I assured him I’d keep his card, in case I had a medical emergency.
“I can’t do anything about the wait time, but I do some nice stitches,” Mason Andrews laughed. “Maybe I will see you around.” He gave a slow nod and turned to rejoin his group, who had finally made it out to the garden and the patio for the wine, cheese, and sunset portion of the tour. I watched him walk off. Men should go back to wearing suits.
On cue, Casey came through the glass front doors of the museum in his photographer’s uniform of blue jeans, black T-shirt, and a leather jacket. Needless to say, Casey didn’t own a bow tie. He was on his way out of town to shoot a hotel in Kyoto for Travel + Leisure. What was he doing here? He rarely stopped by the museum these days.
Casey found me right away and barely said hello before launching into his common refrain lately: “I’m on my way to LAX . . .” And then to my surprise he added, “And I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Now? Here?” Casey usually preferred conversations over a beer on our back patio. But it had been a while since we’d even had one of those.
“Yeah, Joan. It’s time.”
“I can’t do this anymore.”
We stood in my tiny organized office, me leaning against the desk, arms folded across my chest, and Casey staring at the poster from an exhibit on the abstract painting from the sixties featuring Thomas Downing’s Red, one of my favorite pieces in the museum, a grid of thirty-six hand-drawn but crisply rendered circles in red tones, from pink to burgundy, painted on a raw canvas. A study in color and form that was nearly perfect in my eyes. Casey stared at the poster as if his life depended on it, while I focused in on his statement. I can’t do what anymore?
Casey Harper was not a guy who embraced confrontation; it was so much easier to get on a plane or hide behind a lens than to risk mixing it up emotionally. Plus, he’d developed a Teflon-likability that played well with clients, so easygoing and accommodating that you never noticed he always won. Over the years, what I had once considered as an asset, his laid-back style, had begun to annoy me. Tonight’s vagueness was particularly tedious, as he was headed out of town for ten days. I felt enough confrontation for the two of us. “What are you talking about?”
Casey shifted on his feet. For the first time in our marriage, Casey looked scared. “What I mean is, I can’t live like this anymore.”
Now I felt the air sucking from my chest. “Like what?”
Without a word, he took out his phone, tapped it a few times, and held up the photo on the screen for me to see. It was two little boys. Adorable twins in matching striped shirts that looked to be in kindergarten, both smiling at the camera while sitting on their red bikes with training wheels. They looked exactly like Casey but with richer skin tone and wild curls. There could only be one explanation.
“These are my sons. Oliver and Will. They turn five in two weeks. They live in Eagle Rock, and no, I’m not with their mother anymore. But I was, for about six months.” Casey had obviously rehearsed his confession, because there was no stopping him. “And now I see the boys when I can, when it doesn’t interfere with our lives. But it’s time for me to be a real father to them. I’m sorry I lied to you. I have no excuse; I can’t lie anymore.”
I couldn’t breathe. Last summer, after a couple too many drinks on the Fourth of July, I’d floated the idea of having kids like it was foreplay. Casey rejected me on all fronts, both for the sex and the baby making, gently suggesting I try water, aspirin, and sleeping in the guest room. The next morning, I was embarrassed (and hungover) but not disappointed. I thought that’s what we were supposed to do at this point in our marriage, but Casey’s muted reaction made me realize that neither one of us was invested in becoming a parent. We never mentioned it again. Our marriage didn’t look like it was pointing in that direction—at least that’s what I surmised. But now, with Casey standing in front of me with his cell phone twins, I realized my ambivalence was a red flag. And his ambivalence was a white flag. He’d already surrendered to parenthood, and our marriage had been imploding long before this conversation.
I struggled to maintain an even tone. “How could you not tell me that you have children with another woman? Two children, in fact!” As if having one child out of wedlock was understandable but two crossed a line.
He hadn’t rehearsed this part of the conversation. “I thought the reality would go away somehow. That I wouldn’t get attached to them. But that was impossible.”
For the past year, he’d been in demand, a new stage of his career, like he’d finally made it to the top of the heap in the competitive field of architecture photography. Alaska, Rome, Bangkok, Buenos Aires, and everywhere in between. He shot hotels, houses, offices, churches, all kinds of structures for editorial features, advertising, marketing. It was more glamorous than lucrative, but it was what he’d been trying to break into for years. Now he was rarely home. He’d even bought an extra rolling bag to keep packed, so he could simply swap out luggage without doing laundry between shoots. Oh God, was he really even on location?
“How deep is this? Did you even go to all those places to shoot? Or were you hiding out in Eagle Rock with the family?” I spit out.
He didn’t answer. Instead, he actually hung his head. “I didn’t want to hurt you; you’ve already been through so much already with your father. . . .”
“Do not equate this with my father.”
“Fine. What I meant was that you’d been through a lot. In my heart, I knew the longer I let the situation go on, the worse it would get. But in my head, I couldn’t find the words to tell you. I can’t deny them anymore. They’re my sons.”
“I’m your wife.” I saw it all unravel in my head, the decade we’d been together. The friends we had in town. “We’ve been married for almost ten years, and you’ve been lying to me for at least half that time.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Casey’s voice picked up in confidence, maybe even defiance. He was finally free of his double life, and he clearly felt liberated. The asshole. “I can’t lie anymore.”
“Well, good for you. You’re Father of the Fucking Year.” I squeezed my eyes closed to get rid of the image of my Fourth of July declaration and his rejection. How pathetic I must have seemed. “Now what, Casey? Now what? Do we start celebrating holidays with your second family? What’s the name of my sister wife, anyway?”
“I know this is a lot . . .”
“It’s not a lot, Casey, it’s everything. Everything.”
“I don’t expect you to understand tonight.” He was shutting down and shutting me out.
“Who knows? Do our friends know?”
Casey shrugged, and my heart sank.
I had to ask: “All of them? Amy and Dave?”
He nodded. Yes, Amy and Dave knew. Amy and Dave of the weekend-morning bagel tradition and vacations in the desert. Amy and Dave who gave birth last year to my godson, Frederick. Our dear friends knew that my husband had twins, and they showed up every Sunday with extra cream cheese and said nothing. I would deal with that incision later. “What’s her name?”