I turned to go back inside and noticed that a few lights were on in Carl and Eve’s place. Who was there this time of year? Surely not renters. I walked across our shared terrace to see if I could see anyone through the sliding glass door. I wasn’t like a Peeping Tom or something. Just curious. A friend with a proprietary sense of duty, that’s all. I mean maybe kids had broken in or something. Maybe kids were in there drinking or doing drugs or filming a porn movie. Who knew? Maybe it was Carl with that hot little nurse who was making Eve so paranoid. Whoever it was would give me a legitimate excuse to call Eve and report it. Eve had called me again. She was convinced Carl was having an affair. To be honest, we were sort of always looking for an excuse to talk to each other. The idea of talking to Eve fueled my determination to see just who was in their condo and exactly what the hell was going on.
This is what friends are for, I told myself as I crept up to the building and positioned myself ever so carefully on the edge of the sliding glass door against the siding made in China that probably caused a rash on contact. I could make out the bluish light of a television screen. Peering in more closely I saw that an old movie was playing. Oh, for the love of Pete. Someone was watching Love Story, with those two morons who said love means never having to say you’re sorry. Good grief! What bullshit is that? The first thing I say in the morning is I’m sorry!
“Good morning, sweetheart. I’m sorry.”
“Good morning, sweetheart. You should be.”
Then I say it about another hundred times more a day. Okay, maybe not. Maybe I should, because Eliza always nails me for every little infraction, but I’m not going to say I’m sorry every time I do something she doesn’t like. That would make me wrong all the time, and I couldn’t live with that. And it would be further confirmation that she’s right all the time and I couldn’t live with that either. Currently Eliza had too much time on her hands. She had nothing better to do than think up shit she wasn’t happy about. Or adding things to her bucket list. Now she wanted to rent a sailboat and sail from island to island around Greece! And who had the time? Me? I was so busy I could hardly think straight. I just signed a contract to build another hundred homes! And her latest deal was that she wanted a YouTube channel so she could offer cooking videos. She wanted to teach the world how to make chicken fricassee! Was she kidding? I didn’t even know what that was! Make videos? For who and why? And how much would that cost? Listen, between us? I thought she had arrived at that time in life when women feel old, but I was keeping my mouth shut on that one.
So, who was in Eve and Carl’s condo? I thought, bringing myself back to the situation at hand. I peeked in through the glass door again. Whoa! Whoever was on the sofa was getting up! I jumped back, plastering myself against the building once more, inches away from being discovered. Wait a minute, I told myself. You’re not the criminal here! The person with the lousy taste in film is the one in trouble! Not me. So I took a step forward and looked squarely through the door just as the person inside turned to face me wearing some terrible-looking flimsy bathrobe and a lopsided shower cap. She screamed bloody murder loud enough to wake the scores of dead pirates buried on every island in the Atlantic Ocean.
“Aieeeeeeeeee!”
It was Eve!
“Eve! It’s me! Adam! It’s okay!”
She screamed again anyway, I guess just to be sure I wasn’t lying. Finally, she stepped back and took a deep breath. Then she came forward and opened the sliding glass door.
“Sweet baby Jesus! You scared the life out of me, Adam Stanley.”
“Sorry.”
“Just what the hell are you doing on my terrace in the dark staring through the door like a pervert?”
“I saw lights on and I wanted to be sure everything was okay with your property.” I looked hard at her. She’d been crying. And she smelled like alcohol. “Um, are you okay?”
“Sure. I’m just fine. Fine and dandy. Would you like a glass of wine?” she said.
“Sure. Why not?”
She pulled off her shower cap, her blond hair tumbled down her shoulders like filaments of gold, and she stood aside to allow me to cross the threshold. God, she was sexy.
“I’ve already had three,” she said. “I was just going to take a shower and go to bed.”
“It’s only seven o’clock,” I said.
She looked at me as if to decide whether I thought three glasses of wine before seven o’clock was too many or did I think seven was too early to go to bed?
“Adam? Are you judging me?”
“Who, me? Hell no! Where’s Carl?”
“That son of a bitch?”
“Yeah, that son of a bitch.”
“He’s, he’s, he’s . . .”
And then she burst into tears and started to weep. She literally fell into my arms crying like a baby.
“Oh, God. What’s happened? Eve? Talk to me.”
But now she was sobbing, great big convulsive sobs. Blubbering sobs. Ugly crying. I wasn’t good with this kind of thing. I pulled her into me, into a solid embrace, rubbing her back to console her. Maybe Carl was dead. Or dying.
Finally, she said in a whisper, “I came here to end it, Adam. I can’t take it anymore.”
“End what? What are you talking about?” She didn’t mean to end her life, did she?
“My marriage is over.”
“What the hell are you saying?”
“Adam, I’m a terrible failure as a mother.”
“Don’t say that! Daphne is a lovely girl!”
“No, she’s not. She’s a lying slut! She got kicked out of school for sending lewd pictures of herself to one of her professors to get an A.”
“Oh, come on now! That’s not so terrible. All the kids do that these days.” Did they? Who knew? It was terrible. Good grief.
“Yes, it is! It’s really terrible. And I have never done anything except disappoint Cookie.”
“Eve? Let’s be honest. Who could please Cookie? She’d find fault with the pope himself! He’d come to dinner and bring baked ziti and she’d hate it! She’d hate the pope’s baked ziti! She’d tell him it tasted like dog shit. Believe me! I’ve given this a lot of thought! Years, in fact.”
No trace of a smile. I thought she’d see humor in the truth of that, but she didn’t.
“But she’s my mother! Shouldn’t your own mother at least fake it that she’s proud of you for something?”
“Not necessarily. Not if she’s always unhappy. Cookie’s not too happy with herself, now is she?”
“No. She’s a total misery. She always has been. And Carl is definitely not in love with me anymore. He’s sleeping with one of his nurses. I have proof. I finally have proof.”
“Oh, who cares, Eve? I mean, really, who cares if he’s screwing all of them?”
“What do you mean? He’s my husband!”
“He cheats at golf, Eve. That’s the lowest of the low.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, but who cares? He has other redeeming qualities. Listen, can we go back to Cookie for a minute?”
“Sure, but why?”
“Because I’m gonna explain this whole thing to you. It’s her jealousy that’s at the bottom of everyone’s unhappiness. Don’t you know that?”
“I don’t know what I know anymore.”
I led her over to the couch and made her sit down. Then I took an empty goblet from the bar cart, poured myself a glass of wine, and took a long look at her. Even in this pitiful state, she was still the most beautiful woman I had ever known. I took several long sips. She took another drink from her glass.
“This started a long time ago, Eve, before you and I ever met. But when we did finally meet Cookie saw something in our relationship that she’d never have and she couldn’t stand it.”
“What?”