Coming Home (24 page)

Her face paled, and she sank slowly onto a chair.  “They cannot do
this,” she whispered.

“They’ve done it,” he said.  “Jesus, Nancy, I’m so sorry.”

She swallowed visibly.  “And what happens,” she said, “if I ignore
it?”

“Then you’ll be found in contempt of court,” he said.  “You could
go to jail.”

For the first time since their marriage, he was unable to console
her.  She locked herself in the bathroom so he wouldn’t hear the sobbing she
tried to muffle.   But he heard.  He heard every sound she made.  Hands crammed
in his pockets, he paced, muttering under his breath, propelled by fury.  When
Casey came in, he said curtly, “Take care of her.  There’s something I have to
do.”

***

When the maid opened the door, he strong-armed her aside and
followed the singsong of Chinese voices to the dining room.  They were sitting
around the massive table, the three of them, and they looked up in amazement as
he strode into the room.  “What the hell kind of parents are you?” he
demanded.  “How could you do this to her?”

“Mr. MacKenzie,” her mother said icily, “you are not welcome here,
and if you do not leave immediately, I will call the police and have you removed.”

“I’ll stay, by God, until I’ve said what I came to say.  Why?  Why
would you do something like this to her?  That girl has never hurt anybody in
her life.  Her sister means the world to her.  What kind of heartless monsters
are you?”

“We are not heartless monsters,” Dr. Chen said.  “We are hoping
that Nancy will recognize the error of her ways.”

“If she wishes to see her sister again,” the dragon lady said,
“she has only to divorce you.  It is not such a difficult choice, is it, Mr.
MacKenzie?  The family of her birth—”  She looked around the table.  “—or you.”

“You bastards.”  He glanced at Mei Ling, her head bowed low over
her soup bowl.  It was probably already too late for her.  They’d probably
already poisoned her mind.  His hands clenched into fists.  “I don’t know what
cabbage leaf you plucked Nancy out from under,” he said grimly, “but I know one
thing:  she sure as hell didn’t spring from your loins.”

And he left them to their dinner.

***

He broke the news to Nancy on the eve of the tour.  “I’m going on
tour with Danny,” he said as he thumped his suitcase onto the bed and snapped
open the locks. “We’ll be away for six weeks.  When I get back, I want you
gone.”

Her face paled.  “Rob?” she said.  “What are you talking about?”

He opened a dresser drawer, took out a stack of undershirts, and
dropped them into the suitcase.  Deliberately avoided looking at her.  “You
know what I’m talking about,” he said.  “We made a mistake.  We did something
stupid.  It’s over, Nance.  We might as well face it and get on with our
lives.”

“This is not what I want!”

He looked at her for a moment.  Squared his jaw and turned away. 
“It’s what I want,” he said.

“Take me with you.  I would not get in the way.”

He rolled up a pair of jeans and crammed them in beside the
undershirts.  “I can’t.  There’s no room.”

“But Casey is going.”

Dropping in the only tie he owned, he said, “Casey’s part of the
team.  She has to go.”

“I do not understand.  If I cannot go, I will wait for you.  I
don’t mind so very much, waiting for you.”

Against his will, his mind drew a picture for him, a picture of
his return, of Nancy’s slender limbs wrapped around him in a hero’s welcome. 
He pushed away the picture and strengthened his resolve.  Couldn’t she see that
he was doing this for her?  “This is how it’ll be from now on,” he said.  “I’ll
be gone all the time.  All the time, Nance.  Is that what you want?  An
absentee husband?”

“You do not love me?” she said.

He squared his jaw and looked at her.  “Look,” he said, “we had
some fun times together, but I can’t deal with all this shit your parents keep
throwing at us.  It’s not worth it.  I helped you out when you were in a bind. 
Your next move’s up to you.  I just know I can’t be a part of it any more.”

She wet her lips.  “I see,” she said.

His insides knotted in agony, he played his trump card.  “I
couldn’t even promise to be faithful to you,” he said.  “A guy gets lonely on
the road.”

The silence stretched out between them.  He turned away from her,
closed his eyes and swallowed hard. 
I’m sorry
, he thought. 
So sorry
. 
“It’s the best thing for both of us,” he said.

When she didn’t respond, he slammed out of the apartment and began
walking blindly, block after block after block, his hands crammed in his
pockets, his thunderous expression prompting oncomers to veer out of his path. 
Only after the pain and the fury had turned to numbness did he go home.  His
wife was already gone, the apartment stripped of her few possessions.  Except
for the lingering scent of jasmine, she might never have been there in the
first place.

That night, for the first time since he was a kid, Rob MacKenzie
cried himself to sleep.

At twenty-three, Bryan Silver already had two platinum albums and
four hit singles to his credit.  He’d survived two broken marriages and had
auditioned two dozen or more young hopefuls for the role of wife number three. 
He had a reputation as a prima donna, an ego to match, and a dusky, soulful
voice that could make the little girls weep when it wailed the blues.  Born
Bernie Silverman in the Bronx, Bryan Silver was Ariel’s biggest success story. 
And that summer, while
Whisper in My Dreams
held steady at number one,
Drew Lawrence sent Danny Fiore on tour as Silver’s opening act.

Lawrence’s reasoning was shrewd.  Names and faces had a nasty
habit of being forgotten once their brief moment of glory was over, and one hit
record was barely worth the vinyl it was stamped on.  Danny needed exposure,
and Silver would draw the kind of audiences Lawrence wanted him exposed to.

They were scheduled for thirty-seven appearances in six weeks at
county fairs across the South.  They lived in an artificial environment, in the
close, insulated world of a traveling band:  raucous nights and monotonous days
of endless interstate highways; cotton candy and fried dough, greasy hot dogs
and lukewarm coffee; precious stolen hours of sleep on the bus between gigs;
too much togetherness and too little privacy; bottles passed around from mouth
to mouth, and the ubiquitous, sickish-sweet odor of burning marijuana.

Between stops, they
played blackjack, read newspapers, held impromptu jam sessions, wrote songs,
and grew to know each other at their best and their worst.  And Casey, who
always tried to find something likable in everyone she met, discovered that she
disliked Bryan Silver intensely.

Although from a distance Silver appeared attractive, at close
range his teeth were bad and his eyes set too close together.  When he talked
with Casey, he leaned too close, touched her too often.  Worse still was his
way of looking at her, a slow, suggestive perusal that left her feeling
soiled.  For Silver, undressing women with his eyes was probably a reflex
action, but it made Casey uncomfortable.  He never did it where Danny could
see, and she pointedly avoided being alone with the man.

Even worse was Silver’s attitude toward Danny.  The plan had been
for him to play second banana to Silver.  But night after night, in one dry,
dusty little town after another, it was Danny they were screaming for. The
audiences who had come to see Silver were refusing to let his opening act leave
the stage.  They ate him up, called him back for encore after encore.  Silver
came off looking like an afterthought, and it made him furious.  This was his
gig.  Danny Fiore was a nobody, little more than a hired hand, and Silver made
sure he didn’t forget it.  On the surface, the two men were coolly courteous,
but beneath that surface simmered an accelerating mutual dislike.  By the end
of the second week, everyone connected with the tour realized that it would be
a miracle if Fiore and Silver managed to survive the entire six weeks without
some cataclysmic confrontation.

***

The midway was alive with color and sound, and she clung to
Danny’s hand as they threaded their way through the massive throng of people. 
Smells mingled in the air:  French fries and cotton candy, pizza, and the
underlying odor of animal dung.  Casey paused at the entrance to a garish
purple tent.  The sign beside the door read 
Madame Zelda, Palm Reader
. 
“Let’s go in,” she said, tugging on Danny’s arm.

He turned to see what had caught her attention, and his brows drew
together.  “That stuff is bullshit,” he said.

“You’re not supposed to take it seriously.  It’s supposed to be
fun.”

He followed her reluctantly into the tent.  An ancient woman was
seated behind a card table, her silver hoop earrings gleaming in the
candlelight.  “Come in, come in,” she greeted them.  “I am Madame Zelda.  And
you are?”

“Casey.  And this is my husband, Danny.”

“Sit down, my dear.”

Her skin as dry and thin as rice paper, the gypsy took Casey’s
hand in her gnarled, brown one.  She studied the markings, ran a bony finger
along the lines that were scattered like a road map across Casey’s palm.  When
the old woman’s fathomless dark eyes met hers, a shock like an electrical
current ran through Casey’s body, and the hair on the back of her neck stood
up.  “You are a strong woman,” the gypsy said.

The old lady couldn’t possibly know what she was talking about. 
This was nothing more than a clever parlor trick, designed to dupe the
gullible.  “You have a long life line,” the gypsy said, pointing.  “Here. 
See?  I see many years, much happiness.  Children.  Grandchildren.”  She
paused, still studying the lines that criss-crossed Casey’s palm.  “I see a
time of great turmoil,” she said, “of heartbreak.  But you will emerge stronger
than before.” 

Again Casey experienced the odd sensation that the gypsy could see
directly into her soul.  “And I see a great love,” the woman said, “one that
will last into your old age.”

Shaken, Casey gave up her seat to Danny.  He sat gingerly in the
chair and the old woman took his hand, closed her eyes and held it for a
moment.  She opened them, and a slight smile curved her lips.  “You,” she said,
“are not a believer.”

Danny leaned back in the chair and rested his ankle on his knee. 
“No,” he said.  “I’m not.”

She smiled thinly, then turned her attention to his palm.  “Such
an intriguing palm,” she said, tracing its lines and whorls with a fingertip. 
“Full of chaotic energy.  I see success ahead of you.  But unhappiness, too. 
You must learn to temper your ambition, or it will lead to your demise.”

He snorted, but the gypsy merely shrugged.  “See here?”  She
touched his hand with her fingertip.  “You have a short life line.  You must
ground yourself, or like a shooting star, you will burn out.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.”  Danny yanked his hand away and rose from
the chair.  “This is pure bullshit,” he said to Casey.  He grabbed her by the
arm and dragged her out of the tent and back onto the midway.

Outside, there was light and noise and confusion.  Behind them,
tuneless calliope music tinkled from the carousel.  “What on earth is wrong
with you?” she said.

“I told you, I don’t believe in that bullshit.  All her talk about
heartbreak and suffering.  She’s nothing more than a money-grubbing phony.”

“You’re not supposed to take it seriously,” she said.

He shrugged his shoulders as though to ward off some evil spirit. 
Pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit one.  “It’s all prepackaged garbage,”
he said.  “A man comes in, she predicts success and burnout.  A woman comes in,
she predicts babies and everlasting love.  She throws in the turmoil and the
suffering because who doesn’t experience turmoil or suffering in the course of
a lifetime?  It’s still bullshit, no matter how you package it.”

They turned and began walking slowly along the midway, past the
crowds and the carnival barkers.  “I suppose I should be grateful,” she said
ruefully.  “After all, she did promise children and grandchildren.  Not to
mention everlasting love.”

“But with whom?  I’m supposed to crash and burn, remember?”

“Hah!  You have a bit farther to go, my darling, before you crash
and burn.”

***

The bus developed
engine trouble in a small town in Arkansas.  Amid a chorus of complaints, it
was towed to a repair shop, and Bruce, the road manager, booked the crew into a
roadside motel for the night.  It was a rare opportunity for a hot shower and a
real bed, a chance to sit in the dimly lit motel bar and lift a few while
listening to a bunch of locals perform mediocre covers of C&W tunes. 
Although country & western scored low on Casey’s list of favored music,
when Danny collapsed across the bed and began snoring before it was even dark,
she was bored enough to leave him there and join the rest of the noisy crew in
the bar.