Dream Lover (3 page)

I’d never had many friends, but now I was completely isolated. My sisters didn’t question what I was up to.

“I am almost afraid to ask,” Heather stated. “I just hope you are safe.” Prophetic. Now Heather and Mark are back together with one son and another on the way. Will they ever allow me to touch their children again?

After the first week of Jack’s disappearance, I started to get frightened. During the first few days that he didn’t show up, I examined each move I had made and word I had said, to try to uncover anything that might have annoyed him. There was nothing. I had become a voiceless, selfless automaton. So that left the possibility that he had gone on vacation and forgotten to tell me. It had happened before and he wasn’t apologetic when he returned and I confronted him. I factored nowhere in his life. I was a hand job in the bathroom during lunch for the price of a hot dog and soda.

By the tenth day of his absence, I was frantic. What if he had moved away, or gotten another job? I had a friend from yoga who worked in the ER at St. Vincent’s; she suggested I check out the obituaries in the
New York Times
when I confided in her. It took another week and two sick days of searching, but that’s where I finally found him. Jack Edward Smith. I couldn’t read further. It was the correct Jack; this one was fifty-five, lived at the beach, but on Long Island, not in New Jersey. I lay down on my bed and pulled the covers up under my chin. He was dead! His funeral had come and gone. I needed a calendar to check the dates, to see where I was and what I was doing when he died. I got out of bed and brought the calendar back. Somehow, I had to force myself to read the obituary. There was a related story.

Why would anyone write about Jack? The article would tell a lot. I was fucking a well-known person!
Jack Edward Smith, born September 30, 1955, died May 28 in Manhattan. Mr. Smith suffered a massive heart attack on a train bound for Long Island. He was mugged sometime before passengers discovered him. He later died in the hospital. His wife, the former Pamela Fabian of Brooklyn, was unavailable for comment. Mr. Smith was a partner in the firm Lane, Smith, and Romney. His partner, Peter Romney, stated that it was “a sad day for the company. But business will go on.”
I sat back against my pillows. The story about the boss being a tyrant was a lie. I picked up my laptop and continued reading.

The father of two college students, Mr. Smith was well known in the community for his involvement in the Babylon Athletic League. Generous supporters of the arts in Manhattan, the Smiths rarely missed a performance at Lincoln Center.

He was the son of Bernice Stein Smith and the late Harold Smith of Columbus Circle.

The funeral was held in Babylon the day after Memorial Day. It is estimated that several hundred friends and family from around the country paid homage. The decedent’s brother, William Smith, gave a moving tribute to his brother. Burial was private.

I was unable to move. Thinking back three weeks ago, I remembered our dialogue on Thursday, the last day I saw him.

“Have a good holiday. You get a long weekend, correct? The Exchange isn’t open on Memorial Day.” We were walking back toward Wall Street, but would be parting ways before we reached it. It was the first time I had been with him all week. Was he going to ask to see me over the weekend? During the past eight months or so, he had said he was tied up with a project that required him to be out of the office more and more. He wouldn’t always be downtown at lunchtime. “So what are you going to do with yourself?” he asked. And then he did the unforgiveable: He looked at his watch.

I should have suspected something, because the previous autumn he stopped seeing me for the rare nighttime rendezvous. We were limited to one or two half-hour screws a week and we rarely met on the street anymore. I would have to walk to the campus bathroom. I was sure he either was seeing someone else who might run into us or his boss was getting suspicious. It was starting to bother me enough that I was building the courage to say something to him, and then he had to go and die. I couldn’t even stop seeing him on my own.

I decided I would sell the jewelry he gave me; it meant nothing to me now. And I couldn’t pass that hot dog cart again without feeling like crap. I certainly wouldn’t be making any farewell visits to the bathroom. I gathered everything he had given to me and took it to a jeweler I knew in Journal Square. He offered me almost eight thousand dollars for it. But before I took the check, I thought of something else. I wanted to have something to prove we had been together, and the only thing I had was the jewelry. He never called me, so I had no cell phone records, and he always paid for the hotel, so I didn’t have a receipt. There were no ticket stubs, no mementos of any kind, except for fifteen or sixteen pieces of jewelry. The guy in Journal Square thought the garnet earrings might have been estate pieces. I had wondered if they were stolen. Having read that he was a partner in a Wall Street firm of some kind, I hadn’t researched that yet. He was probably rich, too. His parents were from Columbus Circle. That fact said a ton. I left without selling the jewelry.

I needed a plan. The first thing I could do was go to his office. I wanted to see where he worked. He hadn’t said much about anything; the only person I knew anything about was his boss, the religious fanatic. Now that I knew he was a partner, all of the boss talk was a lie. At lunch, I decided to make my visit. The obit had said his company was Lane, Smith and Romney. I went in the front entrance and walked to the directory hanging by the elevators. His office was on thirty-five. I got on the elevator, my heart pounding so hard I wondered if my clothes were moving. What did I have to be afraid of? He was dead. He wouldn’t get angry with me. The worst that could happen was that I would be escorted out. I wouldn’t cause a scene. I just needed to be validated.

The elevator opened directly into the reception area. It was gorgeous. There was a gleaming desk made of some light, modern wood, with a giant brass sign bearing the partners’ names. The lighting was perfect, soft area lighting and direct work lights over the receptionist. She was young and attractive and smiled a big, toothy smile.

“May I help you?” she asked.

“I’m here for Mr. Smith,” I lied. That would get their attention. The receptionist frowned and asked me to have a seat. She picked up her phone and keyed in some numbers, speaking softly into the receiver.

“Someone will be right out,” she said. In less than a minute, a tall, beautiful young woman walked in. She extended her hand.

“I’m Sandra Benson,” she said. “Did you say you had an appointment with Mr. Smith?”

I didn’t speak for a minute, unsure what to say next.

“Not an appointment. I’m just here to see him.”

Sandra Benson spent a few seconds thinking and then said, “Come with me, won’t you?” And she smiled down at me. When I stood up, I realized she was several inches taller than I was. Although I was sure she was younger, I felt silly and immature next to her. It was stupid to come here, but now that I had risked it, I needed to find out more about him. What was he? I was examining why I had allowed him to treat me so badly and I wanted to know why he did it. Who was Jack Smith? I followed her down a long, low-ceilinged, narrow passageway. When I entered her office, I was surprised at its size, the height of the ceilings, the view of the harbor, and the loveliness of the art she had chosen to hang. I would later come to find out that Jack himself had bought the oil painting of vividly colored flower gardens that hung on the wall behind her desk.

“Sit down, won’t you?” She pointed to a chair positioned in front of her desk as she walked around to sit behind it. I felt as though I was at a job interview, and in a few moments, this person would be asking me why I felt that I was suited for the job. “Now what can I do for you?” she asked. She had a pleasant smile but I could sense a tension behind her eyes, as though she had been through this before. She waited patiently for me to start talking, but as soon as I opened my mouth, the tears started. I was disgusted with myself.

“I was seeing a man who worked here, and I haven’t heard from him for a few weeks. I was just wondering if he was okay. I don’t mean to cause any trouble.” She pushed a box of tissues toward me but remained silent. Her facial expression had barely changed, but it was discernible: I was correct; she had been through this before. I wasn’t the first one. Then she smiled at me.

“Why don’t you tell me about it? Jack is a well-loved man. Have you been seeing him long?” I couldn’t read Sandra Benson. Was she really concerned? Or digging? I decided I didn’t care. I needed validation.

“We have been together for three years.” When the words were out, I realized how ludicrous it sounded. We weren’t really together, but I would not tell her that. I could see that the news was not welcome. She stood up and began walking around her desk. I was thinking she might show me the door but instead, she went over and shut it, turning the lock.

“That’s a long time. But I am confused, so please forgive me if I ask too many questions. First of all, I think I need to tell you that Jack passed away. Memorial Day weekend. He had a heart attack on the train.” Although I knew it, hearing it for real made me cry again. She didn’t know that I had come there aware he was dead. I wanted information from her, so I stayed in character: the shocked and grieving girlfriend. I put my head down in my hands and had a good ball. She didn’t move to comfort me or say anything to try to make me feel better. She actually looked a little pissed but was doing her best to hide it. I found myself wondering if she had been fucking him, too.

“Were you a client of his?” The young woman looked like she was in a position of authority in the company; her office alone said “important” and was not one that your average secretary would occupy. Surely, she would know who was a client and who wasn’t. I was not going to lie.

“No, not a client.” I felt silly after that. What did I hope to accomplish? Why did I bring a purse full of jewelry with me? Was I hoping to extort money from his business? What power did I have? So what if he screwed me? Millions of men did the same thing every day and never suffered a consequence. I guess I simply wanted some acknowledgment that I existed, that what I had with him was worth something. But what? I didn’t have anything of value with him at all. I could have gone on and had another relationship that meant something and it wouldn’t have mattered to him at all. I suddenly knew that I had loved him. I had kept hoping each time we were together that he would love me. But it wasn’t possible. He may not have been capable of loving if he could use someone as he used me. A free whore. I started to stand up, to leave. “I’m sorry to have bothered you. I don’t really know why I came here after all, but I am sorry he is dead,” I said.

She spoke up finally. “No, don’t go. I can see that Jack meant something to you. Do you want to talk about it?” She started to walk around her desk again. She had a look of concern on her face, but there was something about her eyes that alarmed me. They were cold and hard. She had to have been involved with him, too, in some manner. A casual business associate wouldn’t have been so intrigued, would she have? “Let’s go get a cup of coffee. I’m ready to get out in the air for a little walk. How about you?”

“Okay. I apologize for interrupting your day. I need to call my office first, though. I shouldn’t have gone to work today. I’m going to tell them that I’m ill.”

She leaned forward and pushed her desk phone toward me. “Go ahead and use my phone. The number is blocked; they won’t know where you are calling from. We don’t always get great cell phone reception on this side of the building.” She walked to the door and unlocked it, letting herself out and giving me privacy. I called and explained that I had gotten ill while out for lunch and would not be back for the rest of the day. Of course, that meant sneaking around. She came back in to retrieve her purse.

“Is everything alright?” she asked. I said it was. “We can take a cab north and you won’t have to worry about anyone seeing you. There is a little coffee shop right by the bridge that I like. Is that okay?” Sandra was being so kind; I had forgotten that she might be a competitor for the affections of Jack Smith. But that wasn’t possible now, was it? He was dead.

We walked side by side along the corridor and stepped into the elevator. We didn’t speak. Once outside, I felt the rush of air leave my lungs; I had been holding my breath. What was I waiting for? This woman, a colleague of Jack’s, someone possibly in love with him, was interested in me because of him. Was she operating out of curiosity? What would make a work associate interested enough to take time away from her job to cross-examine me? My women’s intuition was boiling over. I thought I would allow her to continue being the dominant female and do the questioning. I would listen carefully for anything that might shed some light on her relationship with Jack. I watched her step off the curb and raise her arm for a cab. One came right away. She was dressed in a summer-weight suit that didn’t look high end, with a silk blouse underneath it, and very expensive shoes. She saw me looking at her feet and laughed.

“No matter what, all women love shoes,” she said. “They weren’t as expensive as you’d think. I got them on eBay!”

“No way!” I exclaimed stupidly. “How did you know they were real?”

“I’ve dealt with the seller before.” She turned her foot so I could see the sides and back.

“Stunning!” I exclaimed. I never bought shoes anywhere but at Marshall’s in Newport Center. My salary precluded designer shoes. “It might be dangerous for someone with my budget to start looking on eBay for a bargain.”

She looked at me curiously. “What do you do?”

“I’m a secretary at the Exchange. I have a degree in math, but couldn’t find a job and didn’t want to teach. My family is disgusted. I have already been there for nine years and in twenty, I can retire. I think I’ll stay. If I don’t get fired first.” Why did I say that? After the first few months of escaping every day for a forty-five minute rendezvous with Jack, I never gave it another thought and no one chastised me for taking long lunches. It occurred to me just then that maybe he’d had a hand in it. Maybe he knew someone at the Exchange. “Let Cindy take longer lunches so I can have sex with her.” I wondered if that was why I was still employed.