Substitute for Love (16 page)

She got to her hands and knees, then used the sink to leverage herself to her feet. She reached for the light switch. Her face in the mirror was ghastly white and her eyes were as lifeless as ice. It was what the black hole did to her. She could not go anywhere tonight.

“Reyna, darling, I’m so glad you’re here.” Her father’s hand was cool on her back. He said in a low tone, “I was hoping you would change.”

“I didn’t have time,” she muttered. Her cocktail dress was hanging in the closet in her office. She could not bring herself to put it on. Not tonight.

“Come meet the guests of honor,” he said jovially. She could tell he was displeased.

She expressed her pleasure at meeting the two professors and listened with a fixed smile to their compliments about her father’s conservative zeal and the work of the Putnam Institute. She nodded and prayed that whatever expression was on her face could be mistaken for pride. Her father’s phenomenal radio success had financed the foundation of the Putnam Institute, and millions and millions of dollars from conservative groups seeking Grip’s guidance and the research prowess of Pi’s vaunted staff had built the campus where Reyna spent her working life. The money created the power, and she was a prisoner to it. Her father saw to it that she had little time to herself.

“You’re the author of the talking points on prayer in public schools, aren’t you?” The woman was speaking to her alone, now. Her husband had been lured away by Grip to meet a new arrival.

Reyna nodded and wished to be elsewhere. “I had a lot of help,” she said, trying to spread the blame around.

Professor Atchison smoothed her red suit. “I’m sure that’s just false modesty. You made several brilliant points.”

Reyna gave her the smile that hid how much the comment grieved her. “It’s all in the service,” she said brightly.

The professor regarded her seriously. “There’s adequate and there is brilliant. I know the difference and use each precisely as I mean it.”

“I don’t take compliments well,” Reyna answered. What was the woman’s first name? She’d forgotten in the space of a minute.

“That’s not surprising,” the other woman said drily. “Women are conditioned that way. I spent three hours choosing this suit and two hours on this ridiculous hair style.” She waved an elegant hand, heavy with a diamond wedding ring, at the twist of smooth brown hair that graced the nape of her neck. “Tell me I look wonderful.”

Taken aback, Reyna dutifully said, “You look wonderful.”

“Oh, it was nothing,” the professor replied, then her mouth widened in a grin. “See? I even know I’ve been conditioned to negate compliments and I do it anyway.”

“It’s hard to overcome your programming.” She sought a way to escape the conversation.

“You, Eleanor Roosevelt and I all agree on that.”

The pairing of her name with Eleanor Roosevelt’s set off alarm bells in Reyna’s mind. She hoped that none of that showed as she studied the other woman — lord, what was her name?

“Irene, honey, there’s someone I want you to meet.” The other professor — Dan, she recalled now — was back at his wife’s side.

Irene was consummately poised. She nodded her acquiescence before turning back to Reyna. “I lent my copy of the talking points to a student and keep forgetting to ask for another. Perhaps we could find one before the evening is over?”

“Certainly,” Reyna said automatically. The alarm bells were louder, but there was nothing on which to base her fear. Unless there was a deeply suppressed but predatory gleam in Irene’s eyes, or a shared nuance of restraint. Eleanor Roosevelt had had a long-term lesbian relationship, and although most people thought of her only as a First Lady, Reyna always thought of her as journalist Lorena Hickok’s lover. Lorena had been the first woman to cover the White House for the Associated Press, and Reyna had long admired her. No, Reyna cautioned herself, no, it’s all you. Irene didn’t mean anything by it. You’re the one craving what you know you can’t have — not tonight.

The party became a blur. She let herself be pulled into a what-if conversation with other staffers about elections and polling results. Normally she eschewed them as unproductive, but tonight she had an extra glass of wine and talked politics. Anything was better than the images that spun wildly through her head of a room pulsating with music and women who moved against her. She could almost hear the music, the moaning, and she made herself talk about seats that might be won and districts reclaimed, issues carried, as if any of that mattered a damn when she lived such a monumental lie —

“I was wondering if we could find a copy of those talking points.”

The cool voice cut into Reyna’s schizophrenic hold on her fantasies and the conversation. She nodded. “Sure, I’ll print you one if there aren’t any in my files.”

She led the way from the reception hall through to the marbled floors of the main lobby, then along through the security door to the rear elevators. Her office was on the fifth floor, the same floor as her father’s suite of offices, but at the opposite end with the other senior research analysts. The only light was supplied from the main hallway, but she knew her way around after all the years of late nights.

She swiped her access card when they reached her door. The other buildings of the Institute campus gleamed white in the night. Sometimes the serenity of the setting, with only canyon and trees in the distance, soothed her. But not tonight. “If you’ll hold it open for me I can probably find a copy without having to phone in the after-hours code for the lights. It’s a pain.”

Irene stood silhouetted in the doorway and Reyna registered the pleasing shape but only peripherally. She was hungering for a lesbian, not just any female body. Her vision blurred for a moment, because it was easy to pretend that Irene was a lover, waiting for her to leave work behind, eager for the moment when they would be alone and together.

“I can’t find a copy — I’ll need the lights,” she explained. She punched the eight-digit key combination into her phone, got it wrong, tried again. Finally, the office lights came on. She blinked at Irene, who did not look in the least disconcerted by the abrupt fluorescent glare. “They’re too bright at first, aren’t they?”

Irene let the door swing shut. “But it’s energy-efficient.”

There was no argument to be made to that, so Reyna went back to searching her file cabinet for a copy of the document Irene wanted. She knew the research coordinator had copies in her files, but they were locked — everything was always locked.

“No luck. I’ll print you one.”

“Or maybe you could e-mail it to me.”

“That would work,” Reyna said carefully. They could have settled that downstairs.

Irene wrote her university e-mail address on the back of one of Reyna’s business cards and pocketed a second one. She left the address on Reyna’s desk, then looked up suddenly into Reyna’s face.

The alarm bells were back, clanging against Reyna’s already fragile nerves. Was it her or was it Irene? She didn’t want Irene, for all her charm and poise. Could it be Irene?

A flash, a crack in the perfect picture of a married university professor — gone before she was sure she’d seen it. Recognition, even, not of the longing, but of the way they were both fighting it.

There was something there, Reyna knew, because they walked back to the party in the kind of silence that holds a secret, and parted once they arrived. She was able to make a departure before she gave in to the temptation of another glass of wine. Home, she would go home.

She went to the Friday night movies instead. She had turned toward home, but then caught sight of the tan sedan that had followed her out of the parking lot. Bastards, she thought, sit in the cold near the theater, then. No reason for her to be the only one who was miserable.

She was in marginal luck — it was Mel Brooks night and for a while she found the energy to laugh and the nagging headache faded. Maybe she could just go for a ride, let the wind blow away some of the pain. She knew she could never get all the way to WeHo and back before the end of the final movie, when she would be missed by the private detective out front. But a quick, fast bike ride — that had appeal.

She went up the dark aisle and was saved by a flash of light from the movie that illuminated the back rows of the theater and the man sitting there who carefully did not look at her. She went to the restroom and then back to her seat, fighting tears. When the movie was over she left, not lingering for the last feature. Her breath in the cold air misted her sight, but her ears clearly heard the measured steps of the detective. Tonight was not a new face, but they all looked the same, weary retired cops to whom she was a tedious assignment. She often wondered what their instructions were. Report anything suspicious? Any deviation from the normal schedule? Any time she talks to a woman?

She whirled suddenly. “I’m going home.”

She had startled him. A flicker of chagrin crossed the weathered, lined face. “That makes it easy for me.”

“I don’t really care.” She headed for her car, sorry she had broken her promise to herself to ignore the detectives.

His voice followed her. “I’m a big Mel Brooks fan, so thanks. Next week is mother-daughter flicks — maybe you could take in a regular movie at the cineplex, for my sake.”

She didn’t intend to respond, but the words escaped before she could literally bite down on her tongue. “I can’t wait for mother-daughter films. And fuck you.”

Good move, she told herself, as she squealed away from the curb. Now you’ve got one of them mad at you.

She drove sedately homeward, hating the headlights in her rear-view mirror. She parked in her assigned space and trailed upstairs, feeling tired, depressed and empty, and knowing it was never any different.

It wasn’t until she slipped her cell phone into the charging cradle that she remembered she’d turned it off in the theater. She switched it on and went to check her messages, even though she wouldn’t do anything about them until morning. Her cell phone rang even as she listened to the message from the nurse — damn it, damn it — left over three hours ago. She grabbed the cell phone off the cradle.

“Her condition is improving, but you should come right away,” the nurse — it sounded like Jean — said urgently. “They were able to remove the tube about an hour ago. She’s asking for you.”

“I’m on my way. I went to the movies,” she said irrelevantly. She flipped the phone closed and raced out the front door and down the stairs to the parking garage, all while still repeating to herself, “I went to the movies.”

She hated herself with every stoplight, cursed herself and any progeny she might ever have for her selfishness. Only today she hadn’t been able to stop herself wondering when this might happen. Rationally, she knew that fate didn’t work this way. She had almost been wishing her mother’s suffering — and your own, she reminded herself harshly, as if they could possibly be equal — would soon be at an end. But that was not the reason her mother had had a severe seizure. She would never believe that God worked that way.

Maybe, she prayed, she hoped, maybe it wasn’t too bad. Jean had said her condition was improving. She pushed the light at Commons and then squealed up to the parking lot of the University Medical Center. If the detective was following her it was at a distance because she seemed all alone as she ran across the asphalt to the main doors. Maybe this seizure was just like the last one, severe but short-lived. Maybe, she prayed, she hoped, this isn’t it. She didn’t want it to be, truly she didn’t, she had never meant it. And she still ran, knowing the quick route through the staff entrance and on to the less-used rear elevators. Seventh floor, rheumatology, no, what was she thinking? That was arthritis and joint pain. Not dermatology, that was skin rashes and they had no night staffing. The internists were on three, the neurologists on six — intensive care. She needed to be on the fourth floor. She ran down the stairs.

“Reyna!” Jean’s voice called her to the left when she emerged from the stairwell. She felt dizzy and her mouth was dry.

“I was at the movies,” she said and then she was very quiet because the swirling voices in her head — reminding her of where she had wanted to be, what she might have been doing when this happened — were threatening to drown out the calming effect of Jean’s words.

“She’s stabilized, and her vitals are recovering. They think it was the antimalarial regimen she began — it doesn’t work for everybody. Dr. Basu was here a few minutes ago and he was really pleased with her turnaround. She’s been awake for about thirty minutes.”

“I was at the movies,” Reyna offered, aware at the same time that she was disconnected from what was happening.

Jean put her arm around her shoulders. “Coffee first. My lord, you’re shivering. She’s fine. Come on, let’s get some coffee. You don’t want her to see you like this.”

It was too sugary and needed milk, but Reyna felt better halfway down the cup. Jean had been right. Her mother’s condition would hardly be helped by seeing Reyna in a panic. Jean reappeared from the secret recesses of the hospital, where she had worked from time to time, with a cheese sandwich. Reyna made herself eat it, wondering if it was tasteless because she was so numb or because it was hospital food.

“Your color’s back, that’s better,” Jean commented.

“Thank you. I’m not even your patient.”

“You’re welcome. I bet all you’ve had since dinner was popcorn.”

“I skipped dinner. Had some hors d’oeuvres and wine around seven. And Raisinets.” She met Jean’s gaze for the first time. “Bad night to go to the movies.”

“Don’t think that way,” Jean said firmly. “Your mother worries about you. Worries that you work too hard, that you don’t get much fun. Tell her where you were — she’ll be happier for it, I promise you.”

She nodded, knowing that Jean’s understanding of her mother no doubt surpassed her own. She got to her feet and felt steadier. “If I haven’t thanked you lately for the wonderful care and support you give my mother, let me rectify that — thank you.”

Jean’s smile further warmed her eyes. “Your mother makes it easy to care. Go on in now.”