Wife Living Dangerously (15 page)

“Go on, go on,” I implore.

Mrs. Hoffman’s pale freckled fingers flutter at the nape of her neck. “And a sweet woman grants your request, oh, what joys
await you when”—she pauses for a breath—“when she stands defenseless before you. Embracing, fondling, lying with her.” Mrs.
Hoffman folds the page and returns it to me. “
Interessant.
”

“Yes. Isn’t it? Very interesting.” My skull is reeling with the idea that this poem made Evan think of me. “Really, really
interesting. I work at the Bentley Institute, you know.”

She peers at me. “Ah. I see,” she says, austerely.

“We have pages and pages of letters like this. Yes. Pages and pages.” I can hear myself babbling. “Yes, indeed. We sure do.
From all over the world. Germany, India, Spain, China. You don’t speak Mandarin, by any chance? Do you? Hah-ha. Just kidding.”

Mrs. Hoffman is still leveling her eyes at me. “How is your husband, Mrs. Flanagan? Such a nice man.”

“Michael? He’s fine. He’s just fine. Thank you for asking, Mrs. Hoffman. That’s very kind of you to ask. And yes, he is a
very nice man.”

“Take care of him, Mrs. Flanagan.”

I can’t eat dinner tonight and I cannot sleep. I have the chills, then hot flashes, followed by piercing cramps. I remember
Evan telling me that Ovid described love as a sickness with observable symptoms. I lie in bed and listen to Michael’s B-52
and wonder what my friends would say if they knew about Evan Delaney. Would they think that this little experiment in living
dangerously had gone too far? Or not far enough?

The thirty-second annual Crappie Festival is exactly the way I’d envisioned it. Hot, buggy, packed with people and stinking
of fish. We’d driven in Frankie’s white Escalade that sticks out like a pair of Blahniks among the Dodge and Ford long-bed
pickups and now we’re trudging across the gravel parking lot, Frankie leading the pack in her farmer’s daughter getup.

Michael had arrived early to set up and wouldn’t go on for another hour. The gazebo is empty except for the instruments and
amplifiers. I see my husband’s old saxophone propped against a beam. There’s also a microphone stand in the center of the
stage. I send up a quick prayer. Please, Lord, don’t let it be Edith Berry. Let it be that big fat guy who owns the tattoo
parlor, the one who looks like Orson Welles and sings like Steve Tyler. Or if it has to be a woman, how about Helen Zimp,
who sang with the band at the last open mike gig;
she’s
got a great voice and I happen to know that she’s in a happy, long-term lesbian relationship.

“I see him!” Frankie calls out. “I see Michael! Over there!”

“Where?” I’m roasting in my long-sleeved rayon shirt and my thighs are beginning to chafe.

“Over there. With the—” Frankie stops herself. Then, reluctantly, “With the girl in the bra. A girl that looks like Catherine
Zeta-Jones.”

Michael and Edith are sitting on a picnic bench, elbow to elbow, reading something on a clipboard. They’re probably just looking
over their list of songs, maybe making a few last-minute adjustments.

“That’s not a bra, Frankie,” I say. “It’s a halter top.”

“Sure looks like a bra to me,” Frankie mumbles as we get closer.

“That’s Edith,” I say. “She sings with Michael’s band.”

“Is that
all
she does with Michael’s band?” Frankie sniggers.

“Enough,” says Annie.

I must admit, it
does
look like Edith is wearing a bra or maybe a bathing-suit top. I’d wanted to see Michael before the show and wish him luck,
but upon reconsideration it’s probably best not to talk to him now. I know how he gets before he performs. He says he goes
into what he calls “The Zone” before every performance, some kind of Zen-like state of intense focus. I’ve learned by now
that The Zone doesn’t have room for The Wife so I suggest we check out the quilt booth.

The band has assembled itself onstage and at precisely twelve o’clock Amos Brewster Jr., president of the Rotary Club, takes
the stage. It is disorienting to see Amos Brewster in a bright orange T-shirt and long, baggy shorts that expose his fat,
veiny legs. Amos Brewster is a loan officer at the First Federal bank and until today I have never seen him in anything but
dull gray suits.

“Well, I’ve got to admit, I wanted the bluegrass band we had last year, but I’m not on the music committee so I guess I don’t
get a vote.”

I want to force myself to laugh but it’s too hot. Amos mops the sweat from his forehead with a white handkerchief and holds
up his hands.

“Just kidding. Actually, Joe Patterson’s a good buddy of mine, and when he told me he had himself a rock band, I said, Joe,
you gotta play the Crappie Festival, because we’ll give you a mighty warm reception and all the fried crappie you can eat.
Am I right, ladies and gentlemen? So join me, please, in welcoming Past the Legal Limit!”

A faint cheer dribbles through the crowd. Amos wipes his thick neck and steps gingerly down the plank steps. The band opens
with “Long Train Runnin’” and then Edith appears from the back of the stage and grabs the microphone off the stand. She is
lithe as a gymnast, is wearing a short red skirt and platform sandals, and, of course, the halter/bra thing that just barely
covers her areolas, and she’s wiggling her rear end and shimmying her boobs and singing and sweating and draping her arms
around the various band members and at one point drops to her knees and sings real close to the mouth of Michael’s sax while
he thrusts his hips in a kind of mock display of fellatio and I think I’m going to have a heart attack. Now I know why Michael
hasn’t been interested in sex. He’s already having it, here onstage, where there is passion and throbbing energy and sweat
and crescendos and climaxes, one after the other. Here is where he finds the connection, the intimacy, the power and release.
Not with me, not in our bed.

“Sexy girl,” Frankie mutters. “Should we shoot her or strangle her?”

Frankie doesn’t have much patience for young flirty things, not since her first husband had a three-night stand with a Steak
’n Shake waitress while Frankie was visiting her ailing father in Salt Lake City. Frankie came home unexpectedly early and
found them both naked in the kitchen foraging in the fridge for a post-sex snack.

“It’s okay, Frankie,” I say, trying not to cry. “She’s a singer. They’re performing.”

“Sure they are,” says Frankie.

Edith is holding a bottle of Corona in one hand, a lit cigarette in the other. Somewhere in the middle of “Brown Sugar,” she
leans forward, pulls the cigarette out of her mouth, and holds it to Michael’s lips while he takes a drag.

I have never seen my husband smoke.

I feel a clawing inside my chest, the force of rage and confusion fighting to rip through me. I will not cry. I will not cry.
I will not cry. Not now. Not here. I insist on going home before the show ends and we’re halfway to Frankie’s Escalade when
I hear gravel crunching behind me. It’s Michael, panting and looking concerned. “Hey. Hon. Are you okay? Why are you leaving?
We still have another set.”

“I’m feeling a little…”

“She’s feeling a little
overwhelmed,
” Frankie says, glaring at him.

Michael looks confused. “What do you mean?”

“When did you start smoking?” I said, trying to sound casual but wanting to tear out what little hair my husband has left.

“Is that it? You saw me take a puff of a cigarette? Oh, honey, sweetie, it’s nothing, it’s just part of the act. I don’t even
inhale.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I say, backing away. “It’s nothing. I’m just a little, you know, the heat. I’ll see you back at the
house, okay?”

“Can I bring you back anything?” I can’t decide if the offer is sincere or guilt-ridden. “Ice cream? Aspirin? Anything?”

“I’m fine. Have a nice show. Break a leg, okay?” I realize that my friends have flanked me like a couple of bodyguards.

“Hey, don’t forget I won’t be home ’til late tonight,” he calls out. “We still have that gig at the American Legion hall.”

“Yeah, right,” I say, weakly. I go home to feed, bathe, and cuddle the kids and then, thanks to a sleeping pill and hot bath,
I am out within thirty minutes. The next morning I decide not to mention anything to Michael. I tell him that he was spectacular
at the Crappie Festival and I go to work knowing that I will see Evan Delaney and all will be right with the world.

O
ne week has passed since the Crappie Festival and I feel more turmoil than ever but not because of my husband or Edith Berry
or gnawing memories of Susie Margolis, which are all bad enough but not the worst of it. The worst is that my head throbs
with fantasies of Evan Delaney and the guilt is unbearable. If I keep this to myself any longer I swear to God it’s all going
to come shooting out of the top of my head like a Roman candle. I must talk to Annie, dear Annie, sturdy and stable Annie,
pillar of church and community, confidante, counsel of, and comforter.

We meet at the Freedom Café, a vegetarian restaurant that first opened its doors thirty years ago by hippies who had moved
here for college and never left. The restaurant bears few of its early trademarks: Even the original vegetarian menu has been
expanded to include fish, free-range chicken, and buffalo burgers. The waiters are no longer touchy-feely weavers and sculptors.
They are aspiring actors who comport themselves like pampered house cats, bored and aloof and frequently hostile. When Annie
asks for the standard basket of rolls, our skeletal waitress says nothing but arches a single eyebrow and steps away. Eventually
she reappears with the bread and drops it on the table with a loud sigh. Annie lifts the napkin and notices that there is
no butter, but we’re both too scared of the waitress to say anything.

“So, what’s going on, my friend?” Annie splits open a warm roll and inhales the steam.

This is like jumping off a diving board. It would have been so easy to turn around, but I’d gotten myself to this point and
had to force myself to step forward and plunge in.

“Remember when I said I was attracted to someone?”

“You weren’t talking about your husband, were you?”

“No. I wasn’t.” My face is burning. “Oh, God, Annie, this is so stupid. It’s embarrassing. I’m such an idiot.”

Annie puts her hands over mine. “You’re not an idiot. You’re a wonderful person and you’re trying very hard to be a good wife.
Whatever you’re feeling, Julia, it’s allowed. Can you please believe me when I say that?”

I nod feebly. Then I tell her about Evan. She asks me if we’d kissed and I say no, of course not. She asks if we’d touched
and I say no, not intentionally. She asks me what I like about him, and I am filled with warmth and light as I tell her that
he is kind and attentive, handsome and interesting. But what I like most about Evan Delaney, I say, is that he actually wants
to
be
with me. I am attracted to him, and I am attracted to his attraction to me.

“He likes my perm,” I say, “and my orange sweater.” I can feel my head flooding with tears.

“That’s okay, that’s okay,” Annie says. “You’re married. You’re not dead. Who wouldn’t enjoy that kind of attention from a
great-looking guy? But look. Julia. The important thing is, you’re not acting on it. You’re just basking in it. What’s so
wrong about that?”

“Because I
want
to act on it.” I tell her about the poem, the one that made him think of me.

“So maybe he’s flirting with you. It keeps life interesting. You’re not allowed to flirt back? So you want him. Big deal.”

“It
is
a big deal, Annie. I’m a married woman.”

“Well, how about your marriage, Julia? Are you guys okay? You don’t think there’s anything going on with that singer girl,
do you, whatever her name is, the one with the bra.”

“Edith Berry. No. Michael’s not like that. And it wasn’t a bra, it was a halter top.”

“You sure he’s not messing around?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

But, honestly, how could I be? After the Susie Margolis Incident, anything is possible. Maybe having an affair is like crack
cocaine. You’ve got to have it again. I’ve read the magazine articles, I’ve heard the horror stories passed around at The
Hairport, wonderful husbands dropping bombshells, destroying families, remarrying, having babies with younger wives. Look
what happened to Alexis Merriweather. Alexis and Paul, married nineteen years, the
perfect
couple, and I don’t just mean because they looked good together, which they did, but because they were friends. They actually
did things as a team, like build a canoe in their garage, take a Chinese cooking class, go on a cross-country bed-and-breakfast
tour while the kids were in summer camp. Michael and I couldn’t even manage laying self-stick tile in the basement bathroom
without bickering. Then one day I see Alexis in Borders reading a book with a title like
Leave Him Without a Pot to Piss In: A Smart Woman’s Guide to Divorce.
I heard through The Hairport grapevine that Paul e-mailed Alexis one day (yes,
e-mailed
) to say that he was moving out and nothing could stop him; he’d been having an affair with their dog groomer and had never
been happier. It reminded me of that poor woman in New York who was killed when an air conditioner fell on her head. Alexis
never saw it coming.

“At least I don’t think he’s fooling around. But he does have this new life with the band, this exciting new life.” I feel
the pressure of tears building behind my eyes. “I guess I just feel left out.”

Annie smiles and raises a finger in the air. “Wait a second. Wait a second. I’m getting an idea here.”

“What?”

“Why can’t
you
be part of Michael’s new life?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you could sing with Michael’s band. I’ve heard you sing, Julia. You have a
beautiful
voice. You could show up on open mike night or whatever they call it and blow them all away. Your husband will see this sexy
creature up on that stage and he won’t be able to take his hands off you.”