Undo Part 8

In just fifteen minutes Kate had made an impression on him like no other woman ever had. Meanings for her wandered into his mind.

Intelligent. Simple. Pure. True. What you see is what you get, he surmised. After the meal, she sang. Her voice was enchanting, perfect, and as she sang about pain and hope and love he knew that he had to get to know her personally. Immediately after her performance he introduced himself. At first she seemed disinterested. He suspected her judgment was influenced by his involvement in an industry notorious for destroying the environment. And perhaps also by the eight years difference in their ages. He invited her to visit Wallaby for a personal tour.

She hesitated, but ultimately he persuaded her to accept after asking for a chance to prove that he and Wallaby were unlike all the rest. When she arrived a week later, she surprised him with a special gift: A bottle of wine from her parents' obscure little vineyard in Oregon, where she had grown up. It was a Cabernet Sauvignon, bottled the same year he had founded Wallaby. He was touched by the thoughtfulness of her gesture, and told her she had to be the one to share it with him when the company was ten years old. Her tour was scheduled to last two hours, but as Peter expressed his own thoughts and concerns about the environment, the state of education, the future, they engaged in long and satisfying conversation, and by the end of the day their attraction for one another was evident. And had remained so to this day. They were two people comfortable with themselves and with each other. She maintained a home in Los Angeles, where she was constantly at work on her music or lending her celebrity status to political causes about which she felt strongly. She came to stay with Peter between recordings and projects, and her independence meshed perfectly with his own like composure, creating the foundation for what had become a lasting and loving relations.h.i.+p. They had been together for nearly eight years, and the distance between them imposed by their careers generated a constant longing that kept their affection for one another fresh and alive. Sometimes, like now, it was difficult and he wished they could be together more often. Especially now, with everything the way it was at Wallaby...

And with that thought, he opened his eyes and came back around to the present, and to his guest.

Ivy was lowering a coffee cup from her lips, staring at him. Had she made a pot? He hadn't even heard her in the kitchen. In front of him sat a steaming cup of coffee. Perfect, he thought. That odd sense of dread he'd experienced earlier had returned, just for an instant, when he'd opened his eyes. He needed to sober up a little.

Abruptly she spoke.

"Is it true?"

"What's that?" he asked. He met her azure eyes with a perplexed smile. She gestured with a nod to where the music was coming from. "That you two are lovers?"

"Completely."

She nodded, added more coffee to her cup, very slowly, with considerable concentration. She emptied half a packet of Equal into her coffee. Addressing her immersed spoon, she said, "In everything I read, like "People," or that story about you in last month's "Esquire," they say you'll probably get married. To her."

"I don't know, it's hard to say" Peter said, knowing the right thing to do would be to agree with the speculation, but choosing to answer truthfully instead. "We're both very busy. She's always recording or involved in some cause or another. And I'm at Wallaby." The feeling of dread inside his heart rolled on its side. However this time, instead of striking quickly and fading away, its presence seemed to stretch out and linger as he sat watching what Ivy was doing with her half-empty packet of Equal.

She had dumped the remainder of the artificial sweetener onto the black enamel table. Using the straight edge of the little blue packet, she cut several fine, stark, parallel lines from the small white pile of grains.

Not very subtle, and not a good sign. He attempted to resume the conversation.

"Anyway, as far as marriage, we've never really discussed it seriously."

All of the sudden, he understood the feeling a.s.saulting his senses. Trepidation.

Something - no, a number of things - were going to happen. It was as though a crystal ball had bloomed in his mind's eye, giving him a quick peek into the near future. It all came in a blurry rush, no single picture or image freezing long enough to grasp completely. But he caught the gist, just same. He would go through all the required motions, but in the back of his mind he knew he was helpless. What was coming, he realized with a throbbing certainty amplified by the wine, was only natural.

Jesus, how sick that sounded to his private ear. Still, he wouldn't give in without a fight, for that, too, was only natural. Quietly he stared at the lines she'd cut, mesmerized by their orderliness.

Ivy, too, studied the straightness of her lines, her upper lip hidden beneath the lower. She was the first to notice the silence, to sense its uneasy drift. With a great gust, she blew the white lines from the table and looked across the table at him with a renewed smile.

"Oh, hey. Sorry. I had a little skip down unhappy-memory-lane there for a second, is all. I hope I didn't upset you."

Peter looked at her. He shook his head, then rose without a word and carried his coffee cup into the kitchen.

"Hey, you want to open more wine?" Ivy was at his side, carrying their empty gla.s.ses. "I've been here only three weeks and already have a prototype of my speech interface working." The trembling of her hand caused the gla.s.ses to steadily clink together, a fragile ringing sound. She didn't seem to notice. "Come on, let's celebrate."

He rested his hand over the gla.s.ses, silencing them. "We've had enough."

She narrowed the already small s.p.a.ce between them, and he slid his hands into his pockets, not sure what to do with them. "Thank you for such a great meal," he said, and made an attempt to get past her.

She giggled, held her ground.

He let out a frustrated breath. "Please," he said. "I've got to get to bed." There was no humor in his face.

"All right, then," she said sullenly, and pressed her back against the doorjamb, making way for him.

Just as he was about to shut off the stereo he changed his mind, and decided to leave it on. To keep Kate there with him, he thought, humming along with her voice on his way to his bedroom.

He lit a single candle and placed it on the floor beside his futon bed. Except for the thick stuffed sleeping mat, some books piled against the wall, a Tizio lamp and the Zuni Indian sculpture of a bear that Kate had given him one birthday, his bedroom was bare, like the rest of the house.

He tossed his clothes onto the floor and sat in the lotus position on the soft cotton mat. Kate had introduced him to the basics of meditation when they had first started dating, teaching him to lead himself into natural, peaceful sleep. He closed his eyes and concentrated on relaxing the muscles in his neck and shoulders. Gradually he worked his way down, through the rest of his body. His breathing slowed, and he imagined whiteness, weightlessness. The whiteness slashed into a black surface and he thought of Ivy and the dining room table, her playing with the little blue packet. He pushed this away and brought back the pure white. After a short period, the soft whispering snowstorm turned to warm earth tones, to Kate's lovely hair...

The sound of footsteps broke his concentration. He opened his eyes.

Ivy stood before him, wearing a lightweight cotton kimono. Her face glowed warmly in the candlelight. Her voice was a mere whisper. "I want to be with you."

Peter remained seated in the lotus position, unable, it seemed, to move. He became sharply aware of her delicate physique, his nakedness. He felt their vulnerable auras bending toward one another, reaching. He thought about what he'd come to realize at the dinner table, the feeling of dread inside him that seemed to suddenly threaten everything in his life. He thought of telling her about the few close calls he had had over the past couple of years, how they had ended in tears and shattered dreams for the students. He thought of telling her that in all their years together he had never been unfaithful to Kate. He thought of telling her that in all their years together, Wallaby had never been unfaithful to him, and it was the same thing. Was, he wanted to say aloud and tell her, tell anyone who'd listen, why.

But he told her none of these things. Instead he said to himself, without uttering a word, I had a lot to drink, it was the wine.

But was he really that drunk, or was it something else? Something worse? That he even considered this excuse, that he was actually entertaining a defense for something that had not even happened, not yet, presaged the guilt that would follow if he were to allow them to come together. And apart. And it was all the same thing, he told himself. Today, tomorrow, and the next day and every day after that.

He considered her. She was an angel whose mission was to ease him into the hereafter. He concluded, when he noticed a powdery white substance encircling the inner edge of her nostrils, that she was already "there," perhaps even farther, some point beyond recognition. As if she interpreted this, she brushed her nose with the back of her hand and sniffled.

"Peter," she pleaded, her voice husky, "You've empowered me.

You've given me a whole new meaning. It's my future."

Somehow her words had breaking effect on him. He was both repulsed and beholden by her sentiment. By himself. He turned his face toward the window, fighting the urge to reach out and pull her down by the waist. It was not as if he were in love with this young girl. And the way she made it sound, he was acting on her behalf, like she needed him. Not the other way around. No, not that at all. He didn't need her. She was nothing to him. Just another wors.h.i.+pper in a long string of subjects.

And, as if to prove his cruel pretense, she knelt before him. Her soft knees touched his s.h.i.+ns. He smelled the peppery sweetness of her breath, and his eyes lingered on her radiant golden hair. He looked into her s.h.i.+ning, antic.i.p.ating eyes.

With a deep, winded sigh that was almost a cry, he finally acknowledged his fear. It was inevitable, he told himself, as he felt himself rising. He placed his fingertips about her neck, traced his thumbs along her delicate lips, her precious ears, touched her smooth eyelids, and gently pressed them shut. Her breath hitched, and she waited for his touch to lead them farther.

He slid the kimono from her lean body, and guided her hands to his shoulders. He drew her down, guiding her to his hips. Her smooth b.u.t.tocks slid along his thighs. He felt her pause as she settled onto him, over him.

They kissed.

She pulled away her lips and raised her hips.

He moved his mind to another place, into and around and between Kate's lovely, far-off lyrics. He concentrated, tuned himself to her rhythm.

Down, then up, then again, she slowly drove herself harder and harder. He matched her motion with equal urgency, little lunging lifts, telling himself at the same time that he was not partic.i.p.ating, not really, that she was doing all of the work, it was all her, not him. Their mouths worked desperately, lunging for one another, each attempt to kiss more impossible, more desired than the last...

Spent, he felt a delirious sense of relief, as if it had all been a bizarre dream from which he had just awakened. He raised his head from the mat. For a brief, wanting moment he envisioned Kate resting lightly on top of him.

The music had ended, the silence was palpable.

His mind collapsed. He felt as if he had taken an enormous plunge backward from a high alt.i.tude, his head dizzy, his thoughts vague as he fell. He squirmed beneath the full weight the young girl lying atop him, trying to escape from what they had done. He wanted tonight to be over. He wanted tomorrow to be over. He wanted both gone forever. He wanted another chance.

Ivy stirred. She raised her head off Peter's chest and looked at him. Her face was glistening, content. "Thank you," was all she said. She raised herself from him and collected her kimono. She covered him lightly with the comforter, blew out the candle, and vanished.

He tested his defense. A whisper: "It was the wine - "

But he could not complete the sentence, for it was already done.

And it was not the wine. It was another thing altogether. And he felt it now.

The little thing in his heart. The little thing that had come and gone earlier in the evening. It was back again. It lay quietly, barely perceptible, like the breathing of a tiny creature, and he had almost not noticed it. But there was no mistaking it now, and he fought to grasp hold of it, to suffocate it, but his attempts were futile. It felt as though the thing had established permanent residency.