The Comfort of Lies: A Novel Read online

  Tia and Nathan never went to Fianna’s. During the Nathan year, Tia rarely went at all. Since Honor’s birth, she visited too often.

  “Hey, Ritchie,” Tia greeted the bartender. He and Tia went to school together; two of the few in their crowd who’d transferred from Catholic to public school. Ritchie’s mom was broke after his father died; Tia’s mother didn’t want to waste the money she’d hoped would finance uncovered college costs.

  “Lookin’ good, Tia.” Ritchie winked. He poured Kahlúa, milk, and ice into a silver shaker and shook until it frothed to a peak. Her drink would be extra strong.

  Tia carried the drink to the table where everybody knew not only her name but also her mother’s name, that Tia’s father was a drunken deserter, and that Kevin had popped her cherry.

  No one knew about Honor.

  “Yo.” Kevin lifted his chin in greeting.

  Bobby Kerrigan pulled out the chair next to him. Bobby’s crush on Tia began when they were fourteen and continued right through his marriage, his divorce, and all his relationships after.

  Moira Murphy and Deirdre Barsamian—formerly known as the Sweeney sisters—Irish twins, were dressed alike. Loose sweatshirts hid their marriage-and-motherhood fat. Michael Dwyer, the crowd’s big shot, had hung his suit jacket over the back of his chair, a reminder to all of his significant city hall job.

  “What’s up, Tia?’ ” Michael asked. “Save any old ladies today?”

  “You wish your work was even a quarter as important as Tia’s,” Bobby said.

  “Really? City hall doesn’t compare to some center for old ladies?” Michael asked. “No offense, Tia. I was just kidding.”

  “Yeah, being the pope of payback jobs is gonna get you into heaven,” Bobby jabbed.

  “No offense, taken, Michael.” The smooth sweet drink eased through Tia one muscle at a time. “Why don’t you come by sometime? To the center. Maybe you could find us some funding that I don’t have to beg for. Writing grants is killing me.”

  Tia smiled wide. Michael loved playing important and she wouldn’t mind some of that largesse coming to her agency.

  “I’ll see what I can do.” Michael winked at her.

  “Hey, how’s Robin? Any chance she’s coming back?” Kevin quickly covered his question, which rang so obviously of his crush. “Maybe she’ll fly in and surprise you with a ring. The two of you can finally get married.”

  “Really, Kev? You’re really going there?” Tia asked.

  He put a hand on Tia’s arm, suddenly all serious. “Hey, you know I’m just joking, right? I don’t care if she’s a dyke; she’s a good shit. Better looking than anything around here, present company excluded, of course.”

  Tia fell into the drone of meaningless talk.

  Jokes flew.

  Old stories were retold.

  Moira and Deidre did their wickedly spot-on imitations of anyone missing.

  Six? Seven? How many drinks? Southie bartenders poured them twice the size of those downtown or in JP, so she was twice as high as the number of drinks would suggest.

  Ritchie shouted last call for the second time.

  “I’ll drive you home, Tia,” Bobby said.

  “Better pray she doesn’t puke in your car,” Kevin said.

  “Fuck you, Sullivan.” Bobby took Tia’s coat off the back of her chair. He placed a gentle hand on Tia’s back.

  They remained quiet on the ride. Tia feared she would throw up if she tried to make conversation. Bobby hit the disc button, and Eminem came on.

  She and Nathan had made love listening to CDs Nathan brought her, from the romance of Sam Cooke, to the pounding beat of The Pussycat Dolls. He layered soft over exciting in and out of bed. One minute he’d bring her to a crashing explosion; an hour later, he’d ask if she got enough intellectual stimulation from her job.

  Nathan brought her an array of new music, books, and films. He introduced her to cutting-edge ideas in the literature of gerontology, singers like the Nigerian-German Ayo, and encouraged her to watch documentaries like Waste Land, which he thought would broaden her world.

  He told her she was beautiful, smart, and good. “The whole package,” he’d say. “That’s what you are.” She fought her fear that he considered her some sort of Southie idiot savant.

  Ayo’s “Down on My Knees” was the soundtrack of her pregnancy, breaking her heart, until she finally deleted it and all the other musical and literary traces of Nathan from her life.

  They pulled up in front of her house. Bobby turned off the engine. “I’ll walk you up.”

  “Mmm, don’t bother.” She tried not to slur. “Just get home safe. The roads are such a mess Friday nights.”

  “You’re plastered. Let me make sure you’re okay.”

  “I’m fine,” she insisted.

  “I want to help you.” Bobby’s strawberry-blond hair and blue eyes shined in the dark. Too bright.

  Tia tried to flip the lock to get out. Bobby leaned over the console of his shiny red Corvette and released it for her. Bobby made the only real money in the crowd, realizing earlier than most how valuable Southie property could be, especially the houses on the waterfront. He knew when to pull back and when to buy property for himself.

  Bobby’s hand on her shoulder felt good. Warm and comforting, like a big blanket of you’re-going to-be-okay. She rested against him. Just for a minute. Bobby’s extra pounds made good leaning material. The music played. Bobby went slowly. He put an arm around her and strummed his fingers on her shoulder in time to the song. He reached for her hand. He tucked her fingers in his.

  “You get more beautiful every year.” Bobby brought her hand to his lips. “Honest. You’ve spoiled me for anyone else.”

  “Where’d you learn those lines?” She let him trace the top of her shoulder. “Corny old Bobby.”

  “Excuse me, college girl.” He tipped her face to his and planted sweet kisses on each cheek. Bobby Kerrigan, secret softie. “You know I like that, right? That you went to college? How else do you get anywhere in this world? I admire you, Tia.”

  You drive me crazy, Tia. You make me so damned hot, Tia, Nathan would say.

  Bobby’s hand went lower. He played with the bottom of her Red Sox shirt. She pulled away, for a moment becoming, while not sober, not as drunk. His palm brushed her waist where pregnancy stretch marks and puckered skin striated her flesh into an unrecognizable terrain. If he touched her, he’d know her secrets.

  She hadn’t slept with anyone since the day the stick showed that positive pink line.

  CHAPTER 6

  Juliette

  Juliette opened her eyes to the welcome sight of Nathan holding her favorite mug: sturdy, big, and rough textured. She struggled to a sitting position, already wanting her first sip, Pavlovian in her response to the rich smell of dark roast. “You’ll never leave me,” Nathan used to joke. “You couldn’t live without your morning coffee delivery.”

  Teasing like that was long gone. Much more than trust had been broken when Nathan cheated; a level of ease had disappeared. Kidding about affairs was crossed off the marital banter list six years ago, when the idea of getting her own morning coffee sounded just fine—a terrific bargain to never have to see him again. But, well, life was filled with buts, wasn’t it?

  Max’s screech drifted in through the bedroom door, followed by Lucas’s louder bellow.

  “What are they fighting over?” Juliette asked.

  “Some shirt that Max swears you gave him but Lucas says still belongs to him.”

  “What does it look like?”

  “Blue?” Nathan sat on the edge of the bed. “Maybe green?” He ran a hand down her arm.

  Nathan was forty-two. She was a year younger. Worry lines, which on Juliette portended the not-too-distant day when she’d become invisible, added gravitas to his good looks.

  “Are they dressed?” Juliette brushed off his hand, though even as she batted away temptation, she considered it. Locking the door and making love, even if
it was silent surreptitious sex, offered a moment’s sanctuary from Wednesday, the worst day of her week. Deliveries poured in. Customers woke up realizing they had to look perfect by some weekend function, and only juliette&gwynne could perform that miracle. Lucas and Max both had practices to which she had to somehow shuffle them in between her work.

  Juliette hated Wednesdays.

  Increasingly louder shouts came from the boys.

  “I better make sure they’re okay,” she said.

  Nathan held his hands up. “Stay. I’ll deal with them.” He leaned over and kissed her. “Rain check?”

  She squeezed his love handle. “Rain check.”

  By the time she’d brushed her teeth and pulled on her robe, the sound of fighting had given way to the clicking of computer keys. Both boys, but particularly Lucas, at fourteen, thought their parents’ refusal to allow computers in their bedrooms was insane. For Juliette, it meant keeping her boys safe. She’d read too many times about some nut going after a kid he’d met on the Internet. She could easily imagine her sweet Max drifting out to a playground where, instead of a fellow Civilization video game player, he’d find a thirty-five-year-old killer pervert.

  Juliette stood at the door of the upstairs study, enjoying the sight of them bent toward the screen—Lucas light-haired like her, Max dark like Nathan—and wished she could let them be. Instead she entered, kicking away clutter and boy debris. In her sons’ world, computers, soccer balls, and dirty laundry coexisted quite happily. She was eternally grateful they had moved to a house with enough space to hide the boys’ messes.

  “Good morning, honeys.” Juliette leaned down to kiss Lucas’s head. His hair, still damp from a shower, smelled sweetly grassy. She inhaled until he ducked away.

  “Morning,” he muttered without looking up.

  Juliette hugged her younger boy, who smelled far less sweet. “Mmm. Shower time, it’s getting late.”

  “Can we have something special for breakfast?” Max bounced with enthusiasm in that way only young boys could.

  “Could you clean this room before breakfast?” She pointed in turn at a crumpled sweatshirt, a bowl lined with dried flecks of the previous night’s chips, and mugs flaky with sugary remnants of something unhealthy.

  “Will you make waffles if we do?” Max wiggled his eyebrows and gave a “Don’tcha love me?” grin.

  Waffles.

  She held back her sigh, dreading the extra time making the batter, dragging out the waffle iron, and, with a working woman’s guilt, heating the damned syrup.

  “Okay—you clean, I’ll make waffles.” She pulled her robe tighter as she left and walked downstairs.

  No whipped cream, though.

  The number on the scale had crept up again that morning. She could hear her mother’s lecture on metabolism after forty.

  She opened the front door to fine mist and damp newspapers. Four years after moving, Juliette still missed their Waltham paper delivery guy who’d wrap them in plastic at the slightest hint of wetness.

  She lifted out yesterday’s mail still piled in the oversized bowl on the hall table and replaced it with the newspapers, where they could dry without getting wetness on the wooden top. Last night she and Nathan had both arrived home late, which meant rushing to prepare dinner, helping the boys with homework, and answering too many phone calls and emails. Email had overtaken postal deliveries in importance. Unless there was a package, she expected little but magazines and bills.

  Emerson College alumni bulletin for her.

  Contexts for Nathan. The magazine claimed it made sociology “interesting and relevant to anyone interested in how society operates,” so why did Juliette always pick up Vogue instead?

  Junk mail for Nathan. Junk mail for her.

  American Express bill.

  Last in the pile was a hand-addressed letter forwarded from their Waltham address. The return address was Jamaica Plain. It had been sent to Nathan.

  She recognized the last name.

  Adagio.

  Jesus Christ.

  Tia Genevieve Adagio. Such a pretty name. She’d forced that name from Nathan. “Tell me her name!” she’d screamed. “Tell me, goddamn it! I’m sure she knows mine.”

  Juliette almost crushed the envelope. She should give it to Nathan. Didn’t she trust him now? They were doing so well. The act of giving it to him would strengthen the confidence they’d regained. He’d open it in front of her. That was the right thing to do.

  After closing her eyes and praying she’d find an innocent, forgivable reason for the contact (“I’m dying and must say good-bye!”), Juliette slit open the envelope.

  Pictures slid out and then a letter. A somber little girl stared at Juliette.

  Dear Nathan,

  This is our daughter. Her adoptive parents send photos each year after her birthday (March 6). As you can see, she resembles you.

  They named her Savannah (I know, it’s an awful name; in my mind she’s Honor—the name I gave her at birth), but they’re good people. Caroline and Peter Fitzgerald. She is a doctor; he has a software company. They live in Dover. (I know you will wonder. I do know you.) They will always love and care for her.

  I expect our daughter will call me someday. At her birth, I arranged things to allow this future contact to happen easily. I expect that if she calls, she will ask about you. I plan to help her get in touch if that’s her wish.

  Tia

  Juliette stared at the child, gripping the photos with icy fingers. She placed her other hand on her chest, trying to slow her rapid, shallow breaths.

  Did he know he had this child, this daughter? Tia had written “This is our daughter” as though it were a given fact. We. Have. A. Daughter.

  Had he seen her, spoken to her? Had they had any contact since Nathan’s confession? Please, God, please let the answers be no.

  “Mom!” Max called down the stairs. “Mom!” he repeated when she didn’t respond.

  Juliette shoved the letter and pictures back in the envelope and stuck it into her bathrobe pocket. “I’m right here, Max, you don’t have to scream.” Her words sounded muted, despite the fact that she’d yelled, just as she’d told Max not to scream.

  Max’s head appeared over the stair railing of the second floor. “Where are my blue sweats? Did you remember that I have practice?”

  Juliette twisted her wedding ring and willed the pounding in her chest to subside. “Left side of the closet, hanging beside your denim jacket.”

  He grunted his version of thanks.

  “And shower before you get dressed,” Juliette nagged on autopilot. She straightened the mail until it was piled in size order, trying to think about anything other than the envelope pressing against her hip.

  She stumbled into the kitchen.

  The pictures, the resemblance to Max, to Nathan—for a moment, she thought she’d choke on her rising fury. Memories of her husband’s betrayal rushed through her until there seemed to be room only for anger. A daughter? How could her husband have not told her?

  Tia’s letter didn’t say, “You have a child.” Or “I never told you I was pregnant, but . . . ”

  Yet she hadn’t known that they’d moved.

  What did he know? What did they know together? What else had they hidden from her? Memories of being left out, of Nathan and that woman as a couple while she floundered in the dark, threatened to drown her.

  Not many miles away, Nathan’s daughter was waking, or having breakfast, or maybe getting ready for preschool. A child of his that wasn’t hers.

  Surely her eyes would give away her distress. Blinking, squeezing back tears, she stumbled toward the table and sat on the hard kitchen chair. Once sitting, she dug her nails hard into her thighs. She had to calm down somehow, or the children, Nathan, would read her in a minute.

  Breathe deep.

  What could be more of a betrayal than having a child with another woman?

  Dissociate.

  Not telling her: didn’t that say hi
s loyalty was more to that woman than to her?

  Think about this later. Figure this out later.

  She needed to find out more of the facts before opening herself to lies from Nathan.

  Juliette was well schooled in keeping her own counsel. Growing up with a mother whose version of “Good morning” was “You are not wearing that ugly outfit to school” gifted her with an enduring ability to maintain a calm front. Her mother thrived on knocking self-pity and crying out of Juliette, so early on she learned techniques for preventing tears.

  Soon Lucas, always first, would stomp down the stairs, ready to eat a ridiculously large amount of whatever she offered. He combusted calories impossibly fast. He’d grown taller than his father this year. Nathan pretended not to notice, but Juliette saw how often her husband looked as though he were stretching toward greater height when next to Lucas.

  Screw the waffles. She pulled eight eggs from the fridge. Four for Lucas, two for Nathan—a burst of rage took her breath away—and two for Max.

  Focus on food.

  Max was built husky like Nathan, with a similarly sluggish engine.

  Don’t think about the letter.

  Juliette’s metabolism had once burned fast. No longer. Now she wrestled her lust for bubbling pans of macaroni and cheese topped with crisped, buttery crumbs.

  Had pregnancy broadened Tia? So tiny she’d been, when Juliette found a way to see her, needing to put a face in her nightmares.

  Food. Stick to breakfast.

  Nathan’s lust for food was broader than Juliette’s. He hungered for steak and for things soft, sweet, and savory. Juliette could make him weak with her cheddar biscuits. She should poison a batch for him.

  Was he still seeing Tia? It didn’t seem so from the letter. But who knew? Who really knew one’s husband? Once she would have said she did, but no more.

  Nathan thirsted for his students’ awe. Juliette knew that. They treated her husband like a minor rock star, with his exciting politics and edgy lectures, and he held his face to the attention like a flower to the sun.