Leaving Sophie Dean Read online

  Of course, he had done all that before. He had made just such a trip with Sophie, the year after they met. He had a sudden vivid recollection of her sitting by the fire in a country pub in Yorkshire on a blustery day, gazing lovingly at him over her half pint of bitter, the firelight flickering across her younger, smoother face. “Of course we’ll go,” he told Valerie sadly, and she nestled against his chest, feeling comforted. He led her away, and they made awkward progress down the hall, his arms around her, she still clinging to his neck.

  When the coast was clear, James stepped out from his hiding place. He had just one word to say.

  “Whew.”

  3.

  Sophie lay in the bathtub squeezing hot, lavender-scented water over her shoulder with a large sponge. The bathroom was lit all around with candles, for someone—the owner and former occupant of the apartment of which she had become the “reliable, green-thumbed tenant”—had had the good idea of setting ceramic candleholders right into the tiled walls. Sophie had done all the transactions through a real-​estate agent, so she had not met the owner, but Clement was the surname on the lease, and the apartment afforded some clues about him or her: a practical person (well-built shelves in all the right places), a gardener (dozens of thriving potted plants on the porch), and an aesthete (all the windows had colored glass at the top that glowed in the sunlight).

  Filling the apartment with life had been Sophie’s preoccupation her first evening there. She had lit candles for the motion and warmth of the flame and carried in plants, two by two, from the porch. When she was done, the effect was not the same as the soft breathing of two sleeping children, but it was enough to ensure that she slept well that first night. Clement, she decided as she drifted off, was a soulful person who had mastered the art of living alone happily, and gradually, as she lived here in Clement’s house, that knowledge would be imparted to her.

  On Sophie’s first morning in her still-echoing apartment, Milagros had driven over with a carload of goods she had stripped out of Adam’s house in indignation. Sophie had chosen a few things and asked Milagros to return the rest, which she’d done only reluctantly and after enumerating Adam’s character flaws at high volume. Alone again, Sophie had arranged some books on shelves and unpacked her few clothes. Her dresses looked oddly insubstantial hanging alone in the closet instead of crowded against a man’s dark suits. That first morning she stood for some time at the open closet door looking at them: her bright, skimpy dresses dangling defenseless on the nearly empty bar.

  The days passed, and different aspects of Sophie’s painful situation tossed up into the front of her mind like pieces of laundry thrown against the glass door of the washing machine, momentarily unique and identifiable, then churned back into the amorphous mix.

  One day after school, she took the boys to a pet store, where they chose two goldfish—“No, not that one, that one”—and set them by the kitchen window with colored marbles half buried in the gravel to sparkle in the light and a fernlike aquatic plant to nibble on for vitamins. The fish flashed around the bowl, silver (Cloudy) and orange (Fishtag), lending more life to Sophie’s home.

  The children settled quickly into the new routine. Sophie still picked them up from school every day, gave them a snack, and played with them, but then Milagros took them home for dinner and a bath before Adam tucked them in and read to them. Their new life was not very different, and as Sophie pointed out, the changes were all for the better: two houses to play in now and the treat of Daddy “doing books” every night. The fact that their parents’ paths no longer crossed did not seem to occur to them. It was all so easy, the children appeared to accept her departure so well, that Sophie felt almost rueful, but she was bolstered by this proof that she and Adam—no, that she—had handled the situation correctly. And that was something to feel good about at a dark time.

  The first days she would glance at the clock and, out of habit, half start up out of her chair with a gasp—only to realize with a feeling of blank surprise that nothing at all needed doing. Her only duty was to be at the school gates at two-thirty and the rest of the time—nothing. No questions to answer. No tasks to perform.

  She moved her head, creating ripples in the bathwater, to look up at the ferns on the windowsill, looming greenly through the steam in the flickering candlelight, and wonder yet again why Clement had left all these lovely plants behind. Must be traveling somewhere…but where? And what did the A. R. stand for? Anthea Rose… Albert René… “A. R. Clement,” it had said on the mailbox before she turned the card over, printed her name on the other side, and slid it back into the slot. She hadn’t wanted to throw the card away; it was nicer like this, with their names nestling back-to-back. She wondered if it were unhealthy to think so much about Clement. A lonely, cast-off woman with her mind on one subject for hours and hours of each empty day… “I don’t care,” she said out loud. Her voice reverberated in the tiled room, sounding surprisingly stern. Recently she had begun speaking out loud when alone. Nothing unusual about that, except that she did it unconsciously, so she was surprised, both by the sudden sound of her voice and by the things it said—​often rather harsh things. She wondered if these were signs of failing mental health: first her preoccupation with Clement, then startling herself by voicing thoughts she could not identify as her own. She tried to make herself worry about that, but it was as useless as trying to make a fist first thing in the morning; she really didn’t care. Clement was a safe and pleasant place for her mind to dwell, so let it. She was all too aware that other, darker thoughts lurked out there, waiting to pounce. At night she would wake up suddenly, unable to move, paralyzed with dread, feeling a great weight pushing down on her, pressing the breath out of her. She would lie perfectly still, trapped, struggling to break the spell of horror before her chest was crushed. When at last she mustered the psychic strength to move, she would curl up tightly on her side and press her palms into her eyes to shield her mind from the black thoughts that flapped against her eyelids like bats seeking entry. She promised herself she would examine these thoughts in due course, but not now; for the time being, she must block them out and keep moving. To think might be to crumble, and she couldn’t afford to do that yet.

  She slid down in the bath and bent her knees so they rose, steaming, out of the bubbles, and warm water trickled into her ears, closing off all sounds except the underwater ones, which were amplified. Overhead, reflected candlelight danced on the ceiling. She counted slowly; she had been living in Clement’s house for six… seven… eight days.

  * * *

  The classroom was cathedral-like in its height and hush, its smell of incense and the soft light drifting down from high windows. The only decoration on the cream-colored walls was a large reproduction of a sixteenth-century ink drawing entitled The Centers of Grand Heavenly Circulation, Front and Back View, showing a man sitting cross-legged, his centers of circulation marked and labeled with Chinese characters. The instructor was a tall, pale man named Malcolm, giving his introductory lecture to a dozen students sitting scattered about the floor on mats. “Chi is the vital life force. It enters our body from two directions: up from the earth in its yin form and down from the heavens in its yang form. When we are healthy, chi courses freely through our body along the meridians, and located along these meridians are pressure points called tsubos—special places where chi can be felt and regulated. An unbalanced or stagnant chi can result in pain and illness, so our task is to unblock and equalize the flow, allowing the patient’s natural healing powers to operate more efficiently.”

  His words produced a rare and thrilling sensation in Sophie: absolute certainty that this was where she belonged, this was what she was meant to be doing. At this precise place and time, destiny had kept its date with her. Elated, she glanced around to see if any of her classmates looked as if they might be feeling the same way. They were mostly women, mostly in their thirties, some with a shaggy, granola look, others not so much. She noticed one man who was a type
she remembered from her student days: a sort of earth daddy, a man a good deal older than everyone else, with hair white and flowing, who seemed to strive for an air of having seen it all and of exuding gentle wisdom. He kept his eyes on Sophie for some time, waiting for her to glance in his direction, and when she did at last, he smiled lazily. She looked away.

  Introductions followed, and out of the jumble of names and histories revealed, Sophie retained the fact that the earth daddy was named Jacob, although he invited everyone to call him Jake-O. There was an earnest, bony fellow named Anthony, much given to speaking with one long index finger held in the air, and a laughing woman with black corkscrew curls, named Rose. There was also an intriguingly self-​contained, rather languid young woman, quite tall, whose name sounded like Elle or El, although it turned out to be, as she put it in her lazy drawl, “Just the letter L.”

  Another person in the room, sitting cross-legged on a mat and smiling quietly, made no particular impression on Sophie that first morning.

  * * *

  Marion came over that afternoon with a big, hairy cactus as a housewarming present. “Didn’t you used to have one of these?” she asked, handing it over with a grunt.

  “Oh, Marion, I love it! Yes, I did, but Adam hated it so much I gave it away. Now I feel it’s come back to me, a vestige of my former life. You couldn’t have chosen a more fitting present. Thank you.”

  “Well! Quite a nice place you’ve got here,” Marion said, looking around. “Very tidy, of course!” She laughed, but Sophie perceived the sting in that remark, because she knew that Marion found tidiness—along with thinness—suspect. “How much are you paying?” Her eyebrows shot up at the amount Sophie named. “Really! In Jamaica Plain?”

  It was true it was more than she had planned to pay, and the apartment wasn’t really big enough, the second bedroom being hardly adequate as a treatment room, but the place had felt right to her, and that was what mattered. Even in the confusion of those first days, she had had the wisdom to recognize that this was not a time for penny-pinching or roughing it in grim surroundings. “It’s the going rate, more or less,” she said. “Don’t forget, JP is an up-and-coming area. And I like it, its diversity. People from all over, families of all kinds… It has no associations for me either, and that’s important for a fresh start. And there’s a playground for the boys just across the street,” she added, arranging the tea tray, “so that clinched it.” She pushed open the glass door to the porch with her foot and carried out the tray. “Come and look at the best part! We’ll have our tea out here if it’s not too cold for you.” The porch was as big as the kitchen, lined with plants on three sides and overlooking gray rooftops, with the tips of the trees in the park creating a leafy green patch among the jumble of chimneys, satellite dishes, and old TV antennas. Birds swooped overhead; the air was cool and quiet. Sophie set the tray on the table and poured out the tea, chattering about her landlord or -lady, and how lucky she had been to get into her shiatsu course after someone dropped out at the last minute. Marion didn’t look terribly interested in speculations about this Clement person or in the rundown of Sophie’s classmates. “But what about you?” she put in when she could. “How are you?”

  Sophie felt suitably deflated. “Well, I miss the boys, especially at night when it’s time for books. I love tucking them in.” Marion pressed her eyes closed in sympathy as Sophie continued. “On the other hand, there’s a lot I don’t miss. I don’t miss cooking or housework or… or helping Lydia with that play group. God, I was sick of that! It’s only now that I realize how sick of it I really was.”

  “You’ve stopped doing the play group?”

  “Yes, I called Lydia and told her I have other things to do now.”

  “She must have been disappointed.” When Sophie shrugged, Marion insisted, “But you loved that play group!”

  “I did once. But there’s a time for everything, and my days as an exemplary suburban housewife have drawn to a close.” Sophie sipped her tea, surprised by the bitterness of her remark.

  “Now, that’s just bravado—or rather it’s just you being brave.” Marion allowed a little silence to fall before her next question. “Do you hear from Adam?”

  “He calls when he can’t find things around the house. Yesterday it was the boys’ vaccination certificates. One thing I hated about marriage—and I really did hate it, this isn’t sour grapes—was his asking me where things were all the time. Now he’s walked out on me, and he still expects me to find things!”

  “It’s just an excuse to talk to you.”

  “I don’t think so. I think he has a lot of nerve. I told him not to call anymore. Milagros can pass on any messages. Or he can e-mail or text me. I don’t want to hear his voice anymore. It’s too upsetting.”

  “That’s only natural. But what I hope for you both—Adam, too—is that this crisis will serve as a springboard to a healthier relationship. I’m sure, Sophie, that if you meet this challenge head-on, you’ll come through it more united than ever.”

  Sophie eyed her friend. “Oh, yes? You feel it in your bones, do you? No, Marion, listen to me. Nobody, not me and certainly not you, can possibly know what’s going to happen. So do me a favor and take that crystal ball of yours and…”

  Marion looked so offended that Sophie laughed.

  “And put it away safely! Now let’s forget it. Do you feel like going to the movies tonight? There’s a new French one at Kendall Square. Agnès Jaoui.”

  “I can’t. It’s my night out with Gerald. The first Thursday of every month is our standing date. With crazy schedules like ours, we have to make a date if we want to see each other!” She laughed, then grew earnest. “We needed the time together, so we worked on making it.” Sophie nodded; she knew all about the work Marion and Gerald did on their relationship. It was Marion’s belief that relationships required continual hard work, and this had always puzzled Sophie, for it seemed to her that if it took so much effort, surely that was a sign of fundamental incompatibility. But with Marion there was the sense that to simply get along well with someone like-minded was morally inferior to “working at it” with a less suitable person. Marion’s relationships with her parents and siblings were also the uneasy result of years of diligent work; in fact, no relationship came easily to her, which was probably why she had chosen counseling as her profession. “I’m sorry I can’t go to the movies with you,” Marion said. “It would have been good for you to get out.”

  “Oh, I’ll go. I have to get back in the habit of going out alone, and the movies are a good place to begin. It’s dark, so no one notices you’re alone, and you can’t talk anyway, so… Or wait, in the Phoenix I saw a painting exhibition I could go to. That would be more daring—or do I need to work up to that? You know, I used to like going out alone. At first going out with Adam seemed like being in a bubble. We brought our own world with us wherever we went. When you’re alone, the world can encroach, and that can be scary, but it can be good.”

  Marion laughed. “Maybe. But I don’t think you’ll find many women who wouldn’t prefer to be escorted by an attentive man, given the choice.” As she stood to leave, her eye fell on a basket of toys. “Oh, that’s nice,” she said, pointing. “Makes them feel more at home here.”

  “They are at home here,” Sophie said firmly, and as she closed the door, she reflected that in the old days she would never have told Marion to put away her crystal ball. It was quite freeing, speaking her mind, and new to her, for she had been raised to believe that hurting other people’s feelings must be avoided at any cost. Of course, Marion had never seemed quite so domineering before, but maybe that was unfair. Marion was a good person, no doubt about that—a member of Greenpeace and Amnesty International, for heaven’s sake. They had met at a neighborhood meeting of mothers interested in forming a play group, and although Sophie hadn’t intended to participate in running it, Marion, as its organizer (You don’t need to have one, only to have been one), had teamed her up with Lydia and so
mehow talked her into it. So instead of a rest, Sophie had gotten even more work, but it had been fun, too, in its way. In the days when she was a weary, sometimes uncertain mother of two babies, Marion’s energy and confidence had been reassuring. It was only now that unflattering terms like “steamroller” flitted through her mind, but she told herself that was ungrateful. Marion’s determination to patch up Sophie’s marriage sprang from wholesome professional zeal and not from… well, envy of Sophie’s newfound freedom was how it sometimes felt, but that was ridiculous, of course. After all, Sophie was only free because she had been discarded.

  “Discarded” was one of the words that came to her at night when she lay in bed, unable to move.

  But that was not a line of thought to pursue. As she did many times each day, by an act of will requiring an actual physical effort, Sophie redirected her thoughts onto pleasanter lines. It was nearly two-thirty, the magical hour, the one safe anchor point in her day, time to see the children. She yanked her jacket off a hook and ran down the stairs, remembering that she had promised to take them to the aquarium to see the seals. And that night she had a stack of reading to do for class, so there would be little time for moping, which meant she could probably make it through another day, running just ahead of the rising waters. She knew she couldn’t hold off her feelings forever and that sometime soon her emotional floodgates would open and all the misery and fury she had suppressed since the morning she found the photographs would come sweeping over her. She recognized the inevitability of the deluge that must one day engulf her, but she dreaded its violence and reassured herself with the thought that as long as nothing happened today—​and she was learning to think in terms of the present—​she would be all right.