Picture Perfect Part 35

She felt her heart pounding so fiercely it seemed to be moving the light fabric of her blouse.

"Can you prove it?"

The question came from a woman, and it was softer than most of the others had been, which was maybe why Ca.s.sie did what she decided, in a split second, to do. Keeping her eyes trained on the door at the back of the conference room, she slowly opened the top three b.u.t.tons of her blouse and pulled aside the collar and her bra strap to reveal an ugly, mottled purple welt. She untucked the blouse from the waistband of the skirt and lifted it to her midriff, turning slightly so that the swollen, black-and-blue ribs were visible.

The conference room exploded in a riot of white flashes and cacophonous sound. Ca.s.sie stood very still, willing herself not to tremble, wishing she were anywhere else but there.

WHEN SHE WOKE UP THE MORNING AFTER ALEX HAD HIT HER, HIS side of the bed was cool and the covers had been pulled smooth. For a second Ca.s.sie stared at them, at the neatly aligned pillows. Maybe it had never happened. Maybe Alex had never been there.

She showered, gingerly letting the hot water soothe the sorest places, and then she went in to check on Connor. The night nurse turned him over to Ca.s.sie so that she could feed him. Sitting in the large rocking chair, Ca.s.sie stared out the window at what promised to be a beautiful California day.

"We're going away again," she whispered to Connor. Then she stood up and carried him over to his changing table, ripping loose the tape of the disposable diaper and arranging a fresh one under his bottom.

She stared at his body-the long, wiry legs; the bubble belly; the pockets of baby fat on his arms that almost looked like a grown man's muscles.

When the nurse returned, Ca.s.sie smiled at her. "I wonder if you could do me a favor," she asked, instructing her to pack up a full diaper bag with several changes of clothing and sleepwear for Connor. And then, leaving Connor in his ba.s.sinet, she made her way downstairs.

She didn't stop in the dining room for coffee; she didn't bother to check the library or study for any signs of Alex. The truth was, it didn't matter. She had made her decision last night.

The plan she'd settled on involved his public image. After all, it was what had prompted the fight last night. And, Ca.s.sie had to admit, it was as much a part of his life as she was. Once the golden boy didn't seem so golden anymore, and once he'd ascertained who had thrown the mud in the first place, she would be free. Either Alex would have to admit to her accusations and make himself into a figure of public sympathy by going for help, or he'd have to fight back and discredit her story, slandering her. It didn't really matter which course events took. Either way, the outcome was going to ruin Alex; either way, the outcome was going to kill her.

Because she was forcing Alex to stop loving her, but she couldn't make herself stop loving him.

She opened the front door, walking barefoot down the marble stairs and the winding path that led to the pool and the outbuildings. One day she would show Connor pictures of this castle, and tell him how close he'd come to growing up as Hollywood's crown prince. She walked to the second low white building, the laboratory Alex had built for her after they were married.

It was dark and musty; she had been in here for a few minutes at a time in the weeks she'd been back, but there was too much for Connor to get into and she wouldn't leave him alone during the day at the house. Flicking on the lights, she saw the cavernous s.p.a.ce flood with the colors of the past: yellowed bones and shining metallic tables, silver instruments and rich red earth.

She found herself wondering what the landscapes looked like where these bones had been procured. And what the people who were supported by these skeletons did in the course of a day. She realized that for someone to whom cultural anthropology had been anathema, her questions were odd and unfamiliar. In a way, it seemed as though anthropology for Ca.s.sie had been an exploration in a small, fascinating room, and she had just pulled back a curtain on what she had believed to be a closet, only to find a new room, twice the size of the first.

She would always have her work once she left Alex-it had been there before him and it was as much a part of her as Connor-but her research would never be quite the same. She had seen the possibilities, and after Pine Ridge, she did not think she could continue to look at bare bones in a vacuum. If she had learned nothing else from the Lakota, Ca.s.sie now knew that although a person was made of muscle and bone and tissue, she was equally formed by the patterns of her life and the choices she made and the memories she pa.s.sed on to her children.

Before Ca.s.sie had left for Pine Ridge, she had been studying a skull from Peru, sent by a colleague, in which a clear disk of bone had been removed from the vault. The scientist who'd sent it to her wanted her opinion as to the nature of the damage. Was it a man-made trephine hole-bored out during an operation for obtaining an amulet, or for alleviating headaches-or was it due to something natural? Ca.s.sie sat down at the examination table, scanning her notes for other explanations. Made by a pick during excavation. The continual pressure of a sharp object in the grave. Erosion. Congenital deficiency. Syphilitic reaction. Cradling her own head in her hands, she wondered what some scientist would think about her skeleton if it was unearthed millions of years from now. Would he run his instruments over her ribs, cracked and scarred and mutilated? Would he attribute the bone damage to careless gravediggers? To erosion? To her husband?

Ca.s.sie wrapped the skull in cotton and set it back in its packing crate. She layered it in sawdust and shredded newspaper, touching it with the most exquisite care, as if it still could feel the pain of the damage done. Without printing a formal letter, she folded her observation list. She was not the best person to a.n.a.lyze this; not anymore. So she scribbled a note on the outside about not having the time to study the specimen more, apologizing for the months she'd kept the scientist waiting. Then she stuck the letter in with the skull and closed the crate with a staple gun.

Ca.s.sie carried the skull back to the house to leave with the outgoing mail, feeling its weight increase with each heavy step. She wondered why it had taken her this long to see that a skeleton could tell you nothing, but a survivor could show you her life.

"WHAT WILL YOU DO ABOUT YOUR POSITION AT UCLA?"

"Will you stay in L.A.?"

"Do you have any plans from here?"

Ca.s.sie blinked at the stream of questions, thinking that even if she had a clear picture of where she was headed, the last thing she would do was leave a well-marked trail for the press to follow.

"I've been on maternity leave from teaching," she said slowly. "As for whether or not I'll return to UCLA when that's over, it's a decision I'll have to make down the road."

A man in an olive trench coat pushed back the hat on his head. "Will you stay at one of your other residences?"

Ca.s.sie shook her head. Even if she had wanted the half of Alex's wealth and property that California law ent.i.tled her to, she wouldn't stay anywhere she had been with him. At the ranch, at the apartment, G.o.d, probably even in Tanzania, the furnishings and surroundings were marked with the image of the two of them together. She hesitated, then bit her lower lip. "I have several options," she lied.

SHE HAD TAKEN CONNOR TO OPHELIA'S. "JESUS," OPHELIA SAID WHEN she opened the door. "What the h.e.l.l happened to you?"

Ca.s.sie hadn't bothered to brush out her hair or put on her makeup.

She had grabbed the first clothes she could find that morning, and she looked down at her body to see a purple polo shirt and green-and-whitestriped cotton shorts. "Ophelia," she said simply, "I need your help."

The entire time she was explaining to Ophelia the hidden parts of the last three years with Alex, the half hour she spent showing her the bruises that swelled from the underwire of her bra, Ca.s.sie did not cry.

With her left foot, she rocked Connor in his infant seat, and she answered Ophelia's questions. In the end, Ophelia had cried for her, and had called up the friend of a friend who had connections to an up-andcoming hotshot divorce attorney. When Ca.s.sie tried to refuse, Ophelia had looked at her pointedly. "You may not want a cent from him," she said, "but you've got something Alex wants desperately. His son."

Ophelia had been the one to go to the five banks where Ca.s.sie and Alex had joint accounts, and using Ca.s.sie's ATM cards, she systematically withdrew a generous sum of money from each. She bought diapers and baby bottles for Connor, since Ca.s.sie had left without enough of these.

While Ophelia was gone, Ca.s.sie rocked Connor to sleep and set him on the bed that had been hers four years earlier. Then she went into the living room and pulled down the shades, as if people might already be looking in. She reached for the telephone and dialed the number of the pay phone at the feed and grain in Pine Ridge; the place managed by Horace; the place from which she had called Alex a month and a half before.

"Ca.s.sie!" Horace said, and in the background she could hear the shuffles and grunts of elderly Lakota men bent over the barrels of rolled oats. She heard the cries of children running to the counter, asking for the free spiced gumdrops. "Ton'ktuka hwo? How are you doing?"

For the first time since she'd taken a taxi from Alex's house, Ca.s.sie let her courage waver. "I've been better," she admitted in a small voice.

"Horace," she said. "I need a favor."

JUST PAST FOUR IN THE AFTERNOON, WHEN OPHELIA WAS OUT AT the park with Connor, the telephone rang. Ca.s.sie picked it up with a shaking hand. "h.e.l.lo?" she said, a little more loudly than she had intended, wondering what she would do if Alex's voice responded. But then she heard Will, tinny and hesitant over a bad connection, praying her name. She bent over, relief having kicked all the air from her lungs.

"Ca.s.sie?" Will repeated.

"I'm here," she said. She paused, trying to string together her words.

"What did he do?" Will said into the silence. "I'll kill him."

"No," Ca.s.sie said calmly. "You won't."

In Pine Ridge, with a teenage kid stacking oats to his left, Will banged his fist against the wall. He knew, without being told, that Alex had gone after her again. He understood that the phone number Horace had tracked him down to give him was not Ca.s.sie's. He was powerless, a thousand miles away, and he waited to see what, exactly, she wanted from him. He did not let himself hope, and he would not let himself offer, but he knew that if she asked he would come for her and hide her forever.

"I'm getting a divorce," Ca.s.sie said. "I'm going to hold a press conference."

Will leaned his forehead against the sharp corner of the pay phone.

The Hollywood media would rip her apart on their way to destroying Alex. "Forget about it," he heard himself say. "Come with me to Tacoma."

"I can't keep running away. And I don't want you to rescue me."

Ca.s.sie took a deep breath. "I think it's high time I rescued myself."

But even as she said the words, her shoulders began to quiver and her body slid deeper into the cushions of the sofa, as if she could no longer muster the support to keep herself upright.

"Ca.s.sie, honey," Will said gently, "why did you call me?"

She was shivering so violently she did not think she'd be able to speak. "Because I'm scared," she whispered. "I am so d.a.m.n scared."

Will thought about telling her she wasn't alone; about hopping on a plane to L.A. and driving to wherever she was and kissing her until her body stopped trembling with fear and flowed into his. He wondered how he could be such a fool that he'd trade his heart to a woman who would probably love someone else for the rest of her life.

Instead he forced his voice to be steady and clear. "Ca.s.sie," he said, "you got a mirror around there?"

Ca.s.sie smiled ruefully. "Ophelia's got three in the hall alone," she said.

"Well, get up and stand in front of one."

Ca.s.sie made a face. "This is stupid," she said. "I need more than some dumb dramatic exercise." But she stood up and walked to the mirror, looking at her swollen eyelids, her bruised jaw.

"Well?"

"I look awful," Ca.s.sie said, rubbing her eyes and her nose. "What am I supposed to be seeing?"

"The bravest person I've ever met," Will said.

Ca.s.sie pulled the receiver closer to her ear, sinking into his statement like a cat in the sun. She was reminded of how, when she had first married Alex, he would call her at her office and, like teenagers, they'd whisper for hours behind the closed door about their future, their pa.s.sion, their uncanny luck in finding each other. Ca.s.sie stared at her face in the mirror. "I've never been to Tacoma,"

she said, and with her best attempt at a smile, she tucked Will's words inside her and took from them his strength.

"WHEN DID THE BEATINGS START?"

"Did you know about this before you got married?"

Ca.s.sie let the questions puddle at her feet. She glanced behind her, at Ophelia and Connor, for support.

"Are you in love with him?"

She didn't have to answer; she knew that. But she wanted to. If she was going to make the world see Alex as some kind of monster, it was also up to her to make the world see him as the wonderful, warm, caring man who had made her feel complete.

The best approach, she rationalized, would be to make a joke of the question, as if it had been ridiculous in the first place. "You can ask that of nearly any woman in this country," Ca.s.sie said lightly. But her voice broke gently over the words. "Who isn't in love with him?"

She looked up, searching the rows of reporters as if she was seeking someone out in particular, and then she saw the man in the back corner.

She hadn't noticed him before, but then again she hadn't been looking.

He was wearing a wool peacoat with the collar pulled up, something far too warm for the day. His face was buried close to his chest, and his eyes were hidden by aviator sungla.s.ses.

Alex looked directly at Ca.s.sie and tugged off his sungla.s.ses. He stuffed them into the breast pocket of the coat. Ca.s.sie could not tear her gaze from him. He was not angry. Not the slightest bit. It was as if he understood. She caught her breath, checking again to see what she had missed, what he was trying to tell her.

"One more question," she whispered, her eyes locked to the spot where Alex stood. Why this way? Why now? Why us?

She feebly pointed to a man in the front row of the conference room.

"If you could say anything to him now," the reporter asked, "without any fear of retaliation on his part, what would you tell him?"

She thought she saw tears glittering in Alex's eyes, and his hand came up from his side as if he was going to reach out to her. Don't, Ca.s.sie pleaded silently. If you do, I might follow. And just like that, his arm fell loose again, his fingers stroking the rough wool of the coat.

"I'd say what he always said to me," Ca.s.sie whispered to him. "I never meant to hurt you."

She closed her eyes to compose herself before she dismissed the media crowd that had gathered at her request. When she opened them again, she was still staring at the spot where seconds ago Alex had been standing, but he was no longer there. She shook her head as if to clear it, and wondered if he had really ever been there at all.

Without another word, she turned away from the podium, carefully tucking the back of her blouse back into her skirt. The reporters continued to take pictures and videos of her leaving the hotel conference room: picking up her baby, slinging the diaper bag over her shoulder, moving forward woodenly.

She made her way through the red velvet lobby with people already beginning to stare. Pushing through the revolving door, she stepped onto the sidewalk, drinking the air with huge, heaving gulps.

I did it, I did it, I did it. The heels of Ca.s.sie's shoes tapped this refrain on the concrete as she walked to the end of the block. She moved quickly, as if she were late for an important appointment. Downtown L.A. was busy at lunchtime. Standing at the corner, Ca.s.sie clutched Connor to her chest as they were dodged by businessmen and bicycle messengers and beautiful women carrying shopping bags.

There was nothing specific, really, that made her look up. No noise, no bright light, no inspiration. But at that moment, slicing through the heat and the smog overhead, was a circling eagle. She waited for someone else to point at the sky, to notice, but people only shoved and jostled past, wrapped up in their own lives.

She turned Connor's face, so that he could see it too.

Ca.s.sie shielded her eyes from the sun, watching the bird fly east.

Long after the eagle had disappeared, she stared at the unbounded sky; and even when the flow of human traffic increased and funneled around her, she did not lose her footing.

end.