“Why don't you stay out here? You don't have stairs to worry about out here. She can't go to school anyway, and you could get her a tutor.” Megan looked at him thoughtfully and he smiled. A lot was suddenly coming clear to him now, and then suddenly as he looked at her he remembered what he had said to her when it happened.
“I owe you an apology, Megan.” He was looking at her tenderly across the dinner table, seeing her as though for the first time. “I felt so guilty … I have for a long time, and I was wrong. I know that.”
“It's all right.” She whispered at him. She understood it.
“Sometimes I feel guilty about how much I love you …as though I'm not supposed to do that… as though I'm still supposed to be faithful to her…. But she's gone …and I love you.”
“I know you do. And I know you feel guilty. But you don't have to. One day it'll stop.”
But the funny thing he suddenly realized was that it had. Sometime in the last day or two. Suddenly he no longer felt guilty for loving Megan. And no matter how long he had left Liz' clothes in the closet, or how much he had loved her She was gone now.
Chapter 44
The police checked out the accident, and they had even given the driver a blood test within the hour, but there was no question, it was an accident, and the woman who had struck her said she would never recover. The real fault was Jane's, but that was no consolation as she lay in the hospital, recovering from surgery and facing months in a wheelchair, and months of therapy after that.
“Why can't we go back to San Francisco?” She was disappointed to be missing school, and not to be seeing her friends. And Alexander had been scheduled to start nursery school, but all their plans were up in the air now.
“Because you can't manage the stairs, sweetheart. And neither can Nanny, with a wheelchair. This way at least you can go out. And we'll get you a tutor.” She looked bitterly disappointed. It had ruined her whole summer, she said. It had almost ruined her life, and Bernie was grateful it hadn't.
“Will Grandma Ruth come back out?”
“She said she would, if you want her.” Everything was on hold for the moment.
That brought a small smile, and Megan was spending most of her off-duty hours with her, and they had long thoughtful conversations that brought them closer than they'd been before. The fight seemed to have gone out of her around the same time the guilt had gone out of Bernie. He seemed more peaceful than he had in a while, but he was stunned by the call that came the next day. It was from Paul Berman.
“Congratulations, Bernard.” There was an ominous pause, and Bernie held his breath. He sensed that something earthshaking was coming. “I have an announcement to make to you. Three of them, in fact.” He didn't waste a moment. “I'm retiring in a month and the board just voted you into my shoes. And we just hired Joan Madison from Saks to fill your shoes in San Francisco. She'll be there in two weeks. Can you get everything wrapped up in San Francisco by then?” Bernie's heart stopped. Two weeks? Two weeks to say goodbye to Megan? How could he? And Jane couldn't be moved for months, but that wasn't the point now. The point was something entirely different and he had to tell him. There was no point putting it off any longer.
“Paul.” He felt his chest tighten and wondered if he would have a heart attack. That would certainly simplify everything. But it wasn't what he wanted. He didn't want an easy out now. He knew exactly what he wanted. “I should have told you a long time ago. And if I'd known you were planning to retire, I would have. I can't take the job.”
“Can't take it?” Paul Berman sounded horrified. “What do you mean? You've invested almost twenty years of your life preparing for it.”
“I know I have. But a lot of things changed for me when Liz died. I don't want to leave California.” Or Megan … or a dream that she had spawned….
Berman was suddenly frightened. “Has someone else offered you a job? Neiman-Marcus? … I. Magnin? …” He couldn't imagine that Bernie would defect to another store, but maybe they had made him a remarkable offer. But Bernie was quick to reassure him.
“I wouldn't do something like that to you, Paul. You know my loyalty to the store, and to you. This is just based on a lot of other decisions I had to make in my life. There are some things I want to do here that I couldn't do anywhere else in the country.”
“I can't imagine what, for heaven's sake. New York is the lifeline of our business.”
“I want to start my own business, Paul.” There was stunned silence on the other end, and Bernie smiled to himself as he said it.
“What kind of business?”
“A store. A small specialty store, in the Napa Valley.” He felt like a free man just saying the words and he could feel the tension of the last months just flowing out of his body. “It won't be competition for you, but I want to do something very special.”
“Have you done anything about starting it yet?”
“No. I had to make a decision about Wolffs first.”
“Why not do both?” Berman was desperate and Bernie could sense it. “Open a store out there and get someone else to manage it for you. Then you can come back here and take the place you've earned for yourself at Wolffs.”
“Paul, it's something I've dreamed of for years, but it's not right for me anymore. I have to stay here. It's the right decision for me. I know it.”
“This is going to be a terrible shock to the board.”
“I'm sorry, Paul. I didn't mean to embarrass you, or put you in an awkward position.” And then he smiled. “Looks like you can't retire yet then. You're too young to do a foolish thing like that anyway.”
“My body doesn't agree with you, especially this morning.”
“I'm sorry, Paul.” And he was, but he was also very happy. He sat in peaceful silence in his office for a long time after the call. His replacement was coming in two weeks. After years with Wolffs, he was going to be free in two weeks …free to start a store of his own …but there were other things he had to do first. And he left the store in a hurry at lunchtime.
The house was deathly quiet as he turned the key in the lock, and the silence which greeted him was as painful as it had been ever since she died. He still expected to find her there, to see her pretty smiling face as she emerged from the kitchen, tossing her long blond hair over her shoulder and wiping her hands on her apron. But there was no one. Nothing. There hadn't been in two years. It was all over, along with the dreams that had gone with it. It was time for new dreams, a new life, and with his heart in his mouth, he dragged the boxes into the front hall, and then into their bedroom. He sat down on their bed for a moment, and then stood up quickly. He had to do it before he started to remember her again, before he inhaled the perfume of the distant past too deeply.
He didn't even take the clothes off the hangers, he just lifted them off the racks in bunches, like the boys in their stockrooms, and dumped them into the boxes along with armloads of shoes and sweaters and handbags. He kept only the beautiful opera gown and her wedding dress, thinking that one day Jane would like to have them. But an hour later, everything else stood in the front hall in six enormous boxes. It took him another half hour to get them all down to his car and stowed inside, and then he walked back into the house for a last time. He was going to sell the house, but without Liz, there was nothing in it he cared about now anyway. It held no charm for him. She had been the charm of their entire existence.
He gently closed the closet door. There was nothing in it now except the two dresses he had saved in their plastic cases from Wolffs. The rest was empty. She needed no clothes now. She rested in a peaceful place in his heart, where he could always find her. And with a last look around the silent house, he walked quietly to the door, and then outside into the sunshine.