When he saw Abe Braunstein in a meeting about new tax laws late that afternoon, the accountant was stunned. Mark looked like he had a terminal disease. He usually looked healthy and young and athletic, he was always in good spirits, and even though he was forty-two, Abe always thought of Mark as a nice kid. He looked like the boy next door. Now he looked like someone had died. And he felt as though he had.
“Are you all right?” Abe asked with a look of concern.
“Yeah, I'm fine,” Mark answered vaguely, looking numb. His face even looked somewhat gray. He seemed exhausted and pale, and Abe was genuinely worried about him.
“You look like you've been sick. You've dropped a lot of weight.” Mark nodded, and didn't respond, and then after the meeting, he felt like a jerk for not reacting to Abe's concern. Abe was going to be the second person he'd told, the first being his therapist. He hadn't had the guts, or the stomach, to tell anyone else. It was too humiliating, it made him seem like such a loser, and he worried that people would think he'd been a shit to her. He wanted to explain, and he was torn between wanting to whine, and needing to hide.
“Janet left,” Mark said cryptically as they left the meeting side by side. It was nearly six o'clock. He hadn't heard half of what was said, and Abe had noticed that too. Mark looked like he was having an out-of-body experience, and felt like it. But at first, Abe didn't get his drift.
“On a trip?” he asked, looking confused.
“No. For good,” Mark explained, looking grim. But in a way, it was a relief to tell the truth. “She left three weeks ago. She moved to New York with the kids. I just sold the house. We're getting a divorce.”
“I'm sorry to hear that,” Abe said, feeling sorry for him. The poor guy looked destroyed. But he was young, he'd find another wife, maybe even have more kids. He was a good-looking guy, Abe had always thought. “That's really rough. I didn't know.” He hadn't heard a thing, although he did a lot of accounting work with Mark's firm. But they usually talked about tax law, or their clients, not about themselves. “Where are you living now?” It was funny how men asked each other what they were doing, not how they felt.
“In a hotel two blocks from here. It's kind of a dump, but it's okay for now.”
“Do you want to go out and get something to eat?” Abe's wife was expecting him at home, but Mark looked as though he needed a friend. He did, but he felt too lousy to go anywhere. Closing on the house had made everything seem even worse. It was tangible evidence that his life with Janet was over for good.
“No, thanks.” Mark managed to force out a smile. “Maybe another time.”
“I'll give you a call,” Abe promised, and left. He didn't know whose fault the divorce was, but it was obvious that Mark wasn't happy about it. He obviously didn't have anyone else. And Abe wondered if she did, she was a great-looking girl. They had looked like the all-American couple, the boy and girl next door. Both blond, both blue eyed, and their kids looked like poster children for the American way of life. They all looked like they were off a farm in the Midwest, although he and Janet had grown up within blocks of each other in New York. They had gone to all the same high school dances, but never met. She had gone to Vassar and he to Brown, and they finally met at Yale Law School. It was the perfect life. But no more.
Mark stayed at the office shuffling papers on his desk until eight o'clock that night, and then finally went back to the hotel. He thought about picking up a sandwich on the way, but he wasn't hungry. Again. He had promised both his doctor and his therapist that he would try to eat. Tomorrow, he promised himself. All he wanted to do now was go to bed and stare at the TV. And maybe eventually sleep.
The phone was ringing when he reached his room. It was Jessica. She had had a good day at school, and gotten an A on a quiz. She was a high school sophomore, but she hated her new school. And so did Jason, he was in eighth grade. The adjustment was hard on them. Jason was playing soccer, and Jessica was on the varsity field hockey team. But she said the boys in New York were all geeks. And she was still blaming Mark for everything she didn't understand about the divorce.
He didn't tell her the house had closed that day, or that they would never see it again. He just promised that he would come to New York soon, and told them to say hi to Mom. And after he hung up, he just sat there in bed, staring at the TV, with tears rolling silently down his cheeks.
Chapter 3
Jimmy O'Connor was lean and athletic and strong. He had broad shoulders and powerful arms. He was a golfer and a tennis player. He had gone to Harvard and been on the ice hockey team. He had been a superb athlete in school, and still was. And he was a great guy. He had gone to graduate school, and got a master's in psychology at UCLA, while he did volunteer work in Watts. He had gone back the following year to get a degree in social work, and had never left Watts. At thirty-three, he had a life and a career he loved, and still managed to get a little time in for sports. He had organized a soccer team and a softball team for the kids he worked with. He placed kids in foster care, and removed them from abusive homes, homes where they were beaten or molested or abused. He carried children who had had bleach poured on them, or been burned, in his own arms to emergency rooms, and more than once he had brought them home until the right foster home could be found. The people he worked with said he had a heart of gold.
He had classic black Irish looks, jet-black hair, ivory skin, and huge dark eyes. There was an almost sensual quality to his lips, and he had a smile that knocked women off their feet. It had knocked Maggie off hers. Margaret Monaghan. They were both from Boston, met at Harvard, and had come to the West Coast together when they graduated. They'd been living together since junior year. And grousing about it every inch of the way, they had gone to City Hall and gotten married six years before. Mostly to get their parents off their backs. It didn't make much difference to either of them, they claimed, and then grudgingly they admitted to each other that it was not only okay, it was nice. Getting married had been a good thing.
Maggie was a year younger than Jimmy and the smartest woman he'd ever known. There wasn't a woman like her in the world. She had a master's in psychology too, and was thinking about getting a Ph.D. She wasn't sure. And like him, she worked with inner-city kids. She wanted to adopt a flock of them, instead of having kids of their own. He was an only child, and she was the oldest of nine. She was from good, solid Boston Irish stock, originally from County Cork. Her parents had been born in Ireland and had powerful brogues which she imitated flawlessly. Jimmy's family had left Ireland four generations before. He was a distant cousin of the Kennedys, which she had teased him about mercilessly when she found out, and called him “Fancy Boy.” But she kept the information to herself, she just liked to rattle his cage. About anything and everything. He loved that about her. Brilliant, irreverent, beautiful, brave, with fiery red hair and green eyes, and freckles everywhere. She was his dream woman, and the love of his life. There wasn't a single thing he didn't like about her, except maybe the fact that she couldn't cook and didn't care. So he cooked for both of them, and was proud of the fact that he was a pretty decent cook.
He was packing the kitchen, and his frying pans, when the building manager rang the bell and walked in. He shouted out a greeting so Jimmy would know he was there. He didn't like to intrude, but he had to show the place. It was a tiny apartment in Venice Beach. They had loved living there. Maggie liked to roller blade down the streets, everyone did there. And they loved the beach.