I’M GLAD HE DROPPED his papers, because it gives us something to do. We help him pick them up. Xander even lies down on her stomach to get one that fell behind the couch. Finally he has them all stacked together. As I watch him line up the corners of the papers perfectly, I realize he’s stalling. He is completely stunned, and he doesn’t know what to do.
Finally he seems to understand that any more tidying of papers would be ludicrous, and he puts them down on the coffee table, which is strewn with Legos.
He straightens up, wiping his palms on the front of his plaid shirt, and stares at us.
Xander shifts her weight from one foot to the other. I clear my throat and immediately regret the sound. Desperately I search for a way to set everyone in motion again, but I have only one idea. Since no one else is talking, I say it out loud. “Could I have a glass of water?”
“Sure!” He sort of bounces on his toes, which makes me think he must be a jogger or something. People that old don’t bounce unless they exercise. He leads us to the back of the house to a very messy kitchen. A box of cereal is on its side, spilled all over the white kitchen island. “Jeremy!” Phillips yells. “I told you I’d help you get the prize!” He scoops up a couple handfuls, but quickly gives up and gets a cup out of the dishwasher. He fills it with water from a jug on the counter and hands it to me. I take a small sip because I’m not entirely convinced that the cup is actually clean.
“So,” he says shakily. “If you want the statue . . .”
“Oh, no! Keep it. You should have it,” Xander says. “That’s not why we’re here.”
His dark eyes dart between us warily, like he’s expecting a coordinated attack. “Then why are you here?”
The hysterical way he asks the question shows how totally bewildered he is.
Xander looks at me and takes a step back, like she’s giving me the stage.
Somehow I make my voice work. “We came here because we want to know. Did you and our mother—” I can’t make myself say it.
“—do it?” Xander finishes.
“We’re worried,” I talk over her. “We’re worried you had an affair.”
He drops his chin to his chest. He hangs it there for a long time, his eyes screwed shut. When he finally opens his eyes, it’s with total resignation. “Wait here.”
He trots out of the room, and we hear him climbing some stairs. Xander reaches for my glass of water and takes a sip.
My heart is aching, throbbing, groaning in my chest.
Finally he comes down holding an envelope in his hand. He gestures toward a room off the kitchen, and we follow him into a small study with a ratty couch and a glossy wooden desk. This is probably where he comes to hide from his family when he works, just like Dad hides in the basement. He gestures for us to sit on the couch, and he takes the desk chair, resting the envelope on his knee, his fingers placed protectively over it.
“Before your mother died, she sent me the bird statue with this letter,” he says authoritatively. Suddenly he’s the professor again, which must be a shield he’s putting up between us, like he has to remind himself we’re no older than his students. “I’ll let you read it first. And then I’ll answer your questions as best I can.”
He hands us the envelope. Xander takes it from him, unfolds it reverently, and holds it down on her lap so that we can both read it at the same time.
Dear John,
I hope this letter finds you well. I’m writing because I have some terrible news. I have breast cancer, and they’ve only given me another few months. When I found out I was sick, I wanted to call you. I should have. But I know you’ve remarried, and I want you to be happy. I suppose I still feel guilty about everything that happened, and so I’ve kept my distance.
The last time I saw you, I’m afraid I was cruel. I’m sorry for that.
Every time I look at those doves, it makes my heart hurt a little. I remember you so well, especially now that I have so much time to sit here and think. Please know that you were a great love in my life. Part of me wanted to come with you. But in the end, I had to make the choice I knew I could live with.
I could not believe a love that begins in the destruction of a family has a chance of surviving. This is how I learned to let you go. I taught myself to believe that we would not have been happy together. Despite my sadness over you, I have been very happy with James and the girls. If any family could mend a torn heart, it is mine.
But still know that I think of you often. In these last moments of my life, I’ve wished so much that we could say goodbye.
I’m a very lucky woman to have been loved by two men such as you and James. To know you both, to love you, has been a great honor.
I’m returning these doves to you, John, to enjoy and remember me by. I wish you a long life and tremendous happiness with your family. Take it from one who knows, every moment you have with them is precious.
Yours always,
Marie
Xander finishes before I do, and she raises her eyes to John’s. “So you did? You did have an affair?”
“I’m afraid so.”
The words drop like chunks of ice, making the room cold.
Phillips looks between the two of us, seeming to comprehend something. “Oh, no!” He leans forward, his elbows on his knees. “When we met, I was married. That’s why she didn’t want you girls to know. She was ashamed she’d had an affair with a married man.”
Xander wilts against me. I lean back against the couch. I never thought of this. Never once. Slowly the stunned feeling seeps out of me.
“I wish I could say something that would absolve her.” He stands up, walks behind his desk chair, and leans against the back of it as he talks. His eyes remain on Mom’s letter, which rests in Xander’s lap. “We were very young. And I’d married a woman who wasn’t good for me. Who made me unhappy. But it was wrong.”
“What about our dad?” Xander asks. I don’t have to look at her to know she’s trying hard not to cry. “Was she already with Dad at the time?”
“No.” He slices the air with his hand as if trying to cut away any doubt. “Not at first. She began dating him shortly before she and I split.”
The room is deadly quiet. Through the open door I hear a television come on, some sticky-sweet children’s program. The little boy giggles. He’s so lucky not to know about this.
“Look, girls,” John says. “Your mother was a very good person who made a mistake. She realized how serious it was before I did. And she was the one who broke it off. Long before she married your father.”
“But why did you send her the statue after she got married?” Xander asks. Her eyes are hard, and I realize that she doesn’t trust what he’s telling us.
He takes a deep breath. “Because my first wife left me after Marie married James. Your father. And I wanted Marie back.”
“So you tried to steal her away from Dad?”
“I sent her the statue with a note that I was in town and would be waiting for her in a hotel room.” The memory seems to sap his strength, and he sits down in the chair again.
“Did she come?”
He looks at us both, seeming to measure us. “Yes. She did. She tried to give me back the statue, but I wouldn’t take it. And she left. I never saw her after that.” He blinks twice, and I see a glisten in his eyes. Quickly he lifts his fingers to his face as though checking for tears.
“You really loved her,” Xander says quietly.
For the first time, he smiles at us. “Of course I did.”