The Ghosts of Lovely Women Read online

  “Oh, God,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Remember I mentioned a crazy ex-boyfriend? That’s him. He’s been emailing and leaving messages after a year of non-communication. Suddenly he’s resurrected some interest in me, despite the fact that I’ve answered not one of his requests. So I see we’ve stepped it up a level.”

  Derek’s face looked hard. We were suddenly in that Bogart movie we’d joked about. “Park behind this car. I want to see what he does.”

  We found a spot a good distance from the door, but Derek rolled down his window and I could hear Richard’s authoritative voice carrying toward us on the May breeze: “Hi — I’m a friend of Teddy Thurber’s and her buzzer isn’t working. Could you buzz me in?”

  The most horrifying part of that whole scene was that it sounded so natural, so believable as a ploy, that even from our distance we could hear the Bzzzz sound that meant Richard was being admitted into my building. He was going to ascend to the third floor, to my apartment. Would he linger in the hallway and make P.G. bark? Would he break into my apartment? Had he broken in before and ransacked it? Nausea rose in me like a bad memory.

  Derek touched my arm. “I would say you can come to my place, but I think it’s better if we go in there and confront this, Teddy. Figure out what the hell this guy wants. You say he’s been persistent, and now it’s escalating. He needs a firm response.”

  “Yeah. Except I don’t want to go anywhere near him.”

  “Have you considered a restraining order?”

  “He hasn’t threatened me. He’s done nothing. He just… keeps pushing.”

  “Still a pattern, and ultimately a kind of abuse. If you don’t want the communication, and he insists, that makes it a power struggle.”

  “Always about power, isn’t it?

  “I suppose.”

  I wondered, to my surprise, what Jessica would think of this. Another man trying to assert himself in dominion over another woman. But I did not need to be helpless. I was not Nora Helmer. I lived in a society that supported my rights, my independence. I took a deep breath. “Okay, let’s go,” I said.

  Derek offered me his hand again and I held it tightly, angrily. He seemed to understand, because he said, “We’ll make sure this ends here.”

  We took the elevator, which allowed us the element of surprise. The stairway door was too near my apartment door, while the elevator was at the other end of the hall. When the doors slid open I peered out to see Richard, in his work attire of suit and tie, trying a key in my lock.

  I don’t think I had ever seen a human being do something this audacious before, at least not to me. Dozens of emotions swarmed through me before I summoned up the word “Hey!” and moved toward him.

  He looked up, covering his shock with a smooth smile. “Teddy! I was just going to surprise you, but you caught me in the act.”

  “Surprise me? You were trying to break into my apartment.”

  He went for bashful. “I just wondered if my old key would work. Talk about getting caught red-handed.”

  “I have new locks. Good ones.” Then, as something dawned on me, “Did it work for you yesterday?”

  He shook his head, his expression blank. “I wasn’t here yesterday. I emailed you from Nebraska. I was there for three days on business; it’s a pretty state. Not as boring as people say.” He was assessing Derek over my shoulder, and his eyes narrowed slightly. He looked almost the same, except he was slightly fuller — maybe five pounds heavier, and starting to age around the eyes. He was only thirty-two, but I knew from experience that Richard enjoyed his vices, specifically whiskey and cigarettes.

  “Why are you here, Richard?”

  “I want to talk to you. Can we go inside?”

  “No.” I folded my arms.

  “Teddy, don’t be so unfriendly. Haven’t you ever heard the expression ‘For old times’ sake?’”

  “Richard, I haven’t seen you in two years. The fact that you have popped up out of nowhere, starting this weird e-mail campaign over the last month—”

  “A man can’t express concern for his old girlfriend?” He stepped closer, leaning down to force eye contact. “I was worried about you, Teddy.”

  “Don’t be.”

  He straightened up then, all business. “Listen, I need to talk to you whether you want to or not. If you can ask your friend here to leave us alone—”

  Teachers know a trick about dealing with persistent students. There’s always one who wants to argue: But why did I get that grade? What can I do to change it? How come you don’t like me? Why aren’t you fair? Whatever they can do to seize the conversational advantage and therefore establish power, they do it. The goal is not to engage them, but to provide answers that are short, simple, and, when need be, repetitive. One lecturer at an Assertive Discipline inservice had termed this “The broken record technique.”

  I used this now. “I need you to leave this building and not return. If you have something of a legal nature to discuss with me, send a letter via your lawyer. We have nothing personal to discuss, Richard.”

  “Teddy, I’m not going to stand for this dismissive attitude.”

  “I am asking you to leave.”

  “What have you got against a few minutes of conversation?”

  “I am telling you to leave.”

  “You must be crazy—”

  “Leave.”

  With a stamp of his foot and a rude utterance, Richard left, but not before demanding the last word. “I’ll be back when you don’t have your watchdog here,” he said. Then, to Derek, “You’d better keep the hell out of my way, Buddy.”

  Derek, his face tight with dislike, said, “I was just about to say the same thing to you.”

  They stared each other down for a moment, like wary dogs, and then Richard snorted and stomped down the hall.

  We watched him board the elevator. When the doors shut, the hall seemed unusually still. I unlocked my door with a trembling hand and turned the knob. Derek and I entered in silence. I walked into the kitchen, opened the refrigerator, closed it. I felt ashamed. I said, “I swear he wasn’t that horrible when I was dating him. People wear masks, don’t they?”

  “He’s no reflection on you, Teddy. But he’s trouble, and I want him away from you. I’m going to help you apply for a restraining order.”

  “The man is a lawyer. Doesn’t he understand how inappropriate his behavior is?”

  “He’s not being objective; he’s focused on what he wants.”

  “I feel like crying, but it’s because I’m so angry! I’m not afraid of him, I’m not intimidated by him — but I hate him now. I really hate him.”

  Derek pulled me into a hug. “Cry, then. At least you know a healthy way to release your anger. He seems to be suppressing his.”

  “Anger at me?”

  “More like at himself. If he’s got any sense, he probably realized he should never have let himself lose you. I assume he ruined it?”

  “In any number of ways: immaturity, temper, and finally: infidelity.”

  “So after a year he suddenly came to his senses, perhaps. He began to e-mail you and got no satisfaction. And now suddenly having Teddy back is top on his list.”

  “He acts like a giant child,” I said, slipping out of Derek’s arms and slumping into one of my dining room chairs. Then, still fighting back tears, I said, “If I were doing Kathy’s psychology project, I’d have a lot to say about him!”

  Derek sat across from me. “He said he was in Nebraska.”

  “Oh, God, that’s right!” I jumped up and moved to my phone. I dialed Richard’s office, a number I still knew by heart. A receptionist I didn’t recognize answered.

  “Harlow, Pietrowski, Williams and Statten,” she said, slurring most of the names.

  “Uh— hi. I was trying to reach Mr. Statten all day yesterday and he never got back to me,” I said.

  She treated me to the soothing purr of a well-trained clerk. “Mr. Statten has been o
ut of town for three days,” she said. “I’m sure that he will return your call promptly today, although he will not be in the office until three. His flight only came in last night, so I’m sure you’ll understand he needs a bit of time to unpack and rest.”

  “Oh, right,” I said. “That was his trip to Nevada, or—”

  “Nebraska, yes.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  I hung up and faced Derek, defeated. “His receptionist agrees that he’s been in Nebraska for three days. Got back last night.”

  “Huh. Well, that’s good news, right?”

  “Why?”

  “Because you wouldn’t want to think your ex-boyfriend is crazy enough to ransack your stuff—”

  “Although he obviously is.”

  “—and this means it could still be just a random thing. A thief looking for money.”

  “Except that I live on the third floor, that seems unlikely, and you don’t believe it yourself.”

  “Just looking for an ‘on the bright side’ scenario,” he said, apologetic.

  “You are the bright side.”

  His embrace was warm, still scented by his pipe, and exactly what I needed at that moment.

  Fourteen

  “This horror — it’s going to happen. No, no, no, it can’t happen, it mustn’t!”

  —Nora, A Doll’s House, Act II

  By lunchtime Saturday I had calmed down enough to keep my date with Will. Derek had insisted “just this once,” on driving me to the restaurant, a pub called Chappy’s in Pine Grove. He seemed to fear that I would resent his interference, or that somehow it offended my feminist instincts. I assured him that it did not, but that Will would drive me home and escort me to my door.

  “Believe me, I don’t want to encounter Richard again,” I said.

  Outside of Chappy’s Derek put his car in park and turned to me. It was a nice day — cool but sunny — and despite my odd morning I was feeling cheerful. “Call me when you get home, okay?”

  “Okay.” I slid over and kissed him; it was one of those kisses you think will be short but then it’s fun and it ends up being longer.

  “I think I’ll miss you,” I said, stroking his smooth beard.

  “I think that was a great kiss,” he said.

  I got out and waved until his car was gone, then entered the diner. My brother stood there, glorious as ever — tall, thin, blond-haired and blue eyed, the only one in our family who wasn’t dark. My father had spent Will’s lifetime making “son of the mailman” jokes about his oldest child, but he was obviously as impressed by Will’s looks as were the rest of us. Will was the only one whose hair hadn’t been touched by the early gray; it sat on his head like a golden cap. He was like an advertisement for Swedish sports. My dad said he could star in The Bjorn Borg Story.

  Will was smirking at me. “I’m glad I had to wait for a table, so I could see my little sister making out with some guy in a — what was that — a Highlander?”

  I shrugged. “As you know, I have no idea what any car is, and I barely remember the color. It’s pale, I know that.”

  “It was silver, you feeb, and it looks like a fairly new Toyota.”

  “Thanks for that auto assessment.” I hugged him. “How are you? How was Sweden?”

  “Great. I got to actually see a little of the country this time. Who’s the guy?”

  “He teaches at my school. He just started this week, but oh, so much has happened in a few days.”

  “Obviously some intimate stuff.”

  A waitress appeared and led us to a booth; there, while Will began to read his menu, I told him: about Jessica, about Kathy, about Derek.

  He set his menu down. “Aw, man. Is she one of those girls I met at the football game last year?”

  I thought back — I had brought Will to a St. James football game — which, sadly, they had lost — and yes, Jessica and a girl named Sandy had wandered past us, then come back when they saw my brother. Will is thirty-one, but he looks about nineteen, and the girls were obviously intent upon flirting with him. Jessica and her friend sat with us for a while, and in that time they were ostensibly talking to me about English and how fascinating our reading had been, but they hadn’t been able to tear their eyes from Will, who smiled affably and offered them some of his popcorn. The following Monday Jessica had asked me if Will were adopted.

  “Yes. That was Jessica — the blonde one. The other girl was Sandy Miles; she read a little poem at the funeral.”

  “That’s rough.”

  I took a deep breath and told him the last part of the story: how I had spent my morning at the police station, and later had encountered Richard trying to get into my apartment.

  Will, although generally a placid person, has quite a temper of his own. When he heard about Richard’s invasion his brows drew close together and he slammed down the water glass from which he had just sipped. His voice was low, though, when he said, “I am going to fuckin’ kill that guy!”

  Will had never liked Richard. Now I could see why, but at the time it had mystified me.

  “Will, settle down. Derek’s going to help me get a restraining order, and hopefully that will put an end to it.”

  “Guys with restraining orders still go ahead and kill their ex-girlfriends,” he said.

  “That’s cheery.”

  “He’s a creep, and we need to do something more than giving you some stupid piece of paper which even the cops know does no good. A restraining order,” he said bitterly, as though I’d said I was going to protect myself with a lettuce leaf.

  “Is there any chance that Richard killed this girl?” he asked.

  The waitress appeared; we both ordered a sandwich while I processed Will’s question. Had Richard known Jessica? Yes, he’d probably at least seen her at several school functions he attended with me. That would have been when Jessica was a sophomore or junior, though. I couldn’t think of any real connection…

  “—with that?”

  “What?

  “Would you like fries or fruit with that?”

  “Fries,” I said, casting a guilty glance at Will, who had about five percent body fat.

  He gave me a thumbs-up. “You should taste the food in Sweden. It’s better than you’d think.”

  I sighed with relief, hoping that now he’d leave the topic of Richard alone. He did, for a while. I told him about Lucky and her trip to Colorado. “Sounds nice,” he said. “I want to go back there on my next vacation.”

  “Take me, too.”

  “Sure. And in that vein, I think I’ll be bunking at your place tonight.”

  “Will—”

  “I just want to check out the security. Or is your lover man taking that duty?”

  “We’re not — I mean, obviously, I just met him.”

  “Looked pretty steamy to me.”

  “Anyway.”

  “Yeah. I’m going to bunk on your couch and watch television.”

  “Fine.” Then, while we both dug into our complimentary breadbasket, I added, “Thanks, Will.”

  “Think nothing of it. I’ve grown rather attached to you, you know.”

  “And it only took thirty years.”

  “Granted, I wasn’t thrilled when you were born, but I think I’ve adapted nicely. Although Lucky seemed like one insult too many.” He was grinning as he said it, and as usual my brother’s affable face and manner removed any sting from his words.

  I noticed that the waitress had found another reason to come to our table — this time to wipe some tiny water spill off of the edge, and I realized that she was fascinated with Will. I saw her eyes dart to his left hand and I smiled. “Can I get some ketchup for the fries?” I asked, helping her out.

  Her face lit up. Another chance to see Will’s wondrous blondness. “Of course! I’ll be right back with that.”

  “Stop trying to match me up with the waitress,” he told me, bored.

  “Get married already, and Lucky and I will leave you alone.”
r />   “Thirty-five, woman. That’s when I said I’d get married, assuming I’ve met a smart, beautiful and charismatic woman who likes me back.”

  “Okay. What else is new?”

  “Hey — this will please you, English major. I joined a book club.”

  “You did?” This was a shock, since Will was barely ever home. “How are you going to attend the meetings?”

  “I have attended three out of three, thank you. We’re doing classics right now. We just finished Anna Karenina.”

  “When did you find time to read Anna Karenina?”

  “You do know that I’m always on planes, right? And now we’re reading The Odyssey. Fagles translation.”

  “Ah. Our juniors read that, too.”

  “It’s far more interesting than I expected. Poetic, too.”

  “It is a poem.”

  “Right.” He buttered his bread with a thoughtful expression. “But I found myself having a feminist moment during the reading.”

  “You?”

  “It’s just such a different world. Women are obviously considered sort of sub-human.”

  “That seems to be a theme in my life lately.”

  “But there’s one part that really bugs me. It’s when Odysseus needs to talk to some people in the Underworld, and he slaughters a bull or something and sheds its blood in this area that’s a portal to the dead, and the shades in the Underworld are drawn to the warmth of the blood — the kind that used to animate them. They drink it and it gives them a voice for a short time.”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “And of course Odysseus wants to talk to men: to Agamemnon and Hercules and other guys who are important or who fought in battle, and in order to do that they have to scatter away all these pretty women who have come yearning to speak. Persephone just sends them away, like a herd of deer. Only the men get the opportunity to speak to Odysseus. Only the men have a voice.”

  I pointed a fry at him. “Except his mother. She got to drink the blood, but I think it was only so that she could fill in the plot — to tell Odysseus what his father and son and wife have been doing for the twenty years he’s been gone.”