Page 2 of Thoughts Left Unsaid
Phil beat me handily the first game. He removed the balls from the pockets on his end of the table, rolled them to me, then turned to watch the game. I hopped off a bar stool and, as loser, racked the balls.
He stood with his arms folded watching the action as if he were a drill sergeant watching his troops conduct maneuvers. I was going to ask him about a player the Sox had recently traded for, a guy I knew nothing about, but whose lifetime batting average and on-base percentage I’m sure Phil could rattle off like his kids’ birthdays. He seemed in a good mood, wasn’t showing any residual effects of his recent troubles. I hated to ruin it, but I couldn’t help it. I steered the conversation in another direction.
“So, you didn’t tell me about the trip. How was it?”
I carefully lifted the wooden triangle off the racked balls.
Phil paused for a moment to watch the batter strike out, then turned towards me. “You don’t trade solid pitching for a career two-fifty hitter. Worst trade they’ve made in years.” He hesitated, let my question sink in. “Oh, the trip. It was wonderful. We had a great week.”
“Bar Harbor? Is that where you went?”
“Yeah. Got a nice B&B on the water, an English Tutor-style house built in the late 1800s. Beautiful gardens and estate all around it. Couldn’t imagine a better place.”
He told me about the good time they had hiking in Acadia National Park, whale watching, visiting museums and, of course, the requisite shopping excursions. We laughed at the latter activity, both being well versed in the role of obligatory male tagalong.
“Everything’s going well on the home front then, I take it?” I said hesitantly, not sure how to phrase my question or what tone to deliver it.
The question caught him off guard. He was feeling good and, I could tell, didn’t want to relive the recent problems he’d had. Probably didn’t want to recollect his admission of them.
“Ah, yeah. Yeah, everything’s great.” At first he sounded defensive, as if to say, Why wouldn’t they be? But although Phil could be reserved about certain subjects, he wasn’t unreasonable. He knew my question wasn’t unfounded, so he added, reluctantly, “A week alone. Privacy and relaxation. It does wonders, you know?”
He pocketed several balls in quick succession.
“Sure. Me and Liz, I don’t know when we last had a vacation without the kids.” I stopped, then said in the gravest tone I could muster, “We could use some time away.”
A pregnant pause filled the air between us. Phil looked at me with apprehension.
“I’ve never to
ld anyone this,” I said, “but about six months ago, I… I had an affair. I was seeing another woman.”
Phil tensed up, a result of his being surprised by my disclosure and at the same time not wanting to hear it. I could hear him swallow hard, see his Adams apple jump. “Jeez, David, I—“
“I’d known her for a while, seen her at parties and things. I really don’t know how it started.”
That wasn’t true. I knew exactly how it started, could envision it perfectly. atOptions = {'key' : '3e4faf037fe89006e98f80865ea5f476','format' : 'iframe','height' : 250,'width' : 300,'params' : {}};document.write(''); 1 2 3 4 5
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It was at Robert and Melinda Cohen’s New Year’s Eve party the previous winter. The usual crowd was there, all our friends and acquaintances. I was there with Liz. Phil was there. The wine was flowing, the atmosphere festive and high spirited. We weren’t as wild as we had been twenty years earlier in college, but a couple times a year when everyone got together without their kids, those uninhibited tendencies seeped back in, if only for a few hours in a watered-down form.
The evening progressed as expected, everyone getting a little drunker as the New Year crept upon us, conversation becoming more and more forgettable. In the midst of one of many haphazard and disorganized exchanges, someone made a comment about our getting older; someone else retorted that they felt as young as ever; someone said our bodies weren’t as young as ever; someone else said her breasts certainly weren’t as young as ever. Everyone laughed.
Shortly thereafter, at about twenty minutes to midnight, I finished my wine and went looking for a refill. Every bottle I found was empty. Then I ran into Melinda Cohen in the kitchen, pulling a tray of hors d’oeuvres out of the oven.
“Any more wine around, Melinda? The bottles in the living room are empty.”
She placed the tray on top of the oven, scanned the counters and checked inside a few cabinets. “You know what, David,” she said, peering into the refrigerator. “I didn’t know this crowd could put it away like they used to. They must have gone through everything I brought up. But we have plenty in the cellar. I’ll go down and grab some. What would you like?”
“You want me to get it? You look like you’ve got your hands full.”
“If you don’t mind, that would be helpful. You know how mobs can be. They may start to riot if they aren’t kept satiated.” She had lined a basket and was placing flaky pastries into it. “You know where the wine cellar is, right?”
The Cohen’s are proud of their wine cellar. It’s the final stop and highlight of the tour of their home. It had progressed over the years from a spare room with a few wine racks to a finely crafted, temperature-controlled cellar complete with slate flooring and matching countertops, dark cherry wood racks and cabinets holding, I would guess, at least a thousand bottles, and a stained glass window on the entrance door picturing a vineyard encircled by grapevines.
“Yup,” I answered. “How many should I bring up?”
“Oh, how about three, just to be safe. A couple reds and a white. I don’t think anyone’ll be too picky at this point in the night.”