Page 92 of Identity Unknown
“I just want there to be something out there. Something besides us.” She’s getting teary. “You know these shows that Pete and I are addicted to? Well, they offer hope that there’s more to life than the failed fucking mess I see every damn time I turn on the fucking news. I want goodness to win. I want something bigger and better than us to make sure we don’t kill the entire planet.”
“Me too,” I reply.
“And I want to feel I matter.”
“You matter very much, Dorothy. You always have.”
“I want to matter to them.” She points up at the ceiling.
“I’m sure you do. Now let me take my shower.”
“I want to tell you I’m sorry about your friend Sal.” She’s getting more emotional, pulling a tissue out of her green sleeve. “I met him only a few times but understand why you liked him.”
“I did like him. I liked him quite a lot.”
“And I can see why there would be something between the two of you.” She wags her finger at me, listing in the doorway as if on a rough sea.
“Why would you say that?” I’m not telling her. Never.
“You know, I can sense these things.” She looks ridiculous in her Jolly Green Giant outfit, rattling the ice in her glass, her swaths of green eye shadow iridescent. “When you’d ride with Sal to one of your highfalutin meetings at the Pentagon, theWhite House or wherever, I could tell that Pete was unhappy. He’d make all these snarks about what a piece of junk Sal’s truck was compared to the amazing one I bought Pete. And that Sal didn’t own a gun when of course my husband has an arsenal. And when Sal was on TV, Pete would change the channel.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“I can read him like a book.” She looks at me with a rare hint of empathy that conveys she knows about Sal.
It’s not merely a premonition. No doubt Marino gave up my secret without overtly doing so, and that’s typically how the proverbial cat is let out of the bag. He never meant to, but Dorothy can find the truth behind his darting eyes and bluster. My sister is aware of Sal’s importance in my early life.
“The first time I saw you after you were back from Rome, I knew you’d been fucking somebody,” she says as if there can be no denial. “You were relaxed and seemed almost joyful for you. Naturally, it didn’t last, which was a good thing in hindsight. Long-distance relationships die if they stretch on forever, and yours would have, my dear.” She sways closer, rubbing my shoulder. “You weren’t going to move and change careers for him. And he wasn’t going to change anything for you.”
“Our lives wouldn’t have been compatible,” I reply.
“Must you talk as if your heart’s a block of wood?”
“You know it isn’t, Dorothy.”
“I just wish you’d told me at the time.”
“No offense, but you were the last person I was going to discuss my love life with.” I take another hit of my Manhattan, desperate for a cigarette.
“As much experience as I’ve had with men?” She’s gettingmore emphatic. “I’m exactly who you should have asked, sweet pea. Well, I’m sorry you were sad and I wasn’t there to help,” she adds unexpectedly, tears spilling.
Then I’m overwhelmed by emotions I’ve kept walled off for days, even longer. Some of the sorrow I feel is ancient and no longer visible on the surface.
“Come here.” Dorothy gives me an awkward hug, patting my back as I hear Lucy’s cat Merlin muttering and meowing. “Oh!” my sister exclaims. “I guess when I saidcome here,he thought I meant him!”
She laughs hysterically as Merlin saunters into the bathroom, looking up at me with owl eyes, his ears flat like a helmet, his tail twitching. Dorothy starts crying again, clinging to me, her sash of plastic leaves tickling my skin. Lucy’s cat jumps up on the back of the toilet where he often perches.
“You’ll feel better after you eat.” My only sibling stumbles over the words, nodding her head knowingly. “And you need to put something on your sunburned schnozzle.” She pokes my nose that’s bright pink from my floating on the water while waiting to be rescued.
“I’ll see you downstairs.” I shut the bathroom door, turning on the shower.
After I’ve cleaned up, I find that Merlin has vanished as he so often does. I change into pajamas, putting on a robe and slippers, headed downstairs. Carrying my empty drink glass, I walk into the kitchen, my favorite room in the house.
Old bricks show through the creamy plaster walls, a rackhung with polished copper cookware suspended from an exposed beam overhead. The deep fireplace works, and during cold weather Benton and I use it often. There’s nothing cozier than sitting at the table before the window, having breakfast while looking out at snow, a fire burning.
“What are we talking about?” I ask as he takes my empty glass, big gleaming pots of sauce and boiling water steaming on the stove.
“We were just imagining what a nice night Ryder and Piper Briley must be having in the detention center.” Marino has switched from beer to bourbon. “I’m thinking about them mingling with the general population. Inmates don’t take kindly to child abusers. Especially spoiled rich ones.”