The Accidental Tourist - Anne Tyler [114]
“Oh? Is this some of your doing?”
She only turned a page.
Another plea for the France trip, he supposed. He pulled off the tape on one end and shook the package till a cylinder of glossy paper slid out. When he unrolled it, he found a full-color photo of two puppies in a basket, with DR. MACK’S PETVITES above it and a calendar for January below it.
“I don’t understand,” he said to Muriel.
She turned another page.
“Why would you send me a calendar for a year that’s half gone?”
“Maybe there’s something written on it,” she told him.
He flipped through February, March, April. Nothing there. May. Then June: a scribble of red ink across a Saturday, “Wedding,” he read out. “Wedding? Whose wedding?”
“Ours?” she asked him.
“Oh, Muriel . . .”
“You’ll be separated a year then, Macon. You’ll be able to get your divorce.”
“But, Muriel—”
“I always did want to have a June wedding.”
“Muriel, please, I’m not ready for this! I don’t think I ever will be. I mean I don’t think marriage ought to be as common as it is; I really believe it ought to be the exception to the rule; oh, perfect couples could marry, maybe, but who’s a perfect couple?”
“You and Sarah, I suppose,” Muriel said.
The name brought Sarah’s calm face, round as a daisy.
“No, no . . .” he said weakly.
“You’re so selfish!” Muriel shouted. “You’re so self-centered! You’ve got all these fancy reasons for never doing a single thing I want!”
Then she flung down her book and ran upstairs.
Macon heard the cautious, mouselike sounds of Alexander as he tiptoed around the kitchen fixing himself a snack.
Muriel’s sister Claire arrived on the doorstep with a suitcase spilling clothes and her eyes pink with tears. “I’m never speaking to Ma again,” she told them. She pushed past them into the house. “You want to know what happened? Well, I’ve been dating this guy, see: Claude McEwen. Only I didn’t let on to Ma, you know how she’s scared I’ll turn out like Muriel did, and so last night when he came for me I jumped into his car and she happened to catch sight of me from the window, noticed he had a bumper sticker reading EDGEWOOD. That’s because he used to go to a high school called Edgewood Prep in Delaware, but Ma thought it was Edgewood Arsenal and therefore he must be an Army man. So anyhow, this morning I get up and there she is fit to be tied, says, ‘I know what you’ve been up to! Out all hours last night with the General!’ and I say, ‘Who? The what?’ but there’s never any stopping her once she gets started. She tells me I’m grounded for life and can’t ever see the General again or she’ll have him hauled up for court-martial and all his stars ripped off his uniform, so quick as a wink I packed up my clothes . . .”
Macon, listening absently while Edward sighed at his feet, had a sudden view of his life as rich and full and astonishing. He would have liked to show it off to someone. He wanted to sweep out an arm and say, “See?”
But the person he would have liked to show it to was Sarah.
Rose and Julian were back from their honeymoon; they were giving a family supper and Macon and Muriel were invited. Macon bought a bottle of very good wine as a hostess gift. He set the bottle on the counter, and Muriel came along and said, “What’s this?”
“It’s wine for Rose and Julian.”
“Thirty-six dollars and ninety-nine cents!” she said, examining the sticker.
“Yes, well, it’s French.”
“I didn’t know a wine could cost thirty-six ninety-nine.”
“I figured since, you know, this’ll be our first visit to their apartment . . .”
“You sure do think a lot of your family,” Muriel said.
“Yes, of course.”
“You never bought me any wine.”
“I didn’t know you wanted any; you told me it makes your teeth feel rough.”
She didn’t argue with that.
Later that day he happened to notice that the bottle had been moved. And was opened. And was half emptied. The cork lay beside it, still impaled on the corkscrew. A cloudy little juice glass gave off the smell of grapes. Macon called, “Muriel?”
“What,” she answered from the living