The last secret_ a novel - Mary McGarry Morris [12]
“I told you, they weren't.”
“What about Lyra? What is she now, four?”
“Almost.”
“She must've been there. Of course she was.” She had to have been, throughout. “What does she call you? Ken? Kenny? Uncle Ken?” She remembers something. The club. The Fourth of July cookout? No, Labor Day. The little girl asleep in Ken's arms. So sweet of him, Nora thought, watching his easy tenderness cradling the child. Bob was drunk so Ken drove him home, once again. Ken called to say he'd be late getting home, Bob needed some settling down. She throws back her head and laughs. Yes, all so perfectly orchestrated. “What would you do after you put him in bed, climb in on top of … his wife?” She can't bear saying her name anymore. She, Her, the Bitch. He knows who she means. And so does she, knows, by the long, dismal sigh that it happened like that, Bob passed out in the next room, down the hall, downstairs, but under the same roof, the three of them, Bob, Robin, and Ken, entwined since childhood, playmates from first grade on. Did he ever wake up? He must have. To go to the bathroom, to vomit, the two of them tensing closer as he staggers down a dark hallway, she pictures it, their naked clutching, her breath on his hairless chest, every sick detail. There must have been some close calls. There were, weren't there? Weren't there? What was it like to be inside her, having to worry the whole time that Bob might stumble in on his old friend fucking his wife, her long blonde hair hanging down in Ken's face, because that's how she keeps picturing it. Can't stop seeing Robin lean over him in broad daylight, all the lights in the room on so he can admire every naked inch of her tanned body, perfectly toned and muscled from the years of tennis and running, Pilates, weights. Her six-pack abdomen, he actually said that, teasing her, at the club last summer.
“Well, would you? Did you? You must have.”
“Don't. Please, Nora.”
“Was it more exciting that way?”
“I don't want to do this anymore,” he says, rubbing his eyes.
“Oh, you don't? You don't want to? Oh, poor Kenny. Why? Is it too upsetting? Too painful? Does it hurt too much? In here? In here? In here?” she screams, pounding her chest, over and over and over again.
nd last but never least, our Hospital Building Committee's esteemed chairman, Kenneth J. Hammond, and his lovely wife, Nora,” the faux British voice intones over the loudspeaker.
“Spare me,” she whispers, and Ken's jaw clenches. The wide gilt-trimmed doors swing open. Arm in arm they enter the hotel's glittering ballroom, Nora in black silk, hair tightly back from her waxen face, Ken in his tux, pink silk paisley cummerbund and bow tie. Applause quickens as lovable Ken tips an imaginary hat from table to table, his boyish grin, ever the crowd-pleaser. The ice queen smiles, nodding, sore eyes forced wide, stiffly gracious, throat shredded raw from screaming. Even though Ken has assured her Robin and Bob won't be here, her gaze lasers from table to table.
An elderly blonde in a red strapless dress that cuts into her flaccid bosom reaches for Ken's hand. He bends to kiss her bright rouged cheek. A dear old friend of his mother's Nora knows, can't retrieve the name. In these last few days, lobes of memory have been wiped out, bludgeoned by betrayal. Her brain feels bruised. Nora, you remember Mumma's dear friend, Sissy. Of course. The Hammonds have a wealth of dear old friends. Of course they do, old family that they are. And Ken, dearest of all, the bastard … son of a bitch. Blood seeps hot into her face. Like his father, whose affairs people still recall with an affection usually heard in the play-by-play reminiscences of old college football games. No, that's just another way of letting him off the hook. She has to guard against that, blaming everyone but him. Ken pulls out her chair, with a flourish shakes out her napkin, places it in her lap. Everyone laughs.
Stephen and Donald sit across from them. Stephen blows her a kiss and Donald winks. They ignore Ken. But he pretends not to notice. Donald is an anesthesiologist.