The Marriage Plot - Jeffrey Eugenides [175]
Downstairs, she found Phyllida arranging flowers at the laundry room sink. The sliding glass doors to the deck were open, a yellow butterfly fluttering above the bushes.
“Good morning,” Phyllida said. “How did you sleep?”
“Badly.”
“There are English muffins by the toaster.”
Madeleine padded sleepily across the kitchen. She took a muffin from the package and began trying to split it with her fingers.
“Use a fork, dear,” Phyllida said.
But it was too late: the muffin top ripped off unevenly. Madeleine dropped the uneven sides into the toaster and pressed down the lever.
While the muffin toasted, she poured herself a cup of coffee and sat at the kitchen table. Suitably roused, she said, “Mummy, I have to go into the city tonight to see an apartment.”
“Tonight?”
Madeleine nodded.
“Your father and I have a cocktail party tonight.” Phyllida meant that they wouldn’t be able to stay with Leonard.
The muffin popped up. “But Mummy?” Madeleine persisted. “This apartment sounds perfect. It’s on Riverside Drive. With a view.”
“I’m sorry, dear, but I’ve had this party in my book for three months.”
“Kelly says it won’t last. I have to come today.” She felt bad for pressing. Phyllida and Alton had been so good about everything, so helpful to Leonard in his distress, that Madeleine didn’t want to burden them further. On the other hand, if she didn’t find an apartment, she and Leonard couldn’t move out.
“Maybe Leonard will go with you,” Phyllida suggested.
Madeleine fished the bigger half of her muffin out of the toaster, saying nothing. She had taken Leonard to the city just last week, and it hadn’t gone well. In the crowds at Penn Station he’d begun to hyperventilate and they’d had to take the next train back to Prettybrook.
“Maybe I won’t go,” she said finally.
“You might as well ask Leonard if he’d like to go,” Phyllida said.
“I will when he gets up.”
“He is up. He’s been up for a while. He’s out on the deck.”
This surprised Madeleine. Leonard had been sleeping late into the mornings. Standing up, she took her coffee and muffin out to the sunny deck.
Leonard was on the lower level, in the shade, sitting in the Adirondack chair where he’d been spending most of his days. He looked large and shaggy, like a Sendak creature. He had on a black T-shirt and baggy black shorts. His feet, clad in old basketball sneakers, were propped up on the porch railing. Plumes of smoke were rising from the area in front of his face.
“Hi,” Madeleine said, coming up beside his chair.
Leonard croaked out a greeting and continued smoking.
“How are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m exhausted. Couldn’t sleep so I took a sleeping pill around two. Then I woke up about five and came out here.”
“Did you get some breakfast?”
Leonard held up his pack of cigarettes.
A lawn mower started up in an adjoining yard. Madeleine sat down on the wide arm of the chair. “Kelly called,” she said. “What do you think about coming into the city with me tonight? Around four-thirty?”
“Not a good idea,” Leonard said again in his croaking voice.
“There’s a one-bedroom on Riverside Drive.”
“You go.”
“I want you to come with me.”
“Not a good idea,” he repeated.
The sound of the lawn mower was getting closer. It came right up to the other side of the fence before moving away again.
“Mummy’s going to a cocktail party,” Madeleine said.
“You can leave me alone, Madeleine.”
“I know.”
“If I wanted to kill myself, I could do it at night, when you’re sleeping. I could drown myself in the swimming pool. I could have done that this morning.”
“You’re not making me feel better about going into the city,” Madeleine said.
“Look. Mad. I’m not feeling too good. I’m exhausted and my nerves are all jangled. I don’t think I can