Victor’s voice is sharp. “What exactly do you think I do at night?”
“Do you want me to spell it out for you?”
“Yes, I think I do.”
“If you get to have sex, I get to have sex,” I say. The wordsexfeels like it echoes in the grand space. I glance around, but no one is looking at us.
“Sex,” Victor says. His voice is midnight. “Myers, I haven’t had sex since I married you. Which, if you recall, was several months ago.”
He sounds like that’s a painful revelation. “I recall. I was there.”
“Good. So whatever you think you’re accusing me of, I assure you, it’s not that.”
“Then where do you go at night?”
His jaw works, and then he turns away from me, looking out at the crowd. “As soon as we leave, I’ll show you.”
13
Cecilia
The drive is taut with silence. He’d taken the car himself, and looking at him from the corner of my eye, I wonder if the reason is to have something to do. A machine beneath his hands and a road to watch.
We haven’t spoken since he got behind the wheel, taking us further and further out of the city. The skyscrapers turn to mid-rises that soon shrink into glorious suburbia.
The wide streets we drive through are tree-lined. I glimpse electronic gates and pools behind fences. Old Victorian houses and charmingly cracked pavement only enhance the wealth that hides behind these hedges.
I’ve never been to this area of Long Island.
I look out the window and speak for the first time since we left the gallery. “Are we going to visit a relative of yours? I might be overdressed.”
Victor gives a harsh chuckle. “In a way, yes.”
“Oh. You’re sure I’m not overdressed?”
“You’re not overdressed,” he says. There’s a brief pause. “I’m in a suit, Cecilia.”
Funny, how in my head, that’s what he always wears. Even in the comfort of his own home, I’ve only seen him in suits, heading to work or returning home from it.
He turns onto a smaller street. The pavement is smooth here, and giant oaks line it, their trunks too big to wrap my arms around. The car slows to a crawl outside a property and he turns onto its driveway. A giant wrought-iron gate swings open on electronic hinges.
The house is enormous.
That’s my first impression. Enormous and Victorian and beautiful, with shutters and a wrap-around porch. Boxwood hedges line the building and give way to a stone staircase, slick with leaves. Behind the house I glimpse a lawn that stretches toward tall trees. No neighbors nearby.
“Wow. This house is…”
Victor parks the car. “It’s a lot of things.”
The air feels thick out here, smelling of fall and rain and nature. We walk toward the porch and scare a squirrel. It darts across the lawn.
“This is your grandfather’s house?”
“Yes.” He unlocks the front door, and just like that, everything makes sense. This is where he goes at night. This is where he grieves, even if he’d never call it that.
He won’t look at me. I wonder if he’s regretting this. That I’m here and witness to so much ofhim.But as I step into the wood-paneled entryway, his dry voice becomes that of a guide. Telling me about the property and the rooms.
I follow him through a sitting room with a giant fireplace, into a dining room with a table that’s large enough to seat twelve. I drink everything in. The antlers mounted on the wall. The framed picture of a family tree that looks yellow with age. It’s like a cabinet of curiosities, meticulously decorated and richly furnished.