“No, you want me to do a photo shoot, remember?”
> “You’re sure about Friday, though?”
“We’ll be done by then,” Evelyn says. “You’ll have to work even later than normal. I’ll make sure Grace has those muffins you like and the coffee from Peet’s that I know you prefer.”
“OK,” I say. “That’s fine, but there’s still a lot of ground to cover.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll be done by Friday.”
When I look at her skeptically, she says, “You should be happy, Monique. You’re going to get your answers.”
WHEN HARRY READ THE NOTE Max had sent me, he was stunned silent. At first, I thought I had hurt his feelings by showing it to him. But then I realized he was thinking.
We had taken Connor to a playground in Coldwater Canyon in Beverly Hills. Our flight back to New York left in a few hours. Connor was playing on the swings as Harry and I watched her.
“Nothing would change between us,” he said. “If we divorced.”
“But, Harry . . .”
“John is gone. Celia is gone. There is no need to hide behind double dates. Nothing would change.”
“We would change,” I said, watching Connor pump her legs harder, swing higher.
Harry was watching her through his sunglasses, smiling at her. He waved to her. “Good job, honey,” he called out. “Remember to keep your hands tight on the chains if you’re gonna go that high.”
He had started to control his drinking a bit. He had learned to pick and choose his moments of indulgence. And he never let anything get in the way of his work or his daughter. But I still worried about what he’d do if left too much to his own devices.
He turned to me. “We wouldn’t change, Ev. I promise you that. I would live in my house, just like now. You’d live in yours. I’d come by every day. Connor would sleep at my place the nights she wanted. If anything, appearances-wise, it might make more sense. Pretty soon people are going to start asking why we own two different houses.”
“Harry—”
“You do what you want. If you don’t want to be with Max, don’t be. I’m just saying that there are some fairly good reasons for us to get divorced. And not many cons, except that I won’t call you my wife anymore, which I’ve always been so proud to do. But we will still be as we’ve always been. A family. And . . . I think it would be good for you to fall in love with someone. You deserve to be loved that way.”
“So do you.”
Harry smiled sorrowfully. “I had my love. And he’s gone. But for you, I think it’s time. Maybe it will be Max, maybe it won’t. But maybe it should be somebody.”
“I don’t like the idea of divorcing you,” I said. “No matter how meaningless it might actually be.”
“Dad, watch,” Connor said as she flung her legs into the air, swung high, and then leaped, landing on her feet. She nearly gave me a heart attack.
Harry laughed. “Outstanding!” he said to her, and then he turned to me. “Sorry. I might have taught her that.”
“I figured.”
Connor got back onto the swing, and Harry leaned toward me and put his arm around my shoulders. “I know you don’t like the idea of divorcing me,” he said. “But I think you do like the idea of marrying Max. Otherwise, I don’t think you would have bothered to show me that note.”
* * *
“ARE YOU REALLY serious about this?” I asked.
Max and I were back in New York, at his apartment. It had been three weeks since he had told me he loved me.
“I am very serious,” Max said. “What is the saying? As serious as cancer?”
“A heart attack.”
“Fine. I am as serious as a heart attack.”