Elin Hilderbrand - Silver Girl

Connie slammed the refrigerator door shut, then she threw the wine glass into the kitchen sink and the glass shattered. The noise was startling. Her anger and upset were unbelievable, and she knew that Meredith’s anger and upset matched, if not surpassed, hers. Was there room in one house for so much agony? Connie looked at the broken glass-and she spotted a chip in her enamel sink. Her gorgeous farmer’s sink, of which she had once been so proud.

Wolf, she thought. Ashlyn. Lost to her. Lost.

She thought, Dan. I should have gone to Dan’s.

She said, “Well, while we’re at it.”

“While we’re at it, what?” Meredith said.

“While we’re at it, I’m not the only one who made a mistake. I’m not the only one in the wrong here.”

“What are you talking about?” Meredith said.

She was standing with her hands on her hips, her graying hair tucked behind her ears, her horn-rimmed glasses slipping to the end of her nose. She had gotten those glasses in the eighth grade. Connie remembered her walking into American History class and showing off the glasses, and then in lunch and study hall, passing them around for other girls to try on. Connie had been the first one to try them on; they had turned the cafeteria into a blurry, swarming mass of color. Connie had almost vomited. And yet, she had been jealous of Meredith’s glasses, and of Meredith, since childhood. Practically her entire life.

“I’m talking about the things you said about Wolf,” Connie said. “The horrible things. You insinuated that we were pulling our money because Wolf had brain cancer and didn’t know any better.”

Meredith said, “You basically came right out and called Freddy a crook.”

“Meredith,” Connie said. “He was a crook.”

Meredith pushed her glasses up her nose. “You’re right,” she said. “He was a crook.” She stared at Connie. She seemed to be waiting for something. “And what I said about Wolf was ruthless. I’m sorry. I don’t know how I could have been so awful.”

“And you didn’t come to Wolf’s funeral,” Connie said. “And you knew that I needed you there.”

“I was on my way,” Meredith said. “I was at the door of the apartment, wearing a charcoal-gray suit, I remember. And Freddy talked me out of it.” She bit her lower lip. “I don’t know how he did it, but he did. You know Freddy.”

“Whatever Freddy told you to do, you did,” Connie said.

“That’s why I’m in trouble with the Feds,” Meredith said. “Freddy asked me to transfer fifteen million dollars from the business to our personal account three days before he was exposed, and I did it. I thought he was going to buy a house in Aspen.” She laughed. “I thought I was going to Aspen, but instead I’m going to jail.”

So that was why she was under investigation, Connie thought. She hadn’t been brave enough to ask. Another taboo shattered. She said, “You were supposed to come visit me here in nineteen eighty-two, but you didn’t come because of Freddy. Because Freddy had sent that telegram. He’d proposed, remember? And I said, ‘That’s great, we can celebrate your engagement.’ But you only wanted to celebrate with Freddy.”

“That was thirty years ago,” Meredith said.

“Exactly,” Connie said. “He’s been holding you hostage for thirty years.”

“I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell me what happened in France,” Meredith said. “Did our friendship mean nothing?”

“Wait a minute,” Connie said. “We’ve both done damage to the friendship. It wasn’t just me. I didn’t tell you about Freddy because, at the time, my best judgment told me to let it go. I’m sorry I brought it up.”

“Not as sorry as I am,” Meredith said.

“I’m not Samantha Deuce,” Connie said. “You’re angry with Samantha. Not with me.”

At that moment, Toby came downstairs. “What’s going on?” he said. “Did someone break a glass?”

“Connie,” Meredith said.

Toby turned to Connie. Connie could speak, but Toby wouldn’t hear her. This was her house-where, it might be pointed out, both Meredith and Toby were guests-but she had no voice.

“I’m going to bed,” Connie said. Dinner, she thought. She foraged through the pantry and selected a Something Natural herb roll, which she took a bite out of like an apple.

Meredith said, “No, the two of you stay up. I’m going to bed.”

Old habits die hard, Connie thought. It was exactly nine thirty.

Connie spent the night on the living-room sofa. After growing accustomed to sleeping in a real bed, she felt that the sofa offered as much comfort as an old door laid across sawhorses, and when she woke up, Connie felt like she had fallen from a ten-story building. Her breath stank of onions from the herb roll. She had forgotten to pour herself a glass of water, and her lips were cracked. She needed lip balm. She needed to brush her teeth.

She stood up, gingerly. She decided she wouldn’t think about anything else until she took care of these small tasks.

Water. Chapstick. Toothbrush.

She cleaned out the sink-carefully removing the shards of glass with rubber gloves. She made a pot of coffee. She was okay. Her heart hurt but she was functioning.

Her cell phone was there on the counter, charging, and because she couldn’t help herself, she checked for missed calls or messages. She was thinking of Dan, but really she was thinking of Ashlyn. There was nothing new. The voice mails from Iris and Lizbet lingered, unheard.

The coffee machine gurgled. Connie got a mug and poured in half-and-half and warmed it up in the microwave. She poured in the coffee and added sugar. She could remember drinking coffee for the first time with Meredith and Annabeth Martin in Annabeth’s fancy drawing room at the house in Wynnewood. Connie and Meredith were wearing long dresses. Connie’s dress had been red gingham with a white eyelet panel down the front that was embroidered with strawberries. Connie remembered thinking, Coffee? That was something adults drank. But that was what Annabeth Martin had served; there was no lemonade or fruit punch. Annabeth had poured cream out of a tiny silver pitcher and offered the girls sugar cubes, stacked like crystalline blocks of ice, from a silver bowl. Connie’s coffee had spilled into her saucer and Annabeth had said, “Two hands, Constance.”

And then, when Connie got home and told her mother that Annabeth had served them coffee, Veronica had said, “That woman is trying to stunt your growth.”

Connie smiled now, remembering. Then she felt a heaviness gather inside her. She and Meredith had been connected since her earliest memories. She didn’t want Meredith to be upset with her. She couldn’t lose another person.

She took her coffee out to the deck. There were a few clouds on the horizon, but the rest of the sky was brilliant blue. Nantucket was the kind of place that was so beautiful it broke your heart, because you couldn’t keep it. The seasons passed, the weather changed, you had to leave-and return to the city or the suburbs, your school, your job, your real life.

Connie drank her coffee. She thought, I can’t lose anyone else.

She turned and saw Meredith standing in the doorway, holding a cup of coffee. She was in a short white nightgown. She looked like a doll. Her hair was lighter.

Connie spoke without thinking. “Your hair is lighter.”

Meredith said, “You’re just saying that because I’m mad.”

“I’m saying that because it’s true. It’s lighter. It’s blonder.”

Meredith took the seat next to Connie and reached for her hand. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“I’m sorry,” Connie said.

Meredith narrowed her eyes at the view. Her face was tanned, and she had a spray of freckles across her nose. She said, “I would have died without you.”

Connie squeezed her hand. “Shhh,” she said.

Later that morning, the phone rang. Toby said, “Geez, the phone has rung more in the past two days than it has in the past two weeks.”

Connie threw him a look. Meredith was upstairs getting dressed. There were no reporters out front, so Connie and Meredith were going to run to the grocery store, and if that went well, to Nantucket Bookworks to stock up on novels. Dan had called; he was taking Connie to the Pearl for dinner, so Meredith and Toby would be on their own at home.

Connie checked the caller ID. It was the law firm. Connie picked it up. The fifteen-year-old attorney asked for Meredith.

Connie said, “Just a moment, please.”

Connie caught Meredith coming down the stairs. She said, “It’s your counsel.”

Meredith said, “I wish we’d left five minutes ago.”

Connie said, “I’m going to run up and brush my teeth. We’ll go when you’re off the phone?”

“Okay,” Meredith said. She had her wig in one hand. They were back to the wig.

Goddamn you, Freddy, Connie thought.

She climbed the stairs slowly because she wanted to listen. Toby was right there in the room, probably unabashedly eavesdropping. Connie heard Meredith say, “Hello?” Pause. “I’m doing okay. Do you have any news for me?”

Connie stopped in her tracks, but she was near the top of the stairs, and she didn’t hear anything more.

He wouldn’t talk to her.

“I asked everyone in the system at Butner,” Dev said. “Everyone gave the same answer: Fred Delinn won’t take your phone call, and they can’t make him. They can’t even make him listen while you talk.”

Meredith felt her cheeks burn. She was embarrassed. Humiliated. She was dying a living death. “Why won’t he talk to me?”

“It’s anyone’s guess, Meredith,” Dev said. “The guy is a sociopath, and he’s deteriorated mentally since he’s been in. Everyone at the prison knows what happened with Mrs. Deuce. They understand why you want an audience. Mrs. Briggs, the warden’s secretary, personally pushed for Fred to face you on Skype and at least be forced to listen to what you have to say, but that idea was shot down. It’s against prisoner’s rights. They can lock him up, they can make him go to meals, they can make him go out into the yard at nine a.m. and come in from the yard at ten a.m., they can make him take his meds. But they can’t make him talk, and they can’t make him talk to you.”

Meredith reminded herself to breathe. Toby was somewhere in the room, though she wasn’t sure where. Her right knee was knocking into the table leg. “I should go down there and see him in person.”

“He won’t see you,” Dev said, “and they can’t make him. You’ll go down there for nothing, Meredith. It’s a romantic idea, like in the movies. I get it. You go down there, he sees you, something clicks, he offers up all kinds of explanations and apologies. That isn’t going to happen. He’s a sick man, Meredith. He’s not the man you once knew.”

She was tired of this idea, even though she knew it to be true.

“So you’re telling me I can’t go?”

“I’m telling you you shouldn’t go,” Dev said. “Because he won’t see you. You can travel down there to hot and desolate Butner, you can plan on enduring a media circus, you can meet with Nancy Briggs and Cal Green, the warden, but they’re just going to tell you the same thing that I’m telling you. He won’t see you. He won’t talk to you.”

“I’m not going to yell at him,” Meredith said. “I’m not going to hurt him. I’m not going to go on some kind of crazed jealous-wife rampage. I just want answers.”

“You won’t get answers,” Dev said.

She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She had thought that perhaps the prison would make it difficult for her to talk to Fred. But from the sound of it, they wanted to facilitate the phone call but couldn’t-because Freddy refused. It was the very worst thing: He had stolen everybody’s money, he had lied to the SEC and single-handedly put the nation’s economy in the toilet. He had cheated on Meredith for six and a half years with a woman she considered to be their closest friend. He had lied to Meredith tens of thousands of times-fine. But what she couldn’t forgive was this, now. What she couldn’t forgive was this stonewalled silence. He owed her a conversation. He owed her the truth-as egregious as it might be. But the truth was going to stay locked up in Butner. It was going to stay locked up in the sooty black recesses of Freddy’s disturbed mind.

“Fine,” Meredith said. She slammed down the phone. She was furious. Furious! She would make a statement to the press vilifying the man. She would take down Freddy and the undisputed harlot who was Samantha Champion Deuce. (She wrote her own Post headlines: CHAMPION HOMEWRECKER, CHAMPION TWO-FACED LIAR.) Meredith would file for divorce, and three hundred million Americans would support her; they would raise her up. She would regain her position in society; she would hit the lecture circuit.