The Big Why by Michael Winter Page A

ideal in my head, and I recognized the hypocrisy of my own moral waning. But also there was a keen realization that I had not known Jenny. She had kept her self from me because she felt that if I’d known who she was, I would never have been with her for a minute. There was something strong in my character that made people act a role they hoped I’d admire. A strong character does not mean a champion of moral high ground. It is alluring but damaging. And here she was, drinking heavily, smoking, her stomach relaxed and big. Surprisingly, she became beautiful.
19
    The train home to New York from Boston. Speed damaged the trees and small towns. Then dusk destroyed the world. I told Kathleen everything, except the fact that on Wednesday and Thursday and Friday morning I had not permitted this woman who had sent the letter to unbutton my sleeves and clench the back of my hair and lift me. That I did not lift her and turn my hips to search. This denial of sex seemed paltry, and I could not use it as a confirmation of my love for Kathleen. It seemed like a position, and if I had done that, it was only to use it as collateral against the guilt of previous misdeeds. I would admit to the child, I would accept him. But all Kathleen said to me was, You shaved.
    What.
    Youve shaved.
    She made me throw out all of my underwear.
    I remember the waste of that. She closed her ears to my plea for mercy. At my attempt to be good but the boat out of Boston was delayed. I said I’d had no idea that Jenny would come down to see me off. She hauled out my postcards from the scouting trip. Omissions, Kathleen said, are horrible. They are the worst forms of lying. For they harbour the scent of truth. About the boat’s delay and Jenny’s send-off she said, A coincidence is never that impressive to someone else.
    Kathleen did not know what to do. We had a child, Rocky, and she was pregnant too. Kathleen hated the thought of another woman pregnant when she was pregnant. How can a man make two women pregnant at once? And claim to love? Does he think he is a god? She did not know what to do. At times it was only her goodness that prevented her from hating me.
    I was frantic. I wanted her. I wanted everything about her. What I wanted was the form of life I was living. I wanted to be married.
    She had to be away from me, she said. Would I book a train, upstate. Her parents in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. She was dragging her parents into this. But what did I expect. How long do you need, I said.
    I dont know.
    She was gone a week. I wrote and called her. Rocky had a fine time. He loves his grandparents. They have a farm. He was pulling up fresh new carrots clotted with soil.
    We will give her, Kathleen said, the proceeds of the house.
    She did not say her name.
    Yes.
    And our savings.
    Okay.
    I dont want you to have anything to do with her.
    Agreed.
    And youre emotionally stupid.
    I admitted to this.
    So that ended our first attempt at Newfoundland.
20
    Was I relieved? I had salvaged things. I’d realized that my own ambition, let’s call it Rockwell Land, was tied up not with a place but more with the idea of who I was. The primary things had been salvaged. The family. My son, Rocky, my pregnant wife. New York. I could live in New York. I did some drafting for Ewing and Chappell. I pushed my T-square away from the plans for a confident bank and exhaled. I worked for three solid years. We had two more children, girls. Jenny had her son, George. I was lucky. My friends were married. The frame of marriage. I needed the structure of it. I was a crazy man who needed parameters. A wife. I liked my wife.
    Three years passed like this and my wife grew closer to me. But there was something in the new form of her closeness — she kept a veneer. I had hurt her and this was the result. It was not anything we spoke of, but it shone on her skin. Kathleen was self-conscious around me. A little formal. And then I remembered how she’d been when that letter arrived