Splintered Heart by Emily Frankel

matter? Are you feeling all right?" Mamma asked.
    How tempting it was to answer Mamma's question. Marian wanted to put her head on her mother's lap and be comforted, but it was too late to start being that kind of daughter.
    "I'm fine, Mamma."
    "You're very quiet, dear."
    "I'm just thinking about this and that."
    "Is it something to do with Ferris' business? He mentioned something last time I spoke to him."
    "Yes. Ferris is having difficulties with his partner. You remember Ferris' business partner, Charles Riche?"
    Mamma lived in the ornate, velvet and silver antique world of widows who were cared for and protected by umbrellas of trust funds, brokers, and family lawyers. There were no temperamental promiscuous homosexuals creating problems in Mamma's world. Lovers, ex-lovers playing around and sleeping around belonged in Marian's world, and in Ferris' world.
    "You see Mamma, Charles got himself involved..." Instead of explaining, some perverse reflex made her invent a half-way story that reflected what was on her mind. "Charles has been playing around with some other woman. When his wife found out that Charles was unfaithful, it got very ugly."
    "I didn't know Charles was married."
    "Yes he is. He was. I don't know where the marriage stands now."
    "Ah, well, you're in for it dear." Mamma sighed.
    "Oh no, Mamma, it's not me!"
    "Of course not dear, I know you and Ferris don't have problems that way but let me tell you — I've seen this happen — it's always very messy! No wonder you're worried. You and Ferris are in for a bad time with your friend Charles I'm afraid."
    The game was backfiring. "I'm sure they'll work it out, Mamma."
    "Ah, but it never works out."
    Her mother was making it sound like a fatal illness. "Maybe it didn't in your day Mamma, but these days people — they're very free about sex — there's wife-swapping, orgies, a lot of playing around!"
    "But look at the divorce rates dear. Thank God I had a man like your father."
    Marian watched her mother brushing the sheared beaver, patting it as if she were patting herself on the back. "Mamma, were you ever worried about Daddy that way?"
    "Worried about my Anatol?"
    "Didn't you ever worry about the models? And what about his secretary? She was very young and very pretty — you never wondered when he came home late? "
    "My dear child, a woman always knows if her man is unfaithful. There are all sorts of little ways you know... Your father and I loved each other. Like you and Ferris, we had a real marriage!" Mamma patted Marian's hand reassuringly.
    "But Mamma, what would you have done? Suppose you found out Daddy had slipped, you wouldn't have thrown him out or divorced him, would you?"
    "Marian darling, as smart as you are, you're still such a child in so many ways. I wasn't born yesterday. I knew your father had temptations. But Anatol knew it would be the end of our marriage if he strayed." Mamma was looking out of her window as they were coming into the town where the institution was located, shaking her head sadly. "My dear child, she'll leave him!"
    "Who?" Marian was trying to absorb what Mamma was saying into memories of the past and now . "What do you mean?"
    "The wife — Charles' wife will leave him sooner or later."
    "Ah, well, I don't know about that Mamma." Maria spoke softly. "She loves him. She loves him very much, I'm afraid."
    They were turning onto the long winding drive way that went up the hill to the main building.
    Sounds of children playing came through the closed windows of the limousine. If you weren't looking out of the window you would be certain you were passing through a children's play yard. No matter how many times they'd driven up that driveway, it was always astounding — to realize that the full grown men and women were not pretending, they were just children — six, seven, at most eight-years-old.
    Less handicapped patients stayed in a training school behind the trees. More retarded patients were in the central building