The Lake Shore Limited by Sue Miller Page B

began his long, slowly developing explanation, something he wanted to be discovering as he went along, in just the way he and Edmund had talked about it--they'd agreed that he was actually feeling his way into his position as he spoke. When he got to his passionate declaration at the end, that he would enact whatever he was called up to be--the widower, the glad husband--at that point, they had agreed, he had it; his feelings had caught up to what he was saying. He'd caught up to himself.
    Then her cry, "But you said you loved me."
    Edmund stopped her. He didn't like it. "You sound like a spoiled little girl, Serena." He pitched his voice high and whining: "'You said I could have some candy.'"
    She was nodding, looking sheepish. "Yeah, I hear that. But I'm not sure how I should say it."
    Rafe sat down while Edmund and Serena talked about it. He looked over at the playwright, sitting in the second row of seats. Billy Gertz, her name was. Wilhelmina, she'd told him. Yes. That had been their exchange at the meet and greet.
    "Billy," he'd said. "Short for something, I bet."
    "Wilhelmina," she'd said back, in a stern voice with a German accent, pronouncing the W as a V .
    Now she was slouched deep in her seat, making notes. She had her glasses on. Her head barely rose over the back of the seat. She could have been a precocious fifth grader with a thick bowl haircut.
    She looked up at him, and he met her eyes. She smiled, raised her hand for a moment, and then went on writing.
    "Okay, Rafe," Edmund said.
    He stood up and took his place, and they went over their last lines together. He liked the way Serena said her last line, yelling at him. It sounded full of rage, but you could hear her sorrow, too. She overdid slamming the door, in fun. The set shook. Someone backstage protested: "Hey!"
    "Sorry. Joke," she called, coming back onstage.
    They sat down and talked for a while with Edmund, who had suggestions for both of them. Gestures. Emphases. Praise, though, too. He knew how to balance these things, crafty old Ed.
    When he was done, he looked down at the playwright. "Anything for these guys, Billy?"
    She shook her head. "I might give a few things to you for them tomorrow."
    "Okay then," Edmund said, turning back to them. He clapped his hands. "Be off with you."
    Serena went backstage, where she'd left her stuff apparently, and Rafe came down into the house to get his jacket. Billy was standing up, shoving things into the big bag she seemed to carry with her always.
    "I'm a bit at loose ends," he said to her.
    "Are you now?"
    "Do you fancy a drink?"
    She slung her bag up onto her shoulder. "Hmm. I think so. Yes. I think that's the very thing I fancy."
    ----
    "You smell boozy," Lauren said. "Brewer-y."
    "Ah! You're awake."
    "I woke up when I heard you come in."
    Garbled gook, they called it, the way she spoke, but he understood every word. He'd grown into it with her. He leaned over and kissed her. "I had a drink--several drinks, not to put too fine a point on it--with the playwright after work."
    "Fun?"
    "Yeah, I guess you'd say. She's nice."
    "What did you talk about?"
    "Actually, Swanee, we talked a lot about the play."
    This was true, surprisingly.
    Or not surprisingly. Though Rafe often stayed out in the evenings, away from Lauren, what he did then was drink and talk. He had the perfect life, he often thought, for someone married to an invalid. There was a semisteady supply of fresh blood to listen to his tale of woe. Or of fresh ears. Ear after ear after ear. Just when everyone might have been getting tired of him and his sad story, the play would be over and the faces--the ears--would change.
    Not that he always told the sad tale. Tonight, for instance, he hadn't mentioned it. They had, in fact, talked about the play. And then about Billy. Her life, her history. Why she'd left Chicago, which was, he pointed out, a great theater town.
    "Yes, but the problem with Chicago is that what happens in Chicago stays in