Christie
I got home just as Christie was leaving for work.
"Let's do lunch, Max," she said as she loaded up her car. "We need to talk."
"Name the time and place," I said. "I'll be there."
"Malee's on Main at noon sharp. I'll make the reservations. I'm shooting in Scottsdale this morning, about three doors away. I'll find us a quiet table."
"I got a better idea. Let's go to Chica's and pig out on enchiladas.
"Put a little bit of spice back into our lives, Max," she said with a rueful smile.
"See you then," I said, giving her a peck. I stood in the carport watching her back down the driveway, went in, set the alarm for one hour, stripped down, jumped under the shower, dried off and slipped between the sheets. I was asleep in seconds. I slept the sleep of the blissfully unaware, beyond dreams.
Christie was already at Chica's when I arrived. I couldn't help but notice that she was dressed very plainly. It was as if she did not want to call attention to herself. She was in her working mode. When she was on assignment, she often tried to make herself look plain so that she could move around without calling attention to herself. It takes a special knack, when one is that beautiful but Christie had mastered it. I had a sense that something was up with her, but her smile reassured me. I pulled my chair out and sat down opposite her.
"Right on time, Max," she said.
"It's one of my good points."
"I know it is," she said. "You have a lot of good points Max."
She spoke the way the manager does when he is trying to work up the courage to fire you.
"This isn't easy for me, Max."
"What isn't?"
"What I'm trying to say to you."
"What are you trying to say to me?"
"I feel like such a heel, Max."
The thought that Christie had been unfaithful to me stabbed me with a pain, which I immediately dismissed as being beyond my ken especially after last night when I had shown such admirable restraint.
"I haven't been unfaithful to you, if that's what you're thinking. That's not why I'm upset and confused."
"That makes two of us."
"I went into this with good intentions, Max. But I was wrong. I wasn't honest with myself or with you. All I really wanted to be was a good Samaritan but when you began to get better, I found that I was losing the dependency you exhibited when you were a basket case. I have been struggling with it for months."
"I think I got it I guess." I had a moment when I wanted to laugh. Was I little more than a sympathy fling? Had Christie confused sympathy with love?
"Once you started to get better and you didn't need me quite so much anymore, I began to resent it. While you still had the stress problem, it was like I owned you or something. You were dependent on me. I felt powerful."
I was happy that Christie had not been unfaithful to me. I think I understood what she was trying to say. Part of me wanted out too. Perhaps telling myself that I was pursuing Irish Spring out of a sense of duty to the FBI or my country was just my way of hiding from the guilty secret that I had hidden from myself. I too had desires of escaping from a marriage that had been based on debilitating need.