The Bridegroom Comes: Chapter Ten

Standing on Anton’s front stoop, Tracy fought back the impulse to flee before any one answered the doorbell. “What the hell am I doing here?” he thought. Initially, he had thought he just wanted to see the neighborhood, take a look at the house, maybe, with luck, catch a glimpse of Cynthia or the girls through a window. In spite of having prepared a pretext for doing so, he had not really intended to introduce himself. But, the strength of his disappointment at finding the curtains drawn had caught him short; Cynthia and the girls’ unseen presence, attested by the car parked in the driveway, been too tantalizing. The house itself was nondescript, just another of several standard ranch styles in a suburban track. It brought him no closer to the life within.
Tracy had chosen this day, Saturday, deliberately: Anton had mentioned he needed to be in the office that morning. Tracy no more understood what had compelled him to pull Anton’s driver’s license out of his wallet and memorize the address while Anton was in the shower than he understood what held him now in place, waiting for Cynthia to come to the door. It was the same force that had prompted his request to visit Anton’s church. The connection to his great-grandmother had been, he sensed, not exactly a pretext, but not the whole story, either. It had something to do with the notion that her story hooked his own into Anton’s other life.
Tracy had backed off on his questions about that life, and begun to resort to other, more surreptitious means of inquiry. Besides snooping around in Anton’s wallet, there had been the incident with his prescription sunglasses. When Anton had excused himself to use the restroom during one of their interludes at the apartment, Tracy had slipped them out of the outer pocket of Anton’s satchel into his own pocket.
Cynthia opened the door cautiously, keeping the locked, glass-paned screen door between them. “Can I help you?” She neither confirmed nor overturned any image he had formed of her: It was precisely his rebellion against having to imagine her at all that drove him here. In one sense, what she looked like mattered to him not in the least; in another, it meant everything. What mattered was that she was real, concrete, that her hair was this particular shade of brown with an overtone of red, that her eyes dipped down almost imperceptibly at the outer edge, that her chin receded slightly at just this angle. Tracy’s eyes drank all this in in an instant, but apparently too avidly. Cynthia’s face showed a look of alarm. Noting her stiffen and shift her weight behind the door, he spoke quickly, smiling.
“Hi. My name’s Tracy. I’m a friend of Anton’s. We eat lunch at the same café sometimes. I found a pair of sunglasses he left there, and thought he’d appreciate it if I brought them by. Here.” He held them up where she could easily see them across the glass. Cynthia remained immobile, apparently trying to decide whether to risk opening the screen door.
“Tracy?” she said. “Anton’s mentioned you, I think.” Her face showed her effort at trying to place the name. “No, that was . . . . Are you from Oregon?”
“Um, yeah. But that was a long time ago.”
“This was awfully nice of you. I hope you didn’t go too far out of your way?” Somewhat hesitatingly, she unlocked and opened the door. Apparently, she had decided he presented no immediate threat, but her face remained guarded. She stepped forward onto the threshold, blocking the entranceway.
“No, I would have been in the area, anyway.”
He smiled, and handed her the glasses.
“Thanks.” He smiled again and nodded. Clearly, the moment demanded that he say something polite and take his leave. He sensed Cynthia hesitate, guessing she was debating whether to ask him in; he sensed just as strongly that he had no business doing so.
Before she appeared to make up her mind, her eyes shifted to a car turning the corner, and her face relaxed. Following her gaze to its object, Anton’s face froze, his look of panic contrasting sharply with her relief. The car swung to an abrupt stop in the driveway, and Anton nearly leaped out, then walked furiously toward them. Tracy stood stock still.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Anton’s face was red, his arms held tightly to his sides.
It took an awkward moment for Tracy to find his voice. “I found your sunglasses. They must have fallen out of your satchel.”
“So? You didn’t have to bring them here.” Anton glanced nervously at his wife. Now, he too stood paralyzed.
Cynthia glanced from one man to the other. Her face shifted abruptly from an embarrassed smile, to puzzlement, to something like fear.
“Daddy’s home!” A small body—Sophie’s, the youngest—catapulted out the door and attached itself to Anton’s leg. He reached down absently and cupped the back of her head, not taking his eyes off Tracy.
“Well, anyway, I’d better get going.” Tracy brushed quickly past Anton and strode across the yard and street to his car. Swinging the car around in the street, he looked surreptitiously toward the house entrance, afraid to meet the eyes of his lover. But, Anton’s gaze was fixed on his wife’s face. He appeared to say something, then took his daughter by the hand and walked through the door. Shifting his rearview mirror, Tracy saw Cynthia hesitate at the door to watch the retreating car. Briefly, he had the sense that their eyes met. Then, she turned and followed her husband and child back into the house.