False Impressions. Laura Caldwell
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the table and squeezed my hand.
“It’s funny,” I said. “Because I’ve heard about you from Mayburn.”
Madeline looked at me in sort of a curious way. “You call him by his last name.”
“Yeah. Always have.”
She gave a little laugh. “Mayburn. It seems such a tough name for him.”
“Well,” I said, shrugging, “Mayburn is a tough guy. As far as I know.”
But Madeline didn’t seem to share my assessment. “John is a sweetheart,” was all she said.
I blinked a few times. “Sweetheart sounds like a brother/sister relationship.”
She nodded. “That’s what it became.”
I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows. I knew that Mayburn viewed Madeline as a great love of his life, second only to Lucy.
She seemed to read my look. “That’s what it became…for me,” she said, clarifying.
“Why is that?”
“In part because I’m an only child. I was adopted.”
“When you were a baby?”
“Yes. My parents are blonds from Wisconsin.” She smiled as she thought of them. “But my dad did a lot of work in Japan. That’s where they adopted me from.”
“Do you know your birth family?”
She shook her head. “They did give me a gift once.” She smiled. “I’ll tell you about it sometime.”
“How long did you and Mayburn date?” I asked. “Years?”
“Six months,” Madeline said.
“Is that it?” Mayburn had made it seem longer, or maybe it was the way he remembered it, the way he gave it import.
Suddenly it dawned on me that the people I considered of great importance in my life—Theo, Sam—might not think of me the same way.
Sam, for example, I hadn’t seen or spoken to in months. For all I knew, he was once again with Alyssa, his ex-high school girlfriend. Maybe Sam felt, now, that I was a swerve, something he’d veered around before getting back to his first love.
And Theo—we’d dated about the same amount of time as Mayburn and Madeline. Right now, he’d told me, he simply couldn’t be in a relationship. Theo, an only child, had been close with his parents. But recently, some disturbing events had Theo questioning not only himself but everyone around him. I understood such issues well. I understood that Theo needed to hide to lick his wounds. Who knew what—or who—was important to him at this moment.
“How did you and Mayburn decide he would work on your case?” I asked to pull my thoughts away.
“I told John what was happening—he’s one of a handful of people I’ll talk to when I’m deeply upset.”
I wondered who the others were.
“And then John insisted he look into the matter,” she said.
“Because he knows how important the gallery is to you.”
She nodded.
“Talking about how he feels like a brother now, when I know he didn’t feel the same, makes me sound so cavalier with my relationship with him.”
“He was pretty hurt,” I said, then immediately regretted it. Mayburn would kill me if he’d heard me say that. “Actually he was just sorta hurt,” I said, reducing Mayburn’s pain factor.
“Of course,” she said, shaking her head back and forth. “He had bought a house he wanted us to live in.”
“The one in Lincoln Square.”
“Yes. And that’s when I knew we had different ideas about what our lives would be. I’m not a Lincoln Square kind of person.”
“I can see that.” Historically, Lincoln Square was a predominantly German neighborhood. Much of that heritage was preserved in bars like the Chicago Brauhaus and Huettenbar. The streets surrounding Lincoln Avenue, the main thoroughfare, were populated mostly with wood-frame, single family houses. Wonderful cafes from other regions, as well as cute boutiques and bookshops, now flourished there, too. Still, the hood was more “livable city” than “urban city.” Madeline Saga wasn’t the type to live there.
“I was so shocked that he didn’t understand the life he was planning would never be me,” Madeline said. “That fact surprised me so much, hurt me so much, I just broke up with him. Just like that. And now I’m shamed by my cruelty.”
I reached over the table. Now it was my turn to pat her hand. “Don’t worry about it. He’s wonderful. He’s got a girlfriend, the kids, and obviously he still thinks well of you since he wanted to do this job for you.”
She looked up at me, a considering expression on her face. “John had children?” she said, the words disclosing shock.
“No, no. He’s dating someone who has kids. She’s great. So don’t worry about him.”
“No,” she said. “I suppose not.”
She waved at a passing waiter who soon returned with another round of lychee martinis.
“Tell me about you, Isabel,” Madeline said. “How do you know John?”
I told her my fiancé had experienced “some problems.” The topic of Sam’s disappearance more than a year ago seemed a little much for our first night out, so I only disclosed that I’d met Mayburn through that situation. “Now we’re friends.”
“He is an excellent friend.”
I nodded.
“And where do you live, Isabel?”
“Old Town.” I told her about the three-flat condo building I lived in. I was on the top floor, which was a drag because of the stairs but also a joy because of the private roof deck.
“And this…” She gestured around the bar. “Is this the type of place you would go to with friends?”
“I grew up in Chicago. In the city. So I have an affinity for dive bars.”
“Dive bars!” she said, sounding delighted.
We talked about the city then, about how Chicago had changed so very much, had become, in some ways much more metropolitan, and yet it was still the same hard-working Midwest town it had always been.
Another round of lychee cocktails appeared.
Madeline beamed and thanked the waiter. “To Chicago.” She lifted her glass in a toast.
I did the same. “To Chicago,” I said, clinking her glass lightly, trying not to slosh the drink. The truth was, I was getting a little sloshed.
We both took a sip, then Madeline excused herself and left the table, heading toward the restroom. I sat and let myself just notice, as I’d watched Madeline do over the last hour or so.
I thought about Madeline. I was impressed with the way she was handling the forgery. I could tell it deeply distressed her, and yet despite that, she still allowed herself to enjoy her life when she could.
About five minutes passed, during which I contentedly sat. Then I began to look around the crowd. Madeline had said that many people from the art world—artists, managers, gallery owners, collectors, print makers, art writers—could be found there.
Another five minutes passed.
When the waitress came, I asked for a glass of water. I wanted to stay a little longer. I wasn’t quite ready to stop basking in the light that was Madeline’s attention when she shined it on you.
The water was delivered. More time passed. No Madeline. I looked at my phone—no