Rachel's Hope. Carole Page Gift
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her logical mind, whatever that was, if she’d ever possessed such a thing. Everything inside her was ready to revolt, and she thought she might vomit. She stood as if to head for the bathroom.
“Are you all right?” David asked. “Are you sick, Rachel?”
“I don’t know—no, I’m all right. I’m a little dizzy, that’s all.”
“You should go to bed. Rae, let me help you.” David made a gesture toward her, which she rejected as quickly as it was made. He withdrew, letting her pass by him.
“I’m all right,” she said, waving her hand, dismissing him. “I have to be alone, David. I’ve got to think. I just can’t think tonight.”
He shook his head, his voice heavy with regret. “I’m sorry, Rachel. I really am. I’m sorry for this whole mess.”
She turned and stared at him. The urge to cry was on her again, washing over her like warm water, like wonderfully warm rivers that might drown her. But she held back the tears, the desire to let herself weep in David’s arms. Instead, she asked, “What about her—this girl?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to break it off,” David answered.
“But your feelings. You said you don’t know how you feel.”
“I’ll work it out, Rachel. It’ll be okay.”
She didn’t want to hear this. It wasn’t the answer she needed. “Don’t bother, David,” Rachel said, her voice suddenly high and strangled. “Don’t bother with charity. I don’t want any of it. I just want you out of here. Get out of here—please!” She held the sobs inside herself, the pressure building like a stone in her throat.
David’s mouth tightened as a dazed, incredulous expression settled in his eyes. He was obviously shaken. Could he go so easily, without a fight? For a moment she thought he would argue with her, refuse to leave, even plead with her to let him stay. But she knew he was too proud and hated to appear weak, no matter what. “All right, Rachel,” he said, already moving heavily, dispiritedly toward their room. “I’ll pack a bag and get out. I’ll go, if that’s what you want.”
“Yes,” she said, turning away, going to the window, hugging herself protectively. She was trembling like a rosebud in a tempest.
It was raining finally. The rain poured down and hit the window outrageously, like torrents of tears, like the sudden furious tears in her own eyes.
Three days after David had gone striding out of their apartment, suitcase in hand and jaw set, Rachel broke out of her self-imposed mourning. It was a balmy, sun-washed day, and she needed to get out.
Not that she could escape the scorching recriminations, the self-pity, blaming herself one moment for her impulsiveness, resenting David the next for actually walking out at her insistence. As if that’s what she wanted, his going. Was it? Who knew? All she knew at the moment, on this breezy, clear day in early November, was that she had to get out of herself, out of the house, away. So she and Marlene drove to Laguna Beach to spend the day.
Laguna was one of their favorite places. Somehow the endless clusters of quaint, colorful buildings perched on the hillsides and the little network of streets had managed to escape that steely, glazed look that had become the characteristic of so much of Southern California. Rachel was tired of the endless stark, cold ribbons of freeway twisting and turning, jutting in and out, stripping the landscape of any natural grace.
Laguna Beach was different. The buildings were clever and original. They looked as if they had a history to them, as if many people had given parts of their personalities to these structures. The colorful little shops were crowded with artists’ paintings—lovely seascapes, beautiful landscapes, portraits and still lifes.
Many artists came here hoping to sell their work, the trained and untrained alike. Rachel adored their paintings, the meticulous portraits of old men from the sea, children in soft, airy dresses, and the tiny, finely crafted canvases of fruit—a single apple or a pear, stark against an ebony background.
Throughout the afternoon, Rachel knew Marlene was bursting with unasked questions. Marlene said nothing but cast frequent sidelong glances at Rachel, no doubt to determine the state of her emotions. Marlene was too kind to bombard her with probing queries about David’s sudden move out of their condo. On the phone the morning after David left, Rachel had spilled out the story in brief choked snatches, leaving it to Marlene to fill in the blanks.
“He’s gone and that’s all there is to it, Marlene,” Rachel had told her friend that morning. “And I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I just can’t.”
So that was it. Rachel had said no more.
But now Rachel felt better. Relaxed by the pleasant day at Laguna and with her emotions lulled by gentle sea breezes, she felt capable of discussing with some degree of objectivity her present circumstances. She told Marlene everything that came to her mind as they drove home that evening, finishing with “Yesterday I called a lawyer over in north Long Beach. I had a long talk with him and he suggested I come in for an appointment.”
“You’re not really going, are you?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Does that mean you’re thinking about getting a divorce?”
Rachel struggled to keep her tone neutral. “I have to consider it. I just didn’t realize how things are these days, with the divorce laws and all. The lawyer told me that under California law it’s not a divorce anymore. It’s a dissolution. All you have to say is that you have irreconcilable differences, and that’s it, you can have your divorce. It’s just about that easy. You merely have to wait six months, for what he called the interlocutory period, then the whole thing is done with.” Rachel’s voice wavered with ill-disguised emotion. “What do you think of that?”
“It sounds ghastly to me,” said Marlene, feigning a shudder. She was driving, and they were on the freeway now, in the fast lane, going sixty-five. Marlene liked to drive and could handle a car as well as anyone. She could drive anywhere, for hours at a time, and not get tired or nervous. When she and Rachel went anywhere, Rachel always let her drive.
“The whole thing sounds awful to me, too,” Rachel admitted with a flat little smile, actually more grimace than smile. She recalled the lawyer’s voice, smooth and silky, unconcerned. “While I was talking to the lawyer I thought I must be out of my mind. Here I was talking about David and myself with some stranger like it was nothing at all.
“Anyhow, he said with the laws like they are these days, there’s less recrimination and guilt. He kept using those words, recrimination and guilt There’s no blaming anyone, he said. He claims that makes it all a lot easier.”
Rachel paused and sighed audibly. The sigh seemed to go all the way through her, somehow snatching her strength, leaving her tired. “There’s nothing easy about tearing up a whole part of your life and throwing it away,” she said. “He made it sound as easy as wrapping up the garbage and taking it out”
“I just hope you don’t go and do anything on impulse, Rachel,” warned Marlene. “Divorce, that should be a last resort.”
“Well, the lawyer said you have to pay at least half the fee as soon as you start divorce proceedings. I guess a lot of people get halfway through and change their minds, so the lawyer would be out a lot, I suppose, if he didn’t have you pay at the start. Anyway, I don’t want to do anything until I’m absolutely sure.”
Marlene’s voice took on a cautionary note. “I was just wondering—have you prayed about all this, Rachel?”
Rachel mindlessly twisted her purse strap around her index finger. “Everything’s happened so fast I haven’t had much