Chapter 14

Amanda had additional locks put on her windows, and new handhold barriers the police had recommended to make it impossible for someone to climb up the fa?ade and get in through the windows.

Her apartment was beginning to feel like a prison.

And she slept with the alarm on, in case someone managed to scale the wall to her windows anyway.

She had a hard time sleeping at night, feeling as though someone was watching her and waiting to invade her home again.

It was a feeling of constant tension.

And Pascal saw easily the toll it was taking on her.

She was suddenly too thin and pale, and had dark circles under her eyes.

On some days, she looked sick, although she insisted she was fine.

Pascal could see that she wasn't.

"You need a break,"

he told her one morning when she looked particularly worn out.

Even Lulu was looking tired.

Amanda woke up several times a night now, checked the windows and doors, and then couldn't get back to sleep.

Lulu followed her around dutifully, and slept at the gallery all day to recover from the sleepless nights.

"Why don't you go away for a weekend somewhere?"

"That's depressing on your own.

It would make me feel like a loser,"

she said honestly.

"Couples strolling down the beach, and me alone with Lulu under a parasol."

The image didn't appeal to Pascal either.

He had spoken to Olivier a couple of times, who had reported that Amanda hadn't responded to a single one of his calls, or even text messages.

She had closed the door firmly, and locked it.

She was defending her home from stalkers and burglars, and her heart from Olivier.

He had given up and stopped trying to reach her, and told Pascal it was hopeless.

He had made up his mind to get divorced once Stephanie recovered, for his own sake, but he felt it was still too soon to tell her, so he was respectfully waiting until she was back on her feet.

And there was no evidence of his decision yet for him to show Amanda, and he knew she wouldn't believe him.

"It's too depressing and bad for your health to sit in your apartment waiting for someone to scale the walls again,"

Pascal told Amanda.

She had panic buttons now, connected directly to the police, and they had warnings on their dispatch computers to respond immediately if she hit the panic button she kept in her pocket whenever she was home.

It was like living on a time bomb, waiting for something to happen.

"I have an idea,"

Pascal said.

"I never sleep at my apartment anymore.

I'm always at Delphine's place.

I just keep mine now in case something goes wrong with us."

He had actually been faithful to his latest love for several months, a first for him.

He had told Amanda several times that Delphine would probably kill him if he cheated on her.

But the most shocking thing of all, from his point of view, was that he didn't want to.

He wondered if it was due to age, or a sign of true love.

He wasn't sure which.

"Why don't you stay at my apartment for a while, just for a change of scene, so you can sleep, and you don't have to spend the night with the panic button in your hand, waiting for someone to climb in the windows to steal your knickers or cut your couch in half?"

She had ordered a new one from Italy, and they told her it would take six or eight months.

"I feel silly staying at your place.

I should be able to stay at my own.

It seems cowardly to run."

"It seems smart to me.

At least for a while.

Think about it."

She promised to, but was inclined to dismiss it.

But after another week of sleepless nights, she finally conceded.

"But just for a few days, or a week.

I'm not going to move in and invade your space,"

she said.

But the idea definitely had some appeal.

Pascal lived in a rickety old-fashioned building on the Left Bank, but he had a beautiful sunny living room, a comfortable bedroom with a view of the Eiffel Tower, and a kitchen that belonged in a museum, but she didn't care since she couldn't cook.

Amanda packed a bag for the weekend, suddenly excited by the idea.

She and Lulu moved in on Saturday morning, and she went to the flower market and brought back mountains of flowers and blossoming branches, filling all the vases Pascal had of various sizes, and his apartment looked like a garden in full bloom when she was finished.

She bought some sausages and a bottle of her favorite white wine for dinner.

She walked Lulu along the Seine that night, and felt safe for the first time in months when she went to bed.

She slept for eleven hours, and went for a long walk in the Bois de Boulogne with Lulu the next day.

She went to check on her own apartment, and everything was fine.

And after another long peaceful sleep that night, she arrived at the gallery Monday morning looking rejuvenated and like a new person, and she felt like one.

"Sleep is a miracle drug.

Thank you for lending me the apartment,"

she said gratefully.

"Stay as long as you want,"

he said, pleased to see her looking better, without the dark circles under her eyes that had become all too familiar.

Between Tom, Olivier, and her unidentified erotomaniac, too much had happened to her in too short a time.

And living in her apartment, waiting to be attacked again, was just too stressful for her.

Staying at Pascal's gave her a reprieve.

It felt like an adventure now going to his apartment every night, with the beautiful view, the open sky, the life of the river, the boats drifting by.

It was a fresh view of Paris, which she enjoyed.

She went back and forth to her own apartment daily to pick up her mail and fresh clothes.

Her apartment had a slightly stale feeling to it, with the windows closed.

She opened them when she came home, to let in some air, and then locked everything up again when she left.

She didn't miss it yet.

It was fun to have a change, second best to a vacation, and there were some things she wanted to change when she came back.

She decided that she needed new kitchen curtains and a new rug in the front hall.

The one she had had never fully recovered from the chemicals she and Olivier used to get rid of the fish blood when the stalker left her the florist box with the fish in it.

She was going to look for a rug and fabric for the curtains the following weekend.

She saw everything with a new eye since she wasn't there every day.

Lulu always looked happy to come home and a little disappointed when they left, but Amanda brought her favorite bed to Pascal's, and a bag of her toys, and Lulu was happier after that.

Amanda had been at Pascal's for a week when they had a major rainstorm that lasted for three days.

His apartment was on the sixth floor, just under the picturesque mansard roof.

Two of the windows in the living room were the original eighteenth-century round ones, and leaked so badly there was water all over the floor when she got home.

And there was a major leak over the bed which Pascal hadn't told her about.

She used all her strength to move his antique iron bed, but the room wasn't big enough to move it completely out of the way of the leak, so rain dripped onto her face all night, and in the morning the lower half of the bed was soaking wet.

The apartment had a huge amount of charm, but some noticeable flaws Pascal had failed to mention.

She slept on the couch, but the wind whistled through the oeil-de-boeuf ("bull's eye") windows all night, and she was cold when she woke up.

The weather had gotten chilly with the storm.

Everything in her own apartment was in impeccable condition and good repair.

She owned hers and maintained it beautifully.

He only rented his and the landlord couldn't afford to do repairs, and wasn't willing to.

Pascal knew all about the leaks and apologized to Amanda.

His furniture was ancient, and there was nothing of value there, so he didn't care.

She knew the apartment was cold and drafty in winter too, and every winter Pascal threatened to give it up, but he loved it, so he never did.

On the fourth night of driving rain, which loosened more tiles on the roof and caused more leaks, she went back to her own apartment at two a.m.

It seemed better to be dry, even if a little less safe.

She left her things at his place, and took a cab to her own apartment, and went back to Pascal's in the morning to collect her things.

She had been there for eleven days, and it seemed long enough.

She was less stressed when she went back to her apartment, and Lulu ran up and down the hall barking, happy to be home.

"Okay, okay, you snob."

Amanda laughed at her, in much better spirits than when they'd left.

She listed all the problems to Pascal when she saw him, and he was apologetic again.

"I'm sorry.

I didn't think it would rain so much at this time of year.

It's brutal in the winter, between the wind and the leaks.

The landlord needs to redo all the windows and the roof, and he won't.

I should probably give the place up.

I guess I will if things work out with Delphine, and so far it's looking pretty good.

Her place is really too small for the two of us, so we're talking about finding a new apartment together."

"That's good news.

And I had fun being at your place."

Amanda looked better than she had in a while, and more relaxed, and she had slept well in her own apartment for the past two nights.

A little sleep had given her a new lease on life.

—

The rainy weather dampened everyone's mood at Olivier and Stephanie's house.

They played Scrabble, dominoes, and cards for a few days.

Valerie baked a delicious cake, and Veronique prepared a traditional cassoulet.

They all worried about their horses not getting enough exercise in the rain, and Oliver seemed a little out of sorts when every room he walked into had one or several women in it, laughing, talking, eating, or playing games.

He needed his own space, and couldn't find any anywhere.

He went for a long walk in the rain, and came back soaked.

And when it finally stopped, the Three Musketeers, as he called them, took a drive to check on their horses.

He waved to Stephanie as he walked past her bedroom, and saw that she was looking wistfully out the window, wishing she could join them.

She was still in a wheelchair most of the time, but she longed to get up and walk, and she couldn't yet.

She'd been waiting to talk to him all day, but she couldn't find a time when the others weren't with her.

She turned to look at him with a serious face.

"Something wrong?"

He hoped not.

He wasn't in the mood to listen to anyone's complaints about the weather or the nurse.

He felt like he was running a convalescent home for wayward women.

Stephanie didn't answer his question, which wasn't a good sign, and with a feeling of trepidation, he walked into the room.

She looked up at him with serious eyes that were as stormy as the sky outside.

"What's up?"

"Do you have a minute to talk?"

She knew it wasn't a good time, but it was rare that all the others went out at the same time, and she didn't want to wait.

She had been wanting to talk to him for weeks, and there would never be a good time for what she had to say.

"I guess so,"

he said, without much enthusiasm.

His hair was still wet from the rain, and his boots were soaked.

"I have something to tell you,"

Stephanie said in a small voice, squeezing her hands together nervously.

She looked like she was praying, and her eyes were sad and earnest when she brought them to his face.

Olivier couldn't think of anything that could warrant that kind of solemnity and dreaded what she would say.

The rain was depressing all of them, and she had been cooped up for a long time, and in pain.

She was better now, but she still had a long way to go until she reached full recovery, and some days she was afraid she never would.

He thought she was having a sinker now, and he wasn't in the mood to cheer her up, but he knew he'd have to.

There was no one else around to do it.

Lizzie was her morale booster, but she'd gone with the others.

"It can't be as bad as all that,"

he said, smiling at her.

"That depends on your point of view,"

Stephanie said.

He suddenly wondered if she'd had bad medical news, and if she was sick, in some other very serious way.

"Are you okay?"

he asked her, and she hesitated and then nodded.

"You've been incredibly good through this whole mess ever since the accident.

I feel terrible that we've all imposed on you, and you must be sick of it by now.

My horsey group, the nurses, me like a dead whale in bed most of the time or drugged out of my mind or asleep.

It's a lot of people in the house, and neither of us is used to it, or to being here together anymore.

I'm never here, you do what you want, and suddenly you're invaded by an army.

I'm sorry and you've been wonderful about it."

"Is that all you wanted to say?"

he asked, relieved.

"No, but I just want you to know how much I appreciate it before I say the rest."

He could hear bells and alarms going off in his head.

It sounded like the beginning of a conversation they had been avoiding for years.

He guessed that she was going to either clip his wings or ask him things he didn't want to tell her.

"Before you start, are you sure you want to do this now?"

he asked her.

She looked quiet and calm when she nodded, and he was filled with dread.

She was not going to be deterred.

"We have to talk about this, Olivier.

We've been avoiding each other for years, I more than you.

When the accident happened, I realized how little we know each other.

We're strangers living in the same house.

We always have been.

I never knew you, or myself.

We were children when we were married, and I think we both tried to make it work.

And we both knew we'd made a terrible mistake.

I thought you were the wrong man, and I was the wrong woman for you.

My parents told me we had to stick with it, that they'd had a hard time at first too.

So I listened to them, and I shouldn't have.

I didn't know what was wrong.

I talked to a priest, and he said a baby would fix everything.

It didn't.

It made it worse.

"And I thought something terrible was wrong with me.

I didn't know how to be a mother, and didn't want to know, and you were mother and father to Guillaume.

You actually did a very good job of it, and poor Edouard was just one more weight around our necks, but somehow he seems to have survived it and doesn't hate us, although he should hate me.

I ran off with my horses, and the people I met.

I've been doing it for more than twenty years and you never complain.

I don't know why not.

We could have gotten out of it, and we never did.

We should have."

Olivier had no idea where she was going, if she wanted out, or back in and a chance to start over and do it all again.

He didn't want either.

In theory, he wanted a divorce, but he had wanted it in order to be with Amanda, and she was gone, and he didn't want to rekindle anything with Stephanie.

He didn't have those feelings for her and was sure he never would.

He was still in love with Amanda, even though she was gone forever.

"It's too late now to think about what we should have done, Steph.

The past is over, it's behind us.

It is what it is now, and the real question is whether we want to live like this forever, or let it go.

I've been thinking about it a lot myself."

It was a relief when he said it to her, and easier than he thought it would be.

Maybe they were ready.

"You have? I thought your latest romance was over,"

she said openly, and he decided to be honest with her.

"It is.

But I don't want my life to be over, or to live dishonestly with you.

I think that's where we went wrong."

"I've been dishonest with you since the day I married you,"

Stephanie said simply, and he stared at her, surprised.

"You have? How so? I thought I was the dishonest one here, and I feel guilty about it now.

Once I thought we'd made an irreparable mistake, I never gave the marriage a chance again, and then you were gone anyway.

So, I gave up.

I've been playing at being your husband for years.

We weren't even friends.

I think we are now,"

which was what had made the conversation possible.

They had never been this frank with each other, and suddenly he was glad she had started it.

He hadn't had the courage to.

And she was right.

It was time.

"I had an experience when I was in boarding school,"

she admitted to him.

"I thought it was a stupid one-time girl thing.

I knew other girls who did too.

I was sixteen.

I put it out of my mind and went on.

I never told anyone about it.

And five years later, I married you.

And I knew something was wrong with me.

I didn't know what.

I didn't have the guts to ask myself, but I knew.

I knew it after Edouard was born.

I was twenty-four years old.

And I ran.

I ran into my horse life.

I created a world for myself where I could hide, from the truth and from you.

And when I was twenty-seven, I fell in love, really in love for the first time.

With Lizzie.

And I'm still in love with her, and I hope I will be till my dying day. I cheated you, not just cheated on you. I cheated you of the opportunity to have a real life, to meet the right person, someone who could love you, and not run away from you and shrink from your touch. I don't know if you ever found someone you cared about. Your romances always seemed to be fleeting. I always thought you'd want a divorce eventually, but you didn't. I forced you to live this lie with me, which cheated you of the chance to find what I did with Lizzie. She was only eighteen then, and I was nine years older. I couldn't face the shock it would be to our families and to you. But I don't want to live a lie anymore. This is going to be hard for the boys, and for you, but I have to do it. I owe Lizzie that, I owe myself that, and I owe you that."

She sat waiting for the roof to fall in and it didn't.

She waited for Olivier to be furious with her, and he wasn't.

He was stunned.

"Have you always known that you preferred women, or only wanted women?"

he asked her, and she nodded.

"I think so now.

I just didn't want to face it.

Once I met Lizzie, I had to.

Before that, I told myself that it was something I did for fun sometimes, or I'd had too much wine, or other people did it too.

I never faced that it was what I wanted and who I was, who I am, and more and more so as the years went by.

I don't want to play that game anymore, and lie, and especially not to you.

You don't deserve that.

I should have told you the truth right at the beginning, or at least twenty years ago, once I was sure.

With my whole heart, Olivier, I apologize to you, for all the lies I told you, for the lie I forced you to live."

He smiled at what she said and took her hand and heldit.

"I told you my share of lies too."

He wondered then.

"What about the others? Are they gay too?"

She nodded, about her friends.

"Veronique and Valerie are a couple.

They were married to men, and both got divorced to be together.

Lizzie is the brave one in the group.

She told her parents when she was seventeen that she was sure.

They're a very traditional family, ardently Catholic, both her uncles are bishops.

Her family disowned her and have never seen her since.

She paid a high price for her honesty.

She's a brave girl.

I've been supporting her for years on the money my parents left me.

I lied to you about that too.

I even bought her horses.

She's a very reasonable, responsible person, and she was even at eighteen.

And very discreet.

I even thought of adopting her, but it was too big a lie, even for me.

To tell you the whole story, I want a divorce.

And now that the laws have changed, I want to marry Lizzie."

Olivier was dead silent for a minute, digesting what she had said to him.

It was enormous, and she knew it.

In half an hour, he had gone from being a man with a wife, even if their marriage was rocky, to discovering that the whole twenty-six years of their married life had been a lie and she wanted a divorce and was going to marry a woman.

It was a lot to swallow.

He was still holding her hand.

"Thank you for being honest with me,"

he said, deeply moved.

"I had to be.

You've been so good to me ever since I got hurt.

It reminded me of who you are and what I owe you, and I do love you, just not as your wife.

You don't deserve another twenty-six years of lies from me.

And Lizzie felt wrong about it too.

She loves you.

She talked to me about it.

She's noticed everything you've been doing for me and is grateful to you, and so am I."

"I love her too.

What exactly will that make us now, Lizzie and me? My sister-in-law? My niece? My ex-wife's wife? My sons' aunt?"

he said in a teasing tone.

Stephanie smiled at the irony of it and they both laughed.

"Do I give you away at the wedding? It would shock the hell out of everyone we know, but oddly, I think I'd like that.

It's very symbolic."

And then he grew serious again.

"We have to handle this well with the boys.

I need to think about that."

"Me too,"

she agreed, amazed at how good he was being about it, which didn't totally surprise her.

He was a good person, through and through, and the affairs he'd had had probably kept him going emotionally, from one fling to another, desperate for some form of affection, with a wife who gave him none at all.

She thought his affairs had been justified and didn't blame him for them.

She never had.

"I want a divorce too,"

he admitted to her.

"I was going to talk to you about it when you were better.

I thought it was too soon.

I just lost a woman I really love because she didn't want to be with a married man.

She thought that if she bowed out, you and I could rekindle our marriage.

I told her I didn't think it was possible."

"You were right about that,"

Stephanie confirmed.

"She didn't believe me, so she ended it."

"I thought something like that had happened.

You've been looking miserable."

He nodded.

"I've been miserable."

"This ought to change things for her,"

Stephanie said quietly.

"She won't speak to me or return my calls or answer anything I write to her.

I think she's over it."

"If she's a good person, she'll listen to you.

Is she a good person?"

Stephanie felt protective of him now.

He was no longer her enemy or her jailer.

They could be friends and allies now.

"She's a very good person.

That's why she left me.

Out of respect for you and our marriage."

"Talk to her.

This should make a big difference."

He nodded, thinking about Amanda.

"How old is she?"

"Thirty-nine, a year older than Lizzie.

Almost forty in her case."

They both sat, thinking for a minute.

They had come far in the last hour and a half, and covered a lifetime, with all its truths and lies.

They both felt lighter.

Stephanie knew exactly where she was going now.

She was lucky.

And Olivier had taken it well, like the good man he was.

But he didn't know where he was going.

He didn't know if this would make a difference to Amanda.

Maybe she had gone too far by now to come back to him.

He recognized it as a possibility.

"I hope she comes back to you,"

Stephanie said softly.

"So do I,"

he said, looking at the woman who had been his wife for more than half his lifetime, and no longer wanted to be.

They had been husband and wife, and now they were friends.

They sat holding hands, as they heard the front door close and the others come in, back from the stables.

He felt like part of their secret world now.

"We'll have to work out the details later,"

he said to Stephanie in a low voice.

"What we do with the house, where you're going to live."

"I think we should sell it.

We don't need this house anymore.

Lizzie and I want to get a small apartment where we can stay between shows, with room for the boys, of course."

"I was thinking along those lines too,"

he admitted, as Lizzie walked into the room and saw them holding hands.

Her face went pale and grew instantly serious as Stephanie smiled at her from her wheelchair, and Olivier stood up, patted Lizzie's shoulder, and left to go to his own room, so Stephanie could talk to Lizzie and tell her the news.

Olivier sat down on his bed when he got to his room.

His head was spinning and felt like it was going to explode.

He wondered why he had never suspected the truth about Stephanie.

She had covered it well, but he had lived with her for twenty-six years and it had never occurred to him.

Her parents would have been devastated, but they were too far gone now to know or care, and it all made sense.

And Lizzie was a good person.

She and Stephanie had already withstood the test of time with each other.

And now they could enjoy the rest of it together, without lying and hiding.

He suspected that his sons would be shocked at first, but they might not be.

Theirs was an entirely different generation with different views of what the norms were.

Olivier's world would be shocked, but he didn't care.

And Stephanie's world wouldn't be.

She had built her parallel life well, and the people in her world would embrace her with open arms and celebrate her.

He was impressed by how brave she was, and how brave she had just been with him.

More than ever, he respected and admired the woman he had married, and he actually loved her.

It hadn't been an entirely loveless marriage after all.

—

As soon as Olivier left the room, after patting Lizzie's shoulder, she looked at Stephanie with terror in her eyes.

She had seen them holding hands when she came through the doorway, before he stood up.

She approached Stephanie with caution, bracing for bad news.

"What just happened while we were out? Are you going to stay with him?"

Stephanie had recently promised her she would ask him for a divorce at the right time.

"No.

I told him about us.

I told him the truth about all of it, all the way back to the beginning."

"What did he say?"

Lizzie sank slowly into the chair Olivier had been sitting in.

"He was wonderful.

He's probably the best man I'll ever know.

We wasted a ridiculous number of years lying to each other and ourselves.

And I wasted years for you and me too."

"You didn't waste them.

We've been together all this time.

You really only lied to him."

"And our boys.

He was terrific about it.

It made everything make sense to him."

Stephanie smiled at Lizzie then.

It had been an emotional afternoon.

"He wants to give me away at our wedding.

Or both of us, if you want."

Lizzie was suddenly beaming as tears spilled down her cheeks.

She had waited twenty years for this, since she was a teenager.

Her parents had never forgiven her, but Stephanie had been everything to her.

Mother, sister, lover, friend, and even mentor.

Stephanie had been her whole world, and now they could come out of the shadows into the light of day.

"He's in love with someone too.

It's not working out for the moment, but maybe he can get her back now.

She left him because he's married.

He won't be for long.

I'll get things started now.

I'll call the lawyer on Monday."

Lizzie leaned close to Stephanie and put her head on her shoulder, and Stephanie put an arm around her.

"I told you it would work out in the end."

Lizzie had been worried.

"What made you tell him today?"

she asked her.

"I have no idea.

It just felt like the right time, and it was.

How were the horses?"

"Restless.

Bored.

Like the rest of us."

Lizzie glanced out the window into the garden as she said it, and smiled.

She rushed to push Stephanie's wheelchair to the window, and there over the Paris sky was the biggest rainbow they had ever seen.

"It's a sign,"

she said breathlessly, as Stephanie smiled at her, pulled her gently into the wheelchair with her, and kissed her.