The Wedding of Anna F. Read Free

today.”
    “But I’m telling you, you’ve never done one of these research interviewy-type things. They can go on and on. Are you sure you don’t want me around? To get rid of him if he makes you tired?”
    “I think I can handle it. I used to be an attorney, you know.” I throw my scarf over my shoulder and push out my spout of a lower lip and act mildly insulted.
    “Well, you do look as if you could handle anything today,” she admits. “You look…regal.”
    “Oh, get out of here.”
    “At least promise to call me on my cell if you find you suddenly need anything. And be sure not to wear yourself out. I don’t know why you agreed to do this today. On your birthday of all days. You’re too good.”
    “A birthday is a good day to be good.” To be honest. Revealed. To be born again. “All right, Maia, no more hovering. Go on.”“You’re the boss.”
    *
    I FIND HIM STANDING in silhouette against the living room curtains, the deep green folds that have knuckled to the floor there since my mother’s day. And Maia is absolutely right: so good-looking, so svelte he is! I hadn’t expected that. My heart beats a little faster, in spite of itself. So modern and sleek. Such smooth, curling hair above a sculpted, olive profile. Bardawil. That is his name. But he doesn’t look Scottish. Polished fingers on that hand being held out to me to shake, the nails manicured in the way so many young men take the trouble to have done these days. The schools of New York are filled with beautiful young people, still.
    I smile my warmest smile and step forward, welcoming him, taking his hand in mine. What a beautiful handshake. Like running my fingers along a silken tie and then having, sadly, to let go.
    He nods his thick head of hair and smiles at me, professionally. He says a few polite things about the house—that it’s such a surprise, the way it seems to rise, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, out of the fields. He reassures me he doesn’t want to keep me waiting; but by the fidgeting of his fingers on the handle of his satchel I can tell he’s the one impatient to get going. He asks me where we’d be comfortable sitting down.
    I smile. “That’s usually my question,” I say, and toss my scarf a little farther over my shoulder. “Why don’t we sit right here?” I point to a pair of deep wing chairs in good light near the living room window, turning so that he’ll settle down on the side of my good ear. A few things I learned, as an attorney: one, that you always want to give your clients good light; two, that you will want them to be comfortable, but not so comfortable that they feel free to walk away; three, that you ask and answer questions both as though nothing about them and everything about them potentially meant everything and nothing; and four, that you offer them a drink, but perhaps not right away, not until they’ve grown warm and thirsty and, in some ways, to depend on you.
    This nice young doctoral student appears so cool and independent, however, setting his stylish leather bag at his feet, crossing his legs in his black jeans, that it’s hard to imagine him depending on anything or anyone but himself. Again, it’s not what I expected. Most young people, most students—and I’ve had several as my assistants over the years—are like Maia: hungry, jobless, their nails bitten to the quick. This cool person is however (I have to remind myself) the one that I have invited into my home, to whom I’ve chosen to tell my story. So I must make do. If I had chosen to, I could have talked to any newspaper reporter. But reporters aren’t scholars (I know from having slept with one). Reporters think only of the moment, of what’s in front of them. A scholar reaches back, sees history. And so I sit here, in my winged chair mirroring this young man’s, and face his formal pair of eyes and his long, narrow nose, and I inhale and think, ah, I hope you will see, yes? And I wonder: Why must it be that in