Queen of the Owls Read online

  “Ah. That we can do.” The woman smiled. “Meander as much as you like. I’ll be in my office.” She gestured toward a hallway on the left. “If you need anything.”

  Elizabeth smiled in return. She was glad there was no one to hover and try to be helpful. The silent, moist greenhouse—like a small Hawaii—was what she wanted.

  She made her way through the maze of tables and tall potted shrubs. Morning light filtered through the glass. The smells of dirt and flowers rose up around her, earthen and sweet. The woman must have turned on the automatic mister because warm vapor began to seep from invisible vents.

  Elizabeth opened the plastic door to the special room where they housed the tropical plants, like the ones O’Keeffe had painted in Hawaii. She thought of Hibiscus with Plumeria, the painting that had become the signature piece for the Hawaii collection. A gorgeous and elegant composition, each flower rendered so differently, yet forming a single vision. Elizabeth could see the painting in her mind, as vividly as if it were right there in front of her. The utter softness of the hibiscus, and the mysterious dark place, like a hand reaching upward, calling the eye to follow. A glimpse of sky, blue shapes, exactly the right amount of blue and yellow.

  The hibiscus flowers in the greenhouse were red, magenta, orange, dazzling in their glory. O’Keeffe’s flower was muted, the palest pink, its folds so soft you could almost feel them, just by looking. Elizabeth bent forward to examine the real flowers more closely. Something else was different, besides the color. Her gaze moved to the sign on a post, next to the exhibit. “Hibiscus flowers,” she read, “are perfect flowers, also known as complete flowers, because each has both male and female reproductive structure, consisting of both pistil and stamen, as well as petals, sepals and a receptacle.”

  She grew still. The hibiscus in O’Keeffe’s painting had an empty center. With O’Keeffe’s meticulous attention to color and form, it made no sense. If a botanical element was missing, it wasn’t accidental.

  O’Keeffe had stripped the flower of its sexuality. There was no thrusting blade in the center, offering its stigma and filaments. Instead, just a flimsy inverted stem, like a feather. Diminished, descending, insignificant.

  Elizabeth felt the heavy wet air press down on her. Why did O’Keeffe paint the hibiscus that way? She’d studied the real flower, knew what it looked like. Was she castrating it? Making it pure and virginal? O’Keeffe’s flower seemed nude, vulnerable, yet the dark center promised something more.

  O’Keeffe had said: It is only by selection, by elimination, and by emphasis that we get at the real meaning of things.

  Elizabeth was alone in the greenhouse. There were no other visitors at this hour; the botanist was off in her office; the intern was absent. She bent over the hibiscus plant. Quickly, she pinched off its yellow center and stuffed it in her pocket.

  Three

  Elizabeth’s sister Andrea was sprawled on their navy-blue couch, ankles crossed on the end table. A glass of Ben’s good Côtes du Rhône was balanced on her stomach. “If my abs were tight enough,” she told Elizabeth, “I bet I could keep this thing from wobbling without even touching it.” She eyed the wine as if daring it to spill, then laughed as she grabbed the stem with a deft manicured hand.

  They were having a pre-dinner glass of wine at Elizabeth’s apartment while Ben and Michael, children in tow, went to pick up the pizza. Daniel and Katie loved the occasional family get-togethers, partly because they adored their cousin Stephanie, and partly because it was the only time Ben allowed them to have pizza.

  Andrea gave her stomach an affectionate pat, as if it were a well-behaved child. “And my abs are tight, if I say so myself.” She held her glass aloft and pointed it at Elizabeth, who was curled in the opposite armchair. “Here’s to abs and boobs.” She raised the glass another inch. “To looking good.”

  Seriously? Elizabeth couldn’t help wincing. Of all the things a person might toast.

  Well, that was Andrea. It always had been.

  “Don’t give me that eye-roll,” Andrea said. “You have something against looking good?”

  “I’m not against it. It’s not what I’d toast, that’s all.”

  “Party pooper.” Andrea took a swig of her wine, then grinned at Elizabeth over the top of her glass. “Besides, looking good—and knowing you look good—is the surest way to keep those home fires stoked. And that, as everyone knows, is the secret to a happy marriage.”

  Elizabeth set her own glass on the coffee table. “That’s a bit simplistic, don’t you think?”

  Andrea shrugged. “If it is, that’s because it’s true.”

  This time Elizabeth didn’t even try to suppress her eye-roll. Really, it was such sloppy thinking. It’s how I see things, so it must be true. Her sister wasn’t stupid. It was only that Andrea had no idea—she hadn’t been trained and didn’t care—about unpacking the assumptions behind a declaration like that or questioning what it really meant. It is what it is. The philosophy of someone who pirouetted through life.

  Andie and Lizzie. As different now as they’d always been, even as small children. Elizabeth, settled at a child-sized desk, studiously pushing pyramids and cubes through the proper holes in her shape-sorter bucket, while her sister draped herself in their mother’s gossamer scarves, tossing the ends in the air like fairy wings. Elizabeth could remember the satisfying plonk of the blue and red shapes as they dropped through the cutouts in the plastic lid.

  She gave Andrea a dry look. “Not everyone sees life the way you do.”

  “Everyone who wants to please her man does.”

  “If that’s your priority.”

  “It’s one of them,” Andrea said. “I mean it, Lizzie. Men don’t stray if things are interesting at home. No one goes looking for what they already have.” She flung Elizabeth a quick glance. “I’m just saying.”

  Her sister’s way of trying to be helpful, but it wasn’t. Elizabeth pressed into a corner of the armchair, wrapping her arms around her knees. If she wanted help with her marriage, which she didn’t, Andrea was the last person she would turn to. You didn’t ask for directions to the ocean from someone who had lived in it her whole life.

  “Honestly,” she said, “is that all you ever think about?”

  “It’s all I think about when I think about Michael.” Andrea flashed another impish grin. “And what about you, Lizzie? Griddle hot enough for you and Ben?”

  The casual coyness of the question—as if they were college roommates having a merry exchange of bedroom tales—was like a slap. Elizabeth knew her sister hadn’t meant to be cruel; it was just the way Andrea talked. Another time, she might have lobbed the quip right back. Hot enough was a matter of opinion, so yes, she and Ben paid their twice-monthly dues, each making sure the other got the requisite satisfaction. But tonight she couldn’t pretend, couldn’t even try to. A wave of dizziness swept over her as she remembered—no, not a memory but a jolt into the present, as if it were happening again, right now—the way Richard had looked at her, into her, her knee touching his shoulder as he knelt by Mr. Wu.

  The hell with it. Andrea could probably tell what her sex life was like, just by looking at her.

  “It’s never been hot enough.” She grabbed her wine glass and drained the Côtes du Rhône. Then she set the glass on the table with a defiant thud.

  Andrea’s playful expression was gone. “I kind of thought so.” To Elizabeth’s surprise, her sister’s voice was kind. “I can help you fix that.”

  “I doubt it.” Andrea had no idea what it was like to swim in such tepid water; you couldn’t fix something you didn’t understand. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

  “I mean it, Lizzie. It’s dangerous to ignore a problem like that.”

  Elizabeth wound her arms around her knees again. “Couples are different, that’s all.”

  “That’s just psychobabble. The question is if you’re happy.”

  “No one’s happy all the time.”

  “Well, duh. It’s
what you do about it when you’re not happy.”

  “You focus on other things.”

  “Wrong. You spice it up.” Andrea gave her an arch look. “Maybe take a little side trip. Bring back a fun souvenir.”

  Oh please, Elizabeth thought. Andrea would never take a side trip, and she would never put up with Michael taking one either. She was just fishing. Or showing off, seeing if Elizabeth would react.

  Well, she wouldn’t. Determined to match her sister’s casual tone, Elizabeth said, “You think Michael’s ever strayed?”

  “Oh, he might have.” With a languid movement, Andrea lifted her hair away from her neck. “He does have some new little tricks in bed, so he must have picked them up somewhere.” She gave a conspiratorial smirk. “Not that I mind. Might as well reap the benefits. Ramp up my own game.”

  Elizabeth watched as Andrea wound her hair into a twist on top of her head and then shook it free. Thick and luxuriant, it spilled down her back.

  “It’s all part of the allure,” Andrea said. “I want Michael to look at me and not be sure what I know or what I’ll do next.” She caught Elizabeth’s eye and grinned. “Don’t look so unhappy, Lizzie. It’s not some kind of terrible deception. It’s all part of the dance.”

  Elizabeth tightened her arms, pinning her knees in place. From the hall, she could hear running footsteps and children’s laughter. The door burst open. “Pizza!” Daniel announced.

  Stephanie, a year older, elbowed in front of him. “With sausage and pepperoni.” She threw her father a smug look. “Daddy said we didn’t need both but I said we did, and Uncle Ben said it was okay.”

  “It’s fine,” Elizabeth said. She uncurled herself from the armchair, relieved that her conversation with Andrea had been cut short. “Daniel, can you put the box on the table and get the napkins?”

  Katie wriggled out of Ben’s grasp and ran to throw her arms around Elizabeth’s legs. “Napkins,” she demanded, meaning: whatever he gets to do, I get to do too. Gently, Elizabeth pried her fingers away. “Will you sit next to me, sweetie? You can help me make a face with the pepperoni circles.”

  “I want to sit next to Aunt Lizzie.” Stephanie put her hands on her hips. “Can I, Mom? Can I?”

  Elizabeth turned to Andrea, her eyebrow raised in amusement. Were we like that? Then her gaze shifted from Andrea to Michael, and the amusement vanished. She watched Michael wrap an arm around Andrea’s shoulder and pull her toward him.

  Stephanie was clamoring to be heard. “I want to make pepperoni faces too. And onions. Onion eyelashes.”

  Elizabeth tried not to care that her sister’s husband was beaming as if he’d captured the brass ring. Marriages were different. She’d told Andrea that, only moments earlier. The same way that sisters were different.

  Their mother had drilled that into them when they were small. Everyone has different gifts. She liked to tell people: “Lizzie’s our little bookworm, and Andie’s our little pixie.” A tidy equation, easy to capture in nine short words. The pronouncement was always followed by the ladylike coda: “But we love them exactly the same.”

  Elizabeth remembered being confused. Of course her parents loved them the same. She had never questioned it, so why did her mother have to make a point of saying so?

  She’d thought different gifts meant that people gave you different prizes—except Andie always got the ones that counted, like being chosen to dance onstage, at night, in makeup and a silver tutu.

  “The ballet teacher can only take a few girls for the party scene,” her mother had explained. “But we are so, so proud of you Lizzie. Your story was picked for the school anthology—no other fourth grader, only you! Andie gets to be in The Nutcracker, and you get to be a famous author.”

  Her mother knew very well that there was no comparison between a dumb story about a magic bracelet and wearing a silver tutu at night on a real stage. It was mean of her to say they were the same.

  Elizabeth refused to go to the performance. “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” her mother said. “You’re too smart for that kind of pettiness.” Then she gave Elizabeth a firm smile. “Besides, next time, Andie will come and clap for you.”

  Only it hadn’t ever happened. There was one time when it might have. Elizabeth had been a junior in high school, and they needed girls for a musical version of The Little Mermaid. All she had to do was wear a bikini top made of pretend seashells and strike sultry poses while the girl playing Ariel did her solos. Her friend Marissa’s older brother was the director, and Marissa assured Elizabeth that the part was hers. Elizabeth wanted to be in that play as much as she’d ever wanted anything. But her mother discovered that the matinee was the same time as the advanced placement qualifying test, and that was that.

  Michael’s jovial voice jolted Elizabeth back to the present. “Sit where you like, Stephanie darling,” he said grandly. “As long as I can sit next to your mother and play footsies under the table.”

  Did he have to talk like that? Elizabeth thinned her lips. Then she felt a tug on her sleeve. Katie had found a box of dryer sheets. She held them out proudly.

  “Those aren’t napkins,” Daniel said. “You’re stupid.” Katie’s mouth dropped open, readying itself for a howl.

  Ben looked up from cutting the pizza. “Liz. Why are those things with the food items?”

  “They weren’t,” she muttered, although they were. She grabbed the dryer sheets in one hand, Katie’s arm in the other. “Come on everyone, let’s eat.”

  She helped Katie onto her booster seat as the others found places around the table. “There’s milk or iced tea,” she said. “And, of course, Côtes du Rhône.”

  Daniel craned his neck. “I want a coat.”

  “It’s not a coat you wear,” Ben told him. “It’s a drink for grown-ups.”

  “Speaking of Côtes du Rhône,” Michael said, “send that bottle this way.” He looked at Andrea. “More, sweetheart?”

  “Always, as you know.”

  Elizabeth bent her head as she cut Katie’s pizza into eighths. Just get through the meal, she told herself. Ignore them.

  Still, she couldn’t help wondering what Ben was seeing and feeling. He had to be reminded, as she was, that they never flirted with each other. They never alluded to sex at all. It struck her, suddenly, that for people who loved to talk, their coupling was oddly silent.

  But not hopeless. Surely not hopeless.

  She raised her eyes, hoping that Ben would feel her looking at him and that something would pass between them. A glimmer, a possibility.

  Ben was staring at Andrea and Michael. His eyes were hooded, his mouth pressed in a downward arc. Elizabeth assumed, at first, that he was eyeing them with disapproval—a Ben expression, full of superior aloofness. But it was a different look, complicated and unfamiliar, a troubled wistfulness that sent a shiver right through her bones, as if she’d caught a glimpse of someone she didn’t know or wasn’t supposed to see. Her knife hovered in the air above Katie’s plate.

  “Mama, pizza.” Katie pulled on her arm.

  Elizabeth inhaled. The air was sharp in her chest, like needles. Did Ben feel it too? Did he wonder what they were missing, grieve for something he didn’t understand?

  For a wild crazy instant, she wanted to push away from the table and run shrieking out of the room—or else grab Ben by the collar and make him proclaim what he loved about her—but Elizabeth Crawford didn’t do things like that. Instead, she fixed her eyes on Ben’s silent profile. Inconceivable that he didn’t feel the heat of her gaze.

  Michael handed a wine glass to Andrea. The scarlet liquid shimmered as it caught the light.

  Elizabeth forced herself to turn her attention to Katie. “Pizza’s all ready for you, pumpkin. Let’s count the pieces.”

  She accompanied her daughter’s happy chant, then tucked a napkin into Katie’s collar and busied herself doling out extra cheese, passing out napkins, refilling the children’s cups. She repeated the silent mantra: Just get thro
ugh the meal. You can do this. Stoic Aunt Lizzie, pretending not to notice the current that still sizzled between Andrea and Michael after a decade of marriage.

  “Anyone else want more wine?” Michael asked, waving the bottle.

  “I’m fine,” Ben said. “I’ve got what I need.”

  Really? Elizabeth thought. Do you?

  Andrea set down her glass and looked around the table. “You know, we’re really quite an attractive little group.” She pointed a rose-tipped finger at each child. “Stephanie, you have the most perfect skin, and Katie angel, you’re a total peach with those lips of yours. And Daniel—those bedroom eyes, not that you’ll appreciate them for a dozen years.”

  Stephanie sat up straight. “I have nice eyes too, right Mommy?”

  “Of course you do, my darling.” Andrea’s face brightened. “I know. Let’s play a game. It’s called, What’s Your Favorite Body Part?”

  “My eyes,” Stephanie said promptly.

  “Too many to choose from,” Michael quipped, “though I’d say my pitching arm is right up there in the top three.”

  “We all know what Elizabeth’s is,” Ben said.

  Andrea laughed. “Anyway, we know what it isn’t.”

  Elizabeth recoiled, stung by their mockery. Andrea must have seen her shock because she added, “It isn’t your eyes, Lizzie. That’s all I meant. Stephanie already dibbed that.”

  But it wasn’t what Ben had meant. Elizabeth felt the anger—hot, dark, so unlike her usual restraint. It spread through her body like tinder to a lit match. It was too much to bear. How hard she tried, putting his coffee cup, and her nightshirt, right where he liked it. How unloved and unbeautiful she felt. How unfair it was to glimpse something she couldn’t have.

  She turned to Ben. “Apparently you get the joke. Care to let me in on it?”

  Seconds passed, silent and cold. Wasn’t he going to answer?

  Nothing. That was the answer. There was no favorite part. No part he loved.

  Elizabeth gripped the edge of the table, her fingers digging into the wood. “Fine. It isn’t anything. No favorite part. Everyone happy now?”