Matrimony Acrimony

Privately, later, Amanda would plead temporary insanity. She couldn’t sleep while in love with David Tighe. He took her to hear blues in Chicago, which thrilled her to the quick, keeping her wide awake for a week. He escorted her around The Art Institute, watching her reactions, and explaining the paintings that moved her, and even more about the ones that didn’t.

If Amanda didn’t consciously refine her sensibilities, he kept insisting, she’d always go for plain intensity and sentiment, which he considered cheap. She needed to cultivate an appreciation for subtlety and mastery. That took time for most people, whether as artist or audience. But, of course, David had already decided that Amanda’s personality pegged her as a primitive.

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“Insult or compliment?” Amanda had asked.

That depended. She certainly appreciated art. Her excitement exceeded anything in his experience, and rest assured, she was not the first unenlightened women he’d courted.

No argument there. Standing beside him, she suspected he had trained himself to say “unenlightened” when he meant “ignorant.” But so what? Almost continuously he showed her one glorious field after another.

Separate from her enthrallment were the obnoxious minutiae attending her changing financial arrangements and legal status. She was struggling, too, with attempts to sell her house and dealing with the surprise impossibility of sharing David’s house.

David’s meticulously ordered home offered plenty of space for him and her and Evie and DeeDee. It sat on almost an acre of natural prairie. And yet—no way.

Amanda had brought the girls to dinner there one Saturday evening, and his anxiety over three “primitives” (he didn’t say it; Amanda did) whooping and skidding through his hallways, overtaking his dining room, and accosting his furniture cast a miserable pall. David and Amanda squirmed for opposite reasons over Dover sole and fresh peas, while Evie and DeeDee’s eyes darted in confusion. Amanda imagined them too intimidated to ask: Was it okay to drink their milk like always or must they sip it as David sipped his wine? Since they couldn’t talk and eat at the same time, and couldn’t talk while he talked, the girls ate silently. Except when David tried to elicit a response. Evie feigned quiet pleasure. “This is delicious.”

Later Amanda apologized to her daughters. They shrugged—their father’s girlfriend was the same way.

Sad but true, David confessed, “We need to buy a different house, one that’s ours, not my precious domain.” He laughed. See, he could be light-hearted about it as long as everyone respected each other’s prerogatives.

Yes, well. Maybe if he said so, it would prove true. David was never wrong.

Finalizing the divorce occurred suddenly after what seemed like a lot of haggling. The house quandary didn’t work out as neatly. Real estate had sunk through the earth. They therefore agreed, the big idea having gathered momentum, that Amanda and her children would live at David’s, temporarily. He’d rearrange rooms and box prized possessions until the market turned reasonable. He didn’t mind. “Although, perhaps your girls should eat before we do.”

“I couldn’t agree more.” So they were fine.

Amanda’s divorce from Mike became official in March. Her mother, who hadn’t seen them since she had married Guy, the tennis pro, a year ago, urged Amanda to hold the wedding at the resort. “Assuming,” she said, “the ceremony’s small and simple.”

“Very small,” Amanda said. “Very quick.”

Cheryl and Guy would drive the girls to Madison where they’d meet their father and other grandparents for spring vacation.

David chose Mexico City for their honeymoon; he’d pay for it. His Spanish was fluent and Mexico’s history was underappreciated.

Guy had come here from Finland three years ago. He was thirty-six but looked younger. Cheryl, who was fifty like David, had thickened considerably in the last year. And perhaps consequently, she had taken to wearing very high heels when she wasn’t playing golf. Further, she had dyed her hair a brilliant, deliberately implausible but chic orange.

After the ceremony, Cheryl and David, her new son-in-law, talked avidly about growing up during the seventies. Amanda spoke with Guy for one minute before Cheryl hauled her off,  practically into a hedge. “Hands off, you little bitch.”

Amanda nodded and turned away. She hadn’t found the right time to offer her mother congratulations. Like, “Guy’s a lucky guy.”

But, oh well. Maybe later. Or maybe never.

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