Free Happy All the Time by Laurie Colwin Page A

for a while and get drunk?”
    â€œA very wise idea,” said Vincent. “I’d love to see you drunk. Are you ferocious when drunk, or what?”
    â€œI don’t know,” said Misty. “Suddenly, everything looks very soft.”
    â€œA good sign,” said Vincent. He left his chair and slid over next to her on the banquette.
    â€œDon’t kiss me or anything,” said Misty.
    â€œI promise nothing,” said Vincent.
    A gin fizz was placed in front of her. She sipped it slowly, her eyes a little glazed.
    â€œDon’t mess around with me when I’m in a state,” she said. “I’ll tell you something you don’t know. I’m awfully glad I’m here with you. If you use that against me, I’ll kill you personally.”
    The Magna Charta office was a long, stylish “L.” The prints on the walls were mostly Dürers, chastely framed in thin gilt wood. In the anteroom were framed covers of Runnymeade . The windows looked out over the roofs of midtown Manhattan and Central Park. Guido’s office was a small room paneled with bookshelves. These contained back issues of Runnymeade bound in green, books by authors the Foundation had subsidized, and spiral-bound Foundation reports on projects and works in progress. On a long table by the window were the three Peking glass bowls that had belonged to Uncle Giancarlo and went with the office. There was a brass watering can filled with water and egg shells, a combination suggested by Holly to give the office plants a better life. Uncle Giancarlo had been against houseplants, but Holly had brought in a gardenia, an orange tree, and the asparagus fern that had once hung over her bed. The sight of this fern frequently sent Guido into a fit of nostalgia. In the hallway was a small refrigerator made of fake bird’s eye walnut, which when opened revealed a plastic lime, bottles of seltzer, and three cans of shrimp bisque. At the back was a small conference room containing a couch, a long table, and two upholstered chairs.
    On Guido’s desk stood a framed photograph of Holly sitting near a wall of roses. She looked calm, impeccable, and absolutely gorgeous. It alarmed Guido how often he sat staring at this photograph. On the other side of the desk was another photo, also framed. This was a picture of Vincent and Guido, looking splendid. Holly had taken it one afternoon when they were feeling very pleased with themselves. Their hands were thrust forcefully into their pockets and their heads were thrown slightly backward. They looked like men on good terms with the outdoors—rumpled, handsome, and sporty. Their high spirits had been the occasion of the photo: they had been filled with an almost anachronistic sense of well-being. “If we’re feeling this good, we ought to have a record of it,” Guido had said.
    Between them in the picture, but mostly obscured by the well-cut shoulders of their jackets, was a blur that was Jane Motherwell. Now she was gone and her replacement had not yet been found. Guido was sitting at his desk. He had called a temporary agency to get a typist and an employment service to get a secretary. That accomplished, he was thinking about Holly and wishing he were home.
    Guido longed for home. He longed for Holly’s dinners. He longed for Holly. The elevator man had told Guido that he was the only man who seemed happy in the evening, and he was. He felt his three years of married life had gone by in a swoon, although the details, like those in great paintings, stood out in high relief. But what Holly thought was still a mystery to him. Although by action she seemed to love him ardently, Holly did not seem to live in the realm of the emotions. She felt, she emoted, and she never gave it a second thought. The complexities of love and marriage were things she lived with and through, and that was that. Guido, to whom thinking and feeling were the same thing, was learning