Free Keeping Time: A Novel by Stacey Mcglynn Page B

line of people inching past the wonderful store windows: Macy’s at Herald Square, Lord & Taylor, and Saks on Fifth Avenue. Elisabeth loved the boys’ rosy-cheeked faces peering keenly at the creative, beautifully crafted, mechanically operated moving displays.
    But they hadn’t made the Christmas trek to the city in years. Elisabeth, promising herself then and there, creeping down the artwork-lined, plush-carpeted hallway, that despite whatever insanity was going on at the time, come hell or high water she would take her boys in next Christmas—David, Josh, and even difficult Michael who was still defiantly refusing to study, claiming not to care about school or grades.
    Another blowout earlier in the evening. She had to hide his iPod, send him to his room, imprison him all night, not knowing what he was doing in there. He was asleep before she was; that much she knew.
    Elisabeth, switching on the light in Richard’s office, stepping inside. Feeling sneaky and creepy.
    And guilty—because of the first noticeable things: all over his desk and credenza, pictures of her and the boys, pictures she didn’t even know he had. Elisabeth, staring at them, her heart beating faster, picking one up, holding it. Seeing her life objectively just as any visitor to Richard’s desk might. Her life looking mighty good. Smiling faces of her handsome sons on vacations. She and Richard through the years, starting with the wedding photo, tracking time through to this past Christmas. A picture she didn’t even know he had, of them hugging in front of the decorated tree, in a rare moment when they were both home and awake and unoccupied enough to pose for a#. Thankhabck picture. Steve, home from college, had taken it. She remembered that. And here it was, framed, on his desk.When had Richard done that? When had he selected the picture, bought the frame, and framed it without even mentioning it to her?
    Overcome with tenderness for him. Seeing that nothing had really changed. They had gotten older. They had gotten busier. She had gotten crazier. Holding the framed photo in her hand, feeling tears forming in her eyes, wishing herself back together with him in bed in the quiet of their room. So she could listen to his breathing and try to imagine his dreams as she always used to do.
    And she would apologize to him—not aloud, of course. He didn’t even know he was accused. She would apologize to him in her head for even thinking that this steady, responsible, wonderful husband, father, and man could ever have done what she had seriously been thinking G">one phoabout.
    Elisabeth, putting the picture back on the desk. Sitting down, not in his chair but in a facing chair. To take just a moment. To summarize where she had been and where she was now. To run through the medley of her emotions. Getting up, going around his massive desk to sit in his chair—to reconnect on some level. To put herself back squarely where she had always been with him. Seating herself in the high-backed black leather chair, her arms on the armrest. Planting her feet and swiveling the way her boys would have done. Picturing Richard in it, holding a meeting. Allowing herself a surge of pride in him. Look at the size of his office. Look at his view. That was Central Park out there, thirty-six floors below. He had done very well for himself. He had gone to Yale, on scholarship, both undergraduate and law school. His father had been a New York City bus driver; his mother, a medical secretary.
    Elisabeth, feeling better than she had in some time. It was 1:45; she had a long drive ahead of her. She had better get going, and she would—without even looking in a single drawer. It was over. She would tuck this little episode away.
    Standing up. Starting out of his office.
    Stopping dead in her tracks.
    There, on the back of his door, a dartboard. Four darts in the bull’s-eye.
    ELISABETH, HURRYING BACK to her car, telling herself to stay calm.
    All the way down Fifth Avenue,