Read Online My Summer With George by Marilyn French - Free Book Online

had tickets for Lynda Barry’s The Good Times Are Killing Me that night. Afterward, we would have dinner and talk. I needed to talk to someone wise and caring, who would understand what I was going through and could calm me down. Marsha is intelligent and compassionate without being sentimental. She exudes warmth. Her very voice embraces you. I was sure she’d comfort me.
    Just the sight of my old friend standing in front of the theater warmed me. She’s tall and so thin she’s skinny. Her skin is as white as paper; her dark hair is cut short and hugs her head like a skullcap. Wearing layers of linen topped by a long, embroidered vest, she looked like a priestess for some ancient religion.
    We embraced warmly, as always, and she put her hand on my back as we entered the theater. “You look fabulous!” she said. “I know you haven’t had a face-lift, because I saw you only a few weeks ago, but you look years younger! A new cosmetic?”
    I laughed and shrugged off her question: I didn’t want to launch into my problems until we could really talk.
    The play was splendid, and we left the theater feeling liberated, the way you do after exposure to good art. We cabbed down to Orso, where I ordered vitello tonnato and cappellini with tomato and basil; Marsha wanted caprese and risotto with portobello mushrooms. I waited until the white wine we ordered was poured, before I said, “I’ve met a man.”
    Marsha, her glass halfway to her mouth, stopped dead. She stared at me. “You have?”
    I nodded.
    “Really!” she breathed.
    Marsha had been married to the same man for thirty-eight years. She had hinted about flirtations, even affairs, in years past, but not recently. If she felt an occasional twinge of regret at opportunities forgone or no longer proffered, she never admitted it to me.
    She smiled broadly, extended her glass. “Well, cheers! That’s wonderful, Hermione! Tell me, tell me! Where, when, how, who?”
    I clinked glasses with her and launched into a description of George, our meeting, his persistence and intensity.
    “He sounds madly in love.”
    “Doesn’t he? But he doesn’t follow up. I mean, he asks to see me every day, but only stays for an hour. He makes dates and breaks them; he promises to call but doesn’t.”
    Her kind forehead furrowed. “It does seem to have happened awfully fast. Do you believe in it? His…enthusiasm?”
    “My head doesn’t. My head is on vacation. But my heart and my body believe it.”
    “Ohh,” she lamented.
    “Yes.”
    We sipped our wine.
    “I wonder if he’s like that fellow Teddy Warden, the one Phyllis was sort of involved with for a while—remember him? He pursued her passionately for months, then, when she finally agreed to a relationship, he suddenly went off on an assignment in Europe that dragged on for months…In fact, I don’t know if he ever came back. Do you remember that?”
    I nodded glumly. I didn’t care for the comparison. I looked away and stared around the restaurant. We ordered cappuccino. She must have caught my mood.
    “Or maybe he’s like Martin,” she suggested.
    “Martin? Oh, Martin Goldberg!” I liked that much better. “Yes!”
    Martin Goldberg had been married for years to a brilliant biologist, Elaine O’Hare. She developed cancer some years ago. After she was treated it went into remission for a year or two. But it returned and spread throughout her body. All her friends gathered around her, buoyed her with love for the entire year of her final illness. And throughout her illness, Martin tended her with utter devotion; he was so loving and kind and devoted that all Elaine’s women friends fell in love with him, even the lesbians.
    “Yes,” I repeated. “But his problem was guilt at admitting he could love anyone but Elaine. There was a strong attraction between him and Annie even before Elaine died. I saw it. I think Elaine did too. I think it pleased her. She knew he’d be all right without her.”
    “And he and