Chapter 2
Felicity always dressed with particular care when she was having dinner at the
Whitfields’. Taylor’s mother, Elizabeth Whitfield, noticed every detail, and always
made comments afterward to Taylor, and Felicity wanted to give her as little as
possible to complain about. Taylor claimed his mother’s comments didn’t matter to him,
but Felicity knew they did, and he always mentioned them as though he expected her to
do something about it. She tried on a black dress which looked too funereal, a brown
suit which didn’t look right either, and settled on a navy dress she had bought with his
parents in mind. It was conservative, but the midnight blue seemed softer than black. It
was a proper length, and she wore the pearl necklace her grandmother had given her
when she turned twenty-one, with small, discreet pearl and diamond earrings to match.
She got almost all the paint off her fingers, wore her long blond hair in a sleek
ponytail, and put on high heels, but not too high. Felicity was taller than her mother but
looked a great deal like her. She wore very little makeup, and Taylor smiled when he
saw her. It was hard to find fault with her appearance. She was beautiful, elegant, and
aristocratic.
“You look perfect,” Taylor said approvingly. The dinner was a command
performance, as his parents’ invitations always were. As an only child, he was
expected to dine with them frequently, and he didn’t like to disappoint them. His father,
Phillip, worked for an investment bank, and managed several important estates of wellknown families.
He hadn’t had an exciting career, but he enjoyed his work, had a
reputation for giving sound advice, and had guided Taylor in the same direction, and
Taylor had a good job at a respectable firm, and was on a satisfactory trajectory in
wealth management. He had gone to Princeton, like his father and both his grandfathers.
Taylor and his father went to their reunions together every year, never missing one.
Everything about Phillip Whitfield’s life had been comfortably predictable, including
the girl he married. Elizabeth Brooke, his best friend’s sister, had gone to Vassar, was a
year younger than he was, and he had been her escort at her debutante ball. They had
married when she graduated and he was in his first job on Wall Street. They had waited
longer than most of their friends to have children, and then it had taken more time than
expected to conceive Taylor. His parents were now seventy-two and seventy-three
years old, and always seemed like an anachronism to Felicity. They were conservative
and old-fashioned, and staunch Republicans no matter who ran for president. They were
almost cookie-cutter archetypes of their kind, and their social life was governed by who
was in the Social Register, which was the bible they lived by. They knew that the
Walkers, Felicity’s father’s family, were in it, but her mother’s family was in a far more
suspicious listing, the Almanach de Gotha, which listed the noble families of Europe
and was a publication they had no faith in whatsoever, but at least the Walkers made
Felicity acceptable in their eyes. They were unaware of her father’s dubious dating
habits, his penchant for very young women, and his infidelities, but they wouldn’t have
mattered to the Whitfields as long as his bloodline was good.
It was Taylor’s mother who always subjected Felicity to thinly veiled interrogations.
His father had two Scotches before dinner and was mellower, and enjoyed Felicity’s
good looks and good manners. There had been no talk of marriage until then, but the
Whitfields didn’t want Taylor, at thirty-seven, wasting his time with unsuitable women
he couldn’t marry. The entire weight of carrying on the Whitfield name rested on him, as
the only child of an only son, so it would fall to him to provide an heir to the name one
day. There would be no fortune to go with it, just blue blood and distinguished ancestry,
though far less distinguished than Dominique’s family tree, which they were unaware of
and would have discounted anyway as Eurotrash. They were suspicious of all things
foreign.
Felicity didn’t look forward to her evenings with them, but she went to make Taylor
happy. He was close to his parents, and Taylor and Felicity usually spent the week
between Christmas and New Year with them, at their spartan, drafty, slightly shabby
vacation home in Vermont. It was close to Sugarbush, so they spent most of their time
skiing while they were there. Taylor’s father still skied, but his mother didn’t, after an
injured knee several years before.
After dating for two years, Taylor had moved into Felicity’s loft in Tribeca the year
before. It saved him money to move in with her. It was a big bright loft apartment on the
Hudson River, with a large open space she used as the studio where she painted.
“I got good news today,” Felicity told Taylor in a cab on the way uptown to Park
Avenue in the eighties, where his parents lived and he had grown up. He had gone to
Buckley, an exclusive private boys’ school, then Saint Paul’s for prep school, before
Princeton. He had attended all the “right” schools, and had been an ordinary student,
and a good athlete in high school and college. And he had been accepted in Ivy, the
same eating club his father belonged to in college. Everything in Taylor’s life was a
blueprint for respectability, which Felicity found she liked. There was a comforting
stability to it, although her sister Violet thought Taylor dull and boring. Felicity didn’t.
But she conceded that he and his parents were snobs.
Felicity was aware of her mother’s more unusual background, growing up with
unmarried parents, which seemed a little shocking although Felicity adored her French
grandmother. Her father’s parents had died young so she had no other grandparents, and
her father’s nearly total absence from her childhood had made her hungry for solid,
respectable men in her life. She liked Taylor’s father more than his mother, who always
seemed to be on the hunt for flaws to object to, and was critical of everyone’s
background, and dubious about Felicity’s. She approved of Felicity’s father, but a
French designer mother who made wedding gowns sounded sketchy to her. And
Felicity’s career as an artist categorized her as “bohemian” in Elizabeth Whitfield’s
opinion.
They had been momentarily impressed that Felicity had gone to Yale, but discounted
it quickly when she told them she had majored in fine arts, which sounded like a
second-rate program to them. She had invited them to her gallery shows as a courtesy in
the last two years, and they had never come to see them. They had unimpressive art in
their apartment, and no interest in the art world or Felicity’s work as a painter. Her
good news of the day was that she had been invited to participate in a show at an
important gallery in June, which was big news for her, but Taylor didn’t seem excited
about it when she told him on the way uptown. He had changed the subject quickly to
remind her of his office party a week before Christmas, which he had invited her to.
They were looking forward to it, but the gallery show was a major coup. She had told
her mother, who was thrilled for her, and knew the gallery well. Dominique came to all
Felicity’s openings, and was a staunch supporter of her work. Bill often came with her,
and had bought several of her paintings. Taylor was polite about her art, but wasn’t
interested in it. She had done a portrait of him the year before, for him to give his
parents for Christmas. They didn’t think it was a good likeness of him. His mother
thought it looked “unfinished,” and had hung it in a back hallway, which was how they
regarded her career, and dismissed it.
Felicity was slowly building a reputation as a serious artist on the New York art
scene. She didn’t take their indifference personally, could easily tell they weren’t art
lovers, and Taylor hadn’t grown up with a strong interest in art. They preferred the
symphony, the opera, and the ballet, and had season tickets for all three. They went
because it was the thing to do, not because of any passion for the arts.
Elizabeth looked Felicity over as she always did when they got to the apartment, as
though looking for some flaw, and seemed disappointed not to find it. Taylor’s father
was on his second Scotch on the rocks and already mellow, and Taylor followed his
mother into another room for a private exchange that Felicity paid no attention to, while
she chatted with Phillip about the early snows they were having in Vermont, and how
good the snow would be by Christmas.
Dinner went without incident. The conversation was as bland as the food, some
politics, some business, some gossip about people Felicity didn’t know or care about.
They ate at seven, as Elizabeth and Phillip did every night. Felicity and Taylor were
back on their way downtown to Tribeca before nine, and Felicity felt the tension leave
her body as she relaxed in the cab. Felicity lit a cigarette when they got home, and
Taylor looked at her with disapproval. She wasn’t a heavy smoker, but smoked
occasionally.
“My mother would have a fit if she knew you smoke. She thinks it makes women
look cheap,” he reported.
“I need it after dinner with your parents. I always feel like they’re going to send me
home without dinner if I make some terrible mistake.”
He laughed and poured himself a drink, and sat down next to her on the couch, as
though waiting for her to finish.
“She makes me feel like that sometimes too,” he confessed, “but she was in a good
mood tonight.” Felicity couldn’t tell. Elizabeth always aimed the same pointed glances
at her, like darts, and she had never encouraged Felicity to call her anything but Mrs.
Whitfield. Felicity felt like she had been on probation with them for three years. She felt
fourteen, not thirty-two, and grossly inadequate, every time she saw them, and had a
knot in her stomach throughout the meal, and the food was never good. They served
lamb chops or chicken. The food was always heavy and the meat and vegetables
overcooked. The Whitfields had had the same housekeeper and cook since Taylor was
in kindergarten. She was a sweet woman but a lousy cook, although Felicity had never
commented on the food. The salad was drowned in store-bought dressing. Dominique
always had a French or Italian chef and lighter meals, with lots of fresh food. Taylor
loved eating there. He’d been surprised to find Felicity had no interest in cooking.
Neither did her mother or sisters. All three of the Walker women were more interested
in their jobs and careers than the kitchen.
Taylor finished his drink as Felicity put out her cigarette, and he turned to her with a
serious expression. He looked as though he had something important to say, and she
almost wondered if he was going to break up with her. He looked tense and not too
happy. She knew his parents would be delighted if he got rid of her. Or his mother
anyway.
“Is something wrong?” she asked, suddenly nervous after she had just started to
unwind.
“Not at all, quite the reverse,” he said, and pulled something out of his pocket. She
couldn’t see what it was, as he took her hand and looked into her eyes. “I was going to
wait a while, but my parents think it’s time, after three years. We know each other well
by now, and you make me happy, you’re a good person, and you give me good advice
about my job. I think we’ll do well together. Felicity, will you marry me?” he asked her
in a monotone, and then kissed her before she could answer. Their lovemaking was
efficient and experienced, they weren’t innocents, but he wasn’t a man of passion.
Nothing about the relationship was what Felicity had dreamed of for her future, but it
had been comfortable for both of them for the past three years. And he was right, they
got along well. But she hadn’t had marriage in mind, and didn’t have it in her sights for
at least the next few years. His proposal had taken her entirely by surprise. She was
shocked that his parents thought their getting engaged was a good idea. She knew they
wanted a grandchild, but why now? And why her? Their disapproval had been obvious
for the past three years.
“Are you serious?” she asked in a shocked voice, which wasn’t the response he had
expected or wanted to hear.
“Of course. I wouldn’t have asked you if I weren’t. And my parents approve. I have
their blessing to ask you.” She thought he sounded childish when he said it. He opened
his hand then to show her the small navy-blue velvet box he’d been holding with his
fingers clasped around it so she didn’t see it. He opened the box, and there was a ring
with a small sapphire as the central stone, with a smaller diamond on either side. He
took the ring out of the box and put it on her finger. “It was my mother’s. She agreed to
let me have it.” Felicity’s mother and grandmother wore more important jewelry, and
the ring looked like Elizabeth Whitfield more than Felicity, but she was touched by the
gesture. She stared at it for a minute and then at him.
“I didn’t want to get married this young,” she said honestly, and had said it to him
before. “Thirty-two still seems too young to me, and I’m not ready for children.” It
wasn’t a yes or a no, it was more of a maybe, but she wasn’t jumping for joy. She’d
been completely unprepared for his proposal.
“I’m thirty-seven, and I want to have children before I’m forty and too old to enjoy
them.”
She smiled. “I don’t think you’ll be too old to enjoy kids at forty. I kind of thought
I’d think about a serious step like marriage after I turn thirty-five. I want to concentrate
on my art before that.” It gave her three more years to make her career the priority, and
not marriage or a family.
“You can paint on the side when we have kids,” he said, as dismissive as he always
was about her work.
“It’s not something I do ‘on the side,’ Taylor. I’m not sure you understand that.”
“Kids sleep a lot when they’re babies. You can paint while they nap.”
“Are you serious?” She looked at him intensely.
“Or you can paint at night while they sleep.”
“When I have kids, I want to give them my full attention, like my mother did.”
“She was younger than you are now when she started her business, and she managed
it. I’m sure you can too. You’re a smart girl, you can figure it out. It’s all about time
management,” he said. It was also about talent and passion and dedication, which he
seemed to overlook entirely. “You’ll break my heart if you say no,” he added in a
choked tone, which made her feel terrible about her reservations. She loved him, but
she wasn’t sure she loved him enough to be married to him for the rest of her life. And
she didn’t want to make a mistake, or rush into something she wasn’t ready for. Felicity
always made careful decisions, never rash ones, and she wanted to be honest with him.
“Can I think about it?” she asked, taking off the ring and handing it back to him. He
looked deflated and hurt when she did. “Taylor, it’s more about when than if,” she said
as consolation, which wasn’t entirely true, but she wanted to put balm on the wound of
her not saying yes immediately.
“If you know you want to marry me, then why not now?” he insisted, with the ring
safely back in its box on the table in front of the couch. She felt as though her whole
future was trapped in that box, like a butterfly.
“Because now feels too soon. I don’t know if I’m ready for that kind of
responsibility, and especially kids. You want a baby soon, and I know I’m not ready for
that. It seems silly to be engaged for three years. We live together. That feels like enough
for now. This apartment isn’t set up for kids. If I got pregnant, we’d have to move, and I
love my apartment, it works well for me.” Everything related to her art was of no
consequence to him. That was clear to her and had been for the past three years. “I want
to be a serious artist before I’m a wife and mother, so I can do a good job at all three.
Right now, my art is the priority. It has to be. The rest can wait a few more years.”
“I don’t want to wait,” he said, sounding stubborn and petulant. He had put his heart
and soul into the proposal, and she could see fury bubbling up in him, like lava in a
volcano about to erupt. She had never seen him look like that before. She had bruised
his ego badly. He’d been waiting weeks to ask her, and it had taken him time to get his
mother to give him the ring. She hated to part with it, even though she didn’t wear it
anymore. Phillip had given her a bigger one, finally, for their fortieth anniversary, a
four-carat diamond she wore proudly every day. But she was sentimental about the
small sapphire he had given her when they got engaged. They’d been married for almost
fifty years since then.
Taylor seemed agitated and looked angry as he leaned over and kissed her hard, to
convince her. She was touched that he was so earnest and insistent about it, but it scared
her more than convinced her. She was feeling trapped by the idea of marriage. She
kissed him back, more cautiously, to reassure him. The evening had suddenly become
overwhelming, after the tension of dining with his parents. Taylor became suddenly
passionate, enhanced by the Scotches he’d had all evening, which gave him courage and
seemed to fuel him. His ardor was frightening. She could suddenly see that he’d had a
lot to drink, more than she’d realized, and he got aggressive sometimes when he drank
too much. This was a powerful force that had him in its grip, and she didn’t want his
unexpected proposal to end in a fight.
Before she could stop him, he pressed his mouth on hers, pushed her back on the
couch forcefully, resting his full weight on her so she couldn’t get up, and with one deft
hand, he reached under her dress and yanked down her underwear and pantyhose
brutally, keeping his weight on her as he crushed his mouth on hers. She couldn’t
breathe and she tried to push him off, but he had her dress up around her waist by then,
and before she could stop him, he had entered her with a driving force, slamming her
back against the cushions. She tried to get him to stop but she couldn’t get away from
him or even speak with his mouth on hers. He was pounding the full force of his body
into her, with his whole weight on her, and his mouth pressed on hers, and she was
totally at his mercy, as he intended, and within minutes he came with a shuddering wave
and a shout, and lay on top of her, staring at her. He looked as surprised as she felt, and
she ached from the force with which he had entered her. He rolled slowly off her as
tears sprang to her eyes. There were tears in his eyes too, as sanity returned to him
slowly.
“I’m sorry, Felicity, I don’t know what happened. I wanted you to say yes tonight. I
want you to be my wife.” They were both crying at the realization that he had raped her
in a blind rage.
“That’s not the way to do it,” she said as she pulled her underwear on and her dress
down and sat up. He had never done anything like it before. He had punished her
severely for not accepting his proposal and having doubts about it. She would never
forget the fierce look on his face as he pounded into her. She wanted to get away from
him now, as she stood up on shaking legs. “I told you I wanted to think about it. We’re
adults. Marriage has to feel right to both of us. You can’t force it on me,” she said,
choking on a sob.
“I’m sorry,” he said, looking genuinely contrite, as she walked away into her
bathroom and closed and locked the door. She took off her dress, and saw that she had
bled on it, he had forced her so hard. Even if he meant her no harm, he had hurt her and
frightened her.
It wasn’t a lot of blood, but enough to remind her of what had happened, and how.
He had never raped her before, but she was sure that what he had just done was rape.
He never liked it when he didn’t get his way about something, but this was different. He
had used brute force on her and he was a strong man. There was no way she could have
stopped him, and she had tried, but she was no match for him, with his full weight on
her.
She didn’t come out of the bathroom for an hour, and he was asleep on the couch
when she did. She tiptoed past him, slipped into bed, exhausted, and thought about it for
a long time, lying wide awake. She had seen a violent side of him that night that she’d
never seen before, and hoped she’d never see again. She didn’t know how she felt about
him now, other than angry and hurt and scared, and humiliated, and even ashamed. She
finally drifted off to sleep, and it was morning when she woke up. Taylor was sitting on
the edge of the bed, still dressed. He was staring at her with tears in his eyes. She didn’t
want another scene with him.
“I’m so sorry, Felicity. I don’t know what happened to me last night. I was drunk.
And I wanted you to say yes so badly that I went crazy when you weren’t sure. Take all
the time you need to think. I want to marry you, and I swear I’ll never do anything like
that again.”
“You scared me to death, and you hurt me,” she said with tears in her eyes too. He
didn’t come closer or try to kiss her, he could tell she didn’t want him to.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, and gently took her hand in his. She felt bad for him, but
more so for herself. He was genuinely distraught at what he had done. He kept stroking
her hand and apologizing to her. She wanted to tell him she wanted a time-out, and for
him to move out for a few days. She no longer knew who he was. He’d been a stranger
the night before. She wanted to be alone and needed time to think. She loved him, but
she didn’t know if she wanted to be married to him, or anyone for the next few years,
but he was so heartbroken that she felt sorry for him. It was as though he had been
kidnapped by aliens and had been deposited back on earth, filled with remorse.
“I love you, Taylor. I just needed some time to think,” she said sadly. He was gentle
again now, but the night before he had been a dangerous man. They both wanted to put it
behind them now. And she suddenly had the thought that even if they got engaged, she
could break the engagement if she wanted to. She didn’t have to marry him. An
engagement was a promise, it wasn’t a prison sentence, or it didn’t have to be. “Maybe
we can still get engaged,” she said quietly. “But if you ever do that again, I’ll go to the
police.” He could see in her eyes that she meant it.
“I promise you. It won’t ever happen again. I am heartbroken at what I did.” He went
to get the ring, and slipped it gently on her finger. She felt a shudder when he did. It
would always remind her of the savage animal he had become, but she didn’t say
anything. He didn’t try to kiss her and was deeply contrite. He left late for work a little
while later. Before he did, he turned to her.
“Can I tell my parents we’re engaged?” he said. She nodded slowly with a serious
expression. The joy had gone out of it for both of them. He had ruined it, no matter what
happened now. She needed time to get over it. He could tell.
“I’ll call my mother,” she said quietly. “But let’s go slow for a while. I want to get
used to the idea,” she said, and he left for work. She got up a little while later and
walked over to her studio setup. She stared at the painting she’d been working on, but
for the rest of the day she couldn’t paint at all. Her mind kept going back to the images
of the night before. She couldn’t get them and the memory out of her mind. She didn’t
call her mother until late that afternoon, after sitting in front of a canvas all day. She
didn’t feel excited to tell her the news, but she wanted to hear her mother’s voice.
Her mother sounded busy in her office when she answered on her private line, and
the minute she heard her daughter’s voice she knew something was wrong.
“Are you okay?” she asked Felicity.
“Yeah, I’m fine. I just wanted to tell you that Taylor and I got engaged last night.”
Felicity could feel her voice tremble as she said the words and was trying not to cry, at
the memory of what had happened and what he had done.
“Are you happy about it?” Dominique asked her. She didn’t sound it. She sounded
dazed and traumatized.
“He surprised me. I didn’t expect it. I’m fine as we are now. I told him I feel too
young to get married, but he wants it so badly, I didn’t have the heart to make him wait.
His parents are pressuring him. They want us to get engaged because it’s been three
years.” It didn’t seem like the right answer to Dominique.
“I don’t think that’s a good reason to get engaged,” her mother said. “You have to
want to be married to him.”
“He wants kids,” Felicity said in a flat voice, “soon. In the next couple of years.”
“Do you?” Dominique didn’t think she did. Felicity had never said she wanted
children, even later.
“Not for a long time, like five years maybe. I told him that.”
“It sounds like he’s rushing things,” Dominique said, worried about her.
“Yes, he is,” Felicity said, thinking of the night before. “But I think I can slow him
down.”
“Did he give you a ring, or was it a spur-of-the-moment thing?”
“He gave me his mother’s engagement ring,” she said, glancing at it on her hand, and
she took it off and laid it on the table next to her. It was burning a hole in her finger. It
was a souvenir of an ugly memory now.
“Well, just go at your own pace, be honest with him, and see how it goes. You don’t
need to rush into anything,” Dominique said gently. “And you think he’s the one?”
Dominique asked. She was unhappy to hear of the engagement,
but Felicity was thirtytwo years old and had the right to marry whomever she wanted,
even if her mother thought it was a mistake and didn’t like him.
It pained her to think of Felicity marrying someone so uptight and pompous.
She deserved a much nicer man.
“I think he’s the one,” Felicity said, sounding robotic and wanting to convince
herself. “He says I am for him.”
“That’s no surprise. And his parents are okay with it?”
“I guess so if she gave him her engagement ring. We had dinner with them last night.
They always give me the impression that they think he could do a lot better,” which was
exactly how Dominique felt about him, and his parents.
“Just don’t marry him until you’re sure. Engagements get broken all the time. I’m
sorry to say that to you when you tell me your news, but nothing is irreversible except
birth and death. Anything else you can change your mind about. Just remember that.
You’ll learn more about him when you’re engaged,” Dominique said wisely. “Pay
attention to it, and how you feel.”
“Thank you, Mom. It’s a big step. I wasn’t expecting it. It came out of left field,” and
so did the rape afterward, which was an even bigger surprise.
“Well, best wishes to the happy couple,” Dominique said, trying to be gracious
about it, which made Felicity feel even worse. She knew her mother didn’t like him, and
all the reasons why. If she knew about the rape, she would have hated him, but Felicity
was never going to tell anyone about it. She was too ashamed. It fell into the category of
relationship rape, and there was no excuse for it. And what if he did that when they
were married? She hoped she would have the guts to walk out on him if he did. But this
time, she was willing to forgive. Once. And never again. Now she was engaged, with a
ring she knew would make her feel sick whenever she wore it. It was a hell of a way to
start an engagement and plan a wedding and a marriage. But she was in no hurry to
marry.
She went back to bed after she called her mother, and fell asleep, buried deep under
her covers. Taylor woke her up when he came home with an armful of red roses for her.
They reminded her of the blood on her dress as she thanked him. He had brought
champagne, which she didn’t drink, and he wanted to make love to her, and she said she
didn’t feel up to it. She didn’t know how long it would take to get over what he had
done. She had put the ring back in the box, and he saw that she wasn’t wearing it. It was
no mystery why. He got into bed and held her, and she cried. He knew it would take
time to repair the damage he’d done. She was his fiancée now. He had told his mother
and lied and said she loved the ring. His mother was delighted to hear it, and said what
a lucky girl she was to have him. Taylor thought so too.
“My mother wants to know when we’re going to set the date,” he said as he held her.
“She thought June would be nice. That’s when my parents got married,” he said
innocently, and Felicity only cried harder. She felt like a lamb being led to slaughter.
The last thing she wanted to think about now was a wedding in seven months. Taylor
went to watch TV, and sat on the couch where he had raped her…and Felicity stayed in
bed, and lay staring at the ceiling, feeling worse than she ever had in her life. Taylor
slept on the couch that night, and for the next several days, without her asking him.
There was nothing left to say until she felt better and got over what he’d done. He knew
it was his fault, and took responsibility for it. And in the meantime, they were engaged,
whatever that meant for the present and the future. They were certainly not off to a good
start.
