“He was there for me.”
“Because you’re basically a strong person.He could accept the downs because there were plenty of ups.With your mother, the downs were predominant.He let her know that, which fed into her insecurities.It became a cyclical thing.”He draped an elbow over the sofa back and laced his fingers together.“What I’m trying to do—what I’ve been trying to do—is to help her see things as they really were.I’m not saying that she was a saint, any more than I’m saying your dad was a sinner.I’m trying to create a balance in Patricia’s mind.She has to accept herself.She has to respect herself.She has to put her feelingsfor Eugene into perspective.She has to learn to love his memory and let go of the man himself if she’s ever going to move on in life.”
“Will she?”
“Move on?Eventually.She’s still a long way from it.This hospital represents security to her.She doesn’t feel capable of surviving away from it.”
“Maybe she isn’t,” Pam said, feeling angry again.
Bob was quiet, a sure sign, she knew, that he was waiting for her to go on.She had enough resentment in her—and was comfortable enough with him—to do just that.
“She made a mess of things, having an affair with John.It’s bad enough that she cheated on her husband, but John is her stepson.He also happens to be the dregs of the earth.”
“Your opinion,” Bob said with a raised finger.
“Do you think he’s not?”
“I don’t know the man well enough to say.He rarely comes here.”
Pam snorted.“Rarely?”
“Almost never.”
“When was the last time he came?Three, four years ago?”
“Two.But that’s fine.Patricia won’t see him anyway.”
Pam grinned.“Won’t see him at all?”
Bob shook his head.
“Good for her.”
“Not really,” Bob said.“She’ll have to come to terms with him at some point, but she avoids it.Doesn’t want to talk about him.Doesn’t want to think about him.”
Pam found a kind of justice in that.Not that John wouldbe bothered.Patricia was nothing to him.She couldn’t help his career.
“He said that if the truth came out, it would destroy her.Do you think it would?”
“Not where she is now.It can’t touch her here.Someday, after she leaves, it could hurt her.”He thought for a minute.“Destroy?That depends on how strong she is by then.”
“What will she feel if she knows I know?”
“Embarrassed.Guilty.Inadequate.”
“Then I shouldn’t say anything.”
He arched a brow.“Depends on what you want to say.If you’re angry enough—and you are angry—to yell at her and tell her how wrong she was and how badly she betrayed your dad, then you shouldn’t say anything.She already knows those things.Hearing them from you would open up the wound.”He paused.“How angry are you?”
“Right now?Not as angry as I was when I walked in here.”
He grinned.
“But I was pretty angry when I first found out.It comes and goes.Sometimes it’s anger, sometimes disappointment, sometimes pure revulsion.I mean, my stomach actually turns when I think of him—of them.It’s sick.”
“But it wasn’t incest, Pam.Keep that in mind.They were two attractive people, close in age, each lonely in his way.”
“If you’re asking me to condone it, I can’t.”
