Dear Emily. Fern Michaels

on the television set, uncorked a bottle of wine, rummaged for a pack of Ian’s cigarettes, and settled herself for the night. She drank herself into a stupor and repeated the process every day until January 2. A new year.

      Emily woke with a hangover that was so bad she went back to sleep and didn’t get up till noon, at which time she made out a schedule for herself that did not include Ian. She still hadn’t slept in the yellow room and still had no intention of doing so. Something perverse in her made her carry her things down to the basement. It was all a finished room, carpeted and paneled with a bathroom and small summer kitchen that was outdated, but still worked. At the far side of the basement was what she referred to as her planting room. She could live quite nicely down here until she got some backbone and some guts to do something about her marriage. She knew she was being stupid, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. She also knew she required some kind of professional help. She needed to get out her health insurance policy to see if it covered psychiatric care.

      On the twenty-fifth of January, Emily signed up for classes at Middlesex County College. She scheduled a series of twelve appointments with a psychiatrist named Oliver Mendenares. She rebooked her appointment with the attorney on Park Avenue, kept it, and came away angry. With herself. Because of her blind stupidity, she’d signed away all of her rights to the family clinics. Either she could get herself a job or stay dependent on Ian.

      She’d already made up her mind that she wouldn’t take the two thousand dollars a month if Ian offered it. “Once a fool, always a fool,” she muttered over and over to herself.

      Ian’s return was nothing short of anticlimactic. He went about his business as usual, spoke to her the way he’d speak to someone he’d just met. He didn’t ask how she was, where she was sleeping, what she did with her days. He wasn’t home at any one time to do more than sleep, shower, and change his clothes. The white shirts were still piling up.

      Spring heralded bright, sunny days. A new housekeeper named Edna arrived as did a bright red Mercedes-Benz convertible. A week later a Porsche was delivered. Both vehicles had giant silver bows sitting on top. Cards stuck under the windshield said, “To Emily, as promised. Love, Ian.”

      The first thing Emily did when Edna arrived was to show her how to iron Ian’s shirts. She quit four hours later. A second, third, and fourth housekeeper arrived, but each one quit when the laundry basket was pulled out.

      When the last housekeeper left after two days—the longest any of them had stayed—Ian came home with a wide smile and three jeweler’s boxes. He magnanimously cooked dinner outside on the grill and presented her with the boxes, gaily wrapped. He smiled benignly as he offered them to her.

      “These are lovely, Ian,” Emily said carefully. “Is it safe to keep them in the house?”

      “They’re insured. Do you like them? I think I got everything on the list. The ring is two full carats, the band has two carats in smaller stones. The two bracelets are worth twenty thousand, at least that’s what the appraiser said. Each set of earrings is two full carats each. You have five different strands of pearls. Are they what you like?” he asked anxiously.

      “They’re lovely,” Emily repeated.

      “I put thirty thousand dollars in your account for your three vacations. I think you can take a pretty decent vacation for ten thousand dollars each, don’t you? The travel agent said it was more than enough. I’m working on the shore house and boat. Did I forget anything, Emily?”

      “I don’t think so,” Emily said, her mouth a grim, tight line.

      “You’re trying to fool me, Emily,” Ian said jovially. “In the living room are your furs. You should keep them in a vault. There’s a place in Metuchen named Oscar Lowrey. You can store them there, but if you’d rather go someplace else, it’s okay. What do you think?”

      What did she think? Dr. Mendenares pretty much said Ian had a screw loose, but then he’d pretty much said she had one loose, too. “I’ll think about it.”

      “Aren’t you going to say thank you? I know you, Emily, you thought I wasn’t going to keep my end of the bargain we made. See, you should have trusted me. I always come through. You need to trust me more. What do you see as our problem in keeping a housekeeper?”

      “Those white shirts, Ian. No one wants to iron them. Including me.”

      “Are you going to sit there and tell me, after all I’ve given you, you aren’t going to iron my shirts?”

      “I’m not going to do it. If you want to take back all these lovely things, go ahead. Dinner was…okay. I have to get back to my books now.” She walked away, into the kitchen and down the basement stairs. Only here, in this underground cavern, did she feel safe, reasonably content and free of anxiety. She left the jewelry on the wrought iron table and didn’t bother to check out the furs. She also left Ian with the dishes. The rule had always been: You cook, you clean.

      Mendenares, if she was still going to him, would probably applaud her actions. But then, maybe he wouldn’t. He’d told her she had to stand up for herself, take charge of her life and not be a doormat. That’s when she stopped going to the sessions. At the beginning she’d made a pact with herself to take twelve sessions, and if she couldn’t see the light after three months, she would need more than one forty-five-minute session once a week. How disgusted Mendenares looked when she told him she wouldn’t be returning. “I have to work this out myself. I still love Ian. I will probably always love him. If that’s my weakness, then that’s what I have to work at. I want to try and save my marriage.”

      She hadn’t done anything, though. She returned home and burrowed into the basement with her seedlings, her books, and her memories.

      And now this strange dinner and gift-giving session. What did it mean? Everything Ian did was suspect. He was giving her everything he promised, everything she said she wanted. She hadn’t been able to work up any excitement when the cars arrived. The furs would probably stay in their boxes until Ian hung them up. Mendenares said she had to force herself to look at things squarely and to be honest with herself. And she was trying to do that. Ian was not a kind, generous person. In her heart she believed Ian was paying her off, and as soon as his debt was paid, he was going to leave her.

      She smelled his shaving lotion before she saw him. It was the first time, to her knowledge, that Ian knew she was living in the basement, the first time he’d actually come down the stairs. She looked up from the pile of books on the card table she was sitting at. He was angry but trying to control it.

      “Emily, I think we need to talk.” He looked around uncertainly. “Let’s go upstairs where we’ll be more comfortable.”

      She’d learned a thing or two from Mendenares. She couldn’t give Ian any kind of an edge, because as soon as she did, she was lost to her emotions. “I’m comfortable right here. In case you haven’t noticed, I live down here.”

      “I’m not blind, Emily. If you want to do something stupid like live in a cellar, that’s your business. It’s the same stupid principle that made you sign away your rights to the clinics. This is a magnificent house, a comfortable house. If you want to live like a mole, feel free.”

      “I am and I will. What do you want to talk about? If you want to really talk, then let’s discuss that scene where you left me at Jacques’ Restaurant and then let’s talk about the clinics. In my opinion we do not have a marriage. If we did, you would never have left me and gone to the Cayman Islands by yourself. That was one of the cruelest things you’ve ever done to me and you’ve done quite a few. The list is long. I let you do it to me, though, so I’m as much to blame. You know it too. Giving me all those things is your way of trying to make yourself feel good. I thought it was a joke, a game we were playing when I made out that ridiculous list. I don’t want things, Ian. I want a husband and a family. That’s what I signed up for and you said you did too. I know you’re a doctor, I know you have weird hours, but if I was important to you, you’d find a way to at least call me once a day, have dinner with me, bring me a flower once in a while, something to show me you care.