The three men shared a last glass of wine on the deck before they smoked cigars and went to their cabins, happy and relaxed after a fun day on the boat. They had no plans for the next day, and Adam and Charlie said they were going to sleep late. Gray was already excited about meeting Sylvia to visit the church. He mentioned it to Charlie on their way downstairs, and his host looked pleased. He knew Gray led a lonely life, and thought she'd be a good friend for him, and a useful person for him to know. He had struggled for so long with his art, and was so talented, Charlie hoped he'd get a break one of these days, and was hopeful Sylvia could introduce him to the right people in the art scene in New York. She might not be a potential romance for him, or the kind of woman he was attracted to, but he thought she'd make a great friend. He had enjoyed talking to her himself. She was cultured and knowledgeable, without being pompous or pretentious about it. He thought she was a very nice woman, and he was surprised she wasn't linked to any of the men in the group. She was the kind of woman a lot of men would have been attracted to, especially Europeans, although she was a good fifteen years older than the women Charlie went out with, even though she was barely three years older than he. Life wasn't fair that way, he knew, particularly in the States. Women in their twenties and thirties were at a premium, it was all about youth. A woman Sylvia's age was a specialty, and would only appeal to a rare few, and only then to a man who was not threatened by how smart and capable she was. The kind of girls Adam went out with were generally considered a lot more desirable, in most cases, than a woman of substance and intellect like Sylvia. Charlie knew that there were a lot of women like her in New York who were just too damn smart and successful for their own good, and wound up alone. Although for all he knew there was a man waiting for her in New York or Paris or somewhere else. But he doubted it. She put out a vibe that suggested she was independent and unattached, and liked it that way. It didn't seem to bother her at all, and she was obviously not on the make, for them, or anyone. Charlie had shared his assessment of her with Gray over cigars the night before.
The next morning, as they walked up the hill to San Giorgio, Gray discovered that Charlie's thoughts about Sylvia were correct.
“You're not married?” Gray asked her cautiously, curious about her, as well as what she knew about the church. She was an interesting woman, and he wanted to be her friend.
“No, I did that once,” she said carefully. “I loved it when I was married, but I'm not sure I could ever do that again. Sometimes I think I love the commitment and lifestyle more than the man. My husband was an artist, and a total narcissist. Everything was about him. I adored him, almost as much as he adored himself. Nothing else ever existed for him,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone. She wasn't bitter, she was just finished with it, and Gray could hear that in her voice. “Not the children, or me, or anyone. It was always about him. After a while, that gets old. I'd still be married to him, though, if he hadn't left me for someone else. He was fifty-five when he left me, I was thirty-nine, and over-the-hill as far as he was concerned. She was nineteen. It was a bit of a blow. They got married and had three more kids in three years, then he left her too. At least I lasted longer. I had him for twenty. She had him for four.”
“I assume for a twelve-year-old that time?” Gray snapped, feeling angry on her behalf. It sounded like a rotten deal to him, knowing what he knew of her now, that she had gone to New York after that, penniless with two kids, and no help from him.
“No, the last one was twenty-two. Old for him. I was also nineteen when we got married, and an art student in Paris. The last two were models.”
“Does he see your kids?”
She hesitated in answer to the question, and then shook her head. The answer seemed painful for her. “No, he saw them twice in nine years, which was hard for them. And he died last year. It leaves a lot of things unresolved for my kids, about what they meant to him, if anything. And it was sad for me. I loved him, but with narcissists, that's just the way it is. In the end, the only ones they love are themselves. They just don't have it in them to love anyone else.” It was a simple statement of fact. Her tone was regretful but not bitter.
