Well, what are you going to do? You gonna be Catholic, or you gonna be smart?

Why can't I be both?

Choose, Che.

I can't. All I know is I can't have this baby. But also, I can't not have this baby.

That's what I'm saying. I'll get the money together.

How much you think it's going to be?

Over three hundred dollars.

Che cried. Where am I going to get that kind of money?

I'll give it to you. I have it. I have it saved up.

How am I going to pay you back?

Don't worry.

How did you save that much money?

Little by little. Dollar by dollar. Took me four years.

Oh, Larissa.

It's okay. That's what it's for. I didn't know what I was saving for. But I knew I would need it for something.

I can't take your money.

To save yourself?

Save myself for the short term, burn in h.e.l.l for eternity.

Che, you're not going to burn in h.e.l.l. Who told you this? Larissa appraised Che, contemplated her. I didn't know you and Maury went that far, she finally said.

Che wouldn't look at Larissa. We didn't. With a fake-casual shrug at Larissa's startled face. Oh, last month, during spring break, remember Nuno?

No, I don't remember Nuno!

Yeah, me neither. It wasn't meant to be. Just a fun few hours.

Maury was Che's boyfriend, her high school sweetheart. They were going to the junior prom next month. Yet there it was.

Oh.

I know. I told you it's no good.

You can't tell this to your mother, Che. You can never tell her.

She'll know.

She won't.

G.o.d will know, said Che, bending over her hands, on the stoop of Larissa's quiet Piermont house. They were going to be late for school half an hour ago. It was a sunny morning.

You'll be fine, said Larissa. You'll be okay. You'll see. You can't have a baby at sixteen. That's all there is to it. There'll be plenty of time to have a baby. But we've got big plans after high school, after college. We're going to travel the world. We're going to go live in Rome and teach English as a second language. Then Greece. We're going to become tour guides in France, remember?

I remember. But Che was slumped into a fetal position, her backpack on the concrete steps next to her. She looked like a backpack herself, dark and small and curled up. Larissa sat down next to her, patting her back. How could Che have been so careless when she knew what it would mean? When the decision was utterly unbearable, how could she not have taken every precaution and then some? They went to school. And Larissa carried her books, and laughed in the hall, and pretended that everything was as it always was. Only Che's pallid face by the lockers in between periods was Larissa's ruthless reminder that nothing was the same.

Later they went to New York University together, where Larissa, a theater major, met Ezra and Evelyn and Jared, while Che, an undeclared major, got busy with her causes: saving the spotted owl, saving the whalea"and then her dad had a heart attack and died, and she left the U.S. for good. The girls never did get to Rome or Greece or become tour guides in France.

Nowadays, without Che, Larissa had lunch with Maggie most Tuesdays, and twice a month with her friend Bo, who worked at the Met in the city, and once a month on Thursday she drove to Hoboken to see Evelyn, whom she loved and envied. Occasionally she took a walk with Tara down the street, who, though married with two kids, always seemed lonely. Larissa walked, while Tara talked, and it suited them both. On Fridays, after she had her nails done and her eyebrows waxed with her young nail friend Fran Finklestein, Larissa wrote Che a short note, like a diary entry, gingerly holding the pen with her painted nails. She told Che of Maggie and Ezra, of Evelyn and her five children, of Bo and her hypochondriac mother and her layabout boyfriend. Bo was the only one working in that household and lately it had been driving her crazy. Che was far away and liked to hear news from home.

When the mail came, Larissa would leaf through the catalogs and the magazines standing over the island in her kitchen. She didn't read sitting down anymore. She didn't have time. There was always the next thing, and the next. The phone was always ringing. Evelyn called to ask her what she thought of Marilynne Robinson's new book (which Larissa hadn't read, but pretended she was really into because Evelyn was so smart and intimidated Larissa).

Evelyn and Malcolm didn't watch TV in Hoboken. They didn't even have a TV! They had two couches, a chair, and a fireplace. And a low long table on which to place the tea cups and wine gla.s.ses and the books they were reading. Whenever she and Jared went over, all they did was sit and talk about books. Larissa often held Evelyn up to Jared, who said, "Do you think it's because they live in Hoboken that they don't have a television? We lived in Hoboken, we had a TV." And, "What do you want to do, Lar, you want to get rid of the TV? Propose it, I'll say yes."

Evelyn homeschooled her kids. It was incongruous that she had the time, could find the time, could do it. "What do you want to do, Lar?" said Jared. "You want to homeschool our kids? Propose it, I'll say yes."

"You're impossible when you get that self-righteous," said Larissa.

She envied Evelyn the abilities that Larissa didn't even know how to begin to begin to have. It was all Larissa could do to keep her house organized. Evelyn's house was a lot less organized, but she homeschooled her kids! Evelyn also had twenty-four hours in her day, right? How come she had time to homeschool five children and read Marilynne Robinson?

"TV never goes on," Evelyn explained with a smile.

"Well, I know. But you've got five kids."

"They go to bed. Eventually." When Evelyn smiled, Larissa always felt better about everything. Evelyn had a light-up smile.

In the summertime, most Jerseyites rented a house on the sh.o.r.e by the ocean. But Larissa and Jared didn't want to be like everybody else. They bought a lake house in the middle of rural Pennsylvania, two and half hours from anywhere, on Lingertots Pond in the woods, and Larissa went there with the kids for the summer. First year Michelangelo was old enough to speak, he called the place Lillypond, and it stuck. Jared drove out on Thursday nights and stayed through Sunday. At the end of August they went on family vacations, last year to Mount Rushmore, the year before to California and Disneyland. They'd taken hiking vacations and camping vacations. They'd fished and rock climbed. They'd gone to the Maine Coast and to the Rockies, to the Grand Canyon and Key West. For their anniversary last June, Jared took Larissa to Las Vegas. This was all in the six years since Michelangelo was born. Until he came, they had no money and went nowhere. The boy said he brought his family good luck. Since they lived on a street that was shaped like a horseshoe, they believed it.

As for family before her own family, Larissa had three much older brothers who were sharply ambitious and successful, executive vice-presidents, sales directors and school chancellors. They fiercely competed with one another, but Larissa had no one to compete with. She had neither exceeded nor subverted anyone's expectations. Nothing was expected of her. Her parents unconditionally supported her in every crazy endeavor of her heart. Violin playing? Sure. Punk rock phase with Sid Vicious posters and temporary tattoos that looked real? But of course! At twenty, when she met Jared, her hair was still laced with hot pink. During their more intimate moments Jared still called her his hot pink girl. Which was s.e.xy when she recalled it through the pulsing place inside her that remembered things.

Theater was the thing Larissa thought about when there was nothing else to think about. If I could pray to move, prayers would move me; But I am constant as the Northern Star. She had Mark Antony's agony over Caesar's betrayal carved into her heart. "For Brutus is an honorable man; so are they all, all honorable men." She recited Desdemona's death while she washed the dishes. "Kill me tomorrow, but let me live tonight but half an houra" This was why she painted stage sets for the theater department at Pingry. So that a few times a week, she could still hear unbroken voices shout the bard. If love be rough with you, be rough with love!

She was thoughtful, non-aggressive, not much of a nag, liked jewelry and cooking utensils, therefore was easy to buy for, unlike her friend Maggie, who for all her many virtues was impossible to buy for.

That was Larissa Stark. Constant as the North Star.

2.

Oth.e.l.lo

On Sat.u.r.day night Larissa made a pitcher of Margaritas with Triple Sec, Cointreau and Grand Marnier and thus liquefied the four of them played Scruples, the game that challenged everyone's idea of what was right, a game of moral dilemmas, everyone's hated favorite, all conundrummy ambiguity chased farther down the gullet by hard liquor.

"I don't want to play," declared Jared. "I want to have some superficial laughs. I don't want to delve into the complexities of my psyche, or anyone else's psyche for that matter. Why can't we be like regular people, and just talk baseball free-agency trades?"

He was voted down. The children remained clean and well-behaved (aside from three whines and a stomp from Emily, and silence from the adolescent and sullen Dylan, Maggie and Ezra's son), and nothing broke and nothing burned. Larissa, her cast still on, wore a green, form-fitting jersey sweater and tailored black slacks, her hair loosely piled, her makeup deceptively light. She served Brie in puff pastry, a chicken paprika with pappardelle, a bacon salad with her own dressing, and a rum baba for dessert, also homemade. They drank red wine, chasing it down with shots of Reposado, following it with Margaritas. On the stereo, Glenn Gould played Bach like only Gould could play him, exquisitely, his six Part.i.tas (especially BWV 830) imprinted on Larissa's soul so clearly she could almost play them herself, if only she had a piano, and could play. The fires were on in all the fireplaces, and when the kids ran to the playroom for ping-pong and G-rated board games, the adults were able to talk while the house sparkled, and outside a light dusting of snow fell quietly on the tall bare oaks and the frozen ground.

The question that seemed to come up in Scruples a lot came up. Larissa personally thought it was the only question a game of Scruples ever asked. It was the only question they got mired in, despite the Triple Sec. "You see your best friend's wife making out with another man. Do you tell?" Last time they played it with Evelyn and Malcolm, and that question came up, Evelyn had told Larissa she and Malcolm didn't talk for four days afterward.

Last time they played with Bo and Jonny, Jonny's nonchalant response to this stupid question ("Of course you don't tell. That's the guy code.") so infuriated Bo, they had to take a break from the relationship. Which was difficult considering they continued to live together in an apartment that belonged to Jonny.

When the card was flipped over and read this Sat.u.r.day night, Ezra and Maggie laughed, Larissa groaned, and Jared said, "You know what I'm going to do from now on? Give a different answer each time it's asked, to drive you all crazy and maybe next time we can just play Risk."

"What do you mean from now on?" said Maggie. "That's what you always do."

"Jared," Larissa said to her husband, "just answer the dumb question."

"No," said Jared. "The entreaty is clear. Do not end marriages, cause family rifts, or destroy friendships by revealing something totally inappropriate. And that's by the guys who designed the game!"

Larissa sipped her drink, the salt on the rim deliciously swelling her lime mouth. "Jared's right. We should heed their rules. Besides," she added, "I think we're overlooking the obvious here. How come the only one not in any trouble is the actual adulterer? It's all about the friends, the secrets, the obligations to the friendship. What about the obligations to the marriage?"

"Yeah, but that's too obvious," replied Jared. "That's why it's not a Scruples question. It's not even an ethical dilemma."

"It is a question, however," Ezra said. "A question, among many others," he added pointedly, "that a certain Larissa is refusing to answer. She's doing that a lot tonight. Not answering questions."

"Oh, calm down, Ezra," said Larissa. "Have another drink."

"Are you a relativist or an absolutist, Larissa?" asked Maggie.

"Well, it depends," Larissa replied to the raucous laughter of everyone, and she laughed herself, though she couldn't quite tell what was so funny.

"All right, Miss I-absolutely-shouldn't-have-made-my-*ritas-so-strong," said Ezra, watching Larissa who was busy squeezing more lime into what was left of his drink. "Can we talk about business for a sec? Don't avoid me."

Larissa pulled out a card. "Let's play Invent a Question of Scruples instead," she said.

"Fine," agreed Ezra. "But I ask first."

Larissa had two Margaritas and six part.i.tas in her. She smiled, unafraid, tipping her gla.s.s in a toast. "Yes, Ezra. What's your question?"

"Denise goes on maternity leave after Oth.e.l.lo. That's next month."

This was all he said, like a riddle.

"Is this part of Invent a Question?" Larissa wanted to know. "Denise goes on maternity leave. But she's ambivalent about the baby, being forty-four and a first-time mom. I believe Denise's feelings are justified. She doesn't seem very maternal. You're asking if should I try to dissuade her from having the child and stay on as director?"

"Larissa."

"Yes, Ezra?"

"Stop being deliberately obtuse."

"How am I obtuse?" She loved her Sat.u.r.day nights with her friends. They were like family.

"Why do you make me tell it to you twice? You know I want you to become the new director for the Pingry Theater Department."

Larissa swayed while sitting down. She and Jared exchanged a brief but conflicted look.

She painted background murals. She was the set decorator. Which described her life at home too. And every once in a while, when she was working, she'd hear in the nuance of the rehearsals of the sixteen-year-old's interpretation of Oth.e.l.lo something that would catch her ear, and she'd clear her throat and say quietly, but loud enough so that Moor of Venice could hear: "Try it again, Linus, but this time with the emphasis on must as in, *And yet she must die, else she'll betray more men.'"

The paint she used for the sets sometimes needed to be thinned with turps, which gave her a vicious, delicious headache, because secretly she loved the smell even as she suffered, and she listened more intently to the last act as she stirred the paint, the black and white to make a stormy gray, and waited for the thickened paint to thin so she could paint the walls behind Desdemona's bed, on which lay the fifteen-year-old siren Tiffany from Chatham, still in braces but with a Coach purse, straight from the Swim Club, waiting for her lover in the form of Linus from Summit in Birkenstocks to persuade himself of her unthinkable, of his unthinkable.

"That death's unnatural that kills for loving.

Alas, why gnaw you so your nether lip?

Some b.l.o.o.d.y pa.s.sion shakes your very frame: These are portents; but yet I hope, I hope, They do not point on me."

"Do you ever plan to answer me?" Ezra demanded.

"Yes." Larissa picked up another Scruples card. "Ezra, would you be willing to eat a bowl of live crickets for $40,000?"

"Lar," Jared said, "if you want it, you should take it."

"Want what?" she said innocently. They were getting undressed in the bedroom.

"Come on. Seriously."

But she had too much to drink for seriously. She fell on the bed in her black bra and underwear, her hair loose, her made-up eyes half closing. Pulling up her casted leg, she motioned for Jared with her index finger, and he fell on top of her, in his clothes, also having had a little too much to drink.

"We'll work out the kids," he muttered, kissing her. "Take the job. You know Ezra will be thrilled."

"What, I'm now accepting work to make Ezra happy?" Her arms flung around him.

"No, to make you happy." They nestled, rumbled to an inebriated rhythm of a married Sat.u.r.day night with nowhere to go on Sunday morning.

"I'm happy," she said. "Don't worry about me."

"I know how much you used to love it. Directing."

"Yes." Her eyes remained closed. The true unspoken inquiry hung in the air, the real issue, the only one worth having an answer to, the thirsty dilemma at the crux of each human heart: How it best for me to live?