Tristan: How I Found True Love and Married Someone Else

By Luke Robertson

Tristan Cosgrove is an attorney with a personal problem. A big one, one thats both legal and ethical. And a lot of people could get hurt. When he meets Olympia, she is the most beautiful girl he has ever seen. Both are teenagers, and despite their hesitations, fall in love. But they soon learn that their romance is worse than taboo in the conservative state of Nebraska in 1960, because they are first cousins.

When their grandmother and parents discover their feelings, Tristan and Olympia are forced apart. Tradition, family fear, and state law dictate their breakup. Accepting their fate with difficulty, the cousins marry other people. But the heartache of soul mates is not so easily cured.

Now, nearly two decades later, the fire of their suppressed love rekindles, and the two struggle to justify what both so desperately want. Will they succeed in reclaiming their passion without destroying themselves? Or will an irresistible deadly force ruin the Cosgrove family as well as their own integrity and even their lives?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Sep 26, 2017
• ISBN: 9781480851504

Luke Robertson

Luke Robertson is a fourth-generation Nebraskan. He has published poetry, reviews, and non-fiction and lectured extensively on the arts. He teaches humanities at a small college in the Northeast and lives in the proverbial “little house on the edge of the woods.” An avid reader and book collector, this is his first novel.

Book preview

1

A Faint Cloud on the Horizon

S he was sitting in church when first I saw her—the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Absolutely angelic, she glowed from somewhere deep inside. Modest, completely poised, and with eyes downcast, she waited quietly for the service to begin. The day was Easter, March 29, 1959. I know: this sounds a little too much like Petrarch’s first sight of Laura, but I swear it’s true. More than half a century later, it’s still absolutely clear in my mind. Her complexion was perfect and translucent; her chocolate-brown hair was turned under in a little flip; she wore a brown tweed skirt and jacket. She moved with a gracefulness not often seen in teenage girls.

When our family had walked into my grandparents’ church in Cedar Grove, Nebraska, and I’d looked for them in their customary pew, this vision of beauty had been sitting beside them. My breath had caught suddenly. I had never seen her before in our visits to the grandparents; I wondered, Who could she be? Then it dawned on me that she must have been my cousin Olympia. I’m afraid I neither heard nor saw anything of the service that day—only thoughts and sights of her. Is it right to admire your cousin? I thought. How had she become so … angelic? And when? I was painfully aware of my own awkwardness. Would she notice that I was no longer a little boy? I was not an athlete; would she find me an interesting person despite that character flaw?

My family had driven out to Cedar Grove that morning to visit my grandparents and to see my uncle Jim and his family, who had just moved home after several years in Egypt. We had last seen them eight years before, when Olympia and I were six years old. Our birthdays were a week apart, in February, so we were practically twins. In my mind, I still saw her as a rather strange six-year-old—painfully shy, but I was shy too—and we had been friends for as long as her family had been in Nebraska. Now we were fourteen, and both of us had changed considerably in eight years. She looked older than fourteen—not only in terms of physical development but also, and especially, in terms of her poise.

I had eyes only for Olympia. At dinner on Grandfather’s ranch and throughout the afternoon, I watched for opportunities to talk with her without seeming too eager. And she was easy to talk with, relaxed and patient, unlike any girl I had ever encountered. We talked about our favorite school subjects, about foods we liked and disliked, about our other cousins, and about life in Egypt and in Nebraska. Seats around Grandmother’s table were not assigned, so we found chairs together. Olympia’s colonial British accent was charming, the product of eight years in an exclusive girls’ school in Alexandria.

Amazing! I can’t believe I’ve got a cousin so attractive, so sophisticated. I mean, my other girl cousins aren’t very interesting. They’re not really girls—they’re just … cousins.

I’m glad we’re cousins, she confided. I’m as American as you are, actually, but this is like a foreign country. I don’t know anything about the States. Would you help me sort things out here? … And promise you won’t laugh at me?

Sure, I agreed. Ask me anything. I’d be glad to help. It’ll be easier to ask me than some stranger. I promise I won’t laugh or think you’re weird.

In her pale blue eyes I saw a special twinkle, and she had a smile that seemed to be particularly intended for me. Perhaps she trusted me because she remembered our friendship as children, perhaps just because we were so close in age. Altruistically, I wanted to be a mentor and friend to her. I was confident that she would need a lot of advice about surviving in an American high school.

I had my first opportunity almost immediately. Farther along the table, my brother Art commented to her brother Tom that after he played a baseball game, he liked to cool off with a Coke. Olympia looked puzzled. What’s that?

I was surprised but realized that it was a sincere question. It’s a soft drink—fizzy. The real name is Coca-Cola, but we just call it Coke. It’s really good with ice.

Ice? she asked. Why?

To make it cold. I thought that was obvious.

She shook her head slightly. I suppose that’s one of those American tastes.

Apparently, they had neither ice nor soft drinks in Egypt, which I found baffling. Coca-Cola, I later learned, was a generic name for almost any American beverage in Egypt.

That desire to be helpful was partly altruism. But when I was honest with myself, I knew my motives were more selfish than that. Like a moth that slowly begins to flutter toward a flame, I was unwittingly being drawn toward my doom and was powerless to stop. I could not guess that day that Olympia’s life and mine would be so intertwined, or with what disastrous results. Before my family left for home that evening, I asked her, If I wrote to you, would you answer?

Yes, she said without hesitation. I’d like that. We smiled shyly at each other.

Driving east in the darkness, my mother remarked that it was nice to see that Olympia and I got along so well. You’re so close to the same age, and I hope you’ll become friends. My brother Rick nudged me with his elbow; I punched him in the shoulder.

Well, Dad interrupted, ‘friends’ is good, but puppy love isn’t. Or a crush. You had those goofy puppy-dog eyes every time you were near Olympia. Don’t get any stupid ideas in that direction. Just remember that she’s your cousin. If I’d ever forget that warning, I’d have plenty of opportunity to remember it later.

All young loves end tragically. Or maybe all tragic lovers are young. At least in literature. Some come to mind almost unbidden: Romeo and Juliet were in their early teens; so were Tristan and Yseult when they began. Cleopatra was a teenager; so was Héloïse, although both of them loved older men. Evangeline and Gabriel loved each other from childhood until a distant death. The tragedy usually resulted not from the fault of the lovers but from meddling by other people—such as the Capulets and Montagues, wronged spouses, Heloïse’s uncle, or the British.

In ordinary life, that’s overly dramatic. Thousands—no doubt millions—of couples have made commitments at very young ages and made happy, lifelong marriages. Indeed, millions of hapless young people who have been assigned to marry partners chosen for them by their parents have eventually become faithful and even affectionate spouses.

In modern times, people routinely confuse love with being in love and thereby create their own misery. Love is essential in marriage, but being in love is not. The whole idea of being in love descends straight from the courtly love practices of the Middle Ages. Being in love is an emotional state, and it fertilizes and waters our need for a religious experience of a certain sort: we adore not so much our partner as our mental image of her or him. In fact, most people who are in love don’t actually know the woman or man they place on a romantic pedestal. This is why, from the divorce courts to the tabloids to the movies, people who have fallen in love can suddenly fall out of love. They have learned the truth about each other, and they don’t like it one bit.

I wonder today how I went so wrong about marriage and love. Maybe it was because I had no sisters, so girls were always the unknowable other. Maybe it was because my father lived in such constant warfare with his wife and sons that I so urgently wanted to establish a loving, happy family of my own. Maybe it was because he had beaten the self-confidence out of me and I was desperate to prove my worth as a man. Maybe it was simply bound to happen, for one of God’s mysterious reasons.

Whatever the causes, I know one fact with unshakeable certainty: I have loved the same woman since we were at least sixteen years old. Maybe fourteen, unconsciously. Like the other couples I’ve mentioned, we faced terrible opposition, especially from family. Across half a century and more, my love for her is still as gripping and as consuming as ever. So is my visceral defense of young lovers whose families attempt to separate them because of prejudice or fear.

When he learned his next assignment was Singapore, Uncle Jim decided to leave the company he had worked for rather than move overseas again. He took a job teaching at the state college in Kearney so he could be near his parents and another brother, Uncle Mike. My family lived in Columbus, about a hundred and thirty miles east. That’s at least a drivable distance to Olympia, certainly a lot closer than Egypt.

For the next three years, Olympia and I exchanged letters twice a month or so. Initially, these contained nothing earth-shaking—mostly comments on school, friends, church, movies, and the other relatives. Increasingly, we exchanged confidences and gave each other advice. We always closed our letters with Love, but that’s not unusual within families, and we never used language any more intimate than that. We sent birthday cards to each other. We discovered that we had similar tastes and attitudes about social life: we were essentially melancholic personalities. We had similar problems with our parents and similar interests in reading: we both loved Shakespeare and Conan Doyle and Robert Benchley, among others, and I introduced her to Willa Cather and Robert Frost. We loved history. We were studious, got good grades, and were interested in art and music—she played flute and I the bassoon. She shared my lack of interest in sports and, unlike most of our peers, didn’t consider that a character flaw.

Like many cousins, Olympia and I discovered that we were simpatico. We were good friends of the same age, and although she set my pulse racing and I began to imagine a romantic relationship, we were cousins, and as far as I knew then, Olympia entertained no idea of further intimacy. Was I perverted to find my cousin attractive in that way—as a girl?

Does she even know how sexy she is? I mean, look at that complexion—absolutely flawless. Her mouth is so tender, so inviting, and her smile is to die for. Look at her tight little behind—it’s just perfect, shaped like half moons. And her breasts—not too big, but growing; just a nice handful, I’ll bet. (But how would I know?) And her eyes! The aqua color of pale forget-me-nots but iridescent somehow, and so deep I think I’m drowning when I look into them. I know I’m not supposed to think about my cousin this way, but I just can’t help noticing. I sure wish she’d notice me. As a guy, not just as a cousin.

We saw each other at Christmastimes and other family get-togethers, but with the number of cousins and uncles and aunts who came to these, we seldom had any time to ourselves. These festivities were always at the Cosgrove Ranch, and as my family got closer to our destination, I would get butterflies in my stomach. I wanted to see Olympia right away, but it would not be cool to be obvious about that with the others around. When we arrived, there were always scads of relatives to greet, and of course Grandmother and all the aunts wanted to kiss everybody. Sooner or later, Olympia and I would find ourselves on the periphery of conversations that didn’t really interest us anyway. So we created conversations that interested no one but ourselves.

Because of her eyes, I began to call her by a pet name, Forget-me-not. Yes, it was a double entendre, and at that point I wasn’t really afraid that she would forget me. She smiled briefly whenever I called her that, so I knew she liked it.

At Thanksgiving, you were all worried about your chemistry test. How did that come out?

Well, I passed, anyway.

Yeah, I’ll bet you did. Probably aced it. Passed, huh? Wha’d you get on it? Honestly, now.

A hundred.

"I’d say you passed it. Way to go!"

Well, I guess it’s not too bad, since I hate the class.

"Hey, did you ever finish the book I gave you last summer? My Ántonia?"

Yes. It was great. I thought I told you about that at Thanksgiving.

No, we didn’t ever talk about it. Did you like it?

Oh, yes; I loved it. The characters were so… well rounded, so alive. Ántonia was so strong; she had a hard life, but it didn’t break her. I just kept hoping that she and Jim would realize they loved each other, but it never happened. It’s like they lived their lives on separate tracks: friends but never anything closer. That’s just the romantic in me, I guess.

The part I like best, I said, is all the descriptions of the landscape of Nebraska. And her language is as glorious as the country she’s describing.

Mmmm.

Cather loved this state, and she makes us love it as we read. In fact, I almost think sometimes that Nebraska is the real hero of this story.

She raised her eyebrows slightly and said, I never thought of it that way.

Did you know, I continued, that she wrote several novels set in Nebraska? This is just the most famous of them.

Are they all this long?

"I think the longest one is The Song of the Lark. One of her best is O Pioneers, and you’d enjoy that, too. But if you’re looking for something shorter right now, there’s A Lost Lady. There’s also Lucy Gayheart. I think you’d really like that one; Lucy’s a girl about our age."

She looked reflectively into the distance. I wonder if life out here was really the way it’s described in the novel.

I think it’s probably pretty much true. But why don’t you ask Grandmother about it? She’s lived in Nebraska all her life, and her parents came here almost eighty years ago in a covered wagon.

So such conversations continued until another cousin joined us and changed the subject, or persuaded several of us to ride the saddle horses for a while, or until we were called for a meal.

When we all sat down to meals, Olympia and I always gravitated toward each other. When I touched her knee with mine, I noticed that she did not start or pull back; in fact, after the first time, she always returned the pressure. I noticed that after about two years back in the States, she had shed her British accent and sounded much more like any upper-Midwest high school student. We were together every available minute.

2

We’re Just Friends—Really!

O ver time, my initial infatuation mellowed, although it didn’t really wane. I was able to think with my brain instead of my hormones. We were simply very comfortable in conversation with each other in person or by letter.