Spring Romance: NINE Happily Ever Afters

by Tessa Bailey

  Nick stands and grins, following my lead.

  And just as we tiptoe past Holly’s room, she begins to cry.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Nick

  “Nick, darling,” Simone says, Jean-Marc carrying her luggage into the guest bedroom. “Guest bedroom” is a stretch – Jean-Marc gave up his bedroom and is crashing on the sofa bed in the living room, home from fall semester for a break in honor of his mother’s appearance. Charlie is couch surfing with a friend. He and Simone were never exactly close.

  That’s like saying Donald Trump is just a tad unpopular in Scotland.

  “Simone.” I embrace her, kissing both cheeks, polite to a fault. She wears the same perfume, her style unchanged after all these years, body tight and slimly compact, no extra movement wasted. Her dark hair is pulled back into a chic knot at the nape of her neck. She wears bright red lipstick, with tiny wrinkles lining her mouth. Her lower lids bear thick eyeliner, and all those years of narrowed eyes have left her with a cat-like appearance and what would be called “laugh lines” on anyone else etch deeply into her face, like a series of angry scratches.

  “You look the same. How long has it been?” Her question is rhetorical. She knows.

  “Nearly four years ago. When the twins graduated high school.” Rolf was with her. We spent three hours together. Three hours of watching my kids paraded around for pictures and accolades. Simone excluded me from the rest of her visit on the grounds that Rolf was “too jealous and unstable.”

  She didn’t bother to attend Jean-Marc’s graduation, instead flying him and a friend of his choice to spend a special week in Paris with her.

  “Four years!” Her smile plays at the corners of her mouth like a surgeon’s thread and needle, stretching as it tightens with precision. “Time has been good to you.”

  The leading compliments aren’t designed to flatter me. They’re designed to trigger a similar response from me.

  But I’m not Pavlov’s dog any longer.

  And Simone’s bell doesn’t work.

  “How was your flight?” I ask, gesturing toward the living room, where sofas and Jean-Marc await.

  Her lips part, my offensive behavior duly noted as her tongue saves the day, hiding her reaction, tickling the upper line of teeth. One front top tooth slightly overlaps the other, just enough to be endearing. When she smiles, she is symmetrical, her face so aligned she might have been designed rather than born. The curved tooth always added extra charm. Even Simone had a flaw.

  “Tedious, as always. Everyone sits with their face in a screen. First class is no different now. And people wear sweatpants.” Her nose crinkles in distaste.

  “Maman? Espresso with lemon?”

  “Now that is a young man who knows how to treat a woman,” she says with a wink, her red lips spreading with a smile, chin upturned as she calls out to our son. “Oui! And a small glass of cognac, s’il te plaît.”

  I say nothing.

  “You’ve kept the place exactly the same,” she says in a tone that makes it clear this is not a compliment. “If I look in your closets, I will find the same suits I helped you choose before the children were born.” Her eyes crawl up my body as I stretch on the sofa, one arm across the back, the other clinging to my beer like a life raft. She is cataloguing me in a methodical, seductive manner that would be incredibly arousing if it were any other woman.

  If it were Chloe, I would be hard by now, shifting in my seat to adjust myself, mind whirring through all the possibilities such a gaze offered.

  But that’s not happening now.

  Because it is Simone.

  She’s waiting for me to reply. I’ve been in my head and memory too long.

  “You would,” I admit. “You had good taste.”

  “Had?” She gestures to her dress and earrings, primping her hair jokingly. On the surface, it’s all in good fun.

  But I know the Simone underneath, and this is anything but fun.

  It is a game, though.

  “Have.” I’ll be the gentleman. It costs me nothing.

  “We bought this place with nothing, didn’t we?” she says looking around with sad eyes. “My trust fund, your graduate school stipend.”

  “And the trust from my accident,” I add. When I was in eighth grade, Charlie and I were playing street hockey one day, out in the street where we grew up in Westwood. A drunk hit us. I broke my arm, Charlie broke a leg, and our parents put the insurance settlement money into a trust for us. When we each turned twenty-one, it was ours.

  I invested mine in a down payment for this place.

  Charlie’s money went into his first failed business.

  “How timely,” she says with a smile. “You received the money from that car accident in your youth just a week before we learned about the twins.”

  “And you insisted on buying a home.”

  “It was a good investment.”

  But I wasn’t, I think, struggling to control two people inside my mind, one trying to override the other, the angry half winning.

  “You hated this place from the start.”

  “It was a starter home, Nick.” She shakes her head sadly. “Not meant to be a forever home.”

  “Was I a starter husband, then?” I say lightly, standing and reaching for the espressos Jean-Marc offers us both, his face neutral, eyes on me.

  I don’t do this.

  And he’s picking up on it.

  He goes back to the kitchen for Simone’s brandy.

  You raise babies into toddlers, then preschoolers to tweens, and finally teenagers become young adults, all the while fully formed in their humanity, just needing time to mature and grow. Roots and wings, the saying goes. Children need both.

  I’ve given them roots.

  Their mother cared more about her own wings than theirs.

  “Starter husband? What an American concept,” she says disdainfully, drinking her espresso quickly.

  “I think you gave it a French twist,” I add, going into the kitchen, grabbing another beer.

  Jean-Marc’s face lights up. “Dad?” He’s looking at the bottle in my hand.

  “Of course you may,” Simone interrupts, waving her hand. “Drink. Another stupid American concept. You can fight in a war but not have a glass of wine.”

  It’s the first time Jean-Marc’s asked since he came home from college. He’s nineteen now.

  “Sure,” I concede. I need all the points I can get.

  Simone watches me, eyes calculating, taking in the change. “Why don’t you drink some Cabernet, Jean-Marc?”

  He cracks a beer and stands next to me across the living room.

  Solidarity takes on many forms.

  “Maman!” The moment is broken by Elodie and Amelie’s twin shrieks as they barrel through the front door, glomming onto Simone like barnacles. She gives them double-cheeked kisses and fusses with Amelie’s new haircut.

  “Trés chic!” Simone declares, holding Amelie’s chin between her thumb and index finger, checking the angle over and over. “You look five years older!”

  Amelie beams.

  I unclench a millimeter. The kids are always happy to see Simone.

  “And Elodie, I expect to meet Brandon. You’ve told me so much about him.”

  Elodie’s eyes instantly grow shiny with unspilled tears. “Oh. Um, we broke up.”

  “When?” The question comes out like an accusation.

  I re-clench.

  “Three weeks ago.”

  “Oh. Well, you are a beautiful, intelligent young woman. He was stupid to leave you.”

  “I dumped him, Maman.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he hooked up with someone else.”

  “Hooked up?”

  “He screwed someone else,” Jean-Marc announces, giving Elodie the side-eye.

  “Shut UP!” The two begin squabbling.

  Simone and I exchange a rare look of sympathy.

  And then we laugh together for the first time in
fifteen years.

  It doesn’t last long, as Jean-Marc, Elodie, and Amelie stop dead in their tracks – both physical and verbal. Simone reaches for my arm, the butterfly touch of her fingertips against my wrist making electricity shoot through me.

  Not the kind I like.

  The kind that says you’re being stalked by a wild game animal.

  The laughter dies in my throat as I realize three sets of curious, very wary eyes are on us.

  Our children have not seen us in the same room together in years. Once the girls turned sixteen, they insisted on being independent with their flights to France. I no longer accompanied them. Simone came for their high school graduation nearly four years ago. That was the last time the kids saw us together, and the day was interminably fake.

  Of course it was.

  Rolf was there.

  This feels odd. Off. My protective sense goes into high gear, ears perked, arms and legs filling with pumping blood, ready to shift into danger mode. Simone smiles, her face sweet and genuine for a flicker of time, just enough to make me think of how she looked the day we met on campus during my freshman orientation at RISD, her senior year. The age difference never bothered me; she seemed to enjoy it.

  She is from a family with money, a long line of famous sculptors to royalty throughout Europe.

  She was a rare bird, exotic and alluring.

  I was the solid American, dashing and new.

  New World met Old World.

  She colonized me.

  “The concert starts in three hours. I have to be there early!” Amelie says, making me pay attention to her. Dressed in a classic black suit, the jacket high-waisted, the skirt long and flowing, she’s elegant, hair perfect, face done with makeup that is understated and nuanced, designed to show off high cheekbones and a stateliness I’ve never seen in her before.

  “We’ll be right behind you,” I tell her with a smile. Simone watches me.

  Not Amelie.

  “You have VIP tickets, so you don’t have to rush, Daddy.”

  Simone stiffens at the word Daddy. She’s always preferred Papa.

  Which is why I’m Dad and Daddy. She got to name the kids. I chose what they call me.

  “But we need to park,” Jean-Marc adds with a laugh, then a small belch. I notice his beer bottle’s empty. “And the nearest garage is a hike.”

  “I’ll drive,” I say, raising my eyebrows at his bottle.

  “Of course,” Simone says, her hand still on my wrist, remaining. “As it always was.”

  As it always was.

  * * *

  My daughter – our daughter – delivers a flawless performance for her concert.

  And all Simone can do is critique.

  “Your articulation on the reed needs more precision,” she says, her voice all business. I’ve wondered whether Amelie chose to play oboe because she thought it would bring her closer to Simone. Would offer some affinity, or just a sense of approval.

  If that was her motivation, it’s backfired horribly.

  From the look on Amelie’s face, it’s time to intervene. What is Simone’s purpose in coming to this concert? I spent the better part of the performances mulling over her presence. Why now? Why this event?

  Just… why?

  Covert glances from her during the concert look like flirting. That touch on my wrist. The laugh. The flattery.

  She’s not coming on to me.

  Impossible.

  Sixteen years ago, she decided we were done. And when Simone is done with something, it doesn’t exist for her.

  Yet here she is, done to the nines and talking to me as if we’ve been separated all these years by pure happenstance. Circumstance.

  Fate.

  And not intent.

  “Maman!” Elodie comes up from the rear, hooking her arm in Simone’s, interrupting the stream of French coming out of her mother, all of it advice on how Amelie could hold the instrument better. “Where are we going for dinner?”

  “We?” Simone’s gaze flits to me. “Oh, chérie, we can have dinner tomorrow en famille, together. I hoped to spend some time alone with your father this evening.”

  You would think that Simone had just said she’d found Chloe’s ex’s strap-on in my bedroom closet and was about to use it on Rolf at the Esplanade during a Boston Pops concert.

  “What?” All three of our children ask the same question in unison.

  And they look at me when they ask.

  I frown, turning to Simone in amazement.

  “What?” I echo.

  She laughs, the sound throaty and sensual. “Oh, Nick. You act as if I’m asking for the moon.”

  A slightly different analogy, but let’s go with it.

  “A steak and some wine and good conversation to catch up on all these years is what I ask.” She smiles at Amelie, who is dissolving under the surface but putting on a good front. “You understand, chérie. Tomorrow is for you. Tonight is for the adults.”

  Jean-Marc’s nostrils flare. He and Elodie exchange a glance without moving a muscle.

  “No. Simone, I—”

  Amelie interrupts me, blinking hard, chin up and defiant. “It’s fine, Daddy.” She gives a tinny laugh that makes one of the chambers of my heart stop working. “You have your dinner tonight. We’ll get Maman for a whole day instead, tomorrow.”

  “Yes,” Simone says, beaming with approval. Amelie is on board, locked and loaded, in place as expected. That’s all that counts for Simone. What might be churning under the surface does not matter. The words Amelie says, the compliance, are enough.

  I had forgotten what it felt like to live in a box. Watching my daughter rein in her expectations, right in front of the woman drawing the edges, is too much.

  “But—”

  An imperceptible head shake from Amelie and wider, blinking eyes are the only signs I get from my daughter, who is simultaneously fighting an inner battle and learning the art of decorum. “Daddy, it’s fine.” The vocal fry at the end of her sentence sears me. These are new dynamics. When did my children become complex, emotionally-nuanced social beings?

  It is anything but fine. I open my mouth to argue, but shut it abruptly.

  My kids can fight their own battles.

  And so can I.

  “Fine,” I say, a bit gruff, turning to Simone. I name an Italian place in the North End that she hates.

  She wrinkles her nose.

  I don’t react. Simone always despised my poker face.

  From her reaction, she still does.

  Tough shit.

  I pull Amelie into a hug and whisper fiercely, “You can tell her no. You can.”

  “It’s easier this way,” she whispers back. I can hear the fear in her voice. I know what she’s afraid of.

  She’s not afraid of Simone. Not afraid of disappointing her.

  Amelie is afraid of letting go of the pretend mother who lives only in her imagination.

  The real one in front of her, the one scowling at me for choosing a restaurant I know she hates, has already disappointed her.

  She cannot let go of the imaginary one just yet.

  And I cannot help her. The realization hits me hard, the wind knocked out of me as I nearly choke on my own understanding.

  Elodie’s hugging me, then I get a clap on the back from Jean-Marc, and they’re off, walking toward the T, the girls arm in arm and with huddled heads, Jean-Marc’s head down as he texts someone.

  “They’re so mature,” Simone says, in a tone that says homeostasis has been achieved.

  “They get it from their father.”

  “If you were mature, you would not torture me with inferior Italian food.”

  “Let’s not crack open this topic.”

  “Fine.” She pouts. “I’ll suffer in silence. For you.”

  When the world has only one camera lens and it’s your eyes, any other perspective feels like an invasion. I’ve no doubt she’ll suffer.

  But not in silence.

 
We walk slowly, her heels an impediment, my ability to engage in small talk long gone.

  Bzzz.

  A text. From Chloe.

  Parenting manuals don’t mention the need for a hazmat suit, tongs, and a never-ending ability to sing Mac the Knife until you’re hoarse.

  I smile.

  “Something funny?” Simone doesn’t look at me, staring straight ahead, blinking.

  “Something poignant.”

  I become my son as I walk, half-aware of the sidewalk, mostly focused on my glass screen.

  Consider a change in tune, I text back.

  Suggestions?

  Every suggestion that pops into my mind involves sex.

  Honesty is the best policy.

  I can’t think about lullabies when you’re texting me. All I can think about is you, I reply.

  Simone huffs. “Must you text and walk at the same time?”

  “Work,” I mutter.

  You wouldn’t want to see me. I’m wearing eau de formula and I think I have dried pee on the hem of my shirt, Chloe texts back. From yesterday, she adds.

  No power underwear? I answer, smiling.

  We turn a corner and the front door to the restaurant appears. I halt.

  “You’re not really texting for work, are you?” Simone asks, her voice dripping with suspicion.

  “A colleague,” I say. Which is technically true.

  Power bustier currently doubling as a diaper-changing pad on sofa, Chloe texts back. Sexy. I know.

  She doesn’t know. She really doesn’t know.

  “Nick!” Simone’s angry hiss makes my name sound like a rebuke. “You picked this place. Be a gentleman and deal with the maître d’!”

  TTYL, I type slowly, not caring about the sunburn I’m getting from Simone’s heated glare.

  SOS, Chloe replies, then adds a wink.

  I say two sentences to the man in the white coat and black tie, we’re seated, two martinis ordered, and then Simone demands, “I’ve never seen you that happy about a work issue.”

  “There’s a lot you’ve never seen about me, Simone.” The glow from the quick interchange with Chloe is wearing off.

  Fast.

  Tends to happen when you talk to an ice queen.