“Hi, Di,” said her brother, and gave her a hug. There was flour on his sweater, and an apron tied around his middle. She hugged him back, smiling. Danny’s house was one of her favorite places. When Beatrice had been a toddler, Daisy had worried about bringing her to visit, afraid that she’d break something fragile, or pull the threads of one of the woven tapestries or plant hangers on the walls, but Jesse had put her at ease. “I think children need to learn to live with beautiful things. Besides, there’s nothing in this place as precious as you and that sweet baby,” he’d told her, and Daisy, her emotions already amplified by her hormones, had turned away so he wouldn’t see her crying. In Gladwyne, Hal had made her put anything that Beatrice could possibly get at into a childproofed cabinet or up on a high shelf.
The house was mostly on one story, with three bedrooms. Danny and Jesse shared the largest one. The two others were kept child ready, one with a crib and a changing table and a toddler bed, the other with a set of bunk beds and two twin beds that could be pushed together to accommodate adult couples. Over the years, Danny and Jesse had converted the unfinished attic to a playroom, with a dollhouse and a toddler-sized train. While Danny and Jesse had no children of their own, they provided respite care for foster families, sometimes for an afternoon, sometimes for as long as a few weeks, and they didn’t always know when, or for how long, they’d have a child, or children, to care for.
“Daisy, come meet Tasha,” Danny said. Daisy followed her brother to the kitchen, where Jesse was peeling apples and a girl with brown curls was standing on a stepstool in front of the counter, carefully patting a disc of plastic-wrapped dough with her palms.
“Hi, Tasha,” said Daisy. The girl looked up at her gravely, murmured, “ ’lo,” and went back to her task. Jesse was already filling the kettle at the sink. “Coffee? Tea?”
“Whatever you guys are having.” Danny and Daisy had the same brown hair and hazel eyes, but Daisy had her mother’s heart-shaped face, while Danny favored their father. He was short, with his father’s delicate features, although he’d gotten rounder since his days as the coxswain. He wore steel-rimmed glasses and was almost entirely bald, with the neatly trimmed goatee he’d grown, as if to compensate, more gray than chestnut brown. Jesse was taller, lithe and graceful, with a dancer’s muscled legs and back. His brown skin had golden undertones; his hair was still dark and glossy. He and Danny had met in New York City, where Danny was getting his degree in social work and Jesse was teaching ballet and modern dance in studios around the city, including the Alvin Ailey Theater, where he’d trained, and in whose troupe he’d performed for ten years.
“How long is Tasha here for?” Daisy asked, as Jesse poured scalding water into a marigold-colored ceramic teapot, then shook loose tea leaves inside, and poured more water on top.
“Just until tomorrow night. Her foster parents are at a wedding out of town.”
“I wanted to be the flower girl,” Tasha announced with a woebegone expression, as Jesse found a lacquered tray, with pressed flowers decoupaged around its edges, and set three mugs, mismatched but somehow harmonious, on top. He added a sugar bowl, a pitcher of cream, linen napkins, and a plate of shortbread cookies. Daisy watched enviously, knowing that, given a half hour to fuss and rearrange, she wouldn’t have been able to make the snack look half as good.
“I hope you’ll get to be one, someday. My daughter was a flower girl once.” Daisy cast her mind back over the years, to a time when Beatrice had still been sweet and accommodating. “I remember we read a book, about a mouse who was a flower girl.”
Tasha’s eyes got wide. “Lilly’s Big Day!”
“That’s the one.”
“Let’s get Mr. Pie in the oven, and then we can read it, if you like,” said Jesse.
Tasha giggled. “How do you know it’s Mr. Pie? Maybe it’s Miss Pie!”
“Maybe you’re right.”
They had their tea and cookies in the living room, by the fire, which crackled behind an antique wrought-iron screen that depicted a forest scene, deer and trees and a bear, lurking from the corner. Tasha selected two picture books from the basket full of them next to the fire, and, once each had been read twice, announced that she was going back to the playroom. “I’m building the tallest Lego tower in the world,” she told Daisy.
Once she was gone, Danny asked, “Have you heard from Judy?”
Daisy smiled at the thought of the Judy Rosen birthday drama, which inevitably commenced at least three months before the blessed event. “She texted me a list of birthday menus two days ago, then a different list yesterday, and then, an hour after that, told me to stick with the first list.” Narrowing her eyes, Daisy said, “Which one of you taught her how to text?”
Danny pressed his lips together, while Jesse got busy reloading the tray with their dishes. “Okay, I might have taught her how to text,” Danny said. “But Jesse showed her the emojis.”
“Not the eggplant,” Jesse said. “That one she found all on her own.”
“So, how was your trip? How was the show?” Danny asked.
Daisy told them about the show, and about the new friend she’d made, the other Diana. “Good for you,” Jesse said. “I know how much you miss Hannah.”
“It would be nice to have a friend in town,” said Daisy, who’d long since given up on finding a soulmate among the Main Line mommies. Maybe it was the age difference, or how most of them had put aside careers before they had babies—and certainly her husband’s pickiness didn’t help—but, since Hannah, she hadn’t come close to making a real connection.
“A friend in New York isn’t bad,” Danny said. He smiled as Jesse refilled his mug, but Daisy could see circles under his eyes. His lips were chapped; his beard had new strands of gray. More worrisome was the way his hands trembled as he carried the tray back to the kitchen. She waited, hoping for a moment where she could get Jesse alone, while they chatted about work and Beatrice’s return and the trip Jesse and Danny were hoping to take that summer. Finally, in desperation, Daisy said, “Jesse, can you come wait for the Lyft with me? I need to talk to you about something.” She winked at her brother, hoping he’d think the conversation was about his birthday, and led Jesse outside. As soon as they were in the driveway, she said, “Is Danny okay?”
Jesse sighed. “So you noticed.”
“What’s going on?”
“I wish I knew. I’ve been trying to get him to tell me.” Jesse pressed his full lips together, raking his hands through his curls. “Ever since February, he’s been working nonstop. He stays late after school, every day, and when he’s not there, he’s at the Boys and Girls Club, and when he’s not there he’s at the soup kitchen. And I’m all for good deeds, but…” He tugged at his hair again, looking at the sky. “It’s like he’s trying to atone for something. And I have no idea what. And he won’t say.”
Daisy hoped her shock didn’t show on her face. “Do you think that he…” She let her voice trail off.
“Cheated?” Jesse gave an inelegant snort. “I can’t think when he’d have had the time. No.” He put his hand on her shoulder and looked past her, off into the distance. “And when I ask him, he says everything’s fine, and I’m worried about nothing. Which is making me feel kind of crazy.”
“You’re not crazy. I see it, too.”
“Maybe you can ask him,” Jesse said. “Maybe you’ll have better luck.”
Daisy wasn’t sure about that, but she promised she would try.
12
Daisy
By four o’clock, Daisy was home, greeting Lester, who was wagging his tail and frolicking around her legs with an energy suggesting he’d despaired of her ever returning (and also suggesting that Beatrice, who’d sworn she would walk him, had, instead, only let him out the back door). She was gathering ingredients for dinner when Beatrice came home from school, arrayed in a frilly, puff-sleeved pink blouse, high-waisted jeans, Doc Marten boots, and her typical scowl. Her daughter’s blue-tinged hair hung in ringle
ts, and she’d accessorized with a pair of black velvet gloves and a small hat with a bit of black netting that hung over her eye. It was, Daisy had to admit, quite chic… but she knew if she said one kind word, all of it would end up in the back of Beatrice’s closet. After the age of fourteen, Beatrice treated Daisy’s approval like the worst kind of insult. Meanwhile, Daisy remembered being so desperate for even the tiniest sign of approval from her own mom that she’d taught herself to make puff pastry dough from scratch, the better to prepare homemade spanakopita, which her mom had once enjoyed.
“Hi, sweetheart. How was your day?”
Beatrice shrugged, and muttered, “I must lie down where all the ladders start. In the foul rag and bone shop of the heart.”
Daisy stared for a moment. “So… bad?”
Beatrice made a rude noise in the back of her throat. “Predictable.” She dropped her book bag—not the sturdy JanSport backpack they’d bought her to take to Emlen, but a petit pointe satchel, embroidered with a pattern of forget-me-nots—by the front door, pulled a loaf of brioche out of the refrigerator, and ripped off a chunk.
“Could you use a knife to slice that, please?”
Beatrice made a face, stomped across the kitchen, selected a serrated knife from the block, and, with exaggerated slowness, trimmed the ragged ends off the loaf.
“Did you learn anything interesting?”
Beatrice shrugged.
“What do you think of your new classmates so far?”
“They’re rich prepwads. So, basically, just like my old classmates. My life is like an ouroborus. A snake that eats its own tail, forever.” Beatrice looked especially moody as she smoothed peanut butter and honey on an inch-thick slab of brioche.
Daisy swallowed the lecture she wanted to deliver about how lucky Beatrice was to attend such a well-regarded school, to have a beautiful home and plenty to eat, to know that college would be paid for and that, once she finished, she would never have to worry about not being able to pay the rent. Beatrice, having lived with those certainties every day of her life, would never understand. Talking to Beatrice about privilege was like trying to explain water to a fish.
“What clubs do you think you’ll go out for?” At Emlen, Beatrice had joined the school newspaper and the creative writing club, information that Daisy had gleaned from careful perusal of the school’s online newspaper and its Facebook page, because Beatrice would never actually tell her something about her life.
Beatrice gave her another shrug. Daisy turned her gaze away from her daughter and out at the kitchen, remembering the first time she’d seen their house. On their third date, Daisy had taken the train to Philadelphia. Hal had met her at 30th Street Station and driven her out to Gladwyne, along streets of rolling green lawns and houses that looked more like estates. He’d pulled up the driveway of a stately Colonial, with a white exterior and black shutters, a sloping lawn that looked the size of a soccer field, and a bright-red front door.
“This is me,” he’d said. Certainly in size the house matched the one Daisy had lived in, before her father’s death. But that house, with its wraparound porch and the eyebrow windows that accented the third floor, seemed, somehow, to have a friendly, welcoming character, the fun uncle who’d let you have a sip of his beer at Thanksgiving and slip you twenty dollars on your way out the door. This house felt more like a forbidding grandmother, one who’d frown at your outfit and tell you that you didn’t need that second helping of stuffing.
Hal led her through an empty foyer, past an empty living room, and into an almost-empty kitchen, where he paused to put the two bottles of seltzer he’d purchased into an almost-empty refrigerator (Daisy glimpsed condiments, lemons, and half of a hoagie in a clear plastic clamshell).
Daisy turned in a slow circle that gave her views of the almost-empty living room and dining room. “Were you robbed?”
Hal looked puzzled. Then he smiled. “This is the house I grew up in. When my father moved, he took all the furniture with him. You may recall,” Hal said dryly, “that his place felt cramped?”
Daisy nodded, remembering.
“I just haven’t had time to shop for anything new.”
“I understand.” Daisy was studying a framed black-and-white portrait hanging on the wallpapered wall of the entryway. A man in an army dress uniform stood stiffly, his arm around the waist of a woman in a white dress.
“Your parents?” Vernon was handsome without his comb-over. The woman had long, dark hair and an easy smile. Instead of a veil, she wore a wreath of flowers in her hair. Daisy remembered what Vernon had said about his wife—that she’d liked people-watching, that she hadn’t liked to gamble, that he didn’t know how she’d felt about cooking. “What was your mom like?”
Hal shrugged. “She and my father had high expectations for me and my brother. I’m grateful now, of course, but when I was younger…”
Daisy studied the picture again. She was thinking of her own father’s delight in his sons’ accomplishments, how he’d brag to everyone about their grades, or David’s skill at baseball, or how Danny had been picked as the coxswain of the senior boys’ eight (“he’s the one who steers the boat,” Jack had explained to his own mother, who’d looked perplexed, perhaps at the notion of steering being an athletic endeavor). Had Vernon and Margie been proud of their sons? Or had they been the kind of parents for whom anything less than perfection was a disappointment?
Hal put his hand on the small of her back and ushered her through the French doors, out into an expansive backyard that held an inground pool, a Weber grill on a flagstone patio, and a single lawn chair.
“When did you move in?” Daisy had asked.
“About a year ago,” he said, as he’d fiddled with the grill’s knobs. “I’d been living in Center City, but most of the partners live in the suburbs. Easier to get to the golf courses.”
“Got it,” Daisy murmured.
“I figured I’d be buying a house here eventually, so when my dad was moving out, it just made sense to take over this one.”
Daisy nodded again. It made sense, and even if part of her wondered why Hal hadn’t wanted his own place, she also thought that if someone had offered her the house she’d grown up in, she’d have taken it in an instant.
Back inside, she was relieved to discover that the kitchen was clean enough to perform surgery. There was no trash piled up in the trash can, no dirty dishes on the counters or in the sink. This, it emerged, was the happy result of Hal having hardly any dishes at all. When she’d opened the freezer she’d seen stacks of frozen Hungry Man dinners, and, in the cabinet closest to the sink, there’d been rows and rows of canned Campbell’s Chunky soup. There were two bowls, three plates, and two juice glasses in one cabinet; the drainer next to the sink held a single pot.
Hal had come into the kitchen just as she’d closed the drawer on his paltry supply of silverware.
“Do you just eat the soup out of the pot?” she’d asked.
“It’s efficient,” he’d said, holding her so that his chest pressed against her back. Daisy appreciated his assurance, the way there wasn’t any awkward fumbling or hesitation. “Also, better for the environment.”
“Oh, so you’re an environmentalist.”
“I’m a thoughtful guy,” he’d said, nuzzling her temples, making her shiver. Then, almost as if he’d been waiting for a sign, he’d turned her around and pulled her against him, so they were thigh to thigh and chest to chest. “I’m just doing things out of order,” he’d said. “Most guys find the right woman, then the right house. I got the house first. And now,” he said, kissing her temple, then her neck, “I need you to make my house a home.”
“Oh my God,” Daisy had groaned. “That’s a terrible line!” But she could already feel the voices of her roommates receding, the warnings they’d given her—what does a guy that old want with someone our age?—subsiding. Hal was mature enough to know what he wanted and confident enough to get it. When he pulled her close, murmuring,
“I just want to be a good man. A good husband and father,” she decided that she was lucky that he’d decided he wanted her.
She’d registered for all the kitchen basics that Hal had never acquired, and he’d told her to buy whatever she thought the house needed, from carpets and couches to dishes and glassware, outdoor furniture for the backyard, art for the walls, and everything she wanted for the kitchen. She’d made missteps at first—she still cringed when she thought of the first party she’d held, for a few of the firm’s other lawyers and their spouses. Hal had said, “It’ll just be casual. Just buy stuff to throw on the grill,” but Daisy had prepared for weeks. She’d gotten the butcher to grind a mixture of filet mignon and chuck steak for the burgers, and had blended in mushrooms and blue cheese; she’d ordered hot dogs from Chicago, which came delivered in a cooler of dry ice. She’d made her own barbecue sauce, plus dozens of elaborate canapés, slivers of smoked salmon on cucumbers and a refined version of onion dip, where she spent an hour caramelizing onions. The day of the event, she’d gotten her nails done, and donned a brand-new Lilly Pulitzer sundress and Tory Burch flip-flops in a complementary shade of hot pink.
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