The High Season

by Judy Blundell

“One second.” Carole shut the closet door and threw herself onto the pink love seat. She patted it, inviting Ruthie to sit. “I have five minutes of calm before things blow up again.”

  Ruthie sat. Carole pressed her hands together and leaned toward Ruthie. “Mindy wants to fire you,” she said.

  Ruthie shifted position and waited in vain for Carole to say, Kidding!

  “Look, everyone knows you’re doing a fabulous job, and you’ve taken the place from sleepy to woken up. I’m your biggest fan. I only came on the board because of you. I’ve tried to tell you that Mindy is pushing for all kind of changes—”

  “Yes, irresponsible, stupid ones!”

  “Absolutely. She’s a pill!” Carole gave a reassuring pat to Ruthie’s knee. It was not reassuring. “Look, I guess I’m not as Sun-Tzu-ish as I thought, or maybe it’s because I have a life, but you know how we went on that big board drive, and then she formed an executive committee because the board was too big? Have you noticed that it’s all new board members except for me, Gloria, and Helen?”

  “But she hardly knows the new people.”

  Carole gave her a significant look. “She’s been having lunches and coffees in the city for months. We never should have let Gloria be treasurer. Nobody likes her and so she was vulnerable. Mindy flattered her and now they’re thick as thieves. Don’t worry, you still have me and Helen! But. We need to switch tactics. Now it’s time for you to stand up to her.”

  “You’ve been telling me to get along with her!”

  “I know, but who can get along with her? She’s saying that the gala is failing because you picked the wrong honoree.”

  “Gus Romany? First of all, I didn’t pick him, the committee did, and it was a unanimous yes. He’s done so much for the museum.”

  “He’s not selling tables.”

  “We don’t really start selling tables until July. Nobody’s here yet. The locals can’t afford tables. Only chairs.”

  “Well, she’s using it. He’s old, and outside of the North Fork nobody cares. You don’t want to fall on your sword for this one.”

  “He’s a great artist, and you know the locals will show up—everybody loves Gus.”

  “Sweetie, do you think Mindy cares about the locals? Gus isn’t shiny enough to get support from the new summer crowd. She wants glam. It’s ammunition for her argument.”

  “What is her argument?”

  “That now that the North Fork is changing, now that we have some celebrities, some serious money here, the Belfry should have a bigger presence. Don’t wince, I’m just repeating.” Carole gave a surreptitious glance at her watch. “She wants us to be part of the Hamptons aesthetic—you know, like Robert Wilson, where we do a fundraiser and celebrities come, and we all wear white, and get photographed, and we’re covered in the Times…”

  “People come here to get away from glam. The point is, it’s not the Hamptons.”

  “Helen and I have been working madly behind the scenes. We can’t just stand up in a board meeting and say what we really think.”

  “Why not?”

  “Sweetie, it would be better if you weren’t defensive right now. I’m here to help you. It’s not that you’re not fabulous. It’s just a question of style. You’re kind of…”

  Ruthie waited, internally wincing. This wasn’t going to be good.

  “…um…how can I say this…you’re not…business-y. Corporate,” Carole said, pointing upward to illustrate her success at coming up with a word. “You know, the whole B-school thing. Mindy is married to that guy. I’m married to that guy. There’s a certain way they talk. Just throw metrics into a conversation and you’re good to go. Or optics. That’s a good one. I can have Lewis recommend some books.”

  “This is unbelievable.”

  “I know!”

  “Wait,” Ruthie said. “How serious is this? Should I be looking for a job?”

  “No! We can’t lose you! Don’t do anything while I’m in France. You have the summer to turn things around. Style, remember? It’s not enough anymore to do a fabulous job. You have to do it on Twitter! Everything is about image now. Read the papers. Oh, wait, nobody reads a newspaper anymore.” Carole ran a hand through her hair, and it reassembled itself into perfection. “Do you think I’d have all this if I hadn’t lost twenty pounds and dyed my hair? Come on.”

  “So I should diet?”

  “I’m not saying that, you’re gorgeous. I’m saying it’s not personal. Mindy and Gloria are dying to feel important. If they change the place, they get to talk about it at dinner parties. It doesn’t matter if the Belfry is better. It just has to be different.” Carole patted her knee again. Ruthie now wanted to bite her hand. Bite the hand that underfed her. The pat meant Don’t get hysterical, I have to catch a plane. “Here’s the good news. Because there’s no there there, you can fight. Why don’t you borrow an outfit from me for Spork?”

  Ruthie frowned, puzzled. What was this, high school? Then she realized what this meant. “Because Mindy criticized my clothes?”

  Carole looked uncomfortable.

  “Tell me.”

  “She says you don’t dress up enough. Gloria says you never wear heels.”

  “What?”

  “Look, I’m just saying.” Carole got up and began to rifle through the hangers. “Raid my closet! Please, I’ve had four pregnancies, I have a size that will fit you, double zero all the way up to eight. I was a house when I was pregnant with Verity. Here.” Carole slipped a pair of white pants off the hanger and tossed them on the sofa. She waggled a hanger with a pink silk shirt on it. “This would look perfect on you. Or this, or this.” She tossed more shirts on the pile, a sudden blizzard of pinks and creams and blues. “You’re not going to win this dressed in Ann Taylor, sweetie. And you might want to rethink the ponytail. What size shoe are you?”

  “Thank you for the warning,” Ruthie said, standing. “And thank you for the offer.”

  “Oh, no, now you’re offended!”

  “I’m not offended,” Ruthie lied. “But no. I can’t change who I am.”

  “Of course you can!” Carole tossed another shirt on top of the trousers. “Listen, I’m not on Mars, just France! It’s barely even a foreign country! We’re friends. Which means I have your back.” She cocked her head and studied Ruthie for a moment. “Just try to be…a little less you.”

  7

  JEM’S PHONE

  From: Lucas Clay

  To: Jemma Dutton

  I need to return a blueberry

  From: Jemma Dutton

  To: Lucas Clay

  Get to the end of the line, sir

  From: Lucas

  To: Jem

  Your rutabagas are delightful

  From: Jem

  To: Lucas

  I have to stop texting u will get me fired

  From: Lucas

  To: Jem

  how busy can u be, it’s only May

  …

  When the corn comes in I’ll leave u alone

  From: Jem

  To: Lucas

  Shuck u

  From: Lucas

  To: Jem

  Ya snap. I’m in so much trouble I can tell

  but trouble w u could be worth it

  8

  A LITTLE LESS her.

  Ruthie drove to the farm stand. Mike had texted, saying he was stuck on a job, his day was crazy, could she pick up Jem after all? Nothing about this morning. Nothing about tomorrow night.

  Still. Summer, car windows down. If she blasted the radio she could grasp just a split second of feeling young despite an adulthood of airbags and disappointments.

  Traffic was heavy. Travel writers undid themselves with headlines about the Un-Hamptons, with the predictable result that the North Fork was bec
oming more like the Hamptons every day. The locals were starting second jobs as bartenders and cashiers. They would do the shopping early, take the back roads, and curse the interlopers. Memorial Day weekend was only a taste of what was to come. August would be full of corn and cars.

  Ruthie pulled into the parking lot next to a white Jeep. The sun was at an angle in the sky designed to bounce the accumulated heat straight at you like a punch and then scatter it skyward again.

  Red-haired Annie Doyle was spraying escarole while Jem stood at the counter. Annie had spent many a Saturday night in her house before the triad of Jem/Olivia/Annie had been pitchforked by the alpha girls Meret, Saffy, and Kate. She missed the shrieks and the private jokes and watching whole casseroles of mac and cheese disappear. Instead she had glottal stops and nail care.

  In her cutoffs and pigtails Jem looked adorable, but somehow…mature. This past year there had been times when Ruthie had seen her bicycling, or walking from afar, and not recognized her for a moment. Who was that Pre-Raphaelite with the legs?

  Looking like a god in rumpled khaki shorts, Lucas sauntered toward her, carrying a bag with waving fronds of fennel poking out. He held a block of French butter in the other hand.

  “You found the best farm stand,” she called. “Good start!”

  He stared at her blankly. Then he tossed the bag in the seat, got in the Jeep, and roared off.

  Heat sprang to Ruthie’s cheeks. Okay, the remark was inane, but, what? Had she offended him?

  Then she replayed the blankness on his face. He had completely forgotten that he’d met her. That very morning. In her yard. She’d chatted with him for a bit before she drove off to work. They’d had a conversation. About the best times to avoid ferry lines to the Hamptons, her favorite restaurant in Greenport.

  With cheeks that still glowed with humiliation, she stalked past the broccoli. “Hey, Annie, hello, summer!” she called.

  “Hello, summer!” The back of Annie’s pretty neck was sunburnt. She was about twenty pounds overweight and that meant that despite tilted green eyes and creamy skin she was not popular. She wore overalls and Doc Martens and kept her head down when she walked. No doubt boys walked by her in the halls and dismissed her. Someday she would be glorious. Someday she would flirt. Someday she would have sex and fall in love and betray someone and be betrayed and start all over again. And then, at forty-five, the iron gate of indifference would clang down and she would remember that overalled girl, and she would know she was stuck back exactly where she’d been in high school as if all that sex and attention had happened to someone else.

  “Good luck, sweetie,” Ruthie said, giving her shoulder a pat.

  “If you’re thinking salad, the red leaf is awesome,” Jem said as she walked up.

  “I just saw Lucas Clay,” she said.

  “Yeah, I’m happy he bought actual food,” Jem said. “We helped Adeline unpack, and Dad totally mocked her groceries. It was hilarious, like, just…berries. Celery and radishes. He said she needed butter for the radishes. She said she hadn’t eaten butter in twenty years. I actually think she was serious. Dad was like, oh boy, you need to live.”

  “Oh, God. He didn’t give her his ‘live while you’re alive’ speech, did he?”

  “Yeah, well, a version. You know what I found out? She knows Roberta Verona! My favorite chef ever? She’s, like, her best friend. Adeline said maybe I could meet her sometime, which would be amazing. She brought her own sheets and towels, by the way. Adeline, I mean. And she brought an espresso maker—one of the fancy ones—and a Vitamix. And cashmere throws, like, six of them in different colors. Dad said her car was like ‘Bed Bath and Beyond Imagining.’ ”

  Ruthie pictured six cashmere throws, flung on her couches, on her beds, ready for evening chill. Powder blue, sea green, seashell pink, lilac…did she need a Vitamix?

  “I just have to prep the CSAs for tomorrow, then I can go,” Jem said.

  “I’ll pick out some stuff for dinner. Carole said the kitchen was stocked.”

  “I put aside some beets. I can roast them.”

  Ruthie clasped her hands together. “My kid likes beets. I did something right!”

  “Mom.” Jem made a shooing motion with her hands.

  Ruthie cruised the aisles, choosing lettuce and scallions and lemons and basil. Nonlocal blueberries. Maybe that was Adeline’s secret, antioxidants?

  A pickup truck barreled into the parking lot and her best friend, Penny, raced out, her wife, Elena, following more slowly. “Hello, summer!” Penny cried, and waved at Jem. “Dude, please have garlic left!”

  “On the left, dude,” Jem called. Out of all Ruthie’s friends, Jem was closest to Penny. They had bonded over pizza and The Big Lebowski and never looked back. Penny was a chef, and it was her extended tutorial on scrambled eggs—Low heat! Tablespoon of butter per egg! Yes, I said American cheese!—that had first sparked Jem’s interest in cooking. It was a small, deep pleasure in Ruthie’s life that her child and her best friend had a relationship outside of her.

  “What are you cooking?” Penny asked as she peeked at Ruthie’s basket.

  “I don’t know, maybe just a salad?”

  “Why are you so boring?”

  “I’m roasting beets!” Jem called. “And I have some fresh ricotta! And an orange!”

  “Thank fucking God!” Penny yelled. She leaned over to fondle Ruthie’s herbs. “That parsley is gorgeous. That reminds me, you need to come over soon. You can work for your supper and go clamming with us. We need to eat linguine and celebrate the beginning of traffic.”

  “So many needs with you,” Ruthie said, handing her cash to Annie.

  “All my wants are needs,” Penny said. “Is this garlic from the farm or Stop and Shop?” she asked Jem.

  “Farm,” Jem said. “Promise.”

  “In that case, I will pay you. Linguine soon!”

  “With lots of crushed red pepper.” Jem and Penny fist-bumped, then waggled their fingers at each other.

  “So how’s your glamorous tenant?” Elena asked as they headed to their cars.

  “Well tended,” Ruthie said. “She’s dazzling, if you stare too long you’ll burn out your retinas. And she’s got this gorgeous satellite stepson, who just saw me and didn’t remember me, even though we had a conversation this morning.”

  Penny opened a bag of pistachios and offered them around. With tattoos and a CURSE YOUR SUDDEN AND INEVITABLE BETRAYAL T-shirt and not an ounce of fat, she almost looked like a teenager if you squinted. She cracked open a nut with her thumbs and put the shell in the pocket of her jeans. “Middle-aged-lady syndrome,” Penny said. “You’ll get used to it.”

  “I’m already used to it,” Ruthie said. “Grocery clerks and waiters, sure. But we had a conversation!”

  Penny shrugged. “Happens every day.”

  “That reminds me. How would you describe my style?”

  “You have a style?” Penny asked. At Ruthie’s look, she squinted amiably as she chewed. “I mean, okay, downtown slouch?”

  “Downtown slouch?”

  “Comfy stretchy things in mostly black? Like, today. You’re wearing beige, and I’m like, whoa, she’s breaking out.”

  “You’re lovely,” Elena said. “I always liked those beige pants.”

  “Just hearing the words ‘beige pants’ has cast me into despair,” Ruthie said.

  “Have a nut. Who cares, anyway?” Penny said. “You’re presentable and dependable.”

  “At long last I’ve found my epitaph.” Ruthie looked at her hands, with veins and freckles and one torn cuticle. She saw her mother’s hands, and felt cast adrift toward a future wrinkled with sadness. “We’re all dying, every day.”

  Penny and Elena exchanged a glance.

  “Mindy doesn’t like how I dress,” she explained.

  “Mind
y? Belfry Mindy?” Penny asked. “Headband Mindy? I never met a green polo I didn’t like Mindy? Mindy with the husband who is most likely right this minute relaxing at home in velour?”

  “That would be the one.”

  “Why listen?” Elena asked in the sweet, rational tone with which she faced the world. A copter flew overhead and she had to shout the rest. “Everyone loves you!”

  “Except Mindy.”

  “Nobody likes her!” Penny exploded. “She’s a pill! I was in a town meeting with her, my God! Hours of minutiae! She’s like a walking game of Trivial Pursuit, and if I’m playing, there should be a cocktail in my hand.” Penny tossed a shelled nut into the air and caught it in her mouth. “And speaking of minutiae, I saw your Catha this morning taking her ass-pirational walk.”

  “She’s not my Catha, and what do you mean, aspirational?” Ruthie asked.

  “First of all, she’s an ass,” Penny said. “You know that, right? Second, she goes on these woman walks.”

  Ruthie nodded. “She leans in deep.”

  “Please. Her route goes right by our house. I’m always there in the window with my tea. I started to notice. She only walks up. With women who can help her or her kids. You know, who’s married to the guy who runs something, or who can give her kid an internship. It’s so obvious. This morning she was walking with Doe, that tasty assistant person of yours who’s always looking at her phone.”

  “Tasty?” Elena asked. “That’s gross, sweetie. She’s a kid.”

  “I’m not leering, just characterizing. She’s adorable. My point is, Catha walked down. Odd.”

  “Catha is Doe’s supervisor,” Ruthie said. “Maybe they were having a walking meeting.”

  “What is this, California?”

  “You don’t like Catha,” Ruthie said. “Everybody likes Catha. Why didn’t I know this?”

  “You never asked. I don’t gossip unless you ask.”

  “You just did, honey,” Elena said. “I like her okay. She’s on the Save the Wetlands committee with me. And she’s chair of the No Helipad on the North Fork committee. She drives a hybrid!”

  Penny snorted. “And she’ll drive right over you in it. You think anybody who cares about the planet is a good person. The only things she stands for are herself and the Pledge of Allegiance.” She swiveled back to Ruthie. “Let’s get to the important stuff. How is Casa Berlinger? In other words, how’s the kitchen?”