A car door slams.
“Hello?” I call out. Pine needles fall from my pants as I stand up.
“Jimmy?” Wren walks down the path toward me. My old BC sweatshirt falls midway down her thighs, and she’s wearing her favorite jeans. Her thick hair is brushed back in a yellow headband. I wish I could freeze time, keep her forever in this moment.
“Wren,” I whisper.
“Oh, Jimmy.” She jogs the last few steps and wraps her arms around my neck. Standing on her tiptoes, she reaches up to kiss me. “It’s going to be all right.”
“That’s what I’m supposed to say to you,” I choke, embarrassed that she’s the one comforting me.
“I only know it’s going to be all right because of you.” She wipes at my face. “Yikes, you sure did make a mess of yourself. What do you have there?”
I pull back from her embrace and wipe the wet soil from the top of the box. Our names are just visible, scratched into the lid with a nail over a decade ago. A lifetime ago. When she realizes what I’m holding, recognition turns to joy and a dazzling smile spreads across her face, causing the years to fall away, revealing the girl I fell in love with once upon a time.
“Our time capsule! Jimmy, I can’t believe you remembered where we hid it!” She grabs the box and opens it like a kid on Christmas morning.
The first thing she pulls out is a baseball.
19
Wren
Age 30
June 2002
I’ve never been an expert gift giver. Some people—like Jimmy’s mother, for example—seem to always know what to give for every occasion. Women like Gerry have an innate knack for those type of things. Gift giving goes hand in hand with other talents, such as planning the perfect party and preparing a proper dinner. I pretty much suck at all these things, but I’ve never pretended to be a skilled homemaker.
My own mother never prepared me for the duties of running a household. For this I am both resentful and thankful, depending on my mood. When I was a young bride planning my wedding, I hoped Mom would step up and help with the preparations. Instead, it was Gerry who came to my rescue when I was overwhelmed with table settings and invitations. Like a fairy godmother, she took care of every last detail, from booking the reception hall and planning the menu to picking the flowers and ordering the party favors. Always kind and courteous, she included my mother and me in all the final decisions, but it was easy to let her lead. Her taste was impeccable, and it all came so naturally to her. I spent days debating the merits of lilies versus roses, worrying what each flower might say about me, my marriage, my future. It took Gerry only a few minutes to put together a lovely bouquet combining the two that was both beautiful and somehow perfectly indicative of my love for Jimmy. On the one hand, I’m so thankful for all her guidance, especially since my own mother was not able to fill this role. On the other, I’m jealous of the easy way she just knew what to do. Although Jimmy’s parents never flaunted their wealth, it was clear that they came from extraordinary means. I’ve no doubt Gerry acquired her vast skills at finishing school and while attending country club dinners and cocktail parties. My own family never had this luxury.
Despite my lackluster attempts at over-the-top gifts in the past, I do believe I’ve succeeded in finally getting Jimmy something worthy of celebration. Since he grew up never wanting for a thing, it’s always been difficult to find something he doesn’t already have. Surprisingly, he is the most nonmaterialistic person I know. Maybe since he could always afford anything he desired, the novelty of things wore off at an early age. Instead, he prefers experiences, and although this should be easy for me, he’s always made my meager plans of dinner and a show look like small potatoes next to his grandiose expressions of love. For our one-year anniversary—paper—he gave me a paper airplane with two tickets to Sonoma, California, tucked inside. He rented a log cabin at a dude ranch in Wyoming for our fifth anniversary—wood. This year I’m determined to surprise him. I don’t think he’s suspecting anything crazy, since it’s not one of the big ones. I’ll take year seven. He can have the big one-oh.
***
Copper and wool. Those are the traditional wedding gifts exchanged on the seventh anniversary. Of course I panicked and wrote fifteen lists of all things woolen and copper. None seemed appropriate or useful or anything besides coppery and woolly. Finally, I decided no thing would do and I’d never be able to top the extravagant places Jimmy has taken us. So I took a page out of my dad’s book and improvised.
Dad. A complicated relationship if there ever was one. I love him as much as I hate him, and I doubt that will ever change much. I cling to the good memories, hoping that eventually they will cast aside the worse ones, the more plentiful ones. The drunken nights and angry fights. The mean streak and the sharp tongue. Those are the first thoughts that still come to mind when I think of Dad. But lately better times slip in with the bad, softening the hard edges of painful recollections. Fairy tents in the backyard are one such memory, one long forgotten.
For every one of my birthdays from age six to nine, Dad strung Christmas lights from the back porch across to the old apple tree in our small backyard. Beneath the lights he pitched our old camping tent and filled it with pillows and blankets and my favorite stuffed animals. Each year he added a new critter to the mix. Before falling asleep under the stars, we would start a fire in an old-tire fire pit and roast marshmallows and drink hot chocolate that Mom made in the microwave and brought out on a tray. I was too young to know Dad’s mug was filled with whiskey. Dad would read me a story and we’d fall asleep snuggled together in the tent and wake up to the birds calling morning. I’m not sure why this tradition stopped. I think I made the fatal mistake of asking to invite a friend to sleep over. This question was met with an answer I would hear countless times over the course of my adolescence before I understood the real reason why: maybe it’s best you sleep over at her house. By the time I was fourteen, I’d stopped asking to have friends stay over and would find any excuse to get the hell out of that house whenever I could find a friend to have me. Inevitably, fairy-tent birthday parties were never spoken of again, and I could almost convince myself they were a dream if I didn’t have a few faded Polaroids of happier times.
Jimmy left for work this morning after bringing me coffee and toast in bed. I kissed him good-bye and reminded him of our seven o’clock appointment at Turner’s, our favorite seafood place right on the water. We agreed to meet at the restaurant, since it was close to Jimmy’s office. At six forty-five p.m. I called and told him I wasn’t feeling well. I felt a small stab of guilt for worrying him like this, since lately he has freaked out every time I sneeze, but it was a necessary part of the plan. I needed to make sure he didn’t get home until a little after seven, giving me ample time to transform the yard.
I hear his car pull in the drive just before the headlights of his BMW shine through the thin slats of the gate surrounding the yard. For three hours I have been stringing fairy lights and paper lanterns from the edges of the patio to the corners of the fence. After almost falling off the ladder multiple times, I vowed to thank Jimmy for always handling the Christmas decorations. Hanging lights is a perilous business. Thankfully our stone fire pit is the perfect centerpiece to build my fairy kingdom around. With the help of the instruction packet, I have managed to get our two-person tent upright and relatively stable. I can only hope the winds don’t pick up tonight, since I think I missed a few pins here and there, but so far it’s a calm, albeit chilly, June night.
In front of the fire pit—with a roaring fire now roasting away, after a whole lot of trial and error—I have placed two Adirondack chairs. Draped on the back of each chair is a navy woolen blanket with My Everything embroidered in white. On the makeshift log table between the two chairs is a bottle of chilled champagne and two copper mugs with Today is the best day engraved along the edge of each. Simple copper and wool, but I know my husband. He’s going to be in tears in about five seconds.
I rub my palms against my forearms, waiting for the fire to warm me. Tonight there’s still a chill in the air, unlike the night of our wedding. Summer came early in 1995; the temperatures were soaring in the high eighties and everything was already swollen and sweating. I twirl the black pearl ring on my right middle finger and remember how it barely fit over my heat-swollen knuckles when Gerry slipped the ring—once meant for her oldest daughter June—onto my own finger and told me I was her daughter now too. Just another example of how Gerry always knew exactly what to give and what to say.
Jimmy calls my name loudly. Even outside I can hear him clearly. He’s worried, and I’m afraid it will sully the surprise. He slides open the patio door and rushes into the cool night, still dressed in his suit pants and blue shirt.
“Wren!” he calls out, stopping dead in his tracks as he takes in the yard.
Under the warm glow of the fairy lights, his expression changes from one of panic to pure joy. The worry lines on his forehead relax for the first time in weeks, and a smile stretches from ear to ear.
“Happy anniversary, babe,” I say, holding out my arms for him to fall into.
He pulls me into a hug, the fire crackling in front of us, and the chill leaves my body.
“You little minx,” he kids, brushing a soft kiss against my ear, then my cheek. “I was worried sick when you canceled dinner,” he says, straightening up but keeping his hands on my elbows. “I figured you had to be really sick to turn down a dinner at Turner’s . . .”
I wince, guilty again. Before my diagnosis, playing sick would have been no big deal. Just one of the many things that has changed.
“Sorry,” I say, twisting the ring on my finger. “I needed a little time to prepare the surprise.” I gesture to his seat and take my own, pulling the wool blanket over my shoulders.
He fingers the embroidery on the blanket and smiles, draping it over his lap.
“Seven is copper and wool,” I mumble, self-conscious. Perhaps my gifts are still lacking. He picks up the mug and smiles while reading the words stamped across the front.
“It’s perfect,” he says, grabbing the bottle of champagne and popping the top with a flourish. He pours two glasses, the bubbles fizzing just to the top of each mug but not dripping.
We lift our copper mugs together and offer a toast to our love in front of the fire, watching a few lightning bugs dance in the flames.
***
“I didn’t think we were really going to sleep out here,” Jimmy says, pulling the comforter a little higher over his naked chest. I snuggle deeper into the groove of his shoulder as my heartbeat steadies.
“Oh, don’t be a baby,” I tease. “It’s not that cold,” I say. Admittedly, the temperature has dropped a bit since we let the fire die. “The best way to stay warm is by keeping our clothes off. It’s a fact.”
Jimmy laughs, turning onto his side. He traces his index finger down the side of my bare arm, and goose bumps rise to the surface. “Well, if you say so,” he says, kissing my neck playfully.
We rest our foreheads against each other and relax into the pillow, enjoying the moment.
“You know,” he starts, without lifting his eyes to mine. “You didn’t have to do all of this. You are the best gift of all.” We lock eyes, and he bites his lip. “You’re all the present I ever need.”
A lump rises to the back of my throat, and I’m close to tears. I wish they were happy tears, because what woman in the world wouldn’t be crying tears of joy at having a husband who loves her so deeply that he truly means it when he says she’s enough? But no, the lump in my throat is bile. Even though the cancer inside me hasn’t metastasized out of my womb, it seems to be spreading like a plague through my other systems, wrapping itself solidly around my brain and my heart. Instead of bliss—the appropriate response to this declaration of love made in this magical fairy tent—I feel only bitterness. I know it’s not at all what he means, but when Jimmy tells me all he needs is me, it only reminds me of how little is expected of me. I don’t have to do anything at all, not anymore. Now I have cancer, and it’s my get-out-of-jail-free card. For our tenth anniversary—tin; I looked it up—Jimmy can build me a tin rocket ship and launch us to the moon and back, and it still won’t be enough to beat me out in the gift department. If I live, I win automatically, since each year with cancer is a gift, everyone keeps reminding me. Maybe I should be happy I never have to worry about giving the perfect gift again.
Unfortunately, I’m not that simple. I’m just sad and depressed at this revelation.
We haven’t talked about babies in months now. Cancer and treatment plans have slipped into the spaces where we once discussed ovulation and conception. Even though I still think about getting pregnant constantly, I know Jimmy can’t handle the two things at once.
But the tumor inside me has ruptured, and its malignant force takes control now.
“The only present I want is a baby,” I whisper into the magical fairy tent, and instantly any warmth we’ve created runs cold. “If we’re being honest. That’s the best gift I can think of.”
20
Karen
Age 22
June 1993
Twenty-two might as well be fifty-two. Gymnasts get younger and younger each year. Some of the girls are barely in their teens. Yet here they are, performing routines I didn’t learn until I was sixteen—and doing them well. The talent is younger, and the pressure is fiercer than ever.
When I was five years old, I was competing in the level-sevens. Back then, I was considered a prodigy. Nowadays girls start tumbling when they’re barely out of diapers and blow through the levels at lightning speed. By the time I was ten, I’d competed in the Junior Olympics in levels seven through ten. After that, I was considered “elite.” Since I was no longer a junior, my coach set his sights on big national competitions. Four national championships later, my parents ran out of money. Not that they could really afford the lifestyle to begin with, but they tried. As the competitions got bigger, the fees became higher. At the height of my success, they simply couldn’t support me anymore.
Some of the new girls stare at me. I can tell what they’re thinking: Give it up already. It’s what I thought of girls past their prime back when I was their age. But when they see me move, their faces change. My floor routine is bested only by my vault. I soar. It’s taken me years of perfecting each step to get to where I am today. “Olympic material,” my longtime coach keeps repeating. When everything crumbled, I was All American in both floor and vault as an individual. I was a team selection for the high bar. The Olympics was the next logical step, but coaching and traveling are expensive. Money problems forced me to take two years off from competition, two of my most formative years. Although I kept practicing, it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the Olympics.
Now I’m back. By one means or another, I support myself. Bartending pays most of the bills, and what I can’t afford, I make happen.
“Push!” Gordon screams. Beads of sweat drip down my nose, and I’m beginning to feel light-headed. I’ve performed my vault routine five times already, but he demands more. I round-off onto the springboard, moving seamlessly into a back handspring on the horse before wrenching myself into a one-and-a-half flip with two and a half twists. My back handspring is weak; I know as soon as I push off. My flip is too short, and I fall shy of my full twists. I stick the landing but slightly sideways.
Gordon yells, but I have no push left. I’m exhausted and I haven’t eaten in hours. He eggs me on, mocking me, pushing all the right buttons, knowing exactly how to bring out the best tucked away inside.
“Want me to have one of the juniors show you how it’s done?” he threatens, knowing full well a junior gymnast could never complete one of the most difficult vaulting sequences in history. The Amanar is up there with the Yurchenko in terms of complication.
One more time. Biting back the pain, I throw my hands up to the ceiling and point my toes. I push, my muscles scream, and I fly over the vault
, body twisting. Perfection in motion.
Landing squarely, I turn to smile at him in triumph, but he’s already moving away, on to the next girl. Bastard.
***
We drive to the restaurant in silence. He keeps glancing at me out of the corner of his eye, but I make a point to look out the window, anywhere but at him.
“You’re not still mad about practice.” He doesn’t ask so much as chastise. One of his more irritating habits.
I ignore him and continue to watch the trees fly by through the passenger side window.
“Baby, you know I only press you so hard because I believe in you,” he says. He reaches out his right hand and rubs it slowly up my thigh. I’m wearing a short skirt, the brown leather one he likes best, so he can feel the goose bumps on my inner thigh. “So soft,” he whispers, fingers trailing back down to my knee.
When I turn to face him, the moonlight makes him appear much younger than he actually is.
“I know,” I say, absently brushing his hand away. “But the other girls already think I’m a has-been. It would be nice if you didn’t reinforce the idea.” I hate the childish whine in my voice, but I can’t stop myself. Plus, isn’t that one of the reasons he dates me?
Chuckling, he places his hand back on the wheel and starts tapping out a beat. Another irritating habit. He knows it annoys me, but it doesn’t matter to him. No, he’s Gordon Kirilov, one of the most prominent and successful gymnastics coaches on the East Coast. Gordon Kirilov, renowned for scouting talent in the youngest of tumblers and inspiring the best from his students. Without me, Gordon Kirilov would just be another mediocre coach. I’m his success story. I made him famous. He’s been my coach since I was a ten-year-old Junior Olympian and he was a thirty-two-year-old assistant, just starting his career. We’ve been lovers since I was twenty.
He’s taking us to Basile’s, his favorite Italian place. Of course, it doesn’t cross his mind to go someplace I might actually be able to eat something. Instead, I’ll be tortured by the baskets of warm bread and olive oil, politely refusing even a tiny corner piece. When the pasta courses are served, smelling of rich cream sauce or sweet tomatoes, I’ll ignore the rumble in my stomach and eat my salad without dressing or croutons and nurse a cup of minestrone soup on the side. If I so much as take a bite from his plate, I know he’ll judge me, count every calorie. I swear he thinks that if I so much as look at something full-fat, I’ll gain weight. He warns me regularly of my declining metabolism. I’m not as young as I once was, he reminds me daily.
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