by Nancy Star
“You’re upset it’s B, aren’t you?” Charlotte picked at her sneaker laces. The sneakers were new but the laces were already shredded.
“No,” Annie said. “B is for beginning. You’re a beginner, that’s all.”
Charlotte got up and went inside the house.
Annie wondered why it was so hard to get it right.
She was still thinking about that when another car pulled up. This time it was Tim.
“Hey,” she said when he got out of the car.
“Hey,” he said and sat beside her.
Annie thought he didn’t look right. “Bad day?” she asked. “Hank give you a hard time about Atlanta?”
“Hank wasn’t in today,” Tim said. “He’s away on some island somewhere.”
“On vacation?”
“No,” Tim said. “There’s some new property he wants to buy. It’s a total mistake but he really wants it. And you know how Hank is when he really wants something.”
Annie nodded. She knew they were both thinking about the same thing—how much Hank had wanted Tim, and how hard he’d worked to get him. She put her arm around her husband and gave him a squeeze. She leaned her head on his shoulder. He leaned his head on hers.
He smelled so good, so clean, so damp. She sat up straight. “Did you just take a shower?”
“Yes,” Tim said. “I joined a gym. Isn’t that great?”
“Why would you join a gym?” Annie asked.
“What’s wrong with joining a gym?”
“Look,” Annie said. “Something is definitely going on. I don’t know what it is but it would be better if you would just tell me now.”
“Okay. I’ll tell you. It’s true. I admit it. I joined a gym.”
“I’m a change specialist,” Annie reminded Tim. “I know how to recognize change. And last time I checked, you were not a gym person.”
Tim said nothing. He stared at the ground.
“If you don’t want to tell me because you think it’s not a good time for my life to completely fall apart, that’s true,” Annie said. “But if there’s something going on with you that I need to know about, it would be much better if you tell me now so I can deal with it.” She gripped the underside of the step and waited for the brick to drop on her head.
“What are you talking about?” Tim asked.
The front door opened and slammed.
“Hi, Dad,” Charlotte said. She gave her father a tight hug.
“Hey,” Tim said. “How’s my favorite girl?”
“Good,” Charlotte said.
“Just good?” he asked.
“Super good,” Charlotte said.
“Got any super good news?” Tim said. “I could really use some super good news today.”
“Not really,” Charlotte said.
“Yes you do,” Annie said. “What about your soccer news? That’s pretty great.”
“I got on a travel team today,” Charlotte said. “But it’s just the B team. And they might move down to C.”
“Why don’t you tell Dad how the coach said she heard you’re a great player and you might be fast-tracked to the Aφ team,” Annie said.
“There is no A+ team,” Charlotte said. She turned to her father. “Can you explain it to Mom? She still doesn’t understand.”
“I’m not that good at explaining things to Mom,” Tim said. His voice was flat. “I’m going to go change.”
Tim went inside. The door banged shut behind him.
“He’s just in a bad mood,” Annie said. “It has nothing to do with your getting a B on the team.”
“I didn’t think it did,” Charlotte said. She got up and went to the backyard.
Annie went in the house. Above her she could hear Tim’s footsteps. They perfectly matched the angry rhythm of the thump, thump, thump of Charlotte’s soccer ball hitting the back of the house in the pitch-black night.
Twelve
Annie woke early, and was surprised to see Tim was already up and out of bed. She found him in the basement, running on the treadmill, his iPod plugged into his ears, his T-shirt colored with sweat. He smiled when he saw her. She turned and marched back up to the kitchen.
She couldn’t think of a single person who would understand that the sight of her husband on the treadmill disturbed her. To her it was the same as if he’d suddenly come home with a tattoo, or taken up painting or prayer.
“Good morning,” Tim said when he joined her a few minutes later. He wiped his neck with a towel. “That was tough.”
Of all the people who wouldn’t understand, Tim was at the top of the list.
He opened the refrigerator, stared at the offerings, and reached for a yogurt.
“Yogurt?” Annie said. “You never eat yogurt.”
“I’m trying to be more health-conscious. Nothing wrong with that, right?”
Annie did not respond. She took a bowl out of the cupboard. This was not a good time for her to wonder why Tim would suddenly decide to reinvent himself. She yanked open a packet of instant oatmeal and added water. She had a daughter to reconnect with. She put the bowl in the microwave and set the timer for five seconds less than the directions suggested. She had a business to create. She pressed start and tapped her foot. She had a pediatrician’s appointment to make and a birth certificate to get notarized and a nutrition booklet to digest, for God’s sake.
Tim was fine. Her marriage was fine. It had to be fine. Tim had decided to be healthy. So what? That was a good thing. A new, healthy Tim. That was all it was. She didn’t have time for it to be anything else.
She stopped the microwave before the timer sounded. The oatmeal was watery and thin. She tried to eat it but gave up.
“I have to get some work done,” she told Tim as she put her bowl in the dishwasher. “I’ll be down in time to take Charlotte to camp.” She left the room quickly, looking away from Tim’s puzzled face. Stay focused, she told herself. Be organized. Stick to the Plan for the Day.
She had roughed out today’s plan on the train coming home from the meeting with Sondra. But that was before Gerri Picker had stopped by. Now the plan had to be completely revised.
She’d fill out the soccer forms first thing. That shouldn’t take long, even if there were over a dozen. If she could find her camera, she could take a digital photo of Charlotte before they left for camp. She could stop and get a two-by-two copy printed somewhere on her way to the pediatrician. She could read the nutrition booklet while she waited for the nurse to fill out the medical form. Maybe the nurse would have an idea of where to go to get Charlotte’s birth certificate notarized. If she was really lucky, maybe the nurse would turn out to be a notary public.
She could easily get the soccer stuff done by noon, put it all in an envelope and leave it outside her door for Gerri to pick up, as requested. It wasn’t how she’d originally planned to spend her morning. She still wasn’t sure how much time she’d really need to review the Zaxtec folder. But at least she’d have the afternoon for work. At least she had a plan.
When she returned to the kitchen, her plan fell completely apart.
“Are you coming to my swim show?” Charlotte asked.
Tim stopped reading the newspaper. “When is it?”
“Nine,” Charlotte said.
“Nine when?” Tim asked.
“Today,” Charlotte said.
“I’m so sorry,” Tim said. “I can’t. I have to fly back to Atlanta today.”
“That’s okay,” Charlotte said. “Mom, you don’t have to come, either. It’s kind of stupid. And it’s not like you haven’t seen me swim.”
“Are you kidding?” Annie said. “I’m not missing your swim show. That’s the beauty of being a consultant. I can work all morning and take the afternoon off for your show.”
“My show is in the morning,” Charlotte said.
“Okay,” Annie said. “Just as good. I’ll do it the other way around.”
When the car service pulled up to take Tim to the airport, Annie glanc
ed at the refrigerator door and saw, once again, there was no itinerary posted.
She ran outside. “Tim,” she called as he got into the car. “Where are you staying in Atlanta?”
But he had already closed the car door and didn’t hear the question.
She turned and found Charlotte staring at her.
“What’s wrong?” Charlotte asked.
“Nothing,” Annie said. “Everything is great. I was just going to make French toast. Want some?”
Charlotte nodded.
Annie made a hurried breakfast, which Charlotte ate slowly, as if they had nowhere to go. When Charlotte finished eating and looked up, Annie had the camera lens pointed at her. “Smile,” Annie said, and snapped. “It’s for your soccer playing card.” She checked to see how the photo had turned out. “Look.” She showed it to Charlotte. “How adorable is that?”
Charlotte studied the photograph. “It’s supposed to be just my shoulders and head. And I’m supposed to be in uniform. And I’m not supposed to look adorable.”
They were already going to be late. What was the harm in being even later? Charlotte changed into the uniform Gerri had dropped off. She carefully tied back her hair and then took her position, standing against an empty wall.
“Just from here to here,” Charlotte said gesturing from her shoulders to the top of her head.
“I understand,” Annie said. “Okay. Smile.”
Charlotte narrowed her eyes and tried to look fierce.
Annie snapped the picture. Charlotte circled round to see the results.
“Is this one okay?” Annie asked.
“It has to be. We’re late.”
“I can take another one,” Annie said. “It will only take a second.”
“We have to go,” Charlotte said. The photo session was over.
Camp was thirty minutes away, but there was an accident on the road, and traffic was backed up. They arrived over an hour late.
“You’re lucky,” Magda, the camp director, told them when they rushed into the building. “We’re running behind.”
“Great,” Annie said. “What time does Charlotte’s group swim?”
“Less than an hour,” the director told her.
As Annie waited on a chair in the parents’ lounge, she heard Magda say, “less than an hour” to every parent who walked in, no matter the age of the child.
Finally, the swim show began. The head counselor blew her whistle, and Group I, made up of the youngest campers, jumped into the pool. All, that is, except for one small boy who refused.
The head counselor blew her whistle again and ordered Group I out of the pool. She then joined five other counselors, the camp director, and the boy’s mother in a tight circle around the boy. After twenty minutes of trying to coax the boy into the pool, they agreed to give up.
The Group I swimmers were ordered back into the pool where they demonstrated fifteen minutes of diving, backfloat, sidestroke and treading water. The counselor blew her whistle twice, and on cue the children lifted themselves out of the pool and took a bow. The little boy who refused to swim suddenly conquered his fear and jumped in.
For the next fifteen minutes, six counselors and his mother stood above where the boy clutched the side of the pool and tried to coax him out. Finally one of the counselors jumped in and, playing rescue, removed him.
The swim show limped on. Group II swimmers lined up and jumped in next. Within a minute a girl in the pool screamed that she’d been stung by a bee. Several mothers near Annie began to murmur about the girl’s bee allergy.
The nurse rushed over with an EpiPen. An ambulance was called. Only after the oxygen mask was placed on the little girl’s face did another girl admit, through tears, that she was the bee—she had pinched the girl on the foot, as a joke.
In all—Annie timed it—it was two hours before Charlotte’s age group was called. The girls dove in together, perfectly synchronized. Then one of the girls vomited. Some synchronized vomiting followed.
The swim show was canceled. The pool would have to be drained. Nauseated campers glommed onto their mothers, begging to be taken home. Annie watched, dumbfounded, as, one after another, the mothers around her caved.
“Can I please go home with you?” Charlotte asked. “Just this once? Everyone else is.”
It looked like a fire drill as mothers and their charges hurried to their cars in a perfect line. Finally, it was just Charlotte, Annie, and one other child, who sat by herself, looking like an orphan used to being overlooked for adoption.
“Please,” Charlotte said. “Everyone in my age group is gone.”
“Not everyone,” Annie whispered, looking at the waif.
“That’s the camp director’s daughter,” Charlotte whispered. “She’s the one who threw up first. She threw up yesterday too.”
Annie signed Charlotte out of camp. On the way home they stopped at a diner for lunch. Charlotte was starving and ordered a cheeseburger, french fries, and a milk shake. The minute they got in the car she leaned over the side and threw it all up.
By the time they got home, Charlotte was weak and sleepy. Annie helped her get settled on the couch in the family room in front of the TV, a garbage pail beside her.
“I have to run to the doctor to drop off that soccer medical form, and then I have to go get your birth certificate notarized or you won’t be able to play.”
“Okay,” Charlotte said.
Annie felt terrible leaving her home. “Do you want to come along?”
Charlotte leaned closer to the garbage pail. “No thanks,” she said. “Do we have any soda?”
“I’ll stop at the store on the way back,” Annie promised. “Call me if you start to feel worse.”
With her cell phone clutched tight, Annie rushed out and drove too fast to the pediatrician.
“Can you fill out this form out while I wait?” she asked. “My daughter is home sick. By any chance are you a notary public?”
The nurse blinked as if Annie were speaking a foreign language. “I am a nurse,” she said. “A busy nurse with a full waiting room of sick children.” She gestured toward the sniffling coughers in case Annie hadn’t noticed.
“I’m sorry,” Annie said. “And I’m sorry the form is so last minute. But Charlotte can’t play soccer if I don’t get this to the soccer people today. Would you like me to come back after I get her birth certificate notarized? Is there anyone here who could notarize this?”
“Does this look like a bank?” the nurse asked. She picked up a folder and called the next young patient’s name.
Annie went to three banks before she found one with a notary public. She stopped off at the grocery store next, and bought a six-pack of ginger ale, a box of bendable straws, Tylenol, bread, jam, JELL-O, pudding, and broth. By the time she got back to the doctor’s office it was even more crowded.
“Here,” the nurse said, holding the form out for her.
Annie was sure the only reason the nurse had filled the form out so quickly was to get rid of her. But Annie didn’t care. She was just happy it was done.
When she got back home, Charlotte was running a slight fever. Annie gave her Tylenol and a glass of ice chips.
“I have to go back out and get the photo for your playing card,” she said. “Will you be okay if I leave you for a few more minutes?”
“Uh-huh,” Charlotte said.
Annie drove to the photo store and waited on a long line, only to find out that the picture she’d taken that morning had been inadvertently deleted. She raced back home to take another one. Charlotte was sleeping. Annie thought about waking her, but changed her mind and took the picture as she was.
The crowd at the photo store was gone, and somehow Annie got the manager to agree to Photoshop Charlotte’s eyes so they looked wide open.
This time when she got home, Charlotte was awake.
“Could you keep me company for a while?” she asked.
“Of course,” Annie said. “I just have to leave t
his package outside for Gerri.”
She jammed what she hoped were all the soccer forms in a large envelope, left a message for Gerri on her cell phone as instructed, and left the package outside.
She settled in on the couch beside Charlotte, to keep her company. Within minutes they were both asleep.
When Annie woke startled, for no reason, at five o’clock, Charlotte’s head felt a little cooler. She carefully extricated herself, put a blanket over her daughter, and tiptoed out of the room.
She retrieved her BlackBerry from her bag and found twenty-one emails from Sondra.
She ran up to her office to call. Mimi put Annie right through.
“Thank God,” Sondra said. “Where were you? Did you turn off your BlackBerry so you could get stuff done? That’s what I should do. I tell myself that every day. But I never do. You are so disciplined.”
“Actually,” Annie said, about to explain, but Sondra cut her off.
“This is nothing to worry about, but you need to know that Legal says you can’t start work until you sign our confidentiality agreement. You did get it, didn’t you?”
Annie quickly switched into her email and scrolled down. There it was. “Yes,” Annie said.
“Did you get a chance to read it yet?” Sondra asked. “You didn’t give it to a lawyer, did you? It’s boilerplate. Totally standard. I’m sure all your clients have the same one.”
“Standard,” Annie said, hoping she was right. “I’ll sign it as soon as I read it.”
“You don’t even have to read it,” Sondra said. “Trust me. It’s fine. Honestly. Would I lie?”
Annie got off the phone and attempted a careful reading of the agreement, but the document was written in dense legalese. There were entire paragraphs she couldn’t understand.
Getting a lawyer had been on their To Do list for years, but she and Tim hadn’t gotten to it yet. So she called her friend, Sylvie, in-house counsel at PC&B. Too bad Sylvie was away on vacation.
Reluctantly, she moved on to her only other choice, Trissy. Her sister-in-law had been a lawyer for years. And Trissy loved—in fact she told people she lived for—doing legal favors for her friends.
“Email it to me and I’ll read it right now,” Trissy offered, after Annie explained the situation.