The kettle began to whistle behind her. Sarah switched off the stove and moved the kettle to a cold electric burner.
Don’t crowd him, she thought.
She opened a cupboard and took down a tin of tea, then placed one bag in a white mug painted with small purple flowers. She poured in steaming water, then put away the tea tin.
When she brought her mug to the table, she noticed the envelope.
Alex had taken the letter and the news clipping with him, but he’d left the envelope behind. It lay facedown, a stark white rectangle with one jagged edge. Sarah hesitated for a moment, then sat down and turned over the envelope.
It was addressed to Alex in blue ink in a shaky script. The return address was that of Joseph Pomeroy of Albany, New York.
The name Pomeroy was familiar to Sarah, but it took her a minute to place it. And then she had it: It was the maiden name of Alex’s first wife. Deceased wife, Sarah corrected herself. She knew little about her, for Alex had always been understandably reluctant to dwell on the tragedy of his past, but she did know that Laura Pomeroy had had only one living relative: her father.
Sarah set down the envelope and sipped her tea.
She remembered that soon after they’d first met Alex had told her about his recent past, how he’d lived and taught in Albany and how four years ago his wife and their adopted son had been killed in a terrible automobile accident near their home. Alex admitted that he’d become severely depressed and decided to leave New York behind and try for a fresh start in life in a new location. He’d accepted a teaching post in a high school in Colorado Springs. And after living and teaching here for several years, he’d met Sarah and Brian.
Sarah carried her empty mug to the sink, washed it, and set it in the drainer to dry. She picked up the envelope, considered tossing it in the trash, then placed it on the countertop. She thought Alex might want it, perhaps for the return address.
Sarah couldn’t imagine what Joseph Pomeroy could say that would so upset Alex. She assumed that Alex would tell her when Brian was asleep in bed.
But after she’d tucked her son under the covers, kissed him good night, and rejoined Alex in the family room to watch Masterpiece Theater, he’d said nothing about the letter. He’d regained his composure and acted as if nothing had happened. However, Sarah could see that his eyes were focused sometimes on the carpet, sometimes on the wall, but rarely on the TV screen.
They’d gone to bed with no mention of the letter.
The next morning, Sarah had a nine o’clock appointment, so Brian left the house with her.
Whenever Sarah’s first customer was scheduled later than nine, Alex took Brian to school, because the timing was better for them all. And Alex always picked him up in the afternoon. First, because they got out at the same time. And second, because Will Rogers Elementary School was almost in a direct line from the Whitakers’ house to Jefferson High, where Alex taught world history to struggling sophomores and American history to all three upper grades.
Sarah and Brian, bundled in coats and neck scarves and gloves, followed the flagstone path around the south side of the house to the garage. The sky was clear and blue, but the air was very cold. Last night the local TV weatherman had predicted an overnight low of fifteen degrees and a high today of thirty-six.
A veritable heat wave, Sarah thought grimly.
She unlocked the side door of the garage. Neither she nor Alex had mentioned the letter this morning. Now, as she followed Brian inside, she tried to push it from her mind.
It was cold in the garage, but not nearly as cold as outside. The overhead heater roared on now and then to keep the temperature from dipping below fifty—warm enough to ensure that the aging Jeep Wagoneer and the two-year-old Toyota Celica would both start.
The best part about the garage, Sarah thought, remembering those years without one, was that there was never a need to scrape frost from the windshield.
She flipped a switch on the wall. A motor clicked on. One of the garage’s two big doors rolled up, curling over the decade-old Jeep Wagoneer. Sarah and Brian climbed in, and after they’d fastened their seat belts, Sarah started the engine. She let it run for a minute before she backed out of the garage.
Brian opened the glove box, removed the garage-door remote control, and pointed it through the windshield. He made a noise with his mouth that Sarah supposed was the exact sound of an interstellar laser weapon, and the garage door slid closed.
Sarah backed the Jeep up the curving drive and into the street. The foothills to her right were still white from last week’s snowfall. The streets had been plowed clear of snow, but there were numerous patches of ice where the plowed snow had melted and flowed over the asphalt during the day and then frozen at night.
Sarah drove with care.
She crossed Pikes Peak Avenue and turned left on Colorado Avenue. They drove eastward past a little-used parking lot that had recently been converted into a Christmas-tree lot.
“Is that where we’re going to get our tree, Mom?”
Brian’s finger was pushed against the side window.
“Maybe so. I think it’s the closest.”
“When?”
“I don’t know. Pretty soon.”
“Tonight?”
“I suppose we could, but—”
“All right!”
“But we’ll talk it over with your dad first, okay?”
“Okay, I guess. But we didn’t last year, did we?”
“No, because last Christmas your dad and I weren’t married yet, remember? We weren’t all living together then.”
“Oh, yeah.”
One block from the school Sarah waited at a stop sign as a crossing guard, holding high her own stop sign, led a group of children across the street.
“Mom?”
“What, hon?”
“Do you like Dad better than you liked Daddy? I mean, you’re not going to get a divorce, are you?”
“No, honey, of course not.”
Sarah was taken aback by the question. She was also surprised by Brian’s comparison: “Daddy” was his natural father, Ted Saunders, and “Dad” was Alex.
She remembered the first time Brian had called Alex “Dad,” some months after she and Alex were married. That had been a significant moment for Sarah, symbolizing for her Brian’s acceptance of his new father. It had been particularly satisfying because Brian’s natural father had abandoned them. Well, perhaps “abandoned” was too strong. Ted hadn’t exactly done that. But after the divorce he’d moved to Seattle and Sarah had rarely seen him—him or his alimony and child-support checks. That was okay with her, though. Ted had never been close to Brian, even during the marriage. He’d seemed to resent Sarah’s dividing her attention between two males, and he’d turned much of that resentment toward his son.
Better that he’s gone, Sarah remembered thinking. Besides, she had a good job, and she and Brian could get along just fine, thank you, without any help from an ex-husband.
However, the divorce had made Sarah cautious—perhaps too cautious—in her relationships with men. In fact, during the two years plus between her divorce from Ted and her chance meeting with Alex, she could count on her fingers the number of dates she’d accepted. When Alex had come along, though, she’d known immediately that he was someone special.
They’d gone together for nine months before they’d married. Everything had seemed so easy and natural between them, as if they’d been meant for each other. Just as important to Sarah, Brian and Alex got along well. And thankfully for all of them, Ted Saunders had not stood in the way of Alex’s adopting Brian.
The adoption had been six months ago, and since then Brian had rarely mentioned his “daddy” and had not once spoken of the divorce.
Sarah looked at her son, but he was staring through the windshield.
“Why did you ask me that, Brian?”
“Just because.”
“Because why?”
He shrugged, still starin
g straight ahead.
“I guess because I really like Dad and I don’t want you to get a divorce from him like you did from Daddy.”
“Oh, Brian, I love your dad.” She gave his leg a gentle squeeze. “I love him a whole lot, just like I love you a whole lot. You know?” She squeezed his leg near his knee, making him giggle. “You know?”
“Yeah.”
“The three of us will be together for a long, long time.”
“Promise?”
“Promise,” Sarah said.
She let Brian out in front of his school and watched him run up the sidewalk to join a group of children entering the red-brick building. Then she headed toward North Nevada Avenue, turned right, and drove south for two miles to the shopping center. She cruised through the huge, mostly empty parking lot to the far end of the shops. Hair Today was the second from the end, tucked between a fabric store and a State Farm Insurance office.
Sarah parked the Wagoneer in one of the many empty slots. She unlocked the heavy glass door and pushed through into her shop—actually, hers and Kay Nealy’s.
Nine years ago, when Sarah had graduated from junior college in Cedar Falls, Iowa, she never imagined that she’d eventually co-own a business. Actually, she hadn’t been at all certain just what she wanted to do.
She’d studied art in school, and she’d shown some talent, although not enough, she felt, to ever consider making her living as an artist. After graduation she’d worked for a time in an arts-and-crafts store, but the pay had been practically negligible. She found herself waiting tables at a family restaurant to pay the rent on her new apartment. She liked the people contact but not the job.
Then she’d met Ted Saunders and they’d fallen in love. He’d told her that there could never be another woman in his life, and so they were married. A few months later, Ted’s employer, a sporting-goods manufacturer, transferred him to Colorado, requiring Sarah to leave behind her family, friends, and job.
After the move, Sarah began to change her aspirations from “job” to “career.” A friend of hers in Iowa ran a hair boutique, so Sarah was acquainted with the business. She knew, for instance, that her friend earned a lot more money than she ever had waiting tables.
For the next ten months Sarah worked part-time as a waitress in Colorado Springs and attended school full-time, learning about cuts and styles, tints and perms. Soon after her graduation, she was styling hair in a beauty shop near the center of town.
Sarah liked what she was doing. She enjoyed the company of her customers, and she found satisfaction in her work, which, after all, contained elements of her first love, artistry.
Then she’d gotten pregnant with Brian and eventually was forced to quit her job. By the time Brian was two, Sarah had decided two things: He was old enough for a day-care center, and she was more than ready to go back to work.
Those had been days of mixed emotions. She was delighted to be working for her new employer, Kay, with whom she was quickly becoming fast friends. On the other hand, her marriage was in jeopardy. Before Brian turned three, Sarah and Ted had divorced.
Sarah overcame the trauma of separation by focusing her attention on her son and her work.
After a year or so, Sarah had built up a large enough clientele to justify opening her own shop. She hadn’t said anything to Kay, but Kay knew exactly what was on her mind: You could make a much better living owning a shop than working for someone else on a percentage basis. And the best way to own a shop was to work for someone for a while and then leave and take your customers with you. Kay knew all about that. After all, that’s how she’d gotten started.
So before Sarah had made the big move, Kay had offered her a proposition. For ten thousand dollars Sarah could become her equal partner, splitting the expenses and keeping separate the profits from her own customers. That way they’d both benefit. Even though Kay would take in less money each month, she’d cut her expenses in half, substantially reduce her paperwork as an employer, and she could put the ten grand down on a almost-new Porsche she’d been eyeing. Best of all, she wouldn’t have to start searching for a suitable replacement. Sarah would be out ten thousand, but that was a much smaller investment than if she opened her own shop. Plus she’d be half owner of a business, and her profits would start going up immediately.
Sarah borrowed the money from her parents.
She’d paid them back after only one year of becoming a co-owner.
Sarah removed her coat and hung it on the hall tree near the door. Then she switched on the track lighting, which was adjusted to surround the stations with even light. Comfortable chairs were arranged around this end of the room and partway along the front wall. There were large potted plants and a wicker basket filled with magazines.
Sarah and Kay’s stations were at the far end of the room. Each station consisted of a leather-and-chrome hydraulic chair and a large mirror over a shelf and cabinet. Hanging from one end of each shelf was a large hand mirror, and attached to the other end was a holder for curling irons and a hair drier. The top of each shelf held a small basket filled with assorted hair clips, a bottle of Barbacide to hold the combs, a covered basket of clean brushes, a basket with various types of scissors, a spray bottle filled with water, a jar of styling gel, a can of mousse, a pump bottle of hair spray, and an ashtray.
The latter was for some of their customers, since neither Sarah nor Kay smoked.
Sarah opened the Levolor blinds on the front window, then crossed the room to the desk, which was backed up to the chest-high divider that separated the front room from the back. She pulled open the bottom drawer and stuffed in her purse and her empty “cash box”—a cigar box she used to hold cash, checks, and credit-card vouchers.
She phoned their answering service, but there had been no messages last night, no last-minute cancellations.
Then she turned her attention to the large, well-used appointment book that lay open on the desk. Sarah shuddered to think of what would happen if it were ever lost—absolute chaos and confusion for at least eight weeks, because that’s how far in advance some customers scheduled themselves.
Sarah ran her finger down her column of today’s page, Thursday, December 3. On some days the pages had gaps here and there, hours in which no one had made an appointment. This was not one of those days—Sarah was booked solid from nine until seven tonight. She saw that Kay would be nearly as busy but wouldn’t start until ten.
Sarah rechecked her first customer—9:00 A.M., Veronica Santori, cut only—then went to the back room. She paused just past the doorway to turn the thermostat up to seventy-five.
What the hell, she thought, the heat is included in the rent.
The back room was furnished more for function than for comfort, and Sarah and Kay had softened its look as much as possible with hanging plants and pastel-toned prints in chrome frames.
On the right was a hydraulic chair that was used for perm and color applications. It faced a large mirror over one end of a countertop that ran the entire length of the room. The cabinets below the counter were stocked with baskets filled with assorted perm rods. Halfway down the counter were a pair of hydraulic chairs tilted back and fitted under porcelain shampoo bowls. At the far end of the counter was a sink, a Mr. Coffee machine, and a stack of cups.
Across from the counter were a pair of straight-backed chairs that sat beneath beehive-shaped hair driers. Beside them was a closet filled with towels and assorted cleaning supplies. On the other side of the closet was a cabinet filled mostly with chemicals for perms and hair coloring.
And lastly, on Sarah’s left was a small refrigerator that presently contained two apples, an orange, celery sticks in a plastic bag, a bottle of Evian, four cans of Diet Pepsi, some concentrated lemon juice in a small yellow plastic lemon with a green screw top, and three-quarters of a jug of Carlo Rossi Chablis.
Sarah plugged in the coffee machine, poured in water, and switched it on without adding coffee, since some of their customers preferred decaf o
r tea. She walked out to the front just as Veronica Santori came through the door.
4
“HI,” SARAH SAID.
“Am I late?” Veronica was a small, meek-looking woman, and, Sarah now recalled, she always seemed to feel guilty about something.
“You’re right on time.”
“Are you sure?” Veronica checked her watch, then looked at the clock on the wall to be certain.
“I just got here myself,” Sarah told her. “Come on back and we’ll get started.”
She shampooed Veronica’s hair, which was black and streaked with gray. Thus far, Veronica had turned aside Sarah’s suggestions that they color it. Sarah rinsed her hair, massaged in a conditioner, then rinsed it again and wrapped it in a towel. Then she led Veronica out to her station. While the woman got settled in the chair, Sarah turned to the stereo. It was tuned to an FM jazz station. She didn’t know whether Veronica liked jazz or not—probably not—so she kept the volume low.
While Sarah combed and cut her hair, Veronica explained to her in detail how miserable her life was. Too many bills, too many kids, too many aches and pains. Sarah tossed in an occasional “No kidding” and “I know what you mean.”
By ten Sarah had finished Veronica’s hair, accepted her thanks and her check, and swept the floor. Her next customer and Kay’s first of the day were waiting quietly, leafing through magazines. Then Kay walked in—burst in might be a better way of putting it, Sarah thought—and the atmosphere in the shop immediately changed.
Kay Nealy was an attractive woman in her “dirty thirties” with blond hair so curly it was almost kinky, plump thighs, and heavy breasts. “I was built for comfort, babe,” she liked to say, “not for speed.” She had an abundance of energy, an overdeveloped set of vocal cords, and a strong sense of self. In other words, she was active and loud, and she knew it. She’d come from a large family—two sisters, four brothers—and she’d told Sarah that if you didn’t speak up or push your way into line, you got lost in the crowd.
Night of Reunion: A Novel Page 2