Cassandra’s dark head appeared over the top of the fridge door. “Hey, Mom. Can you take Emily and I to the mall tonight? Her mom said it’s okay with her.”
Bridget stood up and stared blankly at her daughter.
“Mom. I said can you—”
“It’s ‘Emily and me,’” Bridget replied. “And, no, I cannot.”
Cassandra huffed and crossed her wiry arms in front of her still-flat chest, dramatic as always. “Why? Can you give me one good reason why we can’t ever do what I want to do?”
Bridget didn’t know what came over her, she just knew she was sick of having to explain herself to everyone. Almost without thinking, she shut the fridge door and lobbed the loaf of bread at her surprised daughter, who caught it with an expression of shock.
“Nice catch, kiddo.”
“Uh, Mom. Why’d you—”
“Find the ‘Ingredients’ section of the label,” Bridget commanded.
Her daughter tentatively twisted the package in her hands, scanning for the list. “Yeah, okay. So what?”
Bridget strode briskly over to the pantry and swiped a soup can from the middle shelf, but she didn’t hand it to her daughter yet. “Now, read it. See if you can find any of these words on the bread’s plastic wrapper.” She pointed to the kitchen counter where the celiac disease brochure lay open and the gluten dangers highlighted.
Cassandra studied the paper and then, the bread loaf. “Oh, yeah. There’s like three of them on here.”
Bridget grinned at her eldest child. “Thanks. Put it on the counter and check this one, too.” She tossed her the soup. Cassandra caught it, a hint of pride registering on her face this time, and, predictably, she found glutens.
“But why are we doing this?”
Bridget and Evan had returned from the doctor’s office just fifteen minutes before her other two children had gotten off the bus, and Bridget hadn’t had a chance to explain the situation to her daughter. Keaton was outside playing some version of football with his buddy Josh, and Evan was napping after his stressful afternoon at the doctor’s office. Bridget decided to level with Cassandra. “Because these are all foods Evan can’t eat for a while. And maybe never again.”
Her daughter’s eyes widened. “Whoa. That sucks!”
“It does,” she agreed. “Why don’t you grab a black marker and put a note or something on everything Evan should avoid, okay?”
Cassandra no longer seemed so preoccupied with the mall. Thank God for small blessings. “Okay. What should I write?”
Bridget leaned over and kissed her daughter’s forehead. “I’ll let you decide that. Just nothing that’ll make your brother feel bad if he sees it.”
Cassandra bit her lip, a behavior she seemed to have inherited from her mother, Bridget realized ruefully. “Thanks, Mom.”
“For what? You’re helping me.”
“For trusting me,” her nearly teenage daughter said. “For knowing I could do it myself.”
And in that instant, Bridget realized that was the truth. She kept forgetting how Cassandra was growing up. How her little girl was more than capable of helping. Soon she wouldn’t need Bridget at all. Time…it just went by too fast, didn’t it?
“Sorry to have been so distracted lately,” she told her daughter. “It’s been, well, an adjustment going back to work, and these past several weeks with Evan being sick a lot have been pretty hard, too.”
Bridget thought of Dr. Luke and the couple of times she’d seen him since their lunch date. He’d been just that little bit warmer, just that dash more conspiratorial, at the dental office. Not enough to ring any bells of impropriety, but enough so Candy could pick up on it and make a joke or two. Just this morning, Candy had said that Dr. Luke considered Bridget “his most favorite person” in the building on account of their “shared gourmet sensibilities.” Dr. Nina, on the other hand, had returned this week from her month-long sabbatical and didn’t seem to care about Bridget at all or, indeed, notice much of anything. She’d been acting withdrawn and, in Bridget’s opinion, thankfully inattentive.
Of course, next week was a new week. Who knew what lay ahead?
Cassandra, busy deciphering the ingredients on a box of Hamburger Helper, didn’t immediately reply to Bridget’s meager apology. After another few minutes, however, her daughter commented, “You like working there, though. A lot. Don’t you?”
“Yes, absolutely.” Bridget raised herself on tiptoe so she could better search through one of the higher kitchen cabinets. “I like the people at the dental office—” Well, most of them, she added to herself. “And the work environment is very pleasant. I think people should try to find jobs where their skills are appreciated and where they feel comfortable.”
Bridget enjoyed a few moments of basking in the pride of her parenting and getting to speak in the blissfully nonconfrontational manner of a woman to a young friend, as opposed to a harried mom to a quarrelsome daughter.
Then, in a burst of insightfulness not entirely foreign to prepubescent girls (but always disconcerting when it happened), Cassandra glanced up from her box and said, “Yeah. I can tell. You look different on the days you go to work. Like Emily does when we’re in math with Adam—her crush. So”—she speared Bridget with a laser look—“is there someone at the dentist’s office that you think is cute?”
The following morning, Tamara winced when Jennifer told her the news: Bridget’s youngest son was still sick with stomach ailments and the doctor said he might have, as Bridget described it, “a condition.” She’d called Jennifer last night and told her she wouldn’t be meeting them for coffee. She wanted to keep Evan home from school until Monday “to watch him and to try out some new meal ideas.” She sounded very shaken.
“I always hated those days,” Tamara said, unable to keep the note of wistfulness from her voice alongside the orchestration of sympathy. “Not only did it throw off the whole week’s schedule, but you couldn’t help but be constantly anxious.”
Jennifer nodded. “It’s really hard when they’re sick.” She thought about Bridget’s son Evan and knew how fretful his mother was about “his possible disease.” She knew Bridget had been up with him for multiple nights in the past few weeks, not knowing if his stomach pains were due to the flu, to food poisoning or, since he was a worrier like Bridget, to a tendency for a stomach ulcer. Or something worse. Jennifer could understand why Bridget would be very concerned, even if celiac disease was a more manageable issue than many other potential disorders.
Jennifer and Tamara each sent Evan good-health wishes in silence and, then, due to their mutual fidgetiness and proximity to a number of Glendale Grove gossips (the Indigo Moon Café was unusually crowded that morning), they decided to grab coffee to go and walk off some of their residual nervous energy.
Tamara zipped up her brown leather jacket and turned to Jennifer, who blew on her latte but was otherwise silent for their first several yards. “So, c’mon, what’s the story with you? You seemed to have a lot on your mind when I called. What’s been happening?”
Jennifer understood, logically, why one-on-one discussions resulted in greater disclosure on her part, despite her resistance to them. There was neither the danger nor the protection that came from getting lost in the crowd (something that happened even with a trio, since she could easily sit back and let the other two interact). Tamara had called her a few days ago to check up on her and find out how the Homecoming Dance went but, with the other family members at home, she’d been cryptic on the phone and, besides, she hadn’t yet processed everything well enough to discuss it. No such excuses anymore.
“It was kind of a disaster,” she admitted.
Tamara’s eyes widened. “Did Veronica have a terrible time? Did the first guy she was supposed to go with cause a huge scene at the dance? Or did the second guy try to maul her or something?”
Jennifer, well accustomed to Tamara’s dramatic side, didn’t physically roll her eyes, but she thought about it. “No, none of
the above. At least, not that I know about.” She paused on the sidewalk and took a cautious sip of coffee. “Michael and I had a big fight about it. I really didn’t like the way he handled the night.”
“Like a yelling and screaming kind of fight? Throwing vases and stuff?”
This time Jennifer did, actually, roll her eyes. She snickered, too. “In all the years you’ve known me, when have I ever yelled at anyone or thrown anything? And you know Michael, too. Does he come across as a screamer to you?”
Tamara smirked and waggled her eyebrows. “You tell me, honey.”
Jennifer laughed. “No. And he’s not that kind of screamer either.” She drank more coffee. “We have quiet fights. Battles of will. But this laissez-faire way he has of parenting is really starting to bug me.”
Tamara shrugged. “That’s pretty common among guys, though. Not all of them, maybe, but Jon was really hands-off with Benji in most areas. He always left the details to me. And he’s not nearly as laid-back a person as Michael is.”
“True, but it’s the reasons he’s giving for being hands-off that are annoying me. Because he’s a high-school teacher. Because he sees teens all the time. Because he knows himself and, thus, projects that knowledge onto Veronica and this situation. What he’s missing is that she’s my daughter. That if she’s even kind of like me, it doesn’t matter what other teens would do. It’s what she would do.” Exhausted from this rant, she paused again for more coffee.
Tamara paused, too. “What does Michael say when you tell him that?”
“He fucking laughs it off.”
Her friend laughed aloud. “Sorry. You just sounded so much like me for a second there.”
Jennifer grimaced and they resumed walking. “Michael said that Veronica’s extroversion makes her act differently than I would have in a similar situation. That she needs to control her behavior in class, of course, and that he’ll talk to her social studies teacher and the principal, if it ever comes to that, and work with them on any problem. As if I didn’t handle things well enough during the conference, but his buddy-buddy high-school teacher self would just smooth everything over perfectly.”
Jennifer squeezed her fists. “Michael says I have to trust Veronica’s judgment, of which, I must say, she hasn’t shown much since this school year started. And, even though I said I was only going to go to the dance for twenty minutes to take a quick look at this new boy, this older boy, Erick, and that a lot of parents peek in on the kids without being obvious—he refused to let me go. He insisted on dropping off Veronica and picking her up himself. He told me not to interfere so much. That I’d be doing damage to her. That she wouldn’t trust us if she felt checked-up on. Then he went into the kitchen and somehow managed to break the opening lever on the dishwasher, so we need to get that fixed now.”
“Sounds frustrating,” Tamara said, her mind drifting momentarily to Aaron and that tool-belt-wearing, handyman fantasy she had involving him. She pulled herself back to reality.
“Yes, but I’m not wrong, am I? You’re an extrovert. Just because someone is talkative, it doesn’t mean they’re wise.”
Tamara stopped and stared at her. “Nice.”
Jennifer sighed. “Oh, c’mon. You know what I mean. I’m just saying emotional maturity isn’t tied to verbal openness. Just because Veronica’s more popular and chatty than I ever was, it doesn’t mean she’s capable of making better decisions. She’s just more apt to talk about them. And not, incidentally, with us.”
Tamara grinned. “Her best friends have probably gotten an earful, though.”
Jennifer nodded.
“No,” Tamara said. “I don’t think you’re wrong. You and Michael just see Veronica’s behavior differently. Maybe you’re both projecting your personalities on her, and she’s actually someone else entirely. Someone neither of you can fully recognize.” As Jennifer considered this, Tamara—wanting to take advantage of her friend’s unusual loquaciousness—couldn’t help but bring up another point of some personal concern. After her friend had had another minute or two to reflect on the topic of her daughter, Tamara initiated a related discussion—that of their husbands.
“You know how you asked us last month about whether we felt sure in our choice of husband,” Tamara said, “and that maybe we needed to test out our marriage to know?”
“Yeah?”
“What was your day with your ex really like? I know you said the reunion would help you clarify. That you’d probably know more after that. But you can’t tell me you spent all that time touring your old college campus with David and still have no impulses one way or another. No sense of intuition about which man you feel more connected with.”
Jennifer sighed. What was it with her friends and their bizarrely innate sense of knowing, which they were always pushing on her? “Look, Tamara, I’m really not sure how to explain it….”
“Try.”
She inhaled deeply. “Okay, but you’ll think it’s weird, because it’s not as easy as an either-or situation, much as I’d like it to be. David and Michael exist in different planes. Sort of like their space-time continuums are completely separate from each other.” She glanced at Tamara, who, indeed, did appear to find her explanation an odd one. She pressed on anyway. “The world I inhabit with Michael disappears when I’m with David, or even IM’ing with him. Meeting Michael, after David and I broke up, was like journeying to another dimension. Same planet, but a million minute differences.”
“Huh.” Tamara finished her coffee and tossed the paper cup into a nearby trash bin. “But if it’s the same planet, as you say, then when and where does the transition actually happen? For instance, what about when you’re completely alone?”
“You mean, which dimension do I live in then?”
“Yes. Is the journey really out there, between Michael and David? Or is it within you?”
A tiny voice in Jennifer’s head was the first to answer. A voice she, for once, didn’t quash. “It’s been so long since I was really alone, I don’t remember.” She paused. “And as long as I keep the two men apart, I can’t know for sure. I—I’m pretty sure I’m not ready to know, though. Not yet.”
“Fair enough,” Tamara said. “Maybe that’ll change after the reunion.”
“Maybe.” Of course there was a rather large piece of the puzzle Jennifer omitted. A couple of pieces, if she were to be completely honest.
One was that she hadn’t even told Michael about the reunion weekend yet. She’d kept her calendar open, sure, but she hadn’t committed to the event in the eyes of the family for fear she’d unwittingly give herself away. That everyone else in the world had this instinctive sixth sense that her DNA didn’t possess. That if she mentioned David’s name out in the open at home, her husband and daughters would somehow deduce there was something going on.
Then again, Michael was so busy destroying the house, appliance by appliance, maybe he wouldn’t notice. And maybe he wouldn’t understand the specifics of the text messages David had sent her—if he were to see them, and she was careful he wouldn’t. That was the other unspoken piece. She kept her cell phone with her at all times, except when she was showering or sleeping. (And then she had it turned off and hidden in a zipped compartment of her purse.) But somehow she suspected Michael’s liberal-artsy, poetic side would intuit the meaning behind David’s carefully crafted messages, which had, in typical David form, begun nearly innocuously before mutating to an entity just shy of cybersex.
At first, it was about the reunion directly:
Got all RSVPs. 10 for sure. 6 maybes. Thx 4 being in the 1st group! (And ten to sixteen people made quite an intimate group for a reunion, really.)
Then it turned cutesy:
U gotta check out this YouTube vid. Monkey Pong Live! Will e-mail link. (A reference to the computer game their friend Mitch had programmed, which had been a perennial favorite of the club members. Only the video link David sent wasn’t of the real Monkey Pong, but of two real monkeys that were filmed kiss
ing with very raunchy captions below the video.)
Then it became a series of texts—once he’d engaged her in conversation, had gotten her into a habit of answering his messages right away and knew which times of day she could respond quickly:
Look at this ad. (With a link to an online lingerie store featuring mannequins dressed in underwear, wrestling in Girls Gone Wild style.)
To: What kind RU wearing? (She didn’t answer that one. And she immediately deleted it.)
But it was followed the next day by:
Just heard Meat Loaf. (Which she answered cautiously with, I always liked him.)
Then it morphed into:
I know. Rembr. that rainy Sunday? (Which, of course, she remembered. Late August of their junior year. Just back to school after the endless summer break. A room to themselves. Listening to “You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth (Hot Summer Night)” and “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” from the classic Bat Out of Hell album. And touching each other. So, she typed, Yeah.)
He wrote:
I rembr. yr #26 shirt. (Which was really his #26 shirt.)
And then in separate texts that he didn’t wait for her to reply to:
I locked the door.
U took off my fave blues. (His favorite pair of Levi’s jeans.)
My hands, yr legs…
Got rid of yr B & P. (He made quick work of undressing her, yes. Her bra and panties didn’t stand a chance.)
Like an ice-cream cone. (She blushed at that memory. He liked…going down on her. But, at this, she typed, Stop it.)
He defended his texts with:
Just a memory. Nothin wrong w. that.
Only there was. She wasn’t so self-delusional that she could miss what David implied with every keystroke or how Michael would react to his wife taking part in a cybersex reenactment with her old boyfriend.
She was not telling Tamara about any of this.
Through some deft manipulation on Jennifer’s part, and some very general whining about the cluelessness of husbands, the subject eventually twisted and turned to Tamara and Jon.
Friday Mornings at Nine Page 20