The Happiness Thief

by Nicole Bokat

  By the time they began the meal, dark had gathered outside, broken up by the gas streetlamps lining Marlborough Street. Hadley asked Isabel about the conference in Australia—not bold enough to try and solicit an invitation. Natalie smiled at her and mouthed, “I’ll talk to her about it.”

  “I have this friend, Priscilla, whose mom teaches at Emerson, Media Studies or something,” Hadley said.

  “Isn’t she the partier?” Natalie asked, an uptick in anxiety. “When did you and Priscilla get so friendly?”

  “Mom!” Hadley cried. “So embarrassing.”

  Isabel put down her glass of wine and reached across the table to cup Hadley’s hand. “Being a professor is a lot harder than working just two days a week. You have to publish to get tenure.”

  “Which you got,” George crowed.

  “Priscilla’s mom is right, though,” Isabel said. “Professors rate high on careers that make people happy. It just wasn’t a good fit for me, writing for academic journals. I thought I could be more helpful sharing with the general public.”

  The girl tilted her head so that her hair fell, in a chunk, to one side. “Do you miss teaching?”

  “What I do now is still teaching, only I make the rules. I left academia for the freedom, even though I was raised with certain prejudices. Scholarship was one thing, but ‘pop psychology’ another.”

  Hadley asked, “You mean Garrick called it that? Wasn’t he excited that you’re a best-selling author?”

  “No, my father wasn’t pleased,” Isabel said, hoarsely. “Only certain fields were acceptable to him.”

  Natalie recalled Isabel showing her father her report cards, the string of As lined up like good soldiers. Garrick would nod and fold it carefully, handing it back to her. There was an air of ceremony in this exchange, every time. He never displayed her accomplishments the way Natalie’s mom would do. Natalie received some As, but also Bs in Math and B pluses in Gym, and there had been that humiliating C in Home Economics the semester she’d sown her apron into a triangle. Yet her mom had insisted on taping each girl’s final report card onto the refrigerator.

  “What about you, Mom? What did he think of Photography?”

  “Garrick let me go my own way,” Natalie said. She gazed at the white vases filled with the same color roses on the white tablecloth, the fine crystal and gold-plated flatware. So much beauty on the outside, but Belle was more injured by her father’s disapproval than she’d let on while he was alive. “He was never that interested in the choices I made.”

  Isabel said, “You were lucky that way.”

  “I wouldn’t call myself lucky.”

  “No, of course you’re right. I only meant avoiding my dad’s pressure.”

  Hadley studied them, first Natalie, then her aunt. “It sounds like you two grew up in different families.”

  AS SOON AS they got home, Hadley raced to her room.

  “What are you up to?” Natalie asked, following her. She’d hoped that the two of them could watch one of their TV series together.

  At her door, the girl pulled her arm at the elbow, as if stretching before a run. Another newly acquired hobby, thanks to Marc and Elizabeth’s fitness routine. “Mom, still spying on me?”

  “I’m just curious about you, that’s all. I thought you didn’t like that Sophie was hanging around Priscilla.”

  Hadley sighed and switched to her blasé, cool-girl voice. “Chill, Mom. Priscilla’s fine. I’m not walking around high or binge drinking, because she has some power over me. Anyway, since Trump, they sell Klonopin in the school cafeteria.”

  “Very funny.”

  “Can I show Soph my new bag now?”

  Natalie reached out and looped her daughter’s arm around her in a reluctant hug. “Go to it,” she said.

  Alone in the hall, her eyes filled with moisture. Natalie recalled how, as a toddler, Hadley had developed the habit of sneaking into her parents’ bedroom with her blankets, sheets, and floppy stuffed cow. One morning she woke to find her daughter’s warm forehead touching her cheek; Hadley’s breath came evenly, pushing out soft shushes. Her eyelids fluttered, and her small hand rested, as if in benediction, on the top of Moo’s head. Hadley smiled at Natalie upon opening her eyes, and said, “Hi, Mommy. I miss you at night.”

  Time was a ruthless thief.

  On her bed, Natalie checked her phone messages. There was nothing from Ellen. No email either. She wondered if she should call the police. Of course, that was an alarmist response. Isabel was probably right. The old woman was most likely on vacation. She noted the new emails: an inquiry about work, five political cries for donations, and one in her junk file from a bbGodfrey@gmail.

  Natalie clicked on the unknown sender and read: You were lied to about that night. Have you asked your sister about the blood on the car? The guy who was there knows.

  six

  —

  HUGE WINGS SEEMED TO FL AP IN NATALIE’S CHEST. SHE experienced a blurry disorientation. Like the first walk down the corridor of the hospital, after her concussion, with its chemical odors, the sight of the patchy-skinned sick from their opened doors, the grim discussions among the bevy of medical staff. She bolted out of bed, bent her knees, squatting into a dip position, as if readying herself to fall on the ice. Leaning forward, fists on her floor, she breathed deeply.

  Get up. You’re fine.

  How was this person privy to her identity, her email address, her relationship with Isabel, she wondered as she scuttled to the kitchen to get a glass of water, an excuse to keep moving. Hadley, who was most likely plugged into the synth and stomps of Beyoncé, wouldn’t hear her. Her mind charged with questions. The Caribbean night had been so dark, and the only other car on the road had been Simon’s. Maybe another vehicle had arrived soon after they’d left the scene, and the driver had noticed that someone was wounded, which somehow, the three of them had failed to see.

  Exhale!

  It could have been someone from the conference who’d recognized Isabel when they’d first left the party. This bbGodfrey could have been following them, just not too closely, and gotten the license plate number, tracking them down through the rental company. The car had been registered in Isabel’s name, so discovering Natalie’s connection was another loose end.

  Why shadow Isabel? Why the spooky mystery?

  Halfway down the hall, she spun around, dashed back to her computer, hit reply on her mail. Who are you? What do you want?

  Then she typed into Google: “Car accidents in Grand Cayman,” and filtered for November of this year. She read the one brief report: “Surgery for Motor Bike Rider.” According to 27 News, an eighteen year old had been hospitalized after colliding, at 9:00 p.m., with a Jeep Cherokee on the East-West Arterial. There was a Royal Cayman Islands Police Service website that Natalie scanned. On the news link, she speed-read about crashes in other areas of the island than where they’d been heading, at various times of the day and on different dates. She skipped over passages but got the gist of what was on the screen. Nothing correlated with the night that she and Isabel had been driving from the Happiness cocktail party in the West Bay area of the island back to the Grand Reef Resort on the quieter East End.

  Good. Good.

  Natalie changed the search phrase to include “hospital reports.” The first result was a Wikipedia entry, followed by a list of irrelevant information. She tried “deaths on Grand Cayman,” and extended the filter in case the victim took a while to die. God, gruesome. Nothing.

  Her eyes burned. She hunted for the old eye drops—most likely expired—she kept for summer allergies in the hall bathroom. She passed Hadley’s room again; the door was three-quarters shut, neither a deterrent nor a welcome sign. Natalie longed for a diversion, but she was too keyed up to engage in a casual conversation with her daughter. And it was still too early to say goodnight. While Natalie’s pulse had been hurtling, time had slunk along. It was only 9:30 p.m. How could that be? There must be some equation in physics to expla
in this phenomenon.

  She flipped on the light in the bathroom and avoided the mirror above the sink. She knew how she looked: wan, glassy-eyed. She searched the vanity cabinet for the eye drops. Inside, along with a communal box of tampons, was her panoply of over-the-counter medications for stomach upset and headaches, for sinus congestion and menstrual pain, sunscreen, and a tube of cortisone cream for her skin. Among the mess lay her Visine, like a tiny bowling pin knocked over.

  Natalie uncapped the Visine and squeezed two drops in each eye.

  Have you asked your sister about the blood on the car?

  Back on her bed, she pushed the star icon for “Favorites” on her phone. When Isabel picked up, she blurted out, “I got a really strange email. About the accident at the conference. It freaked me out.”

  “Nat, slow down,” Isabel said. “Who was it from?”

  “Someone named bbGodfrey. Do you know him?”

  “Godfrey? No. I meet new people all the time, but I don’t recall that name.”

  “He mentioned the guy on the road, Simon.”

  “That is creepy,” Isabel said, her voice thicker.

  “Did you ever call the police?”

  “I told you I did. And you said you checked the newspapers?”

  “Yes, nothing.”

  “The emailer could be some crazy stalker I upset.”

  “How would he know who we are or about the accident?”

  Isabel hesitated. “It might be from someone who came to my lectures, who wanted to get my attention. Or who I unwittingly ignored. Simon could have mentioned it to anyone in passing.”

  “I’m upset.”

  Natalie wasn’t certain, anymore, if she were referring to the message, that there had been a witness in the Caribbean, or to the rest of what she’d learned about herself, all the revelations like a girdle tightening around her, cutting off her air.

  “Of course, you are. Listen, if this Godfrey contacts you again, we’ll investigate. I’ll take care of this, okay?”

  “Yes,” Natalie said with a rush of reassurance.

  “NORWAY BEAT DENMARK in the Happiness ranks this year. It came in second, after Finland,” Isabel announced from her seat on the desk. “My mother, Sigrid, was Norwegian, so it’s a matter of national pride to me.”

  Natalie stiffened. The last time Isabel had opened up about Sigrid was two decades ago in their Cambridge apartment. One evening, Natalie recited the blurb on the back of a book she was reading. It was about a girl who’d been on a class trip when her mother was murdered.

  Isabel had stopped eating their Chinese take-out, oily on her paper plate. “I was at nursery school and the classrooms were in a basement of a church that faced a cemetery. I tried very hard not to look at the graves. But sometimes, I’d do it anyway and get upset with myself for not being more careful. I’d made a valentine out of red felt for my mother even though it was April. She’d just gotten back home after traveling.”

  Natalie stayed very still, not wanting to cause a disruption. She asked, “Traveling?”

  “To Norway, to visit her family. My dad said she’d needed ‘time off’ from me. Motherhood was too much for her. I’d been a colicky baby. My dad said she hadn’t gotten sleep for months.”

  “But you wouldn’t have had colic anymore at four.”

  Isabel shrugged. “Obviously. But, my father said, ‘Don’t cry when she comes home.’ So, I didn’t. She was home a few days and was supposed to come get me at school. I was so excited.” Isabel’s nostrils had flared. “But she didn’t come for me. Ellen raced into the room.”

  Natalie knew the rest of the story. Instead of picking her daughter up at nursery school, Sigrid had a sudden cerebral aneurysm and died immediately.

  Now Isabel uncrossed her legs and leaned her hands on her knees. Her voice lifted, no hint of sorrow there. She was herself again, not the girl in nursery school whose mother had forsaken her, not the graduate student who still felt the effects of that wreckage. Natalie’s shoulders fell. Isabel had transcended a tragic history; so, could she. She had to believe that.

  “Tonight, we’re going to focus on some of the things we can learn from the countries that got the highest ratings from this year’s World Happiness Report.”

  The man with the tortoise shell glasses and the messy hair cried out, “How does anyone quantify the mood of an entire country?”

  Isabel laughed. “I can hand out the OECD’s two-hundred-page package, which will explain the qualitative and quantitative indicators used, Mr. Sonnenberg.”

  He waved this away. “Jeremy,” he said. “Don’t you chalk up the good mood of the Scandinavians to their excellent social programs, great healthcare, family leave, free higher education, the whole she-bang?”

  “Absolutely. There’s a section this year on how the United States has fallen from third place to nineteenth.”

  Hands on knees, he said, “No surprise why. Positive thinking, what we’re learning here, is all about one’s attitude, not real-world problems.”

  Natalie listened to this interaction, her attention dragged down like a flat stone skimming a lake until it sank into the muck below. She pulled out her phone and checked her email messages, as she did hourly: nothing from Ellen. Nothing from bbGodfrey. The what did I do? chorus temporarily silenced.

  “I’m not talking about denial,” Isabel said after Jeremy recited the litany of the country’s ills. Natalie realized she was nodding as his list lengthened, like a string of spittle from a sick man’s mouth.

  “Don’t you think this excessive navel gazing—all our selfies and Facebook posts and Instagram pictures—have led us to this predicament?” he asked.

  Isabel shook her head. “You are conflating self-care with selfishness.”

  Prama said, “You can’t just stare at the duhkha, you have to work through it. Find those doing good in the world, the light that has been turned on in the darkness.”

  Oh, for fuck’s sake.

  Natalie locked eyes with Jeremy who was making small circles around his ear: cuckoo.

  The college girl called out, “What about those of us who struggle with mental health issues?”

  Yes! Or worse, so much worse. Natalie thought of those brains with the black smudges, the marks of a killer. That could be me.

  “That’s an excellent question, Ms. Anshaw.”

  Isabel referred to studies, quoted statistics and promised that, utilizing cognitive techniques, anyone could reign in personal demons and “enjoy their lives.”

  How? How? How?

  Natalie had asked herself that question so often, over the decades, it creaked, worn and overused, like an old rope bridge. Did she even deserve contentment?

  After the group ended, Natalie lingered behind with the usual crew of women. “I was surprised you brought up your mom,” she said as soon as she had her stepsister’s ear. Once again, they huddled on the other side of the room and spoke in low voices.

  Isabel nodded. “I surprised myself. I’ve been going over this business with Ellen so much, my mom’s been on my mind. I don’t think there was anything sexual between my dad and Ellen. But maybe my dad had an emotional affair with her. Maybe that was part of the reason my mother needed to get away, to visit her family.”

  Natalie reached for Isabel’s hand. “You think Ellen was a problem for your mom too?”

  “Yes. I think Ellen was an issue in both of my father’s marriages. Anyway, I should go talk to Prama before she loses her Zen.” She winked. “Let me know if that nut job emails you again.”

  “Oh, I will.”

  When Natalie left, she found Jeremy Sonnenberg still in the vestibule, looking out the door’s glass panels. He wore a long rancher’s sheepskin coat with the fur-lined collar pulled up and a turtleneck sweater underneath.

  “Hi,” Natalie said.

  He swung around. “Hey, I was waiting for you. Time for coffee?”

  She felt a twitch of pleasure. “Sorry, I have to get home.”

&nb
sp; “Ah, my big mouth got me in trouble again. I admit I got carried away. I promise to reign it in next time.”

  She smiled. “You were a bit of a hog. But that’s not the reason. I have to get back to my daughter.”

  “Babysitter waiting?”

  “Ha, no. Hadley’s fifteen. I don’t want to leave her too late, though.”

  “Wow. Did you have Hadley when you were in Kindergarten?”

  Natalie liked that he’d repeated her daughter’s name. He was listening. “Nope, second grade.”

  “Overachiever I see. I’m Jeremy. Well, you know that.” When she introduced herself, “Natalie Greene,” he asked, “I’m headed to the T, you?” She nodded. “Walk together?”

  “Sure.”

  The wind was a bully swatting her across the cheeks, pulling her hair in front of her face. She hurried east, towards the Orange line. “How about you—any kids?”

  “Nope. Just a Golden named Reed, a Retriever, not one of those fancy doodle dogs.”

  “I love Doodles.”

  Jeremy slapped his hands over his heart in mock pretense.

  “All Retrievers. I swear! They’re my favorite.”

  “Reed’s a good boy. Do you have a dog?”

  “No, my husband—soon to be ex, isn’t a dog person.”

  “Sorry to hear, the dog, not the ex. If you don’t mind me saying that. No harassment, I swear.”

  She laughed. “I think, legally, you’re fine.”

  “So—clever change of subject here—how’d you hear about this workshop?”

  “Isabel’s my stepsister.” When his eyes widened, she said, “Please don’t tell anyone else in the group.”

  “Not a problem. I don’t talk to Prama or Feather or Hemp.”

  She deadpanned, “I’m pretty sure there’s no Hemp.”

  “Okay. Virasana.”

  “Ah. I see you’re not a yoga virgin.”

  “Only a couple of times, very painful. Got stuck in pigeon pose, needed to be airlifted out, limped for a week.”

  She laughed. “Duly noted, no pigeon poses.”