The Secret Desires of a Soccer Mom

by Robyn Harding

  “Yes, lead her on. I didn’t want to do that.”

  “Well” —I managed to slip my hand from his grasp— “she told me you were in love. She told me she was thinking of leaving Doug for you.”

  He did not blink or twitch. “No. If she left her husband, it would not be for me.”

  I didn’t know how to respond. He was basically telling me that one of my closest friends had lied to me, that Karen had concocted an elaborate, imaginary life to battle the suburban doldrums. When I had decided to meet with Javier, I wasn’t sure what to expect: a vehement denial? A confession? But not this bizarre explanation! This virtual stranger was asking me to doubt the sanity of my close friend. And the most disturbing part was: I believed him. I stood up. “Thanks for taking the time to talk to me.”

  He stood, too. “You’re welcome.”

  “I’ll let you get back to work.”

  “There is no problem. I make you another coffee?”

  “Oh, no, no.” I waved my hand. “I’ve got to get going.”

  “To your party?” There was a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

  “I think I’ll skip it.”

  “Well… It was nice to see you again… Paige.”

  I wished he would stop saying my name like that. “Yes… you, too.” I busied myself buttoning my coat.

  “Will I see you next week, at drawing class?”

  There was no need for me to go. My attendance had only confirmed the fact that I had very little artistic ability. I had met with Javier, and though I had yet to form a conclusion about his guilt or innocence, I had completed my mission. I also knew it was a very, very bad idea to see him naked again. “I don’t know…” I said. “I don’t think so.”

  “I hope you will come. Or, come have coffee with me again.”

  “Oh my goodness!” I started. “I didn’t even pay you for the coffee. I’m sorry.” With trembling hands, I dug in my purse for my wallet. A comb and a tampon spilled out onto the floor. Dammit! I bent to retrieve them. God, I had to get out of here. I righted myself and proffered Javier five dollars.

  He shook his head and smiled, sexily. “It is my treat… if you promise to come back?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I was sad about my friend,” he said. “It makes me feel better to talk to you.”

  “Okay… maybe.” I turned on my heel and hurried out of the café.

  I maneuvered the SUV through the darkened city streets and finally onto the highway. Alone in the darkness of the vehicle, I battled a heavy feeling of malaise. Meeting with Javier was supposed to bring clarity, but instead, I felt more confused than ever. I had also expected to feel some sense of accomplishment: I had met with Karen’s lover and could now report my findings to the police. But what was there to report? Karen had coffee a few times with a sexy barista and then imagined a passionate affair with him. I couldn’t let that get out. It was more embarrassing than having a real affair.

  But as I gained more distance from The Old Grind and neared Aberdeen Mists, a new, niggling feeling surfaced in my mind: doubt. Had Javier just played me for a fool? Was he well aware of his power over women? Could he make us believe anything he wanted with stories of his lonely childhood in Spain and his sad-eyed mother? Maybe Karen and Javier really had been lovers? Maybe he had actually killed her? Maybe I had just been duped?

  Chapter 16

  I slept fitfully that night. When I did get to sleep, I had disturbing dreams starring Karen wearing a large blond wig and smeared, red lipstick. But most of the time I lay awake, listening to Paul’s annoying, regular breathing and thinking about what Javier had told me. In the stillness of the night, my confusion seemed almost unbearable. I hoped things would look clearer in the morning.

  They didn’t, but thankfully, there was little time to dwell on the subject.

  I had slept late, which meant a frantic scramble to get my children dressed, fed, washed and loaded into the car for the commute to Rosedale. As we sat in our driveway, the SUV idling, I did a quick, mental checklist: lunches were packed, Spencer’s field-trip form was signed, Chloe’s homework was initialed and in her bag… We had done quite well considering the time constraints. And despite my foul, sleep-deprived mood, I hadn’t even raised my voice. I put the vehicle into reverse and began to back out of the driveway.

  “STOP!” Chloe shrieked from the backseat.

  I slammed on the brakes in panic, thinking I was about to run over the neighbor’s dog or small child. “What?” I screeched.

  “I forgot the Jessica Simpson CD I was supposed to bring to lend to Alexandra!”

  “Chloe!” I whirled on her. “Do you really think a friggin’ Jessica Simpson CD warrants a scream like that?”

  “God,” she pouted. “You don’t need to swear at me.”

  “What are you talking about? I didn’t swear.”

  “You said frigging. Like, duh?”

  “Frigging is not a swear word, young lady,” I retorted. “It is a swear replacement. Now, if you want to get the friggin’ CD, I suggest you hurry up.”

  She scurried into the house and was back within minutes, but we were already going to be late. I had just reached the wrought iron gates exiting our community when Spencer said hesitantly, “Ummm… Mom?”

  “Yes?”

  “I forgot my friggin’ reader.”

  Finally, after depositing my offspring at school, albeit twelve minutes late, I returned to the solace of my empty house. I felt exhausted, irritable and still confused about last night’s conversation. A cup of tea, some couch time and a little mindless Food Network viewing seemed to be in order. I desperately needed a break from contemplating Karen’s real or imagined affair and her accidental or homicidal death. As I filled the kettle, I checked the phone messages. There was one from Jane. Putting the kettle on the burner, I called her back.

  “I want you to come over for coffee,” she said. “I’m going to invite Trudy and Carly, too.”

  “Now?” The soft and welcoming couch seemed to beckon me.

  “At around ten,” she said. “It’s about time we all got together like we used to. Karen wouldn’t have wanted our friendship to fall apart because of her accident.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you at ten.”

  I was the first to arrive at Jane’s palatial home. Okay, palatial was probably too strong a word, but grand wasn’t. They had built the six-thousand-square-foot home two years ago to Jane’s exacting standards. While Karen’s home was like an upscale version of all the others in our suburb, Jane’s was in a different league. It perched, alone, on the top of a hill overlooking the rest of Aberdeen Mists. There was something regal about the McKinnon abode. It was like the king house: the rest of our homes its lowly subjects.

  “Hi!” Jane opened the door and mwa-mwa’d both my cheeks. I stepped into her grand entryway, which, unlike mine, the name actually befitted. “Let me take your coat,” she said, carrying it to a vast coat closet.

  “The place looks great,” I said, looking around. It was a pointless comment. The place always looked great, thanks to Becca and the Wednesday team from Merry Maids. I turned to Jane. “You look great, too.” Again, a completely unnecessary compliment, but she was looking particularly pretty in her white, cashmere sweater and slim, dark denim jeans.

  “Thanks. You look… really tired, actually.” She took my hand. “Are you okay?”

  “Oh, fine.” I laughed away her concern. “I just had a terrible sleep. I made the mistake of having caffeine at about nine o’clock last night.”

  “You silly thing. Come, I’ve got coffee brewing and Becca made a low-fat key lime pie this morning before she took Ainsley to pre-school and Amelia to her swimming lesson.”

  I waited in the resplendent kitchen, nursing my coffee while Jane welcomed first Trudy and then Carly. We sat at the massive, hand-hewn oak table, set with sunny yellow placemats and blue and white Tiffany bone china. Our host cut us each a slice of low-fat pie and then joined us. “Okay,” Jane said,
when she had taken her seat, “there are a few rules for this morning.”

  “Rules for coffee?” Carly laughed, looking from Trudy to me.

  “Yes,” Jane continued. “This is to be a happy gathering. We can talk about Karen, of course, but there is to be no crying. We should honor her memory by reminiscing about the good parts of her life, not the sad ending.”

  “Agreed,” we chorused, holding our coffee cups up in a sort of toast.

  “So…” Jane said. “What’s new with everyone?”

  There was not a lot new, or so it seemed to me. Carly and Trudy talked extensively about the Karen Sutherland Alternative Infertility Treatment charity. Trudy also mentioned Cameron’s supporting role as boy number three in the Young People’s Theatre production of Oliver Twist and Emily’s leap to grade-five piano.

  “Good for them,” Jane said, exuberantly. “And what about you, Carly? Any luck tracking down the Diet Coke man?”

  “No,” Carly said, with a small shrug of her shoulders. “But I’m okay with it. If it was meant to be, I would have found him again. That’s one thing Karen’s death has taught me.”

  “What?” I asked, looking up from my pie. “What has it taught you?”

  “Well…,” Carly said, “that we can’t necessarily control our destiny. I think our lives are already mapped out for us. We don’t know who we’ll meet, who we’ll fall in love with, or even when we’ll die. Karen’s short life inspired me to take each day as it comes and not put so much pressure on myself to find a man. I have a feeling that when the time is right, he’ll look up and I’ll be standing right there, in front of him. ”

  “That’s very accepting of you,” Trudy said, kindly.

  “Or fatalistic,” Jane chimed in. “I don’t know, Carly. You make it sound like we have no control at all. We make choices, choices that define who we become, our happiness and success…”

  “I agree that we have choice in our lives…” Carly was saying, but I could feel myself losing interest in their existential debate. My mind slipped back to Javier’s revelation about Karen’s fantasy life as I waited for a break in the conversation. Then, mustering my courage, I addressed the group.

  “How did Karen seem to you… before she died?”

  There was a long pause. My friends were obviously taken aback by the abrupt change of subject.

  “What do you mean?” Trudy asked.

  “Well, you know…” I said. “Did she seem happy? Content? …Sane?”

  “She seemed very happy,” Carly said. “It gives me some peace to know that she was in a good place, mentally and emotionally, when she passed.”

  “I thought she seemed fine,” Jane said. “I know she was sometimes frustrated about not getting pregnant, but otherwise…” she trailed off with a shrug.

  “So… she never said anything… strange to any of you?”

  “Strange how?”

  “I don’t know, just… weird or out of character?”

  “Why?” Carly asked. “Did she say something to you?”

  “Not really,” I said. “But I thought she seemed kind of… discontent with her life in Aberdeen Mists, just a little… out of sorts during the weeks before the accident.”

  “No,” Jane said. “I can’t think of anything.”

  Trudy, who had been silent up until now, finally spoke. “Well…” she began hesitantly. “There was one thing I took as a little… odd.”

  “What?” I leaned toward her across the massive table.

  “She asked me if I’d ever thought about living a simpler existence—like buying a small apartment, getting a cheap little car, spending less on clothes…”

  “Oh my God!” Jane said, as if this were the craziest thing she’d ever heard. “Why would she say that?”

  “I don’t know,” Trudy replied. “Of course, I told her that I felt blessed to have this life, but she was really on this simplifying kick. She was even talking about leaving Aberdeen Mists.”

  “No!” Jane said. “And going where?”

  “She didn’t say, exactly… but she mentioned Europe.”

  “Europe?” Carly asked.

  “Europe.” Trudy nodded.

  “Did she say where in Europe?” I asked. “France? Spain, maybe?”

  “Yes… I think it was one of those.”

  “Of course it was one of those,” Jane said. “People don’t dream of running off to Germany or Belgium do they?”

  “I suppose not,” Trudy said. “Unless they really loved beer… or waffles.”

  We all laughed, but my mind was preoccupied with Karen’s admission to Trudy. She had obviously been thinking a lot about fleeing Doug and her suburban existence, but what did that mean? Was her relationship with Javier the real thing? Had he promised to whisk her away to Spain to save her the humiliation of facing all the perfect, happily married Aberdeen Misters? Or was she just bored and discontent, and running off to Spain with her dream-boy was merely wishful thinking?

  Jane’s voice brought me back to the table. “Maybe Karen wasn’t as happy as we all thought.”

  “Yes, she was,” Carly said, vehemently. “I spent the most time with her and she was happy… very happy. She may have been a little frustrated, sitting around at home waiting to get pregnant, but she loved her life. She loved Doug.” No one said anything for a long moment. Carly added. “He has an air tight alibi, you know.”

  “We know,” I said.

  “Of course.” Trudy nodded vigorously.

  Jane jumped in. “No one’s saying Doug killed her, but maybe their marriage wasn’t as picture-perfect as we’d all believed.”

  “Well, whose is?” This came, surprisingly, from Trudy. She instantly noticed our eyebrows raised in surprise. “I’m just saying that no matter how solid your marriage, everyone occasionally daydreams of running off to the south of France with some muscular, young mailman.”

  I gasped. “You mean Leon!”

  “No!” She blushed. “I was being hypothetical. I could just have easily said muscular, young … meter reader.””

  I pointed at her. “You do mean Leon!”

  “Leon has great legs,” Jane said.

  “Particularly his calves,” I added.

  “He’s twelve years old!” Carly cried.

  “He’s twenty-four,” Trudy said. “Not that it matters because I wasn’t talking about him, specifically.” She was beginning to sound a little flustered.

  “Okay… I’m sorry,” I said, patting her hand, “but you’re right. Everyone has fantasies now and again.”

  “That’s right,” Jane seconded. “Even if you are happy, there’s not a woman in the world who doesn’t occasionally wonder about a different kind of life… a different kind of man.”

  “True.” I nodded.

  “So… Karen was probably perfectly happy,” Carly said. “I mean, you three have it all, and you still have fantasies.”

  We all agreed that this was true. Fantasizing about living in a small apartment in Europe did not necessarily mean Karen had been seriously unhappy with her current existence. With that subject exhausted, we returned to more lighthearted banter: how Chloe was adjusting to being a bespectacled sideshow attraction; Becca’s recipe for low-fat key lime pie (the secret was ricotta cheese); and the Foundation for Success’s annual fundraising craft sale… Before we knew it, Becca had returned home with Jane’s two Ralph Lauren-clad daughters, signaling that it was time to go.

  When I arrived home, I felt more lighthearted than I had since the tragedy. Jane had been right: it was important to keep up our coffee tradition in Karen’s absence. She would have wanted us to go on. In fact, our coffee klatch was kind of an homage to her. Going to my pantry, I grabbed the two, family-sized cans of soup and took them to the living room. Flicking on The Young and the Restless, I lay on my back and began working my pectoral muscles. It had been weeks since I’d felt motivated to tackle the life makeover list. Of course, lifting the soup cans was just a baby step, but still… It wa
s a good sign that I was on the road to recovering my normal life.

  As I lifted the cans and watched Malcolm (returned from the dead with really unfortunate cornrows) argue with his former lover/sister-in-law, a realization crept over me. My carefree mood had to be attributed to more than just a good chat with girlfriends. In fact, I almost felt like I’d had an epiphany, of sorts. Trudy’s confession had been the trigger. If even perfect Trudy fantasized about running off with Leon—or, rather, some anonymous hottie—then perhaps Karen’s make believe affair with Javier wasn’t so strange, after all? I had feared my belief in his story was a result of my own gullibility, my weakness for attractive, sensual men. But now, I realized he was probably telling the truth. We all had these momentary flashes of a passionate, exciting life outside the confines of suburbia. It was completely understandable. And the only difference between our fantasies and Karen’s was that she had told me her amazing love affair was real. So she’d told a little fib. So what? It probably made her feel happy to talk about it as if it were actually happening to her. I was glad to have brightened her final days by playing along.

  Victor Newman walked out on Nikki for the three thousandth time, and I breathed a deep sigh of relief. I felt as though I could finally stop clinging to my doubts and suspicions, and close the door on the mystery of Karen’s death. It was just as Paul had said: a freak accident. It was just as everyone had said: everyone but silly, paranoid me. I could finally let it go. There was no need to ponder the circumstances of Karen’s death, to question Doug’s alibi, or to think about Javier… at all. I was finally free!

  Chapter 17

  This sense of lighthearted freedom lasted through the weekend and on until Thursday. I was patient and fun-loving with the children, kind and affectionate with Paul. On Saturday night, back on schedule, my husband and I made love. It was very nice. Javier did make an appearance in my mind’s eye, but I no longer felt guilty about it. Now, fantasizing about Javier was no different than fantasizing about George Clooney. Since I had decided to drop the art class, there was no fear I’d be running into either one of them.