Mrs. Saint and the Defectives: A Novel

by Julie Lawson Timmer

  “Can you tell Jesse I’ll see him next door for school pickup?” she asked, sliding one foot into a shoe.

  “You can eat breakfast here if you want, you know,” Markie said. “We have cereal and toast. And I think there are frozen waffles.”

  Lola slid her other shoe on. “Ronda’s making oatmeal,” she said. “She always makes it for me when it’s cold out.”

  “Oh,” Markie said, “is oatmeal your favorite?”

  Lola ran back to the counter, leaned close to Markie, and whispered, “Not when Ronda makes it!” Giggling, she raced back to the door to let herself out. “See you after school,” she said, tossing Markie a smile and a wave before she disappeared the same way she had arrived, as though she had been doing it forever.

  Chapter Thirty

  Lydia couldn’t comprehend why Markie didn’t want to go home for Thanksgiving.

  “We are home,” Markie said, and Lydia laughed as though her daughter had said something ridiculous.

  “You always spend Thanksgiving with us. And what about Jesse?”

  “He’s gotten used to a quiet house,” Markie said. “He’ll be fine.”

  “But your father. Have you ever even cooked a turkey?”

  “I’m forty-five years old, Mother. Anyway, there’s the dog this year, and Jesse has this project he’s working on, and . . .”

  She looked around the house for more excuses. Water leak, small electrical fire, hole in the roof—any of these would be welcome. If Lydia had called a week earlier, Markie could have milked her sprained ankle and crutches, but a few days before her mother reached out, the doctor had finally declared Markie healed enough to drop the sticks and start putting weight on her leg. She now wore a walking boot and was getting along quite well. And she remained unwilling to lie to her mother. She steered clear of the direct route—telling Lydia she couldn’t take a long weekend of passive-aggressive digs from her about the life choices she should have made or lectures from her father on money management and career advancement. Not to mention the McLarens and the Wilsons and the other friends who would parade through the front door all weekend for her parents’ annual Thanksgiving open house. Ice tinkling in glasses, voices getting louder and tongues looser as Clayton kept the drinks flowing and they all went through the predictable comparison of the successes and failures of their children and grandchildren. It had been difficult enough when Markie was on the success list.

  Lydia wouldn’t appreciate that kind of frankness, but not because it would hurt her feelings to learn Markie didn’t like their group of friends. She was Teflon, Markie’s mother; insults slid right off her, and before they hit the floor, they morphed into cutting remarks designed to let Markie know that any problem she had with her parents’ friends was actually a problem of her own. If she couldn’t get along with the McLarens or the Wilsons, well, then, cue the long sigh as Lydia struggled to accept the fact that despite all they had done for her, Markie was simply not the daughter they had hoped for. As for Markie not liking how her parents spoke to her, Lydia wouldn’t even hear that part, having long trained her inner ear not to detect any noise approximating criticism directed at her or Clayton.

  “But I thought we’d invite Kyle,” Lydia said.

  “You used to ask me not to bring him home for Thanksgiving! Now we’re divorced and suddenly you want him there?”

  Lydia sniffed. “I just think a nice family holiday would make the two of you see what you’ve given up.”

  “We’re not getting back together, Mom.”

  Until recently, she would have added that they were barely speaking. But that was no longer the case, as these days they were interacting quite nicely. Markie didn’t think this was the time to tell her mother, though. Lydia would only use it as an opening to push harder for their reconciliation, and Markie was never going to reunite with Kyle, even if the sight of him at the bungalow’s side door now made her smile rather than scowl.

  A few days after their talk in the coffee shop, and after a number of imploring texts and phone calls from Markie, Kyle had finally agreed to come over to visit Jesse. By then, she had given some thought to his situation, and she’d had a lightbulb moment when her father mentioned over Skype how handy Kyle was. When he arrived, she greeted him with a welcoming smile and a list of repairs he and Jesse could work on: replace the broken window in the garage, change the filter on the furnace, fix the leaking hot water faucet in the upstairs bathroom. “Frédéric said he’d be happy to lend you his tools,” she told him.

  While Markie reviewed files on the patio that afternoon, she could hear the sounds of wood being sawed, nails being hammered, and a father and son talking and, from time to time, laughing. When she asked Kyle about it on the phone later, he told her he had never had an easier time relating to his son as he did that day, when their hands were full of tools and their attention was on a broken window frame or a loose pipe. “Sure beats staring at each other in my matchbox of a living room,” he said.

  He agreed to return the following week, and although he flaked out at the last minute, he made a point to ask for a rain check, something he had never done before. When the new date arrived, he was at the bungalow door at the scheduled time, his own toolbox in hand, with a list of his own. “I noticed a few other things when I was here last,” he said.

  “Terrific!” Markie said, turning to the basement door to call Jesse.

  “Wait,” Kyle said. “Before you get him up here.” Markie spun around to face him. “I just want to say that I know it’s not enough,” he said, gesturing to the piece of paper in his hand. She could see his jaw muscle flexing as he struggled, either to find his next words or with the memory of what he had done. Without turning, she called to Jesse.

  “He’s here?” the boy yelled back, his excitement palpable.

  Markie smiled at Kyle and said, “But it’s a good start.”

  “We’ll buy the plane tickets,” Lydia said now, unwilling to drop the matter. “For Kyle, too.”

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  “Would you rather drive? It’s such a long way.”

  “I’ve got to go, Mom.”

  “What a shame for Jesse to lose his traditions along with his family,” Lydia said, in lieu of goodbye.

  That night, instead of waking Lola when Patty knocked, Markie let the girl sleep and hurried down to answer the door before Angel woke. “I thought you might want to stay over again, in case Carol took the key, or—”

  Patty grinned. “Outsmarted her. Made a few copies and hid them in the car. She can try to keep us out, but it’s not going to work.”

  “Do you really want to go through all that?” Markie asked. “Because you could stay here instead. Lola could sleep the whole night, and you wouldn’t have to deal with your mother. Would be a lot easier, right?” She took a step back and gestured for Patty to come inside.

  Patty didn’t move. “I don’t want to put you out just because I’ve got a difficult mother.”

  “Believe me, you’re not the only one.”

  “Yeah,” Patty said with a laugh, “I’m sure your mom’s always getting faded and stealing your money and hiding your keys.”

  “The details might be different, but the difficulty is pretty much the same.” Markie took another step away from the door, clearing the way for Patty to come in.

  “Well,” Patty said tentatively, still not moving, “it was kind of nice having a shower with actual water pressure that morning I was here. It trickles out at our place, and if the neighbor beats me to it, it’s cold by the time I get in.”

  “Lola and I just put clean towels in the bathroom tonight,” Markie said.

  “That’s good you’re putting her to work.”

  “I didn’t intend to. She insisted. She’s apparently fascinated by the washer and dryer.”

  “She’s fascinated by a lot of things over here,” Patty said. “I’d hate for her to get too comfortable. Count on staying all the time.” But she took a step inside,
closing the door behind her.

  The next morning, Markie was refilling her coffee mug when Patty, back from walking the dog and finished with her shower, came downstairs.

  “You want a cup?” Markie asked.

  “Mrs. Saint’ll have my head for drinking coffee with you over here instead of dragging you to her place,” Patty said.

  “I won’t tell if you don’t.”

  “I’m not really the drag-someone-somewhere type, anyway,” Patty said. “I’m more of the live-and-let-live mentality. And you’re the drink-your-coffee-alone type, I happen to know. So you do that, and I’ll go next door and yuk it up with the others.”

  “No,” Markie said, “really. Stay and have a cup. An entire group I’m not keen on, but if it’s just one person . . .”

  Which wasn’t completely true. There wasn’t anyone she was eager to have coffee with, even if it were only the two of them. Except for Patty. The conversations they’d had lately—when Patty stayed over, or when she came to get Angel for her walk—had made Markie see that there was something different about her. Patty had an easiness, a certain level of self-acceptance, that most people, in Markie’s experience, didn’t have, even though plenty pretended they did. Patty wasn’t embarrassed or apologetic about her crazy addict of a mother or the conditions under which she was raising her daughter.

  And she seemed equally nonjudgmental about other people. She spoke only respectfully about Mrs. Saint, Ronda, Bruce, and Frédéric, despite their peculiarities, and she had never given the impression she thought Markie was odd because of her hermitlike existence or her refusal to accept help from, or socialize with, the people on the other side of the fence. Anyone could say something pithy like “Live and let live,” but as far as Markie was concerned, Patty was the only person she had ever met who actually meant it. It made being around her feel so freeing and uncomplicated that Markie had noticed their visits getting longer and longer only because the clock told her so and not because she found herself feeling anxious and claustrophobic the way she did when conversations with other people started dragging on.

  Being around her had even made Markie lighten up on herself a little. Patty didn’t look sideways at Markie’s faded, tight yoga pants or her messy ponytail or her freezer piled with frozen pizzas, so Markie didn’t frown at herself in the mirror as often or gulp with guilt at the contents of her grocery cart. It was such a change from her old life and the censorious gazes of Lydia and the Mothers’ Club—looks that had caused Markie to spend years doubting her outfits, her hairstyles, her entire being. It made her cringe to think she had aimed the same stare of condemnation at other women, both at Saint Mark’s and in her fancy neighborhood. She wished she had met Patty years ago. She’d have been a happier person with Patty in her life. And a better one.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Perspective. A month earlier, the thought of spending an entire day shopping and cooking would have made Markie want to take a long nap. But the day before Thanksgiving, as she unloaded sweet potatoes and onions and flour and cranberries and oranges onto the kitchen counter, she felt positively giddy at the prospect of devoting the rest of her day to making sweet potato casserole, rolls, and cranberry sauce for the next day. Having escaped a weekend of blame and shame at her parents’ house, she felt lighter than air and filled with an energy she hadn’t experienced in a long time.

  To everyone’s surprise, she had accepted Mrs. Saint’s invitation for Thanksgiving dinner. So had Frédéric—no shock there—along with Ronda and Bruce, which was also nothing new. But Patty’s and Lola’s presence would be a first. They had resumed spending nights in their own apartment, and things had been okay between Patty and her mother, but recently, Carol had started seeing a man who frightened Lola and made Patty feel she should count her spare change and inventory the contents of the medicine cabinet before she left each day. Carol insisted on having him over for the holiday, so Markie invited Patty and Lola to stay with her and Jesse for the long weekend.

  Markie wasn’t a good enough cook to pull off an entire Thanksgiving meal on her own, but after her mother’s guilt trip, she couldn’t bear to allow Jesse—or Lola, for that matter—to spend the day in the bungalow eating sliced turkey on bagels when they all knew there would be an enormous holiday feast being served on the other side of the fence. So she had agreed to show up on the holiday with a few side dishes and the membership of her house. Even Angel was invited.

  Markie was folding the grocery bags when Mrs. Saint knocked at the side door, then let herself in.

  “I have brought recipes,” the older woman said, producing a thin stack of recipe cards from her coat pocket.

  Instead of snapping back that she would follow her own cookbooks, Markie decided to negotiate a bit and trade her compliance for some information. Eyeing the cards the old woman held out but not taking them, Markie said, “Lola tells me Frédéric lives with you.”

  “Of course he does,” Mrs. Saint said, in the same “duh” tone Lola had used when discussing the topic with Jesse.

  Mrs. Saint stepped to the kitchen counter and sorted through her cards, searching. “So. For the sweet potato. I do not want marshmallows on top. You Americans are always looking for ways to take a perfectly acceptable vay-gay-tay-ble and turn it into a candy.” She curled her lip. “This will not do.”

  She found the recipe she was after and set it on the counter. “Here. For the casserole. And . . .” She paused while she looked for another card. “Aha! Yes, here.” She set another card down. “For the rolls.”

  Markie scanned the ingredients on the second card. “Yeast” was underlined twice and circled, and she imagined there had been some paperweight-like rolls served next door after Ronda forgot this key ingredient. She pushed the cards toward their owner.

  “I find it odd that all this time you’ve never mentioned he actually lives there. Or where it is that he goes in the afternoons. You want all this information about me and Jesse, yet—”

  “Ah,” Mrs. Saint said, smiling patiently as though Markie were a child struggling to comprehend the difference between a circle and a square. “But you are not asking about me. You are asking about Frédéric.”

  “Oh, come on! You had no problem telling me things about Ronda and Bruce. And Patty.”

  Still smiling tolerantly, Mrs. Saint placed a dry, cold palm on the back of Markie’s hand, letting it rest there. “Mais oui. But there is a difference between the kind of telling that will hurt a person and the kind that will not.”

  Markie, finally, smiled back. “Yes, that’s true.”

  “But I can tell you this about Frédéric,” Mrs. Saint said. “He does not live with me because he is not able to live by his own self or because he cannot afford. He came here for a very good job many years ago, and over this time, he saved much money. And, also, as you have known by now, he is most capable. He lives with me only because he wants me to be safe always. And he trusts this job to no other person.”

  “Came here for a job?” Markie repeated. “You mean, from Canada? You told me you’ve known him for many years. Did he grow up there, too? Did you and Edouard move here first? Is that why Frédéric came, so he could be closer to the two of you?”

  “About Canada,” Mrs. Saint said. “I want to tell you about this, too—”

  The side door burst open then, and Patty rushed in, out of breath, Angel running ahead of her.

  “And now I must go,” Mrs. Saint said. “We will talk of this another time.”

  “Did you run?” Markie asked Patty when the older woman was gone.

  “No,” Patty said, still panting. “I carried this.”

  She pointed to something sitting outside, and before Markie could get to the door, Patty was through it, heaving a wooden bookcase inside. It was small and squat, with only three shelves, but from the way Patty was straining, Markie could tell it was made of solid wood.

  “It needs a good wipe-down,” Patty said. “But it’s a great piece. Better than cardboa
rd, wouldn’t you say?” She pointed to the kids’ makeshift game shelf in the corner. “I garbage-picked it. Curb retail, I call it. Why spend money when you can spend a little time and energy instead?”

  Clearly pleased with herself, she trotted to the kitchen to dampen a paper towel, then returned to the shelves, running the towel over every inch. Before Markie could decide whether she wanted to furnish the bungalow with other people’s castoffs, she found herself helping a cheerful Patty push the new unit into place against the wall and transfer the games over. When they were finished, they stood back to admire the scene.

  “Much better than cardboard!” Markie said, realizing, to her surprise, how little she actually cared about the origins of the thing.

  Together, they carried the empty cardboard boxes back to the basement, and while they were down there, Patty noticed the corner where all of Markie’s artwork sat, still boxed up, waiting to be loaded onto the moving truck.

  “You mind if I . . . ?” Patty asked, a hand on one of the boxes.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Whoa,” Patty said, lifting out a painting. “Mother and girl. Or Madonna, right? That’s what they call her? You don’t see that too often, do you? Isn’t she usually holding a boy?”

  Markie smiled. “She’s always holding a boy. Can you believe that’s supposed to be one? The artist got carried away with the curls, I guess, and ended up with a very feminine-looking boy. That’s why I got it for such a good price, because it’s a reject. I was in this gallery looking for some things for the nursery after we learned Jesse’s gender, and that’s the first thing I saw. I bought it anyway, since it was marked down to almost nothing, and I thought, Why not? We might have a girl next. We didn’t, obviously, and I never hung that one. I didn’t get one for Jesse’s nursery, either. I ended up going with a Noah’s Ark theme and stopped looking for a proper Madonna. Anyway, the rest”—she swept her hand over all of the boxes marked ARTWORK—“were all hanging in our old house. That one’s lived in a box since the day I bought it. Kind of a shame, now that I think of it.”