You Made Your Bed: A Novel

by Cornelia Goddin

  “Girls take boys?” said Gordon.

  “We’ll crush you!” shouted Caroline, throwing a fist in the air, but she had no confidence, given that Lillian was a distinct liability and Ainsley Tennant had no idea what she was doing. Caroline was furious about the injustice of the teams but couldn’t sort through the rush of words in her head to make a convincing protest, so she decided to concentrate on hitting Wilson’s ball out of play as often as she could instead of winning.

  All of the players chose mallets and took turns according to the colors on the first stake. The game proceeded the way croquet does: slowly, with the non-Crowes sometimes needing to be reminded to take their turns; Gordon cursing extravagantly and making everyone laugh when his ball took a bad hop and ended up on the wrong side of a hoop; Wilson gleeful when he knocked Caroline’s ball into the hydrangeas with a satisfying thwock. Lillian surprisingly held her own, considering she was listing to one side most of the time, staring out to sea as though waiting for a ship to round the point with someone or something very important on board.

  The boys did, in fact, win. Wilson danced around Caroline, doing his best to rub it in, but Caroline did not give him the satisfaction of showing her anger.

  “Bring me a lemonade,” she told him, settling into a lounge chair to work on her tan.

  “Get your own, loser,” he said, grinning at her, and then at Arnie, who was too afraid of Caroline to taunt her.

  But Caroline did not bite. She opened a book and flipped onto her belly, and Wilson’s face crumpled a little. His team had won and then the grown-ups disappeared and Caro wouldn’t pay any attention, and it was like all that work was for nothing. His glory so short-lived it left a bitter taste in his mouth.

  “Come on,” he yelled to Arnie, because Wilson, like his father, bounced back from defeat and disappointment with rocket-ship speed. The boys flew around the side of the house, looking for something new to entertain them. And they got their wish, because right there in the coastal Maine sunshine, they saw Gordon fucking Ainsley Tennant against the side of the toolshed. Her legs were wrapped around his hips, his forearm against the wall, and his hips pumped like a piston as he groaned.

  The boys, of course, were mesmerized. They had grown up in New York City, not led sheltered lives, and they had seen fucking on video more than once. But not fucking in real life, so close they could walk over and touch the people doing it. Not people they knew. They stood holding their breath, taking it all in. And then Wilson smacked Arnie on the shoulder and Arnie said, “Hey!” and Wilson sprinted up the porch steps and into the kitchen, Arnie following.

  “Where’s your mom?” Arnie whispered, as Wilson poured them glasses of lemonade.

  Wilson shrugged. He took the glasses of lemonade onto the back end of the wraparound porch, where a small bar was set up. He splashed vodka into their glasses.

  Lillian was upstairs in the room she shared with Gordon. In New York, they had been sleeping in separate rooms for years, but they always had so many guests in Maine that they needed the extra bedroom. The room was decorated in a style that made her intensely homesick, since it looked almost exactly the same as when she spent summers at the cottage as a child. The furniture was workmanlike, not antique, and painted a glossy white. The curtains were dotted Swiss and wafted in the breeze, the love seat covered in a blue-and-white ticking. The wide floorboards were painted a light seafoam green that made her miss her long-dead mother every time she noticed it.

  Lillian took a novel from the bedside table, lay down on the chenille bedspread that smelled faintly of bleach, and tried to read. But she was drunk and tired, and the sentences swam and wriggled on the page; she was distracted by the whooping of the boys outside, by a fly bumping along the ceiling, by her zigzagging thoughts.

  Just as Caroline was rolling over and reapplying sunscreen, Gordon came back around the side of the house, wearing a Speedo.

  “Dad,” she said. “Put some clothes on.”

  He laughed. His teeth were one of his best features, they were straight and white—naturally, without braces or whitening agents—and his arch was wide, all of which gave him an air of physical strength and power. His skin was lightly tanned with freckles on his shoulder, dark blond hair slicked back, showing an artfully receding hairline reminiscent of Cary Grant’s.

  “You know I can pull it off,” he said, coming over near Caroline’s chaise.

  She shook her head.

  “Admit it,” he growled.

  She laughed and shook her head again. “Okay, Daddy, whatever you say.”

  Gordon stood with his hands on his hips and lifted his face to the sky. “Glorious day,” he said. “Come get in the water with me.”

  “It’s too cold, Daddy,” said Caroline.

  “Such a delicate flower,” he said.

  Ainsley Tennant skipped down the porch steps wearing a bikini bottom and a T-shirt with nothing on under it. Gordon watched her and a slow smile spread across his face.

  “Oh, all right,” said Caroline. “I’ll go in, but only if it’s just the two of us.”

  Gordon turned away from Ainsley. “Oh Caro, mi cara, possessiveness is not attractive. How is it possible I have not gotten this across to you yet?” He reached out and took Ainsley’s hand, and pulled her up close to him. His nostrils flared. Caroline and Ainsley couldn’t take their eyes off him.

  Gordon flicked a glance up to his bedroom window. He saw the dotted Swiss curtains moving in the light breeze. And then he took off for the dock, running fast and easily. Caroline jumped up to follow, a few steps ahead of Ainsley, and behind them Wilson came streaking across the lawn. He passed the girls and leapt onto his father from behind just as Gordon stopped at the end of the dock.

  “Let me stand on your shoulders!” Wilson shouted, clambering up his father’s wide back. Gordon took his son’s hands to steady him while the boy got his feet up on his shoulders, then stepped to the edge of the dock.

  “Ready?” Gordon called out.

  “Aiiieee!” yelled Wilson, pushing off from Gordon’s shoulders and making a perfect dive into the freezing Atlantic, slicing into the water and not coming up for an alarming length of time.

  “My boy!” shouted Gordon. “Excellent!” Wilson surfaced and began flailing his way to the floating dock another twenty yards out.

  “I don’t know,” said Ainsley, wrapping her arms around herself and shivering, even though she hadn’t yet touched the water. Without a word, Gordon dove in after Wilson and showed off his perfect freestyle form, arriving at the floating dock seconds before his son. He lifted himself up by pushing with his arms while Wilson clambered up the ladder, the two of them talking and laughing, just out of earshot.

  Caroline turned around and went back to her chaise and her book, tears glittering in the corners of her eyes.

  11

  Caroline

  As I was saying, considering the pros and cons of various methods of murder takes up the majority of my middle-of-the-night ruminations. Shooting is so common in this country that by all rights it should be near the top of my list. If anyone in the family hunted, and there were guns lying around the apartment and some possibility of pushing the idea of an unfortunate accident…but we don’t and there aren’t. I’ve considered using a gun from a hundred different angles and it just isn’t going to work.

  Unless I decide to kill on the street, and try to pass it off as a simple mugging gone wrong.

  A possibility.

  The feeling of shooting another person—I can’t quite decide if it would feel like living a cliché, or like the closest a woman gets to experiencing ejaculation. Perhaps both at once.

  The biggest problem with guns is that they leave behind a trail of evidence that would be daunting to manage. You’ve got the initial purchase of the firearm, though the dark web should cover that. You’ve got barrel patterns, gunpowder residue, angles of bullet entry. You’ve got the problem of noise attracting attention. Even silencers aren’t exactly silent
—I bet you didn’t realize that?

  And sure, you dispose of the gun in some manner that seems final, but who’s to say it will stay lost? Unless you happen to have a smelter in your closet, that gun will always exist in the world, lying in wait to convict you.

  Though I do like imagining the look on the victim’s face, as they see the gun…they don’t believe you would ever actually fire it…and then you do. Eyes wide in disbelief as the life leaks out of them.

  No doubt I sound rather bloodthirsty, but honestly, I’m not. I like intellectual puzzles, is all. And justice. These contemplations of mine—they’re not much different from a young boy’s imagining himself as a superhero, setting things right in the world and breaking a few heads along the way. I’ve been trying to tell you—you don’t know the whole story.

  Sometimes, to make things right, people have to get hurt. The world is like that sometimes; you could even say it is the natural order of things. Just ask the zebra.

  Part II

  12

  Wilson

  Back in the city, at 744. When the elevator doors open, I take two steps out and BANG! Caroline and I smack right into each other. She goes down on one knee but recovers quickly.

  “Haha! I’m happy to see you!” I say, and throw an arm around her shoulder. Caroline is funny about hugs unless no one could possibly see, and Marecita or Mummy might wander by at any moment.

  “Frère Jerkah,” she says, straightening her jacket. Not holding back on the stupid French name she called me when we were kids, so that’s a good sign. She’s got sunglasses on so she’s even harder to read than usual.

  We stand there in the foyer for a long moment. I’ve got a ton of questions but with her you’ve gotta be careful. If you lay your whole hand down at once, she’s likely to sweep all the cards to the floor and you’re fucked. Keep your cards close to your chest—that should be our family motto.

  “Good to see you,” she says, lifting her sunglasses to the top of her head and smiling at me. “Maybe it’ll be easier to knock some sense into your head in person.”

  I grin at her. My sister—don’t take this the wrong way—she’s a total babe. Legs for days, great bod, streaky blonde hair. You’d think she’d have boyfriends around the block but I don’t know, she’s picky, I guess. Too smart for her own good maybe.

  I pretend to whack her in the side of the head and she grabs my forearm and holds it. Lately we’ve been sort of stuck in this half-joking wary place, and I don’t know how much is just the usual big-sister bitchiness or something else. But mostly I feel happy to see her, and think she feels the same, even though it’s Caroline, so she’s not gonna show it.

  “Let’s talk. Your room,” she adds, giving me a poke in the ribs. We go down the long corridor and duck into my old bedroom. There’s a Tufts pennant on the wall that Mummy got for me when I finally got accepted, but all the video game and death metal posters are gone. It doesn’t feel like my room anymore, which is fair enough, I guess.

  “It’s still so weird to come back here,” I say. “Do you think it’ll ever stop being weird?”

  Caro shrugs. “The fact that you’ve grown up? No. It’ll be forever weird.” She sits on the end of my bed. “So talk to me about this therapy business, Willie. Give me some hints about how I can talk you out of it.” She gives me one of her big smiles, the kind that feels like it’s got a price tag attached.

  Now I shrug. I decide, for once, not to joke. “I don’t think you can.”

  “It’s really doing something for you?”

  “Who knows? It’s only just started. It’s not the kind of thing that’s supposed to work in five minutes.”

  “What sort of result are you looking for?”

  I cross my arms and look up at the ceiling, sort of cocking an ear in case Sandie wants to whisper some encouraging words in there. “See, the problem is, I’m numb,” I say finally. “And I’m about to be a father. I wasn’t looking for that to happen, and if it had been my choice, yikes! It wouldn’t be happening. But. Now that I’ve had a little time to get used to—anyway, point is, I don’t want to be a crappy father. I’d like…I want to be better at this than Dad.”

  Caroline laughs. “You want to win at fatherhood?”

  “Not what I’m saying.”

  She pushes her hands into the mattress and lifts herself a few inches off the bed.

  “Look, leave Dad out of it, okay? I’m just…there’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a decent father, right?”

  “Of course not. I just don’t see the necessary connection between that and psychotherapy. Maybe you should just focus on making your wife happy, and supporting her, and the same thing with the kid. It doesn’t have to turn into this huge earth-shattering deal—people have been having kids for a long time without all this angst and introspection attached to it, right?”

  “Right.”

  She traces a pattern with her finger in the bedspread. “So what kind of stuff does she ask you?”

  You hear that? She shifted her tone just then, making it light and nonchalant. But I know Caroline: she’s always hiding what matters to her most.

  “Sandie? She doesn’t ask me anything, really. It doesn’t work like that.” I pause, watching her face to try to guess where she’s going next. “You should try it.”

  She throws her head back laughing. “Never gonna happen,” she says, and yeah, that I can believe.

  “Look, I don’t know why you care either way. If any shit floats to the surface, it’s going to belong to Dad and Mummy, not you. Right?”

  “Right,” she says, adjusting her sunglasses on her head.

  “Anyway, how’s your job with that professor going? Ever since Rebecca…I’ve barely seen you. How’re things shaking?”

  She starts talking, but it’s her usual talk that manages to say nothing and make the listener feel stupid at the same time. Classic Caroline. I notice that as she talks, she’s rubbing her belly with one hand, around and around, sort of absently caressing herself. Which…that’s exactly what Rebecca started doing when she got pregnant.

  “—I do like the work well enough, there just isn’t quite enough of it, you know?”

  “You could always teach. It’s not a bad gig.”

  “I don’t have quite the same need as you to piss Gordon off,” she says, snickering. “And kudos to you, it does drive him berserk. He’s always scheming about how to get you back east and into a job he approves of.”

  Our eyes meet and we smirk together. Just like old times.

  The hand on her belly keeps going around and around. I don’t think she realizes she’s doing it. If I were a betting man, and I totally totally am, I would lay odds that my half-insane and beautiful sister has a bun in the oven.

  And what’s all the more delish? I don’t think she even knows it yet. It’s not often I get a leg-up on something before Caroline.

  I want to give her a giant, comforting bear-hug, but ha! Caroline is not a woman you take those kinds of liberties with, believe me. She’s not a woman who likes being reminded in any way that she might actually need anyone else. A force of freaking nature, my sister.

  If I’m right? Maybe the baby will soften her up a little. Might be the best thing that ever happened to her.

  Almost like she knows what I’m thinking, she takes her hands away from her stomach and rubs her temples. I open my mouth to say something but she jumps in to say, “Yes, okay, I’m really stressed out at the moment. If you dare say one California word to me about meditation or something, I’m going to push you out of a window.”

  I take a risk and put my hand on her cheek. “Oh, Caro. Seriously, just chill. My therapy has fuck-all to do with you, really. Just forget I ever said anything.”

  She looks up at me and smiles, all thousand watts turned on. Like I said, it’s when my sister is smiling that you really have to watch it.

  13

  Caroline

  It’s a week before Christmas. The professor is on vacation and giv
en me nothing to do, so I’ve decided to go to Paris, maybe stay all the way until Christmas. It’s not as though Mummy cares where I am or what I do. And Gordon…this is a busy time for him. He’s got some deal cooking with that guy who likes Leslie Dahlquist, plus no doubt fifty other deals that need babysitting in one way or another.

  On the other hand, I’ll miss the fireworks when Wilson tells the parents about his therapy. I’m counting on Gordon to put an end to that silly enterprise; I suppose if I were being cautious, I’d stick around to see if I could help. But I’m feeling an urge to get out of town, to live an anonymous life if only for a few days. I can put out any fires when I get back.

  I can’t say Paris is my home because obviously that is New York, one hundred percent. But it is still close to my heart, because obviously it’s a beautiful, cosmopolitan city. The name Crowe means nothing there. There’s no pressure to present the right face to the public, no reporters nosing around, no photographers. I go there to relax.

  My flight’s leaving in a few hours. First class, of course. Are you insane? If there was ever something worth spending money on, it is getting your ass out of coach. If I teach you nothing else, remember that.

  On the other hand, some people I know (*cough* Natalie) spend far too much energy weighing the pros and cons of the amenities of various airlines. I don’t bother with that. In first class, no matter who’s doing the flying, the drinks are free and the seats roomy. What else matters?

  Also. The word “amenities” irritates me. Are we really such spoiled children that we require every fleeting whim fulfilled and every discomfort soothed? I suppose, to be honest, I too like to soothe my discomforts, as you have probably noticed. But “amenities” don’t soothe the discomforts of the soul. They do nothing for your existential dread, your inability to fit comfortably into the zeitgeist. An amenity is nothing more than a decent-quality chocolate offered by a cheerful airline hostess.