by Toby Devens
His gaze was still fixed on me when Claire said, “Hey, Colonel.” The look he tugged from me went to Jack, with a nod, before landing on the girl.
She said, “Claire? From Coneheads? You’re double vanilla on a waffle cone. Or sometimes a hot fudge sundae.”
His eyes sparked with recognition. “Claire, of course. Happy Fourth. I didn’t know you without your scoop. And the blue lipstick threw me off.”
Her lips were stained by the blueberry ice stripe.
“Good parade this year, huh?” He was still keeping me in his wavering line of vision. I watched perspiration bead above his upper lip. “Flag, Claire?”
“Absolutely,” she said. She pinched the teensy flagpole between two fingers and gave it a teensy wave. What I’d heard of her voice so far had been chirpy. But now it dropped an octave and went somber: “Thank you for your service. I mean, really. From the heart.” She was one for hearts, Claire was.
“Right, thank you for your service,” Jack echoed, startling me. Too little and late, but I was willing to give credit where due.
I took a deep breath. “My son,” I said. “Jack.” Pause. “Farrell.”
They performed the male greeting ritual, shaking hands and taking each other’s measure.
Scott snapped a backward glance as the band launched into “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” the traditional music that signaled the approaching end of this year’s parade. On cue, the floats picked up speed for the last lap toward home, which was the parking lot of the West Woodruff Middle School.
“Looks like your ride is leaving,” Jack said. Could have been rude, maybe not. Oversensitive, I wondered whether it sounded like he was hustling Scott along. I sent my son a warning look. He sent me back all innocence.
Scott answered good-naturedly, “Yeah, the photographers want us posed on the floats, so I guess I’d better hop on.” He smacked his right thigh. So when he leaned in to me, I figured that, in spite of his easy climb down from the float, whatever he wanted to say privately had something to do with his leg. But what I got were a few hurried words. “I’ve been really busy, Nora. Hit by some unexpected stuff. I’m going to try to make class tomorrow, but right now everything’s up in the air. It may be a last-minute call. I hope that’s okay.”
No, a part of me wanted to say from inside my hermit crab shell, where I’d been burrowing in for most of the last eight years. Life was so much safer hunkered down in my house on Surf Avenue, where even when waves broke hard at high tide or a nor’easter slammed the coast, you didn’t get swept away.
The other, braver part nodded yes.
We were halfway through that hazy purplish hour before sunset, waiting for night to fall so we could watch the fireworks explode over the ocean. Margo had claimed territory for us by spreading an old blanket on the sand, her island among the hordes that occupied every square foot of beach. A Brooklyn girl, she loved those hordes. They reminded her, she told me, of the precious, rare summer nights of her childhood when, every other Tuesday, her favorite aunt, Tante Violet, her mother’s twin and temperamental opposite, plucked little Margo from the dreary Wirth brownstone to watch the fireworks splash light and color over Coney Island. Memories that for Margo shone brighter than anything in her jewelry box.
She settled back against the towel draped to protect her delicate skin from the plastic beach chair (like the ones they’d carried on the subway to Brighton Beach), took a sip of her Diet Coke, rummaged in her beach bag, and dug out a bottle of sun block formulated from Tuscan herbs especially for exposure to twilight. Margo swore the most damaging rays ambushed you at dusk.
“You too,” she said, pointing to my arms. “You’re beginning to fry.”
When I declined to smell like a Caesar salad, she went from casting a “you’ll be sorry” glance at me to a longer look at her husband, who was stretched out in a lounge chair next to her, earbuds in place, sunglasses nested in his chest hair, eyes closed. I wondered if he really had “WWFG—The Shore’s Home of Country Music” coming through, or if he’d dialed the volume low enough to pick up outside chatter. He looked blandly innocent, but was he tuned in to our conversation?
“Maybe it’s your lack of sex paired with your lack of estrogen, Nora, because everything’s shriveling up in you, including your brain. Cut Scott some slack. The man does have a life besides learning the cha-cha.”
That was unfair and I fought back. “All I said was I was disappointed about maybe not getting to see him in class this week. You kept pushing me to expand my horizons. Okay, so I did, and now that I’m disappointed that they’re shrinking, you’re telling me I’m overreacting.”
“I’m saying, roll with it. This is real life, honeybun, not some schoolgirl fantasy. Relationships take time. They need to be nurtured. They face obstacles. And you told me yourself, Scott and Jack shook hands at the parade, so you’ve made it over the first hurdle.”
My gut warned me it wasn’t as simple as a quick change of heart. I knew my kid. He’d played nice as a peace offering to me because he was tired of tiptoeing around Tiger Mom. It was also possible he had something brewing with Claire, who was obviously a fan of the vanilla-loving colonel, and Jack didn’t want to mess that up.
“You know Pete thinks Scott’s a great guy, right?” Margo was spritzing sun block. “When they were on the board of the retired veterans’ home together, Scott had some good ideas about staffing. Pete was disappointed when he resigned. Scott said it was for personal reasons, no details, but now I think that must have been about the time of his divorce. Pete never did get the Bunny-Scott matchup. Like the time she came to the home’s fund-raiser one year in a dress cut down to there.” Margo pointed to her well-covered navel. “Everything, and I mean everything, was on display. Her skirt was so short you could almost see her whiskers. Totally inappropriate, though Pete said it gave the old soldiers a lift. Well, not below the belt, considering they were the last of the World War II and Korea vets, but there were a lot of bushy white eyebrows raised. The woman has no class. Sleazy.”
“But pretty,” I answered.
Margo wrinkled her nose, probably not at the scent in the air, which was a blend of boardwalk hot dogs and that Caesar dressing sun block, but at the thought of Bunny.
“Pretty? I suppose. If you like the ‘rode hard, put away wet’ look. Trust me, Bunnicula will not be a tough act to follow.”
“She must have had something.” I sighed.
Margo clucked in obvious disapproval. “I hope you’re not having a crisis of confidence, Nora. Back in college, you were the poster girl for breezy self-assurance. Which is probably why the boys fell for you like ten-pins. And Lon—he could have had anyone, but you just bowled him over.”
She dropped the spray bottle of sun block in her beach bag and pulled out a jar of neck moisturizer. Margo had specific potions for each part of her body. Greased up like that, she should have slid through life. She hadn’t.
“Your parents thought the world revolved around you, so of course you were confident. And confidence is very sexy.”
“You were the sexy, confident one,” I countered.
“In my case, it was an act. Well, not entirely. I have to admit that the ten years with the child psychiatrist helped. And the nose job. But you were genuine, natural man bait.”
“Man bait? Me? That’s crazy. I never—”
“I’m not saying you slept around, sweetie.” Margo shot her husband a calculating glance. He expelled a light snore and she continued. “But let’s face it—you weren’t a vestal virgin either.”
Oh, please—you could count on one hand the number of men I’d had sex with. Margo, on the other hand, and another other hand and at least one more hand, was into the double digits before she met Pete. It was part of her bohemian persona as a drama major, she’d proclaimed. Actually, when we were in our twenties it was part of most of our friends’ personas. As long
as you practiced safe sex and didn’t mistake it for love, it was kind of a badge of honor that you could treat men the way they treated the women passing through their lives—not badly, but casually, compartmentally.
Five men, but no one really did it for me before Lon. No one after, either. He ruined me for anyone else, or so I thought until I laid eyes on Scott Goddard.
“Give the colonel the benefit of the doubt,” advised Margo, who hardly ever gave anyone that benefit. She raised her hand, taking an oath. “I guarantee, he’s not after anyone but you.”
That’s when Pete opened his eyes and gave me an appraising look. “Needed that nap,” he groaned. Then, overdramatically, I thought, he sat up, checked his watch, unfolded to upright, and stretched.
“So,” he said, “I don’t know about you two, but all I had for dinner was a yogurt and a bag of baby carrots, and that was at five. I’m starved.”
Margo cocked her head in my direction, sending me a not-so-cryptic message as he slipped on his “Orioles—Go Birds!” T-shirt. Neon orange and black. You couldn’t help but notice it and the man wearing it. Which was the point, according to Margo. In his prime, he’d been mobbed on the beach. Now he had to advertise.
“Anybody want anything? You, sweetheart?”
“I’m fine.” An ironic smile played around Margo’s mouth. “I brought along a box of granola bars. Low-fat, high-fiber. It’s in my bag. Help yourself.”
I knew she was testing him, baiting him.
“No, thanks. I don’t want anything sweet. But how about you, Nora? Candy apple, funnel cake, taffy? I can stop at Benny’s.” The shop that had been feeding Tuckahoe and the surrounding towns junk food for decades.
“I’m good,” I said.
He patted his wife’s head. She showed me the whites of her eyes.
“I’ll be back before the show starts.” And he was off.
“The annual hot dog run,” I said.
After twenty years, I knew the menu by heart: hot dogs all around and the biggest tub of french fries Frybaby sold. Ditto on the onion rings. Lon and Pete used to polish off the high-cholesterol stuff by themselves. No wonder my husband’s arteries had been as clogged as the Lincoln Tunnel at rush hour.
“Yeah, but now Pete’s a vegetarian. This year it’s more an excuse to get away and call the girlfriend.” A shadow of pain, followed by disdain, skimmed her face. “Also, to press some older flesh. His fans await him. He just has to dig ’em up.”
We watched Pete detour to the most crowded patch on the sand and slowly thread his way through the blankets and chairs. “Wanna make a bet how long it takes before someone stops him and asks—”
She didn’t get to finish her sentence as Pete got waylaid by a gray-bearded man in an O’s ball cap.
“Hit number one. They usually say, ‘Aren’t you . . . ?’ They never used to ask, but he’s been out of the spotlight so long, these days they double-check. Give them a minute and they’ll be deep in a shallow conversation about the 1998 game between the Yankees and the Orioles where Pete made that once-in-a-lifetime catch off Rodrigo Ferez.” She waved off a sand fly. “Oh my God, can you believe this? He’s signing the guy’s stomach.”
Pete was indeed scrawling his autograph on an XX-large-T-shirt-covered potbelly.
She shook her head. “My husband carries a pen in his shorts pocket. Sad, isn’t it?”
It was Pete who broke the news. Not immediately. First he mowed through the three ears of nonbuttered corn he’d brought back from his trip to the boardwalk. When finished, he pitched the bag holding the cobs into the trash can, which was at least ten feet away. A perfect shot, which prompted a smattering of applause from the neighboring blanket. Margo had endured enough.
“Pete Manolis, ladies and gentleman,” she announced, and flourished a very smooth hand toward her husband. “Let’s hear it for the Greek Icon.”
“Hey.” He extended a bare foot and kicked her ankle. “Cool it. You’re being ridiculous.”
“I’m being ridiculous? How many bellies did you sign? No, really. How many?”
She was smiling, maybe joking. Men get a certain fawn-in-the-high-beams look when they’re dealing with the mysterious, fulminating volcanoes that are women on the rumble. They’re not sure if it’s laughter waiting to explode or something much worse. I saw Pete spin the wheel of reactions. He landed on playing along, but you could tell he wasn’t sure if it was win or lose. The foot that had nudged his wife was now nervously stamping sand. Oh, he was really taking a chance.
“Three bellies, four shoulders, the back of a hand, and one very shapely tush.”
“The shapely tush, now that I believe,” Margo drawled.
“Marg, I’m joking. Come on. Lighten up.” He strolled around to kiss the back of her neck. She didn’t shake him off. He was smart enough to change the subject. Or try to. “You’ll never guess who I ran into on the boardwalk.”
“Kim Kardashian, and you just had to stop and sign her ass.”
Outrageous was Margo’s specialty, but we all laughed and the dangerous moment passed.
“Scott Goddard at the Korn Krib. You know him, Nora.”
I nodded, working to keep my face expressionless.
“I haven’t seen him since he quit the board of the vets’ retirement home. Amazing guy,” Pete enthused.
Margo flicked me a “calm down” glance and took over. “Scott’s back in Nora’s ballroom class this year. And he’s a good dancer. Right, Nora?”
“On his way,” I mumbled. Then offhandedly, though I was sure that Margo wouldn’t buy the casual delivery, I added, “Maybe I’ll stop by and say hi. You know where he’s sitting?”
“About four rows almost directly behind us,” Pete said. “Plaid blanket. He was with someone at the Krib. I think. She was in line ahead of him, paid, and handed him the bucket.”
I scouted out the plaid blanket.
“Pretty?” Margo asked him, cutting to her version of the chase.
“I didn’t see her face and he didn’t introduce us. Redhead is all I know.”
“It’s a recessive gene. She could be his sister. Or his daughter, here for the holiday. Lots of people come in for the Fourth,” Margo said for my benefit.
I saw only the back of the woman seated on the blanket and didn’t recognize the hair. I was acquainted with the color, though, a heinous, carroty, do-it-yourself, whoops! dye job. But Scott seemed okay with it, with her. He was on his feet, hands moving, head nodding, chatting away. Hey, we’d only been out on one real date and it had ended awkwardly, canceling out the kisses, erasing any expectations, I thought with a twinge. I bit my lip as he reached down to grasp the redhead’s hand. Okay, more than a twinge. A pang stabbed me. Damn if she didn’t stumble against him getting to her feet. No, stronger than a pang. His hands were on her shoulders balancing her. A prick. That’s what it was. That’s what he was. A quake of anger rocked me. All that lovey-dovey stuff with me? Feeding me mussels and dancing me down the garden path—what did it mean if less than a week later he had another woman pressed against his chest? Even Margo was shocked. Her tsk-tsk cut through the noise all around us.
So much for me dropping in on Scott Goddard’s blanket for a hello.
Oblivious, Pete said, “I think I’ll walk with you, Nora. I’d like to talk to him about getting back on the board. Three years have passed, so maybe he’ll reconsider.”
“No, you don’t. Sit,” Margo commanded, and flashed him a “don’t ask” look.
A few minutes later some kind of answer sauntered our way, heading toward the water. Hot pink halter dress and matching pink flip-flops, neon orange hair cut short. Now—I sat spellbound at the approach—she passed directly in front of Margo, who fanned away a reeking cloud of cigarette smoke. In a voice that would have easily reached tenth-row orchestra, my friend said, “There are rules against smoking on the beac
h. There are fines. It really stinks up the place. I can’t believe how some people can be so inconsiderate.”
Belinda aka Bunny Goddard, converted to redhead and skinnier than I remembered, glowered down at the source of the comment. She locked eyes with me for a split second, then nonchalantly flicked her ashes within a millimeter of Margo’s painted toes. I swear I saw little sparks of fury shoot from my friend’s bangs as she brushed them back from her forehead. Ominously, she began to shift to her feet. Which is when Pete, in a version of the quick saves that had inspired cheers in Camden Yards in his heyday, snatched his wife’s hand and yanked her back into her chair. “Let it go,” he said.
But, of course, Margo had to have the last word. She growled, “Bitch,” after Bunny, then whirled on me. “Can you believe that chutzpah?”
I believed. Bunny wasn’t short on nerve.
The three of us watched Bunny’s progress as she turned, wound a path back to the plaid blanket, sashayed up to Scott, dropped her cigarette butt in the sand, then ground it out with the toe of her flip-flop. Scott bent to pick up the discarded inch of cigarette. The man who played by the rules. That’s what I used to think anyway. I could read Margo’s mind from the exasperated look she gave Pete—not me, Pete. All men are liars.
As the first of the fireworks detonated over the ocean, Scott sat. Then Bunny lowered herself to the blanket beside him. Was she leaning against Scott’s legs—one flesh and blood, one carbon-fiber composite? I said yes, but the light was fading, the silhouettes were low and jumbled, and Margo, viewing the same pantomime, said absolutely not.
“Ugh. The evil one rises from the crypt. I thought he buried a stake through her heart. Didn’t you tell me she moved to Florida?”