The Night the Lights Went Out

by Karen White

  He didn’t bother to explain who he was or why he was there or why he was coming from the direction of the bedrooms. Merilee had a strong suspicion that he was doing it on purpose and she felt herself smile.

  Michael shook his hand and introduced himself.

  “And this is a good friend, Sugar Prescott,” Wade said, indicating the old woman, who was still sitting but behind Michael and out of his line of vision.

  “My landlady,” Merilee explained. “Sugar, this is my hus—ex-husband, Michael.”

  Sugar stared at him with hard eyes, and Merilee had the strangest feeling that Sugar was doing it for her. The old woman didn’t stand or say anything, just kept staring at Michael like she was waiting for him to disappear into a pillar of dust.

  “It’s good to meet you,” said Michael, for once at a loss in a social situation.

  “Hrum,” said Sugar, not taking her eyes away from him, while he tried to keep smiling as if being given the evil eye were something that happened regularly.

  Turning to Merilee, he said, “So, I was thinking if Lily was feeling up to it that I would take the kids to Cracker Barrel for lunch.” He patted his pockets as if making sure he had his wallet, and Merilee noticed the bare finger on his left hand, a discernible indentation visible from where a wedding band had once been, worn every day for eleven years. This shouldn’t have surprised her, shouldn’t have made the lump form in her throat. Tammy wouldn’t want any proof that the man sleeping next to her had belonged to another.

  Colin started jumping up and down, shouting, “Cracker Barrel! Cracker Barrel!”

  Lily hopped on one foot. “Yes, please, Daddy!”

  Merilee stole a glance out the front window to Michael’s car, relieved not to see a person in the passenger seat. “Won’t Tammy mind not having you home for Sunday lunch?”

  He looked a little sheepish. “She’s . . . resting.”

  Merilee crossed her arms. “The first trimester is always the most exhausting.” She didn’t know she’d said it until it was too late, only Wade’s widened eyes making her realize she’d spoken out loud.

  Michael gave her an odd look. “You know?”

  “Anyone who reads The Playing Fields Blog knows.” She glanced at Colin, who seemed oblivious to the conversation and was still jumping around shouting, “Cracker Barrel!” Quietly, she added, “You and I will have to discuss this later, in private. We’ll need to explain this to the children.”

  “Of course. But a blog? Who writes it?” His face darkened, and Merilee imagined him trying to organize his thoughts, to prioritize line items, to limit loss. It was what made him such a good corporate financial adviser.

  “I don’t know—it’s anonymous. And I don’t ask around because I don’t want to publicize it. It mentions a lot of families in Sweet Apple, including ours—although not by name, thankfully—and it’s not all that flattering.”

  “This isn’t acceptable,” he said, his face darkening further.

  Neither is leaving your wife and getting another woman pregnant, Merilee wanted to add. But didn’t. Michael had always been better at pointing out other people’s shortcomings than at noticing his own.

  “Well, freedom of speech and all that. The person isn’t using names, so hopefully not everyone reading it will know it’s us. And if nobody talks about it, then hopefully it will fade away.”

  Lily was now hanging on to her father’s arm, breathing heavily from hopping, and a deep crease between her brows was now visible. “It now has over two thousand followers. Everybody at school knows about it, but Bailey doesn’t think anybody knows some of it’s about us. And she promised me she wouldn’t tell.” Her eyes widened as if a thought had just occurred to her. “But what if she does?”

  After a deep breath, Merilee said, “That’s for us to worry about and not you, all right? I’m thinking this is just a short-lived fad that will go away soon and we can forget all about it. Like Pokémon Go.”

  Her words did nothing to soften Lily’s frown of worry.

  “Look, why don’t you all go out to lunch and forget about some stupid blog. It will give me a chance to do a little housework.” She hadn’t planned on it but felt the need to say it out loud in Sugar’s hearing.

  Michael glanced at Wade as if still waiting for an explanation for his presence, before turning back to Merilee. “I thought maybe you’d like to come to lunch with us. You know, like old times. Just the four of us.”

  She felt Wade and Sugar staring at her, making her feel that if she didn’t have the right answer, they would provide it. “There’s no ‘four of us’ anymore, remember? Besides, the kids have been with me all week. I’m sure they’d like some alone time with you.”

  “Mom—,” Lily started to protest, but Merilee cut her off with a glance.

  “We’ll both be there for school and athletic events when we can, all right? But things are different now.”

  “Is Miss Garvey coming with us?” Lily asked, her voice so quiet that Michael had to lean closer.

  His mouth tightened, understanding the meaning behind Lily’s question. “You can call her Tammy now, Lily, remember? She’s not your teacher anymore. And it’ll be just you, me, and Colin. We can get sundaes for dessert, too, if you want.”

  “Sundaes!” Colin shouted, resuming his jumping, while Lily barely mustered a smile.

  She sent Merilee a hopeful look. “But what about my foot? Dr. Blackford says I should stay off it.”

  “I’ll carry you,” Michael answered before Merilee could say anything.

  As if conjured, the sound of tires on gravel came through the front screen door as Daniel’s black Mercedes came to a stop next to Wade’s pickup truck. She met him at the front door, relieved to see he had her phone in one hand, and horrified to see he had Sugar’s tray full of cookies in the other.

  She found herself flushing, remembering what Lily had said about Daniel thinking she was pretty, and hoping it had been a throwaway remark that he didn’t recall. “Daniel—so nice to see you again. But really, I could have picked these up myself. You didn’t need to go to all this trouble.”

  “No trouble at all,” he said, grinning, looking very much like Brad Pitt in his sunglasses and oxford-cloth shirt rolled up at the sleeves. “I was headed back to Sweet Apple before Heather and the girls were ready, and when she realized we had your phone, she said I had to bring it to you as soon as I got back to Sweet Apple. Claire and her husband will be here in about an hour to return your car.” He looked sheepish for a moment. “You know, you really should have your phone password protected. It would have made it harder to find out who the phone belonged to, but anyone could have accessed all of your passwords and personal information.”

  “Yeah, I know.” She looked at the tray, wondering how she was going to get it into the house without Sugar seeing, when she noticed that half of the cookies were missing. “I thought nobody ate them because I didn’t include nutritional information.”

  He gave her a self-deprecating grin. “Well, nobody at the party ate them. But when Heather went for her run this morning, the girls and I enjoyed a few. For the record, we all agreed they were probably the best cookies we’d ever tasted—but don’t tell Heather. She thinks her flourless carob chip cookies are to die for. And they would be if you like eating paper.” He winked. “I thought I’d done a good enough job of hiding all the empty spaces on the tray.”

  She laughed, then pocketed her phone while taking the tray. “Would you mind doing me a favor? I need to get this tray to the kitchen without Sugar seeing, so if you could go in and say hello and introduce yourself to the men and distract Sugar for a minute, I’d appreciate it.”

  “I’m on it,” he said with mock seriousness. “And I’d like to take a look at Lily’s ankle, too, if that’s all right.”

  “Perfect,” she said, giving him a thumbs-up before running back toward
the kitchen. When she returned a few minutes later, after having placed the cookies into storage bags and washing and drying the tray, Lily was back on the sofa while Daniel examined her foot. Sugar had thankfully stopped glowering at Michael and had stood as if preparing to leave.

  “If you’re ready to go, Sugar, I’ll drive you back,” Daniel said as he stood.

  “Yes, thank you,” she said, causing Wade and Merilee to exchange a worried glance. Sugar held up her bare arm. “I forgot my Fitbit, so why torture myself?”

  “I think you’re missing the point, Sugar,” Daniel began, then stopped, realizing how pointless it probably was to argue. Facing Merilee, he said, “Lily is doing nicely—no problem with her putting weight on it, and Friday cheerleading tryouts are fine. Just let me know if you notice any swelling or bruising, but I think it’s good. She can walk on it today, just no running or jumping, okay?”

  Lily nodded, looking almost disappointed that her day of leisure on the couch was over.

  Daniel offered his hand to Wade. “Good to see you again.”

  They shook and Wade nodded.

  “You two know each other?” Merilee asked.

  “Sure do,” said Daniel. “We go way back to our single days right after we both moved to Atlanta. Lived in the same apartment building in Buckhead.”

  “And Wade dated Heather for a bit, too, didn’t he?” Sugar said, projecting her voice so everybody would be sure to hear.

  Wade gave them a tight smile. “Yes, a million years ago when we were just babies. And before she met Daniel, I might add.”

  “Small world,” Merilee said, trying to picture the golden Heather with the pickup-truck-driving Wade and unable to.

  Sugar’s lips pressed together in disapproval. “That’s when she still had brown hair and shopped at Penney’s. Don’t think she does that anymore, right, Daniel?”

  Instead of answering, he tucked Sugar’s hand into the crook of his arm. “Nice to meet you,” he said to Michael as he led a straight-backed Sugar out the door.

  “Wait a minute,” Merilee said as she scooped up the tray she’d left on a side table and handed it to Daniel. “If you wouldn’t mind.”

  “Not at all,” he said with a wink.

  There was an odd glint in Sugar’s eyes. “When you return a serving piece, you’re supposed to return food along with it.”

  Merilee thought of all the cookies in the storage bags sitting on the kitchen table, and the times she’d offered food to Sugar and each time been refused. “Thanks for letting me know,” she said with a forced smile.

  “I’ve got all that I need,” Wade announced, following them outside. “I’ll call you sometime this week to set up a time to come install everything.” He said his good-byes, then climbed into his truck, leaving Merilee alone with Michael, the children having been told to go get their shoes.

  They stared at each other for a long moment, strangers but not. She noticed for the first time the dark circles under his eyes, his slightly rumpled pants and shirt. “You have the iron,” she said. “But if you take your clothes to the dry cleaner, ask for light starch. You like it that way.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “So, how are you?”

  “Just great. Fabulous.” Awful. Heartbroken. Lonely. She said none of those things. He didn’t deserve them. He didn’t deserve to know how much she still hurt, or that all he had to do was say he wanted her back and she would be lost again, all her strength and resolve dissolved like smoke.

  “Good,” he said. “That’s really good. You look great, by the way. Like you’ve lost a lot of weight.”

  She bristled. If she had it would be because she no longer had an appetite. A broken heart could do that to a person. “Thank you,” was all she said.

  “Oh, before I forget.” He fished something out of his pocket. “I found this in your old nightstand. It had rolled to the back and got stuck behind a bunch of pens and pencils. I think it’s one of David’s.”

  He placed a yellow-hatted Lego construction worker in her outstretched hand. “Thanks,” she said, unable to meet his eyes.

  The children rushed out of their rooms, Lily limping to protect her ankle, kissing Merilee before jumping into their father’s car.

  “I’ll bring them back in a couple of hours,” Michael said as he opened his car door, then waited for a moment as if searching for the right words. “Call me if you need anything, all right? Anything at all.”

  She nodded, standing there and waving as they pulled down the drive, red dust blowing in her face. She clutched the Lego man in her hand, feeling all the losses in her life at once, and wondering how long it would take until the hurting and the missing would stop.

  Ten

  THE PLAYING FIELDS BLOG

  Observations of Suburban Life from Sweet Apple, Georgia

  Written by: Your Neighbor

  Installment #4: Memory Care and Botox Parties

  As much as I avoid driving—what with having to dodge the families of deer and overly enthusiastic and road-hogging bicyclists on our narrow country roads—I do have to venture out from time to time to stock my pantry and do all the other errands needed in our suburban lives.

  Something I noticed this week as I gritted my teeth and ran my errands—the excessive number of day care centers and retirement villages. Day cares and senior citizen neighborhoods are sprouting like mildew in our bucolic suburb. Does anybody else see the humor here? The same children raised by caregivers see a natural progression toward housing their aging parents in much the same fashion. Reminds me of something I read once, about being nice to your children because they will one day pick your nursing home. Don’t get me wrong; these institutions are necessary given today’s lifestyles. But it does make me think.

  And what’s with all these “memory care” buildings attached to the residential halls at the senior citizen villages? From what I’ve seen, memory doesn’t need caring for after it’s gone. Just call it “The Forgetting Place” or “Home for People Who Can’t Remember” and be done with it. Because that’s what they are. I think I’ve had enough of euphemisms.

  Along the same lines as euphemisms is the overuse of the word “party.” I’ve always associated the word with birthdays and retirements—things to be celebrated. No longer just for housewarmings and dinners, the word “party” is now being used alongside “karaoke,” “Pampered Chef,” and “Botox.” This last one really confuses me. How could going to someone’s house where a (hopefully) qualified person lays you down on a sofa and injects a botulism toxin into your face be considered—in any sane person’s world—a party? And shouldn’t a person be insulted just to be invited? Lastly, what does a person bring as a hostess gift for these gatherings—Band-Aids?

  Yesterday in line at Kroger, the two women in front of me were talking about a Botox party they were going to that evening in one of our gated neighborhoods—that I won’t name just in case you noticed your tennis partner looking less wrinkly today even after all those years in the sun. They kept looking back at me, and for a horrified moment I thought they were going to invite me, too. I was torn between slapping them if they did and pretending I didn’t speak English. Luckily, I remembered that I’d been trying out shades of foundation in the drug aisle and had left two streaks of different-colored makeup slashing across my cheek, making me look like an Indian. Excuse me—Native American.

  While at that same Kroger, I spotted the recently involuntarily downsized third-grade math teacher in line at the pharmacy counter. I assumed she wasn’t there for birth control, seeing as how that ship has already sailed, but probably for prenatal vitamins.

  I’d only seen her before at a distance, but up close it’s easy to see why a married man—or any man with eyes—would find her attractive. And young. I think she’s barely out of college. She’s a dead ringer for a lingerie catalog model, with perfect skin, thick dark hair, and a warm smile
. It’s the smile that gives her away as a teacher, though. That slow and patient smile teachers of all small children use when explaining something in that way of theirs. I wonder if she was good at her job. I wonder if she misses it and regrets the choices she’s made.

  While I was there pretending to look at different shampoos, another woman, apparently the mother of one of her former students, recognized her, too. She’d bumped her cart into the teacher’s, so she couldn’t pretend that she hadn’t seen her, and she spent the entire time not looking at the expectant mother’s belly and not saying anything more than how hot it was outside.

  And then I got distracted by free samples of Talenti gelato and lost sight of the teacher. If you haven’t tried that gelato, don’t. I think it must contain a controlled substance, because after one bite I found myself purchasing four small containers in different flavors. I guess the former teacher isn’t the only one with self-control issues. Except if I gain a few pounds it won’t wreck a family.

  Speaking of life’s upsets, we are smack-dab in the middle of hurricane season here in Georgia. We’ve had a hot and dry streak since June, which always gets me worried. And not just about the weather. If you read the arrest reports in the Sweet Apple Herald like I do, you’ll notice there’s hardly been a full column of late. And even though we’re winding up for a hotly contested mayoral race, there hasn’t been an ugly word or unsubstantiated claim made by either side as of today. I feel something brewing in the air, like a warm wind blowing westward over the Atlantic from Africa, the official birth of a hurricane. So check your hurricane shutters and stock up on bottled water. A storm is coming.

  And now for today’s Southern saying: “That’s as handy as a back pocket on a shirt.” I went to Walmart last week to purchase some necessary items and saw that they had hand soap on sale in those really big containers. Packaged with them was a hand pump to screw into the top when you were ready to use it so you don’t have to go through the aggravation of pouring the soap into a smaller container. Except when I got home I discovered that the pump didn’t fit on the container. I spilled about half the soap trying to get it to work. When I finish cleaning up all the soap off my bathroom vanity and the front of my shirt, I will be sure to take it back to Walmart (in a sealed bag). And when I dump that soap on the customer service desk, I will say, “This is about as handy as a back pocket on a shirt.”