Are We There Yet?

by Kathleen West

  “Well, don’t freak out.”

  Calm, Meredith told herself again.

  “It’s just, Mr. Robinson told me today I’m getting a C. Like, for the midterm. It’ll be on my report card.”

  C, Meredith repeated to herself. Calm. She tightened her grip again on the wheel. What was it with this teacher? Sadie had never scored poorly on anything in her life, at any point in her schooling. And then, this one guy in this one class—

  “And,” Sadie said. Meredith gritted her teeth. “I’ve been thinking.” Meredith sped through a yellow light, anxious to get home. “It’s time for me to quit the Elkettes.”

  Meredith pressed harder on the gas. She imagined Sadie with her tight French braids, the silky purple ribbons. She pictured the shelves in the basement where they’d lined up the old pairs of skates. “We can trade these in,” Bill had said. “Get a discount on the next pair.” But Meredith couldn’t do it. She wanted to remember their only daughter wearing skates at all of her different ages. When she looked at them on her way to the laundry room, she remembered the first spins, the first jumps, the first podium finish for the Elkettes, Sadie holding a trophy bigger than herself.

  “It’s just, my priorities are changing,” Sadie said. Her voice sounded distant, as if she were speaking to Meredith through a tin-can phone. “And I obviously need more time for my studies.” The stoplight in front of Meredith flipped from green to yellow. Her distance from the intersection was too far to make it, even if she floored it, and instead she slammed on the brakes. Sadie’s head thudded against the headrest as the car ground to a squeaky halt. “Mom!” she shouted.

  “Sorry,” Meredith muttered. She couldn’t think of anything else to say, not about the C, not about the Elkettes. She still flashed on the photo multiple times per day, the image of her half-naked daughter sneaking into her consciousness while she performed neck and hip mobilizations in the clinic. Her first thought about Sadie’s new revelation was to call Alice to vent. Together, they’d talked about parenting teenagers in a detached sense, laughing nervously about other people’s problems. Sadie’s teen years were going to be solid, Meredith had been sure of it. But now Sadie seemed worst-case-scenario, and Meredith couldn’t call Alice.

  She watched the cars stream in front of her through the intersection, their headlights bright in the murky fall afternoon. She could hear Sadie breathing hard behind her. Meredith wondered what Alice was doing this afternoon. Did she supervise Teddy for online school? She remembered the pink “rocket ship” she and Lacy Cushing had seen on the trailhead sign at the park after they’d passed Alice and Nadia that day. Lacy had pointed backward, her thumb indicating the path where Alice walked behind them. “If you ask me,” she’d said, “that disgusting graffiti is his fault, too.”

  “Do you know anything about that pink graffiti?” Meredith asked now.

  “Hmm?” Sadie blinked.

  “Those penises,” Meredith said. She watched her daughter flinch at the word but carried on. If Sadie was sophisticated enough to send a nude photo, certainly she could handle hearing the medical terminology for male anatomy.

  “Oh.” Sadie kicked at the floor. “Not really.”

  “Not really?” Meredith’s “calm” mantra dissolved, and she found herself shouting. “Sarah June Yoshida, if you know a single shred of information about—”

  “Chill!” Sadie yelled, and after she’d succeeded in interrupting, she was quieter. “Mom, chill.”

  “Don’t you dare tell me to chill—”

  “Look!” Sadie interrupted again. “The only thing I’ve heard about those tags was when Grace and Alexandra talked about their feminist club.”

  Meredith remembered the T-shirts she’d seen at the ethical parenting discussion. “What about the club?”

  “They said at lunch that it was such a relief that after decades of people’s obsessions with, um . . .” She paused.

  “What?” The light turned green and Meredith broke the eye contact she’d been maintaining through the rearview mirror.

  “It’s just, they said, after like everyone being obsessed with women’s bodies, it was nice to see some male parts.” Sadie coughed. “Like getting attention, or something.”

  * * *

  THE ROUTE TO Meredith’s mother’s house in southern Minnesota, a small town thirty miles from the nearest Target, took them out of Elm Creek past the Sullivans’ neighborhood. She imagined Alice’s spotless kitchen. Alice’s turkey would come out perfectly in an All-Clad roasting pan. She’d post the proof on her professional Instagram.

  Bill had turned on an investment podcast in the car, and they’d all been quiet for several minutes. Meredith stared at the brown Minnesota landscape, trees void of leaves but not yet covered in snow as Bill drove the Jeep out of the metro. Finally, Sadie spoke softly from the back seat. “Does Grandma know?”

  Meredith leaned back against the headrest and blinked at the withered cornstalks in the field outside. She thought about asking, Know what? But it was obvious.

  “No,” Meredith said. She knew she should try to sound upbeat, but she felt so tired, her eyelids heavy. She had whispered to Bill about synchro and the C as they’d loaded their luggage. He had hugged her and said they’d talk later. But when? They’d be in her mother’s four-room house all weekend.

  “You didn’t tell her?” Sadie sounded small. Usually Sadie approached challenges with bravado, shoulders back. Meredith pictured her right arm out, chin lifted as the Elkettes glided onto the ice to take their positions before their music began. Sadie never showed a hint of reservation. Where would she hone her confidence now that she’d apparently left skating behind?

  “I didn’t tell her.” Meredith kept her eyes on the fields.

  A few seconds later, her daughter broke in again. “Because you’re embarrassed?”

  Meredith looked at Bill. He paused the podcast. They’d both been mortified, of course. Bill hadn’t so much as made eye contact with Sadie since Meredith had shown him the photo. What dad wants to see that? What mom does? Beneath her intense anger at Alice and at the boys who’d shared the picture, she knew that yes, she was embarrassed. She was shocked and appalled and humiliated that her daughter was the one who’d made such a public and stupid mistake.

  Bill shrugged, deferring as usual. “I guess, yes,” Meredith said. She turned and caught Sadie’s eye. Her daughter’s skin looked peaked, her eyes tired, too. “It’s not the kind of thing I like to tell my mother.”

  Sadie’s lips pressed together. “I know,” she said. “I know I’m such a disappointment.” And then she turned toward the driver’s-side window. Meredith followed her gaze to the opposite-direction traffic, to the families headed to the city for the holiday.

  Alice Sullivan

  The first thing Alice noticed were the planters on Julienne’s porch—big, matte metal vats filled with fall foliage and artfully placed sticks. No way she did those herself, thought Alice as Patrick pulled up to the curb in front of the house. She scanned the neighbors’ steps for similar displays and thought she could see another stick-and-greenery arrangement three doors down. Cardinal Gardening, she suspected, a company she regularly recommended to clients. Alice and Patrick had discussed skipping the “family reunion from hell,” as Alice had taken to calling it, but in the end, she’d decided on the path of least resistance. She could suck it up, she told herself. She’d perma-smile for a couple of hours in the hopes of preserving her relationship with her mother. Plus, if she refused to go to Julienne’s, she’d have to explain to the children why they were carving a turkey alone, and after everything else, she just didn’t have the reserves.

  Julienne’s house was decidedly bigger than the Sullivans’, and Alice could see the netting for a trampoline beyond a wide-slatted fence.

  “They have a tramp!” Aidy shrieked, spotting it simultaneously. She threw open her door the second Patrick ha
d put the car in park and ran straight across the grass. Her navy dress bounced over white tights and black dress shoes. Adrian had chosen that dress herself, alleviating any guilt Alice might have felt about either adhering to the dress code or breaking it. Patrick, too, had donned one of his usual blue quarter-zip pullover sweaters and gray pants. Teddy had khakis and a blue-check oxford that more or less matched Patrick’s outfit. Alice looked down at her own wine-colored dress. She didn’t own a similar blue or green one, she reminded herself as a twinge of regret seeped in. Blue was her mother’s color. And besides, the dress code email had been ridiculously insensitive. Still, Alice had grabbed a navy pashmina on her way to the car, a concession she could throw over herself for the photo. She peered after Adrian, who had opened the gate and begun scrambling up to the deck of Julienne’s trampoline. Her unbuckled shoes lay on their sides in the grass.

  Alice thought about calling Aidy back but decided against it. Instead, she grabbed a cast-iron pot filled with mashed potatoes from the floor near her feet and turned back toward Teddy, who’d carried the cornbread rolls in his lap.

  “Got ’em,” he said, before she’d even asked him to help. She smiled. They hadn’t fought in days. Donovan had come over on Monday night, and the two boys had watched a movie and played cards. Nadia had sipped wine with her in the kitchen, and they’d barely mentioned Elm Creek, except to discuss new pink graffiti that had popped up on a RE/MAX realty Sold sign. Alice had been relieved to note that the vandals hadn’t limited themselves to Ramona Design.

  “Has Donovan heard anything new about the tagging?” Alice had remembered his prescient warning to Nadia about the hashtags and their recent tandem searches of the kids’ rooms for paint.

  Nadia had shaken her head. “He still doesn’t know.”

  At Julienne’s, Alice sighed as she walked past her mother’s car, parked right up next to the Martíns’ garage door. As Alice approached the porch, the front door opened. Julienne looked statuesque in a navy sheath dress with long sleeves. Alice’s breath caught as she took in the similarities again between this woman and her—their—mother. Julienne’s blond hair, blown out and with some kind of product in it for shine, fell perfectly to her shoulders, one side swinging forward as she opened her arms to take Alice’s potatoes. Or maybe to hug her. Alice wasn’t sure, and she reflexively drew the Le Creuset pot (red, she realized, like her own dress) back toward her body.

  “Julienne!” Patrick said then. He stepped in front of Alice, breaking up the stilted moment. “It’s so lovely to meet you.” Patrick reached around her in an easy hug. “Thank you so much for having us.”

  “It’s my pleasure.” Julienne winked at Teddy. “Hello again. Weird connection, huh?” Alice had explained it before his first appointment with Milo, and to her great relief, he hadn’t asked too many questions about the “amazing coincidence.”

  “Now that I know who you are,” Teddy said, “I can see you look exactly like Nana.” Julienne’s smile broadened, and her eyes seemed to sparkle with the pleasure of the compliment. Alice fought to maintain a neutral expression, but she could feel her left eyelid twitch.

  “I’m afraid our daughter has gotten ahead of us.” Patrick smiled. “She caught a glimpse of your trampoline and made a run for it.”

  Julienne laughed. “My Laura saw her through the window and was more than happy to abandon her job of napkin folding to go out and do a little jumping.” Julienne turned around. “Come in,” she said over her shoulder. “Your mom’s in the kitchen, chopping romaine.”

  Your mom.

  Patrick put his hand on Alice’s shoulder and massaged. They followed Julienne through the dining room, past a 1980s oak table and chairs. The chairs, Alice noticed, had charming spindle-style legs. A cheap yet adorable cornucopia lay on the table in the middle of a burnt-orange runner. There were simple, hand-lettered name cards next to each brown place mat.

  “Beautiful table,” Alice said. And it was, in its own way.

  “Thanks.” Julienne flopped her wrist toward the candlesticks and the cornucopia. “Laura and I love to add to our kitsch collection. We shop the T.J. Maxx HomeGoods. You know the one on Main and Excelsior? That”—she pointed at a ceramic turkey on the sideboard next to two small vases of mums—“was one of our favorite finds.”

  “Love it.” Alice faked enthusiasm. In her dining room, the sideboard would have been adorned at either end with tight bouquets in tin buckets. She’d have chosen bells of Ireland, orange roses, dahlias, and spider mums. Sometimes Adrian picked out a few miniature pumpkins and gourds at the farmer’s market while she shopped, and those, too, might be placed in groups of three. Not this year.

  “Maybe T.J. Maxx is below your standards, since you’re a designer?” Julienne laughed as they entered the kitchen. There was a smokiness to the aroma, something richer than the normal herb blend that Alice usually stuffed into the cavity of their bird.

  “It smells wonderful,” Alice said, ignoring the comment about T.J. Maxx. “Hi, Mom.” Her mom kept chopping. Alice could see her smile from the side, her cheeks flushed and a dish towel slung over her shoulder. She looked completely comfortable with Julienne’s knife in her hand, Julienne’s cutting board beneath a pile of lettuce. Her mother put the knife down and wiped her hands on her borrowed apron.

  “I caught a glimpse of Adrian through the back window—” She stopped as she registered Alice’s red dress, the slightly flared skirt swirling as Alice stepped forward, her arms still encumbered with potatoes.

  “Blue or green,” her mom said quietly. Her smile evaporated. “That’s what I asked for.”

  Alice felt light-headed. Patrick shook hands with Julienne’s husband, who’d set down his wooden spoon. “I’m Patrick.” His voice filled the room, louder than usual, and Rafael responded with a hearty hello.

  “Let’s put your potatoes here.” Julienne steered Alice toward an empty burner. “And Teddy? Those can go right here.” She gestured at her Corian counter, and he deposited the rolls.

  Alice’s mouth went dry as she looked out the back window at Adrian and Laura. Julienne’s daughter was perfectly dressed in a light green top and navy pants. On the trampoline, Laura held Aidy’s hands, and even through the glass, Alice could hear her daughter’s laughter.

  “This is Miguel,” Alice’s mom said to Teddy.

  “Dude,” Miguel said to Teddy, “do you play COD?” The two disappeared immediately upstairs. Alice’s head started to hurt, a needle prick right in the middle of her forehead. She opened the sliding glass door to the backyard and waved hello to Laura.

  “Mommy!” Adrian shrieked. “Laura double-bounces me. Watch!”

  The two held hands, and Laura buckled her legs at the close of one of her jumps, sending Adrian’s way up, so that both her and Laura’s arms were fully extended.

  The girls looked like they’d been cousins forever. “Hi, I’m Laura.” She giggled. “Obviously.”

  “Did you know she’s my cousin?” Adrian ran to the mesh side of the trampoline in front of Alice, pressing her hands against it. “My actual cousin? And living in the same exact town?” Alice would have laughed at her earnestness if it weren’t for her blackening mood.

  Laura walked over, too, her feet sinking into the webbing of the trampoline as she approached. Her eyes matched her mother’s and grandmother’s. “I’d be happy to babysit sometime,” Laura said. “And my mom said Aidy’s working on her reading? I could help.”

  Aidy. A nickname for family and close friends, and yet Laura commandeered it. “That’s nice. Adrian, why don’t you come inside now?”

  Laura smoothed Adrian’s hair. “Oh, I’m sure we’re fine for a few more minutes,” she said. “It takes forever to actually get the dinner on the table. We’ll come in five?”

  Adrian ran back to the center of the trampoline, her arms out for Laura’s. “Let’s keep jumping!”

  Neither l
ooked back at Alice to gauge her reaction. She thought about insisting that Adrian leave the tramp, and then imagined the scene: herself standing on tiptoes, reaching into the enclosure, trying to capture Adrian, who was rapidly becoming too big to physically commandeer. She pulled closed the sliding glass door and looked back at the adults.

  “Those just need a warm oven,” Alice said, pointing at the rolls Rafael had unwrapped. The ceilings felt low, the bronze pendant lamps closing in over her head.

  “Alice, could I chat with you for a moment?” Her mom appeared at her side. She’d removed the apron to reveal a lapis sweater Alice had never seen before.

  “Let’s get a glass of wine first?”

  “Of course!” Julienne piped in. “Sorry for not offering sooner. Red or white?”

  “White,” said Alice, just as her mother said, “Red.”

  Rafael, busy with a gigantic pile of cilantro, laughed. “Not totally in sync today, eh?”

  “Good thing we’ve got both.” Julienne seemed overboard cheerful.

  After Julienne poured their wine, her mom gestured toward the dining room. “Let’s take the photo soon, okay?” Julienne suggested as they left. “Before everyone is overstuffed from dinner?” She laughed and rubbed her stomach. “Or maybe I’m just thinking of myself.” She walked to the sliding glass door and signaled for Laura and Adrian to come in, which they did immediately without negotiation.

  Rafael picked up his phone from the countertop. “I’ll text the boys to come down.”

  Alice’s mom grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her toward the ceramic turkey in the dining room. “Why would you wear red?”

  Alice shook her arm free. “God,” she said. She was immediately transported back to high school, to one of the few times she’d missed curfew. Alice had found her mother sitting rigidly on their brown tweed sofa, waiting with her arms folded. “I don’t look good in blue,” she said now. Even when she’d been in high school, Alice had been allowed to choose her own clothing. “I’m here, aren’t I?” Alice gestured toward the cornucopia. “We’re doing your Thanksgiving.”