Hope in a Jar

by Beth Harbison

  “On something?” She looked down at her feet, as if she’d misunderstood him. “I don’t—”

  “Drugs,” he snapped. “Have you taken something? Smoked something?” He looked absolutely certain that he’d caught her at something.

  “No!”

  “I won’t put up with that in my house, you know.”

  She straightened her back and faced him even though every instinct in her was to kick him in the nuts and run away. “I don’t take drugs. No one I know takes drugs.”

  He nodded, scrutinizing her. “That better be the truth. For your sake and for ours.”

  “It is.” She wanted to sound strong, to intimidate him as much as he intimidated her, but to her own ears she sounded like Smurfette. On top of that, she hated how he and her mother were us and ours, as if Olivia were just some outsider who had stumbled upon the house and forced them to take her in. “Do you know when my mother’s going to be back?”

  Still watching her, as if she were going to whip out a joint if he looked away for so much as a second, he said, “She’s working until closing tonight because of the preholiday sale this weekend. I don’t expect we’ll see her until around eleven.”

  Oh, God. Olivia’s mother worked at the Hecht’s department store at Montgomery Mall. It was only a couple of miles away but through so many lights and major roads that it might as well have been a hundred miles. On the nights she had to help prepare for a big sale, she was usually stuck there well past closing. Sometimes she didn’t get home until after midnight.

  Olivia couldn’t stand the thought of being in the house with Donald alone that long. Not that her mother made things any more comfortable, but at least when she was there Donald had something else to focus on besides everything Olivia was doing wrong, messing up, or in the way of.

  “I can take some steaks out of the freezer for dinner,” Donald said, as if it were a generous offer. “Do you know how to cook them?”

  “Not really.” Not unless they were Steak-Umms. “And I’m sleeping over at Allie’s so I won’t be here,” she said, though they hadn’t specifically talked about it yet. She slept over at Allie’s almost every weekend, so it was a safe bet, and even if she didn’t, she’d rather stay out as long as she could and risk his wrath later if she had to than sit here and eat dinner with him in stony silence.

  “Allie’s,” he echoed, walking heavily to the freezer. “Allie, Allie, Allie. I hope her family doesn’t mind that you’re there so much. They’ve already got two kids of their own, you know.”

  “I know.” It was just like him to try to inject even more doubt into Olivia’s self-esteem. You know your friend has her own family and they don’t want you, don’t you? She didn’t even think he did it on purpose. It was just his personality to automatically default to the negative.

  “They invited me,” Olivia said, defensive. “Her mother invited me. So I guess it’s okay.”

  “I guess so.” He didn’t look at her and instead began to whistle quietly as he plunked a frozen steak onto the counter and took a tomato out of the fridge. “I expect you to behave yourself when you’re there. I don’t need the goddamn neighbors talking about what a hellion my wife’s kid is.”

  Maybe it was the fact that she’d been agitated around him for so long, or maybe it was that he was attacking her now when all she wanted to do was leave so they wouldn’t be around each other, but Olivia’s temper flared. “I’m not a hellion!”

  “Watch your tone, young lady.”

  “I’m not a hellion,” she said again, although a little bit more quietly.

  He shrugged. “What do I know about what you do when you’re not here?”

  “Nothing!” Anger swelled in her chest. “But if I were doing all these things you’re accusing me of, you probably would have heard about it by now.”

  He stopped and looked at her. His voice was low and icy and there was definitely a warning in it. “Watch your tone.”

  “I’m sorry.” She hated herself for apologizing. “I didn’t mean to yell.”

  “Don’t do it again.”

  “Okay.” She couldn’t think what else to say or how to get out of this. “Um, I’ve got to go now.” She looked at the clock then. It was only four-thirty. Allie wouldn’t be home for almost an hour.

  “Make sure you let your mother know where you’re going,” Donald reminded her. Far be it from him just to tell his wife himself when he saw her.

  “I’ll call her,” Olivia said without looking back. “As soon as I get to Allie’s.”

  “Olivia.”

  She stopped, took a short breath, and turned around. “Yes?”

  “Make sure it’s okay with Peggy Denty that you stay over.”

  “She said it is—”

  “I’m asking you to confirm.” He was like a drill sergeant. “You don’t want to impose. Am I right?”

  She hung her head. “Yes. I’ll make sure.”

  She ran to Allie’s house like there was a ghost at her heels. And, in a way, there was. In her imagination, Donald was everywhere, regardless of how hard she tried to get away.

  He hadn’t done anything or even said anything overtly mean, but his words felt like blows. Everything about him that made her feel bad came from the stuff behind and between his words, and in his gestures.

  It all added up to one fact none of them could ignore: She was an intruder in his house, the unfortunate price he had to pay for marrying her mother. She owed him something, but she wasn’t sure exactly what. Probably just gratitude and undying subservience.

  Allie’s house was six up and across the street, around a bend. If the street were straight, they probably could have seen each other’s bedrooms at night, maybe sent signals with flashlights.

  Knowing Allie was still at her piano lesson, and that her older brother, Ross, was probably the only one home, Olivia went straight around to the backyard to wait until Allie got home. As long as the sun stayed out, it would remain pretty warm. It didn’t really cool down these days until dusk.

  She sat on the trampoline and looked at the back of the house. The wide picture windows upstairs were open, and Olivia could see the curtains inside stirring with a breeze she barely even felt. The kitchen window, bottom left, was open, too. Olivia could smell coffee, very faintly, mingling with the earthy smell of fallen leaves around her. Mrs. Denty always had a pot of coffee on.

  Often, when Allie and Olivia came in from school, Mrs. Denty would have a friend over, too, and they’d be sitting on the porch, drinking coffee with sugar and cream, and eating the buttery melt-in-your-mouth shortbread cookies Mrs. Denty made.

  Olivia leaned back on the warm canvas of the trampoline and looked at the sky. White, puffy clouds moved very slowly, changing form gradually. Mickey Mouse became an elephant and then a giraffe and then expanded into blue nothingness.

  It was soothing.

  “Olivia?”

  She shot upright.

  Mrs. Denty was standing in the middle of the yard, her hand over her eyes like a soldier’s salute, blocking the sun. “I thought that was you!”

  “I’m sorry!”

  “Why are you sorry?” Mrs. Denty came over to her. She wore pleated tweedy brown pants with built-in suspenders, and a puffysleeved white blouse. Olivia had seen those pants at Hecht’s and they were pretty expensive. “Good heavens, you didn’t do anything wrong. I was just wondering who the dead child on the trampoline was.”

  Olivia laughed. “Just me.”

  “And that’s fine if you want to be out here for some reason, but wouldn’t you like to come in?”

  “I didn’t want to bother you. Actually, I thought Ross would be the only one here, and I really didn’t want to bother him.” Ross was a senior in high school and had no time for irritating little “rug rats” like Allie and Olivia.

  Mrs. Denty chuckled. “Loud as he plays that stereo, he probably wouldn’t even have heard you.” She put out a hand. “Come on. You’re never a bother. You come talk to me wh
ile we wait for Allie Cat to come home. I assume you’re staying over tonight?”

  “Yes, I was planning on it,” she said, then her conscience poked her. “Donald wanted me to make sure it was okay with you for me to be here.”

  A dark look crossed Mrs. Denty’s face. “It is always okay. Honestly, I have told him that myself countless times.”

  “I think he just wants to be sure. He has a big fear of people talking about him. Saying bad things, like that his wife’s daughter is a cling-on or a hooligan or something.”

  “You?” Mrs. Denty laughed outright. “He doesn’t have a clue how good you are.”

  Olivia nodded. “I know.” Then she was glad to feel Mrs. Denty’s warm arm around her shoulder.

  “People who don’t have their own kids sometimes have trouble relating to them at all.” Mrs. Denty gave her a squeeze. “I hope you know it’s not your fault.”

  “I know.” Olivia swallowed the hard lump in her throat. She did know, or at least she was pretty sure, it wasn’t her fault. But still, it was hard to feel completely at home anywhere these days, and Mrs. Denty being so nice to her was reassuring but at the same time it made her feel sort of guilty.

  Like she didn’t deserve it.

  “Now you have a seat and I’m going to pour you some of this wonderful hot chocolate I found at the Giant today.”

  Allie came bursting into the house then. “I’m home!” As soon as she saw Olivia, she cried, “Oh, my gosh, you are in trouble!”

  “Me?” Dread filled Olivia’s chest, much, much more than Allie could have realized or even imagined.

  Allie nodded. “I just went by your house to get you and Mr. O’Brien was there and he said he thought you were with me, and I said I was just at piano, and then he looked really mad and said he was going to go look for you, and that if I saw you I should let him know.” She took a moment to catch her breath. “He looked totally furious.” She shuddered. “He is such a jerk.”

  Olivia bit her lower lip. What was she going to do? The idea of an enraged Donald O’Brien driving around looking for her was terrifying. “I’d better go,” she said, defying every self-preservation instinct she had.

  “No!” Mrs. Denty never yelled, at least not as far as Olivia had ever known, but this was close. “I’m sorry, Olivia, but please let me call him.” She bustled to the phone, taking large, hard strides to the kitchen.

  Olivia was profoundly grateful for the offer. She did not want to talk to him herself.

  It took long minutes after she dialed before Mrs. Denty finally spoke. “Donald? Yes, hello, this is Peggy Denty. Listen, I’m calling to see if my daughter has come to your house, by any chance. Olivia’s here and we’ve been waiting for her to get back from piano and—”

  Allie giggled but Olivia tensed.

  “—she was?” Mrs. Denty went on. “Just now?”

  Olivia felt a sense of relief rush through her like cool water.

  “Then I suppose she’ll be here—Oh, for heaven’s sake, here she is right now, coming in the front door.” She gestured at Allie, who picked up the cue with relish.

  “Hey Mom, Liv.” She called it out while running across the room away from the phone, then came back and added, “Oh, Liv, Mr. O’Brien wants you to call him right away.”

  Mrs. Denty winked at her daughter approvingly and Allie gave a silent, squealy smile.

  “What’s that?” Mrs. Denty asked into the phone. “Yes, right here. We’ve been having hot chocolate together and chatting. Did you want to talk to her?” She paused, then shook her head at Olivia. “It’s no bother at all, honestly, Donald. I’ve told you that before. We love having her. Right. Okay, then, give my best to Caroline. We’ll send Olivia home in a day or two. Okay. Bye-bye.” She hung the phone up and looked at it for a moment, less than pleased, before turning back to Allie and Olivia with a smile.

  “Was he pissed?” Allie asked.

  “Don’t use that word,” her mother said, then sighed. “He was angry at first, but when he found out Olivia was where she said she’d be, he cooled down.” She shook her head to herself, then said to the girls, “I don’t condone lying, but sometimes you just have to know how to deal with people. If I’d called and simply told him the truth straight-out, he’d have thought I was covering for Olivia.”

  “Like she’d ever do anything wrong,” Allie scoffed.

  “I’ve done things wrong before.” Olivia was feeling vaguely protective of her mother for some reason. Maybe of her mother’s choice in men.

  “Bull,” Allie said, before her mother could say something more gentle.

  “My point,” Mrs. Denty stressed, silencing both of them, “is that sometimes the only way you can get someone to believe the truth is by using a little white lie. Now, how about we have that hot chocolate I was telling you about?”

  Nine

  Make yourself happy with a little tickle.

  —ad for Tickle deodorant from Bristol-Myers

  Allie wasn’t tired after dropping Olivia off at her hotel. In fact, she was wired. And the idea of going back to her apartment and the pile of mail on the table, the half-eaten chicken and cashews from China’s Good Fortune in the fridge that she wasn’t sure was still safe to eat, and thirty-eight minutes of the latest episode of America’s Next Top Model (the first thirty-eight minutes—she’d sat on the DVR remote without realizing it and had shut it off so now she wouldn’t know how it ended until next week) didn’t appeal to her at all.

  So she took the long way back, popping in a depressing old Jackson Browne CD and driving up Woodley Road to the National Cathedral singing along about a photograph that captured the moment right after a smile. She pulled up in front of the old herb cottage and put the car in park.

  This was probably stupid. Perhaps even dangerous, given the town she was in and the hour. But this was a place she’d loved since she was a child and her grandfather used to bring her to the Flower Market here the first Friday of every May. She couldn’t come here without feeling nostalgic and yet, in some way, warm.

  She got out of the car, ignoring the voice in her head that told her not to do this.

  That voice was always in her head, telling her not to do pretty much everything. Don’t drive on the highway, it told her, it’s too dangerous. Don’t fly overseas. Don’t get salad from the grocery store; it might have E. coli.

  She’d learned a long time ago that she was better off ignoring the voice.

  Ironically, she locked her car, then stopped and deliberately turned back to unlock it. If she was going to take a chance on being here alone at this hour, her car could, too, damn it.

  Besides, if she had to run for it, it would be better to leap into an unlocked car than to have to stop and fumble with the electronic fob, probably locking it over and over instead of unlocking it.

  See, she was cautious enough to think of that. She wasn’t completely without common sense.

  She walked through the Bishop’s Garden, a maze of boxwoods that smelled of a hundred years of earth, and green, and beauty. It was a pathway filled with large flagstones, winding around through the foliage. There were little coves along the way—a garden bench here, a wrought-iron chair there—but she was on her way to the prize: the small, wooden gazebo, called the Shadow House, in the center of the maze.

  When she was little, it had seemed almost impossible to wind through and finally get to the gazebo, but now she wondered how she could ever have gotten lost. Anyone who could see over the bushes could see exactly where it was and how to get there, though it required a bit of dodging through the low tree boughs.

  Maybe that was the key right there. When she was little, her grandfather had delighted in taking her hand and winding her this way and that, pointing out all the little flowers, creatures, and bugs along the way.

  Now, even though he had gone on to be God’s own gardener, she almost felt he was with her, guiding her through the earthy, dark path to the best thinking spot in the world.

  She clim
bed into the gazebo, her feet thudding dully on the wet wood, and sat down.

  Peace took over. The artificial environment of the hotel melted away, along with the sequins and the makeup and the falsely smiling faces and their pretense at recognition, and finally Allie was alone with her own feelings.

  It was strange how little she’d thought of Kevin tonight. That was the first thing that struck her. After two years with him, she might have imagined she’d feel something more than anger at his betrayal and annoyance that his timing had left her to go to her reunion alone.

  But that was pretty much all she’d felt. No heartache, no regret at lost opportunities, no wish that he’d stepped up to the plate.

  It wasn’t that she was heartless. Heaven knew she’d been faithful and loyal to Kevin. She’d never treated him with anything less than the utmost respect, and as long as he did the same, she could see spending forever with him.

  Happily(ish) ever after.

  It was that ish that got to her.

  She sighed and leaned back against the hardwood arm rail of the gazebo. The sky was in plain and glorious view. The clouds were beginning to part and the moon was touching their edges, lighting them up like the opening scene after the credits from some impossibly romantic 1940s movie.

  Kevin would have thought that was a weird analogy.

  And there it was. He didn’t get her. And she, to be fair, must not have gotten him, because something had made him turn to Charlotte even though he had a perfectly faithful, intelligent, kind girlfriend of childbearing age (barely) who was, on the surface, perfect for him.

  Maybe her incessant Cary Grant references had annoyed him, as much as his lack of comprehension had annoyed her. Maybe he hated her Cheesy Beef Macaroni Dinner as much as she hated the rare tuna steaks he loved so much. Maybe just the sound of the opening strains of the Beatles’ “I Feel Fine” made him want to tear his hair out the way the endless jams of anything Dave Matthews made her want to.