Mommy Tracked

by Whitney Gaskell

  “If it won’t shut up, try throwing it off the plane,” Fiona had purportedly snapped.

  And then there was the young woman who had once worked for Fiona as a nanny who was now a hot property on the talk-show circuit, enthralling viewers with a portrait of Fiona as an absentee mother who spent all of her time working or indulging in bizarre beauty treatments (including allegedly getting her bottom bleached, although Chloe wasn’t sure what that could possibly involve) and rarely saw her children. Fiona was threatening to sue the nanny for violating their confidentiality agreement.

  After years of having to hunt down every story assignment she got, magazine editors were finally coming to Chloe with assignments. Practically overnight, she had more work than she could handle. First she was asked to write a follow-up article about the backlash against mothers who nurse in public for Pop Art. Then Mothering magazine called to ask her to do a piece on the pros and cons of early potty training. And then a maternity magazine hired her to write a story on the drastic steps some celebrities take to lose weight after having a baby.

  Chloe hired Mavis to sit with William in the afternoons while she worked, and she often stayed up late into the night, tapping away at her laptop. And, slowly, her days took on a sort of routine that helped distract her from the almost unbearable sadness she felt over James’s absence.

  Chloe hadn’t even wanted the bracelet. It was a faux-bamboo bangle made out of clear brown Lucite, and not at all her taste. Yet she couldn’t help herself. She picked up the bracelet and slid it on. It felt cold and hard on her wrist. And Chloe felt that familiar rush of exhilaration, a tantalizing cocktail of intoxication and fear. Her pulse picked up; her heart drummed in her chest.

  William let out a squawk from his stroller and kicked his feet impatiently. He liked to be in constant motion when they were out and about and resented the stop.

  Chloe glanced around to see if anyone was watching her or had been alerted to her presence by William’s grousing. But Saks was deserted. There were a few women back behind the cosmetics counter, wearing white lab coats and chattering to one another, but Chloe doubted if they could see her from their vantage point across the floor. A zoned-out middle-aged woman clutching shopping bags and dressed in head-to-toe taupe passed by, looking absentmindedly at a rack of earrings. But she didn’t seem to notice Chloe, and a moment later she moved on.

  Now, Chloe thought. Now!

  She removed the bracelet from her wrist and pretended to set it back on the display case, but then she palmed it and slipped it into her diaper bag hanging off the back of William’s stroller. She felt the familiar rush of exhilaration and had to force herself to continue to browse calmly through the accessories. She feigned interest in a display of Isabella Fiore purses and then in a rack of metallic-hued belts before turning and resolutely pushing William toward the back entrance of the store.

  She was just reaching out to open the door, feeling her victory swell up euphorically in her chest, when a hand clamped on to her arm. Chloe spun around to see who had grabbed her, trying unsuccessfully to pull her arm back as she did so.

  It was the taupe woman—only now she didn’t look so glassy-eyed. The woman reached into one of the paper shopping bags and pulled out a small walkie-talkie.

  “I’ve apprehended the subject,” the taupe woman said into the unit while Chloe stared at her uncomprehendingly. “I’ll bring her up now.” The woman dropped the walkie-talkie back in the bag and pulled on Chloe’s arm. “Come with me.”

  “No, wait,” Chloe protested. She clutched the handle of William’s baby stroller. “Obviously there’s been a mistake.”

  The woman reached forward into Chloe’s black nylon diaper bag and pulled out the ugly Lucite faux-bamboo bangle. Chloe went cold. Fear seized at her, and her throat closed.

  “Please,” Chloe whispered. “Please. I’m with my baby.”

  “You should have thought of that before you shoplifted,” the taupe woman said. And then, still holding on to Chloe’s arm, she propelled Chloe—and, by extension, William in his baby stroller—with her.

  Chloe felt numb as she sat holding William in the back room of Saks. The baby was awake and looking around with interest. It wasn’t what Chloe had expected a detention room to look like—the sort of grim interrogation room you see on Law & Order, with bars on the window and a single steel folding table in the center of the room. This looked more like a small break room. There were several tables, a water cooler, and a cork message board with flyers and announcements tacked to it: an advertisement for a personal defense course, someone looking for a good home for a golden-retriever mix, a reminder for employees to put in their vacation requests six weeks in advance.

  The taupe woman who’d apprehended Chloe was standing by the door, deep in conversation with a short, squarish woman wearing a white security uniform. Chloe couldn’t hear what they were saying other than occasional snippets, such as “file charges,” “official complaint,” and—worst of all—“call child-protective services.”

  At this last one, Chloe felt like her heart had been dipped in ice.

  Did they mean…are they going to take William away from me? Just for stealing a bracelet? Oh, please, no, she thought desperately. Chloe had never been particularly religious, but she began to bargain with God. Please don’t let them take William. Please. I promise I’ll never steal anything ever again, if you’d just please grant me that one request. And I’ll start going to church and volunteering at a homeless shelter and whatever else you want—just don’t let them take William.

  “Ms. Truman.” In her panic, Chloe hadn’t noticed that the short, square woman in the uniform had crossed the room to speak to her, and she was startled by the security guard’s sudden appearance in front of her.

  “Yes?” Chloe asked, her voice high and strained.

  The security guard held out a portable phone to her. “It’s store policy to allow you a phone call. Is there someone you could call to come pick up your son?”

  “Yes,” Chloe said gratefully, so relieved that they wouldn’t just take William from her and put him God-knew-where that she didn’t even care what they were planning to do with her afterward. “Thank you so much.”

  The guard nodded brusquely and handed her the phone, then walked back to continue her argument with the taupe woman. Chloe sat, cradling William in one arm and holding the phone in her free hand, while she tried to figure out who to call. Juliet was the obvious choice—she was a lawyer—but Chloe didn’t want Juliet, or any of her friends for that matter, to find out that she was a thief. Her parents were too far away to help. The only other person she knew in town was Mavis, but Chloe had already learned that the older woman loved to gossip, and she didn’t relish the entire neighborhood hearing about this.

  Which left only one person: James. Chloe didn’t have a choice, she had to call him. She shifted the phone awkwardly to her other hand and dialed his cell phone number. He answered after one ring.

  “Hello,” he said. His voice sounded tinny and distant.

  “Hi, it’s me,” Chloe said.

  “Hey,” he said, his voice softening. “Where are you calling from? I didn’t recognize the number.”

  “I’m in West Palm at the mall, and…well, I’m in trouble. I need you to come get William,” Chloe said. “Now. It’s an emergency.”

  When James arrived, his boyishly handsome face was taut and pale. The female uniformed security guard led him in, and Chloe’s first thought was how out of place he looked in the dingy room, dressed for the office in a crisp white shirt, pale-purple silk tie, and navy-blue wool pants.

  “Mrs. Truman, your husband is here,” the guard said unnecessarily.

  “Chloe, Jesus, what’s going on?” James asked, crossing the room quickly. Chloe stood and wordlessly stepped into his arms, which he wrapped around her. “Where’s William?” he asked softly.

  “Right here, in his stroller,” Chloe said, turning to look at William, who’d been lulled into a m
ilk-sated sleep. “Will you take him home? I don’t know how long they’re going to keep me here or what they’re going to do to me….” Her voice, quavering with fear, trailed off.

  “What happened?” James asked. “They said they were holding you for shoplifting a bracelet. I told them they must have made a mistake, that you must have gotten distracted by the baby and forgotten that you were holding it. Right?”

  Chloe buried her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes, feeling her forehead press against the soft cotton of his shirt. She knew she could lie, say that it was a mistake, and that James would believe her. But she couldn’t. Not only was she a terrible liar—a liability for any thief—but she didn’t want to lie. Not now, not anymore. She shook her head slightly.

  “No,” she whispered. “I took it.”

  “But why?” James asked. He was being careful to speak quietly, so that the guard wouldn’t overhear him.

  Chloe shrugged, shaking her head more vehemently. “I don’t know. I just…did,” she said faintly.

  “Did you think we couldn’t afford it?”

  “No, that’s not it. It wasn’t even that expensive. I just felt this…urge, I guess. It’s happened before,” she said.

  “Oh, Chloe,” James said with a sigh, and Chloe felt an almost unbearable sadness wash over her. She’d disappointed him. It was an awful feeling.

  “Don’t admit anything to them,” James said. “In fact, don’t say anything to anyone. I’ll call your friend, the lawyer, and ask her to come represent you.”

  “No!” Chloe said, louder than she meant to. She took a step back and peered up anxiously at James. “Please don’t tell her. I don’t want anyone to know. Please.”

  “Okay, shh, okay,” James said soothingly. He took her back into his arms, and Chloe relaxed against him. Having him there made her feel like everything might be okay after all.

  “Mrs. Truman?”

  Chloe turned. It was the short, squat security guard, frowning at her. The guard was homely, with coarse features and brushlike hair, and she had a name tag pinned to her white polyester uniform blouse that read MONA STANWICK. But despite the stern expression on Mona’s face, there was a kind light in her brown eyes. Chloe knew Mona was just doing her job, which, in this case, was catching thieves.

  Well, she’s caught one, Chloe thought. And feeling bolstered by James’s steady presence beside her, one arm wrapped around her shoulder, she decided it was time she took responsibility for her actions. The term scared straight was making a hell of a lot of sense to her right now.

  “Are you going to press charges against my wife?” James asked.

  “No, we’re not,” Mona Stanwick said. “The value of the item you took was rather insubstantial, under fifty dollars, so we’re going to let you go with a warning, Mrs. Truman. This time. I can promise you that if it happens again, we won’t be so forgiving,” the security guard said, arching her eyebrows for emphasis.

  “Thank you,” Chloe breathed, so overcome with gratitude, she was surprised she was able to speak at all. “Thank you so much.”

  “All right,” Mona Stanwick said. She nodded at the door. “You’re free to go.”

  Chloe staggered out of the door with James following behind her, pushing William’s stroller. Chloe felt woodenly self-conscious as she walked through the store toward the exit. Are the salesclerks looking at me? Does everyone know? For a moment Chloe faltered and had to reach out and grab on to a rounder of women’s sale jackets to steady herself.

  But then James caught up with her and took her hand in his, which gave Chloe the courage to start moving forward again, putting one foot in front of the other.

  It wasn’t until they were outside, in the warm stillness of the afternoon, that Chloe was finally able to speak.

  “Thank you,” she said, turning to face him.

  “For what?”

  “For coming down here.”

  “Of course I came. You know I would.” James frowned suddenly. “Don’t you?”

  “Yes—well…” Chloe hesitated. “I wasn’t sure you’d want to, after…after everything that’s happened between us.”

  “Chloe.” James touched her arm lightly. “You’re my wife. You’re my family.”

  “But it’s all been so…so awful lately.”

  James nodded. “You were angry. And rightfully so.”

  “But we never fight. We never have before,” Chloe said.

  “Maybe we should. Maybe if we actually did, we could work out some of our problems and we wouldn’t get to this point—me living in a trailer in the driveway, you stealing bracelets at Saks. And you were right about everything you said that day. About how I need to step up and be a better dad. Maybe it took you shouting it at me for me to finally hear it. I’m so sorry.”

  The relief that rushed through her took Chloe’s breath away. So he had heard her. For once he’d really listened to her.

  And yet Chloe hesitated. “But how do I know that things won’t go back to the way they were before? With you off golfing every weekend and me never getting a break from taking care of Wills?”

  “They won’t. I won’t.” James smiled wryly. “I’ve learned my lesson. Learned what it’s like to live without my family. I don’t want to ever go through that again.”

  “I don’t either,” Chloe said. “And I’m sorry too.”

  “You don’t have anything to be sorry for. I’m the jackass here.”

  “Well, I’m the one who just got caught shoplifting,” Chloe said, shrugging. She stared down at her feet. “It isn’t exactly something I’m proud of.”

  “Why did you do it?” James asked.

  “I’m not sure, really.”

  James fell silent, and Chloe didn’t have the nerve to look back up at him. Instead, she stared down at William’s sweet round face, still slack with sleep.

  How could I have done this when William was with me? she wondered, and a fresh wave of horror washed over her. What if she’d been arrested? What if they’d taken him away from her? And what if she hadn’t been able to get hold of James? Where would they have put William? It was too awful to consider.

  Whatever I have to do to get control of this, I’ll do, Chloe thought. I have too much to lose to ever take a chance like this again.

  “It’s over. I won’t ever do it again,” Chloe promised. She’d made the promise to herself in the past, but this time she meant it. Saying it out loud, saying it to someone else, made it more than a promise. It was now an oath. “But I think I’ll need help. Maybe I should try talking to someone, like a therapist.”

  “I think that might be a good idea. Maybe we should go together and talk about some of the problems we’ve been having.”

  “You’d do that for me?”

  “Chloe.” When James looked down at her, his eyes were soft. “I’d do anything for you. You and William are my family. I love you.”

  “Oh,” Chloe said. “I didn’t know.”

  “You didn’t know I loved you?”

  “No, I knew you loved me, it’s just…” But Chloe stopped. It was just that she always thought she was the one who loved more. There was always one person in a relationship who did. But maybe she’d been wrong about that. Maybe both people could love equally. Or maybe they could take turns being the one to love more. She looked at James, suddenly feeling shy with him.

  “What are you doing now?” Chloe asked.

  He shook his head. “Nothing. I thought I was going to take Wills home, so I took the rest of the afternoon off.”

  “Do you want to go home and talk?”

  James looked at her for a long moment and then reached up to brush a stray curl back from her forehead.

  “More than anything,” he finally said.

  “Good,” she said. “Let’s go home.”

  twenty

  Anna

  Anna hadn’t wanted to fight with her mother. But sometimes the fight just found you. Or at least that’s how Anna consoled herself when she wa
s in a philosophic frame of mind.

  The argument had come about when her mom began to question Anna about her relationship—or lack thereof—with Noah.

  “When are you going to see Noah with the sexy smile again?” Margo asked.

  “First of all, it completely weirds me out when you refer to a man I’ve dated as sexy. Second, you do remember the part about him having four ex-fiancées, right? And third, I’m not going to see him again,” Anna retorted, trying to ignore the way her stomach felt like it was falling out of her body whenever she thought about Noah.

  “Four fiancées.” Margo waved her hand dismissively. “It’s not like he’s had four wives, for goodness sake.”

  “It’s not much better,” Anna muttered.

  “Why aren’t you going to see him again? Has he called you?”

  “No, but that was my choice. I told him not to.”

  “Why the hell would you do something stupid like that?” Margo had asked, her voice sharp.

  “Mom, shhh,” Anna said, giving her a pointed look and then nodding in Charlie’s direction.

  They’d taken Charlie out to the Orange Cove Grill for dinner and ordered cheeseburgers, fries, and chocolate shakes all around. Anna didn’t want to get into her nonrelationship with Noah in front of Charlie, even if he (a) was only two, (b) hadn’t yet mastered the English language, and (c) was too busy pushing packets of sugar around the table, pretending they were trains, to pay any attention to what Anna and Margo were talking about.

  “Choo choo,” Charlie said happily.

  Just before her mother had started in, Anna was mulling over an idea for an article: The Best Cheeseburger in Orange Cove. The Orange Cove Grill—an overly grand name for what amounted to little more than a burger shack—would top the list. Despite the humble surroundings, the cheeseburgers there were excellent, dressed in dill relish and homemade mayonnaise and served with thick steak fries made from scratch. Delicious. Anna had been savoring her burger, right up to the moment that Margo—who was incapable of letting anything go—had to go and ruin dinner by bringing up Noah.