Eva narrowed her eyes at Maggie. “Yes, starving. Let’s eat.”
Maggie looked at her friends. “And since it’ll take us at least an hour or two to pick these crabs, let’s begin the first meeting of the Scarlet Letter Society we’ve had in five months.”
“I think it’s obvious we’re going to start off by talking about whoever wrote about our existence on the Internet, am I correct?” asked Eva.
“Clearly,” said Lisa, passing the bowl of corn on the cob.
“So how much sanctimonious high-falutin’ bull hockey is this blog crap?” asked Maggie, swilling her Summer Shandy. A large steel antique washtub filled with ice and bottles of the popular local favorite beer now sat beside them on a small wooden table dragged out from the porch. Citronella tiki lights kept bugs away and lit their bay-gazing Maryland summer crab feast.
“It’s positively unreal,” said Eva. “Like any of us needed this middle school Internet crap when we all have other actual real life things to deal with.”
“I was already a wreck dealing with the miscarriage, and this just set me over the edge,” said Lisa. “I’ve been a mess. I can barely keep the bakery open. I was happy to have a reason to close it this weekend. What I mostly do is spend time worrying. What if Jim finds out about my membership in the Scarlet Letter Society? After everything we’ve been through…”
“Whoa, slow down there, buttacup,” said Maggie. “I doubt Jim reads some trashy local blog and it’s not like he hangs out down at the fire hall where the guys are talking about it.”
“Oh God,” said Eva. “I hate the idea of anyone talking anywhere about my love life. The fire hall? Is that really happening?”
“Yeah, but so what? Wes told me his brother was talking about it because his wife told him about it,” said Maggie.
“Okay, so now your gay best friend theater director and therefore half the town along with the massively gossipy fire hall community are all discussing the three of us being members of a secret society of women who cheat on our husbands?” asked Eva.
“I feel sick about it,” said Lisa. “We all know how this town works. They have nothing better to do than talk about something like this.”
“Yeah, pathetic for certain,” said Maggie, “but who gives a flying fuck? People need to get a life, or something. And what about the subdivision swinger sex club? That seems a little more controversial than our personal lives, doesn’t it? Shit, I’ll read about them.”
“I have the weirdest feeling it’s my neighborhood,” said Lisa, putting down her crab mallet and picking up her beer.
“Your neighborhood?” asked Eva. “How do you know? There must be seven hundred and fifty of those cookie-cutter clusters, no offense.”
“Please, none taken,” said Lisa. “You both know how much I hate my life every time I drive past the ‘Welcome to Stony Mill’ sign.”
“What makes you think it’s your neck of the woods?” asked Maggie.
“There’s this girl Rachel who works down the street from my bakery,” said Lisa. “And she’s my neighbor. We’re on the welcome basket committee together.”
“The what?” asked Eva.
“The what the fuck?” said Maggie.
“Oh God, I never should have mentioned it, I’m embarrassed,” said Lisa. “It isn’t something I ever would have done. I never get involved with that neighborhood crap. But this girl is my neighbor at home and in town so she asked if I would contribute a pie or muffins once in a while when someone new moves in. I don’t usually have to deliver them or anything, and I just blow off the committee meetings or whatever.”
“Committee meetings,” said Maggie. “I bet those parties are outta control.”
“You ladies would die if you saw this queen bee who runs it,” said Lisa. “Jeannie Appleton, she’s in charge of everything.”
“Wow, she must be so proud to run her whole vinyl-sided borough,” said Eva.
“She’s a nightmare,” said Lisa. “She’s the word we save only for very special horrible women.”
“A Cuntasaurus Rex?” said Maggie. “I went to high school with her. Jeannie Robbins back in the day.”
“You did? Holy crap. No, what was the other thing you call people?” said Lisa.
“A thundercunt,” said Maggie and Eva in unison.
“Yes,” said Lisa. “She’s their leader. The mayor thundercunt.”
“She is someone I would love to cunt-punch,” said Maggie. “Even back in high school.”
Eva shook her head. “How many times do I have to tell you that you can’t go around cunt-punching people?”
“The judge would be on my side,” said Maggie.
“Well, I wouldn’t be your lawyer,” said Eva.
“Sure you would, miss corporate fancy ass,” said Maggie. “Pro bono, too.”
“Pro bono my fancy corporate ass,” said Eva. “I think the firm would scratch my name off the building and all the stationery if I started working as some Jerry Springer cunt-punch defender.”
“That would be an interesting business card,” said Lisa, feeling happy to spend time with her friends. It wasn’t that she had forgotten about her recent miscarriage, but for the first time in weeks it wasn’t at the very front of her brain. She sipped her beer, wiping crab seasoning onto a paper towel and reaching for a piece of corn. She glanced past her friends at the waning light of a stunning sunset, thankful for its peacefulness.
“What’s the latest in your world?” Eva asked Maggie, sitting back to take a break from picking crabs, enjoy the painted sky, and sip her beer.
“Not much,” said Maggie. “Renovations at the shop have kept me busy, things are fine with me and Dave.”
“Completely fine?” asked Lisa.
“Yeah,” said Maggie. “I started spending more time taking photos, which has sort of always been a hobby but I found a really good camera at this consignment shop so I’ve been spending more time doing it. I brought it down here to get some pictures.”
“Change the subject much?” asked Eva. “Don’t get me wrong. I love that you’re taking photos, and the view from here of the sunrise over the Choptank River is phenomenal if you can get up that early. But Lisa asked about you and Dave.”
“I was just trying to share the news about my new hobby, missy,” said Maggie, flipping Eva the bird. “Look, nothing’s really changed. Dave and I are committed to getting back together, and I’ve spent most nights at the old house with him and we’re happy.”
“But you haven’t totally moved back in?” asked Lisa.
“My apartment over the shop has been my home for a long time,” said Maggie. “It’s convenient. My books and shit are there. I’m just not ready to pack all that crap up and move it to a place that’s so many blocks from work.”
“You’d still be able to walk to work,” said Eva. “But I certainly can see how you wouldn’t be jumping at the idea of getting rid of the place of your own.”
“It’s not like I’m afraid of commitment,” said Maggie. “I mean I’ve been married how many times? I’m losing count.”
“Three including the one to your current boyfriend or whatever you’re calling your first husband-slash-ex-husband,” said Eva.
“Would you marry Dave again?” said Lisa. “Does he talk about it?”
“We don’t really talk about it,” said Maggie. “Things are fine. Why stir them up?”
“Fair enough,” said Eva. “Makes sense.”
“There’s something to be said for just not stirring things up,” said Lisa.
The women set about cleaning up the crab feast, rolling debris-covered newspapers, tossing trash bags in the metal cans behind the garage. Eva walked Maggie and Lisa to the two upstairs guest rooms, giving out towels and water bottles. She apologized again that the small guest house was being renovated for when the boys got there. She walked downstairs and began closing up the house. She had taken her mother’s first floor bedroom. She showered and changed, flopping into bed to read the Wall
Street Journal before she could fall asleep. Just as she reached over to turn out the light, she heard the sound of a tiny “ping” on her windowsill.
Back in Keytown, Rachel pulled into the driveway of her house on Maple Lane. Before she headed into work, she needed to take her son, Jacob, to the YMCA summer day camp. She looked up at her house, willing herself to hate it less than she did. It was the so-and-so model (the Avalon? the Windsor? She couldn’t even remember; it had been five years since they’d had it built) and it was a piece of crap. The vinyl siding, as with many other houses in the neighborhood, needed power washing. The neighborhood’s rampant green algae mildew was much more noticeable on houses that were lighter—if the homeowners had known about it when they chose siding colors, they all would’ve chosen algae green, which they would’ve called “Moss Green” because it sounded nicer.
She looked at the wood trim around her windows, which all needed paint. People with old Victorian houses were constantly bitching about upkeep, but Rachel didn’t think those houses needed any more upkeep than a modern cookie-cutter McMansion in a subdivision. The houses were slapped together and only five years after their construction they faced numerous problems homeowners couldn’t afford. Roof leaks, drywall cracks, and drafts were only a few of the issues with houses they’d been told in the brochures would be “maintenance free.”
She texted Jacob (“In the car! Time to go!”), too lazy to get him. Her husband, Martin, was in the house, working from home today. He was an executive director for a non-profit environmental organization nearby and every so often worked from his home office. If she went into the house, he’d ask her about the breakfast and she didn’t have time to fill him in.
Her phone lit up with a new text message. She opened it, expecting it to be Jacob telling her he was on the way. It wasn’t.
Kate: How’s my favorite ginger?
Rachel brightened. Her entire body perked up just seeing the message.
Rachel: Much better now that she’s hearing from her favorite blond.
Kate: You in town today?
Rachel: Yeah, eff tax extensions. You?
Kate: Cleaning office to get ready for back-to-school. Stop by? Bring lunch?
Rachel: Can do. Name a time.
Kate: One pm. No onions on my sub.
Rachel: Yes, ma’am.
Rachel felt chills down the center of her, and turned down the car’s air conditioning. Goose bumps rose on her arms and legs. Her day had just been made.
The car door slammed. Rachel turned some internal, automatic switch, and was transformed back into her motherhood reality. Jacob sat in the passenger seat, saying nothing.
“Hey, sweetie,” said Rachel. “Are you ready for camp? Sunscreen, bug spray, bottle of water, and lunch?”
“Yes, Mom,” said her son, who would enter middle school in a few weeks. His brown, shaggy hair hid his eyes despite his mother’s many pleas he get it cut. She sighed, missing her little boy and wondering how she’d handle the uncertain hormonal years ahead. His earbuds perpetually stuck to the sides of his head, he barely seemed to want to speak to her anymore. “You already packed that all this morning, remember?”
“I do,” said Rachel. “But I wanted to make sure you packed the lunch into the backpack. Are you bummed about something?”
“You know I hate this dumb nature camp,” said Jacob. “I’m too old for it. I don’t know why you’re making me go to it.”
“You can’t sit around all summer playing on your iPad,” said Rachel. “Dad thought this one would be fun for you.”
“Yeah, well it’s not,” Jacob responded.
Rachel quietly sighed. Why did it seem like kids were never happy no matter how much you did for them?
“It’s only a few more days,” she said, “then we can go to Ocean City and you’ll be able to go boogie boarding and go to the waterpark and stuff.”
“Finally,” said Jacob.
And Rachel wondered what happened to her sweet, bubbly little boy. It seemed like he had been abducted by aliens and replaced with this moody, disinterested preteen who currently had his head buried in a game on his phone. She knew childhood would disappear one day, but it didn’t make it any less sad when it had happened with her only son.
She drove on in silence, letting her thoughts wander back to Kate. The last two months had gone by in an instant. Their affair was as scorching as a Maryland summer. Rachel had partaken in, with the full knowledge and enthusiastic support of her husband, a number of affairs with women over the years. But there was something about this relationship that was different. Their connection was so strong, their time together much anticipated and so appreciated. They communicated all day—Snapchats, Facebook messages, texts—they didn’t even mean to do it, it was just a natural friendship that had become far more. Their weekly lunch dates were much anticipated.
Rachel walked around to the other side of the car door to open it for Jacob, who still tapped away at his text message.
“C’mon, buddy,” she said. “I need to get to work. I’m already late and my jerk boss is going to give me crap.”
“I thought I wasn’t allowed to say crap, Mommm,” whined Jacob.
“You’re not,” she responded. “But I can say whatever I want, because I’m an adult. Have fun at camp!”
She handed him his backpack and he skulked off.
Rachel spent a quick moment in the parking lot checking for messages before driving into town. There were three:
EFFINGBOSS: on way in?
Kellie: What the fuck just even happened at The Princess’ house this morning?
Kate: See you at one, ginger.
She smiled at Kate’s nickname for her, decided to answer Kellie when she had more time, then grimaced at her boss’s message. Damn, she thought. Aileen, the principal accountant at her firm, was the worst bitch of a boss ever. Everything about her, from her outdated ’90s shoulder-padded suits and ’80s feathered fake-blond haircut to her condescending attitude and passive-aggressiveness, drove Rachel insane.
She wondered how she was going to cruise into work past 10 a.m. after the little gossipfest at Princess Jeannie’s house and the camp drop-off and still manage to deliver sandwiches to her girl crush at the college by 1 p.m., but she’d make it work somehow.
As she put her phone back in her purse, Rachel saw the clear amber plastic of the prescription bottle tucked inside. Her son’s Adderall prescription, picked up at the pharmacy yesterday, called to her. She’d often heard of other moms using the drug as a pick-me-up and for weight loss. She had wondered if it would give her an extra burst of energy to get through her days, which were constantly filled with stress and running around. Well, one won’t kill me, she thought, grabbing the bottle of water from the SUV cup holder. She tossed back a pill.
Rachel arrived at the downtown accounting office a few buildings away from Lisa’s bakery. Finding nowhere to park on the street, she navigated the narrow alley between the brick buildings, cursing Keytown’s lack of parking. She wasn’t supposed to park in the small lot for customers behind the office building, but she figured she could move the car at lunch. If that bitch goes out to lunch today and sees my car out here, she will lose her mind, she thought, squeezing her SUV into a narrow spot; branches spilling over one side of the brick wall scraped her passenger’s side door and she cursed under her breath again.
She rushed into the office and practically ran directly into Aileen, who stood there, hand on hip, wearing her typical outdated suit (this one an ’80s aerobic class shade of teal) and standard-issue ugly-but-comfortable old-lady sandals, never failing to reveal her ugly talon-like toenails, painted pale pink.
“Well, I’m so glad you could join us,” Aileen sneered in her fake sing-songy voice with matching fake smile that never reached her narrow lizard-like eyes, surrounded as they were by poorly applied blue eye shadow and a pair of overly large glasses. Though she was only a few years older than Rachel’s forty-two, she looked at least a dec
ade her senior. Her pale pink manicure and wrinkled hands clutched a large pile of mail. She issued a casual up-down visual review of Rachel’s lower-cut cotton dress.
I honestly do not know how this woman continues to exist as though she was dropped here in a time machine, thought Rachel for the hundredth time. And damn the mail for coming right at the moment I was walking in. Also fuck you for staring at my tits, ya weirdo.
“I’m so sorry,” said Rachel. “Jacob woke up and said he wasn’t feeling well and I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to get him off to camp.”
Aileen pursed her lips. “Well, that’s great you were able to work out your child care issues today.”
Rachel didn’t respond. She had learned from many failed communications with her boss that digging a conversational hole was unwise: Aileen would always have the last word so the sooner you gave it to her, the better. Show her the belly. Aileen clickety-clacked across the worn hardwood floor back to her large corner office facing the perfectly manicured courtyard and, fortunately for Rachel, not facing the parking lot.
Rachel hurried to her office after picking up a stack of her mail from the receptionist. She plopped into her chair and it rolled slightly on its protective floor mat. She turned on her desktop computer and unpacked her laptop from its plain black bag, setting it up on the desk next to her computer. Rachel preferred to work on two machines simultaneously. Everything business- and accounting-related remained on the desktop that looked about as outdated as her boss; personal communications and Internet use were reserved for the laptop. She explained the duality of devices on her desk to her boss as needing the laptop for looking up tax code regulations and checking company email while she was in the middle of the accounting software. Aileen was too cheap to buy desktops that would’ve been easier and quicker to use with the Internet, so she allowed it.
Rachel opened her MacBook Air, the splurge a result of her own tax refund. Her husband, Martin, would never have even noticed since of course she did their taxes. Her fifty-five-year-old white-haired husband was now semi-retired from the environmental non-profit, working part time from home so he could pursue his “dream” of writing screenplays. He was probably out on his canoe on the lake by now, working on “character development.” Though she’d loved his poetic nature at first, the bottom line was that she had married him for the money she thought he’d had but that he had eventually frittered away on his “dreams.” Rachel wasn’t crazy about concepts like semi-retirement and dreams and character development because she was still the one with the nine-to-five job. She sighed, sitting back, and noticed the most delicious buzzing sensation moving through her veins. Oh, that pill. Maybe it was just what the doctor ordered (or didn’t) to get her through the day.
The Scarlet Letter Scandal Page 3