Jeannette must’ve been waiting for me to get off the phone because when I step out of my office, she’s waiting for me. “What is it? Is something wrong?” I say, scanning the kitchen behind me.
“Everything’s fine.” She laughs. “God, you’re paranoid.” She has no idea. I’ve told Randy what happened but not anyone else on staff—I need work to be immaculate, a refuge from the rest of my life. “You actually got a really interesting phone call.”
She hands me a slip of paper. Her handwriting is like Larry’s, the letters so tiny that I have to hold the paper up close to read it. “Mark Brinson, the Butterman Catalog.” And then a number with an area code I don’t recognize. “He said to call him today, if you can.”
“Is this, like, the real Butterman Catalog?” I ask.
“Yeah, the fruit baskets. My mom always got the catalogs. She sent Christmas gifts from it every year.”
“Mine, too.” I remember the catalog sitting dog-eared on the kitchen counter, my mom’s ever-present can of Tab nearby.
I call the number from my cell as I step out the back door into the parking lot behind the bakery. With the ovens going, it gets obscenely hot in the kitchen and I need some relief, not that I’m going to get much outside today. It’s fully spring, but for the past several days, it’s felt like July. I keep overhearing customers make jokes about global warming and, from some of them, snickers about the bullheaded Republicans who don’t believe in it. Typical D.C., where even a simple conversation about the weather can quickly become political.
“Mark Brinson,” the voice on the end of the line says.
“Hi, it’s Waverly Brown returning your call,” I say.
“Waverly! Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. How are things in the nation’s capital?”
Ugh. He has an overenthusiastic salesman’s voice. I’m immediately turned off.
“Good, good. Where are you calling from?”
“Oregon. Portland, Oregon. Ever been?”
“No, I never have.”
“Well, it’s beautiful. You should come see us. Maybe after this conversation, you will!”
“I’m curious why you called me. That’s for sure.”
“Are you familiar with our company, Ms. Brown?”
“It’s Waverly. And yeah, I know the catalog.”
“Well we’re more than just the catalog,” he says. “We have dozens of stores across the country. We’ve been in business since the 1930s.”
“That’s impressive,” I say. “So what do you want with a punk like me?” Seriously, I think.
“Ms. Brown, I have a cousin in D.C. She’s a triathlete, like me. Ever done a triathlon, Ms. Brown?”
“It’s Waverly,” I say again, more impatiently this time. “I run some but I’m not much of an athlete. I just don’t have time with my business, which I assume has something to do with why you called?”
“Lots of great running trails in your area,” he says.
I throw my head back. Come on. Get to the point, already!
“I was out there a few months ago, visiting my cousin. We’re training for an Ironman together.”
“That’s an accomplishment.”
“Yes, the training’s intense. Well the reason why I’m calling”—finally!—“is because when I was there a few weeks ago, my cousin and I had just finished a long bike ride and she took me by your bakery. I had one of your famous doughnut muffins. Let me tell you, after a two-hour ride, it really hit the spot. You’re really talented.”
“Thank you,” I say.
“And then, wouldn’t you know it, I was on the plane home the next day, thumbing through the Sunday New York Times, when I saw the article about you. What a coup that must have been for you! And well deserved!”
“Thanks so much,” I say, starting to like him a little more. I can feel myself smiling.
“It got me thinking, and so I called the bakery a couple of weeks ago and had a couple dozen shipped out here. Do you recall? I had them shipped to my personal address.”
I have a vague recollection of Randy telling me about something like this, but it must have happened around the same time that Amy was in the hospital because I can’t totally remember, and I should. We’ve had a handful of people, usually past customers who’ve left the area, call once or twice asking for shipments of a particular favorite goodie, but it certainly doesn’t happen frequently enough that I wouldn’t notice. “I do, I remember,” I lie. “How did you like them? They survived the trip, I hope?”
“They were fantastic, but the truth is that they weren’t for me. My job is to find new products for our mail-order business. And I’m calling because we’d like to start offering our customers your muffins. We want to be in business with you, Ms. Brown.”
I stop pacing around the parking lot and fall back against Randy’s Jetta, which is parked in the spot next to my car.
“We can work out the details later, but I wanted to start with this introductory call to introduce myself and find out whether this is something that even interests you. Does this interest you?”
“Yeah,” I gasp. “It definitely interests me!” I know that I probably shouldn’t sound so eager, but I can’t help it. My muffins being sold nationwide? I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I could pay off the house loan in full. I could buy the bakery space from that nitwit Alec. I wouldn’t feel nauseous every time I got a bill in the mail. Larry and I could even take a vacation together. Or, hell, just go out for a nice dinner.
“Well, that’s great. That’s great that you’re interested. I’m going to put together some information for you and we’ll chat more over the next few days. Does that sound good?”
“That sounds fantastic,” I say.
After I’ve given him my email address and thanked him a dozen more times, I hang up and turn a celebratory twirl. I fall back on the warm hood of my old rusted-up Subaru and shield my eyes from the sun with one hand while I call Larry with the other.
“Hellooo,” he says. I hear a baseball game on the television in the background.
“Guess what?” I can’t believe what I’m about to say. “I have some good news.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
A few nights later, Kate, Larry, and I are standing at the island in my kitchen, hovering over a giant bowl of linguine. “Family style,” Larry says, laughing, spearing his fork into the food. When I poured the pasta into the bowl on the island, Kate and Larry charged, Larry handing Kate a fork from the silver canister where we keep them on the counter. We ended up not bothering with bowls. “I think more pepper,” I say through a forkful. “You think more pepper?”
“Sure,” Kate says, her mouth also full.
I grab the grinder off of the counter behind me and turn a few twists over the bowl. Kate begins to tell us about the trip she’s thinking about taking over Memorial Day—to India.
“Is this some sort of Eat, Pray, Love thing?” Larry jokes.
Kate holds her fork over her head and makes a motion like she’s going to stab him. Only Larry can get away with that kind of sarcasm with her. Anyone else would be walking backward out the door by now, hands up in defense, saying they didn’t mean any harm.
“Actually, Brendan and I met for dinner yesterday,” she says.
I put my fork down. “Dinner? Yesterday?” I look at my watch. “Um, how many hours has it been since then and you’re just now telling me?”
“Well, you’ve been so busy becoming a national superstar that I didn’t want to bother you with it.”
“Please.” I roll my eyes. The deal with the catalog is going to go through and it’s all happening very quickly. The muffins will appear in next month’s issue. A photographer and food stylist are coming out at the end of the week to take photos of me and the muffins. I’ve made an appointment with Kate’s hairdresser; you’d think I was getting a root canal, I’m so anxious about it. Mark Brinson says we’re shooting for ten thousand orders this first go-round. Ten thousand orders. I don’t k
now whether I’ll ever be able to wrap my head around that number.
My first check, a signing bonus, is in the mail. Earlier today, I got online and moved some money around to cover next month’s loan payment. My house is officially safe. It was a relief to see the zero balance on the loan after I was done, but I didn’t exactly jump up and down like a sweepstakes winner. It was more like the kind of relief you feel when you’re driving and you swerve to avoid getting in an accident that would have been your fault. You tell yourself you’ll pay closer attention from here on out.
“So? How was dinner?” Larry says. This is the good aspect of Larry having never made friends with any of my friends’ significant others. He can participate in girl talk.
“Well,” Kate says, pausing to swallow her bite. “He was actually available for dinner. That’s the first thing. A few months ago, I don’t think that Brendan would have stopped working even if his own mother died.”
I feel myself tense up. Even all these years later, I still feel it when someone mentions a parent dying.
“So where did you go?” I say.
“Of course you ask about the restaurant first,” she teases. “Restaurant Nora.” It’s one of our mutual favorites. I haven’t been in years, with the budget and all.
“Did anyone bother you?” Larry says. “I mean, the two of you together, in public.”
“Not a one,” she says, smiling. Brendan and Kate became old news a few weeks ago, when pictures surfaced of two Miss USA contestants smoking pot in an Atlantic City hotel room before the pageant. Miss Vermont and Miss Idaho, apparently. Kate joked that Brendan probably bought them the drugs and hired the photographer.
“So? How was it?” I ask.
“It was good. You know, it was actually kind of nice. Strange, being together like that. He’s been staying on Capitol Hill. An apartment.”
“Are you having second thoughts?” I ask.
She shrugs and glances at Larry.
He notices. “You girls need me to leave so you can really pick this thing apart?” he says.
“No, no,” Kate says. “No. I haven’t made any decisions. I don’t know what I’m thinking. I don’t know what I’ll do. It was nice, though, even to just sit together, and even though it was awkward. I wonder when I’ll be able to look at him without seeing those photos of him with her.”
“I’m sure,” I say. “But it’s a start. If that’s what you want—a start.”
The doorbell rings. Larry and I look at each other and shrug. “I’ll get it,” he says, putting down his fork and wiping his hands on his jeans.
After he’s left the kitchen, I look at Kate and say, “So? What else?”
But before she can answer, Larry calls, “Hon, come here.”
Walking down the hallway toward the front door, the first thing I see is pink. And then, like a gear slowly turning, the source of the salmony color registers in my brain: Amy’s pink trench coat. She’s standing with Larry, in sweatpants, her coat, and a baseball cap that only partially covers the bandages around her head. Emma’s standing beside her, her arms stretched high to show Larry the stuffed penguin she’s holding. Both of them look tiny next to his burly heft.
“I’ve been calling,” I say. I don’t know why it’s the first thing out of my mouth.
She presses her lips together and lowers her eyes toward Emma, smoothing her hand over her little girl’s hair. “I’m not supposed to be driving.” She tugs on her hat. “I didn’t get your calls.”
I nod. Kate walks up behind me. “Amy,” she gasps.
Amy scans the room anxiously, and then her eyes finally rest on me. “I need your help,” she says, her voice breaking.
I have to lock my knees to keep from crumpling onto the floor with relief. “Okay,” I say. “Anything at all.”
Amy just nods, not needing to say more.
Twenty minutes later, we decide that Margaret and Davis should pick up Emma and take her to the hotel. She’ll be safer there. She doesn’t need to be hanging around here while we figure out what we’re going to do. Amy’s on the phone with her mother, giving her directions to my house. She’s pacing my living room, circling around the coffee table as if she’s following the lines of an invisible toy train track. She looks so frail beneath the oversized sweatpants and sweatshirt she wears, her head a turban of gauze beneath the hat. I want to tell her to sit down, to rest, but I’m scared that anything I might say will be the wrong thing that sends her back out the door.
“No, there’s nothing to be scared of, Mom.” She scowls into the phone. “I have to stay here because I have to deal with this now. Going down to North Carolina would just prolong everything. No, no, he doesn’t know that I’ve left.”
The doorbell rings and it’s as if its gentle chimes are an air raid signal. Larry and I leap from our spots on the couch. What if it’s Mike? There’s a rolling ache in my gut as I peek out of the curtains, but I can’t make anything out. I go to the door.
“Oh, Jesus,” I say, relieved when I peek through the peephole. I twist open the brass lock on the heavy wooden door. “It’s just my neighbor.” The nosy freelance writer.
We chat for a minute and hardly more—she sweetly stopped by to congratulate me on the Times article, making me feel guilty for wanting to slam the door in her face—and I turn back toward the living room. Kate is tapping her foot impatiently and playing with one of the bangles on her wrist as she waits for Amy to get off the phone. I go to the kitchen to refill Amy’s glass of water. She’s off by the time I’m back.
“Please sit down, Amy,” I say. “I’m sure you shouldn’t be moving around like this.”
As she moves to sit on the couch, Kate and I both rush to help her. She stops us. “I’m fine,” she says.
We’re all quiet for a moment. I sit down across from her, on the floor, resting an elbow on the coffee table.
“My mom didn’t say, ‘I told you so,’ at least,” she says sullenly. Another minute passes. “It’s hard to believe that the bogeyman we’re guarding ourselves from is my husband.”
Kate and I look at each other. Larry slips quietly from the room, knowing that the three of us need this time together, and goes to check on Emma, who’s coloring in the kitchen.
“Do you know that he once drove four hours to North Carolina after a thirty-six-hour hospital shift to pick up barbecue from my favorite place back home just because I’d mentioned that I was desperate for some?” She starts to cry. I jump up from my spot on the floor to sit next to her.
“You’re going to be okay,” Kate says, scooting down the couch until she’s next to her. “Everything’s going to be fine,” she assures her again.
Amy nods. The look on her face is a yearning one, like she wishes that Kate’s certainty could somehow transfer through the air between them and land on her, like a costume she could jump into.
Amy rubs her palms over her thighs. “I was in bed,” she starts. “Emma was curled up next to me, in the crook of my arm. We were watching The Little Mermaid. Claire bought it for her while I was in the hospital. Ever since I got home, Emma seems to spend most of every day either asking to watch Ariel and Prince Eric or singing the songs from the movie. I didn’t mind—I’ve loved just snuggling up with her. Part of me was starting to get resentful that I’d eventually have to get out of bed.
“Mike was downstairs making dinner. He said earlier today that he was actually thinking about taking a leave from work to take care of me. And, he said—” She pauses to look at me. “To take care of himself. I know you’ll never believe me, but he’s really been incredible. Three times a day, he carries up trays of food. Cereal or toast in the morning, lunches of soup and cookies that Emma says are from her, ginger ale in one of the crystal wineglasses we got as a wedding present. While I lay upstairs with Emma, I could hear him doing the dishes, pushing the vacuum, opening and closing the washing machine door. I know that nobody else understands what an effort he’s making, but I can. I decided that that’s all that m
attered.”
I’ll never understand how she can speak sympathetically about him, I think, watching her. It’s as if she’s a puzzle I’ll never figure out, as if she’s something I’ve never seen before.
“It’s not as if I didn’t know this would be hard,” she says. “Believe me, over the past few weeks I’ve felt like everything I’ve learned in my thirty-five years of life, every moral truth, every hard-won lesson, has just flitted away. I’ve hardly let myself think about the specifics of what I have to deal with going forward, except for when Mike came into the bedroom to talk about his case or give me updates from his calls with his lawyer. I didn’t want to deal with it. Not yet. Not until I had at least a few more days of cuddling with my baby girl and watching the happy way that she stretched her little body against mine as if she was still a part of it.”
I think of the way that Emma had acted after the police brought her out of their house, and how while she was sitting with me in their front yard, she seemed so aware, almost wise, in the way that the commotion around her didn’t faze her. I twirled my fingers around her cider-colored curls, watched her doughy fingers pick at the grass, and thought that it was like she was waiting for all of the adults around her to figure out what she already knew. She knew too much.
“Mike said that everything was much more likely to work in our favor if I testified on his behalf,” she says.
Our favor, I think.
“He wanted me to say that he was taking some sort of medication and that he was also drinking when everything happened. He said it would be easy to come up with a story about a drug that would make him hallucinate at the wrong dosage.” She looks at me. “He said that whatever you told the police wouldn’t hold up as long as I said it wasn’t true.”
He’s pure evil, I think to myself.
“The truth is that he was drunk when he put me in the hospital, and he never drinks, hardly ever, except for a beer here and there. And I felt like I was a broken record, with the way I was pushing him so hard to see a counselor. How many times had he told me that I’d be more help to him than a stranger? I wanted to have the same faith in myself that he seemed to. I wanted us to be able to do this at home, together. As a family. As a husband and wife. I actually don’t remember what happened a few weeks ago. Not exactly. I know it was early in the morning and I kept hitting the snooze alarm. He yanked me out of bed and said something about how it was my fault he’d overslept.”
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