“Like Brigitte Bardot!” they yelled at the same time. Pru’s heart was racing.
Jacob turned down the volume on the radio. “We should stop and get Annali a dog,” he said.
“Does Patsy want a dog?”
“Not for Patsy. For Annali. For her birthday. She’s going to be three.”
“Yeah, well, a three-year-old isn’t going to take a dog out for walks.”
“If you see a pet store, pull over, and we’ll get her a dog.”
So far she hadn’t seen anything for miles except for farm stands and motels. “Okay, Jacob,” she said. “But maybe you should check it out with Patsy first.”
Jacob didn’t say anything. He drummed his knees, and sang along with Chrissie Hynde.
They arrived just before noon. Jacob took the rickety beach house stairs two at a time. Pru opened the trunk and took out their bags. When she looked up at the house, Jacob had both of them in his arms, Patsy and Annali.
JACOB PUT HIS ENERGY TO GOOD USE SHOPPING, CHOPPING, and cooking. He had an insane amount of energy. Omelets with mushrooms when they arrived, chocolate fondue and strawberries. He banged nails into walls and drove wedges under the new refrigerator to straighten it and caulked the bathroom shower. He ran along the beach chasing Annali and played games with her in the arcade on the boardwalk. By the time dinner rolled around, Pru was exhausted.
He made beef Wellington for dinner, and then—at last, thought Pru—sat down to watch a basketball game on the television. She and Patsy began cleaning up the kitchen. Patsy was going over her plans for the move. She would have to quit the teaching job that she’d just begun, and find something new. Annali came over with a dead beetle she’d found, and they both admired it. “Show Jacob,” Patsy said, and Annali scooted right off, carefully cupping her hands around the bug carcass.
Pru was dying to suggest to Patsy that the job situation gave her another good reason to wait on moving, at least until the spring, but remembered she’d promised herself to butt out. She was about to offer to help with the moving van, when there was a loud cry from the living room.
“Honey, no!” Pru heard Jacob yell, then: “Dammit, Annali!” She looked up in time to see Jacob stand up, and Annali fall gently to the floor on her bottom. Annali looked up at Jacob, her eyes wide in surprise. Jacob looked down at her, then at the hand he’d pushed her with, as if it belonged to somebody else.
“Oh, honey,” he said. “Annali,” he said, reaching for her.
Annali sprang up and ran from the room. Patsy put down the dish towel she was holding, and followed her into the bedroom, closing the door gently behind them.
“Shit,” Jacob said, “I can’t believe it. I pushed her.”
He sat back down on the couch, muting the volume on the TV. “Christ. I feel like a monster.” He put his head in his hands. “I can’t believe it,” he said again. He looked truly miserable.
“She’ll be okay,” Pru said. “Kids are tough.”
But he didn’t answer. Pru thought he seemed a little more distraught than the circumstances called for. He hadn’t exactly pushed Annali, from what she’d seen. It looked more as if he had sort of tried to pull her to the side, but she’d become unbalanced and fallen to the floor.
Jacob kept watching the door to the bedroom, but he made no move to go to them. At last he turned off the TV and went outside. Pru finished the dishes, occasionally looking out of the glass doors to where Jacob stood at the railing, staring off at the ocean. Presently, Patsy came out of the bedroom.
“Where’d he go?”
Pru pointed to the deck. “He’s pretty upset,” she said.
Patsy went out to him. Pru watched them through the doors. Patsy tried to get him to look at her, but he wouldn’t. Finally she pulled him by the hand down the stairs to the beach.
The phone rang and Pru went to answer it. It could only be Nadine, at home by herself.
“I miss my girls!” she said. “I’m so jealous of you all there together. How’s it going?”
Pru could hear the clack of her knitting needles in the background.When her mother was agitated, she knit like nobody’s business. When Leonard was sick, she made matching hats, ponchos, and mittens for Pru, Patsy, and Annali. The lovely, intricate patterns would have taken a normal person several months to finish. Her mother did them in a couple of weeks, sitting by his bed at home, then in the hospital, then home again, for his final days.
She told her mother about the incident with Jacob and Annali.
“Poor Jacob,” her mother said. “Do you remember pushing her off the swing, last year?”
“God, yes. I think you spent more time consoling me than her.”
“It’s something every parent has to get used to, you know. There’s nothing that shows you how not perfect you are like being a parent. Jacob’s used to having all the answers, I think. I don’t think you could be a doctor, otherwise.”
“I’ve been thinking,” said Pru. “Is she allowed to move with Annali? What about Jimmy Roy?”
“We haven’t heard from Jimmy Roy in a while,” her mother said, sighing.
“Really?” Pru was surprised. She knew Jimmy Roy had been gone for several months, but he’d always kept in touch, little post-cards and letters to Annali. He’d sent her pictures of penguins, which were tacked up on the wall behind her bed.
“I guess Jimmy Roy could stop her from moving,” her mother continued, “but I don’t think he will.”
“No,” Pru agreed. “But do you think this is a good idea? Moving here just to be near Jacob?”
The needles paused, and then resumed.
“There’s nothing for Patsy around here,” her mother said at last. “She’s been biding her time, you know. She’s not like you, Pru. She needs to be excited by life.”
“Whereas I need to have the crap bored out of me by life?”
“You just have a different tolerance. Patsy will follow her heart, wherever it takes her. I don’t think it’s my place to tell her where that is.”
“Unfortunately, Annali has to follow Patsy’s heart, too.”
“It’s a good heart, Pru. I don’t think we have to worry. I barely knew your father when I married him.”
Although she’d heard that before, it was impossible to visualize. She thought of her mother, sitting up in bed in her flannel Lanz of Salzburg nightgown, and found it hard to believe she’d ever been impulsive. It must have been just that one time, that one wild instinct that drove her to marry Leonard after knowing him only three weeks. Then she settled down to her life of making dinners and vacuuming the carpets and going to the basement of the First Christian Missionary Alliance to play Senior Scrabble.
Pru had the strange feeling that her mother was playing online Scrabble now—as well as knitting—while they talked. Sometimes her voice would fade out, or it would take her a moment too long to answer. Was she quietly typing in a word, so Pru wouldn’t hear?
“You’ll be sad if they move here, won’t you?” Pru said.
The needles stopped again, and there was a long pause. “Oh my goodness, yes,” Nadine said, at last. “I most certainly will. I certainly, certainly will.”
AFTER SHE HUNG UP WITH HER MOTHER, PRU CALLED her home phone. That was another good thing about being self-employed: You could actually pretend that your obsessive checking in with all means of communications was work related. She’d managed to restrict herself to checking her messages only twice a day, which, considering, was rather valiant.
That was how she thought of herself now, self-employed. She just wasn’t earning anything, that was all. But she was on the verge of locking up a couple of jobs Kate had steered her way. She now truly needed the money, and would be glad to have something to do with her days. She needed to get away from the Korner, where she was spending too much time. Some days, it was the only human contact she had.
No messages. She wondered how far into the realm of getting weird on John she’d already wandered. Was there any return? Could th
ey go back to their easy friendship? Or was she doomed to this no-man’s land forever?
No-man’s land. She liked that. She’d have to tell McKay, when she saw him again.
THE NEXT MORNING, SHE AWOKE TO THE SOUNDS OF Annali shrieking and laughing in the kitchen. She came out of the bedroom to see Annali trundling through the house, followed closely by a small, pudgy yellow puppy.
The puppy kept jumping up on Annali and licking her face, to her great delight. “Look what Jacob brought me!” she yelled, when she saw Pru.
Jacob seemed somewhat abashed at himself, but pleased nonetheless. Pru could see that Patsy was pleased, too. All Pru could think of was, How are you going to get it home? And who was going to walk him during the day—Nadine, with her bad hip? Well, it wasn’t her concern. She poured coffee for herself and sat down, bending to pet the puppy when it came wriggling over for a sniff.
Jacob wanted to rent bikes for everyone. For him, Patsy, and Annali, he rented a tandem with a child’s seat on the back, and a red bike for Pru, upright and retro in design but with thirty speeds. Annali insisted on bringing the puppy along, but it kept getting its leash tangled in the pedals of the tandem, so they ended up pushing the bikes along as the puppy wriggled and bit them on the ankles. Their little group seemed to be the main attraction in town. People keep stopping to coo and pet the puppy, whom Annali had named Jenny. Jacob seemed to love the attention almost as much as the puppy did. “She wanted a dog,” he said to everyone. “Am I going to tell her no?”
Patsy squeezed her arm and said, “This is perfect. Everyone I love best in one place. Perfect.” Her wildly happy aspect had returned. There was no sign of her previous anxiety. Patsy was having a good day. It was as if the dog had signaled something to her, something irrevocable.
By the end of the day, Jenny had nipped Annali on the nose at least twice, attacked the new furniture, and dragged a rotting shellfish carcass halfway up the beach stairs. Annali wanted to take the dog to bed with her, but Patsy explained that it must sleep in its crate until it was trained. When Jacob kissed her good night, Annali said, “I love my dog. Good night, Daddy.”
Hearing this, Pru looked up from the sink. Patsy was watching Jacob closely, a combination of amusement and worry on her face. Jacob said, mildly, “Good night, kiddo.” But as soon as Annali and Patsy disappeared into the bedroom, he rose and went outside to stand at the railing.
Pru lay down on the couch and began reading a biography of Toussaint L’Ouverture that John had given her. He said L’Ouverture was even more fascinating than Churchill, and up against even greater odds, and what was she doing reading about dead white European males, anyway? After Patsy finished putting Annali down, she went to find Jacob outside. Presently, Pru could hear their voices coming in through the window. She heard Patsy say something laughingly, but then Jacob said, in a somber voice, “I think it’s a bad idea.” Pru put down her book.
“Why?” Patsy’s voice sounded teasing, but there was a note of anxiety, too. “Did it scare you?”
“It’s just confusing, that’s all. I’m not her daddy.”
Pru stopped chewing the gum in her mouth, waiting for Patsy’s response.
“I know that,” Patsy said, after a pause. “But she loves you, Jacob. Isn’t that what you wanted? Because, you know, you could have fooled me.”
“Let’s go for a walk,” Jacob said then, and she heard their steps rattle down the stairs and their voices drift away.
Soon Patsy returned, alone. Pru put down her book. “What happened?”
“What do you mean?”
“Where’s Jacob?”
She shrugged. “Walking on the beach.” She began to move to the bedroom where she and Jacob were sleeping.
“Is everything all right?” Pru said.
“Sure. Why?”
“I don’t know. Jacob seemed a little freaked earlier, when Annali called him Daddy. That’s all.”
Patsy stopped, and turned around. “Pru, don’t you start,” she said, in an unsteady voice.
“I’m not . . .”
“Yes you are! And you’re going to freak him out, with all your prying and your demands and your usual bullshit!” Pru was so surprised she couldn’t speak. Patsy was shaking. “Just quit it, okay?” She hissed, and then banged into the bedroom.
Pru stayed where she was, struggling to understand what had just happened. Then she went to Patsy’s room and tapped on the door. When there was no answer, she let herself in.
She found Patsy sitting on the bed, plucking at a pillow on her lap. Pru sat next to her and took her hand. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Make me understand.”
Patsy leaned back against the headboard and looked at Pru with big, inscrutable eyes. “Just be happy for me,” she said. “Just get behind this. Why is everyone chasing him away?”
“No one is chasing him away,” Pru said. “But, you know, we’re not perfect. I know he thinks you are. But the rest of us—he’ll have to learn to put up with our ways, that’s all.”
She was trying to be cheerful, but she could feel how insufficient it was. If she only knew more—but Patsy hadn’t told her what was going on, and she didn’t know how to ask without setting her off. Patsy had always been moody, but her present state made those days seem tame, by comparison.
“Just be happy,” Patsy said again. “Look how good everything is. Just look.”
“I am happy,” Pru said. “Aren’t you happy? Isn’t Jacob?”
“Of course,” Patsy said. “You see how we are together.” She began to say something, then bit back the words. She looked as if she might start crying.
“Well,” Pru said, at a total loss now, but determined to stay in the game. “I am happy. Happy, happy, happy.”
Patsy pushed away the pillow she was plucking. “Okay, now you’re freaking me out,” she said. But she wasn’t laughing, and her eyes were sad.
PRU AND JACOB DROVE BACK TO D.C. THE NEXT DAY. It was overcast and cold. Jacob was different, silent and rigid. He didn’t play any music. He hardly spoke during the three hours it took to get back to the city, except to announce at a rest stop that he was going in for a coffee. Pru watched the light, steady rain out of her window. Every now and then, Jacob would shake his head, set his lips tightly, and grip the steering wheel, as if wrestling with something. She asked him once if he wanted to stop and eat, but he was so deeply immersed with the argument he was having with himself that he didn’t answer. Pru went back to watching the rain, lulled by the sound of the wipers.
When they finally pulled up outside her apartment, Jacob let the engine idle and grabbed her bag from the backseat. Pru wished she could think of something to say. Seeing him this way made her nervous. Jacob was many things, but morose and moody didn’t seem to be one of them. Everything had changed, somewhere. She didn’t know what, and she didn’t know how. The wipers slapped at the rain while Jacob held out her bag to her, practically wishing out loud that she would go.
“I guess I’ll see you at Thanksgiving?” she said.
He looked out the window at the rain, running a hand through his hair. There was a short silence. “I might have to be in the hospital,” he said. “I’ll have to see.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well, we’ll miss you.” She tried to smile at him, but he wouldn’t look at her.
“Yeah,” he said, turning away. Two people holding newspapers over their heads dashed past the car, laughing. “You’ll explain it to Annali, won’t you?”
“That you’re working? I think she’s old enough to understand that.”
“She’s a great kid,” he said suddenly. “I love that kid. I really love her.”
He said it with such regret and finality that it made her shudder. Suddenly, she knew that they were not just talking about Thanksgiving. Why? Just because Annali called him Daddy? Was he kidding? She found it hard to believe that, given his obvious attachment to her, he’d be so alarmed at the return of his affection. What was going on?
&n
bsp; She didn’t know what to say. She listened to the cold rain falling on the canvas roof of the car. “She’s really attached to you, Jacob,” she said at last, a statement, a plea.
He nodded. “I know. Good-bye, Pru,” he said.
She didn’t move. “You’re leaving them, aren’t you?”
“Listen,” he said. “Please—don’t make this harder for me than it already is.”
“Harder for you! What about Patsy? And Annali? Have you even thought about what this will do to them?” She didn’t think she’d ever been so angry in her life. She wanted to grab his face, make him look at her. She wanted to dig her fingers into that handsome jaw, to hurt him, badly.
He fell silent, and turned away again. She didn’t think she could continue to speak to him without screaming. Without another word she opened the car door and stepped out. The rain, heavy and chill, was beginning to come down fast, and she ran up the stairs of her apartment building. Before she’d even found her keys in her pocket, Jacob had pulled away from the curb and was gone.
Eleven
Pru decided not to tell Patsy right away about her conversation with Jacob. She really meant to keep to her resolution not to get involved. But when Patsy called her later in the week to help arrange a moving van, she changed her mind. She laid it all out for Patsy, as best she could remember.
In the car, with Jacob right in front of her, she’d been absolutely sure they’d never see him again. But now, talking to Patsy, who clearly thought no such thing, it was disconcerting to hear how shaky her conclusion sounded. Patsy was entirely unimpressed, when she was finished. Tears, shouting, accusations of lying . . . that Pru had expected. This blasé shrugging of the shoulders, she hadn’t.
“I’ve heard him say that before,” Patsy said, brushing it off. “Then, in the next second, he can’t live without us. It just scares him sometimes, that’s all. Don’t worry. We’re fine.”
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