Good Karma

by Christina Kelly

  DEDICATION

  To Bill, my dreamboat.

  EPIGRAPH

  Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.

  —ROALD DAHL

  You never know.

  —NORA EPHRON

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Acknowledgments

  P.S. Insights, Interviews & More . . .* About the author

  About the book

  Read on

  Praise

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  chapter 1

  Behind her, Karma was getting restless. Catherine could hear him stretch, stand, and shake, his ID tag hitting the hard edge of the doggie seat.

  “Don’t look at him,” Ralph warned, his hands clutching the steering wheel. “He’s fine.”

  “But maybe he needs to stop again.”

  Ralph adjusted the rearview mirror. “Don’t project.”

  “Project?” Catherine asked. “What do you know about projecting?” She’d had it with his amateur psychology.

  “A bar of soap has more sense than that stupid dog.”

  Catherine turned her attention back to the Savannah map, to try to get a sense of the city, to somehow pinpoint where they were. They’d been on the road so long, it was hard to tell. She turned the map ninety degrees and refolded it. It reminded her of a math problem. If a car were traveling at sixty miles an hour heading due east, and a Boston terrier was in distress in the backseat, how long would it take for his bladder to explode? At what velocity would the poor dog erupt into a mushroom cloud and take her husband and his golf clubs with him?

  “Look.” Ralph pointed to a small sign that directed them to the island. “Only five miles.”

  They were approaching the end of the parkway, that much was clear. Three lanes merged into two, and orange detour barrels dotted the shoulder. She placed the map back into the glove compartment and grabbed the Seven Oaks brochure. As Ralph focused on a lane change, she pulled down the sun flap and watched Karma in the mirror. He seemed to be comfortable, but she could never be sure. He always breathed as if he were wearing scuba equipment, his little pushed-in nose struggling with the simplest tasks.

  The brochure to Seven Oaks, at least, felt solid. Some companies had sent only a glossy three-fold leaflet and a website address. But after spending a week with real estate agents looking at places to retire, she knew not to trust websites or fancy brochures, even though she and Ralph had done their research. They’d collected all the magazines they could find with headlines like “Top Ten Places to Retire” and “The Next Chapter,” but not all developments had met their expectations. They’d visited Asheville and Charlottesville and Hilton Head. They’d toured housing communities with names like the Sanctuary and the Farms and Sunset Estates. They even visited a subdivision called Trilogy, whose three parts were touted as “Golf. Tennis. Fun.”

  They wanted warmth, but not Florida; several friends who’d relocated there had died within the first two years. Catherine’s divorced sister, Martha, had moved to the Villages, a gated community north of Orlando with the motto “Florida’s friendliest hometown.” Martha loved it, but got a venereal disease within the first month. “What can I say?” her sister told Catherine. “It’s just a lifestyle decision.”

  They’d just spent two nights in Charleston, at the base of a cabled bridge on the Cooper River. But their room had smelled of unfamiliar fur, and Catherine had found cat kibble under the bed. Only Karma had seemed to be in a good mood there. They’d squandered two afternoons walking through Low Country cottages with eat-in kitchens and screened porches with an agent who looked as if he were on spring break. He was young enough to be their grandchild, if they’d had one. What did he know about retirement or 401(k) plans? Or why a master bedroom on the main floor was actually a practical solution for their knees, not just a theoretical idea, good for “resale”?

  She’d wanted to fall in love with Charleston, with its history and Southern charm, but the city had felt overpriced and sprawling. They could just stay in New Jersey if they wanted that. The historic district, with new shutters and fresh paint on old buildings, like an aging woman with too much eye shadow, just made her sad.

  “It says they have a dog park,” Catherine said, flipping through the Seven Oaks brochure. “‘A picket-fenced six-acre playground of meadow and woods will keep your pooch and his people happy.’”

  Karma shook in the backseat.

  “Yes, baby. You’ll get your own dog park. With t-r-e-a-t-s.” Catherine spelled out the word, careful to enunciate each letter.

  “Don’t encourage him.”

  “Treats. Treats. Treats.”

  Karma barked.

  “And I’ll tell you again, once and for all,” Ralph added, “he doesn’t understand English. He’s a d-o-g.”

  “Oh, really?” She might have said more but resisted. He had done most of the driving, after all, and had been touchy since he’d retired four months earlier. Since he’d arrived home one Friday night with an engraved plaque from his going-away luncheon and a single cardboard box of personal effects from his forty years at the bank.

  “Or do calculus. Or appreciate fusion or the power of compounding or . . .”

  Catherine unclipped her seat belt and swiveled around to the backseat. “A dog park!” Catherine shouted, too loudly for the small car. She was sorry at once. “It’s just he’s sensitive and you never, ever appreciate him,” she said quietly.

  He laughed a bit and shook his head.

  “And you never have.”

  Fewer cars were passing them now as they headed east, toward the island. The road narrowed and Karma settled again into his car seat.

  It was time to make a decision. They were all going a little crazy. The last Charleston listing had been a roomy three-bedroom on a cul-de-sac in Mount Pleasant. They were standing in the vaulted entryway when the young agent mentioned a local Thai restaurant and Ralph had erupted, “I don’t care about noodles, for god’s sake! I just want to play golf!”

  All the properties they’d seen had been adequate for their needs, but none of them had a sense of community or security. Living in a gated community wasn’t on her bucket list, but the glossy print about the twenty-four-hour manned gatehouse and twelve-foot perimeter fence did sound comforting. Catherine wasn’t as trusting as she used to be. That’s why they’d gotten the dog in the first place. Even if she sometimes treated the dog l
ike a baby, dressing him in colorful hats, Karma would certainly alert them to an intruder. At least that was the plan. But, bless his heart, the dog either didn’t care or didn’t know about security. When a serviceman knocked, he’d lift his head from the dog bed, then go back to sleep, annoyed.

  Ahead, the cirrus clouds melted into the horizon. A streak of orange appeared by the larger, distant bridge, the one that would transport them to the island. The gray-green marsh grass carpeted the shore. Catherine looked down and recognized that they were at the exact spot where the inside cover photo had been taken. There didn’t appear to have been any airbrushing of telephone lines or sleight of hand with a computer; the marsh was actually lovely in the fading light of afternoon. A motorboat idled in the Intracoastal and she could see the outline of large houses on the far shore. Maybe this could really work.

  Karma snorted again.

  “Just give us five minutes,” Ralph whispered to their dog.

  Catherine continued reading aloud, certain her voice would soothe Karma and maybe her husband. “‘Seven Oaks offers a community of all ages with gated security and patrols. You’ll find tranquillity in the seclusion and safety of our island, which is conveniently located only twenty minutes from Savannah’s historic district.’”

  She looked up as they reached the next bridge, a sleek structure that felt like a springboard into another country. It wasn’t that they were exclusionary, she thought, but they deserved to feel protected. They’d earned it.

  A sign at a single traffic light indicated the entrance to an assisted-living facility and small shopping complex that included a café, grocer, bank, and golf cart retailer. On the sidewalk, an elderly couple strolled, the woman’s arm looped around the man’s elbow.

  “Arrrr.” Karma stood again and restlessly scratched the seat.

  The light turned green and Ralph accelerated, too fast. Ahead they could see the shiny steel gates of an impressive gatehouse. The road split into two lanes, one marked RESIDENTS ONLY and the other GUESTS. Both had thick mechanical arms blocking the enclave. To the right was an elaborate bronze sculpture of a tree, its muscled branches embracing a sign: WELCOME TO SEVEN OAKS.

  Suddenly Karma yelped uncharacteristically, a high-pitched squeal of discomfort.

  “Shit!” Ralph muttered.

  Just before the entrance, Ralph careened to a stop on the shoulder. In one motion, Catherine undid her seat belt, flung open the door, jumped out of the car, and unhooked her dog’s harness. As she pulled him out with one hand, she struggled to attach his leash with the other. Before she could, Karma escaped from her grasp, leaped to the ground, and rushed to the wood chips beneath the sculpture.

  Lifting his back leg as high as he could, he sprayed the thick trunk as his parents watched helplessly.

  Karma was home.

  chapter 2

  The next afternoon, Catherine sat in the back of Audrey Cunningham’s Mercedes sedan while Ralph took the front passenger seat. Audrey, a member of the platinum sales club at Seven Oaks, had picked them up at their three-night Discovery Package rental. She’d already shown them five listings, but they had yet to see a house they’d be happy in. Catherine wondered, really, what it would take.

  She’d been studying the back of Audrey’s head and trying to decide what color her hair was. Marigold? Canary? Saffron? It was supposed to be blond, of course, but the actual color was yellow and swung from her head in a waggish bob that had been secured in a sparkly headband, a look appropriate for a teenager, but not a fortysomething Realtor. At one time Catherine might have done something fanciful with her own hair. Perhaps she could have colored it a natural auburn when the silvery hairs started sprouting, but the change had seemed so sudden, like Ralph’s retirement, and now it felt too late. One day she had it high and tight in a bouncy ponytail, the next loose and parted to one side, hoping to cover her thinning patches.

  “Honey.” Ralph swiveled from his place as copilot. Catherine thought he should be wearing a fancy headset, the way he was pretending to help navigate. “Audrey asked you about your tennis.”

  Catherine came to as if waking from an appendectomy, feeling as if there were something missing inside. “Sorry, I’m just taken by the landscape.”

  They were in the southern half of the kidney-shaped island. That much she knew. The magnolias towered over them, creating a comforting canopy, with shafts of sunlight breaking through the branches at irregular intervals. When she and Ralph got married forty years earlier, they were going to have the ceremony under similar trees in her aunt’s backyard. But it had rained on their wedding day, so they exchanged vows under a blue plastic tent that whistled whenever the wind blew.

  Audrey chirped in: “What are your expectations for tennis here?”

  Audrey had used that term nearly a half-dozen times. Expectations. She specialized in four-syllable words. Amenity. Community. Immaculate.

  “Well, I’m on a 4.0 team back in New Jersey.” It didn’t sound very impressive, so Catherine added: “One year we actually made it to regionals.” She hoped this conjured something more impressive than what it had been—a long weekend spent on hard courts outside a Holiday Inn in Hoboken.

  “And where do you play in the lineup?” Audrey asked.

  This was sort of like asking her weight or bra size. Did it matter? And how could she explain that now she was just the floater, the one on the team who adapted easily to various styles of play? The younger sister. The Virgo. The one who never rocks the boat. The one who could return from either the deuce or ad side.

  “It really depends,” Catherine answered vaguely. She would start a new tennis life here. She could do or be whatever she wanted.

  “They call her the floater,” Ralph added. “Because she can play with anyone.” He grinned stupidly at Audrey. “She’s a good sidekick.”

  Yes, that’s right, Ralphie, you tell her, Catherine thought, but said, “I’m looking for a solid partner now. That is my ex-pec-ta-tion.”

  Ralph pressed his lips together.

  “Well, you’ll find our teams spectacular.” Audrey made eye contact with Catherine in the rearview mirror. “Beyond our regular team play, we’ve got a nice junior program, tournaments, and even a husband-wife mixer.” She turned to Ralph. “You do like to mix it up, don’t you?”

  Ralph laughed, a deep baritone noise that came from his abdomen. He was acting like a teenager. “Sure, I like to mix it up sometimes.”

  Then suddenly the thought came to Catherine: Take him, Audrey. Just take him. And take his laundry and his grassy golf stains and the clearing of his throat. Take his stinky egg salad sandwiches and his toe fungus and opera CDs and his hypochondria. But another part of her, the part she hadn’t accessed in months, maybe years, told her: But he’s mine.

  Although they’d fallen out of active love, the breathless feelings all young couples believe will never fade, a shared history held them together. A loyalty of working through the years. Finally, at their new home and with the freedom of Ralph’s retirement, maybe they could reconnect and find the magic that had once brought them together. That was her ex-pec-ta-tion. Her hope. For if she didn’t have Ralph, what did she have?

  Catherine shrugged, stretching the tight muscles in her shoulders, rocking her neck back and forth. She looked at her watch. “We should head back soon. Karma will need to go out.”

  The car was quiet. Quieter than it had been all morning. “I said, Karma will need—”

  “Stop it! Stop it with the dog! He is fine!” Ralph’s voice erupted like a summer squall, coming from nowhere, low over the horizon, in a single thundering clap. After a moment he added, as if he had to apologize to Audrey and not his wife, “We’ve been looking for too long. We really need to find a new home sometime soon.”

  Apparently, Audrey had seen this all before. She was part salesperson, part psychiatrist. “Don’t worry.” She patted Ralph’s knee, then reached into her tote, pulled out a listing sheet, and handed it to him. “We’ve got just o
ne more today. It’s been on the market for a year. The owners spend most of their time up North. It’s got an incredible layout with a remarkable view of the marsh—twenty-five hundred square feet, new appliances, close to golf, view of a small lagoon, and a patio for al dente entertaining.” She puckered her lips together and made a popping sound with her mouth.

  “Al dente?” Catherine asked. “Is that so?”

  “And a large backyard for her dog.”

  For her dog.

  It was getting hot in the car. Catherine had read that on a sunny day, the inside of a parked car could reach a hundred and fifty degrees in ten minutes. She imagined Ralph running to the hardware store and leaving Karma in the backseat. That was something Ralph would do. He would return with a new hammer and wonder where the dog went, why all that was left was just white bones and fur.

  They pulled up in front of a traditional two-story Georgian home. As Catherine got out of the car she could smell salt from the marsh. She brought a hand up to shield her face from the sun, while Ralph moved around to open Audrey’s door. Catherine noticed that Ralph’s thick gray hair had started to grow over his collar. He’d stopped getting regular cuts, so she made a mental note to remind him.

  The three of them walked together toward the brick path that led to the front door. Audrey pointed out plantings to Ralph, who had shown a sudden interest in azaleas and boxwoods. He seemed fascinated that the camellias would bloom wine-colored in the fall. Meanwhile, Catherine was eager to see the inside. To see the gas stove and marsh view. If there was enough room outside for Karma to roam comfortably without wandering into the high grass.

  Audrey went to the lockbox, punched in a code, retrieved the key, plugged it into the lock, and flung open the door. “Ta-da!” she shouted.

  In front of them, the room opened into a large living area with cathedral ceilings and a piano in the corner. Catherine liked the sudden freedom she felt.

  “You’ll see the space is sensational for entertaining,” Audrey said, swinging her arms out as if she were a hostess on a game show. “And here, before we go any farther, let me show you this exterior space.”