“Where the hell have you been? Is there some reason that you can’t answer your cell? That you don’t answer all fucking day, Lainie? Do you know what happened, that Candy crashed your Jeep and—”
“Let me see the children! Are they okay?”
Again that wooziness I’ve never known. I go tearing past him. In the den the children sit quite still, staged by Charles. There is nothing new in the way that Tom faces the big screen, his head lolling back and his hands on his iPad. Jack is close enough to him that they could be glued together; he is watching SpongeBob SquarePants on the TV with intense concentration. Matilde is sitting on the opposite end of the couch with Claire neatly beside her. She is reading Great Expectations and Claire is trying to imitate her, listlessly turning the pages of a Dr. Seuss book, Green Eggs and Ham. My children are from another place and time because I left them alone and have become the voyeur, observing without participating. They are beyond my reach. Charles’s wrath weighs down the room.
Jess insinuates, “… over an hour away … hadn’t checked her phone in five hours … trusted this Candy…”
“Am I invisible, Jess?” I say. To Charles I ask, “What happened?”
“Candy totaled the Jeep, Lainie. While you were out of town.” He is in the unaccustomed role of worrier and gatekeeper, more exhausted than after four surgeries packed into one day.
“Is she all right? Was anyone with her?” I know it matters although Charles won’t allow it to matter. I’m in a position I’ve never been in before. I have abandoned my children for my own preservation. City life with city children would not have yielded such a catastrophe. Jess abreast Charles, Jess taking his side, Charles smirking at his superiority. He wins the best parent award.
“Matilde,” I say.
“Mom?” She drops Great Expectations and hurries over to me. Up close she is wispy when we hug. “Mom, can you believe what happened? About Candy and your Jeep?”
“Yes, yes, I heard.”
Claire collides into my arms as I bend down. “Mommy! Where were you? Mommy, Mommy, we made an angel food cake!” I stand up and she starts her water dance. I resist the urge to warn her, Not now, my darling girl. Yet why should I? Her eternal optimism is one reason that I’ve returned. If only it could be bottled and sold.
“Candy wants to talk to you,” Tom says without moving.
“Where is she?” I ask. Then Jack comes racing toward me and practically pushes Claire down when he grabs my legs. He puts his head against my thigh.
“Jack, dear Jack.” I put my hand on his curly brown hair, hair that reminds me of Charles that first year we were together. Chestnut, thick, unruly.
“Everyone should go back into the room,” Jess purrs.
Her eyes and Charles’s eyes meet for a brief second. Tom grins at Jess in a way he hasn’t grinned at anyone in at least a year or two. Charles folds his arms in this O.R. move—he’s top dog.
“I’ve fired Candy,” he says. “Although she might claim that she’s quit. She’ll be leaving any minute. Her one friend in Elliot has agreed to drive her to the station.”
“Fired her? I don’t know what you mean, Charles.”
Jess straightens up in that “running for office and next at the podium” style.
Charles is glaring at me, a glare he reserves for strangers who offend him, those who are clueless to his fame.
“Candy doesn’t have to leave. I don’t want her to. I’ll go speak to her, Charles.” I’m submerged in a wave of terror. He is taking away my chance to fight another hour, another day.
“Too late for that, Lainie.” Charles’s face is slanted away from the light. “I’m the one who was here in the crisis today. Candy smashed the Jeep. She’s irresponsible. I won’t allow her to drive my children.”
“She isn’t irresponsible. She’s been with us for eight years, Charles. Candy was twenty when she first came to babysit. Candy left Juilliard for us. She moved in to be with our family!”
“More fool she,” Charles says.
Jess sighs dramatically. “She left Juilliard for a babysitting job? She must not have been that good.”
“She taught Matilde how to play piano.… She taught the children songs. She taught them a bit about the fiddle.…” I try to defend Candy.
“That’s enough, Lainie,” Charles says.
I can’t stop. I can’t let it happen. “We’ve left her in Cape May with my mother, Charles, while we were at those four-day conventions. Those vapid doctors’ conventions in California. In Arizona. We trust her; she’s held it together for us.”
“I won’t dispute that, Lainie, I won’t dispute the past. What happened today while you were off in the city doing God knows what shows that Candy isn’t working out in Elliot. I don’t want her in the house. She could have killed the children.”
Why would he say such a thing in front of them? “Well, she didn’t, Charles, she didn’t have them in the car. She had an accident, Charles. People have accidents every day. It doesn’t mean she’s inept. Do you know whose fault it was? How the accident happened?”
“Apparently she lost control. The Jeep spun around twice. That is the police report,” Jess says in a flat voice.
“That’s about it,” Charles says. “She isn’t welcome anymore.”
I let go of Claire and Jack and that swirling sensation behind my eyes intensifies. A free fall from grace.
SEVENTEEN
Candy’s tenure has come to an end and neither she nor the children seem able to wrap their minds around it. Jess has decided to plant herself squarely in the middle of it, helpmate to both Charles and to me. While Candy is in her room packing, Jess calls a caucus in the dining room. Tom comes along in his recently acquired adult comportment; both he and Charles seem quite taken with Jess. I hear Matilde and the twins making noise in the back hall.
“Let’s go see Candy because she has to pack and move away for a bit,” Matilde explains.
Claire starts to cry—she knows better than anybody how it will be without Candy. She and Matilde. Had we stayed in the city this might never have happened unless Candy fell in love, married, and left the country. I suddenly appreciate how much Candy sacrificed for me, for us. So that I could do my miniatures and keep up a semblance of my career, Candy put her own work on hold. The center has fallen out in Elliot since Candy is not equipped to drive the children around. She resists plugging in addresses on the GPS and she is too cautious for back roads and alternate routes. I have heard her frustration when houses that she’s meant to find for drop-off and pickup can’t be located. I’m starting to suspect that she resents big homes with curving private roads and being in the car in constant if small traffic jams.
I walk downstairs to Candy’s room, where Claire is latching herself on to Candy and almost falling to the floor.
Matilde and Jack stand and watch Candy rapidly fill two small suitcases. She opens a tote bag that I painted in pastels for her last summer. It’s a scene of the boat runners at Cape May Inlet on a summer day. That’s when she starts tossing her belongings, her rage surfacing.
“… in my fuckin’ life,” Candy is saying into her cell phone. “Piece a’ shit.”
Candy kicks a boot, a black leather number with a wedge heel. We bought it together about a year ago.
“I’m sorry,” Matilde says. “So sorry, Candy.”
Candy stops for one moment, a pair of Under Armour workout shoes in one hand and her charcoal Lululemon yoga pants in the other. She places them in the bag, grabs her fiddle, and opens the case.
“I love you children, you know that. Matilde, I’m going to miss you.…” Then she starts throwing books in the bag, seeming more angry than before. That’s when she notices that I’ve come through the kitchen side of the basement to stand close to the wall.
“Sometimes I’ve envied you a room downstairs, off the beaten track, Candy,” I say, walking in.
“Lainie.” I can’t see her face in the shadows but I know those dark circles under her
eyes that could be from her kohl eyeliner. I have learned to ignore the many ear piercings that grace her ears, usually adorned in hoop earrings.
“Lainie, I’m sorry. So sorry.”
“I know. I know, Candy. Matilde was four and Tom was six the day that you came to meet us. How you looked at them … that’s why I hired you, you know. I knew you were young, a student.… Life is going to be a mess without you, Candy.… Candy, whatever today was about … please don’t go. Let me salvage this.”
“Don’t come in!” Matilde says, looking over my shoulder. “Mom is so…”
I turn around and there is Charles, yet again standing in a doorway, this time with Jess behind him, her arms crossed.
“Mom is so what?” I ask. No one is listening.
“Candy, your friend is waiting outside.” Charles holds out his hand and there is a wad of cash. “Here is two months’ pay.”
I start shaking my head as I hold up three fingers. That’s when Jess begins to shake her head at me.
“Charles? Can we speak alone for a moment?” I ask.
“Look, I don’t want to get in the way but it’s rare that we end up firing someone,” Jess begins. “We don’t work in corporate America. Your idea is overly generous, Lainie.”
“Jess,” I say, “please. What’s happening isn’t about you.” To Charles I say, “Three months. It’s the least we can do for Candy.”
Charles looks at me and I look away. He is very familiar with how infrequently I pick and choose my battles. Charles opens his wallet for the extra month in hundred-dollar bills. Candy opens the door and the house becomes dark and dreary; the days stretch before me in a soulless town.
“No. No! Candy isn’t leaving, Charles. I won’t have it. She was with us when the twins were born, she was with us when Tom broke his leg on the Sunfish. She is part of our family, Charles. You have no idea, Charles; Jess has no idea!”
“Candy, your ride?” Charles holds the wad of money.
“No, Candy, listen to me.” I press my hands together, my fingertips turn white. “Candy, tell me this nightmare is ending. Promise me that you’ll stay.”
Candy puts her arms around me. One last time we share the mom/nanny language that was expedient in the city, where nannies are practically “wives” to the mothers.
“I’ll call, Lainie, I’ll call you. Maybe it’s for the best since this place isn’t for me. The house … the driving … I miss New York.”
Who wouldn’t feel that? Yet there is little more to say and I resist being disloyal to Charles. The fight is over and we both know it. Candy climbs the staircase while Matilde follows, guiding Claire and Jack. I shift my weight up the stairs with Charles and Jess at my heels.
The moon is low and shines through the glass windowpanes of the first floor. Jess switches on the overhead light. Everyone’s eyes flutter.
“Fight back, Lainie, those are my parting words to you.” Candy lugs her bags to the front door.
“Candy, may I help in any way?” Jess asks.
“Doubtful.” Candy puts her purse over her shoulder and glares at Jess.
Tom leaves his father’s side and lines up beside Matilde. Candy throws her arms around each child, kissing them. Matilde starts to cry and then Claire believes that she should cry.
“You’re stuck, you know, Lainie. Being here. S-T-U-C-K,” she spells it out. “I’ll miss you, I’ll miss the kids.” She sighs, she kisses me last.
Then she looks at Charles and Jess. “The truth is, I won’t miss the losers in Elliot.”
Within seconds of Candy’s exit, Jess says, “Don’t worry, Lainie. Finding another nanny is right up my alley. I’ve already lined up a few interviews while you were gone today.”
I’m about to respond when I notice that Claire has discovered my stash from City Island, which I’d tossed on the credenza in my haste. She is shaking the Tupperware that holds the clamshells.
“What does Claire have in her hands?” Charles asks. The Tupperware pops open. “Is this crap from today? Weren’t you at the dermatologist? You lied to me about your plans in the city, Lainie!”
“Well, Charles,” Jess interrupts. “I have been trying to get Lainie an appointment with Dr. Evans—she’s the best dermatologist in town. As good as anyone in the city. The wait … it’s awful.” She turns to me. “You had to see your own doctor in the meantime.…”
Matilde is becoming quite pale. “Mom, did you go to the—”
“True, Jess,” I say. “I had to stay with my doctor in New York until an appointment breaks in Elliot.”
I begin to drift, floating back to the afternoon that is being snatched from me. The mallards, my precious findings—parakeet feathers at the end of the visit—the tranquility. Jess and Charles continue babbling as if what they speak of counts. Jess is raving about her many resources, the twins are shouting. I walk into the living room with Matilde and the twins following me. The twins press their noses into the bay window.
“This reminds me of the living room on Riverside Drive, Mom, for special occasions … holidays. But it’s like a balloon has popped or the party’s over.… C’mon guys, we should leave.” Matilde tugs at the twins.
“By all means, Matilde, stay where you are. No special occasion necessary.”
“Because the house is rented, Mom?”
“No, because I don’t care,” I say.
* * *
I realize that it is seven o’clock and Candy would have already fed the twins, who must be starving. “They’re acting out. They’re hungry,” she would say.
Ten minutes later Matilde and I start rummaging around in the refrigerator. I open the freezer door. “How about we microwave a frozen pizza or chicken fingers?”
Instead Matilde starts scrambling eggs with a whisk, putting too much milk in, and the eggs are watery. I hoist Claire and Jack onto the barstools at the granite island where they watch Dinosaur Train on the kitchen flat-screen. As they begin to eat with their eyes glued to the show, Tom materializes.
“Oh, Mom?” he says. “Dad wants you to come into the dining room.”
I move quickly before anyone chokes or falls off a stool.
The lights are low and Jess and Charles are immersed in conversation. Jess stands with her thighs pressed against the long dining table. Her upper body is tilted toward Charles, who is across from her, sitting in one of the Queen Anne chairs.
“… in twenty-four hours … forty-eight at most. Pronto,” she says.
“That’s impressive, Jess,” Charles says.
“Yeah, good stuff,” Tom agrees.
“Tom?” I say. Tom, who I thought would remain in the kitchen. “Tom, don’t you want some dinner? Matilde and I have thrown together—”
“No thanks, Mom. Not yet.”
“That’s the point, Lainie,” Jess says. “Tom might not want what you’ve ‘thrown together’—eggs, I believe, with ketchup for good measure? I can help, I can recommend a fabulous nanny, someone who will change your life.”
I look out the window, although there is nothing visible—mounds of land and suburban homes covered in darkness.
“Lainie,” Charles says. “Listen, we’ll have someone else and be right on track. Just make sure that she drives, Jess, please. Confidently. That she’s familiar with the area.”
“I would only find someone with those skills. Leave it to me.”
Charles is pleased—I’ve never known him to be interested in the hiring of a nanny before. I resist any remark that might break the spell, appreciating that I’d be worse off without Jess’s input. Without an old friend who knows how to fix things—including the Arts Council—in a town that might as well be Mars. A friend who has the ability not to be bogged down with kids day in, day out, rather to move irreproachably through the morass of drop-offs and pickups. I shudder at the thought of life without Candy, and that enhances Jess’s offer. Let Jess put her money where her mouth is.
I nod. “That’s brilliant, Jess. Truly brilliant.”
> I cede the day to Jess without a fight. She takes over our family’s future as flawlessly as if it were her own. Gratitude surpasses rage. For now at least.
EIGHTEEN
The next morning I’m slow to resume work. Too aroused and confused from last night’s events with Charles, I’m stuck staring at the large unfinished canvases. That’s when the landline rings with startling clarity. Matilde, I know before I answer hello.
“Mrs. Morris?” A voice I’ve never heard before. Authoritative, teacher-like.
“Speaking.”
“Ms. Wagner calling. I’m a gym teacher and one of the swim coaches at Elliot Middle School.”
“Is everything all right … is it Matilde?” My heart thrashes against my rib cage, the sound swooshes through my ears.
“Mrs. Morris, would you be able to come to the school now?”
“What has happened? Please…”
“Matilde is okay. Only we cannot get her out of the pool.”
I blame myself when I lay eyes on Matilde doing flips at the edge of the twenty-five-meter-long pool, alone. Mostly since I’m the only one who realizes what she’s doing. I myself yearn to stay in the Y pool for hours on end. Vapor is coming from the top layer and it makes it seem as if Matilde is disappearing in the middle. Ms. Wagner, the young and perplexed assistant coach, should be on a schedule except that Matilde is keeping her there. The pool can’t be locked up, and Ms. Wagner is beyond agitated; she’s pacing and putting her whistle in and out of her mouth with a quick thrust of her tongue. Matilde is swimming like a shark in mid-ocean. What a secret thrill to witness my daughter swimming as if she is a captive of the water. She has never had such velocity.
I’m also dutiful and detect the ramifications of the scene, putting my daughter into Elliot mode. At the moment that I bend down and tap her hand as she cuts through the water, Mr. Flaven, the head gym teacher/coach for the school, appears. Matilde flips again and again and again, fierce and expert; she is spellbinding. I tap her back more forcefully. Either she doesn’t feel it or she is deliberately oblivious.
Between the Tides Page 10