“Probably. He can be a little unpredictable lately.”
“Uh, I think that’s true for pretty much all four-year-olds. As for lunch, any dietary restrictions I should know about?”
“Nope, no allergies. Noah pretty much eats anything.”
“God I’m jealous. Jake eats like five things, and they’re pretty much all beige. I hope Noah is okay with PB&J.”
“Definitely. Crusts and all.”
“He eats crusts? Jeez. So let me get this straight: He can read and spell, he eats pretty much anything, he’s polite to all the camp counselors. How are you raising the perfect kid?”
“He’s far from perfect. I mean, he’s the light of my life, but like any kid, he has his issues. Like I said, he doesn’t really love the water . . .” Amy decided to leave it at that and not mention the instances in DC where he spent playdates playing by himself. He’d clearly moved beyond that with Ethan. She hoped that would be the case with Jake.
“Please—my sister still doesn’t love the water, and she’s thirty-three. I’d hardly consider that a failing. Sounds to me like you have the perfect child.”
“No one is perfect,” Amy said, and although she tried not to sound defensive or condescending, she realized she probably did.
* * *
On the way to pick up Noah from camp later that week, Amy’s mom called. The two had spoken a few weeks prior, after Amy and Rob had agreed to send half the money her mom had asked for. Ellen had been audibly disappointed that Amy hadn’t convinced Rob to send the full two thousand dollars, but in the end she didn’t argue, mostly, Amy assumed, because she was grateful for any bit of help she could get.
“Hey, Mom, what’s up?”
“Just checking in to say hi,” she said, though Amy suspected there was more to it than that. They didn’t speak infrequently, but they also didn’t have the sort of mother-daughter relationship where they talked every day over any old thing. Most of that was down to Ellen, who wasn’t much of a phone talker. She never had been.
“What’s the point?” she’d always say. “Fancy having all that time to waste talking about nothing. Some people have work to do.”
Amy knew her mom had been overworked and overtired, but she’d also always held her emotions close to her chest. She’d lost her husband a few weeks before their eighth anniversary, and yet as far as Amy knew, she hadn’t really talked about that loss with anyone. The memories from that time were fuzzy at this point, but Amy remembered friends stopping by a lot right after her father’s death—usually bringing meals and gifts for her and Tim—but the visits gradually dried up, and Amy couldn’t remember seeing any of those people at her house after that. At the time, Amy didn’t understand why, and then when she was older she assumed people forgot about them once the shock wore off. But in recent years, she’d begun to wonder if her mother had actually pushed those friends away because she didn’t want to talk about her husband’s death with anyone, not even people she considered close friends. The few times Amy had brought up the subject, Ellen shut her down before the conversation could even begin.
“It’s always good to hear your voice,” Amy said. “How are things?”
“It’s been wicked hot. I don’t know if the heat wave has made it down to Philly, but we’re dying up here.”
“I’ve seen a few stories online. It’s been hot here, but ironically not as bad as farther north.”
“Noah looked pretty sweaty in those photos you sent of him at the park.”
“Those were from a few weeks ago. It got really hot for a few days there.”
“That photo of him drinking from the bubbler cracked me up. I haven’t seen one of those in years—looks like something out of the fifties.”
“It’s an old park, but they keep it up really well. I also haven’t heard someone say ‘bubblah’ in almost twenty years, so thanks for that.”
“Never forget your roots!”
Amy laughed. Her mom lacked sentimentality about nearly every aspect of life, but she was a diehard New Englander, through and through. That Amy had settled down in the Mid-Atlantic was no doubt viewed as a huge insult.
“So I assume the money came through?” Amy asked, though as soon as the words came out of her mouth, she regretted it. She wished she’d let the conversation go on longer before turning to financial matters, which always cast a pall over the conversation. She didn’t expect her mother to start talking suddenly about her life and feelings, but the sooner she began talking about money and, by association, Tim, the sooner the conversation would spiral downward and then abruptly end.
“It did,” her mother said. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I hope it helps.”
“It will. It already has.”
“How is Tim doing?”
“Good. Really good. I mean, you know, he has his days. But this time feels different to me. I think he’s turned a corner.”
“That’s great. I’m really glad to hear that.”
“He’d love to hear from you.”
“I’m not sure that’s true . . .”
“It most certainly is.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because you’re his big sister. You need more of a reason than that?”
“No, I just meant . . . it’s not as if we talk all the time. It’s been a while. Years, actually.”
“And whose fault is that?”
“I . . . hope you’re not suggesting it’s mine.”
“Well, you’re the one who moved away.”
Amy pulled to the side of the road and put the car in park. “You’re kidding me.”
“What? You left. That’s a fact.”
“I’ve been back numerous times to help him detox and get back on track.”
“All I’m saying is, how hard is it to pick up the phone?”
“This coming from the woman who says talking on the phone is a waste of time.”
“It is most of the time. But this is different. Tim needs you. You’re his sister.”
Amy closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “I know that. And I tried to help him—for years I tried. But every single time, no matter what hoops I jumped through, no matter what sacrifices I made, he ended up right back where he started. And at a certain point, for my own sanity, I needed to step away. I’m happy to provide financial support to help him get better, but I’m just not sure I can travel down that emotional avenue again until he proves he is serious this time. It hurts too much. There are only so many times I can volunteer to have my heart broken.”
“Yeah, well, a mother doesn’t have that luxury,” her mother snapped back; then she hung up.
* * *
Amy didn’t want to start something with her mom. She never did. But discussing Tim was always like tiptoeing across a field studded with land mines. Now that she was a mother herself, Amy appreciated even more the struggles Ellen had gone through with Tim, and she understood why it was such a sensitive topic. But that didn’t change the fact that Amy had pretty much reached her emotional limit when it came to her brother. To throw so much of yourself into helping someone . . . to have it not make any difference . . . she just couldn’t bring herself to get caught up in it all again. She still loved Tim deeply, but she wasn’t ready for a call. Not yet.
So that Friday, instead of carving out time to call her brother, she busied herself with chores and eventually took Noah with her to Target, where they ran into Grace and Ethan.
“Hey, Noah, look who it is,” Amy said.
“Ethan!” He ran over to Grace’s cart.
Amy smiled at Grace. “What a nice surprise.”
“It was bound to happen at some point. I practically live here.”
“I can relate.”
“So how are you guys? I keep meaning to tell you how much fun we had Saturday.”
“We had a great time, too. I was really impressed with the food. Do you guys go there often?”
“Not really. We kind of forget about i
t, to be honest. Every time we go back, I’m like, ‘Why don’t we come here more?’ And then I forget about it for a while and the same thing happens again. I hear they’re getting a liquor license, which will probably help me remember.” She laughed.
“I think I saw your mom the other day at drop-off.”
“Oh, yeah, she’s been doing drop-off and pickup this week because Julian and I had conflicts. She didn’t mention that you guys met.”
“We didn’t really. We just sort of said hello to each other, but she was with Ethan and looks a lot like you, so I figured she had to be your mom.”
“You think we look alike?”
Grace sounded a little surprised, but Amy couldn’t understand why. Her mother was Southeast Asian, and although Grace’s ethnicity was more muted, she had the same eyes and smile. They weren’t twins, but they definitely resembled one another.
“You don’t think you do?”
Grace shrugged. “I guess. I’ve always thought I looked more like my dad. I mean, he’s Mr. WASP, but we have the same face shape and nose.”
“I’ll have to reserve judgment until I see him at pickup.”
Grace choked on a laugh. “My dad? At pickup? Please. He never even picked me up from school. Neither did my mom most of the time, now that I think of it. It was mostly the nanny.”
“Did they both work?”
“Oh, no. My dad did—still does—but not my mom. You might ask why she needed a full-time nanny if she didn’t work, and to that I say . . . you got me. I don’t think she liked being a mom very much. I mean, hello—if we could afford help, I would definitely take it. But I don’t think I’d need someone all day, seven days a week. At that point, it’s sort of like . . . why did you have kids?”
“It sounds like you guys are closer now, though . . .” Amy hesitated lingering on what was likely a sore subject, but she wasn’t sure how to pivot the conversation without entirely changing the topic. She couldn’t relate at all to Grace’s upbringing. Her mom wasn’t always around when she and Tim were young, but that was because she was working several jobs and raising them alone. Amy tried to picture Ellen’s response to hearing that Grace’s mother didn’t work and had a full-time nanny. She would probably first ask whether the woman was disabled, and in discovering the answer was no, she would say something like, “Real rough life.” Or, more likely, her usual, “Fucking rich people.”
“I wouldn’t say we’re super close, but she’s definitely stepped it up since finding out about Julian’s financial issues.”
Her eyes drifted to Ethan and Noah, who were ogling the boxes of Tim Tams on the shelf. “Oh my God, have you ever tried those things?” Grace said, swiftly changing the subject, much to Amy’s relief.
“Tim Tams? I don’t think so. They’re like chocolate cookies, right?”
“Chocolate cookies with a chocolate cream filling, and the whole thing is covered in fudge icing. They’re originally Australian, though I think Pepperidge Farm owns the company now. One of my best friends from college had family in Australia, and last time I saw her she taught me about the ‘Tim Tam Slam.’”
“Which is . . . ?”
“You bite off opposite corners of the cookie, and then you use it like a straw to drink some sort of hot drink—coffee, hot chocolate, tea, whatever. The Tim Tam starts collapsing, and you shove the whole thing in your mouth at once.”
“That sounds . . .”
“Magical?”
“Pretty much.”
“It is. We should do it sometime. In fact, if you’re free this weekend, we could arrange a Tim Tam Slam session. Ethan can’t have them because they might contain traces of nuts, but I have some nut-free cookies for him that are similar.”
“I’ll never say no to chocolate.”
“Want to say Sunday?”
“Sure!” Amy paused. Sunday. The playdate with Emily and Jake. Crap. “Actually . . . I take that back. We’re supposed to go to Jake’s house that day.”
Grace’s mood deflated, and Amy suddenly felt very awkward, as if she were back in middle school and was deliberately leaving Grace out of a social engagement. The reality was, in middle school Amy was the one regularly being left out, whereas Grace had probably never experienced such exclusion.
“Oh. Never mind then. Maybe another time.”
“We’re around Saturday,” Amy offered.
“We’re actually supposed to have brunch with my parents Saturday for my mom’s birthday.”
Amy didn’t know why she felt so guilty for arranging a child-oriented social engagement that didn’t involve Grace and Ethan, but she did. It’s not as if she owed Grace and Ethan anything. Except. . . well, she sort of felt as if she did. They were the first people other than Rob’s family to welcome her and Noah to Philadelphia, and Ethan was Noah’s best friend. And from what Emily had said, the three boys were like the Three Musketeers at camp, which meant they’d be down a musketeer on Sunday. That gave Amy an idea.
“Why don’t you guys join us at Emily’s on Sunday? I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.”
“That’s okay—I don’t want to impose.”
“I really don’t think it would be a big deal. The kids are just going to play outside, and she’s making peanut butter sandwiches—though I guess Ethan couldn’t have that.”
“He can have peanut butter. He’s only allergic to tree nuts.”
“Oh, well . . . see? What’s another peanut butter sandwich? It’s not as if she’s making lobster.”
“I guess. If you’re sure? I really don’t want to screw things up.”
“I’ll give her a call this afternoon. I’m sure it’s fine. The more the merrier, right?”
“Sure,” Grace said, though she didn’t sound convinced, and if Amy were being honest, she wasn’t either.
* * *
On the way home, Amy called Emily from the car. “Hey, Emily?”
“Amy, hi, what’s up?” She sounded out of breath.
“Sorry, am I catching you at a bad time?”
“No, no, I’m just cooling down from my run. It’s fine.”
“Oh. Okay. So the reason I’m calling is because I just ran into Grace Durant at Target—”
“Grace shops at Target? Wow, didn’t expect that.”
Amy furrowed her brow. “Doesn’t everyone shop at Target?”
“Well, I do, and I’m sure you do, but Grace . . . I don’t know. Target seems so basic for her. Like anything she’d buy there she would buy on Amazon so no one would know she needed toilet paper and laundry detergent like the rest of us.”
Amy wasn’t exactly sure what Emily meant. Sure, Grace’s clothes tended to be pieces that Amy hadn’t seen anywhere else, but she wasn’t a snob. Considering her background, Grace struck Amy as pretty down to earth.
“I get the impression she shops there a lot, actually.”
“Huh. Times have changed. Anyway, you were saying?”
“So I ran into her and Ethan, and we got talking about these cookies—Tim Tams?—and she—”
“Tim what?”
“Tim Tams. They’re these Australian cookies . . . I can tell you about them on Sunday. But to make a long story short, she asked if Noah could play with Ethan Sunday. I told her we already had plans with Jake, but I was wondering . . . would it be okay if they joined us? I know the three boys love playing together.”
There was a brief pause on the other end of the line. “Um . . . yeah. I guess that would be okay.”
“It’s totally fine if it isn’t. They sounded pretty busy, so I’m sure they have other things to do.”
“No, no . . . I mean, I’ll have to get a few more snacks. . . .”
“Grace will bring Tim Tams. And I can bring something, too.”
“Okay. That’s . . . yeah. I’m sure Jake will be thrilled.”
But by the sound of Emily’s voice, she didn’t sound thrilled at all.
Chapter 11
Sunday arrived, and Amy headed off for Emily’s house. She g
lanced down at the bowl of fruit salad sitting on the floor of the passenger seat. She’d gone a little crazy with it. There was easily enough to feed twenty-five children. Maybe thirty. Why had she gone overboard? She knew why: Because she’d invited a friend to someone else’s house, and she felt guilty about it. Oh, sure, a fruit salad will make everything better. She hoped Emily would just think she was being generous.
“What time is Ethan coming?” Noah asked as Amy stopped at a red light.
“Same time as us.”
“What if we get there first?”
“Then we’ll play with Jake until he arrives.”
“I want us all to get there at the same time.”
Amy took a deep breath. “Hopefully we will.”
“But what if we don’t?”
“Then we don’t. But we will all be there eventually, and everything will be fine. It doesn’t matter exactly when we get there.”
“Yes, it does.”
“Noah . . .” Amy couldn’t muster the energy to argue with him, and really there wasn’t any point. Even if it didn’t matter exactly when they arrived—and it didn’t!—it mattered to him, and so no line of reasoning would make any difference.
“What?” Noah said, prompting her to finish her thought.
“Nothing. Never mind. It’s just—ah! Would you look at that? Ethan’s mommy is pulling up at the same time.” Thank God, she added to herself.
Noah clapped his hands together excitedly as she parked in the driveway. “Yaaaaay!”
They piled out of the car and met up with Grace and Ethan as they all walked to the front door. Emily’s house was a split-level, nestled in a community with other split-levels, with sidewalks and big trees and well-maintained front lawns. The neighborhood wasn’t quite as quaint as Glenside Park, but given the number of driveways filled with tricycles and Fisher-Price toys, it seemed like a perfect place to raise kids.
“Look what I have,” Grace said as she held open her tote bag.
Amy peered inside. “The legendary Tim Tams. Oh, boy.”
“It’s a little warm for hot chocolate, but coffee should do the trick. It’s never too hot for coffee.”
The Last House on Sycamore Street Page 13