Eventually she separated from Betsy and plopped down beside me, smiling. “Did you have fun last night?” she asked. “I did.”
“I came by your house earlier,” I said. “I brought muffins.” I sounded put out, even though I didn’t mean to.
“Muffins?” she said. “What kind?”
“Chocolate-chip banana,” I said. “Warm.”
“Mmm,” she said, her face dreamy as she closed her eyes and rocked back and forth. “Warm chocolate-chip banana are the best.” She opened her eyes. “Wish I’d been there,” she said.
“It was the least I could do. To thank you. And to come alongside you,” I added hesitantly.
“Come alongside me?” she asked, her eyes wide. “About what?”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “About Mark’s job …”
She waved her hand in the air as though she were swatting a fly. “Oh, honey, that’s no tragedy. We’ll be just fine.” She smiled at me pitifully, as though I were a dramatic child instead of the woman who found her sobbing in her closet. She pointed over at Betsy. “Tom’s even going to help me find a job if Mark can’t find one first. Isn’t that great?”
“You—you’re going to—work? But I thought you said he was going to find another job.”
“Well, I mean, the market’s tough out there. I think it would be foolish of me to not try to do my part, don’t you?”
All I could think of was the hole that her working would cut into my life. What about our morning walks? Carpool plans? What about freezer cooking? What about our friendship? I felt panic rise up in my throat like bile. I didn’t know if I was disgusted with her for thinking of working or with myself for being so selfish that I could even make her husband’s job loss about me.
She waved her hand again. “Well, this is all getting ahead of ourselves, now isn’t it? We have no idea what’s going to happen, so let’s just not worry about it before we have to.” She smiled again, though something behind her eyes looked different, uncertain. “What I really need is to get away. What would you think about that? Do you think you could do a girls’ getaway weekend?”
“Umm, sure. Yeah, that’d be great. But I mean, umm …when?” Like it mattered. Of course I would go. I would do whatever I could to go on a girls’ weekend with just Justine and me.
“This weekend. Let’s be spontaneous! Of course, if you can’t go, I could ask someone else.…”
“No, I can go. Let me work it out with David.”
“Great. My parents have a place down at Myrtle Beach, and we could drive down there. What do you say?”
I nodded even as my brain was still scrolling through my to-do list, checking my mental calendar. Where was my life-management notebook when I needed it? “I’d love to go,” I said, matching my smile with hers, tooth for tooth.
“Fabulous!” she said. She gave me a high five like we were kids. “This is going to be fabulous. All we’ll need is our bathing suits and some clothes to wear out to dinner.” She hopped up to go back to Betsy. I prayed she wouldn’t invite her, too, hating my territorial side. “I think I want to go dancing,” she said, doing a little dance move right there and smiling at me before she walked away, leaving me to try to picture our middle-aged selves dancing at some club in Myrtle Beach far away from our husbands, kids, and middle-aged lives. I was sure she was just kidding. I fished around in my beach bag for my cell phone. I had arrangements to make.
Chapter 23
Justine
What kind of person spends the day with a man’s wife, all while planning to meet that woman’s husband alone at the beach that same weekend? Tom had asked me to figure out a way we could spend the night alone, and I had, the idea popping into my brain even as Ariel and I were talking at the pool. My plan was brilliant, and no one would suspect a thing. I just tried not to think about Betsy as I stood in front of the display of bras at the lingerie store. There were pink and red and black and white and beige ones. There were leopard print and heart print and zebra print and stripes and polka dots. There were lacy ones and plain ones and racerback and strapless.
I fingered the silk, wondering whether buying sexy underwear would automatically make me guiltier. That just the act of picking out a lacy black bra with lacy black underwear to match (when all I currently owned were dingy white granny panties, most of them with holes) would make the next step irreversible. Plucking it from the rack and paying for it was adultery by proxy. As I strode toward the checkout registers, I thought of Tom’s eyes on me in the set I had in my hand, the appreciative smile that would spread across his face.
Betsy’s face kept playing in my mind as I waited for my turn to be rung up. She had been so kind, so complimentary. “I was a bit skeptical at first,” she had confessed to me by the pool. “I was a bit worried there might still be something … between you and Tom.” She had giggled. “I guess there’s a bit of high school left in all of us.”
I hadn’t flinched. “Well, we all grow up, don’t we?” And I had grown up enough to even forgive her for taking my part. Of course, I had taken her husband as the consolation prize. That made it easier.
I wanted to hold it against her that she was so trusting, blame her for not looking both ways before crossing the road. Because the car was coming that would knock her into the air, crush her in its treads. I could see it coming. Why couldn’t she? A part of me wanted to tell her to be more careful, to fight harder, not to welcome me with such open arms. I waffled between pitying her and despising her for not being stronger. She trusted God, Tom told me. I told him I used to.
When Betsy mentioned Erica as we floated on our rafts, I said nothing derogatory. I listened as Betsy went on about how much she liked her, how nice she was. If things went the way they seemed to be heading, Betsy would need a friend who understood what it was like to lose a husband to another woman. Erica certainly understood that.
Walking to my car with my secret purchase swinging from my arm, I didn’t think so much about what I was doing—or was about to do. I thought instead of Erica and how she had already run the gauntlet, already shaken herself free from the bonds of marriage. Oddly enough I longed to be in her shoes.
My parents were keeping the girls for a few hours so Ariel and I could get on the road and not wait for Mark to get home. He was “job hunting,” which was code for sitting in a coffee shop and staring at his laptop mournfully. I knew he wasn’t really doing anything, just waiting for me to announce I’d found the job that was going to save our family, even though we hadn’t spoken of it again since the day he lost his job. My blood coursed through my veins, hot and pulsing, at the thought of it. I could feel it throbbing in my temples as I stowed my last items in the bag I was packing. Caroline draped herself across my bed, looking like her dog had died. “I wish you weren’t going, Mommy,” she said into her arm.
“Sometimes mommies need a break. You’ll understand that someday when you’re a mommy.” She didn’t look up. “I’ll bring you a prize?” I tried.
She raised her eyebrows, and I could see the hint of a smile from where her mouth was hidden in her arm. “What will you bring me?” she asked.
“What would you like?” I asked, zipping up the bag and backing out of the room, like one would move away from a dangerous animal: slowly, with caution.
She slid off the bed and followed me. “Umm, I don’t know.”
“Tell you what, you think of it, and Daddy can tell me.”
She hopped down the steps, already reeling off the things she thought I should bring her. I lugged the heavy duffel down behind her, not listening. “Caroline, honey, hop on down. Quit stopping,” I said when I nearly ran into her.
I heard Cameron calling out, “G-ma’s here. G-ma and G-per are here. And they brought the car.” She and Caroline went scrambling for the driveway while I carried the duffel out to my car. I thought about the things I had put
into the bag that I would never want Mark to see, the texts on my phone that I needed to erase. I loved organizing my home but was finding organizing an illicit relationship mentally exhausting. I opened the garage door and plastered a smile on my face so my mother wouldn’t suspect anything.
The whole group was standing by the restored 1930 Model A Coupe that had become my stepdad’s retirement project. The sun bounced off the hood, which he had lovingly painted a dark green color. My stepdad rocked back on his heels, his face radiating pride. My mother rode around with him as though she liked all the attention the car garnered, but I don’t think she did. I think you just do things to keep your husband happy, things you’d never suspect were going to be part of the vows when you stood there in a white dress. I thought the two of them looked pretty silly puttering around town well below the speed limit, but I knew better than to say so.
The girls had climbed in, and Cameron was pretending to drive. Caroline was in the rumble seat waving at no one. My mother squeezed my shoulder. “All set?” she asked. She had a sad expression in her eyes, even as she smiled at me. She was worried about Mark losing his job. It took us both back to darker times in our family’s history. Times we didn’t mention once my stepdad came into our lives and rescued us.
“It’s fine, Mom,” I said to her. “Thanks for coming to get the girls. Again.”
She squeezed my shoulder again. “You just need to get away, get your mind off things. Now, who is this person you’re taking with you to the place?”
My parents always called their condo at the beach “the place.” Not “the beach place,” not “the condo,” always “the place.” They rarely went there, and my mom admitted to me she didn’t really even care for the beach. “All that sand,” she had said disdainfully, sticking her tongue out. “I wanted to get a place in the mountains, sit on a porch overlooking the mountain range, sipping coffee and going for walks.” She had shrugged. “Oh well, this is nice. And the girls enjoy it.”
“Ariel, the girl who moved in behind me, is going. The one who bought Laura’s house?”
“Well, that’s an interesting choice,” my mother mused. “You hardly know her.”
I didn’t tell her that was precisely why I had asked her. “Well,” I said, “it’s a good chance for me to get to know her.”
My mother shrugged her shoulders. “I guess.” She paused. “I just hope you’re not trying to replace Laura with her. You might be disappointed if you do.”
I wanted to laugh. If my mom was trying to protect me from disappointment, we were long past that. “It’s fine, Mom,” I said again. I turned to my stepdad to change the subject. “The car’s looking good,” I said.
He chuckled. “These girls sure do love it,” he said, pointing at Cameron and Caroline, who had switched places. “I said I’d take ’em on a ride. They’re saying they want me to drive it in the neighborhood parade for the Fourth.”
I ignored the pang that came with him mentioning the Fourth of July. Ordinarily I’d be in rehearsals by now, practices dominating our lives as the date moved closer. “They’d love that,” I responded mechanically and put my arm around him. He’d been married once before my mother but lost his wife to cancer before they could have children. We became his family, and he never seemed to want more.
“You know I got that car from a guy who had it in his family for thirty-five years. It just sat in an old shed, all but forgotten. He couldn’t believe I wanted it, wanted to pay him for it.” He smiled at me. “And I couldn’t believe he’d let me have it for such a steal.”
I nodded. I’d heard this story at least three times. Then he went on to add something he’d never said before. “That’s what any good collector does. He finds someone who doesn’t know what they have and talks them out of it before they can realize it. If someone doesn’t see the value in something, you can take it from them much easier.” He looked at me meaningfully. The smile on my face didn’t falter as I nodded and tried to keep his words from penetrating my heart.
“Well, I better get going, Dad,” I said. “Ariel’s waiting on me.” I waved the girls over to hug them good-bye. They all stood in the grass as I got into my car and backed out of the driveway. My earlier purchases and my stepdad’s words tangled together in my mind like clothes in the washing machine. I waved to the girls as I drove away, leaving them to watch my car disappear as I cranked up the radio and let the music drive my guilt far away.
Chapter 24
Ariel
“Okay, so I put chicken in the Crock-Pot and all you have to do is stick these baked potatoes in the oven for dinner about five,” I proudly instructed Heather. I was successfully putting into practice several strategies I had learned from Justine. The girl nodded, an intense look on her face as though she was memorizing my every word.
“I left a list of instructions here for David so if you’d just make sure he sees it. He should be home about six. But that’s if his flight is on time and if nothing comes up last minute.” I looked around the house, suddenly convinced I had forgotten something despite my best efforts at organization. Guilt laced my thoughts as I wondered what kind of mother leaves three small children with a sitter so she can go have fun. Are mothers even allowed such luxuries?
“It’s fine, Mrs. Baxter,” Heather said, reading my mind. “Go have fun.” She looked over at Justine, who stood in the doorway twirling her keys like an anxious teen ready to drive for the first time.
Justine smiled at her and then looked at me. “She’s right,” she said with a sympathetic smile. “They’ll be just fine without you.”
I thought about David’s words to me that morning. “We won’t even know you’re gone,” he had teased. When I was home, I wanted to be less needed, but as I stood readying myself to leave for two days, I wanted to be irreplaceable. Go figure.
“Wait!” I said, digging my camera out of my bag. “Let’s get a picture together before we go!” I looked at Heather. “Will you take it?”
She nodded and followed us out to the car while we posed with our thumbs up, mugging for the camera. When we were done, I tucked the camera back into my bag and turned to the boys. “Okay, hugs good-bye!” I pressed each one of them to me, memorizing their dirty little boy smells. I looked into their eyes and said that I loved them, that I would be home soon. They nodded politely, looking bored and maybe a tiny bit sad. Really they just wanted me to go so that Heather would play games with them.
I sat down beside Justine in the car, and she rolled down the windows, letting the thick, humid Southern summer air wash over us as we backed out of the driveway and pointed the car toward the entrance to the neighborhood. It felt decadent to be using Mark’s sporty sedan instead of our requisite minivans, and I rested my elbow on the windowsill and let the rush of air take my breath away. We passed by her house on the way out, and I noticed Mark and the girls in the front yard. I started to wave at them, but Justine didn’t even look over. I quickly lowered my hand and kept my face forward as she did, focusing on the adventure ahead and not on what we were leaving behind. It seemed I needed to be taught how to leave.
Justine had our day all planned out from the moment we arrived until the moment darkness fell. As I slumped on the bed, pleasantly exhausted from a kid-free day of sunbathing and a visit to the spa on her parents’ condo property, I smiled to myself. I scrolled back through the photos I’d taken during the day. Justine relaxing on a raft in the pool. Me getting my toes done at the spa. Both of us posing beside the sign that read “Massages Included!” I smiled and stretched luxuriously as I rolled over to watch Justine. She was out on the condo balcony, talking on her cell phone again. She had fielded phone calls all day from Mark and the girls. I tried not to rub it in, proud that Heather and the boys were apparently doing fine. I hadn’t received a single call. As she slipped back into the room, tucking her phone into her beach cover-up pocket, I smiled at her. “Ever
ything okay?” I asked.
She nodded, biting back the smile that played on her lips.
“Is Mark missing you already?” I teased.
“Are you having fun?” she asked.
I gave an exaggerated ahhh. “I could get used to this,” I said.
“I’m glad to hear it.” She looked around. “I could get used to this too. It’s always nice to get away. I don’t do it enough, ya know?”
“Yeah, if I had this place at my disposal, I’d be here every weekend,” I said. I turned to watch the ocean waves crashing in on each other. A family on the beach was packing up to go in. The mom chased a little girl, picking her up and carrying her once she caught her, while the girl thrashed. She was a chubby toddler in a pink bathing suit with a spiky ponytail on top of her head. My heart lurched. Even when I wasn’t on mom duty, I could muster up a serious case of ponytail envy.
Justine and I had spent the afternoon at the condo pool—a fancy affair with a long, lazy river. I had mentioned taking a walk later, before dinner, but she had never answered me. “Think you’d like to walk before dinner?” I repeated, hoping she would want to squeeze in a walk. I loved the beach in the evenings when it wasn’t so hot, the sun wasn’t so brutal, and the sand wasn’t so crowded with people. I’d love to get some shots of us out on the beach in the soft evening light.
She Makes It Look Easy Page 17