Don't Scream

by Wendy Corsi Staub

  She wants to witness the big milestones just as she’s been able to witness the little ones: first steps, first words, first teeth…

  I just want to be their mom. And Garth’s wife. That’s all I really need to be.

  Which is good, because that’s all I am. And I love my life just the way it is…

  There’s just something about being in Fiona’s presence that makes her a little self-conscious about the decidedly domestic path she’s chosen.

  She crosses the porch with a still-protesting Jeremy on her hip, wondering if maybe she should have called first, instead of just barging in here.

  Glancing at her watch, she notes that Fee will most certainly be in the office at this hour. She’s in the office at just about any waking hour—including some hours that the rest of the world may not necessarily count as waking.

  “Shh, Jeremy.”

  Opening one of the tall double entrance doors, Brynn steps into the dim hall that was once a grand foyer. High ceilings, ornate moldings, and a sweeping staircase bear testimony to the building’s past; several closed, placard-bearing doors to its present.

  “It’s dark,” Jeremy informs her in a small voice.

  “I know, it’s okay. See? Here we are.” Opening the door fronted by Fiona’s name, she steps into one-half of the former double parlor. It’s easy to picture the tall, double-hung windows, hardwood floors, and marble fireplace looking exactly the same in the late-1800s. The reception area, like Fee’s adjacent office, is tastefully decorated with nineteenth-century reproduction wallpaper and fabrics, and antique furnishings.

  A skinny blonde looks up from the tall potted fern she’s watering beside one of the two windows.

  “Hi, I’m Brynn, a friend of Fiona’s.”

  “Oh…hi.” The girl looks so uncertain that Brynn knows immediately that her days here are numbered.

  Fee has absolutely no patience for indecision.

  That’s why Sharon, who, during their college years had been the private secretary for the dean at Stonebridge, was the perfect office manager for her. The older woman doesn’t have a wishy-washy bone in her body. If she likes you, you know it on sight. Same thing if she doesn’t like you. Brynn, she always liked, and the feeling is mutual.

  Toying with the watering can, the new girl asks, “You don’t have an appointment…do you?”

  Brynn shakes her head, feeling almost sorry for the girl. She’s painfully skinny and inappropriately dressed in a gauze skirt and thick, flat sandals. Her long forehead and plain, egg-shaped face are unnecessarily accentuated by straight, wispy, straw-colored hair parted in the middle.

  “I need a cup,” Jeremy announces, eyeing the Poland Spring cooler.

  “Is it all right if I get him a drink of water?” Brynn asks.

  Again, the girl is riddled with incertitude.

  Brynn shifts Jeremy to her other hip and fills a paper cup anyway.

  He takes a big gulp, squirms, and demands, “I want to get down.”

  “No, Mommy’s going to hold you,” she tells him firmly, acutely aware of the stained glass lamp and porcelain bowl of potpourri on a nearby table.

  I shouldn’t have brought him, she realizes, and on the heels of that thought, but I had no choice.

  What she wouldn’t give to have a doting grandma nearby, as most of her friends do. But her father and stepmother are a world away in every sense, and Garth’s parents are retired in Florida. For Brynn, getting out of the house without one or both the kids is an impossible weekday challenge.

  She hands her son the empty paper cup to play with and decides she’d better get down to business before Jeremy’s limited patience runs its course.

  “You must be Fiona’s new assistant,” she tells the girl.

  “That’s right.”

  “What was your name again?” Brynn prods, fully aware that she never said.

  She isn’t rude…just young. And clueless.

  You poor thing, she thinks sadly. Fiona’s going to eat you alive.

  “Oh, I’m Emily.” Of that, at least, she seems certain.

  “Nice to meet you. So is Fiona here?”

  “I’m not supposed to disturb her unless it’s an emergency.”

  “Is she alone in there?”

  Emily nods. “But—”

  Brynn starts for Fee’s closed door.

  “No, wait—”

  “It’s okay,” Brynn tells her, as she reaches for the knob with the hand that isn’t wrapped around Jeremy. “You’re not disturbing her. I am.”

  Settling into a booth in the Cedar Crest Coffee Shop on the northern end of Main Street, Isaac Halpern accepts the laminated menu from a pretty student waitress. She blatantly checks him out.

  With his traditional good looks—clean-cut dark hair and blue eyes, a strong, but not too strong, nose, and a tall frame that’s both lean and muscular—he does get his share of attention from women.

  Especially back home in Manhattan, where straight, single, successful men are as valuable a commodity as rent-controlled real estate.

  “Know what you want?” the waitress asks with a toss of her long black hair.

  “I haven’t even looked at the menu yet.”

  She shrugs. “Most people already know.”

  “Just give me a minute, okay?” he asks, and she drifts away.

  The menu is stained with brownish splashes and there is a grain of dried rice plastered to the laminate. Terrific.

  Holding it gingerly, Isaac scans the lengthy list of offerings beneath the heading:

  Breakfast Served 24 Hours

  Eggs, omelets, French Toast, pancakes, bagels, cereal, fruit, sides of anything you can imagine…

  Pretty much the same menu as in any diner back in New York, but at less than half the price for everything. Pretty much the same setup, too—long counter along one wall, a row of booths along the other. Most of those are empty, and only a few of the stools at the counter are occupied.

  But this is a college town; this place is ten times busier at two in the morning after the bars close than it is now.

  Just a stone’s throw from here is the Zeta Delta Kappa house, its gray shingles freshly painted this semester with red trim. Those are the official sorority colors, the red representing the sorority mascot, which is the cardinal.

  Why a cardinal? Isaac asked Rachel once, when she was poring over her secret sorority notebook, cramming for the pledge quiz. Why not something more exotic, like a pink flamingo, or a peacock?

  Because cardinals stand out more than anything else, and they’re cheerful, and they’re everywhere, she replied with her usual Rachel decisiveness. When was the last time you looked out the window and saw a pink flamingo? There’s nothing better than spotting a beautiful, cheerful splotch of red in the trees on a gray winter morning.

  There hasn’t been a gray winter morning since she said it that Isaac hasn’t searched—to no avail—for a cardinal.

  “Did you decide?”

  He looks up. The waitress is back already, pad poised, hair still hanging around her face. Shouldn’t she be wearing a hairnet, or a ponytail, or something? That she isn’t doesn’t bode well for the cuisine.

  Yeah, he should tell her he changed his mind and get out of here.

  Instead, he hears himself say, “I’ll just have a Western Omelet and whole-grain toast. And coffee.”

  He isn’t the least bit hungry, but he’s here; he should eat.

  And why are you here?

  Not here in the coffee shop; here in Cedar Crest.

  I’m here because…

  Because…

  God, I shouldn’t be here. What the hell is wrong with me? Why do I keep coming back here every September?

  This was a bad, impulsive idea.

  Not the first in his life, though, and it surely won’t be his last.

  All because of her.

  Rachel.

  The waitress departs. As if on cue, his cell phone begins to vibrate in the back pocket of his jeans;
he hurriedly grabs it and flips it open. The number displayed in the caller ID box is a familiar one.

  “Hey,” a female voice says. “It’s me.”

  “Hey. How’s San Francisco?”

  “Foggy. How’s New York?”

  He hesitates.

  “Sunny,” he says, because it was supposed to be; he caught the local weather forecast on Z100 before leaving for Massachusetts.

  “Did you remember to feed Smoochy this morning?”

  The cat. Damn.

  “Yes,” he lies.

  That tabby is so fat he can probably survive off his own body fat for weeks. Still, Isaac should have remembered to feed him. If anything happens to the cat, Kylah will be heartbroken. And furious with him. Particularly when she finds out her pet’s well-being was sacrificed for this little annual expedition to New England.

  No, not when.

  Not even if.

  She won’t find out. She’s safely on the West Coast, he’ll be home in New York before she is, and the world’s fattest feline will be fine.

  “I miss you,” she says with a sigh.

  “I miss you, too. How’s the conference going?”

  “You know. Same as they always go. It’s all a big blur of name tags and handouts and bad food and watered-down drinks. I can’t wait to get home tomorrow. Don’t forget—my flight gets in at six and I’m coming straight home, so…”

  “I’ll be there.”

  And he will. Because he can’t stay here in Cedar Crest indefinitely.

  But he’ll be back again.

  And again, and again…

  For as long as it takes.

  About to protest the abrupt intrusion, Fiona looks up from her desk to see not the hapless Emily, but Brynn, framed in the open doorway.

  Her heart sinks.

  She isn’t in the mood. True, she was just sitting here, craving a cigarette and brooding about the very thing Brynn is undoubtedly here to discuss, but…

  But I don’t want to talk about it. Not yet. Not until I’ve decided how I’m going to approach this whole mess.

  Looks like she doesn’t have a choice, though.

  “Hey.” Fiona stands and feigns an affectionate smile at Jeremy, whose lower face appears to be covered in some kind of sticky sludge. Lovely. “What are you guys doing here?”

  Brynn just sends her a level look and closes the door behind herself just as Emily pops up, hovering nervously and looking apologetic.

  I’ve got to get rid of her, Fiona thinks wearily. I’ll fire her first chance I get…

  And replace her with whom?

  “Listen, we need to talk about this thing,” Brynn is saying in a low voice.

  “Did you get ahold of them?” Fiona asks.

  Of course Brynn knows who she’s talking about. Cassie and Tildy.

  “No, I couldn’t.” She sinks onto the visitor’s chair beside the desk with Jeremy on her lap.

  “Did you try?”

  Brynn shakes her head.

  “Brynn, you said you’d call them last night.”

  “I know I did, but by the time I got the kids ready for bed, Garth was home, and—”

  “You didn’t tell him, did you?”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “Shh.” Fiona frowns and nods at the closed door, beyond which Emily could presumably be eavesdropping, though she sincerely doubts it.

  That would take initiative and, as far as she can tell, her assistant doesn’t possess a blessed ounce of it.

  Nor, apparently, does Brynn. She said she would call the others.

  Figures. Well, you learned long ago that if you want something done right…You do it yourself.

  “I’m just making sure you weren’t tempted to tell Garth,” Fiona says in a low voice. “I mean, he had Rachel in class, and he was in that faculty search party, so I thought maybe you figured—”

  “Well, I didn’t say anything. You didn’t tell anyone, did you?” Brynn whispers.

  “No.” Fiona ignores the slightest twinge in the vicinity of her conscience. “Who am I going to tell?”

  “Jeremy, no!” Brynn unpries her son’s fingers from the fringed lampshade beside the chair.

  He protests loudly as she removes several strands of maroon thread that are plastered to his sticky hands.

  “Sorry, Fee.”

  She nods, not about to say that it’s okay. Because it isn’t.

  Brynn should know better than to come barging into her office first thing in the morning—or anytime, for that matter—particularly with a toddler in tow.

  Anyway, this isn’t the time or place to discuss what happened in the past…ten years ago, or yesterday.

  Then her friend looks up at her with those big puppy dog eyes of hers and says, “I’m scared, Fee.”

  Fiona’s irritation dribbles away.

  So am I, she wants to admit.

  “The more I think about it, the more I’m sure it’s just Tildy or Cassie playing a stupid and totally unfunny joke,” she assures Brynn instead.

  “Really?”

  No.

  “I mean, who else can it possibly be?” she asks Brynn, but her attention is focused on Jeremy, reaching for the tall Lladro figurine on her desk.

  It depicts a mother and child; Deirdre sent it from Spain as a gift for Fee’s first Mother’s Day.

  Fiona was stuck at home with a newborn at the time. For her, the beautiful porcelain figure was less a testament to new motherhood than it was a symbol of her lost freedom.

  She had never been to Europe then. Saddled with a baby and a husband whose salary barely covered the rent, she probably never would get there…or so she believed at the time.

  She pulls the Lladro slightly closer to herself, out of Jeremy’s grasp.

  Brynn doesn’t seem to notice.

  “I can think of someone else it can be,” she says, and Fiona’s heart skips a beat.

  “Who?”

  “Think about it, Fee.”

  “I am thinking about it. Who are you talking about, Brynn?”

  “Rachel,” comes the unanticipated reply, just as Jeremy grasps the figurine and drops it onto the hardwood floor, where it shatters deafeningly.

  The Dave Matthews Band was on the portable CD player, drowning out the night sounds.

  “Go for it, Fee!” Tildy commanded and Fiona, standing on the crest of The Prom, facing the lights of

  Cedar Crest in dazzling array below, popped the champagne bottle with two thumbs. The cork shot out into oblivion; then they heard the faint rustle of its landing in the thicket far below.

  “Woo-hoo!” Tildy reached to take the bottle from her.

  “Um, shouldn’t Rachel have the first sip?” Brynn spoke up. “Since she’s the birthday girl?”

  “Oh, that’s okay.” Rachel reached into her sweater. “I’ve got something better.”

  She produced a pint-sized mason jar.

  “What’s that?”

  “Grain alcohol.” Unscrewing the lid, Rachel took a swig, made a face, and offered the jar to the others. “Who wants some?”

  “Are you kidding?” Tildy wrinkled her cosmetically perfected nose. “Where’d you get that? Somebody’s disgusting bathtub?”

  “No, from my stepbrother, over the summer.”

  “Which stepbrother?” Fiona asked. Rachel’s family was a blend of full-, half-, and step-siblings as well as former and present stepfathers and stepmothers.

  “Which one do you think? I’ve only got two steps, and Joshua is only in fourth grade.”

  That would leave the older stepbrother, whose father had married her mother briefly a few years ago. Their parents had long since gone their separate ways, but Rachel was still close to him. He had graduated last May from Morgantown University in West Virginia; now he was living and working in New York. The sorority sisters were planning a road trip to Manhattan later in the fall, and Rachel said they could stay with him.

  “So where did your brother get grain alcohol?” Cassie as
ked, after a delicate sip from the champagne bottle.

  “Where else? This came straight from the mountains of West Virginny.”

  “Hey, Rach, that hillbilly twang is about as believable as your fake English accent,” Fiona told her.

  “Yeah, but at least it’s a lot better than her fake Southern drawl,” Brynn put in teasingly.

  “Hey, my drawl was pretty good,” Rachel protested. “That guy I met in the Rat the other night believed me when I said I was from Mississippi.”

  “Yeah, up until you told him your name was Scarlett,” Tildy said with a snort.

  “You guys were in the Rat the other night?” Fiona asked.

  They exchanged guilty glances.

  “Sorry, Fee,” Brynn said. “You were working that night anyway.”

  “Whatever. Just because I can’t set foot in there until I’m twenty-one doesn’t mean you all have to stay away.”

  But she didn’t sound as though she meant it.

  And she added a bit sharply, “Just don’t go in there when Pat’s tending bar. He knows you’re underage. He can get busted if he lets you stay.”

  Somebody changed the subject to the upcoming Rush Week before anyone could point out that Pat had seen them there and looked the other way, plenty of times.

  Fiona had some funny hang-ups about being the lone townie among them. It wasn’t easy for her to watch the rest of them hit the popular local bars with their fake IDs.

  “Sure you guys don’t want any? It’s homemade.” Rachel brandished the jar of grain alcohol as though she was proudly referring to a tray of decadent brownies.

  Still no takers.

  Rachel shrugged and swigged, going about it almost grimly when she thought nobody was paying much attention.

  But they were—each of the four, in her own way.

  They all noticed there was something off about Rachel that night. As the night wore on, her voice vacillated between somber and shrill, but she didn’t really say much of anything.

  Nothing that would strike any of them, later, as having shed light on her strange mood.

  “You’d better go easy on that stuff,” advised Cassie, who took her pre-med studies seriously. “You’re so petite, Rach—you can’t handle that much. It can make you sick.”

  “It’s my party, and I’ll barf if I want to,” Rachel sang to the tune of the old Leslie Gore song.