Neighborly

by Ellie Monago

  I place her in the crib and wipe at my eyes. I yell, “I’ll be right there!” Then I take my sweet time putting on a bra and some clothes. If they need to see me that desperately, they can wait. If it’s my tormentor finally ready to go mano a mano, a part of me welcomes that. Let’s just get it over with. Say what you need to say. I’ll apologize. I’ll kiss ass, whatever it takes to get a clean slate on this block. I can’t live this way.

  When I open the door, I see Brandon, and over his shoulder is a large bag made out of bamboo or some other expensive natural fabric. He’s holding Zoe’s hand, and she’s peering up at me politely, his perfect child an unintentional rebuke, a study in contrasts with my own fire-breathing spawn.

  “Hi,” he says, his voice raised to be heard over Sadie, his eyes full of sympathy. “I would have gone away, but I thought maybe I could help. I brought over every colic remedy I could think of. Zoe had some problems when she was younger, and we tried everything. Sound machines, homeopathic remedies, belly massages, probiotics . . .”

  I burst into tears.

  He drops Zoe’s hand and pulls me to him for a hug. “Oh, I get it,” he tells me. “Knowing she’s suffering and not being able to help is the worst. It’s water torture. But it’ll get better, I promise you. Look at Zoe now. We all survived.”

  “It’s not just that,” I sob, but I can’t tell him the rest.

  “What do you think about my taking Sadie for a walk? I can wear her around me in a sling. That used to work sometimes for Zoe. The thing is, nothing works all the time. That’s part of what makes it all so maddening. But breaks help. No offense, but you look like you’re at the end of your tether.”

  He’s just so good. I cry harder.

  “What can I do to help?” Brandon asks. “Just name it. Put me to work. Really, I need something to do. I’m going crazy.”

  He’s going crazy? He doesn’t know the half of it. Improbably enough, I start to laugh.

  “Oh, my poor mental health amuses you? What am I, some kind of clown?” He’s doing the worst Goodfellas accent I’ve ever heard, and my laugh turns more genuine and less maniacal. “Listen, you’d do me a favor to let me take your squalling kid. I need to get my mind off some things.”

  I hesitate, wondering if it’s safe to hand over your child to someone you don’t know well. I would have thought so, given that he’s a neighbor, but that isn’t exactly the most reassuring thing a person could be right now. Still, he’s Brandon.

  “Are you sure you don’t mind taking her for a walk?” I ask.

  “Of course not. I’ve got the swaddle I used for Zoe. Let’s see if I remember how to tie it around me. It’s a memory exercise, and at my age, I can always use one of those.” He fumbles in the bamboo bag and removes half a yard of fabric. I never got the hang of those myself.

  “If you’re sure, I’ll run upstairs and get her.”

  “Oh, wait!” he says. I spin back, heart sinking already. There’s always a catch. “Take this.” He gives me the bag full of colic remedies. “And don’t start crying again.”

  “Thank you,” I tell him with great feeling. “Can you have her back soon, like in ten minutes?”

  “Absolutely,” he says.

  I shoot upstairs to where Sadie is on her back, limbs flailing, face a devastating shade of tomato. I sniff her diaper—clean and dry, just like it was the last time I checked—and despite her impotent waving arms, despite her rage, I get the sunbonnet tied under her chin. It’s sort of sad how she can be so angry and yet so powerless.

  I lift her up and carry her downstairs. “Sadie,” I say, “do you remember Brandon? And this is Zoe. They’re going to take you on a walk. A sightseeing tour of the neighborhood.”

  “Sweet Sadie,” Brandon croons, taking her from me. “Even when she’s cross, she’s beautiful, Kat.” She already sounds calmer in his arms. Her cries are more piteous than angry. What am I doing wrong? Why is she so mad at me?

  Because she can be. That’s what Dr. Morrison would say. I’d been a perfect child for my mother because I had no choice. I was trying to win her over. Sadie knows she’s got me, completely, and that’s what I want for her. Absolute security.

  After Brandon does some impressive jujitsu moves with the fabric, she’s fastened to his chest, gazing up at him, the sobs on her lips replaced by curiosity.

  “It’s just the newness,” Brandon says. “I’m an unknown quantity.”

  This whole neighborhood is. At the thought, my gratitude becomes mixed with unease.

  “Speaking of newness and unknown quantities, how are you doing after the other night?”

  “Girls’ night, you mean?”

  “I know they talked to you about becoming open. Don’t worry, they expect you to be kind of freaked out.”

  “Good. Because I am.” That’s not all I’m freaked out about, though. I don’t know what to believe—whether I really just drank too much and blacked out like Doug thinks or if I was the victim of foul play.

  He laughs. “I was the only person who wasn’t freaked the first time I learned about it. I was like, ‘Bring it on! New experiences in suburbia!’ Though I won’t let Gina catch me calling it suburbia.” He turns more serious. “Openness works for certain kinds of marriages. Not every marriage is cut out for it.”

  “You and Stone are cut out for it?”

  “I thought we were.”

  “What happened?”

  “There was a little stalking incident. That can happen with the closeted types.”

  I stare at him, trying to unravel what he’s said. “So one of the husbands was stalking you?”

  “As it turned out, I’m really more of a cuddler anyway!” He grins, trying to make light.

  Who did the stalking? Oliver, maybe? Andie said Oliver had been with both men and women. “I’m more of a cuddler these days, too.”

  “Could I give you a little piece of advice?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Sometimes people say yes who should say no. Like . . .” He looks behind him. “Yolanda and Wyatt. She doesn’t feel like she can say no, and she’s so afraid of losing him that she said yes. Now she’s stuck. All she can do is layer on more and more rules.”

  “I could tell sometimes she feels kind of insecure. But he seems to really love her.”

  “He does, but . . .” He glances toward the street again. “She’s gotten herself in this bad position. She gets together with men she doesn’t want, because what she really wants is for Wyatt to stop her at the door. She wants him to grab her arm and say, ‘Don’t go.’ She never would again. But he never does.”

  It’s obvious this isn’t just idle gossip. Brandon is truly sad for Yolanda and the state of her marriage. For whatever reason, though, I can tell that he really wants me to have this information. It could even be the real reason he came over this morning.

  “Poor Yolanda,” I say. “Thanks for warning me.”

  He looks down at Sadie, who is calm as a lake now, and I assume he’s going to unwrap her and hand her back. Instead, he says, “I’ll have her back in a jiff.”

  Before I can respond, Zoe gives me a wave, and the three of them are off down the street.

  If someone like Brandon lives happily on this block, then it could be a good place after all. I really want that to be true. We just got here, and to sell the house and start all over somewhere else, to have to admit to Doug’s parents that we made a mistake . . .

  I’m not going to sell my house and move away, so I need to follow Andie’s marital advice to its logical conclusion. I need to let all this go. Accept Doug’s explanation. Three (or four or more) strong drinks and a shot after a year of abstinence could very well mimic the effects of ketamine. People have hallucinations with too much alcohol, and I could have imagined the muscle rigidity. It’s not like I’ve never had a blackout before.

  Brandon is a kind and genuine person, and he loves this neighborhood. He loves these neighbors. The same neighbors who took care of me in my blacked-
out state and brought me home safely and texted me again and again about how much they like me. The ones who want me to join their club, strange as it may be. And then there’s Andie.

  I’m lucky.

  I think it again, making the thought bigger, louder, more vivid, like Dr. Morrison taught me to do. It’s like it’s written in the sky.

  I

  AM

  LUCKY

  Doug texts me, checking on how I’m feeling. He tells me not to worry about making dinner. It’s not lovey-dovey, but it shows that he’s not happy with how yesterday went, either. He’s also prepared to let things go.

  When he arrives home, he holds up a bag. “Your favorite,” he says. “Sushi.”

  I try not to think about how expensive sushi is. Instead, I appreciate his effort. I thank him and lay out the plates and chopsticks on the kitchen table. He sits opposite me, feeding Sadie a bottle as he gazes at her adoringly. “Don’t wait for me,” he says. “Dive in.”

  I also try to ignore the fact that he hasn’t touched me or made eye contact.

  He likes the rolls, while I like the sashimi, which means I can tell easily what’s mine. Slowly, I eat the ahi, yellowtail, salmon, and mackerel, allowing myself unfettered pleasure with each bite. I savor.

  He shouldn’t have splurged, but I decide not to care. I chew languorously. I luxuriate. When Doug and I used to go out to dinner, before Sadie, eating could be a sensual experience, not simply a refueling. This is the woman I used to be, and perhaps that’s who Doug is trying to conjure. He didn’t call me crazy, I remind myself, not exactly. He just said I was different. Well, I can be that person again.

  Sensual. That makes me think of girls’ night. I’m pretty sure there was flirting and dancing. But with whom? All I can remember is the heat of bodies pressing in on me, and that I liked the feeling.

  Does Doug need to know how I acted? If I don’t tell him, will one of the neighbors? I wouldn’t blame him for feeling hurt. He hasn’t seen that side of me in a long time.

  “I have another surprise for you,” he says. “I’m going to build the kitchen cart tonight.”

  “Thank you. That means a lot to me.”

  I take Sadie, and he starts in on his maki. He doesn’t look up as he says, “What do you think about my going out to a sports bar on Main tonight to watch the game with all the guys? After I’ve finished the cart.”

  So the cart is just a ploy so he can go watch the game. Not that I would have stopped him from going, even without the cart. Doesn’t he know me better than that?

  “Which guys?” I ask.

  “Bart, Oliver, Nolan, Vic. Wyatt begged off.”

  It’s all his new friends, the husbands of the women from girls’ night out. What if they want to get together so they can warm Doug up to the idea of the openness?

  “Go,” I say. “Have fun.” Maybe Doug can be the one to bring it up to me, the one to say no.

  He nods slowly. Then, out of nowhere, he says, “You know you can tell me anything.”

  I nod slowly back and lie, “I do know that.”

  Session 68.

  “What did it mean to you, that there were so many?”

  “It wasn’t that many.”

  “From what I read, eight victims came forward, though they didn’t all testify.”

  “What does that say to you? It says to me that at least some of them were lying. They probably misinterpreted him. They wanted to feel special, and they misunderstood his kindness.”

  “Like—”

  “I’m just saying, people like to blame other people. They don’t like to take responsibility. That’s the whole problem with society.”

  “I feel like you’re deflecting a bit. Let’s not talk about them. Let’s talk about you.”

  “We’ve already talked about me, ad nauseum. I’m sick of talking about me and about feelings. It doesn’t really get us anywhere. I’m still stuck being who I am. I’m stuck being part of this terrible story, betrayed and alone. I just want to run away. I wish I could change my name or my face. I’m afraid this is going to follow me everywhere.”

  “Do people recognize you?”

  “Not often, but enough. The newspaper can’t show photographs of minors, but once in a great while, it happens. And in Haines, people talk. I never go back there. It’s unfair. None of this is my fault.”

  “No, it’s not. But you do have to make sense of it.”

  “I have to come out of my denial, is what you mean.”

  “Possibly.”

  “How about you just say it? Just tell me what you really think of me.”

  “I’m not here to sit in judgment.”

  “Everyone passes judgment. That’s why I need to stop talking and just escape. Find myself a nice guy and marry him and have a baby or two and stop being me.”

  “Wherever you go, there you are.”

  “Yeah, well, we’ll see.”

  CHAPTER 17

  I’m trying to think positive, to silence all the niggling doubts, to forget. It’s exhausting. But I’m making progress. I force myself out of the house, and Sadie and I take limited trips to the park and around town. I’m afraid to run into any of the women except Andie, afraid they’ll ask me again if I’ve spoken to Doug, afraid to disappoint them with my answer.

  Andie’s the one I want to see, but she seems to be avoiding me. Her texts are friendly but brief, and she’s too busy to go on walks or to lunch. She offered to be my sounding board, but now she won’t let me take her up on it.

  Maybe she’s just flaky. She could make overtures to lots of people and never follow through. Better to have found out sooner rather than later, before I get in too deep or share too much. Still, it hurts to have misjudged her. It hurts just to miss her.

  I go where I need to; I take care of my responsibilities. While at the grocery store, Sadie has an epic meltdown and my face is aflame, yet I forge ahead. Two different women, obviously mothers themselves, tell me, “Hang in there, Mom!” and I do.

  Doug comes home with a bunch of new clothes he bought. He says that the AV is hotter than our neighborhood in Oakland, which is patently untrue. Here, we have breezes off the water. The clothes are from a men’s store on Main Street that he says Tennyson recommended, and I gape at the price tags. But I say nothing. Since I’m not going to divorce him over some linen pants, I have to let it go. He’s going to iron them himself, though.

  We haven’t had a conversation of any depth in days. I don’t think any of the men spilled the beans about openness while they were watching the game. If they had, Doug would have said something.

  The next morning, I run into Andie at Mommy and Me class. She knew that I’d been meaning to go; why didn’t she call me? We sit next to each other, shaking our maracas and singing, making exaggerated expressions so our babies will smile. It feels awkward to me, but nothing in her bearing suggests she feels the same. Afterward, she rushes off immediately, saying she has an appointment but that we’ll “definitely talk soon. Maybe we could all have dinner again?” She doesn’t wait for my response.

  Briefly, I had the promise of a whole social life. Now I feel like it’s receding. I’m an island within an island. Yes, the women are texting me, but they’re not inviting me anywhere. I can imagine all the fun they’re having without me: boat rides, shopping trips, jogs along the beach, bunco games. But I can’t partake of it unless I let them partake of Doug. Can I?

  Maybe I can. They told me how much they like me, immediately. Not only Doug but me, too. They said that even if I opt out, we’ll still be friends. And at the block party, everyone did seem to be friends. I can’t imagine that all those people are on the spreadsheet.

  I just don’t want it to be weird when Doug and I opt out. We should have everyone over. A cocktail party, maybe? No, we can’t really fit everyone in our house. Our yard is big, though. Maybe a barbecue? Doug would love that, even though it would mean that he has to mow the grass and pull some weeds. We’d also have to buy a grill, which m
eans more debt, but that wouldn’t trouble Doug. Then we can announce that we’re opting out. I’ll have to talk to Doug before then, which will give me a much-needed deadline, since I’m quaking at the thought of that conversation.

  Doug comes home, and I tell him about wanting to throw a barbecue. He grabs my face and kisses me. I bask in the spontaneous show of affection. We’re going to be OK after all. The walls between us will come down.

  “Awesome! Yes! Absolutely!” He’s nearly dancing around the room. “We have to go to my parents for July Fourth, but how about that next weekend? Who should we invite?” He’s giddy, like a girl about to have her first sleepover. His excitement is infectious, and we plan the guest list together. It’ll be all the usual suspects, and they text back their RSVPs quickly.

  On the one hand, I feel extreme relief. Everyone is coming. On the other hand, I’m terrified. Everyone is coming.

  I’ve read a lot of Agatha Christie. When the whole cast of characters is in one place, that one place could very well become the scene of the crime.

  No, we’re talking about a barbecue. How bad could it be?

  Before I know it, it’s July Fourth weekend, and I still haven’t talked to Doug. But I will. I’m going to do it. I can’t chicken out forever.

  “Do you think we forgot anything?” I ask Doug, the hatch of the Outback still yawning open, our suitcases inside.

  “If we did, we can just buy it there.”

  I never like to go to Scott and Melody’s house in Fort Bragg, yet this holiday, I’m actually OK with it. Some time away from the AV might do me good. It’s a palate cleanser.

  “Oh, you know what?” I say. “I lost Sadie’s sun hat, and I forgot to buy her a new one. I don’t think we’ll be able to find that in Fort Bragg. Isn’t it basically a retirement community?” I glance across the street. Brandon and Stone keep forgetting to bring over Zoe’s old clothes, which might include a sun hat, so now’s a good time to get them. “I’ll be right back.”

  No one answers when I knock on their door. I know Doug and I could just stop at Target on our way, yet I want some reassurance from our neighbors that everything’s OK. I see that Andie’s car is gone. I look up and down the street, my eyes catching on the brownest lawn.