by Sara Zarr
Hearing her lay out all the things that he knew were true, that he’d avoided thinking about for weeks, was like getting sandblasted. Every little rough edge of denial blew off, and what remained was the clean, smooth reality that he could have and should have turned to her instead of shutting her out.
Maybe it wasn’t too late, maybe they could go somewhere and talk and he could fix this.
“Nadia, I—”
“And now I don’t trust you.”
The bell rang.
Without trust, there was nothing, no chance. The reality of what he was losing, what had already been lost, crashed down in an avalanche of pain that made him hurt everywhere. Limbs, gut, head.
“So this is our breakup,” Nadia said.
He leaned agains the lockers, letting his head bang softly against the metal. “Are you sure?”
“Don’t do that, Kyle. Don’t.” She took a step away from him. The traffic in the hall had thinned out. “Don’t avoid me for weeks and make me chase you down and say all that and now all of a sudden be back in.”
“Sorry, I’m sorry.” She was right. And so much braver than him, tougher. He found a scrap of courage in himself and asked, in a whisper, “Can we hug?”
She nodded, wiping a tear away, and reached up to put her arms around his neck and shoulders. He slid his around her waist, found the solid expanse of her back.
He couldn’t believe he’d let this happen.
They were both crying. “I’m sorry,” he said again, into her hair. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry.”
He let her go.
After they said goodbye, he knew he was cutting the rest of the day. He wrote himself a note about an appointment and signed his dad’s name, dropped it at the office, and headed off to his parking spot under the tree.
6
FOLLOWING HIS mom didn’t feel like a decision so much as fate: going early to talk to Ito led to the Nadia reckoning, which led to cutting school, which led to Kyle going to the beach for the morning to cry, then to eating tacos in his car at lunch in the parking lot of the big shopping center near his house because there wasn’t really anywhere else to go that wouldn’t use too much gas.
He was still beating up his already raw heart for all the wrong steps he’d taken with Nadia when he recognized his mom’s car, parked in the next row. The city might be crawling with white Avalons, but only his mom’s had the Baker & Najarian license-plate frame.
In itself, seeing her car wasn’t a big deal. This was the Vons where they did their shopping. This was the Starbucks his sisters would go to when they lived at home. These were the food places they’d grab takeout from on busy weeknights. Now, though, every movement of his mom’s seemed relevant in a new way.
He slid down in the front seat and waited. It felt like forever before she came into view with a single bag of groceries in one arm and her phone up to her ear. Laughing. Smiling. Two things she hadn’t done at home in Kyle’s recent memory. She got into her car and backed up, then Kyle started his.
Maybe she was just going home. Going home with some groceries in the middle of the day, no big deal. But from her very first turn out of the lot, in the opposite of the usual direction, he knew she wasn’t.
Maybe another errand. Maybe a different grocery store for the special gluten-free bread she liked.
Following another car wasn’t as easy in real life as it looked on TV. People constantly changing lanes and turning made it hard to keep at least one car between them, and then he missed a light and got behind for a few blocks. Next, he ran a yellow light to keep it from happening again, sure that his mom would spot him. Except she was on the phone the entire time. Which was illegal.
“Come on, Mom,” he muttered. Did she follow any rules anymore?
When she turned down a neighborhood street, he stayed farther back.
“What are you even doing?” This time, he was asking himself. With few other cars on the road, she would realize she was being followed, and then what? He pictured her face, defensive, when she’d said, “I’m allowed to have a life.”
She made another turn; he let himself lose her, then pulled over to park and turned off the engine.
She existed. His mother existed, outside of their family as well as inside of it. Just like how Kyle kept existing when he was running from Nadia, ditching the team, trying to figure out his own deal.
It seemed obvious, that people existed outside of how you needed them to. But it didn’t feel obvious.
A tap on his car window nearly made him jump out of his skin. A woman, probably around his mom’s age, smiled at him through the glass. A pretty smile. Her blond hair was pulled back into one of those little knots at her neck. He lowered his window.
“Are you my one thirty?” she asked. “I thought I got here early enough to beat you.”
He looked around and saw he’d been parked in front of a small yellow house for sale.
“No, I’m just . . .” Stalking someone? Following my cheating mom around? “I had to pull over to answer my phone.”
“Good for you.”
“My mom drilled it into me.” Ironic. “You’re . . . a Realtor? You’re showing that house?”
“I am.”
He had an urge to see it. He’d always liked tagging along with his dad on reno projects. He liked the actual work—especially when his dad let him sledgehammer walls—but most of it was the pull of stepping into someone else’s world, seeing how they lived, from what kind of furniture they sat on to the coats in their closet. All these people, existing, with lives as real as his.
“I’m not, like, in the market for a house or anything, but could I see the inside?”
She bent down to get a better look at him. “Sure. I’ve got about ten minutes before my appointment.” She held up her phone. “Just going to grab a picture of you and your license plate to send to my colleagues, okay?”
“Oh, right.”
He got out of the car and stood for the picture, then she led him up the walk. She had on jeans and a long, loose cardigan, low-heeled boots. “The fact that you want to see it means the curb appeal is working, right?” she said as she got the key out of the lockbox.
“Definitely.” The house had a front garden that looked overgrown but not out of control—wild pretty, not wild neglected. The door and trim were painted glossy white, cheerful and inviting against the yellow of the rest of the house.
“I’m Dawn, by the way. Coldwell Banker.”
“Kyle. Baker. Of Baker and Najarian.” He hoped throwing that in would make him seem less like a kid cutting school and more like a junior contractor who had a right and a reason to be scoping out houses.
“Oh, I’ve seen your trucks around town.” She held up the key. “I’ve only shown this house once. I can practice my spiel on you.”
“Go for it.”
She smiled, put on her salesperson face. “Okay. This home has had only two owners. The current owners have done a lot of upgrades.”
When they went in, the first thing Kyle noticed was the light. Bright but soft, no glare. From the front door you could see straight through to the backyard, which was the same wild pretty as the front, and had a round table and two chairs on a small patio.
“It’s not huge,” Dawn continued, “compared to some of the newer houses around here. But the space has been well thought out.”
He hadn’t even noticed the size, though now that she mentioned it, yeah, it was tiny. A person could feel wrapped up in this house, versus bouncing around like a loose pinball, which was how he felt lately at his.
Dawn jingled the keys in her hand. “I probably shouldn’t point out how small it is first thing, right? I just figure people will notice.”
“I think they’ll notice the light first.”
“During the day, yes, that’s true.”
He took a few more steps in. The front room opened up into the kitchen, with wooden cabinetry painted that same glossy white, and butcher block countertops. The
appliances were white, too. So different from the granite and stainless steel most of his dad’s clients wanted.
“It’s so . . . like, happy,” he said.
“I’m glad to hear you say that. I agree. It’s a cheerful little house. I’m hoping a young couple or maybe some empty nesters or a single person with maybe a kid or a dog will fall in love with it.”
Empty nesters. That would be his parents soon. Or maybe they’d become single people before that even happened. He imagined his dad, a single person with maybe a kid—aka Kyle.
“So are you the Baker of Baker and Najarian?” Her smile was so steady.
“It’s my dad,” Kyle said.
“Ah, I figured.”
“Both my parents, actually. And their partner is the Najarian. In summers I work with them on some stuff. Nothing like this, though. More new construction and McMansion remodels.” He stood in front of the French doors that led to the back garden. If he had a business like his parents’, he’d rather work on this kind of place.
“If you have a card, I’m always looking for contractors to recommend to clients.”
“Not on me,” he said.
“Well, I’ll probably remember.”
He turned the lock on the French doors and opened them up. Sun warmed the garden without making it too hot, and he realized he was standing on wooden planks. He turned to Dawn, who was in the doorway, smiling that smile as cheerful as the house. “There’s no concrete,” he said, “so it won’t get scorching out here even in the afternoons. You should tell that to buyers.”
“Nine out of ten of them will want to tear out this wood and pour concrete rather than maintain and condition the wood.”
“They shouldn’t.”
“Hey, I wish you could buy this house,” she said.
Here in the sun, he could now see the fine lines around her lips that were a tiny bit red from her lipstick, the only makeup she wore that he could tell. He looked at her freckled collarbone, and her hands, and their short, unpainted fingernails. Wild pretty.
If he could look at this person his mom’s age and see the attraction, be drawn to her, it shouldn’t be that much of a stretch to imagine an actual grown-up guy falling for his mom—seeing her across a room, or bumping into her at a coffee shop, and wanting to be closer to her.
But . . . his mom was his mom. She belonged to him, to him and his dad and his sisters. Or, belonged not to them, but with them. Right? Wasn’t that how it worked?
Dawn touched his back, lightly. “Are you okay?”
He swallowed. “I’m only in this neighborhood because I was trying to follow my mom,” he said in a rush. “Because I think she was . . . I don’t know . . .” Going to her boyfriend’s house.
The doorbell rang, and Kyle realized what he was saying to a total stranger. Dawn’s smile had fallen. He couldn’t tell if it was in a kind and concerned way, or a why-are-you-telling-me-this? way. “Hold that thought.”
He didn’t want to hold that thought. He wanted that thought to go away.
She reached into her back pocket. “Here’s my card if you want to send along any information about your parents’ company. Like I said, I’m always looking for people to recommend.”
“Yeah,” he said, taking it.
She was already walking to the door. An older man came in, dark skin, blue cardigan. An empty nester or a single dad or a guy with a dog? This time, Dawn started her pitch by talking about the light. While she showed the bedrooms, Kyle slipped out, closing the cheerful white door behind him.
He got a little lost driving out of the neighborhood and wound up spotting his mom’s car a couple of blocks away from the yellow house, parked right in a driveway. If she was trying to hide something, she wasn’t doing a great job.
He passed it by, drove a few more blocks, hands tight on the wheel. Who cares. Who even cares.
Maybe the person in the house who belonged to the driveway wasn’t the guy. Maybe it was a client. Or one of her lady friends. Maybe they were in there drinking coffee and complaining about their families and how all they wanted was to get away from their dumb husbands and annoying kids, shouting, “I’m allowed to have a life!” and clinking mugs.
He pulled over and turned on his phone, tapped on his text thread with Emily.
My mom’s car is parked in a driveway and I think it’s the guy’s driveway. I followed her.
Seconds passed, a minute. More nothing.
He tried Megan. I obeyed you and talked to Ito. No dice for this season. Maybe next season but now I have to coach kids. hope ur happy
Another minute. He felt forgotten.
where are you??? he sent to Emily.
Screw it. He drove back to the house where his mom’s car was and parked half a block down, behind a Dumpster. He could just barely see the front door. He whisper-sang “Do-Re-Mi,” and on the third “That will bring us back to do-oh-oh-oh,” the door opened and his mother stepped out. She looked up and down the street. Either he was hidden enough or she wasn’t thinking to look for him. Probably scoping for a nosy neighbor or something.
Then the door opened wider. A man—tall and thin and bald, a basic-looking white guy—put his hand on Kyle’s mother’s shoulder. She reached up and touched it with her own. The man seemed to pull her back inside, into the shadowy entryway, and Kyle lost sight of them. When they reemerged, they were laughing. They were playful, pushing and pulling at each other.
He recognized what it was, and the reality of it was a fist to the stomach. It’s one thing to know it. Another to see it.
The chime of his phone made him jump.
I’m in school
Oh, right. School. He wanted more from Emily anyway, like an are you okay, or commentary on him following his mom. She didn’t give it. When he looked back up, his mom’s car was driving down the street in the opposite direction. The front door was closed and now he noticed the number painted next to it: 936. He sat there for the longest time, waiting for Emily or Megan or anyone to release him from this staring contest with a house.
No one came through. He started the car and got out of there, making a note of the street sign when he passed the corner. Snowdrop Lane. Even the name of the dumb street pissed him off. It never snowed here, and never would, and it sounded like something from a kids’ fairy tale and not from a nightmare of home wrecking and lies.
7
HE WENT back to the shopping center, thinking he should pick up some job applications. Start making his own gas money. And also maybe get out of this coaching-kids thing. If he said his family needed the money, Ito couldn’t do anything about that.
He sat in his car to fill them out but couldn’t concentrate.
That look on Nadia’s face. And now I don’t trust you.
Coop flipping him off the other day, telling him he was shit.
Ito being all “You know you can’t play in the games.”
Text me when you’re done with school, he wrote to Emily.
He waited for her reply. Filled out the easy parts of the applications. Walked around the perimeter of the parking lot. When he’d killed as much time as he possibly could and texted Emily twice more, he went home, where the house had that empty, depressing, four-thirty feeling.
Where did his mom go after she left the guy’s house? To the Baker & Najarian offices like everything was normal?
Back when Taylor and Megan still lived at home, his parents had kept this calendar in the kitchen and a magnetic notepad on the fridge. Everyone wrote in their plans and left notes about where they were. That had all stopped. Maybe they thought Kyle didn’t mind, that he could just take care of himself.
He looked through the refrigerator, hungry again after the small street tacos, but there wasn’t anything to eat unless you counted condiments. Hey, Mom, maybe pick up some food for us while you’re buying groceries for your boyfriend? In the pantry, he found a few bags of pasta with a handful left in each. There was also a jar of nacho cheese sauce. He put a pot of water on t
he stove and cranked up the heat on the big stainless gas range. Kyle and his dad had done this whole kitchen together last summer, to his mom’s exact specs. White granite on the island and countertops, travertine tile, new appliances, including the massive stainless-and-glass range hood that loomed over him now.
What was the point? Why did his mom ask for this specific kitchen if she didn’t want to be in it with them?
Still no replies from Megan or Emily. He put his phone on the counter and tried not to look at it. He got a bowl and a spoon and stuck the jar of cheese into the microwave, and then dumped his random assortment of penne, linguine, and shells into the boiling water. He heard the garage door. That meant his mom, because his dad parked his truck on the street. Kyle’s heart sped up.
You already knew, he reminded himself. What you saw today, you already knew.
She came in through the door that led from the mudroom to the kitchen. Her hair was damp, and she had on leggings and a long T-shirt.
“Hey, sweetie.” She kissed him on the cheek. He pulled back. “I was just at the gym.”
Go visit the boyfriend for a quickie, then head to the gym to clean up and change out of the adultery clothes. Maybe somewhere in there go to the office. She had a whole system.
“Are you not talking to me?” she asked, leaning against the granite he’d helped install just for her.
“Not really. What am I supposed to say?”
“Say whatever you want. I’m still your mom. I still love you.”
“Well I don’t love you,” he said, stirring the pasta.
He scooped out a piece of penne: undercooked. Then a strand of linguine: perfect, and about to be overcooked. He didn’t want to look at her and see that what he said had hurt. Kind of couldn’t believe he’d said it.
“I understand that you feel, right now, that you don’t love me.” She didn’t sound hurt at all. She sounded calm and reasonable. Like his mom. “I would still rather you talk to me than not talk to me.” She paused. “What are you making?”
“A big ball of gluten and dairy. You wouldn’t like it.”