The Floating Feldmans

by Elyssa Friedland

  How could her children—or was it her grandchildren—be so cruel? Were they deliberately trying to embarrass her with that absurd picture Photoshopped onto a sweatshirt in a garish shade of yellow? Could it possibly be retribution for her making them come on this trip? But she hadn’t forced it! Yes, she had strongly intimated how much it meant to her that the family be together to celebrate this milestone. And her children knew that historically she preferred to bury her birthday in a biographical footnote. But still, Elise and Freddy were hardly dangling from yo-yo strings, ready to jump at her beck and call. Quite the contrary. How many holidays had she and David celebrated alone, the two of them quietly slicing a turkey on Thanksgiving while listening to David’s favorite jazz musicians, because their children were “just too busy to get away”? Too many to count. And yet on this occasion, her children had accepted the invitation without much prodding. So the sweatshirt meant something else. Somebody—a blood relative of hers—thought it would make her happy. And that was even worse. She was a stranger to her own kin.

  She hadn’t intended to start squabbling with Elise the minute she saw her. If anything, she’d committed to plastering a smile on her face no matter what slights slipped from either of her children’s mouths or the rudeness she faced in her grandchildren. But she was so rattled by the sweatshirts, so frighteningly unnerved by the sight of Elise and Freddy hugging like old friends, that she found herself yelling at her daughter for giving her the wrong place to meet, which wasn’t true, but as she thrust herself into the argument, the veracity of what she was saying felt irrelevant. All Annette had wanted was for everyone to get along on the boat and yet she was instigating. She thought about the stash of Ativan mixed in with David’s drugs. He was supposed to take them if he felt himself getting nauseated on the boat or anxious in general about being away from his regular doctors. He would hardly notice if she filched one or two.

  And what was up with Freddy’s girlfriend? She was a bigger surprise than the sweatshirts. Natasha, the interloper with whom they were stuck eating the next fifteen meals with, looked no older than a college coed. A beauty she was, of that there could be no doubt. And nothing seemed patently wrong with her either—at least not off the bat. She had a pretty smile, shook hands with both Annette and David confidently, and, notwithstanding her cheesy and totally inappropriate choice of outfit, was poised and well-spoken. Perhaps she needed a green card. She had an eastern European look to her. How awful for a mother to think this way of her own son. To believe that a looker like Natasha wouldn’t want anything to do with Freddy unless there was something to be gained. Annette decided not to share her suspicions with David just yet, curious to hear his initial reaction before she infected it with her own.

  It had been some time since she and David had had their last heart-to-heart about Freddy and what would become of him. Both of them acknowledged it was pointless to try to help him out now—it wasn’t as though they had a family business he could join like so many of their neighbors’ children had enviably done. The less capable sons and daughters (usually it was the sons) took on roles with big titles and little responsibility. It was the ultimate gift a parent could give a child who needed support, but it wasn’t like David could magically bestow a medical degree upon their son. And what else could they have done for him? She hardly needed any help with the office management. A few years ago, Annette had made David join Facebook under an assumed name (she’d picked up that tip from a similarly situated friend) so they could spy on him. Freddy didn’t post much and, when he did, it was usually banal pictures of him rafting or barbecuing with friends, yokels dressed in ridiculous sleeveless tank tops and ratty cargo shorts, a criminal focal point with all those gorgeous aspen trees and snow-capped mountains in the background. The point was, Freddy was fine. He wasn’t a surgeon or a lawyer, he didn’t check the boxes they’d drawn for him, but he was happy and healthy as far as they could see. Annette reminded herself she shouldn’t be asking for more. They knew families who’d suffered tragedies far greater than children not earning college degrees. Privately, after he’d eaten a good dinner and situated himself in his beloved recliner in the family room, she would remind David of this indisputable fact from time to time and he wouldn’t disagree.

  Now that the whole family had grouped together on the dock, Annette spearheaded the effort to board the boat.

  “Elise and Mitch, I booked you in a lovely stateroom on the seventh floor, not far from ours. With a balcony,” Annette said, hoping they realized that she and David had splurged for this extra amenity. “Rachel and Darius, you are a few decks below in an interior room.”

  Rachel rolled her eyes visibly. Annette hoped Elise would scold her daughter for the unappreciative attitude, but she said nothing. In fact, from what Annette could tell, Elise was in another world. She certainly seemed nervous. Annette regretted their scuffle and hoped it wasn’t the source of whatever was bugging Elise.

  “Sounds wonderful,” Mitch said while Elise was apparently too distracted to respond. “We really appreciate this trip, Annette. You too, David.”

  Annette looked Mitch up and down. He might really be the most normal of the lot of them. A hardworking family man, even-tempered, good to Elise. Sure, he wasn’t a member of the tribe, but she’d long since gotten over that. It had bothered her so much in the beginning that she’d firmly decided not to suggest that Mitch call her “Mom.” Now she regretted it. He was the only one to say thank you so far for the trip. The only one whose face wasn’t painted with abject fear, like her children’s, or pure jadedness, like her grandchildren’s. It was too late now, though. Elise and Mitch had been married for over twenty years. It was hardly the time to make the “call me Mom” overture.

  “You’re very welcome, Mitch. And I must say you are looking extremely well,” she said, patting him on the cheek. At the very least she could be overly gracious to him.

  “Freddy,” she said, turning to her son. “You and”—Annette struggled to pick out his girlfriend’s name from the word stew in her brain—“Natasha are in a cabin just a few doors down from Elise and Mitch. Also with a balcony.” Heaven forbid she didn’t treat Elise and Freddy perfectly equal on the trip, Annette thought. She’d never hear the end of it. Annette had even made the travel agent triple-check the square footage of the rooms to make sure they were the same. “Yes, Mrs. Feldman,” the always chipper agent had reassured her. “Both your daughter and son are in staterooms that are two hundred and eighty square feet.” That sounded frightfully small and Annette imagined Murphy beds and airplane bathrooms. She said as much to the agent, who assured her the boat was a feat of engineering and the rooms would be perfectly adequate. She worried for David, who needed a comfortable bed and a tub. The agent had laughed when she asked about the latter. “First cruise?” she had said.

  “Actually, Mom, Natasha and I changed rooms,” Freddy said, not meeting her gaze.

  “Honestly, Freddy, would it bother you that much to be next to us for a few lousy nights?” Annette snapped. She just knew one of her children would move to another part of the ship seeking privacy. They barely ever saw each other as it was.

  “It’s not that,” Freddy said, and damn if Annette didn’t notice something of a faint smirk creep across his face. “Natasha and I are staying on Deck Sixteen.”

  Deck Sixteen? But that was the Suites Only level. How in the world was her son paying for that? She hoped he wasn’t so desperate to impress this pretty, young thing that he was going into debt for it. Further debt, most likely.

  Elise, for the first time, seemed to come to attention.

  “But Deck Sixteen is where the suites are. That’s the club level.”

  Apparently both her children had done their homework. She’d insisted the travel agent overnight the glossy brochures to them, since the pictures and amenities listed would be far more persuasive than anything Annette had to say.

  “Correct,” Freddy sa
id, putting an arm around Natasha. “We thought we might like a little extra space.”

  Natasha smiled and this time her expression wasn’t full of sweetness and charm. It was haughty. “Freddy and his hotels,” she chimed in. “I always tell him we don’t need a huge room, but he does it every time.”

  Annette had nothing to do but accept what was happening. The room she’d reserved for her son wasn’t good enough. Elise would be seething with jealousy, not to mention eaten alive by curiosity as to how Freddy was paying for all this. And David—well, he just looked tired watching the whole turn of events unfold.

  “Fine. Whatever,” she muttered. “Let’s just go check in.” She pointed toward the registration desk and nudged Darius and Rachel along.

  “Actually, we’re already checked in,” Freddy said. “The club level has priority service. They took our bags from the cab and already gave us the room key. See everyone at dinner?” he asked, the corners of his mouth turning up again.

  Annette was fuming. She looked to Elise for a sympathetic eye, but her daughter had slinked away and appeared to be trying on a pair of cat-eye sunglasses from a pushcart.

  “Let’s go,” she said firmly to David and at least someone listened to her.

  As they moved across the gangway, a peppy girl appeared before them with a Purell dispenser in hand. “Washy, washy!” she chirped, dropping dollops of the clear gel into both David’s and Annette’s hands. Annette felt the force of David’s sharp exhalation on the hairs along the back of her neck.

  ELEVEN

  Darius wished he hadn’t called her. If he could do it all over again, maybe a simple text message saying good-bye. Or even a tag on Instagram, where he could mention in a comment that he was going on a cruise. But no, he had to pick up the phone like a total loser and say, “Hi, Marcy? It’s Darius,” as though they both didn’t have caller ID! She’d giggled when she heard his voice. Was it that obvious he was in love with her? Apparently so. Her giddy, high-pitched laugh upon hearing his voice made that fact painfully clear.

  The minute Darius heard about the trip from his mother, his first concern was the Wi-Fi. He, Marcy, Jesse, Jesse’s brother, and some others were in constant group-text communication. If he didn’t respond for a few days, they’d probably just forget he existed. He’d miss out on all the inside jokes over the course of a week and by the time he reached land again, they’d all have a new hangout and a new lingo and he’d be back on the outside clawing his way back in. Which he wouldn’t care that much about if it weren’t for Marcy. She was perfect. There was no one else in school as beautiful, as cool, as sexy as she was. He felt like a loser announcing on the group text that he was getting on a cruise ship with his grandparents and wouldn’t be in touch for a week. He figured everyone would just ignore it and his contribution to the conversation would be dangling like a spider from a web, the eyesore in an otherwise well-knitted conversation.

  So he called Marcy.

  At least he wasn’t so moronic as to say he was calling to say good-bye. No, he took the time to fabricate a cover story. She’d recommended a band to the group the last time they’d all been hanging out—Lata Skata—and he’d of course run home and downloaded all of their music and listened to it well into the night. When he dialed her number, he planned to start off by saying thank you for the excellent recommendation. It was a lie. The only thing he liked about the cacophonous sound of Lata Skata was that it made him think of Marcy. Then Darius could casually mention that he was “heading out of town for a week” without getting into specifics. This way she might take notice of his absence on the group texts—not that he ever managed to spearhead plans like the older guys or crack jokes like Jesse. No, all he managed to intersperse were bland iterations of “cool” and “ha-ha.”

  Her laugh had taken him aback so much that he failed to stick to the script. Instead he blurted out: “I’m going away on a cruise to the Caribbean with my nana.” Nana! He’d never once called Grandma Annette “nana” and yet somehow that was what he said. After the moment passed, he knew with certainty he would never lay a hand on her boobs. Never. He’d probably never touch any breast because Marcy would tell all the girls in school what a loser he was. The best he could hope for was a fresh start in college, if he could get himself in.

  “That’s sweet,” she said and he didn’t know what kind of sweet she meant. Sweet like cool that he was going to the Caribbean and might surf and snorkel? Or sweet like cute that he was spending time with his grandmother? Correction. His nana.

  He decided not to assume anything and just responded, “Yeah.” Collecting himself, he added something more coherent. “Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that I listened to Lata Skata.”

  “And?” she said, growing animated, her excitement seeping through the phone in an audible gush.

  “Sick. Thanks for the recommendation.”

  “Anytime, Darius. Anytime.”

  She’d used his name when she didn’t have to. Surely that meant something. His father used people’s names when he wanted them to open up more. It was a way to establish familiarity and was a convenient trick of journalists. It was stupid of him to read so much into it, but he couldn’t help it.

  “Well, I’ll see you when I get back,” he said.

  “Yep,” she said, now sounding a million miles away, like she was scrolling through Snap or watching TV.

  He’d hung up, discouraged all over again.

  That was three days ago. Now he stood with his family waiting to embark, praying that by the time he returned to shore Marcy would have forgotten all about that pitiful call. Maybe his acne would also clear up by the time he returned. Supposedly the sun could dry out whiteheads.

  Mostly, Darius hoped the time away from Marcy would help him focus on other things, like college applications and figuring out why he was so afraid of the triple pike. It wasn’t likely, though. Even as he packed for the cruise, he wondered if Marcy would like the bathing suits he chose and if she would think his Ray-Bans were too mainstream. Rationally, he knew it didn’t matter. But he couldn’t stop imagining scenarios where they’d encounter each other on the boat. At the teen pool. In the arcade. And he wanted to look just right. His mother had made some offhand comment to him that with the boat having three thousand people, there were sure to be some pretty girls on board. It was one of her desperate attempts to bond with him. But he just shrugged noncommittally when she’d said it. After what he’d uncovered hiding in their attic, Darius was certain he was hardly the one in the family who needed confession.

  Other than being apart from Marcy for longer than he could stand, Darius found himself excited for the trip. He wanted to get to know his uncle Freddy. Rachel had said he was really cool, but when he’d pressed her on how she knew, she just said she did and to leave her alone, a dismissive response typical of his snooty sister. And while his mind was filled with the gruesome possibility of Marcy and Jesse getting together in his absence—she’d once told Jesse that he had great hair and now Darius couldn’t stop seeing her fingers, skinny twigs with nails always painted in venomous colors, running through it—he was still looking forward to a break from the group. It was exhausting having to be on all the time. To worry about saying the right thing, laughing at the appropriate time—but never too much, because that was lame—and constantly maintaining an aura of cool.

  Cool.

  What did it mean? Darius didn’t know if it meant legitimately not caring (and if so, he had no shot) or just being really good at seeming like he didn’t care. He longed to speak to Rachel about these things. After all, his sister had managed the impossible in high school. She was popular and had made honor roll, was respected by the nerds on the chess team and welcomed by the pretty cheerleaders at their lunch table. The boat was his chance. He wouldn’t be so naive as to ask for a formal tête-à-tête. But ultimately they’d be forced into a lot of time together—the interior rooms (where he
knew they’d get stuck) were only one hundred and fifty square feet. They were going to be sharing a bunk bed. At night, when he could avoid eye contact, he would gently broach the topic of how he could better navigate the tortures of high school social pressure. There were only so many nights in a row his sister could pretend to be sleeping when he started talking to her.

  But after laying eyes on Freddy and his girlfriend—a creature who literally forced his eyes to bulge from his head (thank goodness for the maybe-cool-maybe-not Ray-Bans)—he decided perhaps his uncle might be a better source of advice. To hell with Rachel. Her high school boyfriend, a bencher on the lacrosse team, was nobody that spectacular in Darius’s estimation. And she was way too obsessed with her stupid summer job, an unpaid internship at a local law firm that advertised on phone booths. And, if he wasn’t mistaken, Freddy actually seemed interested in him, even reaching over to give him a combination back pat and head rub as a greeting. It was a glorified noogie, but somehow when Freddy did it, it wasn’t lame.

  There was another reason Darius was hoping to get some face time alone with his uncle. He wanted to discuss his mother. It felt like a betrayal to talk to his dad about it, and Darius didn’t want to be the cause of friction between his parents. That was supposing his father didn’t already know. Based on his father’s lighthearted jokes about the electric bill being high on account of their menopausal mother (major TMI, in Darius’s opinion), he didn’t seem overly concerned about the household spending and was likely in the dark, much like the shopping bags.

  Even if Uncle Freddy was useless, it would be a relief to unburden himself to an adult. This was the sort of thing Darius might have told his high school guidance counselor—Ms. Green was always saying she would offer a nonjudgmental ear to anyone who knocked on her door—but he was dodging her because of college applications, not to mention that rumor had it she was sleeping with the assistant principal and therefore Darius wasn’t eager to come a-knocking. Darius was pretty impressed when his uncle mentioned he’d moved up to the club level suites. If nothing else, he wanted to check out Freddy’s room.