“Indeed.” Cleo laughed too, though she felt a bolt of sadness for her old ex-friend. Why had everything between them always had to be a competition? Regret.
In fact, Cleo had spent last night poring over her list of 233 regrets to assess if what had occurred to her in Seattle—more friendships, more appreciation for kindnesses, more room for art in any form—had made the list. They hadn’t, not really, other than the brief notation from five years back—I never learned to paint. Or sing. Or dance. Or anything. Maybe that could have been a nice thing. Nearly everything on there was a concrete wrong or a direct action that Cleo had taken: she was surprised to see MaryAnne internship essay buried in the first hundred—she could have sworn she never put pen to paper about MaryAnne. But then there were simpler items too: not taking a probiotic regularly, not ordering Lucas’s Christmas presents in the fall during Labor Day sales, the like. Yes, there was a shouldn’t have quit yoga, but that wasn’t really reflective, now was it? That was an action that she would like to undo. But did not. Had not. The yoga itself might lead to a more meditative, thoughtful state, but as it was on the list . . . not particularly insightful. Even, Cleo realized, her regret about her artistic pursuits. She could have tried something, done anything!, but she hadn’t. She’d been content to jot it down and carry on. She reread the list of 233 regrets and wondered why she hadn’t found them more propulsive, why they hadn’t sparked her to change, to make amends, and who she might be, how she might feel if she had.
Indeed, Cleo had instead used the list to purge herself of guilt, of any sort of misdeed—big or small—but she hadn’t used it to become better. And though her dad wasn’t around to ask, she was starting to suspect that was his intention. Her father was a good man. He was faithful and devoted and funny and smart. And maybe his list made him this way or maybe he made his list to avoid becoming anything he didn’t want to be—unfaithful, cruel, less informed. Cleo didn’t know; she couldn’t know now. But she did know that writing things down and using them for good were not the same thing. It occurred to her how much this notion echoed the very beginning of MaryAnne’s op-ed.
“Anyway,” Gaby said. “Two orders of business. One: Oliver Patel has asked if he can come visit.” She grimaced as if this were a terrible thing as Cleo raised her eyebrows. “But I’ve decided I like him and so I said yes.”
“Wow,” Cleo said, swallowing the last of her Trefoil sandwich. “That’s unexpected.”
“I shouldn’t have started with that because we’ll have to unpack that at a different time.” Gaby talked over her. “I should have started with: I just got off Skype, and Veronica Kaye wants a meeting.”
“Veronica Kaye? Of Veronica Kaye?” Cleo knew it sounded stupid even as she asked it, and she hated sounding stupid. But she, who was pretty hard to stun, was stunned.
Veronica Kaye ran the empire Veronica Kaye Cosmetics, which she had founded when Cleo was in about middle school (Cleo and MaryAnne just loved, loved, loved their frosty pink lip gloss) and which over its first decade became a billion-dollar company. It was female-led from top to bottom, from Veronica herself to the women on the sales floor at Nordstrom and Macy’s and now on QVC, which hocked a slightly lesser brand of the goods for a discount price. She was known to write big checks for candidates she supported, but receiving this support was elusive, the white whale of the political world. She’d never jumped into the presidential race, instead choosing to focus on smaller, local campaigns where she thought grassroots work could make a bigger difference. Cleo had always admired her for that. It was easy to write a check for a splashy candidate who got coverage on all the news networks. It was probably more authentic to quietly endorse a state senator or a local mayor who could bring immediate change to a community.
“You led with Oliver Patel when you could have started with Veronica Kaye?” Cleo said. “Oliver was cute in high school and obviously foxy now, but seriously?”
“I know, I know. I’m allowed one swoony mistake at the thought of his cheekbones, and that’s it. Oh, also, he FaceTimed me this morning and I was almost late for work . . .”
Cleo held up her hand. “I love you more than anyone in this world other than Lucas, but I really do not need to hear about your phone sex.”
“Technically, it was FaceTime sex, but point taken.” Gaby checked her phone. “Also, I need that list of your ten regrets by end of day. That’s what put you on Veronica’s radar in the first place.”
“My regrets put me on her radar? Gaby, no one knows about this list other than you.”
“Right, but I mean, the video, the buzz. The spunk behind it.”
Cleo met her gaze. “I mean it, Gaby. I don’t care if you want to tell the world that I’m trying to make some . . . reparations. I do care if you share that I have two hundred and thirty-three of them.” She didn’t add: And that this was my thing with my dad. And it was private. And it was ours. And also, there were items on that list that she did not want exposed, could not have exposed.
“Understood. You have my word. She won’t know. And honestly, there’s no reason she has to.” Gaby nodded, an affirmation. “It’s my understanding that she likes the gumption—and that’s all she really needs to see. Also, though, she wants to meet on Friday, and I think we should bang out another one by then.”
“Gaby, these aren’t like . . . items on my grocery list.” Cleo debated another Trefoil but felt a stomachache coming on, so she closed the box and opened her bottom drawer, dropping the box back inside. “Besides, the mess of MaryAnne hasn’t exactly been cleaned up.”
This was true. Lucas had been texting nonstop with Esme (Cleo had yet to ask him about the girl here at home and whether or not he was being unfaithful, though she didn’t know what this meant for fourteen-year-olds), and this morning on the drive to school he informed her that her visit had only made MaryAnne more determined. The video of Cleo’s escapade was still blazing through YouTube, rocketing all over Twitter, and viewers remained split on who really was in the wrong. Maybe MaryAnne liked her odds of swaying the public opinion tide. Or maybe she was still just furious.
“More determined to do what?” Cleo had asked Lucas.
“She just said more determined, then put the rolling-eyeball emoji,” he said. He held up his phone to show her, but then the light turned green, and someone behind them honked, and Cleo jolted forward.
“Well, can you ask? Also, I thought emojis were—”
“God, Mom,” he interrupted. “I’m just trying to help. I’m not, like, your spy.”
Gaby’s phone buzzed, and she hopped to her feet, her message to Cleo received. “By the way, speaking of MaryAnne, CNN sent over a request for a comment.”
“Comment on what?”
“MaryAnne posted something else on Facebook, and you’re right, the story isn’t going away.”
Cleo nodded. One of their male reporters had chased her down the hall this morning before she ducked into a bathroom, just about the only place he couldn’t pursue her. She’d waited him out until he finally gave up. Stall tactics. Another thing politicians excelled at.
“I don’t think we should give them one,” Gaby said. “I don’t want to have to answer everything she does with a tit for tat. Let’s think on it, put a pin in it. And in the meantime, ten regrets, and I choose four more. ASAP.” She paused. “Please.” Her phone vibrated again, and she grinned and held it up for Cleo to see. “Oliver.”
“Lovebirds already,” Cleo said.
“Speaking of good sex, I’ve been thinking.” Gaby sat back down.
“Oh God.”
“No, seriously. It wouldn’t be such a bad thing if we lined up some dates.”
“Whatever happened to being proud of how independent I am? How I don’t need a man to stand by my side?” Cleo reached back down for the Girl Scout cookies.
“Jesus, you don’t.”
“So then what?”
Gaby stood again—moving on to her next item, ready to put this one to bed. “For
you, Cleo, for you. Not because you need one or because you’re lesser for it. But because Lucas is getting older now, and maybe I might actually like Oliver Patel.” She laughed, corrected herself. “Who fucking knows. But you can’t be on your own forever.”
“I can be single forever,” Cleo snapped. “I am perfectly happy being single.”
“Being single and being on your own are two different things,” Gaby said, not unlike what Matty had echoed at the bar in the Sheraton. “No one can do anything in this career, much less in this world, on their own. I’d think you’d know that by now.”
Gaby’s phone blipped, and she said, “Shit,” and disappeared out the door.
And Cleo stared at her bottom drawer and wished she had thought to buy a few more boxes of Girl Scout cookies. She’d like to be better prepared.
Emily Godwin had volunteered to drop Lucas after practice again, and this time she came to the door.
“Mom! Mrs. Godwin is here!” Lucas yelled, then stomped up the stairs to his room. Cleo, from her office, heard two pairs of feet and realized that Benjamin, Emily’s son, must have trailed Lucas inside. His door slammed, and Cleo rushed out in slippers and sweats to thank Emily personally. She hoped everything was OK; Emily usually just did the flyby drop-off, and though Cleo genuinely really liked her, she was also always a bit relieved not to have to make any chitchat. Chitchat was low on Cleo’s list of things to do. With constituents, sure, because that was part of the job, and the job she welcomed. There was purpose behind that kind of chitchat.
“Cleo!” Emily said warmly and pulled her into a hug. She and Cleo had been friendly since the boys landed on the same soccer team in second grade, and though they weren’t close, Cleo enjoyed her company, as far as she enjoyed anyone’s company other than Gaby and Lucas (and now Matty), on the sidelines and those occasional out-of-town tournaments. Most people in town and on the team worked in politics in one form or another, so it wasn’t strange to have a sitting senator staying at the Hampton Inn with the team any more than it was to have any other parent. Emily had started her career as a lawyer in the Justice Department but after three kids gave it up for, as she often said, the sanity of staying at home. Which, actually, is not exactly sanity. She’d laugh about it, and Cleo always liked her for this. That there was no apology for her choice and there was also a recognition that it wasn’t an easy one.
Her husband had also worked for the Justice Department, but around the time Benjamin was born, he jumped to outside counsel for better money. Emily once mentioned that they’d discussed who should quit—with three kids it felt like someone should—and at the end of the day, her husband just wasn’t ready to be a stay-at-home dad. Emily had shrugged as if, well, it was what it was, so she became the full-time parent. Not because he was better at his job than she was, not because she was dying to pack lunches and fold laundry and run all the soccer carpools, but because in the default of the gender hierarchy, for some reason, the man’s need as usual came first.
Emily didn’t begrudge him, and Cleo understood that everyone made choices that kept them sane, which wasn’t always the same thing as keeping them happy. But Emily was happy enough, and it wasn’t Cleo’s life to live. Besides, as a single mother, even an ambitious, ball-busting single mother, of course there were times when Cleo wished that she had the time to pack lunches and fold laundry and run soccer carpools. (Cleo actually had no desire to do any of those things. But in theory, yes, yes, she would have liked that.)
At the very least, it might have been nice to have a partner so every decision didn’t have to land on her shoulders alone. When Lucas was a baby, it was exhausting—all those micro decisions that seemed like they might be life-changing. Bottle or breast? Stomach or swaddle? Organic or non?
One morning, early in her second year at law school and in a rush to get to her criminal procedure class, she completely forgot to put pants on him. He showed up at day care with no pants but still smiling and totally unselfconscious and kissed her on both cheeks before she left (which nearly made her crumble right there on the soft padded floor), as if him standing there without pants was entirely normal, and the wonderful caregivers assured her that she was not the first harried young mother to forget her child’s essential clothing. (He also lacked both socks and shoes. It was spring; he didn’t freeze.) It would have been nice from time to time to have a partner around to remind her to put pants on the baby.
Georgie had tried. Cleo had to give her credit for that. She’d flown out a few days after Lucas was born and slept on the couch of Cleo’s small off-campus apartment. Her own boys were three by then, so Georgie surely could have taught Cleo a thing or two. And it was kind, of course, that she showed up. And for the first day or so, Cleo had been grateful. Much like how when she initially started dating Matty, she’d appreciated his own quotient of generosity. But Cleo was so fucking exhausted and so used to making decisions for herself that by that second day, Georgie’s help began to feel instead like suffocation. Really like judgment. From someone who, for the bulk of Cleo’s life, hadn’t been in any position to pass judgment. Actually, up until Cleo’s early teen years, and certainly in the time that they’d shared a roof, Georgie had been a goddamn disaster. But there they were, the older sister as an expert, the younger one without a clue: Cleo not knowing what to do about the umbilical cord scab; Cleo having bought the wrong size diapers; Cleo nearly fainting when his poop was bright green and then having to listen to Georgie assure her (in what Cleo thought was a quite patronizing tone) that this was all just normal.
Cleo, a rigid straight line, just wanted to scream.
She’d read all the books and done her homework, and yet still Georgie tried to grasp her breast and show her how to nurse; Georgie tried to reswaddle him when Cleo’s attempts weren’t sticking; Georgie knew how to bounce him on her shoulder to get him to both burp and sleep within two minutes. And it was all too much for Cleo—not just her kindness but that her sister was in her space telling her what to do and how to do it, and her feelings weren’t even rational—she knew this! She knew that her annoyance should instead be gratitude, but on the fourth night, while Georgie was demonstrating how to give Lucas a proper bath, Cleo could just not take it a second longer—what she perceived as condescension (which she later realized was not, but this took at least a year). She exploded on Georgie to give her some space and that she was his mother. Then continued with plenty of other unkind words about how difficult Georgie made life for her parents, about how Cleo didn’t want to be taking advice from someone who had once been brought home with a police escort (a house party where Georgie had been found falling-down drunk)—all words of regret now—shouting so loudly that Lucas cried for an hour straight. And even Georgie’s patented bouncing technique would not quiet him.
Georgie left the next morning, and they returned to their monthly phone calls (if that), and Cleo dialed an agency and found a very nice woman, Bernadine, who understood boundaries and didn’t try to shove Cleo’s nipple into Lucas’s mouth and arrived at eight a.m. and left at six p.m., and that was much more civilized than the messiness of family. At least, that’s how Cleo saw it at the time. Once she got herself into a routine, she put him in day care, which meant even more boundaries and no one in their home but the two of them. Cleo was happier that way.
Tonight Emily pulled back from their hug and reached down for an (organic reusable) grocery bag at her feet. “I was at Costco today and bought an extra rotisserie chicken. Thought I’d see if you’d eaten.”
Cleo reddened. She’d planned to just order a pizza. Again. Lucas could live off pizza if she’d let him. And she didn’t want to be Emily’s pet project. “I haven’t,” Cleo said. “But really, it’s OK.”
“Don’t be ridiculous—I have more free time than you. Let me help.”
“I just . . .” Cleo couldn’t think of an excuse fast enough. She didn’t want Emily to think that she regularly needed help for simple things like, well, like dinner. Carpool rides we
re amazing, but that was because Cleo couldn’t be two places at once. Stocking their fridge or making a pot of pasta was simple adult stuff, and Cleo should be more capable. Just like she should have known how to swaddle Lucas or eke out a post-bottle burp.
“You have to eat, and I had an extra, no big deal.”
“You’re right,” Cleo conceded and stepped aside, welcoming her in. “Thank you.”
“The boys ran off before I could tell Benjamin that we weren’t staying. Someone to FaceTime in Seattle? Does that sound familiar or . . . did I not eavesdrop correctly?”
They landed in her kitchen, and Emily heaved the bag to the counter. She removed the chicken, which smelled, frankly, heavenly and also nutritious, which was a change from Girl Scout cookies and plane food and vanilla macadamia muffins.
“No, you heard correctly. Do kids date these days? If so, I think maybe he’s dating someone, my old friend’s daughter, there.” It occurred to Cleo that Emily might have her ear to the ground on eighth-grade gossip. “But have you heard of any . . . romance here?”
“Oh, Benjamin wouldn’t say a word.” Emily pulled out a bottle of wine, then a salad. “But I’ll ask Penny; she’d know. She’s like the town crier.” Penny was their youngest, only sixteen months younger than Ben. God bless Emily Godwin—How on earth does she do it? Cleo thought. “Oh, I also got you a salad. They were on sale. I figured after . . .”
“You saw the video from Seattle?” Cleo laughed. “This is a pity dinner, isn’t it?”
Emily laughed too. “No, just, Jonathan’s working late, and the other two kids are accounted for. I hated the idea of you on your own after . . . all of that.” She paused. “I hope you don’t mind. I know we’re not . . . I mean, I’m sure you have other friends to do this kind of thing with.”
Cleo reached for a wine opener. “I don’t really. Believe it or not, cutthroat young women do not make friends easily.”
“I wouldn’t call you cutthroat.”
Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing: A Novel Page 11
