The Best of Enemies

by Jen Lancaster

  “Wow,” I reply, forcing a smile. “Then . . . you’re still just a girl!”

  CHAPTER THREE

  North Shore, Illinois

  Last Wednesday

  “Hi, sweetie! Come in, come in! Oh, my goodness, look at you! Très chic! Is that a St. John top I spot?”

  As I open the door for Ashley, the warmth of the June day wafts in behind her. The air outside smells like freshly mown grass and the neighborhood’s alive with the buzz of dozens of leaf blowers. As of the first sign of spring each year, there’s never a moment from dawn until dusk that the air doesn’t reverberate with the sounds of all the lawns in North Shore being professionally clipped. Some days it’s noisier up here than it ever was when I lived in the city. Thank heavens for triple-paned windows!

  I lean in to peck Ashley on both cheeks, my lips never actually grazing her skin. How can Dr. K say that watching the Real Housewives is worthless? Those gals taught me air kisses are so much more cultured than a hug or handshake.

  Ashley’s practically unrecognizable from when we met last fall. Her now lowlighted golden-brown hair, lightly flecked with her apparently natural buttery streaks, is pinned up in a side-swept bun, an almost exact replica of Cate Blanchett’s style at the premiere of The Monuments Men. Gone are the tacky ankle booties, replaced with a simple (but divine) pair of heeled Chanel spectator oxfords. I imagine the numbers on Barry’s AMEX have worn clean off at this point.

  “Natch!” Ashley squeals and gives me a little spin. “The whole dealie’s from their new resort collection!”

  I could not be more proud of successfully remaking Ashley in my own image. My sister Kelly was right when she told me it’s easier to build people up than tear them down.

  Well, that’s more of the spirit of what she said. Kelly’s exact quote was “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Since Ashley was predisposed to disliking everyone I dislike, particularly after her snafu with Brooke Birchbaum at the fall swim meet, I felt like she should be on my team.

  Ergo, makeover.

  Ashley seems like an entirely different person from the one I met tottering around on Bambi legs in hooker shoes, delivering highly inappropriate snacks last September. Now she’s tasteful, tailored, and can hide six kinds of veggies in her turkey meatballs. You’re welcome, Goldman family!

  And yet . . . at some point over the spring, she managed to somehow surpass my image. I mean, St. John? Really? Who can afford St. John in this economy? When did she stop buying Ann Taylor Loft? I find this turn of events distressing. If Ashley were to put her ideas for a trophy-wife-turned-snack-mom lifestyle Web site into action, I might not be able to handle the competition.

  So there’s no misunderstanding, we don’t need a Kitty Carricoe, Version 2.0.

  Version 1.0 is doing quite nicely, thank you.

  Ashley and I cross through the cathedral-ceilinged, transom-windowed, blue slate-floored foyer, past the round maple pedestal table holding an etched crystal pitcher, which brims with my trademark fresh-cut Stargazer lilies and pink and green Pistachio hydrangeas.

  “Your arrangement is to die!” Ashley exclaims.

  “Six hundred and twenty-one Facebook users would agree,” I reply. Kelly always says it’s not bragging if it’s true.

  I really did hope to surpass one thousand “Likes,” though, and not having reached that number made me anxious. Should I have taken the photo on a sunnier day? Or used a different filter? More “Walden” and less “Amaro”? Do I need to obscure the stems by wrapping a banana leaf around them? Or are my trademark blooms beginning to lose their appeal? Shall I shake things up a bit? Go more kitschy and approachable and display my blossoms in a painted Ball jar instead? Do I mix in some tulips next time?

  Or is it just that I’m slipping in popularity?

  Please, God, tell me I’m not slipping. That’s the last thing I need.

  Ashley asks, “Where do you find the little flowers that kind of look like a brain-fist?”

  “Here and there,” I reply, failing to mention the special order I place through North Shore Petal Pushers every week. Oh, no. I made Pistachio hydrangeas happen in North Shore. Not her. Those are mine.

  The clacking of Ashley’s heels echoes throughout the house. We pause for a moment to admire the wall of my black-and-white family pictures, artfully arranged in eclectic frames to form two letter Ks, the first backward and the second forward. (Sort of like Kim Kardashian’s logo, except not hideously tacky.)

  The K thing has . . . gotten out of hand. We gave Kord my maiden name, as that was always the plan. Then Dr. K was so tickled by all our first names beginning with that letter, he insisted we follow suit with the rest of the Littles, hence altering my preferred spellings of “Cassandra” and “Connor.” To me, the alphabetical matching smacked of the Duggars’ naming protocol, but Dr. K insisted. For Mother’s Day last year, he gave me a monogrammed piece of jewelry to represent all of their names.

  The pendant on the necklace reads KKK.

  Betsy almost burst a blood vessel laughing when I showed her, while her African American driver, Charles, seemed decidedly less amused. I told them both it was the gesture that counted. The lovely, sweet, accidentally racist, completely tone-deaf gesture that now lives at the bottom of my jewelry box.

  “You make beautiful babies!” Ashley says and I can’t help but feel proud. She points to the photograph I took of Kassie in the North Shore Forest last fall, face radiant with joy as the leaves she’s tossing waft down to cling to her fair hair. “My fave.”

  Although the day in the shot wasn’t quite as festive as it appears—while I was trying to capture the perfect photo, Dr. K grew impatient and began to tap away on his iPhone, completely turning his back on the whole scene. I was aggravated he wasn’t more supportive, especially since he used this exact picture in an ad for his practice in the North Shore Shopper.

  Still, no matter what else’s happening around me, this photomontage cheers me up. I’m so fulfilled by the family we’ve created. Once in a great while when I’m frying in the blinding sun at yet another soccer game, or feeling my bum AND brain going numb as I sit on stiff metal bleachers in the natatorium, two laps into the endless fifteen-hundred-meter breaststroke competition, I wonder what my life might be like if I hadn’t taken this path.

  And then I’m overwhelmed by the guilt over my momentary wistfulness.

  But right here in this double-K-shaped display, where all my accomplishments are laid bare in funky metallic frames, I always return to my happy place.

  Ashley and I pass the sparsely furnished living room (I prefer to call it “minimalist”) and then the dining room, which is so minimal that . . . well, it’s actually empty, save for a dreamy handwoven rug in lush shades of crimson and ocher that Betsy found in Indonesia. (Betsy gives THE BEST housewarming gifts. Fact.)

  “Your dining table hasn’t arrived yet?” Ashley asks. “Ohmigod, how long has it been?”

  “Can you believe it?” I fume, hand balled into a fist on my hip in an approximation of outrage. “Who knew it took so long to ship the old-growth beech from Bavaria?”

  Truth?

  I have no clue how long it takes to ship old-growth beech from Bavaria, having not actually ordered any.

  I may not have been entirely forthright with Ashley about the status of our nonexistent dining room furniture as we developed a small cash-flow sitch last fall.

  See, our financial problems are twofold—first, we bought our place at the top of the market. I was on board with this particular location because no one who’s anyone lives west of Green Valley Road in North Shore, at least according to my sister, Kelly. Sure, I grew up in the more rural part of town informally called West North Shore, which was fine as that area was zoned for horses.

  Dr. K and I forked over twice what we might have paid a few miles away so our kids could attend the tony Lakeside Elemen
tary instead of Calvin Coolidge, my completely unremarkable grammar school alma mater. Kelly told me that Calvin Coolidge wasn’t even offering Mandarin classes at the time! Still, the quaint little Cape Cod we bought was adorable, nestled in the midst of so many old-growth oak trees.

  Before we even moved in, we made the business decision to tear down the Cape Cod in order to take advantage of the size of our lot, because that’s what everyone does in North Shore. (Hoo-boy, you should have heard what Nana Baba, my ridiculously utilitarian mother-in-law, thought about that!) Now our sparkling new, triple-paned, custom-built, mock Tudor home is deliciously spacious, and the large, oak tree–filled yard has been reduced to a landing strip of grass in the front and the back.

  Kelly insisted that only negligent monsters allow children to play outdoors alone, so I’m confident we’re better off with the expanded interior space, even if part of it’s presently bereft of furniture. But since the housing crash, we’ve lost a ton of equity and we’ve maxed out our homeowners’ line of credit, just like many North Shore families, so we’re a bit stuck. (Not Betsy and Trip, but they don’t count.)

  Others are floundering, too. I’m sure of it. I saw my next-door neighbor Cecily dropping off items to sell at the North Shore Doubletake consignment store last week. Naturally, I ducked out before she could see me. Wouldn’t want to embarrass her!

  The second reason for our cash crunch has been the one-two punch of fluoridated water and sonic toothbrushes. The cavity-filling business is a shadow of what it once was in the candy-coated, sprinkle-topped heyday of the second half of the last century. Back before my father sold Dr. K his North Shore dental practice and retired to South Carolina, he had a staff of four dentists, twelve full-time hygienists, a lake house and a ski cabin, and two brand-new Cadillacs delivered to our driveway every fall. Dr. Daddy says cans of full-sugar soda alone paid for my tuition and convertible Cabriolet.

  To compensate for the changes in the industry, Dr. K sank a ton of money into building up the cosmetic portion of his biz last fall. Dr. Daddy’s old shag carpet and Brady Bunch–style paneled walls are finally gone. The office is so high-tech now! The exam room looks like NASA with all the plasma screens. Unfortunately, air abrasion drills, digital panoramic X-rays, and jaw-tracking technology don’t exactly come cheap.

  Honestly, the only reason I’m still able to dress Kassie in Hanna Andersson and Billieblush is because of the posts those companies sponsor on my blog.

  Ashley interrupts my thoughts. “Hey, is Dr. K around?”

  “No, it’s his day off, but he was called away for an emergency.”

  Cookie, his office manager, wasn’t specific about what kind of emergency it was, but apparently it was urgent enough that he rushed out of the house like his pants were afire. I’d never complain, but it’s funny how he can’t quite spring into action to help me, but when work calls? Step aside, everyone!

  Speaking of his job, but can we take a moment here to discuss Cookie?

  First, what kind of adult calls herself Cookie?

  Mind you, I’m not jealous. Far from it! I mean, she’s a grandma. A forty-something grandma, but still. I cannot even imagine how embarrassing that must be. Plus, she tries to be extra chummy with me, as though we’re equals, or coconspirators on some great secret. Unacceptable.

  I’m miffed by her lack of deference and I don’t love how dependent Dr. K has become on her in the past few years. He made a lot of his upgrade decisions based on her recommendations. I miss the early days of helping out at the practice myself. Cookie laughed herself asthmatic when she found my old “Miles of Smiles” promotional flyer, but that “ridiculous ploy” brought in tons of new patients.

  At Betsy’s last fund-raiser, she asked if I felt threatened by Cookie, which, impossible. She’s so not in my league. For crying out loud, she rides a motorcycle in the summer, parading around in leather vests without a hint of irony when everyone else is wearing sundresses! And don’t start me on the makeup and feathered hair. Feathered! Hey, Cookie, Pat Benatar called and she’d like her eyeliner back.

  I do prefer Cookie to the constant stream of nubile young models/actresses he employs as part-time hygienists. (They generally last until they book their first local cell phone commercial.) Dr. K says the male patients love having hot, young girls in the vicinity of their mouths. (Gross.) He tells me they inspire the men to book their six-month cleaning appointments on the spot. As for his female patients? His cosmetic dentistry practice is up twelve percent with the North Shore mom demographic ever since he hired that glamazon Brandi who goes commando under her scrubs.

  I couldn’t care less about Cookie, but Brandi is . . . not my favorite.

  Last year, Brandi showed up to the practice’s Christmas party in a skintight, one-shouldered sheath so low cut that I should have issued a plus-one invitation to her left aureole, as many times as it made an appearance that night. Eventually I stuck a GIVE PLAQUE THE HEAVE-HO pirate sticker over the offending nubbin, which she found hilarious. Apparently she didn’t mind as the sticker gave everyone an excuse to gaze at her breasts with impunity.

  Thank God Betsy convinced me to borrow one of her Alexander McQueen LBDs that night instead of wearing the twee advent calendar sweater Kassie loves so much. I mean, maybe my figure wouldn’t sell a cell phone, but between Spanx, a mostly plant-based diet, and a daily combination of Pilates, light reps with kettlebells, and chasing after three children, I can still fit into my old college button-fly jeans. I have no reason to worry.

  Although . . . by “fit” I mean “get them almost up my thighs,” even though I’m basically the same weight as I was in the nineties, despite the impossible-to-eradicate belly pooch and widened hips. What pregnancy does to the pelvic girdle should be criminal. Kord was in the ninety-ninth percentile for height and weight! He was the size of a watermelon coming out, and not those cute round ones the grocery stores sell now—I’m talking the oblong, submarine-shaped dealies that Baby carried in Dirty Dancing.

  I’m so lost in thought that I don’t even realize that Ashley’s been yammering on.

  “. . . so, Barry thinks I should talk to him about veneers or maybe Invisalign to close up the space between my front teeth.”

  I quickly retrieve the lost thread of our conversation because this is not going to happen. “Shame on Barry for trying to change you!” I exclaim. “Your teeth are perfect, honey. Very natural. You don’t want to look like a TV anchor, amirite? Bright, generic smiles are so last year. The little gap between your front teeth gives you character! You’re like a young Lauren Hutton!”

  “Who?”

  Of course she doesn’t know who Lauren Hutton is.

  “I mean the model Lara Stone, sweetie.”

  This seems to satisfy her and she drops the subject.

  We need the revenue and I’m sure Dr. K could find a myriad of expensive, dining-room-table-affording solutions for Ashley, but the problem is there’s only one person who’s allowed to have the perfect smile in the Lakeside PTO.

  And that position? Is filled.

  “Where are the kids?” Ashley asks. “Seems awfully quiet in here.” The house never seems empty or still when they’re present. Furniture doesn’t make this place a home—my family does. My sweet babies are always racing all over the place, challenging one another to a million different kinds of games, and eating their own weight in chocolate-chip (zucchini) bread!

  Of course, the older they get, the less they seem to need their ol’ mama. Practically broke my heart a couple of nights ago when Kassie insisted on reading her Little House on the Prairie book herself before she went to sleep. There she was, in her massive canopied bed, all alone in a cavernous room, illuminated by the small pool of light from her nightstand, her fine hair spilling around her tiny shoulders, nestled in a bank of fluffy pillows. She looked so small and fragile, I just wanted to scoop her up and hold her forever.

 
; What a bittersweet moment—although I want my children to become autonomous, independent individuals, that doesn’t mean it won’t hurt when it happens. How did they grow up so fast? Kord has to shave every day and Konnor won’t let me hug him in public anymore. Some days I just want to scream, “Where’d my babies go??”

  I tell Ashley, “Kord’s at swim camp until Friday, same with Konnor, except it’s soccer, and little Kassie’s still too young for sleepaway camp, so her Nana Baba is taking her to the Children’s Museum and then she’s spending the night.”

  I don’t mention that Nana Baba’s already called twice—once to complain that Kassie’s darling little fringed moccasins didn’t offer enough arch support, and then to crow about how much Kassie loved her first Chicago-style hot dog.

  Which is so great because I was hoping to add hog-lips-and-bunghole to Kassie’s diet.

  Still, Kassie worships her Nana Baba, so I don’t engage.

  The upside of the Littles needing me less is that I can finally redirect some attention to my husband. Sometimes I worry I spend so much of my time trying to be the picture-perfect parent and homemaker that I forget to actually be a wife.

  Truth?

  I can’t even remember the last time Dr. K and I ducked into the mudroom for some hanky-panky. The kids always assumed we were folding laundry, which is how that became our code word for sex.

  Of course, our mudroom would make any red-blooded American woman weak in the knees, because it’s a work of art.

  So not kidding. I’m talking Fifty Shades of Mommy-porn.

  The walls are white-painted bead board on the bottom. The top part is decoupaged with oversize, vintage nautical maps in the dreamiest patinas of pale turquoise you can imagine. (Best Craigslist find EVAH.) One whole section around the garage door boasts built-in cubbies for each kid, including seats where they can take off their shoes, meaning I never have to see backpacks or sneakers strewn all over the kitchen. There’s a massive reclaimed farm sink in the middle of a huge island, designed for folding (or other lay-flat activities), topped with a fat slab of white marble that shimmers in the sun. I especially love the wall of shelves where I display my extensive jadeite glass collection. The floor’s the same blue slate of the entry hall and I have a couple of jute rugs strategically placed, which perfectly coordinate with the wicker laundry baskets. In addition, there’s another whole wall hosting my built-in home office.