One Little Secret (ARC)

by Cate Holahan

  She swapped the brush for a foam wedge and patted the color from the purple swath outward over the larger red area, stopping at the welt’s chartreuse outline. Jenny fished in the bag for a small bottle of lavender face primer. She pumped a dime-sized amount onto the tip of her pointer finger and massaged it over the bruise’s tender edges where the yellow concealer had not touched. The purple lotion dulled the biliverdin-tinted skin into a honey brown akin to her natural tone. Yellow to blend red and blue. Purple to blur green. She finished with a full-coverage foundation and a setting powder that was supposedly waterproof—though she now doubted it, given the failure to outlast her late afternoon jog. She’d have to be more careful about regularly freshening up in the heat.

  Jenny examined the results in the mirror, smiling in spite of herself. Practice had improved her cosmetology skills. An intense examination might reveal that the skin beneath the right eye had a grayer undertone than the rest of her face. But no one would see the bruise.

  A door popped open in the adjoining bedroom. Her semi-pleased reflection vanished from the mirror. In its place stood a stranger with worried eyes and a mouth pulled like guitar wire.

  Louis entered with a pouch of ice and tube of arnica cream, the right choice for skin discoloration. Her husband was a good doctor—she had to give him that. He placed the paper towel of ice in the sink, beside her bag, and then wrapped his arms around her waist. His chin nestled atop her healed shoulder. “I’m so sorry, babe.”

  Jenny examined her husband’s reflection. His fair skin had become so lined since she’d first met him in medical school. There were wrinkles on his forehead, formed from years of punctuating statements with his eyebrows; a pair of lines around his pursed lips, two parentheses highlighting the emotions that he tried to discard; and, her favorites, the starbursts that exploded from his half-moon eyes when he was happy or sad or, like now, concerned.

  Facial lines told a story, Jenny thought. So many couples traded each other in as that story started to emerge, when they finally knew one another well enough to read each other’s faces. Her parents had been that kind of couple, divorcing—despite two kids—simply because they’d become annoyed with one another for aging, resentful of seeing their disappointments etched into their spouse’s skin. They hadn’t contemplated what would come after their separation: how her mother would entertain guy after guy, none of them interested in settling down with an older woman with children, even if she did look good for her age. Nor how her father would suffer a string of divorces, each new woman robbing him of half his wealth until he’d become destitute, relying upon checks from the kids to purchase booze for uninterested barflies. Her folks hadn’t cared that the routine they’d found so boring was what had made their children feel secure. They hadn’t worried that that their kids might grow up feeling alone, uncertain, and abandoned, desperate to recreate the stability they’d once known.

  She and Louis were not like her parents. They valued their child and their routine. Their shared history. When Jenny stared at Louis’s reflection, she saw the med student with whom she’d worked through organic chemistry and the college kid who had taught her how to ice skate. The young man with whom she’d managed to furnish an apartment on a resident’s budget. The husband and father who had worked twelve-hour shifts and then, as soon as he’d finished his residency, watched a toddler so that she could complete her program. She saw her daughter Ally’s lanky body and auburn curls twisted with copper highlights. She saw the love of her life … and the man she’d betrayed.

  It was so easy to convince oneself that history didn’t matter, that whatever was out there was better than whatever had come before. But seeing her husband, smelling the sandalwood of his familiar aftershave, observing the concern for her in his creased skin, Jenny knew she’d made a mistake. Another man would never measure up to Louis. She couldn’t leave him.

  “What can I do for you?” he asked. “How can I help?”

  She turned from the apparition in the mirror to face the real McCoy. “Nothing. I’m good now.”

  He gave her a smile that failed to crinkle his cheeks.

  “No, really.” She looked into his eyes, blue laced with gray like gathering stratus clouds, and tilted her head. Louis saw the signal and pressed his mouth to her red lips. Caramel flavors from the whiskey lapped at her tongue. His warm hands slipped under her shirt, grazing her stomach. He kissed her harder as he grasped the blouse’s fabric and pulled it upward.

  She wrenched back. “I just did my makeup, and folks will want dinner soon.”

  Louis bit his bottom lip and wagged his brows.

  “Later,” she said.

  “Promise?”

  “Promise. Now go.” Jenny pushed his chest. “I need to fix my lipstick.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE DAY OF

  The flat side of the knife was reflecting the late-afternoon sun into Nadal’s eyes. Susan shifted the cutlery’s angle before severing the top of the strawberry in front of her, sending the glare into the center of the deck table. She sliced the fruit into four thin pieces and then scraped them into the metallic bowl overflowing with raw spinach.

  She was tempted to taste one before dinner was ready, but she fought the urge and grabbed another plump strawberry. Ben had found some decent produce in the farmer’s market off the highway. Given the surroundings, she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. Even the backyard where she sat, nestled in the sandy dunes, had a lushness to it. A mossy green lawn, flanked by scrub oaks, surrounded the long pool and small patio. It stopped at a swaying line of ornamental grasses, the green stems morphing into rose-colored plumes, mimicking the ombré of the house’s grayed timbers behind her. Beyond it, the sea rushed toward the dunes, the large swells drawing ever closer to the undulating grass.

  Susan wondered whether it would rain at some point. The air, still humid despite the waning sun, had the heavy feel of a coming storm. It had the smell of one too. There was a clean odor, as if the atmosphere had been laced with some green herb. The scent mingled with the smell of the lemon Ben had squeezed over the side of halibut roasting atop a foil bed on the grill, beside some husked corn and the baby potatoes she’d quartered.

  Susan breathed it all in as she resumed cutting the remainder of the strawberries and half-listening to Louis holding court. He was relating an ER story about a man who had come in with an unknown injury. In the short time she’d known Louis, she’d heard at least half a dozen stories with the same theme. Most were interesting, though they all had the same ending of Dr. Murray saving the day. That was a good thing for all involved, Susan guessed—though it did make Louis seem a bit of a braggart.

  As Louis talked, Susan heard the back door pop open. She looked over her shoulder to see Jenny enter the yard. Even with the sun’s amber glare on her neighbor’s face, Susan could see that Jenny had freshly applied her makeup.

  “Hey everyone,” Jenny called out. “Oh, did folks get into bathing suits?”

  While Jenny had been dealing with her bug bite, they’d all donned swimwear, responding to Rachel’s suggestion that they enjoy a soak in the hot tub after dinner. Susan was somewhat relieved that Jenny wasn’t wearing her suit. The sporty bikini that Susan had shimmied into no longer fit as well as it had the prior year, and she wasn’t eager to shed the sundress she’d layered over it, especially not after eating. Rachel, on the other hand, was clearly itching to get into the hot tub. She wore a white one-piece with a cut-out side that advertised her svelte form, despite the translucent, floral kimono hanging open off her narrow shoulders.

  “I still need to put mine on.” Louis waved Jenny over. She walked across the grass to the tiled area where they all sat. Instead of scooting a few inches to make room beside him on the bench, Louis yanked the belt loop of his wife’s shorts, pulling her onto his lap in a playful, possessive way that Susan couldn’t help but envy. It had been a while since Nadal had publicly showed the same need to have her physically near.

  “I
was telling them the detergent story.” Louis grinned as if the so-far tame tale was a bawdy one.

  Jenny groaned. “Really? Why?”

  “It’s one of my more amusing ER war stories.”

  “Horror stories.”

  Louis kissed the side of her temple. “It’s a good thing you switched to television. You’re too sensitive for emergency medicine.”

  “I just think it’s gross.”

  “I’ve already started it.” Louis turned his attention back to Rachel at the head of the table. She sat catty-corner from Nadal, whose shoulder, Susan noted, barely brushed her own even though he sat beside her.

  “So, as I was saying,” Louis continued. “Here we all are thinking compound femur fracture because of the way this guy is grasping his thigh through his pants and howling about a hit, you know? The heet. The heet, right?”

  Susan winced at Louis’s poor Mexican accent, which sounded more like Tattoo from Fantasy Island than anything remotely Spanish. She looked to Jenny to see if she took any offense. Her mouth was tight, either in disapproval or anticipation of a cringe-worthy punch line. Susan stopped dicing the strawberry, just in case the conclusion of Louis’s “war story” was shocking enough to make her slice through her finger.

  “So”—Louis clapped his hands together—“we get him on the table and start to cut away his jeans, sure we’ll see a bone fragment protruding from the leg. Instead—get this—what we see is a third-degree burn. I mean, huge patches of white carved into this guy’s thighs. The skin burned through to layers without any melanin. It’s awful. And we realize this man’s been talking about heat, not a hit.”

  In the corner of her eye, Nadal’s nose flared like he smelled rotting seafood. She tilted the cutting board over the bowl and scraped the remaining fruit into the salad. “That’s terrible. Poor man.”

  Louis shrugged, either disagreeing with her assessment or not caring either way. “We stopped the burning and saved his leg. Ultimately, he had to be transferred to a burn center for recovery. But we got the chemicals off.”

  “How did he get a chemical burn on his thigh?” Rachel asked.

  Louis squeezed Jenny’s shoulder. “Well, that’s the funny part. His wife, apparently, worked as a maid in some hotel. She’d discovered him cheating and coated the inside of his jeans with an industrial-strength alkaline laundry powder.” Louis suppressed a laugh. “Sure showed him. If it weren’t for his boxer shorts, she would have burned his balls off.”

  Rachel snickered. Susan followed suit out of a sense of politeness, despite failing to find the humor in a man nearly losing his leg. Her halfhearted snort clearly wasn’t convincing, because Jenny began shaking her head at her husband. “See? You turned everyone’s stomach. Right before dinner.”

  Louis’s stormy eyes shimmered. “Oh come on, babe. It’s a crazy story. Tarantino couldn’t make that up.”

  Ben frowned, and pointed at Louis with a metal spatula. “Spousal abuse is a real riot, Louis. I hope the perpetrator ended up in prison.”

  “Hell if I know.” Louis stifled another laugh. “I was busy saving the cheating bastard’s leg from amputation.”

  Rachel rose from the table to grab the near-empty bottle of wine at its center. She tipped it upside down into her glass, adding a swallow to the drop above the stem. “Oh, lighten up, Ben. You should be taking notes for your mystery series.” She gulped the last bit and then smacked her lips together. “I bet that story would fly off the shelves. Death by Detergent by Ben Hansen. Inspired by true events.”

  “I want a cut,” Louis laughed.

  “Well, it would only be fair,” Rachel said, smiling. “The woman can’t profit from her crime. Son of Sam law. The doctor and his author neighbor, on the other hand …”

  “Fish is ready.” Ben pulled the salmon off the grill and plated it on a waiting plastic platter. “Hopefully some of you still have an appetite.”

  Rachel traded her wine glass for the empty bottle. “We should refresh this. What goes with fish? A nice white, right?” She waved the recycling at Nadal. “Help me pick one?”

  Nadal glanced at his own empty glass. “The California Chardonnays are all fair game. I brought a white Burgundy that’s better for later in the week.”

  Rachel pointed the bottle at Nadal like a rifle, staring down its slender neck. “The fact that you can distinguish between Chardonnay and white Burgundy alone proves that you, sir, should be in charge of picking the bottle for dinner.”

  Nadal’s hand glided atop Susan’s own, resting on the cutting board. “Hey, hon. You know the dif—”

  “Your wife’s busy chopping strawberries, for goodness’ sake.” Rachel’s tone switched from teasing to scolding.

  Nadal looked down at the bench that he straddled. Reluctantly, he set his whiskey on the table. Rachel’s smile stretched into a Cheshire cat grin. “We’ll be right back.”

  Susan watched Rachel strut back to the house with Nadal in tow. Rachel couldn’t really need that much help with the wine. Though she might not be able to distinguish between a California Chardonnay and a French Burgundy by taste, Rachel could certainly discern the difference between a label reading PRODUCT OF CALIFORNIA versus one proclaiming PRODUIT DE FRANCE. So why had she wanted Nadal to come with her so badly?

  Susan glanced at Ben for clues as to the real reason. He watched his wife reenter the house, deep-set eyes shadowed by his lowered brow. Was he concerned? Was Rachel trying to make him jealous? Susan silently chided herself for the thought. She’d never make friends if she let her insecurities keep her on the lookout for flirtation. Given her own history, she was probably projecting anyway.

  “Bring out some balsamic vinegar, too? I think I saw some left in the fridge door,” Susan shouted over her shoulder, keeping her tone nonchalant. “If it’s expired, maybe grab the olive oil and mustard Ben bought, and a fork? I can whisk it together with a splash of white wine to make a dressing.”

  “Will do,” Nadal answered.

  A spinach leaf folded over the edge of the mixing bowl in front of her. Susan plucked the piece from the side and popped it into her mouth. It tasted like green cellophane.

  “What are the boys doing at camp?” Jenny asked.

  Susan made eye contact with her, acknowledging the question while pointing to the salad bowl. She covered her mouth with her hand, not wanting to treat her neighbors to the view of mashed spinach undoubtedly between her teeth. “Every sport on the planet for Jamal, including water skiing. Jonah has water skiing and some soccer practice. His camp also focuses on occupational therapies—social interactions, team building, that kind of stuff. It’ll be good for him.”

  “Occupational therapy can really work wonders.” Louis’s voice dropped a decibel, as though he were giving her a diagnosis.

  Susan didn’t want to hear one. She plucked another baby spinach leaf from the lip of the bowl, distracting herself from the line of questioning. Someday, she hoped people would ask about Jonah in the same way they inquired about Jamal, focusing on the things he did well and not the ways he could improve.

  “Do you think you’ll keep homeschooling?” Louis asked.

  “I don’t really have another option at the moment.” Susan rubbed the spinach stem between her thumb and forefinger, twirling the leaf like a pinwheel. “The private schools here won’t take a child with an autism diagnosis. And the public school would place him in special education classes, which would be a disaster for him. He’s well above his grade level academically. He just gets overwhelmed from too much stimuli. He can’t handle too many strangers or loud noises. But he’s working on it. They’d mainstreamed him when we’d lived outside of Redmond.”

  Louis nodded, his face a mask of seriousness and concern. “Is he taking risperidone?”

  Susan closed her eyes for a beat so Louis wouldn’t see them roll. The moment he’d started asking about Jonah, she’d known the conversation would turn to medications. Doctors thought pills and scalpels could solve nearly any problem.
“It makes him very sleepy.” She spun the spinach leaf into a blur. “He has such an active mind, and we didn’t want to sedate it to mush.”

  “Maybe a mild—”

  “He’s a great kid,” Ben interjected, shutting off the grill’s gasoline. “Bright. Will’s always saying he’ll be first to colonize Mars.”

  Ben Hansen to the rescue. Again. Susan allowed her eyes to travel up his superhero physique to his chiseled face. She grinned at him. Finally, someone was willing to treat her kid like a human being and not a medical experiment.

  “I’m not used to talking about Jonah’s diagnosis with non-family members.” She let the leaf tumble to the table. “But it’s important for our friends to understand so that their kids get where he’s coming from and can overlook some of his difficulties to see what he’s really great at. I appreciate how nice your children are to him.” She looked to Jenny. “Ally always waves to him in the backyard and asks about his day. She treats him like a younger kid next door, which he is.” She transferred her attention back to Louis. “That’s really all he’s looking for. All we’re looking for.”

  Louis pulled his thin lips into a tight line. Susan gathered that he wasn’t accustomed to his free medical advice not being appreciated. But people—with or without a medical license—needed to understand that her son should be accepted for who he was, not who she or anyone else might want him to be.

  A broken air seal shattered the tension. Nadal closed the door behind him with his free fingers. He carried a stack of paper plates topped with cutlery in one hand. The other held a wine bottle. “I’m starving.” He dropped everything on the table save for the Chardonnay. That he placed in the middle like a centerpiece. It had already been uncorked.

  Had he shared a glass with Rachel inside? Again, Susan admonished herself for worrying about flirting. So what if he had? It didn’t matter. What mattered more, she told herself, was that he’d forgotten the dressing. The spinach salad would be inedible without it. That, she told herself, was the reason for the tightness in her chest.