Not Perfect: A Novel

by Elizabeth Laban

  “What’s going on?”

  “Fern’s sick,” Tabitha said, just as Fern stopped retching and curled into a ball of misery.

  “Too much goat cheese,” Levi said a little meanly, or maybe a lot meanly. “Who has just goat cheese for dinner?”

  “No, it couldn’t have been that. I feel fine. Do you feel fine?”

  “I guess.”

  “So listen, I can’t leave her here. Do you think you can call Dash and see if you can walk with him and his parents?”

  “I’ll be fine,” Levi said. “I’m almost thirteen. I can walk to school alone.”

  Tabitha hesitated. Lately, she was always worried about these small decisions she made on her own without Stuart there to say, “He’ll be fine.” But really, if Stuart were there he would walk Levi to school, and this wouldn’t even be a discussion.

  “Okay,” she said slowly. And for the first time in a long time, Levi smiled.

  Levi Brewer was aware of the air hitting his face in a way he hadn’t been before. Maybe because he was usually ducking his head, waiting for his mother to embarrass him. Whatever. He was finally free. He couldn’t believe his luck. Well, he was sorry Fern felt bad, of course, but he was very happy to be out here alone. So many things ran through his mind as he stepped onto the sidewalk after nodding to Mort. He could skip school. He could run away. He could go to the train station instead of school and just see where he ended up. He could go looking for his father, who hadn’t been home for so long and hadn’t even bothered to call. Levi was fairly sure this was not normal. No, he told himself, he had to play it cool. If he pretty much did what he was supposed to do, then maybe he could walk alone more often. He should wait to do something crazy. He should take his time and plan it.

  He hesitated before deciding to go his usual way, just in case his mother was watching him from the window, which was likely. But as soon as he knew he was out of sight, he turned north again, away from school, and walked up Nineteenth Street toward the Square. By now he would bet his mother had moved away from the window and gone back to Fern. He glanced at his phone. He was a little early, and really, he could be a little late, so he calculated that he had about twenty solid minutes to sit and think. He went to La Colombe, his father’s favorite coffee place. He walked in slowly, scanning everyone. Of course he knew his father wasn’t going to be here. There was no way he was just waiting two blocks from their apartment. He was supposed to be away, on a business trip. But something didn’t seem right, no matter what his mother told him. He chose one of the few empty tables, farthest from the coffee bar, and sat down. He opened his backpack, then unzipped the deep inner pocket. This was where he kept the envelope.

  He wondered if he dared pull it out. Everyone around him looked busy, so why not? He brought it out onto the table and held it. Then he lifted the flap, which was getting pretty ratty. He had to be careful. He didn’t want it to rip. Inside there were five ten-dollar bills and a note. He could get coffee! He could do anything! But so far he hadn’t spent a dollar of it; he hadn’t broken a bill. He wanted to keep it just as his father had given it to him. He counted the bills, then let them settle back to the bottom of the envelope. He pulled out the note. It was on plain printer paper, and it looked like it was written quickly.

  Dear Levi,

  I am so proud of you. Everything you’re doing, especially for your bar mitzvah, is exactly what I hoped you would do. I have to go away for a while, and you’re sleeping now so I don’t want to bother you, but I wanted to tell you a few of my ideas. You are going to rock your Torah portion, I just know it, and I’ll do whatever I can to help you with that. Also, as far as your community service project goes, I think you should do something to help the hungry. Feeding people is so basic, so important. There is an organization called The Family Meal that my old firm worked with, reach out to Nancy there if you want to. If you have something else in mind, go for it! I love you. I’ll be thinking about you.

  Dad

  Levi pretty much had it memorized by now, but he read it over and over again, hoping something new would appear or that he would suddenly realize he had missed something, a clue or an extra page. But every time it was the same. Nice enough, but not what he really wanted to know. He wanted to know where his dad was and why he’d been gone so long. He wanted to know why he left this note instead of just calling from wherever he was to talk about it. He put the note back in the envelope, which he slipped into his backpack. He scanned the crowd one more time, and then he left, headed to school, told Rhona at the front desk that he was sorry he was a little late but his sister was sick and they had had a rocky morning. Rhona smiled and nodded. He could probably tell her anything and she would believe him. As he walked to his classroom, he ducked into the bathroom. He knew he was supposed to text his mother, she was probably waiting with her phone in her hand, but it was late, and she’d wonder what took him so long. Better to pretend he forgot. Before he put his phone away for the day, he found the tracking app, the one with orange stick figures, thinking he would turn on the notification part so he could see if his mother tried to track him, and then bust her since she promised she wouldn’t do that. But as he was about to do it he had a better idea and turned off the tracking ability altogether. He just blocked it. Ha. Really, he could disappear at this point and nobody would know.

  Tabitha had told Levi to text when he got to school, but he never did. She had already called the school to let them know Fern would be absent, and she didn’t want to call the front desk again and draw attention to herself. So now she was going to have to spend the entire day just hoping he made it and would then get home safely. It was only 8:55 in the morning. It was going to be a long day.

  She dialed Julie’s number.

  “Hi! It’s Tabitha,” she said. “I am so sorry, but Fern is really sick and I can’t leave her, so I’m not going to be able to get the cheese plate together or the nondairy alternative.” She couldn’t resist throwing that back at her. Julie hesitated, then quickly thanked her and said she would go in search of another snack provider.

  Tabitha had elaborated on her initial lie last night and told Fern that Rachel wanted to show her the rotting food because she thought it was cool. Rachel made a few references to a school assignment, but Fern just let them go by, looking vaguely confused. Tabitha had banked on the fact that Fern wouldn’t correct Rachel, and she had been right. Tabitha was starting to think she was a better liar than she gave herself credit for. Fern had been polite and accepted some old cheese that Rachel offered her after the tasting. Tabitha brought it home and put it in the fridge, but even if it was still good enough to eat it looked awful, smashed and slightly discolored, with the faintest smell of ammonia. Tabitha had briefly thought about plating it nicely and dripping the luscious balsamic vinegar on the really bad spots, but it would have taken too much, the whole rest of the bottle maybe. Besides, she wouldn’t dare present that to the school. Or maybe she should, then they would never ask her to bring food in again. But no, she wouldn’t do it, despite her seemingly desperate state. She was especially glad now that Fern had eaten only the fresh cheese last night and not any from the possibly rotten pile. Rachel had wanted Fern to taste it, going along, Tabitha knew, with her phantom supermarket project, wanting her to see the different stages of cheese decline. Tabitha had wondered at the time if Rachel was onto her, if that was Rachel’s way of pushing her to the point of having to confess there was no assignment, that it was something else. But Tabitha had said, “No, that wouldn’t be necessary,” and Rachel had let it go.

  At noon Fern was still sleeping and Tabitha was going crazy—stuck at home with that stupid notebook demanding her attention and worrying about Levi making it to school. She tried for the tenth time that morning to use her Find My Friends app, but the cursor just spun and spun, never settling on a spot. She pushed on Stuart’s face, right next to Levi’s—she couldn’t resist. And as it always did, as it had since the minute she realized he was gone, she got a b
ig fat Can’t be located. Great, nobody could be located. She returned to her room, made the bed, and pulled the list out again.

  Back to item number two—no talking once he left. She tried. It was only 7:00 a.m. when she found the note. And they had been up until just a little after midnight. She had crashed—in fact, now that she thought about it, he had encouraged her to take a Xanax that night, the evening had been so hard. She added that to the list—item number seven: The encouraged Xanax. So when she fell asleep, she was really asleep, and when she woke up she was groggy. Still, how far could he have gotten by then even if he’d left the house as soon as she’d conked out? She imagined he would be at the airport, or maybe on the other end of the flight, renting a car and starting that long drive north, assuming he was going north, which in this case made more sense than ever—though maybe not—there were so many unanswered questions. He could have been going south, or west, or east. Whatever the case, her calls kept going to voicemail, over and over again. Finally that stopped, and it just rang and rang. And of course he didn’t call. Maybe he wasn’t ever going to call her.

  Part of the reason she wanted to reach him so much was the fight. She had thought they were going to be able to sort things out, together, to finally be honest with one another. And if she had been able to reach him that next morning, she would have asked him if he felt the same way. She could see now that he had given her the answer in the most dramatic way possible.

  Stuart and Tabitha didn’t fight much in their marriage. Did they really fight at all? That one time over the wedding cake—Stuart had wanted plain, plain, plain, and Tabitha had asked for a basket-weave design, something she had always imagined she would have on her wedding cake, ever since she was a little girl. He had finally given in, but he never embraced it. He never seemed to have liked their cake. She had had boyfriends along the way, before Stuart, with whom she had huge yelling fights, sometimes throwing things, blowouts that ended with one or the other storming away. One boyfriend had even left her alone at the movies and never came back. But she and Stuart never did anything like that. She had always thought it was a good thing—a stable home for the kids, and really, who had time to fight like that anyway? Now, though—now she wondered if the not fighting was the bad part. She started to think about the specifics of the fight; she even considered outlining it, but she wasn’t ready. Not yet.

  Next item on the list—the T-shirt in the closet. His University of Michigan shirt—maize and blue and old and tattered, something he never, ever traveled without. This time he did. It was still folded on the middle shelf in the closet. Why would he leave that? Or a better question might be: Why did he usually feel he had to take it? Well, now she could probably guess, but for years she had wondered about the significance of that shirt. After he left this time, she was shocked when she first saw it there. Now she went into the closet and touched it, as she often did lately. Usually, she didn’t want to disturb it, but she pulled it out and looked at it. It was clean and creased where the folds were. She couldn’t make any sense if it. Instead of folding it and putting it back in its place on the shelf, she brought it out to the bed with her, pulled back the covers, and shoved it to the bottom on Stuart’s side. She was just pulling the comforter back into place when she heard Fern.

  She half jogged to her room, a little afraid of what she was going to find. Fern was sitting up, glassy eyed and flushed. Tabitha went to her, felt her head again. It was even hotter. She knew she should call the pediatrician, but she didn’t want to deal with the co-pay—the one that must be paid at the time of the visit. She got the thermometer and took Fern’s temperature. At least she isn’t throwing up anymore, Tabitha told herself, for now.

  “Do you want a cold washcloth?” she asked, as they waited for the thermometer to beep.

  Fern nodded. Her skin looked sweaty and her eyes kept shutting.

  Finally they heard the beep-beep-beep. It read 103 degrees. Tabitha sighed with some relief. That was high, very high, but not emergency high. She fetched the cold washcloth and put it on Fern’s forehead. Then she pulled out her phone and texted Holly, a mother of a girl in Fern’s class at school who was an emergency room doctor at the local children’s hospital. She was one of the most generous people Tabitha knew, never seeming to mind if anyone with kids contacted her with a question or concern. Even so, they were just becoming friends, and she didn’t want to overstep anything. But really, what choice did she have?

  Hi! It’s Tabitha! I am so sorry to bother you, but Fern has a high fever—103—and I just wondered, is there anything going around right now?

  She pressed “send” and waited. If Holly was working, it could be a long time. But right away she saw the bubbles indicating a response.

  Oh no! I’m so sorry to hear that. But yes, there’s a bug with a high fever, some vomiting. Not much to do but wait it out and keep her cool. A cool bath might help. Text if you need anything or if her fever goes up . . .

  Tabitha texted back THANK YOU in all caps, and suddenly didn’t feel so alone. She ran a cool bath, making sure it wasn’t too cold, and eased Fern into it. She sat with her, reading When You Reach Me. They were loving the book, and Tabitha didn’t want to waste it when Fern wasn’t feeling well, but she perked up and listened. Tabitha heard her phone buzz, and she saw Holly had written again.

  Keep her hydrated!

  Tabitha nodded, like she was talking to Holly directly. When she got Fern out of the tub, into fresh pajamas, and watching television, she gave her a big glass of ice water, which Fern happily sipped. All was well for about two hours, until Levi didn’t come home.

  At 3:20 she became aware that it was time for him to be leaving school and decided to wait until 4:00 to text him. At 3:55 she could barely sit still. It took only fifteen, maybe twenty, minutes to get home, so even if she was being generous, he should be home by now. She looked out their window overlooking the Square. She could see down and across but not much to the left, which was where he would most likely be coming from.

  What’s your plan? she texted when she couldn’t stand it anymore. No response. She tried to locate him with the app on her phone again, but still nothing. She looked at Stuart’s face next to Levi’s but didn’t push on it. This, like so many other things, was not going to help her. She went to sit with Fern, who was much happier and much cooler. One crisis averted, another one just beginning. What was it that Rachel always said? That motherhood seemed like a very long game of Whac-A-Mole to her—that crazy game at the arcade where you had to keep whacking the moles to win. You just manage to control one and the next one pops up. Well, this certainly felt like that. She started to make a plan in her head. If he wasn’t home by 4:15 she’d start calling around. But really, whom would she call? If he wasn’t home by 4:30 she’d go looking for him. At 4:14 a text came in: at 7-11. A strange sound of relief started somewhere in her chest and escaped through her mouth. Fern looked at her but didn’t say anything. Then she looked around.

  “Where’s Levi?” she asked.

  “Seven-Eleven,” Tabitha said, getting up. She needed a minute to herself. She went into the bedroom and pushed the door closed, stopping just short of clicking it shut. She pulled out the notebook and wrote one of the two things that all along she had not wanted to write, but now felt she had to. It was the easier one to write—there was no question about it. In the end, she thought, it would probably prove to be the most important clue of all.

  Item number eight: The threat.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  With all the commotion of the day, Tabitha forgot about the appointment with the rabbi, which was surprising since she had been dreading it so much. Her iPhone pinged to remind her just as she opened the door to let Levi into the apartment. It was now five o’clock, and the appointment was at five thirty. She was trying so hard to not be mad, to not blow up at him. How could you forget to text this morning? Didn’t you know how worried I would be, literally all day? How could you so casually go to 7-Eleven and not tell me? I
t was all simmering under the surface. But she did not plan to say any of it. Levi was suffering, too, she reminded herself. Also, he was okay, he was fine.

  “What’s that?” he asked in a pleasant-enough tone, as he walked over the threshold and into the apartment. He smelled like the outside, sunshine, and city grit. She realized she hadn’t been out all day.

  She glanced at her phone. Closed her eyes briefly.

  “It’s a reminder that we have a meeting with Rabbi Rosen in half an hour,” she said through clenched teeth, the same teeth she had just willed to stay unclenched.

  “No way,” Levi said matter-of-factly. “I’m not going. I have homework.”

  “You are going,” Tabitha said, thinking ahead to what this would mean. Getting the car from the good spot on Pine Street (they used to park in a garage, paying almost $300 a month, but she stopped that weeks ago and got the city parking permit that cost less than $50 a year). She would lose the spot and spend many minutes, possibly an hour, looking for a spot at the exact moment everyone was coming home from work for the night. Levi would beg to be dropped off, she would eventually give in, and by the time she got back the kids would be starving. Shoot—dinner! She hadn’t even thought about dinner. And Fern. She couldn’t take Fern. She could, almost, she was so much better. In another lifetime she would bundle her up and they would go together. She would read to her, and they would stop at Square on Square on the way home for the best wonton soup, or Dim Sum Garden for the best dumplings—whatever Fern felt she was up to. But the world didn’t work that way anymore. At least their world didn’t.

  She heard Levi close his bedroom door hard, not quite a slam, but a deliberate close. She looked at Fern on the couch. She was so happy, so much better, watching an old Disney Channel DVD. Making her go out right now was not the right thing. But really, she should have called this morning. What was wrong with her? She hadn’t even thought of it. She googled the number for the synagogue and called, but there was no answer. She had the rabbi’s cell phone for emergencies. Was this an emergency? She found the contact information on her phone and called.