I wrinkled my nose. “Don’t think so,” I said. Then I thought about what that would be like, being someone smart like Lise, living in my castle with my baby girl and writing stories about my life. I laughed again. “Who knows? Maybe. Someday.”
“Sorry to interrupt,” I heard Lise say, joining us. “But Sylvia’s trying to decide what to do. There are reports on the radio of a fairly big storm coming this way, and she’s not sure if we should leave for Connecticut today and try and beat it, or stay here and ride it out.”
“I suppose we’d better head back,” Diana said, rising to her feet and wiping her hands off on her swimsuit, “and help her decide.”
I helped the others gather up our beach things and followed them on the walk back to the house.
At the far edge of the sand, I turned back for one last look. The wind had picked up and the sky had turned a sickly greenish color. Something was coming. Something big.
I lowered my gaze to the water’s edge in time to see the first wave break over the moat surrounding my castle, washing my carefully built fortress away.
Blackout
Recommended Reading:
Lise: Best of Friends, Cathy Kelly
Diana: Outer Banks, Anne Rivers Siddons
Sylvia: Such Devoted Sisters, Eileen Goudge
Cindy: The Friendship Test, Elizabeth Noble
• • •
“Where were you when the lights went out?” Diana tittered.
“What the hell does that mean?” Sylvia said.
“It’s just that I’ve always wanted to say that, but it doesn’t work when there’s only two people, and it seems I’ve only ever been with one other person during blackouts. But this? It’s like a drawing-room murder mystery. You know? ‘Where were you when the lights went out?’”
“It’s not at all like a drawing-room murder mystery,” Sylvia said.
Sylvia had had the foresight to prepare one more cooked meal before the storm hit in earnest, knocking out the power, and the four women were seated at the dinner table, finishing up the remains of shrimp scampi by candlelight as the rain lashed against the windows and the howling wind battered the house.
“It would be nice,” Cindy said, putting down her napkin, “if we could get through one meal together without someone bickering with someone else.”
“Are you feeling OK?” Sylvia said. She put her hand on Cindy’s forehead. “Is the baby OK?”
“I’m fine,” Cindy said with a sigh. “The baby’s fine. I’m just not in the mood to hear everyone else fighting tonight, that’s all.”
In the hours before the storm hit, they’d debated what to do. Sylvia had been for staying put. Diana had been for packing as quickly as possible and getting the hell out of there.
“And go where?” Sylvia had asked. “South? West? The storm’s coming down from the northeast. We can’t go home.”
“Can’t go home?”
“No, Thomas Wolfe,” Lise had backed up Sylvia, “not tonight at least.”
“Oh. I see.”
“We’ll have to just ride it out here,” Sylvia had said, “and hope we don’t all get swept away.”
Now, as the flickering light from the candles danced shadows across their faces, Cindy’s expression settled, as though a decision had been made.
“Never mind what I said about not fighting,” she said.
“What do you mean?” Sylvia asked.
“Look, I know that ever since we got here, you all have been burning to talk to me about something but haven’t been able to get up the nerve. So, as long as we’re all stuck here together, you might as well have at it. If we all die together in this storm, you might not get another chance.”
“How can you possibly be considering going back to Eddie?” Sylvia burst out with it.
“What are you talking about? Who said I was definitely going back to Eddie? And what business would it be of yours if I was?”
“It’s our business,” Sylvia said, “because we don’t want to see you hurt anymore.”
“But isn’t that part of life? Doesn’t everybody get hurt sometimes?”
“Not like you’ve been hurt.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, though. Sure, Eddie and I have had our bad spells. But what couple doesn’t? Look at Diana and Dan, Lise and Tony. You can’t tell me they’re not having their own problems too now. Dan’s not sleeping with Diana, Tony’s pissed at Lise for quitting her job and for coming on this trip, that Dirk guy seems to be getting in everyone’s business. But are they going to give up? And, if not, why should I?”
“Because it’s different,” Sylvia said. “It’s—”
“Maybe it’s not,” Lise said, cutting her off.
Sylvia’s head spun toward her, an expression as much shocked as betrayed upon her face.
“Look,” Lise said, squirming uncomfortably in her seat. “Maybe we’re all wrong.” She addressed Sylvia. “I know I said I’d go along with this. I know it’s what we came down here for. But do you realize how…hubristic it is to sit in judgment of someone else’s relationship? It’s too easy to stand on the outside of a marriage, or any other kind of relationship, and say what the people in it should do. But who really knows? Would you want us to dissect your relationship with Sunny like we do Cindy’s with Eddie?”
“I’m not sitting in judgment,” Sylvia said. “I’m just—”
“I can’t believe I’m going to agree with Lise,” Diana said, “but I think she may be right. Perhaps it’s time we just butt out. We can’t know why two people stay together.”
“Maybe not,” Sylvia said, “but I know why they should come apart. Do you know what Eddie did to Cindy that night of the party, after she got rid of us?”
“No!” Cindy said. “Don’t! I told you that in confidence. Stop!”
But Sylvia didn’t stop. She told Lise and Diana about the bowl of cherries, about what Eddie had done with those cherries. Then she told the others how Eddie had told Cindy—commanded her—to give up her friends.
“I had no idea things were that bad,” Lise said.
“That’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever heard,” Diana said. “Well, maybe not the most horrible. But it is awful. I’ve put up with an incredible amount of shit in my life, much of it from men, but I’d never stand for something like that.”
Cindy was crying in earnest now, fat tears rolling out of her eyes and trailing down her cheeks. “I can’t believe I trusted you!” she shrieked at Sylvia. “You make Eddie sound like the worst person in the world!”
Sylvia put her hand on Cindy’s back and gently rubbed the space between her jutting shoulder blades. “You know what’s the funny thing?” Sylvia spoke gently. “I actually feel sorry for Eddie; it’s like he’s his own fatal flaw, like he can’t help but smash the good things around him, at least where you’re concerned. So, no, I don’t believe Eddie’s the worst person in the world. I just think he’s the worst person in the world for you.”
“Why are you with Eddie?” Diana said softly. “We’ve asked the question before, but you’ve never answered. Why be with him in the first place? Why stay with him after all the things he’s done?”
“Because,” Cindy said through the tears, “who would I be without Eddie?” As she went on, it was as though she were reciting something she’d memorized, a mantra. “I’m not pretty like you, Diana. I’m not smart like Lise. I’m not talented like Sylvia is with her cooking. If I didn’t have Eddie, what other man would ever have me?”
Sylvia laughed. “Oh, God,” she said. “I’m sorry. I know it isn’t funny but…” She grabbed one of the candlesticks. Then, placing a hand under Cindy’s elbow, she lifted the other woman from her seat and led her to the bathroom where, by candlelight, she made Cindy look at herself in the mirror.
“Look at you,” Sylvia said. “I don’t know how you can’t see it when everyone around you can. You’re not just pretty. You’re beautiful. You’ve got one of the most beautiful faces I’ve ever seen,
and the pregnancy only makes you more so. And you are smart. You were smart enough to make me go to the doctor when I was too stupid to go. You’re doing fantastic with your online classes. I just know that whatever you decide to do in life you’ll be talented at it. If you’ll only believe in yourself.”
“You’re nuts,” Cindy said, but there was a slight smile breaking through the tears.
Sylvia laughed again. “Now that we know.” She sobered. “But it doesn’t make what I’m saying any less true.”
They returned to the table where Lise and Diana had cleared the dinner dishes, setting out fresh peaches and a peach pie Sylvia had baked earlier in the day.
“Thanks for the pep talk,” Cindy said, using a napkin to wipe the tear trails from her face with a vengeance. “Really. But it doesn’t change anything. I’m pregnant with Eddie’s child. I think it’s time I told him. Maybe that’ll change things.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Sylvia said. “Wrong, wrong, wrong.” And now it appeared she was getting angry. “What do you think will change? Do you think you and Eddie will stop being bad together once there’s a baby in the picture?”
“‘Bad together’? You say it as though part of what’s the matter with me and Eddie is my own fault.”
“I don’t know,” Sylvia said, considering. “Maybe it is.”
“I don’t think it’s helpful,” Lise interjected, “to start blaming the victim.”
“That’s not what I’m doing,” Sylvia said. “And who said anything about blaming the victim? Or even about Cindy being a victim? She’s an adult. She may not have been when she first got together with Eddie, but she is now. She’s made her own choices. She needs to learn how to choose differently.”
“Thanks for talking about me in the—what do you call it?—third person? I’m sitting right here, thanks,” Cindy said. “And you still haven’t explained what you mean by ‘bad together.’ You think it’s possible that Eddie might not act like this if I were a different person? If he were with a different woman?”
“Maybe,” Sylvia said, considering that too. “I don’t know. I just know that when the two of you are together, it’s like a bad recipe.”
This was a new idea to Cindy; the idea that she and Eddie were a recipe that didn’t mix well, an equation that didn’t add up.
“You know,” Sylvia continued, “Carly told me all about your parents. She told me how, when she was living with you and Eddie for a while, you used to do things that she knew would piss Eddie off and that you should have known too. I’m not saying women should walk on eggshells in a relationship—or men, for that matter—but when you know someone long enough, you know what their hot-button issues are. You know that if you hit those buttons, you’re going to wind up with a fight on your hands. And if the person whose buttons you’re pushing happens to be of a violent nature, it’s that much worse. Carly also told me about how, one time, you set it up so she’d have to get out of the apartment when Eddie was in a bad mood, almost like you wanted him to abuse you. And then I remembered how you’d done the same thing with us the night of the party, sending us away when our staying might have made a difference in the outcome.”
Cindy opened her mouth to protest, but Sylvia talked right over her.
“Don’t you see, Cindy? You’re living your mother’s life all over again. You’re caught in a pattern, a cycle, and it has to stop.”
“What are you saying?”
“I think you know what I’m saying. I think you’ve known it all along. You’ve known you were pregnant for—what?—almost five months now? In all that time, how could Eddie not have noticed? He’s been in denial—maybe he doesn’t want a kid, maybe he’s never wanted a kid, or maybe he’s just scared of change—but you’ve been in denial yourself. And, yet, deep down inside, subconsciously, you must have known that the idea of you and Eddie raising a child, together, was a bad one, that it would just repeat the cycle. Why else would you have never told him before now about the pregnancy? You need to break the cycle, Cindy. If you have this baby with Eddie, with Eddie as the father, it won’t end well. If the baby is a boy, he’ll learn by example that women are inferior and that abusing and demeaning them is the way to go. If the baby is a girl, she’ll grow up to be like you and your mother, thinking that being abused somehow equates with love.”
Cindy looked at her hands, and then she looked up at Sylvia. “What,” she said, “are you proposing I should do?”
Sylvia took a deep breath. “I think you should tell Eddie you’re pregnant.” She paused. “And I think you should tell him the baby isn’t his.”
Sylvia
“I have supported you in everything ever since I have met you, Sylvia, but I cannot support you in this.”
In the aftermath of the storm, during the long road back from Georgia to Connecticut, I’d managed to mostly convince the other three women of my wisdom on this subject. Sunny, on the other hand, was proving to be another matter entirely.
“It is simply not ethical,” Sunny said now, as if the matter was that simple. We were seated on my bed, and, instead of a welcome-home kiss, I was being treated to a course in ethics. What a world.
Not to mention, a loud world.
From the other side of the door I could hear music pounding as Cindy and Carly listened to some show on TV.
“I just do not think it is right,” Sunny said, “keeping from a man the knowledge that there is a baby in the world that is his.”
“Eddie never even told her he wanted kids,” I said.
“Does that matter? Why not give the man a chance?”
“Sunny, you met Eddie. Do you honestly think that guy you met—you remember, the drunk guy that insulted everyone in the room, picked fights with everyone, abused his girlfriend after everyone left—is going to change? That he’s going to suddenly be Mr. Sober Diaper-Changing Dad?”
“What about the baby? Once the baby is born, you do not think he or she has the right to a father?”
“Sure, a good father. But not Eddie. Not someone who will abuse his or her mother and probably abuse the baby too. And what do you think things would be like after the baby’s born? Do you think suddenly Eddie and Cindy’s relationship will get better? That’s a fairy tale.”
“Says the woman who never had any children.”
“Says the woman who knows. I may have never had any kids of my own, but I know what a strain children put on a marriage, even the best of marriages. Did you know that, statistically speaking, married couples who don’t have kids but do have pets are likely to live the longest and happiest lives?”
He couldn’t prevent a smile from escaping. “This,” he said, “I did not know. Perhaps you should write up an article for the New England Journal of Medicine?”
I ignored his sarcasm. “Hey, people can always find statistics to back up whatever the point is that they want to make.”
“Then,” he said, “perhaps you and I should put it to the test by getting married and adopting a cat?”
I ignored that too.
“All I’m saying is,” I said, “you don’t have to be a parent yourself to observe these things. The child’s-eye view I had growing up was plenty for me.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning my parents, by all accounts, were in love before Minnie and I were born. I’m not trying to say they were anything as bad as Cindy and Eddie afterward—far from it—but everything changed for them and, because they wound up with twins instead of a single baby, everything changed times two. Every single thing was something to disagree about. What to feed us, how much we should eat, should we be able to cross the street by ourselves, when could we go on our first date, should we pay for all or part of our college educations. My dad thought my mom was too rigid. My mom thought my dad was too lenient. Everyone always thinks that parents cry when their kids leave for college. But I swear, in our family, it was like the whole house heaved a sigh of relief. They loved us plenty, but they were glad to just finally go back
to being themselves, a couple again. Now you take the same thing, you throw a baby into a relationship mix that is not working, and what do you think you’ll wind up with?”
“At least Cindy is not having twins.”
“Amen to that.”
“But it is still wrong, Sylvia. You must know in your heart it is wrong.”
“I know nothing of the kind.”
Sunny got up off the bed and walked out of the room, gently closing the door behind him.
I collapsed back onto the bed and stared at the ceiling.
• • •
An hour later, there was a knock on my bedroom door. “Sylvia?” Carly poked her head in. “Sunny’s back. He says he’d like to talk to you.”
I rose from the bed and went out to meet him at the front door. On my way, I tossed an afghan in Cindy’s direction. The girl needed to take better care of herself.
“Let’s sit out here,” I said to Sunny, indicating the front stoop. “It’s a nice evening.”
And it was a nice evening. The early September day had been hot, but now that it’d gone close to dark, the air felt much cooler, clean, as we sat and watched people arriving home late from work and cars coming and going.
Sunny took my hand in one of his and patted the top with his other hand.
“Explain it to me,” he said. “Explain it so a simple doctor can understand. Tell me how this is going to work.”
“It’s like this,” I said. “This plan of mine, it’s the one way everyone has a chance of winding up happy: Cindy, the baby, maybe even Eddie. Maybe he’ll learn from his mistakes, at least a little something. Maybe he won’t take the next woman for granted as much as he did Cindy.”
“‘Everyone has a chance of winding up happy,’” he echoed. “You do realize you are playing God, do you not?”
“Sure,” I said. “But that’s what ‘Sylvia’ means in Australian: ‘God’.”
The Sisters Club Page 25
