by Lisa Beazley
May 15 Oh, Cass, my darling—
The grass is always greener, isn’t it? Re. Jake, I’m happy that his Brussels sprouts are finally getting the attention they deserve. But for all the sprouts in the world, I don’t for a second think you should have stayed with him. He is a good guy, but not a great guy. And he was kind of always messing with your head, wasn’t he? Or were you the bad guy? I can’t remember. Either way, Leo is a good egg, and I had a good feeling about him from the first time I met him. And you know, there’s an excellent chance Jake was looking at you and thinking that your life looks fantastic and full and perfect. All is well here. Adrian’s job gave him a car, which smells to me like a bribe to get us to stay longer. He uses it when he’s in town, but it mostly just sits there because I stick to taxis. The drivers are a hoot! No one tips for anything here, but I usually round up, which sends some of them over the moon. My driver today was struggling to put into words how grateful he was for my seventy-cent tip, and finally came up with, “You are a nice, sporting lady!” How do you like that? I was wearing yoga clothes, so maybe that explains his comment. Either way, it made me smile for hours. I’m still enjoying my role as den mother to all of these helpers. I started a Monday-night personal finance workshop to help them budget their money and start savings accounts. The stress these women are under to send money back to their families is unreal. Most of them make $500 or $600 a month, and with a few exceptions, every cent goes back to their families. Still, it never seems to be enough, and there are a lot of tear-filled phone calls telling sons, no, you can’t go on the class trip, or brothers, no, you can’t buy any extra seeds for this season’s planting, or mothers, no, you can’t get the hip-replacement surgery. It’s all pretty gut-wrenching. I even started a backroom savings and loan here, where I keep envelopes for them to put away $5 here and $10 there, so they can save up the $400 minimum to start a real bank account. I’ve started paying them interest—$5 for every month they go without withdrawing any money. It sounds silly, but I’m finding it so fulfilling. I’m also coaching them on how to ask for a raise. A few of them are making way under the going rate. Unfortunately, it’s created a bit of a fissure between some of the other “ma’ams” and me, which is a shame because most of them are really nice people—they’re just a bit, oh, I don’t know, unsure how to “have help” in a way that’s anything other than this master-servant thing. I realize now that I’m as big a cliché as the rest of the expat wives here. So many of them—of us!—gave up a career to move here. And those who didn’t were busy with their kids and housework, but now we have all this time on our hands, so we develop projects. When I meet someone new, I can usually suss out her project within minutes. Either it’s fitness (honestly, the bodies on these moms! Most of them have the ass of a twenty-year-old), or it’s obsessing over their kids’ schooling and extracurriculars, or they’ve started a small fashion business, or they volunteer or blog or whatever—certainly no one will admit to not having a project. That would just be lazy. Oh, the tyranny of having help! Mwah! —Sid In fact, I was in the midst of a little project of my own: a rich and ongoing fantasy in which I was Jake’s wife instead of Leo’s. I imagined serving ten-dollar tacos on his trendy new food truck, tending his rooftop garden, hanging around at TV show tapings, having romantic candlelit dinners, feeding each other chocolate cake before steamy lovemaking sessions . . . that kind of thing. I had just enough self-awareness to laugh at myself over the whole thing. But I stopped short of an actual reality check, which would be that I’d still be working long hours while Jake worked the opposite hours at his restaurant. I’d still be watching friends and colleagues have babies and vacillating between convincing myself that I didn’t want kids and panicking that my window on becoming a mother was closing. Because the truth was that I’d longed for an unoriginal life, as Jake called the well-tread path of parenthood. I’d wanted to get fat and have cravings for pickles and ice cream in the middle of the night, to scream at my long-suffering husband during labor, to smilingly complain about sleepless nights, to wear my baby in one of those slings that looked like a big Ace bandage, to be out on the streets of New York in the early-morning hours when only dog owners and parents were awake. That’s what I always wanted, and here I was punishing the great guy to come along and give all of that to me by longing for the good but not great guy who wouldn’t. Leo, who wanted what I wanted, who’d spent his life savings on the IVF treatments that made me pregnant with twins—“a two-for,” we’d called it—was getting the short end of the stick. At least in my fantasies. I was conscious of my bad behavior but somehow also removed from it because I wasn’t acting on it. But, in fact—of course—I was. You can’t think about something that much and not have it show up in your actions. An unfortunate side effect was that when I wasn’t feeling annoyed with Leo for some small transgression involving cheese or whose turn it was to wake up first, I started to pity him for having an ungrateful wife like me who doesn’t appreciate him. And pity is not an emotion conducive to romance. The guiltier I felt, the less into Leo I was. And the more into Jake I became. My restless legs syndrome—a maddening affliction I’d not been able to shake since the end of my pregnancy—had reached an all-time high right around this time. And many of these fantastical escapes from reality took place as I paced the living room floor in the middle of the night, shaking out my legs and scrolling through Facebook on my phone, increasingly cruising Jake’s new “public figure” page. Soon I was following his food truck on Twitter and picking up tacos from it every week when it was parked on West Fourth Street. I’d walk the boys past the sex shops and tattoo parlors, brushing off their questions about the crotchless leather bodysuits or the Day-Glo water bongs and trying to distract them with questions about what kind of tacos they wanted. Once, I surreptitiously took a picture of Quinn in front of one of the seedier adult shops and tagged it #citykid. It didn’t get as many likes or comments as I thought it would, and we walked the long way from then on, avoiding the tawdriest section of the street. Jake was never there at the truck, but we kept going anyway because the boys loved those tacos, and so did Leo. I didn’t tell him who was behind them. Meanwhile, Monica and I took to strolling past the Pig on our way to Chelsea Piers each week. That was actually Monica’s idea. She was hoping for more free meat. All these things—which amounted to vague stalking—soon became part of my routine. My routine had become precious to me this year. When I found something that worked, I created a little ritual around it and we’d do it every day or every week. The experts say that regimens are important for kids, but I think I benefited more than the boys did. Before I got it all figured out, I would look into the abyss of a fourteen-hour day with them and despair at the bleakness of it all. There is nothing more dismal than waking up to a cold and rainy day with two toddlers in a small apartment and nothing planned for the day. The key, I’ve found, is to have something slated every morning, to force you out of the house early, and to stay out as long as you can. Our Friday mornings from spring through September met those requirements handily, for it was when we walked across town to the Lower East Side, where my friend Mandy was in charge of the community garden’s chickens in the Sara D. Roosevelt Park. Mandy is one of the few single friends with whom I’ve been able to maintain a friendship since having the twins. She is great with the boys, and they adore her, so the Friday mornings we spend with her are a real treat. She holds a lease on a dozen apartments on the Lower East Side and in SoHo and is able to make a living renting them out by the week to European tourists. (It’s not altogether legal.) She’s always got this big set of keys with her, and she spends her days zipping around downtown on her red Vespa. Mandy has a Chihuahua named Chato. Chato is a rescue dog with some emotional issues and has bitten Quinn no less than four times (just nips, he’s never broken the skin) yet the boys remain undeterred and lavish him with affection. The chickens arrived in March on loan from a farm upstate. We bring them Greek yogurt and wor
ms, which we buy at the bait shop around the corner from the Chinatown fish market. Occasionally one of the chickens—who were supposedly menopausal—would lay an egg. Discovering one was pure magic for the boys, and we’d always get to keep it. I’d wrap it in a T-shirt and put it in my bag, and we’d have scrambled eggs from Regina or Hattie or Daisy for lunch. After chicken duty, we’d visit Mandy’s vegetable plot. The boys had planted tomato seeds with her, and while I’m 80 percent sure what they dutifully watered every week was a weed, they loved checking its progress and seeing the chickens and being the only kids ever allowed in the coop. Other children would watch with envy as Mandy invited them in to check for eggs. Mandy called Joey the chicken whisperer because the birds always went right up to him. He spoke to them low and soft. “Hi, girls. Good girls. Good chickens.” Quinn was a bit jumpier and was known to scream at their approach, causing them to flap their wings and cluck in reaction, but Joey would set them right in a matter of seconds while Quinn hovered nervously behind Mandy’s leg. On those mornings, if we managed to get to the garden without incident, if we bought the worms without anyone having a tantrum for a candy bar in the bait store, if I hadn’t yelled, if they were both in the coop and no one was crying, I would stand there holding Chato by the leash, watching my boys with Mandy and the chickens and feel genuinely satisfied. I was proud that those were my adorable boys in there with the chickens and that I was able to give my city-dwelling kids this experience. At these moments, I loved my life. CHAPTER EIGHT
New York June 1 Sid, You are the coolest. A backroom bank—I love it. But is it legal? Just be careful—don’t they cane people for less over there? Remember our “office” in the garage attic? We had that box of index cards where we’d keep files on the neighborhood boys? God, I’d love to have a look at those cards now. I’ve come around to your sex challenge idea, by the way. Leo doesn’t know it, but I’m aiming for three times this week. Boy, is he in for a shock. I’ll report back with results. In fact, do you know what’s really depressing? We had a new mattress delivered last week, and neither of us made the inevitable jokey-but-not-really comment about “christening it.” (Nor have we “christened it,” I probably don’t need to tell you.) And you know what’s even weirder? We literally (and I do mean literally) have not spoken one word about the mattress, despite the fact that it was a heavily researched decision. Over months, we e-mailed and texted links to articles on mattresses and went separately to Sleepy’s and reported to the other on our preferences via e-mail. When it arrived, I texted him, and when he came home that night, the boys and I were already asleep on it. Anyway, I’m off to my first yoga class. I hope it will make me a calmer, nicer, sexier version of myself—which would make me you, I guess! Wish me luck. —Cassie PS—In case you were wondering, the mattress is amazing—a long-overdue upgrade from the pile of coat hangers and cotton balls that I was sure comprised our old mattress. I haven’t slept better in years! If only my restless legs would cease and my kids would stop climbing on top of me in the middle of the night . . . When Leo arrived home at six forty, I had the boys in the tub. Ten minutes later, I walked the four blocks to Up-Dog Studio above the juice bar on Hudson Street (which Monica and I are convinced is a cover for a major drug trade). The narrow stairway was lined with votive candles, and soft music played while incense burned from above. I paid my thirty dollars, removed my shoes, and grabbed a towel from the pile atop the shoe shelf. A bit nervous, I pulled my phone out of my bag and pretended to be busy on it while entering the studio. Had I been paying attention, I might have made a quick retreat, but by the time I silenced my phone and dropped it back into my bag, it was too late.
“Hey, neighbor!” My heart sank. It was Jenna, who lived across the hall from me. And as if that weren’t bad enough, Jake was there, too. “Cass,” he said with a nod of his head and what might have been a wink, but I wasn’t sure “Hey, guys,” I said softly, looking around, and then accepting my predicament and taking the last open spot, right between them. Jenna Newman and I had a complicated relationship best summed up by the term “frenemy.” She’s just the kind of person Sid would have had no complaint with and might have even befriended, but whom I couldn’t stand. Her daughter, Valentina, was six months older than the twins and light-years ahead of them developmentally. Jenna was, naturally, a mommy blogger and seemed to think that this made her a sought-after parenting expert. We’ve been neighbors for years and were always sort of friends, but motherhood changed everything about our relationship. When she found out I was pregnant, it was the beginning of the end, only I didn’t know it at the time. With her placid and perfect newborn daughter, whom she had delivered in her bathtub, Jenna was quick to offer advice. Advice that I gladly accepted at first. I was so busy at work that I didn’t have time to read the stack of books she loaned me: So That’s What They’re For, Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth, and Birthing from Within. Luckily, she was ready with a CliffsNotes version each time I passed her in the hall. And I ate it up. In fact, between her and Sid, I didn’t need any books or childbirth classes. I felt fortunate to have them both. Jenna is a single mom, and I’ve got a real soft spot—and a lot of respect—for single moms, which made me hate myself for hating her. When the twins were first born, I was still grateful for her counsel and neighborly hot meals. It was kind of her to check on me and sit with the babies while I showered, and she does make a delicious cauliflower quinoa pilaf. Technically speaking, she may be a better person than I am, and if Grandma Margie’s version of heaven exists, there’s a good chance she’s in and I’m out. But at a certain point, her offers of help and handy tips seemed mere excuses for her to show off. With great annoyance, I came to realize that Jenna had appointed herself my mentor when I’d only wanted a friend. I started to resent her pride in her skills and felt I deserved a little credit—a handicap—for having two babies at once. By the time the twins were eating solids and I was three months back at work, I’d reached my limit with her. It was the BÉABA baby-food maker that did it. She’d bullied me into buying it in the first place, telling me all about it no less than seven times. I would nod and say, “Yes, sounds fab. I should get one.” And then she just picked one up for me at Babies “R” Us and told me I owed her $120. And what could I do? Refusing it was as good as signing my kids up for cancer. Baby food out of a jar, with its chemicals and preservatives (and ease and convenience) was so vilified that to even buy it in my neighborhood was a secretive, shameful act, and one that I engaged in every week while that cheerful green-and-orange machine sat occupying more counter space than I could afford. The thing was, I did love my kids and I didn’t make them food. So as it turns out, it is possible. Because I’m still insecure about it, let me present my case. I’d get home from work at six fifteen on the dot, send my nanny home, and immediately nurse the boys, feed the boys (from a jar), bathe the boys, cuddle and coo with the boys, read Is Your Momma a Llama? with the boys, nurse them again, read Goodnight Moon with them, and then attempt to put them to sleep. All the while, the pristine appliance loomed like a judgmental beacon, its very presence actually lessening the quality of my time with my babies. Leo usually came in around seven thirty with takeout and we’d pass Joey and Quinn around until they fell asleep, scarf down the Thai or Chinese or Mexican, and then one of the boys would be up. I’d crawl into bed at some point, where I would sleep for an hour or two at a time, awakened intermittently by my restless legs or my restless babies, until I woke for the day at five or six a.m. The organic kale and cauliflower and sweet potatoes turned browner by the day, and each night before I slinked off to bed, I’d think, I’ve got to make that baby food before the veggies go bad. To this day, the sight of a CSA box tugs at a dark little part of me that wonders whether my difficulties at getting pregnant in the first place were a sign that I wasn’t meant to be a mother. Once the boys entered toddlerhood, Jenna would see me, wild-eyed, coming up the stairs with the boys, who were often covered in sand
or ice cream or both and crying, refusing to budge from the landing, roaring like T. rexes, barking like dogs, fighting like ninjas—anything other than calmly and quietly walking beside me, in the style of Valentina. In these moments, she would cock her head to the side and say, “Oh dear, let me help you.” Sometimes she would take my bags, but other times she would go all Supernanny, and in a treacly voice, say something like, “Hey, kiddos, do you know how to play the quiet game?” When we had playdates on rainy days, Jenna was known to say things like, “Don’t worry, Valentina; I’m sure Joey’s mom is going to have a talk with him about sharing,” and then look at me expectantly. When she put out a tray of crudités for snack time and Quinn asked, “What’s that?” referring, I assume, to the jumbo white asparagus nestled among the carrots, celery, and cucumbers, she said, “Oh, honey, these are organic vegetables with pesto Greek yogurt dip,” her voice dripping with pity, as if the boys had never before seen a vegetable. “This is Valentina’s favorite snack.” Then, in a fake effort to alleviate what she assumed was my great mortification, she stage-whispered to me, “Actually, she doesn’t have a choice.” I felt like she was trying to lure me into some mommy competition. But instead of giving her that pleasure, I retreated further into my slacker-mom persona. If anyone was keeping score, Jenna was surely crushing me, so why not just accept my booby prize? But acknowledging this only further aggravated me: I felt like I should have been a great mom. All the prerequisites had been met: a happy childhood; an affinity for children in general; positive role models in my mother, grandmother, and sister; a supportive spouse; a strong desire to become a mother in the first place. So what was the problem? All signs pointed to some defect of my personality. Still, I preferred to assign little bits of blame here and there, a good chunk going to the complicated feelings churned up by Jenna. Her blog was called My Funny Valentine, and it was a record of everything Valentina ever did or said. It had a cool, spare design and ethereal photos. Each post would wrap up with a bit of parenting wisdom from the mother of this amazing child who did and said only altruistic and hilarious and precious things. The way I saw it, she’d lucked into having a girl with an extremely easygoing temperament and a taste for broccoli, and was going around taking credit for something she actually had very little to do with. She had one post about how she had planned out Valentina’s gradual exposure to screens. Valentina had not touched an iPad and never watched TV, and Jenna claimed to use her phone for emergencies only while she was in Valentina’s presence. Jenna planned to start introducing television in ten-minute increments, slowly building to her first feature film, which would be The Wizard of Oz when she was seven. I love The Wizard of Oz, but I would never admit it to Jenna. It bothered me that our neighbors tended to group us together, assuming we were close friends. There weren’t many kids in our building, which was made up of mostly gay men and elderly people hanging on to their rent-controlled apartments from before the building went co-op. I worked hard to distance myself from her in every way I could. Unfortunately, we have similar tastes in furniture, music, and children’s clothes. And even more maddeningly, I agreed with a lot of what she said about children and parenting in general, but her superiority was so sickening that I fought every instinct to side with her, even if that meant not doing the best thing for my kids. For instance, every time she blathered on about “screen time,” I went home and sat the boys in front of the TV for a healthy dose of it, a prophylactic against ever being in the position to tell some poor beleaguered mother that my children hardly ever watched TV. When she “discovered” Elizabeth Mitchell’s children’s music, I had also recently been playing it for the boys every night while we got ready for bed. When she told me, complete with a smug explanation as to why this was the perfect bedtime music for Valentina, that Valentina sang along so sweetly and that it was their special thing, I pretended like I thought it was fine, but that we usually listened to lullaby versions of Ramones songs. I immediately went inside and downloaded that Rockabye Baby! Ramones album, so it wasn’t really a lie. Monica and Jenna have never met and I don’t plan to introduce them, because I couldn’t bear to watch the carnage that would ensue if Monica got ahold of her. Despite being terribly annoying, Jenna wasn’t a bad person, and I felt slightly—perversely—protective of her. When we were dating, Jake had tried to get me to go to yoga classes with him, but I was a Pilates girl and we became jokingly exclusive to our chosen exercise regime, never crossing the line. Aside from one or two prenatal classes I took four years ago, this was my first real yoga class. Needless to say, Jake and Jenna were the last two people I’d want witnessing a potentially vulnerable or embarrassing moment—let alone hour. I considered staging an emergency with the help of my phone, but I naively thought my years of Pilates and ballet would help me fake my way through the class. As I sat down, Jenna looked impressed that Jake and I knew each other. He was becoming quite famous, and with his sleeve of tattoos, scruffy face, and perfect teeth, he looked the part. “I’ve never seen you here before,” said Jenna. “Yeah, I haven’t taken a yoga class in years,” I said, making an effort to speak slowly and softly. A wiry and kind-faced woman who looked to be some exotic mix of South Asian races approached me and quietly asked, “Is this your first time here?” “Yep,” I said quickly, a bit uncomfortable with her eye contact. “Not your first time to yoga, though?” she said, making a face as if this possibility would be unfathomable. “No, no,” I assured her with a wave of my hand. “Okay, then, we’ll get started,” she said to everyone. I shot the instructor a look that I hoped said, Cover for me—my ex-boyfriend and my archnemesis are here, and I need to look good, okay? Any meaning my look imparted was quickly diminished when she said, “My name is Yiren and this is Flow One. Welcome.” Maybe it’s spending my days with a couple of three-year-old boys, but at the combination of her name, which sounded exactly like “urine,” and the word “flow,” my eyes bulged and I stifled a giggle. A quick scan of the faces in the mirror that spanned the front of the room revealed that I was among mature adults. I wished Monica were there. We would have dissolved into a giggling fit and had to leave the class, embarrassing ourselves, yes, but that would have been preferable to what I endured for the next hour. I had to watch Jenna and Jake to know what to do next, my shoulders weren’t opening the way everyone else’s were, and I kept defaulting to ballet-style turned-out feet and pointed toes, which repeatedly drew Yiren over to correct my stance. My faded Detroit Tigers T-shirt and Old Navy brand yoga pants weren’t helping. Jake and a few of the model types looked straight off the ashram in some loose-fitting linen-hemp blend pants and tight ribbed tank tops, while Jenna and the rest were all wearing the same brand of extremely flattering yoga outfits. I made a mental note to find out where to buy a pair of those pants that made Jenna’s butt look ten times better than it actually was without having to ask her. I muddled my way through the next hour and then rushed out at “Namaste,” without even a glance in Jake’s or Jenna’s direction. To put some extra distance between Jenna and me, I jogged home, dreading the annoying yoga tips she was probably already planning to work into our next hallway encounter. Needless to say, I was not feeling like the goddess I wanted to feel like in order to kick off the sex challenge—plus I needed a dose of Jenna antivenom, so I was relieved to get a “yes” in response to my text to Monica: Need a drink. Wine bar in 1 hour?? Please! I took the stairs two at a time, hoping to catch the boys before they fell asleep and get Leo’s blessing to go back out for a drink. Leo had the boys in pajamas and was reading The Circus Ship on our bed when I came in. I climbed aboard and nuzzled the boys while Leo finished the book, and things were already better. We each took a boy and lay in bed with them, singing, “If I Had a Hammer.” They were asleep before the final verse. I didn’t stop singing until we had crept out of the bedroom. “Hon. Would you mind if I grabbed a quick drink with Monica?” “No. Go ahead. Have fun.” I kissed him on the lips, lingering a
bit longer than our typical goodbye peck, as if to signal forthcoming intimacy and as a “thanks” for always being so cool when I needed to escape. I showered quickly, put on a non-cotton bra and undies, jeans, and a brown knit cowl-neck top, blasted my hair half dry, and ran downstairs. I grabbed a stool at the oval-shaped bar and ordered two of the second-least-expensive glasses of red zinfandel and a cheese and olive plate. With no sign of Monica, I fished my notebook out of my purse and began a letter to Sid, my second that day. Monica showed up just as I had stopped to apply a Spider-Man Band-Aid (also found in my purse) to the writing callus on my middle finger. Looking and smelling fabulous, she planted kisses on my cheeks while I crumpled the Band-Aid wrapper and slid my notebook back into my bag. Monica had been a party girl about town before the twins, so she’s in her element in a bar. “I need your help,” she said, settling into her barstool. She took a sip of the wine I had ordered for her. “Mmm. Thanks.” Then she opened up her laptop and we hovered over her draft post: “The Racist’s Guide to Child Care.” We snickered our way through a completely offensive and simplistic nationality-by-nationality guide to selecting a nanny. It was all based on actual comments we’d heard from other moms. “You’ve got to get a Tibetan; they’re so gentle and calm.” Or, “Jamaicans can cook, and nothing fazes them,” or, “An Eastern European will never complain.” A group of banker types hovered nearby, and a few of them approached Monica at different points during our two hours there. She was ruthless. I felt so bad for them. Sid, who was approached just as frequently, would talk to anyone, which often annoyed me. I’d try to shoot the guys a sympathetic yet firm look that conveyed that they had no shot, despite the confidence they felt in the warm glow of Sid’s smile and eye contact. But they seldom got the hint. I’ve never been one to suffer fools gladly, and so in addition to being the plain sister, I was often also the rude sister. With Monica, I was the plain, but kind, friend, often finding myself stuck talking to some guy she’d just heartlessly rebuffed. I like to think I played each of these roles to equal effect. I’ve never minded being the “friend” or the “sister” of the person of most interest in any given social setting where men are present. But I do fear it’s made me a bit superficial. I don’t mean to, but I catch myself judging people based on their appearance all the time. It’s ironic, really, considering I do things like go to a bar with damp hair. New York June 1 Dear Sid, It took me thirty-six years, but I have finally accepted that I need to put more of an effort into my appearance. I’m sitting in a bar surrounded by people looking lovely and put together in the flickering candlelight and feeling like a bit of a slob. The truth is that I grew up sort of letting that whole area slide because I was always intimidated by you. I guess I was hoping people would assume that I actually looked just like you but I just didn’t try. I didn’t want people to see me in an outfit with my hair just right and makeup on and think, “That’s the best she can do?” It sounds so silly and it’s embarrassing to write it down, but I sometimes have that thought when I see a person who has clearly put a lot of effort into their appearance and the result is kind of meh. I’ll think, Oh, how sad. That is the best they can do. I’m not a nice person, I know, but it’s what has kept me in sweatpants all these years, so maybe that has been my punishment! I guess I wanted to create the illusion that I had potential. At the same time, I took pride in what I felt to be a certain authenticity that comes with not trying too hard. Of course, now I see that authenticity and putting effort into your appearance are not mutually exclusive. The clothes were a start, and this week I have a hair appointment and may just stop by Sephora on the way home. And that’s what’s up with me. Your turn. xoxo, Cass PS—How would you sum up the Filipino people as a whole in regards to child care? When I arrived home, Leo was snoring on the sofa with a bowl of popcorn on the floor next to him. I disappointed myself by feeling a tad relieved that I wouldn’t have to seduce my husband, and after checking on the boys, I climbed into bed with my novel. In the next scene in my book, the main character, a married woman, begins a steamy affair with a sexy drug addict she meets at an art gallery. I put the book down, got out of bed, and went back to regard Leo. His face was a little weathered, but he still looked as handsome as ever—the main difference being that instead of wild and wavy, he wore his dark brown hair shaved close to his head, a preemptive strike against male-pattern baldness. I went to the fridge to pour myself a glass of water and found half of a brownie on the countertop. I knew immediately he had saved it for me. He was always saving me halves of things. If someone at work brought cupcakes, he’d eat half and wrap up the rest for me, keeping it in his bag until after the boys were in bed. He was the first good guy—okay, great guy—I’d ever fallen for. I was always more into the bad boys, and I wondered for a minute where I would be now If I’d married a guy who didn’t save me half of his brownie. Probably in bed with him, I thought, sighing, and went back to my book. I knew it was Jenna by her knock. “Hi, Jenna. What’s up?” I said, hoping to convey with my voice that I didn’t have time for chitchat. “Great yoga class last night, right?” “Eh.” I shrugged. “Where do you normally practice?” I noticed an envelope in her hand. Ignoring her attempt to get me to ask her for yoga advice, I said, “Is that my mail?” “Oh, yeah. I found it in my box.” “Thanks,” I said, holding out my hand. “It looks like fu-un,” she said, looking down at the envelope, annoyingly still in her clutches. I could see that it was from Sid and that indeed it did look fun, with my name in big bubble letters and sparkly rainbow stickers festooning the edges (Lulu’s contribution, no doubt). “You’re lucky I checked. I rarely check my mail.” I gave her a that’s weird look and said, “Okay, thanks, then . . .” But she went on. “I get all my important mail in my PO box. I set it up when I was going through the divorce and I didn’t know where I’d be living.” Damn her. Defeated, I said, “Do you want to come in, Jenna?” “Sure—Valentina’s at school, and I’m stuck on this blog post. I could really use a coffee, if you have any.” Leo was home for the morning, a rare occurrence. Having just finished a wrestling session with the boys, he was sprawled out in the middle of the floor, groaning and stretching while they all watched cartoons together. He’d been working late the night before, so he stayed home until ten to spend some time with the boys. Leo was good like that; he made a point to see them every day, even if it meant dashing home for twenty minutes in the middle of the afternoon. “Leo, are you okay?” Jenna asked. “Oh, hi, Jenna. It’s just my back. I’m not used to our new mattress.” “Here, let me show you something,” she said, sitting down on the carpet beside him and then proceeding to guide him through a few yoga poses, much to the annoyance of Quinn and Joey, whose view of the television was now obscured by Jenna’s and Leo’s butts. That didn’t take long, I thought. I started washing the breakfast dishes, my back to the room, as much to demonstrate my indifference as anything else. Done with Leo, she made her way back over to the table. I poured her a cup of coffee and continued to tidy up while she prattled on about the post she was working on—something about how she talks to Valentina about the “bad nannies” they encounter out at the playgrounds. At some point I joined her at the table. As irritating as I found her, I was glad to sit and drink coffee with an adult for a few minutes while the boys were occupied with Leo. Singapore
