“You have a shirt on under that, I assume?” Caroline said.
“Yes,” Randy said, pulling his sweater over his head. Caroline laughed as she realized that this was the second time in the past two hours that she had watched this man ruin a shirt.
“What?” he said.
“You’re going through shirts left and right today. Aren’t you?”
“I guess I am.”
Caroline applied stain remover to the sweater and tossed it into the ancient appliance.
“What’s all this?” Randy asked, stepping farther into the basement. Spread throughout the dimly lit space were large pieces of furniture covered by thick sheets of plastic. Sofas, armchairs, a dining room table, and a bedroom set along with smaller items—brass candlesticks, a bowling ball, an empty picture frame.
“When we moved from our old house,” Caroline said, “we had to downsize, so Mom moved all the furniture into the basement. All this was supposed to be temporary. She was planning on having a yard sale, but when my sister died, Mom stopped throwing things away. So everything’s just sat down here ever since.”
“She can’t let it go?” Randy said, tracing his finger through the dust on a sheet of plastic.
“I guess not. She hasn’t touched Lucy’s bedroom, either. It’s sort of a shrine to her now.”
“It must be hard to move on when you lose a child,” Randy said. “I can’t begin to even imagine. I remember hearing about your sister when it happened, but I didn’t really know her all that well. I guess I didn’t know you all that well, either.”
Caroline turned the dial on the washing machine and pressed START. “Yeah, we didn’t really travel in the same circles in high school.”
“It’s odd,” he said, “because you and Emily were so close for so long. It’s a shame how people sometimes drift apart.”
How could he not know? He had to know.
“Your mom seems to be doing well now,” Randy said, moving deeper into the basement, as if to inspect every piece of furniture through its milky, plastic sheath.
“It was a long time before she was normal again,” Caroline said. She walked towards the stairs, hoping Randy would follow. She didn’t like it down here. Too many memories. “But if all she’s got to show for what she went through is a basement full of old furniture that she can’t let go of, I’d say she’s doing pretty good.”
Randy stopped beside the bed that her mother and father had shared so long ago. He turned back to her. “And now she runs a pet cemetery and deals with death all the time. Kind of ironic, huh?”
“Not really,” Caroline said. “Mom went from not handling death well at all to becoming an expert on it. Kind of like those people who convert to a new religion. They sometimes become more religious than the people who were born into the religion. Same thing with Mom.”
“I guess she decided to own it,” Randy said.
“Exactly.”
Randy bent down to get a better look at the console television that once dominated their home on Farm Street. “How old were you when your father split?”
“Fifteen,” she said. “Same age as my daughter, actually.”
“Jane, too,” Randy said.
“Yeah? She seems great. I haven’t met your son yet.”
“Jake. He’s twelve. A good kid. A smart-ass, but I think most kids are at his age.”
“Polly certainly is,” Caroline said.
“It must’ve been hard to lose your father at that age.”
“Yeah,” Caroline said. “When he left, I sort of lost my mother, too. I never really got her back.”
“What do you mean?”
“That woman upstairs isn’t the one I grew up with. It’s weird. She’s kind of like a stranger to me. I think Polly knows her better than I do. When I left for college, she was a mess. Depressed. Drinking. While I was gone, she completely transformed herself. I think I’m a little jealous, to be honest. I could never pull off something like that.”
“What happened to your father?” Randy asked. “Do you still see him?
“No. He moved to Florida and never came back. He sent money every now and then, but that was it.”
Randy stepped over to an armchair in the far corner. He pulled back the plastic and ran his hand along an upholstered arm.
“That was my father’s chair,” Caroline said. “He used to read to me in that chair when I was little. It’s so strange how a man go from loving his children so much to just leaving them behind.”
“I’m not cheating on Emily, if that’s what she told you.”
“Emily didn’t tell me anything. And it’s really none of my business.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“It’s really none of my business,” Caroline repeated. “We should head back upstairs. I’ll come back for your sweater after dinner.” She took a couple steps in the direction of the staircase, hoping again that her momentum would pull him along.
Randy sighed. “I’ve been with Emily since we were seventeen. She’s only the third girl I ever kissed. I’d never really flirted with a girl before Emily. I never even flirted with Emily. She asked me out, and I said yes. That was it.”
“You have a wife and kids. We don’t get to do everything we want in life. Sometimes we have to leave things behind.”
“Easier said than done,” he said.
“Not when you have a wife and kids,” Caroline said. “Kids should make things pretty clear. At least it did for me.”
“Are we supposed to give up on our dreams when we get married?”
“If flirting with girls is your dream, you need to rethink your priorities.”
They stood in silence for a moment, a couch and a coffee table wrapped in plastic separating them. Caroline hadn’t noticed, but her hands were balled into fists. She was angry. This man was a little boy, and she found herself feeling sorry for Emily because of it. “I don’t think my mother even knows I’m here. I’d better get upstairs and see if she needs some help.”
She reemerged from the basement into a house of hustle and bustle. A thin, young woman who Caroline didn’t recognize was passing through the hallway into the dining room carrying a large bowl of potato salad. She could hear conversations coming from the kitchen and the living room.
She found her mother and Polly in the kitchen. Her mother was pulling a pan of chicken from the oven. Polly was filling a glass pitcher with water from the tap.
“It’s about time you showed your face,” her mother said. “Polly’s turned my peaceful evening in front of the television into a full-blown party. What was she thinking?”
“I’ve been asking myself the same question,” Caroline said, glancing over at Polly. Polly avoided eye contact, turning quickly in the direction of the dining room with two pitchers of ice water in her hands.
“What’s she up to?” Caroline asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Why the sudden need to invite everyone she knows to your house for dinner?”
“What are you talking about?” her mother asked. “She barely knows any of them.”
“Exactly. Emily’s family, your boyfriend, who you never told me was blind by the way, and George Durrow. That’s a strange guest list.”
“Agnes, too,” her mother added. “Spartacus’s aide. I hate that girl.”
“This doesn’t strike you as a little odd?”
“I don’t know. I think it’s going to be fun. I can’t remember the last time I had this many people for dinner. So you met Spartacus, then?”
“Yeah. Why didn’t you tell me that he’s blind? Or that his name is Spartacus?”
“I don’t know. I guess I didn’t think it’s his most important quality.”
“Okay, Mom. Sure.”
Polly reappeared in the kitchen. “I think we’re all set. Should I put out that chicken, too?”
“No, there should be plenty on the table. I’ll leave this here to cool in case we need more.”
“Polly
,” Caroline said, motioning her to stop. “What’s going on?”
“Dinner. Can’t you tell?”
“I’m serious. What are you doing?”
“I thought it would be nice for you to have dinner with Emily, and I wasn’t going to invite her over alone. Can you give me a break? I’m just trying to do the right thing. Okay?”
It wasn’t okay, and Caroline knew it.
“Caroline,” her mother said. “Go get Spartacus and George from the porch, and then sit down.”
Caroline obeyed her mother’s instructions, escorting the men through the house and to the dining room. Two extra leaves had been added to the table, making it longer than Caroline had ever seen it. The woman with the potato salad was Agnes, who was much younger than her name implied. She rose upon seeing Spartacus enter the room and guided him to a seat beside her. Caroline could see why her mother didn’t like this woman. She and Spartacus moved almost as one.
The dining room chairs were interspersed with stools from the kitchen, an armchair from the living room (which had been placed on the end of the table), and a swiveling desk chair from the office. The Island of Misfit Toys.
“Have a seat wherever you’d like,” Caroline told George and then moved to find a seat for herself. At that moment Emily entered the room, trailed by Jane, a teenage boy who she assumed was Jake, and finally Randy.
“It’s so nice of you to have us for dinner,” Emily said, greeting Caroline with an embrace. “You met Jane earlier, but you didn’t have a chance to meet Jake. Jake, this is Mrs. Jacobs.”
“Please, call me Caroline.” She reached out to shake the boy’s hand. He was tall, already taller than his parents, with a bushy pile of blond hair on the top of his head. He struck Caroline as intelligent and disinterested, not unlike Polly.
“Nice to meet you,” Jake said. His voice was changing. It cracked as he spoke, but he didn’t seem to notice. “So you knew Mom when she was a kid. That’s crazy.”
“You and Emily were childhood friends?” Spartacus asked.
“We were best friends until Caroline moved,” Emily said. “I was so upset when that moving truck drove away. I remember begging Caroline’s mother to let her live with me.”
“I’d forgotten all about that,” Caroline said.
About a week after Caroline’s mother had announced the move, Emily had come up with a plan. “You’re not going anywhere,” she had said. “Trust me.”
When Penelope had arrived home from work that day, Emily, Caroline, and Lucy were sitting at the dining room table. A pot of macaroni and cheese was sitting on the stovetop, steam rising from inside. Bowls of broccoli and corn were sitting on the table.
“Look at this,” her mother said as she entered the kitchen. “You guys finally decided to earn your keep.”
“We just thought it would be nice if you didn’t always have to make dinner,” Emily said. “We know how hard you work.”
“Yeah? Who told you that?”
“We can just tell,” Lucy said. “You’re always so cranky.”
“We know how hard it is to support a family,” Emily said. “We just wanted you to be able to relax a little.”
“That sounds nice on paper, but I don’t believe a word of it. What are you ladies up to?”
“Nothing,” Caroline said. “Just trying to be nice.”
“I’m serious,” her mother said. “Did you burn a house down today? Get arrested for speeding?”
Lucy giggled,
“Mom, just sit.”
Emily poured lemonade while Caroline scooped food onto plates. Lucy summarized The Brady Bunch rerun that she had been watching before dinner. They were all seated and eating when Emily made her pitch. “Mrs. Waters, we have a proposal for you.”
“I knew it,” she said. “Teenage girls aren’t this nice without a reason. Are you a part of this?” she asked, motioning to Lucy.
She giggled again.
“Caroline and I are best friends,” Emily said, launching into a formal tone. “We’ve lived across the street from each other forever. I know you guys aren’t moving that far away, but it feels far to us. We don’t want to be separated. So what I’d like to ask you for is joint custody.”
“What’s joint custody?” Lucy asked.
“Joint custody of Caroline?” her mother asked.
“Exactly. I’d like to have Caroline stay with me for three days a week. We can figure out which days work best, but we were thinking maybe Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, since this is when we spend the most time together anyway.”
“I don’t want Caroline to move away!” Lucy wailed.
“I’m not moving,” Caroline said. “Just doing sleepovers.”
“What do your parents think of this?” her mother asked.
“I haven’t asked my parents yet,” Emily said. “I figured that if you said yes, they couldn’t say no.”
“Very clever, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to say no for them. It’s sweet, but it’s just not how things work. You guys can have all the sleepovers you want, but Caroline can’t live with you. Even on a part-time basis.”
“But Mom,” Caroline pleaded, “it’s only three days a week.”
“You can’t get joint custody of a child just because she’s moving a few miles away from her best friend. It doesn’t work that way.”
“We don’t have to make it legal or anything,” Emily said.
“Besides, I’m going to need you, Caroline. It’s just the three of us now. I need you to take care of Lucy after school. We’re a family. It’s going to be more important than ever that we stick together.”
“We didn’t think about that,” Emily said.
Caroline didn’t care what they had and hadn’t thought about. She was angry at Emily for not pushing harder. But like Emily, she knew there was no hope. That was the difference between Emily and most other children. She knew when the battle had been lost. She knew when to cut her losses. While most kids dug in their heels and fought until voices were raised, Emily understood the concept of living to fight another day.
As she listened to Emily tell the story of their joint custody proposal, Caroline suddenly found herself wondering if Emily really believed that it had been the move that ultimately doomed their friendship. How many kids attempt to negotiate for joint custody of their best friend? Maybe the person she should be angry with was her father, who was responsible for them losing the house. She’d spent so much of her life blaming a teenage girl for her problems, when in reality, it had been her father who had set things in motion. Maybe Polly was right. Maybe Emily didn’t even remember the cafeteria scene. Maybe it was nothing more than a tiny blip on her radar.
“I think that’s sweet,” Agnes said. “Trying to get custody of your friend.”
“Sweet? It was brutal,” Caroline’s mother said, entering the room with a pitcher of ice water in her hand. “Broke my heart. Broke my already broken heart.”
“Everyone take a seat, please,” Polly said, following behind her grandmother. “Mrs. Labonte, can I see you in the kitchen for a second? I could use your advice.”
“Only if you call me Emily,” she said.
“Of course,” Polly said. Something about Polly’s affability froze Caroline’s heart. Something was wrong. Polly was sweet, so something had to be wrong. She rose to follow but was stopped by Randy, who was rolling out the desk chair beside her. “No spills this time. Okay?” he said.
Caroline smiled. “Sure.”
“Your daughter can really pull together a party.”
“She’s always been an impressive young lady,” Caroline’s mother said, entering the room and taking a seat beside Spartacus.
“I’m Agnes, by the way,” the young woman said, waving to everyone around the table.
“I’m sorry,” Caroline’s mother said. “I should’ve introduced you. But this is better anyway. If you could just say hello when I introduce you, then Spartacus will have a sense of where everyone is sitting.”
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Introductions were made. It was all very friendly.
The salad bowl was making its way around the table when Polly entered the dining room. She crossed to the other side of the table a little too quickly in Caroline’s estimation, and plopped down in the armchair at the far end of the table.
It was the satisfied look on her daughter’s face that told Caroline that her suspicions were not unfounded. Something was amiss. Her eyes darted around the table, trying to find the trap, the snare, the spring that was about to be sprung.
It wasn’t until Emily entered the dining room, holding a bottle of wine, that Caroline realized what was happening. She watched Emily stop, scan the table, and furrow her brow.
That was the moment that Caroline knew.
She could not believe Polly’s ingenuity. Even as she filled with horror, she couldn’t help but be impressed with her daughter.
“Where should I sit?” Emily asked, scanning the room.
Caroline knew. She didn’t having to look. There was no empty seat.
A second later, Polly rose from her armchair. “Oh, dear. I dragged in every chair in the house. It looks like we don’t have enough room for you, Emily.”
Caroline began to rise, to put an end to Polly’s plan, but as she did, she saw it, plain as day. A flicker of recognition on Emily’s face.
She knew. And that meant she had not forgotten.
As their eyes met, it was as if the teenage version of Emily Kaplan had returned. Had never left, in fact. It had been there all along, hiding behind oatmeal cookies and admissions of possibly adulterous husbands. In that instant, the Emily Kaplan of old and the Emily Kaplan of new merged into one.
Polly had done it. Recreated history. Brought her mother back to where it had all began. It was Caroline’s moment to finally say what she had wanted to say for so long.
nineteen
Caroline didn’t care that this was the wrong time for a confrontation. She didn’t care that her mother and her mother’s boyfriend and Emily’s immediate family and George Durrow and Agnes the home health aide were all listening. Emily hadn’t cared about the audience around that lunch table, so Caroline didn’t care now.
The Perfect Comeback of Caroline Jacobs: A Novel Page 13
