The Secret Ingredient for a Happy Marriage

by Shirley Jump

  “Anna and Sarah are friends. They sold Girl Scout cookies together last year in front of the Stop and Shop and then we went out for ice cream.” As if sharing some Samoas and a couple cones of mint chocolate chip was enough to convince Sister Esther that she was mistaken about the kids involved.

  “Well, sadly, sometimes friendships turn. I don’t know what happened between Anna and Sarah, but today on the playground, Sarah was…” Sister Esther’s face pinched, and the sympathy vanished. “Well, she had Anna up against the wall, and she was threatening to hit her. Anna was very clearly frightened. Anna tried to get away, Sarah grabbed her, and they ended up on the ground. The fight went on for several seconds before one of the teachers broke it up. No one was hurt, but there are consequences, as you know.”

  The clock on the wall ticked. A bell rang, and a second later, there was a low roar in the halls. Nora couldn’t find her voice.

  Sarah had beat up another girl? In third grade? A girl who was her friend? Why?

  “I realize how hard this is to hear,” Sister Esther went on. “And I’m just as surprised as you are, believe me. Because Sarah is such a good student and has not been in this kind of trouble before, I’m going to meet with her teachers before meting out an appropriate discipline. There will be some kind of suspension, I’m sure. Maybe even…” The nun let out a breath. “Well, let’s see what the consensus is before we talk about extreme options.”

  Like expulsion. Nora shook her head. This couldn’t be happening. Maybe all of it—the auction notice, the fight with Ben, this meeting—was some kind of bizarre uber-realistic dream. Maybe that was what Ben was doing—ignoring reality and walking around in some fantasy of everything being okay.

  “I can’t believe Sarah would do such a thing,” Nora said. “You can rest assured, Sister Esther, that her father and I will talk to her.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. It’s always a good thing when the parents are involved and on board. However, you need to know that if Sarah can’t learn from this lesson and start being nice to the other children, then…we will have to expel her.” The nun sighed. “I really don’t want to do that. I have enjoyed having another generation of O’Bannon girls at this school. You four girls were always such a bright part of my days.”

  The nun went on to mention possibilities for discipline and remediation. Things like meetings with a counselor, some time spent after school doing menial chores and weekly parental check-ins, while Nora’s mind whirled around the information that her daughter had been brawling on the playground. Nora thanked Sister Esther, then headed out of the principal’s office. She stopped by the receptionist’s desk, made up a doctor appointment for Jake, and then signed both kids out for the day. Given the fight Sarah had been in, both she and Sister Esther had agreed it would be best for Sarah to go home and Nora didn’t want to come back up here in a few hours to get Jake. Now Nora was lying to the nuns. Maybe all this was God’s way of giving her a little warning smack about the Ten Commandments.

  She went into the hall to wait for Jake. Sarah was still sitting on the bench, her gaze locked on the tile floor.

  Nora bent down in front of her daughter. Tears hung on the ends of Sarah’s eyelashes, and her nose was runny. Any anger and shock Nora had felt in the principal’s office disappeared. Nora wanted to scoop her up and tell her that it would all be okay, like she had so many times before. Instead, Nora fished a tissue out of her purse and dabbed at her daughter’s face. Sarah drew back, again, an almost imperceptible distance. The first time, Nora could write it off as embarrassment or upset, but the second time the cold front moved in between her and her daughter, there was no denying Sarah was avoiding Nora’s touch. When they were out of the shadows of St. Gregory’s, Nora would see if she could figure out what was wrong. “Honey, let’s go home, okay? Then we can talk.”

  “I don’t wanna talk.”

  “That’s okay, for now. I signed Jake out so you two can skip out of school early today,” Nora said, trying to make the whole thing sound like a fun-fun idea. “You guys can come to the bakery with me, and then tonight, how about we go to Grandma’s house?”

  Sarah shook her head. “I wanna go home. I don’t wanna go to Grandma’s house.”

  “Grandma’s house is fun,” Nora said, still in that peppy, this-is-awesome voice. “And I bet she’ll make you guys some cookies. We can rent a movie and stay up late.”

  When Sister Esther had mentioned consequences, Nora was pretty sure the nun didn’t mean cookies, movies, and delayed bedtimes. Nora knew she should be harsher, angrier, but she couldn’t summon up the energy right now. In the scheme of things, a playground fight ranked a lot lower than homelessness.

  “I wanna sleep in my room,” Sarah said. “I wanna read my Harry Potter books. I wanna see Daddy.”

  Three things that Nora couldn’t give her daughter right now. Jake came bounding down the hall, his usual affable self, and saved Nora from an answer. “Hi, Mommy,” Jake said. “Sister Mary said I get to go home early. Do I gotta go see the doctor?”

  Nora ruffled Jake’s dark brown hair and smoothed the unruly waves he’d inherited from his father. “Nope, no doctor. Just a fun day at the bakery with me, Aunt Bridget, and Grandma. And then we can go stay at Grandma’s house and have a sleepover. Sound good?”

  “Yeah! I love going to Grandma’s!” Jake, the child who took everything in stride, who rarely complained, danced beside Nora as the three of them walked down the hall and out to the car.

  Sarah didn’t say a word. When had her eight-year-old gone from bubbly and talkative to silent and sullen? In those hours when Nora had stayed late at the bakery, pouring herself into the job, because that was the only place where she could feel like she had some kind of control? Or on those nights when Nora had paced the kitchen, drowning in a pile of bills and demand letters, trying to balance a budget that was forever uneven? Or in those weeks when Nora had drawn into herself, while her husband was gambling their future away?

  Ben should have been there for the kids when Nora couldn’t be. Ben should have picked up the slack, especially when he knew how many hours Nora worked. His job was more flexible, since he was the boss and could set his own hours. Ben should have checked the homework and grades. As usual, he’d left her to juggle everything. Her job, the bills, the kids. Yet another reason why Nora wasn’t answering his texts or heading home.

  The kids climbed into the car, Jake talking a mile a minute, Sarah ignoring everyone. Nora engaged in a half-hearted conversation with her youngest while she drove, but her gaze kept flicking to Sarah. Her daughter had her backpack clutched to her chest, chin on the gray fabric, her face sour and sad.

  Nora parked in the back of the bakery beside her mother’s car. By the time she helped Jake unbuckle, Sarah had already gone inside. Ma was waiting at the back door when Nora pulled it open, her face expectant. Across the kitchen, Bridget was on the phone, taking an order. She had given the kids a quick hello, sent a wave in Nora’s direction, and then went back to the call. Iris was mixing dough in one of the massive stand mixers, watching the arm revolve and giving the recipe nervous glances from time to time.

  “Half day?” Ma asked, with a judgmental arch of her brow.

  Just once, Nora wanted to walk in this building when she was having a bad day and not be subjected to an FBI-worthy interrogation. Just once, she wished her mother would give her a hug and leave her alone.

  “Something like that.” Nora told Jake and Sarah to go out front and pick a cookie. When the kids were gone, she turned to her mother. “Can we, uh, come stay with you tonight?”

  “Stay with me? Why?” Colleen’s gaze narrowed, and she leaned closer.

  “Ben is…uh…finishing up the kitchen renovation. I won’t have a sink or stove while he’s doing that, and the house will be a mess. With the kids, it’s just…tough.”

  In the space of twenty-four hours, she’d lied to her sister, a nun, her kids, and her mother. She was pretty sure she’d just bought h
erself a one-way ticket straight to hell. Do not collect two hundred dollars. Do not pass purgatory.

  Ma cocked her head and studied Nora for a moment. It was like being in front of the headmistress all over again. Nora held her ground, keeping that fake smile on her face until her cheeks hurt. “It’ll be nice to spend time with my grandchildren,” Ma said. “And since you’re busy here and I have a little free time in the afternoon, why don’t I get them from school tomorrow so they won’t have to go to that day care?”

  “That would be great.” One less bill to pay, a bill Nora couldn’t afford anyway. “Thanks, Ma.”

  The assessing look returned. Ma put a hand on Nora’s cheek. “Are you okay? You look a little pale. Are you sleeping enough? Eating enough?”

  “I’m fine, Ma. Just fine.” The immortal phrase used by everyone in the O’Bannon family. A phrase that had become Nora’s mantra. If she kept saying everything was okay, then maybe by some weird law of attraction or last-minute miracle, it would be.

  Iris wasn’t entirely useless. She was quiet, so quiet that Nora forgot she was there. She did whatever Bridget or Nora asked, with minimal questions. They kept her on simple tasks—mixing dough, filling baking pans, washing dishes. Around three, she asked if she could leave. Iris toed at the floor for a second and spoke more words than she had since she’d arrived. “Is it okay if I go now? My friend has a doctor appointment ’cause she’s, like, pregnant, and she broke up with her boyfriend because he, like, plays Xbox all day and treats her like crap.”

  Ben might have been far from perfect as a husband, but he had been there for every OB appointment and had been there to hold Nora’s hand, rub her back, and talk her through the labor and delivery with that calm, quiet voice of his. She could only imagine how hard the road ahead would be for Iris’s friend. “Iris, if your friend needs some baby clothes, I have plenty left over from the kids. I’d be glad to put together a box.”

  “That’s really nice of you,” Iris said, her face bright with surprise at the offer, which made Nora wonder what kind of world the girl lived in where this kind of thing was a shock. “She’s on, like, food stamps, and baby things are expensive.”

  Nora didn’t have the heart to tell Iris that those expenses only grew as the kids did. Not to mention the stress. A box of hand-me-down onesies and bibs was about all Nora could offer right now.

  “No problem on leaving early, Iris,” Bridget said. “When you come in tomorrow, we can set up a more official schedule.”

  “Okay. I…I appreciate it. I’m trying to help my mom out.”

  “Well, as long as you keep working out like this, you’ll have a job,” Bridget said.

  “Okay.” Iris lingered a moment, worrying her bottom lip, as if she had more to say. Instead, she took off her apron and headed out the door, with only a quiet goodbye sent in Colleen’s direction. As Iris exited, she stepped to the side, making room for a tall man in jeans and an old Stones T-shirt to enter.

  Ben.

  For a second, Nora’s heart forgot everything that had happened. She saw the stubble on his cheeks, the one untameable wave of hair, the rippled muscles of his arms, and the solid wall of his chest. Ben had worked in construction since he was fifteen, and even though he had his general contractor’s license now, he preferred to be hands-on, transforming a pile of wood and plaster into a celebrity-worthy bathroom or gourmet chef kitchen. The defined muscles and flat plane of his stomach showed how hard he worked, and despite everything, Nora’s body still reacted to his. Damn it.

  She wanted to hate him, and maybe a part of her did. The part that felt betrayed, the part that had been alone and sobbing on the bathroom floor, waiting for a husband who was on a three-day bender of slot machines and roulette wheels. That anger simmered beneath the surface, like a tsunami behind a dam. She’d never talked about it, never told Ben about that night. Instead, she kept those emotions tucked deep inside the crevices of her mind.

  Sarah and Jake broke into a run, barreling across the shop’s tile floor and straight into Ben. “Daddy!”

  “Hey, guys!” Ben chuckled and scooped up both kids, one in each arm. “What are you two doing here?”

  “Mommy said we got to get outta school early, ’cause we’re having a fun day,” Jake said. “And tonight, Gramma’s making us cookies, and we’re gonna watch a movie at her house.”

  “Are you coming to Gramma’s too, Daddy?” Sarah asked.

  Ben lowered the kids to the ground and put a hand on Sarah’s shoulder. “Let me talk to your mom about that, okay?”

  Nora cut her gaze away from the question in Ben’s face, the hope in the kids’ eyes. “Ma, could you watch the kids for a minute? I want to talk to Ben…without little ears around.” She kept her tone light, as if they were going to talk about something mundane like Sarah’s birthday party, not the end of their marriage.

  “Sure, sure.” Ma bent down to her grandkids. “Who wants to help me finish putting up the Halloween decorations? I think we need more cobwebs, don’t you?”

  Nora left her apron on the counter and headed out the front door with Ben. They walked a little while in silence, ambling down the sidewalk and away from the nosy stares on the other side of the plate glass windows of the shop. A part of Nora wanted to let the silence linger because then she wouldn’t have to talk about the rest, all those things about their relationship that she hadn’t faced as the bills stacked up and the stress threatened to overwhelm her. But doing that had left her with a dying marriage, an empty bank account, and a repossessed house.

  “I’m not coming home, if that’s what you’re here to ask me,” she said finally. “Either way, there’s no home to go to.”

  “Home is what we make it, Nora.”

  She scoffed. “Let me get you some linen so you can embroider that into a little sampler and hang it on the wall.”

  “Can we talk about this without the sarcasm, please?” Ben’s face pinched into a scowl. “I want you to come home, Nora. You and the kids.”

  “Home? What fucking home, Ben?” She shook her head. “Home is a place you can depend on, a place you know your kids are going to wake up in every day, a place you are sure they will go to sleep in every night. Our home is on the auction block. It’s not ours anymore.”

  They skirted a planter filled with chrysanthemums, blooming bright yellows and oranges. Georgi, the owner of the flower shop next door to the bakery, gave Nora a little wave as she passed. She nodded in return, pasting a smile on her face. That everything-is-fine smile she had perfected since childhood.

  Ben ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “I don’t know what you want me to do, Nora.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Ben. It’s too late. I think…” She drew in a breath, let it out again. She couldn’t keep lying to herself or to Ben. The truth had been right there in front of her on all those nights she sat home alone, and in all those moments when she looked at the man she thought she used to know and realized he’d become a stranger. “I think we should separate. Officially.”

  He stepped in front of her. His body blocked the sun, and a cool shadow dropped over her. “Are you asking me for a divorce?”

  She looked up into eyes that used to be filled with love and understanding, not the cold distance she saw now. She caught the scent of his cologne on the breeze, a mix of warmth and sawdust. They might have had something wonderful once, but every disappointment, every hurt, every loss had whittled away what was left of their relationship. She was tired of fighting. Tired of hurting. Tired of hoping. “Yes, Ben, I want a divorce.”

  He stared at her for a long, long time, his features hardening. “So you’re giving up.”

  “No, I’m not. I’m accepting reality. Maybe you should try that sometime.”

  He threw up his hands and started walking again, his steps hitting the pavement with hurried, angry thuds. “What the fuck do you want out of me, Nora? I’m working as hard as I can, going to meetings, groveling—”

  “Groveling? Really?
You fucked up our lives, Ben.” She grabbed his hand and spun him back to face her. “You lost tens of thousands of dollars. You didn’t pay the bills. You didn’t stay involved with the kids, and now Sarah is probably going to be kicked out of St. Gregory’s for fighting—”

  “Sarah got into a fight?” Concern erased the anger in Ben’s face, and for a second, he was her husband again, the man who had held her hand in that delivery room and calmed her when the pain got too hard to bear. “Is she okay?”

  She refused to fall for the look in Ben’s eyes again. He might have been in that delivery room, but he had also deserted her when she needed him most. “She’s fine. I took care of it, Ben. Like I have taken care of everything else from the day we got married. And don’t worry, I’ll take care of the divorce too.”

  THREE

  On the nights when the panic set in and sleep eluded Nora, she would lie on the couch under a blanket her grandmother had knitted, watching shows about gold miners or hoarders or strange medical procedures. One night, between infomercials for acne medicine and rotisserie ovens, there’d been a documentary about some woman who had a rare disease that could only be treated in a hyperbaric chamber. She’d lain in that glass coffin, breathing extra-oxygenated air, while medical staff sat outside, watching her every breath.

  That was what being at her mother’s house was like. Ma had intuition that would make Sherlock Holmes jealous, and she’d sensed something was up from the minute Nora asked if they could stay there for the night. The renovation excuse was as thin as rice paper, but it was all Nora could come up with.

  After Ben left, Nora went back to baking and frosting, using the repetition of work to keep herself from thinking. She’d told the kids their father had to go back to work and would call them later. Jake had pouted until Ma put him to work turning the stand mixer on and off as she whipped up more cake batter.