by Jane Porter
“I know something juicy,” Monica chimes in eagerly.
I shoot Patti a “here we go again” look. Monica Tallman irritates me. She isn’t poor, and she’s not unattractive, but she’s pathetically insecure and compensates for her feelings of inferiority by trying too hard.
The truth is, Monica needs a life. And she needs to stop copying my hairstyle.
Monica throws a hand into her hair, showing off her most recent highlights, which are nearly identical to mine. “The Wellsleys separated this summer,” she announces loudly.
“The Wellsleys?” Kate gasps.
Monica nods, sips her wine cooler, pleased to be the bearer of horrible news. “Apparently Lucy was having an affair.”
“What?” We all turn, shocked, to stare at Monica.
Patti frowns, a deep furrow between dark eyebrows. At least I know she doesn’t do Botox. “I don’t believe it,” she says. “I can’t believe it. Lucy would never do that. I’ve known her for years—”
“She’s on the altar guild at St. Thomas,” Kate adds.
Monica shrugs, lips curving. “Jesus loves a sinner.”
Unbelievable. I drain the rest of my gin and tonic and immediately crave another. Too bad I can’t send one of my girls for the drink, but they don’t sell liquor to minors here.
Monica gives her wine cooler a twirl. “Pete’s going after custody.”
“No.” Now this is going too far. It really is. I know Lucy, too, and she’s a great mother, a good wife, and it would destroy her not to have the kids. Kids need to be with their mother, too.
Well, unless their mother’s a nutcase.
Like mine was.
“Pete thinks he’s got a case.” Monica sounds smug.
I hate it when she’s so smug. I really think she needs to work out with her personal trainer a bit less and volunteer a lot more.
“You can’t take children from their mother,” I defend. “Courts don’t do that. I know it for a fact. Are you sure she’s having an affair?”
“I imagine it’s over now that Pete found out, but Pete’s embarrassed. He paid for her lipo, the implants, the tummy tuck, the eye job, the laser skin treatments, and now he finds out it wasn’t even for him? Fifty thousand later he feels a little cheated.”
Patti’s outraged. “Lucy didn’t even need the work. She did it for him. He’s never been happy, especially with her.”
I nod my head in agreement. Lucy was really attractive, even before all the surgeries, and you know, you couldn’t tell she had that much work done because it was subtle. We knew, because she’d told us, highly recommending her plastic surgeon to us. And in the plastic surgeon’s defense, he was very, very good, and the only way I knew Lucy had done her eyes (before we knew about the plastic surgery) was because she just looked happier.
Apparently, she was happier.
She was getting laid by someone who wasn’t her fat husband.
That’s not a nice thought, and I shouldn’t think thoughts like that, but Pete is big. He’s gained at least thirty-five or forty pounds in the last year or so. Maybe more. When I saw him at brunch a couple of weeks ago, I almost didn’t recognize him. Nathan, who never notices anything like that, leaned over to me and said Pete was a heart attack waiting to happen.
Did that stop Pete from filling up his plate at the buffet? No. In fact, he went back for seconds and thirds—piles of sausages, cream cheese Danishes, eggs Benedict, blueberry-and-sour-cream crepes, strawberries covered in whipped cream. You could hear his arteries hardening as he lumbered back to his table.
I can’t blame Lucy if she didn’t want to sleep with Pete. I wouldn’t want to eat with him, much less do the down and dirty, but an affair . . . ?
I wonder if the sex was good.
God, I hope it was, especially if she’s going to lose the kids.
Shaking my empty glass, I listen to the ice cubes rattle. I want another drink but can’t make myself move. Not just because I’m tired (which I am), but because if I go get another drink, it’s more calories.
I weigh the pros and cons of another drink, knowing that I’m in good shape, but it’s something I work at. Image is important, and the closer I get to forty (oh God), the more I care about my appearance. It’s not enough to be fit. You’ve got to look young, and that’s some serious time and money.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about getting some work done. Nathan says he loves me as I am, thinks I’m perfect, and doesn’t want any artificial bits of me, but if it’d make me better, wouldn’t the pain be worth it?
I tune back in and realize they’re still discussing Lucy and Peter.
“—says he feels like she humiliated him in front of the whole community.”
“Well, I didn’t know until now,” Kate says.
Me either, and my fingers itch to take my phone and call Nathan and see if he’s heard. He used to be in Rotary with Pete. They were both in the Friday morning group that met for breakfast at the golf course across town.
Patti’s frowning. “She’s like us, a stay-at-home mom. So who could she be sleeping with? A UW student? A pool boy? Who?”
“Someone’s husband.” Monica looks like a cat. She’s so pleased with herself that even her ears and eyes are smiling. “Apparently Pete has told the wife, too, and so that’s two families wrecked.”
Wrecked.
The very word conjures up horrible memories, and I suddenly touch my stomach, checking to see if it’s flat. It is. I can feel my hipbones. Good.
The thing to know about me is that I hate fat almost as much as inefficiency, which is why I’m always hungry. I want to eat, but I don’t. Nathan thinks I’m too thin, but he doesn’t know what it’s like always having women look at you, compare themselves with you.
“So where is Lucy now?” I ask.
“I think she’s still in the house. Pete tried to kick her out—and she left for a couple nights—but she returned. Said she wouldn’t leave, that it was her home, so Pete took the kids and left.” Monica stretches, yawns. “God, it’s a gorgeous day. Can you believe this beautiful weather?”
Kate and Patti exchange glances. “So where are Pete and the kids staying?” Kate persists.
“Their place in Sun River.”
But they’ve got to be coming back soon. School starts on Tuesday, and Pete has to work.
Those poor kids. They must be so scared and confused.
I look around the pool for mine. My girls are just yummy. I really shouldn’t brag, but all three are beautiful—you can tell they’re sisters, they all have the same golden skin, long honey blond hair, and big blue eyes. People are always stopping me, telling me the girls should be models. Maybe they will be. I don’t know. We’re just so busy as it is.
“Mom! Mommy!” Tori wails tragically at the edge of the grass, her big beach towel bunched at her feet, her paper plate upside down in her hands. “I dropped my French fries!”
I sigh. My friends chuckle. They know what it’s like, they know what I’m going through. “Go get some more,” I call to her. “They’ll remember you at the counter.”
“Come with me,” she pleads.
“You can do it. Besides, Brooke’s still over there. Catch her before she leaves. Tell her Mommy said to—” But before I can finish, Tori’s running past me.
“Daddy!” she screams, rushing toward Nathan, who has just appeared at the pool.
Smiling, I watch Nathan swing Tori into his arms. We’ve been married eleven years, twelve on Valentine’s Day, and I still think I married the sexiest, greatest man. It’s not just because he has money, either. We’re happy. We have a great life together. I’m lucky. Blessed. Really and truly.
Nathan’s a wonderful father and an amazing provider. You should see our home—as a little girl, I dreamed of someday living in a house like ours—and our three little girls are gorgeous, and Nathan spoils all of us. Constantly. So much so that I feel a little guilty sometimes.
“There’s my beautiful wife,” Nathan says
, walking toward us with Tori still in his arms.
Nathan is a vice president for Walt McKee’s personal holding company, McKee being the founder of satellite communications, and that’s the name of the game here in Seattle: technology. Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Steve Balmer, and Walt McKee are all practically neighbors and if not close friends, acquaintances. I’m not trying to name-drop, it’s just that this is my world, the one I live in. I see the Gateses and McKees and the Balmers everywhere. Our kids play together on the same sports teams, dance at the same ballet studios, swim at the same country club pool, and sometimes attend the same school.
Nathan leans down and kisses me before turning to greet my friends. In the late afternoon light, he looks even more golden than usual, his brown hair sun streaked from swimming, surfing, and playing golf, his warm brown eyes almost bronze. I think he’s more handsome now than when I first met him.
“Hello, honey,” I answer, reaching out to capture his fingers. “How was your day?”
“Good.” He shifts Tori to his other arm, oblivious that Tori’s damp little body has left his shirt wet as well as stained with a splatter of ketchup.
Tipping my head back, I smile up at him. “I didn’t think I’d see you for another hour or two.”
“Escaped early.” He puts Tori down, glances around. “I see Jemma. Where’s Brooke?”
“Eating something somewhere,” I answer.
He nods and pushes a hand through his thick hair—I’m so glad he still has his hair. “I’m going to get a beer. Anybody want anything?” he asks my friends. “Kate? Patti? Monica?”
They all shake their heads, but I can see their eyes feasting on him. I can’t be jealous, either. Let’s face it: Nathan’s feastworthy. Six three, very broad shouldered, and with very nice abs. He works out daily, always has.
“How about you, darling girl?” he asks, turning to me. “Gin and tonic with lots of lime?”
I smile up at him. “I love you.”
“I know you do.”
I watch him walk away, thinking again that I’m so lucky that it sometimes makes me feel guilty, having so much. I certainly didn’t have any of this growing up. Growing up . . .
Growing up was a nightmare.
I shudder, push the thought away, telling myself to focus on the here and now. Everything’s good today. Everything’s great. And it’s not as if I just fell into this amazing life. I worked to get here, worked to make it happen. Now if only I could relax and enjoy it more.
“Oh, my God.” Monica leans forward, grabs Kate’s arm. “Lucy’s here.”
“What?”
Monica nods across the pool. “She’s just walked in, and she’s got the kids.”
Our heads all swivel toward the pool entrance, and Monica’s right. Lucy Wellsley is walking around the deep end of the pool, a beach tote bag over her shoulder, a stack of colorful striped towels in her arms as her three kids, two boys—fraternal twins—and a little girl, all run ahead.
“Should we invite her to join us?” Patti asks, glancing at me.
“I don’t know.” I mean, I feel bad for her, but infidelity? Affairs? This is bad. Really bad.
“She’s brave,” Kate mutters. “I wouldn’t show my face here.”
“Well, I don’t think we have to worry about extending an invitation,” Monica practically purrs. “Because Lucy’s on her way here now.”
Chapter Two
Lucy stands next to us, her arms still bundled around the thick stack of fuchsia and turquoise beach towels. “Hi,” she says brightly. Too brightly.
I feel for her, I do, especially as she has to know that everyone’s talking about her. God, what a nightmare. I’d rather die than be discussed by all the other moms.
Patti stands and gives Lucy and her towels a quick hug. “Hi, stranger,” Patti says. “How are you?”
Lucy’s gotten thin, and not attractively thin. Her eyes look huge in her face, the skin pulled too taut across her cheekbones and jaw, ruining the effect of all her expensive work. “Fine. What are you girls up to?”
“Not much,” I answer, and really, my troubles are nothing compared with her drama.
“When did you get back in town?” Monica asks.
Lucy appears momentarily rattled. “I’ve been here.” There’s a pause. “Was I supposed to be out of town?”
Monica has the grace to blush. “Sorry. I was thinking of Pete.” No one says anything, and Monica adds even more awkwardly, “He was the one out of town. He had the kids, right?”
Lucy’s fingers tighten on the towels, her fingers and knuckles shades of purple and white. She swallows hard. “They’ve just come home.” Her voice has dropped and deepened, reminding me of bruises. “It’s been a month since I’ve had them. Or seen them.”
I can’t help glancing toward her kids, who are in the pool, jumping and diving as though they haven’t a care in the world, and my chest tightens.
They’re pretending. Kids do that so well. Pretend to forget. Pretend you don’t feel. Pretend you don’t remember.
We had to do that in our family, too, when my parents divorced. Act like you’re just a kid and you don’t hurt. Act like you feel nothing and all you care about is your TV show and your bowl of ice cream. Because you are only a kid, right, no real feelings developed yet. . . .
Nathan returns just then with our drinks and welcomes Lucy with a genuinely warm hug and hello. “Hello, Lucy,” he says, handing me my drink before leaning down to kiss her cheek.
She stands stiffly, her body at an angle as though afraid to be caught touching him.
“Hi, Nate,” she says, using her husband’s nickname for Nathan. I’d never call Nathan “Nate” in a thousand years, but for some reason all Nathan’s friends shorten it up.
“Sit down,” he says, gesturing to our grouping.
Lucy looks at us, her eyes nearly as lavender blue as her voice. She’s depressed. It’s there, all over her face. I bite down, uncomfortable. “That’s okay,” she answers, sensing correctly that she’s not wanted.
Nathan shakes his head. “No, I insist. Let me get you a chair.”
“Nate, no. I can do it. Honestly. I’m not sick.”
But Nathan’s already gone to locate a chair, and once he’s returned we all settle into a rather stilted conversation about the coming school year and the start of soccer, although Patti’s boys have been playing football for nearly three weeks already.
Our kids appear periodically with requests for food and drink and ice cream, requests we all manage to resist to varying degrees.
“Hey, isn’t our book club meeting soon?” Patti asks with a small self-satisfied stretch. It’s nice just sitting here, feet up. The kids are happy. We’re happy. There’s nothing we have to do.
“One week,” I answer. I’m hosting the September meeting. Haven’t even thought about book club in a while. “I guess I better get reading.”
“You haven’t read The Glass Castle yet?” Monica’s lips purse disapprovingly.
I flex my toes. “It just sounds so depressing. Another memoir about a dysfunctional family. I mean, haven’t we read that already?”
“Book club isn’t genre reading, Taylor. We’re not just reading for the plot, but the beautiful prose.”
“I don’t find poverty, abusive parents, and alcoholism beautiful. No matter how one writes about it.” I’m irritated now. I don’t know why everyone gets such a vicarious thrill out of reading about childhood pain. I certainly don’t. “I wish we’d pick some different books this year. More uplifting subjects, maybe even some nonfiction.”
Monica rolls her eyes. “The Glass Castle is nonfiction.”
Monica so annoys me. I can’t even believe that we pretend to be friends. I don’t know why she does it. I do it because she’s Patti’s childhood friend, and Patti says she has a good side, although I haven’t seen it.
“The point is,” I answer, folding my hands neatly in my lap, “that we’ve read lots of stuff like this before, and I t
hought we could maybe read something more uplifting.”
Monica laughs. “Like what? The Secret?”
My face suddenly feels hot. She knows I’ve been reading the book and have it on DVD, too.
Thankfully, Nathan saves me from having to answer by placing his palm on my bare thigh. “We should head home.” He lightly rubs down to my knee. “Feed the kids dinner.”
Grateful, I cover his hand with mine and squeeze. I’m ready to go. My little gin-and-tonic buzz has abruptly worn off, and all I want to do is escape. Rising, I start gathering the girls’ things, organizing the sundresses and sandals to expedite getting to the car. It’s while I tuck suntan lotion and little-girl sunglasses into the tote bag that I hear Nathan invite Lucy over.
“We’re just throwing some salmon steaks on the grill,” Nathan is saying to Lucy, “and I can pick up some burgers on the way home for the kids. Why don’t you join us?”
My head jerks up.
Lucy for dinner? Lucy to our house . . . tonight? After the day I’ve had? No, Nathan, no. I don’t want company over. I’m not in the mood to entertain, and if I was in the mood, it wouldn’t be Lucy.
“That’s so nice of you, Nate,” Lucy answers, “but I don’t want to put you and Taylor out—”
“If it were an inconvenience, I wouldn’t have offered.” Nathan smiles down at her. “We haven’t seen much of you lately, and it’d be good to catch up.”
“Let me go talk to the kids. We were just going to hang out here until they kicked us out, but it’d be fun to go to your house. We . . . haven’t seen much of our friends this summer.”
She disappears, and I just stare at Nathan. He sees my expression. “What?” he demands quietly, hands outstretched.
My friends turn their heads away while I just keep staring at Nathan. I hear Patti start talking about the back-to-school brunch as Nathan crosses to my side.
“I thought she was one of your friends,” he hisses.
“She is,” I hiss back. But my tone isn’t convincing. I don’t know if Lucy and I are still friends. Angrily, I stuff Brooke’s terrycloth jacket into the tote. “It’s just been a busy day, Nathan—”
