by Robin Brande
The way he had looked at her...
Not just shame, but maybe regret. Just a small touch of regret.
Maybe if he had known she’d be coming back, he would have waited the two months. Eliza doubted it, but she was willing to imagine. Just for this moment. Just for the sake of argument.
He would have waited and welcomed her back. Taken her into his arms and into his bed the very first night. Picked up where they’d left off, and made her fall even harder for him.
That was the problem, Eliza thought. The inevitable what if of that fantasy of hers. She might not have known—not for a long time. She might have come back to him and believed he was the right second man for her. She would have lied to herself—let him lie to her. When all along she was disposable. “We can do this as long as we want.” And when he didn’t want her anymore, there she would be, that much deeper in, that much further up the cliff. No safety, just her foolish belief that he would hold her, no matter what.
And that’s when he’d cut the rope.
32
“What do you want to do for your birthday?” Eliza asked.
“Saw this cast off,” Hildy answered.
“Besides that. Should I throw you a party?”
“And invite who?” Hildy said.
“I don’t know, Frank Sawyer maybe...”
Hildy scowled. She’d been doing that a lot more lately. Eliza knew the woman was on her last nerve, having to be dependent for so long. It didn’t suit Hildy’s personality. But there wasn’t much they could do about it. At her appointment the day before, the doctor confirmed it would be at least four more weeks before he could take the cast off.
Even after that, Hildy would still need about a month of rehab before the doctor would sign off on her driving. Hildy took the news hard.
“I’m not an old lady!” she’d complained to Eliza on the way home. “But I feel like one with you having to take me everywhere.”
“Just pretend you’re rich,” Eliza said. “It has nothing to do with your age. I thought fancy New Yorkers have drivers take them everywhere.”
“Not in a piece of crap car,” Hildy pointed out. She’d gotten it back from the shop, finally, and both she and Eliza agreed they preferred the rental car. Even with the rear damage fixed, the frame made strange, creaking noises, and seemed ready to fall apart any minute.
Now Eliza did her best to cheer up her mother-in-law.
“Let’s have a party where everyone has to eat with one arm tied behind their backs—and it has to be their good arm. Then we’ll serve Chinese food and make everyone eat with chopsticks.”
Hildy cracked the slightest of smiles.
“I think it’ll be good for you to see people spilling food all over their chests,” Eliza said. “Then we can criticize their table manners.”
“Just a quiet dinner at home, Lizzy. It’s just another birthday.”
“It’s your seventieth birthday, and you and I have had enough quiet dinners at home to last us forever. I’m throwing you a little party, so you might as well be happy about it.”
“Can I consult on the guest list?” Hildy asked.
“Yes, as long as no one’s last name begins with W.”
* * *
Eliza didn’t recognize the phone number displayed on her screen.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Lizzy, it’s Livia.”
Lizzy?
“Let’s grab coffee this morning. I just finished my meeting early, and I don’t have to be across town until ten. You’re on my way—I’m driving toward you right now. So get dressed and I’ll be there in ten minutes. See you!”
She hung up before Eliza could slip in a word.
Eliza stared at her silent phone.
“Who was that?”
“Livia Keane.”
Hildy made a face. “What did she want?”
“To be best friends, apparently. She’s picking me up for coffee.”
“When?”
“Right now.”
“You’re not going, are you?”
It was a reasonable question. Eliza had absolutely no interest in being Livia’s friend, and in fact, found the woman repulsive.
“No,” Eliza said. “You’re right. I’m not going. I’d rather clean out your basement.”
“Good,” Hildy said, “it needs it.”
Eliza carried their breakfast dishes to the sink.
“You know why she wants to, don’t you?” Hildy asked.
“No idea.”
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”
“I’m not her enemy,” Eliza said. “I just don’t like her.”
The doorbell rang. Daisy barked as if burglars had just broken in.
“There’s something fishy,” Hildy said as Eliza headed down the stairs.
“Maybe so,” Eliza said, “but we’ll never know. I’m sending her away.”
* * *
Eliza replayed the whole scenario in her head afterward, trying to understand how it happened.
It was because Livia was so disarming.
“I wish I could dress like that,” Livia said, embracing Eliza and pressing a cool cheek against hers. “You always look so comfortable. I have to wear these.” She tugged up the hem of her slim black pants and showed Eliza the chunky high heel of her boot. “You probably never had to deal with corporate life. I love the clothes sometimes, but sometimes I’d rather leave the house in sweats and a big shirt and tell people, ‘This is what you get,’ like you do. So,” she asked, “are you ready?”
“Uh...no, actually. I have some work around here that I need to do for Hildy.”
“No! Come on,” Livia said, “I’m dying for a girls’ date. I’ve just been meeting with four fat farmers—hm, that’s a nice slogan—and I’m sure the minute I left they all grabbed their crotches and spit out their chaw. I need girl energy—female energy. And four shots of espresso. Come on, Lizzy, there’s a little café in the village, no one will see you. You don’t even have to comb your hair. Let’s go right now.”
In the coffee shop, Livia paid for Eliza’s drink, waving away any objection. “I’m sure I make five times what you do,” she said with a friendly laugh. “You go ahead and sit down.”
Eliza watched while Livia placed their order, complimenting the barista on her hair. “Is that naturally curly? Ugh. You know we straight-haired girls hate you.” Livia laughed. “But then you probably hate us, too.” When the barista agreed, Livia stuffed an extra large tip in her jar. Then she carried the two to-go cups to the table.
Livia pulled the lid off her own, closed her eyes and drank deeply. While Eliza watched the performance. It really was a performance—all of it, Eliza thought. From the costumes Livia wore—today it was black wool pants, black boots, a black knit turtleneck, and a hip-length red wool jacket—to the way she made sure her voice carried throughout a room. No wonder men like Ted and David noticed her. It would be impossible not to.
“So, are you working on something?” Livia asked her.
“Uh, sort of. I’m always basically working.”
“Me, too,” she said, sighing. “I live and breathe the job. That’s why I need to grab these times whenever I can.” She reached over and squeezed Eliza’s hand. “I need this, don’t you?”
Like a daily blow to the head.
“So, how did that class go the other night?” Livia asked. “It looked like a nice turnout.”
“Oh, yeah, it was.” Eliza’s stomach tightened. She hoped Livia wouldn’t say any more about that night.
“Ted is very happy, you know,” she went on. “Those classes have been a success. Tell Hildy she’s very popular. Ted is always looking at the numbers.”
Eliza nodded. She wasn’t sure how to respond.
“So,” Livia began again. “Let’s just clear the air.”
Oh, please, Eliza thought, let’s not.
“I know about you and David. He told me all about it.”
Eliza could feel the
color drain from her face.
“Those Walsh boys are...” Livia drew in a deep breath and shivered as if shaking off her feathers. “Well, I think we both know. The point is, men move on, don’t they? Much more easily than women, I think. I’ve always wondered about that: Is it because they’re externally-driven, and we’re internal? We take them into our bodies, but for them it’s...” She shrugged. “Maybe more mechanical. I think it’s harder on us emotionally, don’t you?”
Eliza just stared at her, trying to keep her face as expressionless as possible.
“David is so...” Livia looked off to the side. “What’s the word?”
Eliza didn’t help her.
“Physical. I think that’s it,” Livia said. “He lives very much in his body.”
From that point forward, Eliza hardly heard anything else that she said. She felt a million miles removed, staring down from above at the scene of her and that horrible woman. It was like finding herself trapped somewhere without any means of escape, and all she could do was hope she would wake up soon and know it had all been a dream.
Livia glanced at her slim gold watch. “Oh! I have to go.” She had ordered the largest size coffee they had, and now threw away half of it untouched. “Thank you so much for coming out with me. I feel so much better already.”
Eliza, on the other hand, felt as if she’d been pushed off a mountainside and landed on her back a thousand feet below. And still had to get up and drag herself out of the canyon even though every single bone in her body was broken.
“Thanks, doll,” Livia said as she dropped her off. “You have saved my morning.”
Eliza drifted back into the house, feeling that the whole conversation had been unreal.
When she rose up the stairs she found her mother-in-law waiting for a report.
“So, did she sleep with him?” Hildy asked.
“Which one?”
33
“Happy Birthday, Hildy,” Frank Sawyer said. He handed her a cellophane-wrapped bouquet of flowers with the Walsh’s Fine Foods sticker still on them. “Hope you like roses.”
“Roses, Hildy, isn’t that nice?” Eliza said, giving Frank an approving nod.
“How old are you?” Hildy asked him.
“Seventy-five.”
“How do you like it?”
“Okay so far,” he said.
“Do you feel old?”
“Older than you,” he said.
Satisfied, Hildy told him, “Go ahead and stick around.”
There were only six other guests in the living room: all three Jacksons; a woman named Irene, whom Hildy knew from the fabric store; and the neighbors from across the street, Mr. and Mrs. Nolan. Mr. Nolan drove a car that leaked oil in their driveway—an eyesore that Hildy always resented—but she’d forgiven him for the sake of the party and now treated both of them very cordially.
“This is Frank Sawyer,” she told them. “He runs the Independent.”
“The independent what?” Mr. Nolan, who appeared to be in sixties, asked Frank.
“Careyville Independent,” Frank told him. “You read it, I suppose?”
“Never miss it,” Mr. Nolan answered.
“Good,” Frank said. “That makes one.”
Katie seemed bored. Eliza went over to her, tugged on her sleeve, and motioned her into the kitchen.
“Do you know how to decorate a cake?” Eliza asked.
“Uh-huh, I’m really good at it.”
“Good, because I’m horrible,” Eliza said. “I bought all these supplies, but I have no idea how to use them.” She showed Katie her collection of sparkles, candles, and tubes of colored frosting. “Can you do something really nice for Hildy? I think she’d really like that.”
Katie tackled the assignment with fervor. “Did you make this cake?”
“I did,” Eliza confessed.
“It looks good.”
“Thank you. I hope it is.”
Eliza heard the doorbell ring again. She wasn’t expecting anyone else.
“Can you take over?” she asked Katie. “I trust you. Make it great.”
“I will,” Katie told her, then set seriously about her task.
Eliza sent Hildy an inquiring look on her way toward the stairs. Hildy shrugged and went back to talking to Frank. Eliza liked that the two of them had something to say to each other. She hoped they might say something together more often.
She opened the door. To be greeted by a bouquet of roses twice as big as Frank’s.
Ted shifted the roses aside, drew Eliza in by the waist, and kissed her on the cheek. “Remember me?” He left his hand on her hip. She pointedly removed it.
“Are those for Hildy?”
“Of course,” he said. “Who else?”
“Did she invite you?”
“Not exactly,” he said, “but word travels. And since she’s my favorite lady over the age of thirty-one, I thought I’d swing by and wish her Happy Birthday.”
Eliza glared at him suspiciously.
“What?” he asked. “Didn’t you miss me?”
“Not particularly.”
“Heard my brother dumped you.”
“Ted.” She made a move to push him back outside the door, but he chuckled and swept her into one arm again.
“Don’t be so sensitive, beautiful. We all make mistakes. He made a big one. But now I’m here and it wouldn’t hurt you to be friendly. We’re still friends, aren’t we?”
Hildy appeared at the top of the stairs. “Teddy!”
“Hello, Mrs. Shepherd,” he said, doing his best imitation of a young man in a 1950s sitcom. “I heard you turned fifty today.”
“I’m not afraid of my age,” Hildy said.
“Okay, then, sixty,” Ted said, “but that’s my final guess.” He flashed a smile at Eliza as he mounted the stairs.
* * *
Frank Sawyer’s eyebrows nearly disappeared into his hairline. Eliza shook her head in warning. If he thought he was going to pester her about Ted later, ask her questions, wheedle some sort of juicy gossip out of her, he was dead wrong. Eliza returned to the kitchen to check on her cake decorator’s progress.
“Katie! That looks fantastic!”
The girl stepped back and admired her own creation. “You like it? I put the flowers on the sides and on the top so people would get two of them on each slice.”
“I can’t believe it,” Eliza said. “You’re really good.”
Carolyn Jackson came into the kitchen. “Beautiful!” she told her daughter, but she wasn’t really there for that.
“What’s he doing here?” she mumbled to Eliza from the side of her mouth. They could hear Ted and Will in the other room, laughing about something. “Will’s thrilled—he has a little playmate. But did you invite him?”
“No,” Eliza said emphatically.
“Mom, can you do that rose thing you did on the cupcakes?” Katie asked. “I can’t get it right.”
“Sure.” Carolyn barely looked at what she was doing while she still talked to Eliza. Yet four perfect frosting roses quickly bloomed beneath her hand.
“So he just showed up?”
“Yes.”
“How did he know?”
“No idea,” Eliza said.
“Do you think Hildy invited him?”
“I really don’t think she would,” Eliza said. “She knew I wouldn’t like it.”
“Then what do you think he’s here for?” Carolyn asked.
Eliza shook her head and glanced at Katie.
“Katie, honey,” Carolyn said, “can you go tell Dad I need his cell phone? I think I left mine at home.”
Katie left on her errand, and Carolyn leaned in. “Okay, so what do you think?”
“He said he heard David dumped me.”
Carolyn huffed in outrage. Eliza appreciated that.
“He said I should be friendly,” Eliza said.
“Friendly,” Carolyn said. “Right.”
Katie returned with the cell ph
one, which Carolyn pushed into her pocket on top of her own.
“Dad wants to know if there’s any beer.”
“I’m sure he does,” Carolyn said.
Katie stood there, waiting for an answer.
“Yes,” Eliza said, “there’s beer.” She opened the refrigerator to retrieve one.
“Mr. Walsh wants one, too.”
Eliza and Carolyn exchanged a glance.
“So I guess he’s staying,” Eliza said.
“Just one beer,” Carolyn told her. “That’s all. Then you send him on his way.”
“You act like I want him to stick around.”
“No, but I’ve known Teddy a long time.”
* * *
The Nolans left first, then Irene, and then Frank.
“Got an issue to get out,” he told Hildy. “But best wishes to you—I mean it.”
Hildy gave him a more relaxed smile than she’d offered all evening. “Thanks, Frank. You’re not so bad. Lizzy says nice things about you.”
“All true, I’m afraid,” Frank said. “And I can say the same about you.”
They parted with a handshake, which Eliza viewed as a success. Maybe she’d find Hildy a different dinner companion yet.
“Thanks, Eliza,” Carolyn said. “Mrs. Shepherd, happy, happy birthday.”
“Thanks, sweetie, you’re a good girl,” Hildy answered, giving Carolyn a hug and a kiss on the cheek. “And Willy, you’re as handsome as ever.”
“Hear that?” he said to Carolyn.
“I never said you weren’t handsome,” she answered. “Just a slob.”
“And Katie!” Hildy said, holding the girl’s face in her one good hand. “What a wonder with that cake. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, Mrs. Shepherd. Thanks for inviting me. It was fun.”
Eliza shot Carolyn a look showing she was impressed.
“Manners,” Carolyn whispered. “We like them.” She jerked her head toward the one remaining guest on the couch. “What are you going to do about him?”
“Call a taxi,” Eliza muttered. Ted was six beers down, and showed it.
