Heart's Desire

by Laura Pedersen

  “I’ve baked bread,” volunteers Auggie.

  “That’s what I mean.” I throw up my hands. “And see, you’re not gay.” But suddenly I realize he hasn’t exactly denied it. Nor did he give a name to this “someone” in Russia. I simply assumed that he meant someone of the opposite sex, like when Marion the Librarian sings “Goodnight, My Someone” in The Music Man and her someone is clearly a man. “I mean, you’re not gay . . . are you?”

  “No,” says Auggie.

  “Well that’s what I told him.” I shake my head and decide that this is the last time I’ll ever take advice about guys from Bernard.

  “Though I’ve been with some guys,” says Auggie.

  “Huh?”

  “I’ve had boyfriends,” he clarifies. “And girlfriends.”

  “Oh,” I say as it slowly dawns on me. “You’re . . . you’re . . . bi.”

  “I guess,” he says. “But I hate labels and just prefer to think of myself as a people person.”

  “Sure,” I say.

  “Does that bother you?” he asks.

  “No. No, of course not,” I say. “Why would it bother me? I mean, it would be great to have so many people to date, right?”

  “That’s one way of looking at it, I suppose,” he says.

  “Then, um, this person in Russia?” I ask.

  “Svetlana,” he says.

  “That’s a woman?” I confirm.

  “Yes, most definitely,” he says.

  Only now I’m sorry I asked. I don’t think it would have felt so bad to get beat out by a Sergei so much as a Svetlana. “It’s wonderful that you’re in love, honestly,” I say, and try to make my voice sound as if I’d never really been interested in Auggie like that in the first place. It’s not an easy bluff for me, after having thought that he’s really and truly The One, but I think I manage to be convincing. I quickly start asking him questions about Cape Cod, since I’ve always wanted to go there.

  Only it’s hard to concentrate. Once again the elusive pursuit known as love resembles a game of chance. Any poker player worth his salted pretzels knows the good hands come along so rarely that you have to be prepared to bluff here and there if you’re ever going to have a shot at eventually winning big.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  IT’S THE SECOND WEEK OF JULY AND SUMMER HAS OFFICIALLY settled upon the heartland. By nine o’clock in the morning plants begin to droop, birds cancel all but emergency flights, and not a single bee rises above the flowers. The pungent aroma of fresh mint fills the stagnant air around the summerhouse.

  It’s also the tenth time Louise is supposed to help me weed the garden and she tries to wriggle out of it by saying that if she is pregnant, it could be dangerous for the baby. Following the Auggie drama, I’m cranky and frustrated and in no mood for her crap. So after asking Olivia exactly how soon you can use one of these pregnancy tests, I hightail it over to Herb’s drugstore on Main Street.

  In the store windows are big, red-lettered discount signs that I’ve never seen before. Yet inside it’s empty and quiet, except for some Muzak playing softly in the background. In fact, it would appear that Herb never replaced Jemma and now works by himself as both pharmacist and cashier.

  “Hey, Hellraiser,” he greets me. But it’s with none of his usual sarcasm, more just out of habit.

  “Hey, yourself. Business still bad?”

  “I found this cooperative on the Internet—a hundred or so mom-and-pop drugstores buy in bulk so that we get the deepest discount possible, like the big guys.” He unhappily scans the vacant aisles. “But that Valueland, I’m telling you, they’re selling below cost and taking a loss. I don’t know how long they can keep it up. In the meantime, they’re definitely getting all the traffic. I’m just hanging on through customer loyalty. Only the kids coming up don’t care about that. Same with people on a tight budget.”

  I head toward the aisle with all the women’s stuff. Most of the boxes and bottles feature cover art with birds, wings, and big white swooshes. It’s obvious that men were the first to get their hands on designing the packages for feminine hygiene products. Who else would have equated a menstrual cycle with the Age of Flight? Wouldn’t featuring an armchair or a meatloaf dinner on the box be more of a come-on than a flock of seagulls?

  There are at least five different kinds of pregnancy tests. I can’t imagine how one is different from another. And they’re all around the same price. So I finally choose the package without the smiling woman on the front of the box. And then I retrieve a bottle of chocolate Yoo-hoo out of the cooler in back.

  The one neat thing about Herb is that he never comments on your prescriptions or purchases. He rings up tampons, hair dye, and hernia trusses as if they’re shampoo and toothpaste. Same with itch cream and antibiotics. If I stop and consider it, he probably knows more about people in town based on what they buy than any lawyer, minister, psychiatrist, or even medical doctor.

  And though it’s none of his business, for some reason I don’t want Herb to think the pregnancy test is mine. “It’s not for me,” I say as he puts the box in a brown paper bag.

  “Right,” he says. “It’s for a friend.”

  He knows that I live with the Stocktons and I suppose it’s pretty obvious that it’s not for Olivia, Ottavio, or Bernard.

  “Hope everything works out,” says Herb. Then he takes a box of condoms from the display next to the counter and drops it into the bag. “Free gift.”

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING LOUISE IS IN THE DOWNSTAIRS BATHROOM taking forever with the pregnancy test. I’ve been waiting outside the door so long that I’m getting nervous and begin to hop from one foot to the other. Finally I order her to open the door before I kick the damned thing down.

  Louise undoes the lock and lets me into the cramped powder room. She sits down on the toilet seat lid and proceeds to stare at this small vial on the countertop while holding the crumpled page of directions in her hand. “It had better turn blue,” she says with conviction.

  But the tube is standing in front of the cabbage rose wallpaper and appears to take on a pinkish cast, so we start shouting, “No pink, no pink!”

  Bernard appears in the doorway and asks, “Which team are we rooting for?”

  “Blue,” I say.

  “Blue! Blue! Blue!” Louise and I chant as if we’re cheering the University of Michigan in the Rose Bowl, and Bernard enthusiastically joins us.

  Olivia and Ottavio come downstairs to see what all the commotion in the small powder room is about. “Is there a flood?” she asks.

  However, something starts to happen with the test and Louise’s eyes grow wide and she raises her hand to indicate silence. Bernard whispers something to his mother and she in turn whispers to Ottavio.

  Louise puts her hands together and quietly chants, “Yes, yes, yes.” In a voice that’s barely audible she says to me, “I think it’s turning blue.”

  From his position just outside the tiny bathroom, Bernard grabs my shoulder. “What? What’s happening?”

  “She thinks it’s turning blue,” I whisper to him.

  He turns to Olivia to pass on the news and then she tells Ottavio, as if we’re all playing a game of Telephone.

  “Yes!” Ever the cheerleader, Louise jumps up and down in victory.

  “Let me see!” I push her aside. The indicator is indeed bright blue. “It’s blue!” I yell. We hug each other and hop around like when we were little kids discovering new bikes on Christmas morning.

  “Such a relief,” exhales Olivia. “And isn’t it wonderful that we no longer need to kill a rabbit like they did in the old days!”

  “What’s going on?” A sleepy Brandt staggers into the hallway. He probably didn’t arrive home from the lab until his usual three in the morning.

  “Nothing,” we all say in unison. But the vial is sitting right on the counter for anyone to see.

  “An experiment,” I say. “Louise is taking science in summer scho
ol. Only we must have done something wrong because it didn’t work properly.” I quickly toss the test into the garbage before Brandt can manage a closer look.

  “Oh. Well, maybe I can help,” offers Brandt.

  Louise looks at me with sudden panic in her eyes that practically shouts, What if this geek finds out what happened?

  “Actually, that would be great, Brandt.” I ignore her frantic eye signals and her foot stepping down on my toes. “Louise failed science and history. Olivia is already helping her with the history.”

  “No problem. I get an hour for lunch, so I can come back here between one and two every afternoon,” suggests Brandt.

  “That’d be terrific,” I say.

  “Thanks a lot,” says Louise.

  I’m the only person who knows her well enough to pick up on the fact that she means her reply to be sarcastic.

  The other good news is of course that now Louise has run out of excuses to avoid weeding and watering the garden. And this is perfect timing, because the storyboard for the scholarship has to be in the mail by midnight tonight.

  After hustling my sister out to the yard with a trowel and some gardening gloves, I sit down at the computer and work out a concept based on an idea Bernard planted with his story of how Isadora Duncan was inspired by the red poppies of her native California. Only I use pictures of buckeyes and other flowers indigenous to Ohio and get the computer to make them dance to Bernard’s favorite version of the song “No One Ever Tells You” by Diane Schuur and B. B. King. At the end, when the flowers all take their bows, the camera cuts to the detergent bottle standing in the orchestra pit waving a little conductor’s wand as if coordinating the production number. The metaphor is supposed to be the perfect dinner party—with food, wine, good company, and of course glasses without spots, so your neighbor doesn’t have to pull you into the kitchen for a tête-àtête. The last few frames show the detergent/conductor turn to the audience, wink, and say in B. B. King’s canyon-deep voice, “Because no one ever tells you!”

  Pleased with the format for the commercial, I spend the rest of the afternoon tweaking the graphics and synching up the sound. It’s actually a relief when The Veal Fight breaks out, because I desperately need a break.

  The Veal Fight used to occur so regularly that Gil had eventually abbreviated it to TVF. TVF happens when Bernard is preparing his favorite meal of lemon veal piccata with tomato bisque soup and garlic mashed potatoes. I can tell that it’s starting when I hear Olivia’s opening salvo, which is the recitation of statistics. And I’ve got to give her credit for research, because she uses new ones every time.

  “A male calf born to a dairy cow is locked up in a stall and chained by his neck to prevent him from turning around for his entire life,” Olivia lectures Bernard in the next room. “They inject him with antibiotics and hormones to keep him alive and make him grow. He’s kept in darkness except during feeding time and then finally slaughtered.”

  “That’s not what they said at my PETA meeting,” counters Bernard, and I can hear him begin pounding the veal cutlets with his wooden mallet.

  “Since when have you been going to meetings of People for Ethical Treatment of Animals?” demands Olivia, and I can visualize her hands on her hips. It’s a good question, too, because certainly she would have seen him there.

  “My group is different from yours,” Bernard teases his mother. “Our PETA stands for People Enjoying Tasty Animals. We serve Beef Wellington made with lots of veal pâté or a tasty Butterfield leg of lamb topped with herbed mayonnaise.”

  Olivia storms out of the kitchen and into the den, where I’m using her computer. She throws up her arms and starts haranguing me. “Did you know that our modern dairy cow lives with an unnaturally swelled and sensitive udder, is likely never to be allowed out of her stall, is milked up to three times a day, and is kept pregnant nearly all of her abbreviated life?”

  Looking up from the computer screen I say, “Uh, actually I didn’t.”

  “Her young are usually taken from her immediately after birth,” continues an agitated Olivia.

  Bernard pokes his head into the den. “Vegetables are alive, too. They’re just easier to catch.” He disappears back into the kitchen.

  “Do you want to see my detergent ad?” I ask in an effort to calm her down.

  “Of course.” Fortunately it’s easy to distract her with anything creative. Olivia pulls up the other chair.

  “All the frames haven’t been run together yet, but here’s what it will look like, more or less.” I click through them in time to the music so it resembles a slow-motion cartoon book.

  “That’s wonderful, Hallie!” Olivia claps her hands with obvious delight. “I adore the way you used a delphinium as the bass player.”

  I explain how you’re supposed to get the feeling of a perfectly coordinated event, like one of Bernard’s dinner parties.

  “One without veal or lamb,” she quickly adds.

  “Of course,” I say. “All vegetarian.”

  “A meatless diet yields forty percent lower risk of cancer,” she says. “Maybe you can work that into your commercial.”

  Chapter Forty

  TRUE TO THEIR WORD, THE ADOPTION AGENCY DOESN’T GIVE YOU an opportunity to flush your drugs down the toilet or hide your chimpanzee in the neighbor’s garage. On a Friday five weeks after Bernard’s announcement about adopting a baby, a woman with a briefcase full of paperwork unexpectedly shows up for a spot inspection.

  Her name is Mrs. Farley. She’s shaped like a Bartlett pear but is efficient-looking, with a dark brown helmet of hair and crepe-soled shoes that I imagine are good for examining those hard-to-reach places, the ones where babies inevitably ferret out the poisons and peeling lead paint.

  She peers hard at me and then glances down at her clipboard. “Hallie Palmer?” Mrs. Farley inquires as if she’s taking attendance.

  “Present and accounted for,” I say.

  “According to my records, Bernard Stockton is your legal guardian. He’s applying to adopt a baby and therefore I need to ask you a few questions.”

  “Sure,” I reply. “Fire away.” I can’t help but take pride in how I’ve risen up in the world—going from local juvenile delinquent to official reference in the short space of twelve months.

  The legal paperwork signed to make Bernard the guardian for me and also Brandt was really only completed in case we ever need emergency appendectomies, but apparently the adoption people award points for this and classify him as a foster parent.

  “Has Mr. Stockton provided a nurturing home environment for you?”

  “Yes, very nurturing, and nutritional, too. He taught me to cook and I can make orange roughy, tarragon chicken salad, and Pompey’s head—a roll of ground meat in a tomato and green pepper sauce, named for the Roman general Pompey the Great, who was known for having an exceptionally broad head. Bernard demonstrated that recipe last year when Olivia and I were reading Julius Caesar together.”

  “Oh really?” asks Mrs. Farley, as if she’s not quite sure whether this is some sort of put-on.

  “Yes, and I almost forgot, schiacciata con l’uva.”

  She appears puzzled.

  “Tuscan grape bread.”

  “Of course.” Mrs. Farley appears slightly stunned by my recitation, but now smiles approvingly. However, when she looks down at my mud-streaked legs it’s obvious there is some concern over whether we have indoor plumbing.

  “And I work in the garden.”

  “I see.” She makes a note on her clipboard and I’m pretty sure it’s a positive one, as if this wholesome outdoor exposure has contributed to making me a responsible and productive member of society.

  It’s a good thing she didn’t see the yard six weeks earlier, because it was the kind of jungle where a toddler could have been lost for good. But now most of the perennials have found their way up through the soil, including a border of pretty pink and white tulips, and along the fence shy red and purple petunias have be
gun to unfold. The rose garden also looks presentable after being dug out from under two tons of leaves and dead weeds like a lost continent. And I take it as a direct compliment that the bumblebees have returned to carefully work over the unfolding petals.

  It’s pretty much a one-way conversation, with Mrs. Farley asking the type of sensible questions that perfectly match her outfit. There doesn’t seem to be any point in inquiring about her childhood, since it’s pretty obvious that she was born a middle-aged woman. And I’m careful not to mention that I’ve recently become a sex maniac.

  When we’re finished she tells me that she also needs to interview Brandt. By a fortunate coincidence the lab where Brandt works is being painted and it’s the one time he’s actually at home all day. We head from the living room into the kitchen. When Mrs. Farley walks, her stiff denim dress moves in the opposite direction of her hips, and oval-shaped perspiration stains are visible under her arms.

  The fact that Louise and Brandt happen to be sitting at the kitchen table doing science homework when Mrs. Farley enters is obviously a major coup. Not only that, but it’s easy to tell that Brandt actually enjoys science. He’s using a bowl of ice cubes and a pitcher of water to demonstrate the weight of a liquid versus a solid. And when Louise eventually gets a right answer, an observer would assume they’d just won the lottery from all the cheering and clapping. Wow, I think to myself, we couldn’t have scripted this scene any better for one of Gil’s plays.

  Mrs. Farley is also pleased by the fact that Olivia is a certified teacher. Though she definitely doesn’t get a chance to see Olivia in action. Because on that score Bernard did prepare in advance. He has repeatedly warned his mother to act normal and not initiate any discussions on subjects such as how Lord Byron’s sleeping with his nanny at the tender age of nine and then later having an affair with his sister may have influenced his poetry. Olivia’s also not supposed to ask anyone from the agency to sign her latest petition to save the small-scale Latin American coffee and cocoa farmers from being squeezed out of the global marketplace by multinational companies. Likewise, in his attempt to refashion her into a potential doting grandmother, he doesn’t mention anything about Olivia not being allowed to cook. Bernard once confided to me that when he was young and she made dinner for the family, he and his father prayed after the meal instead of before it.