But the flower arrangements are off. Who approved Gerbera daisies? Do Gerbera daisies scream patriotic to you? And someone forgot the little American flags in the lemonades, which round off the entire look and were, as Catherine told her staff, just as she ran out the door to try to make one of Penelope’s gymnastic meets, “the final flourish, the salute to America, the salute to our readers.” She didn’t tell them that the flags were fresh off the shelves at Target, a tip of the hat to her potential partners/life raft. Should she have? Was that the only way to get her staff to actually dedicate themselves to the fine print, to the nitty-gritty details?
Those goddamn flags could cost us a partnership, could cost you your jobs, you nitwits! Now, are you listening? Now, are you paying attention?
It’s no goddamn wonder that their hits are faltering, that ad sales are sinking. How does someone on her payroll forget a goddamn salute to America?
“It’s beautiful!” Annie whispers. She smacks her hand across her chest, like she was pledging allegiance to Catherine. “Wow, Cathy, just . . . wow.”
Catherine freezes her face into something like what she hopes is a smile as she runs down the checklist of all the screwups. Her eyes feel wild, her irritation unhinging her. Maybe she should have ignored her irate CFO, maybe she shouldn’t have overcommitted to a TV pilot and a Target partnership (though she surely needs both), maybe she shouldn’t have gotten distracted with all this personal stuff from her past—coming here, dredging up old wounds, losing focus. Or maybe this is her penance for poaching from someone else, for never quite being good enough to play in the big leagues, even though she’s firmly in the big leagues. Who ever said she was good enough to deserve it?
Leon slaps the table, clattering the plates.
“That’s it! That’s how I know you. You’re The Crafty Lady. Oh, man! I used to watch you on Food Network, like, all the frickin’ time.”
Lindy side-eyes Leon at the revelation. Catherine spreads her smile wide and hopes he doesn’t ask why she no longer guests on the Food Network. (They replaced her with Suzy Carpenter of that stupid Suzy’s Secrets blog who was twenty-nine and a mom of four, not to mention a size zero with flawless blonde highlights and a cheeriness that could make birds sing.)
Colin rises and helps himself to seconds.
“Well, hey,” Leon says, pulling her into a hug, like they’re old mates, like Catherine is at all comfortable with this. “Man, I didn’t mean anything with my comment . . . I was just playing . . . if I’d known the French toast was coming from you, well, man . . .”
Catherine doesn’t think she can smile any wider than she already is, so she gently pushes her hands against his chest and untangles herself from his lanky limbs, and thanks him demurely. He offers a reverent bow. Though she’s not sure that this was much of a compliment: delicious only in name, not in execution.
Leon, evidently a domestic god in skinny jeans and a neck scarf (and whose presence she still doesn’t quite understand—Who are you? What are you doing here?), takes her phone, peering intently at the photo spread. Catherine worries that he’ll recognize something, call her on the plagiarizing farce that she (kind of, at times) is.
Instead, he says, “That looks awesome.” He exclaims, “You’re killing it! I’d like to go to a goddamn barbecue that looks that fly.” He moves to hug her again, but Catherine delicately steps backward ever so slightly, and they both pretend that he’s not attempting to invade her personal space with his fawning.
“You’re into crafting?” Lindy asks.
“It relaxes me. Also, you should try my coffee cake. Next time you’re in the city, I’ll make it for you.”
Footsteps reverberate overhead, and they all gaze upward, and then Owen plods his way down the steps.
“Good morning!” he says, as if he hadn’t ingested approximately seven times the legal alcohol limit twelve hours ago and then kept the rest of them awake since. His baseball cap is slung too low, but otherwise he’s in pretty good shape for a guy who arguably could be hospitalized right now. He glances at Leon, utterly unperturbed by a stranger standing in their old living room. “Hey, dude.”
“It’s practically noon!” Catherine says. It’s not like Owen has slept so much later than the rest of them (well, other than Catherine, who rose at 8:30 a.m.). But she can’t help herself. Who does he think he is to saunter down here and act like he hadn’t been a ridiculous fool last night? When she woke, she resolved not to hold it against him all day, but now he’s so buoyant and unapologetic that she resolves to nearly hold it against him forever. “And you missed French toast.”
French toast is Owen’s favorite. She knows this will sting.
“It’s also July 4th,” Annie says, like this is just occurring to all of them for the first time.
No one says anything for a moment. They all stare at their bare feet (Owen stares at his socks because he fell asleep in them), contemplating the enormity of something so simple as a new date on the calendar. Yesterday was just any old day. Today was Bea’s birthday. Twenty-four hours can flip your perspective on end.
Leon just glances at the rest of them because he has no clue what this all means.
“Jesus. It’s Fourth of July,” Colin says, mostly to himself. “We need to go out and do something. Something like we used to,” he says to the others, gazing at each of them. “For Bea.”
“For Bea.” The rest of them (well, not Leon because he still doesn’t know who Bea is) murmur.
For a second, they mean it, they really do.
Colin proposes revisiting Bea’s favorite places on campus, each of them sharing a memory at each one, something they loved best about her. They set aside their differences, the vast divide between them, the urge to simply leave and return to their safer havens at home, because each of the five of them is too embarrassed to admit they can’t do this for Bea. What sort of friend would they be if they couldn’t do this for her?
They walk to Wawa for coffee and convenience-store doughnuts because that’s what they ate back then, when no one had heard of organic food, and their bodies could handle a diet of minimal-to-zero nutrients. (Not Annie, though—she usually took a bite to be polite, then stuffed the rest in a wadded-up napkin.)
Owen orders a breakfast burrito at Taco Bell Express, just like he used to, and Catherine sighs because his digestive system at forty is not what it was at twenty. At twenty, it wasn’t even all that good.
“Hey.” He shrugs. “A college morning isn’t complete without a breakfast burrito.”
“This isn’t a college morning,” Catherine reminds him.
“You’re being technical.”
She was being technical, but Catherine is always technical. Her irritation runs through her, tangible, an electric shock. She massages the back of her neck.
“Just a decaf,” Lindy says, eyes down, though the manager recognizes her, and she agrees to a photo.
“OK, I’ll start,” Colin says. “What I remember about being at Wawa with Bea is how she was on a first-name basis with the cashier . . . what was it?” He squints, casting for the memory. “Hector? Maybe Hector. Anyway, she’d sweet-talked him one night when we came in drunk without our wallets, and Bea just had to have those yogurt pretzels. Remember those things? They had them in bulk?”
“Ew, those bins. Yes. You just reached your hands in and took them.” Catherine shudders. “If I knew then what I know now . . .”
“Well, anyway . . . Bea somehow convinced Hector that if she didn’t get those yogurt pretzels right then, she was gonna, like, die.” He stops himself.
“It’s OK,” Annie says. “You don’t mean it literally.”
“She asked him about his family and his kids and where he came from, and all of this mumbo-jumbo that who would have thought to ask? And then she promised if he gave her free reign over the yogurt-pretzel bin, she’d never forget any of his kids’ b
irthdays.” Colin shakes his head and laughs. “You know Bea. How could he say no?”
“So that’s why we always got free yogurt pretzels whenever we came in,” Catherine says. She resists the urge to check her phone. She’s e-mailed her whole team to find out just how the details slipped through on the shoot, and even though there’s nothing to be done now, and even though it’s a national holiday, she’d like some answers. She expects some answers. But she tells herself it can wait, at least until they’ve exited Wawa, finished honoring their memories of Bea.
“That is why.” Colin smiles. “And honestly, I don’t think she ever did forget a birthday. She brought back a Jets jersey from New York once for his son. And a snow globe another time.”
The clerk from Taco Bell calls out Owen’s order. Catherine sighs again as Owen licks grease off his fingers and exhales contentedly. They all shove their hands into their pockets and stare at the floor.
“Well, anyway,” Colin says, “that’s what I remember about her here, and I bet Hector remembers her too.”
“Bea was good about keeping her promises,” Annie says.
And no one has much else to say to that, because they’re all keenly aware of the promises of their own they failed to live up to, the promises to Bea they failed to keep.
They opt for their old dorm next; Annie’s the one who suggests it. They amble down crimson brick-paved Locust Walk, which cuts like a connective artery through the hub of the campus, on their way to the Quad, where fate and the fire threw them together and made them family. Catherine reaches for a memory of when she lived there with her roommate . . . Susan Ling, that was her name. What ever happened to her? They were never close, and besides, Catherine spent all her time with Owen, and then Owen introduced her to the others, and since Owen’s roommate had transferred to Villanova the second week, she practically moved in. She remembers that Owen never complained that he needed space, that he wanted to have some breathing room to go out with the guys, or didn’t want a girlfriend to drag him down when he pledged Sigma Chi because Sigma Chis were notorious for getting all the hot girls. He let her redecorate with tapestries from Urban Outfitters and a flimsy rug that smelled like hemp she found down on South Street. They were a team, a unit, and neither was ever particularly far from the other. They studied together in the library stacks, they ate breakfast and dinner together, and they fell asleep watching 90210 reruns together.
But that was all so long ago, Catherine reminds herself. Before real responsibilities. Before real problems.
Catherine swipes her phone. Nothing yet from her team. She sets her jaw and grimaces. Where is everyone when I need them?
She tries to remember the last time she told Owen she needed him; the last time, really, she needed him period. Surely, if she told him about the trouble the company was in, of the dwindling revenue stream, he’d want to help. Actually, just a few months ago, he did want to help. But that was about him wanting to work—any sort of work, Catherine gathered, which is not exactly the kind of help she needed.
Anyway, it’s her, really. She lost track of relying on him—like she’d lost track of Susan Ling, she supposes—and she’s not so sure she wants to retrace those steps. She’s not even sure she needs to rely on him anymore, even though she recognizes the dangerous slippery slope this recognition can initiate in a marriage.
The Fourth of July Road to Freedom festival is in full swing on Locust Walk. Two men decked out in colonial garb march a few feet behind them, rattling off “Yankee Doodle Dandy” on a fiddle and a flute. Colin does a slightly off-rhythm jig with his feet, then links elbows with Annie and spins her around until she shrieks about dizziness. Lindy sings “Yankee Doodle Dandy” opera-style, and Leon and Colin give her a standing ovation (though they’re already standing). Catherine empties the clutter from her mind (though she checks her phone once more) and feels it too, the infectiousness of their old selves—free from the weights of adulthood—nipping at their heels. All of them laugh, a fleeting but perhaps sticky moment of joy, to be back here, their mirth traveling up through the towering oak trees that arch and crest above them, insulating them from the reality of the outside world. Or at least that’s what the oaks did back then; now they’re memories of a memory.
Annie pulls out her phone and snaps a photo for Instagram.
“When was the last time you guys were back here?” Leon asks. “All together?”
Catherine taps her phone against her hip, waiting for Lindy to answer. He’s here on her account, after all; she should be the one to explain their history. The rest of them have plenty of other baggage to handle; they shouldn’t have to babysit this interloper. But no one else seems particularly put out by his presence.
Instead, Annie looks up from her screen, from her hashtag frenzy, and responds to Leon. “Oh, gosh. All together? Not in a long time.”
“Not since the funeral,” Colin says.
“No,” Lindy snaps. “Not since the wedding. All of us. Together.”
Catherine steels her eyes at her phone, ignoring her, though she internally blanches at the mention of her wedding, of how she behaved.
Still nothing.
Where is her team? Why does no one care that the photo spread is a mess? She clenches and unclenches her fists, and wishes she could stride on ahead without them, loop around campus or maybe the track down at the stadium, like she does at the office to clear her mind, regroup, realign her axis. Instead, she’s walking around as if there’s a pebble wedged in her sole, like something is bothering her that she just can’t pinpoint.
A row of tents, which teem with summer students, a few professorial types, and local families with cherubic but sweaty children, block their streamlined path to the Quad.
A sign hangs from each tent pole.
LIVE LIKE THE COLONIALS DID!
“Come, come,” a revolutionary soldier beckons. “Come join us in the festivities celebrating our great liberation from our oppressor, her Royal Majesty!”
Oh, please, God, no, Catherine thinks, and checks her phone again. I do not have time for this. What she really means is she does not have the patience for this.
“Madam, what is that thing you hold in your hand? Is it some sort of enchanting device?”
“What?” Catherine asks, just as Annie says, “Ooh, what are the festivities?”
Another soldier steps out and barks: “Butter-churning contest in two minutes! Who will step up and lead the nation?”
“The nation needs to be led in a butter-churning contest?” Catherine says to no one in particular.
“She’ll do it!” Annie claps and points her finger squarely at Catherine.
“I will not do it!”
“You’ll be perfect!”
“There are prizes,” chimes soldier #2.
“I don’t want prizes!”
“I’ll do it.” Owen steps forward.
You’ll do it? Catherine thinks. Is this your way of proving that you can out-domesticate your domestic-diva wife?
“Owen’s doing it!” Annie claps again, then steadies her phone for a video.
“Oh, fine, I’ll do it.” Catherine flanks her hands on her hips.
“COME ONE, COME ALL! WHO DARES TO TEST THEIR HANDS AND CHURN A BARREL OF BUTTER FOR THE VILLAGE?”
“I volunteer!” Leon places his hand over his heart, like churning butter is some sort of patriotic duty.
“You don’t volunteer!” Lindy replies, but he’s already stepped forward, already been anointed with a sash that both Owen and Catherine now tuck over their right shoulder as well, which reminds Catherine of that scene in Star Wars when Han Solo and Chewy get anointed for their bravery at saving the universe. She’s surprised at the memory: she hasn’t seen Star Wars since she was a kid, when her dad sneaked her into the theater even though she was too young and her mother forbade it.
Catherine peers at Owen, t
hen Leon, then two kids who are about eleven who’ve also joined in, their parents hooting and hollering, like this is actually a real thing. But then she thinks of Penelope and Mason and that maybe they’d find this a little bit hilarious, and also that they’d have a chance to see what their mom is good at, why she misses their games and their recitals and isn’t home for bedtime nearly enough. So as each of the contestants stands behind an old wooden barrel, Catherine thinks, I will win this for my children. I will win this because I can. I will win this because I sit atop the domestic-goddess world, and Target and HGTV and stupid Suzy Carpenter can bite me.
“It’s on.” She nudges her chin upward, like Rocky Balboa.
“Bring it.” Leon smiles but doesn’t look nearly as intimidated as she’d like him to.
Owen tries to reply, but he’s burping up what Catherine imagines is old beer from last night. Finally he whispers (mostly to Leon), “You have never met a more competitive woman than my wife in your life. Godspeed.”
Catherine scowls at him, even if it’s true. It is true. She won’t apologize for that! She shouldn’t have to apologize for that. Her competitive drive is what pays their mortgage. What sends their kids to private school. What allowed Owen to quit that job that made him so miserable. Catherine hates that she feels like she should apologize for wanting to be at the top of everything, the best at everything. Way back when, when she first rose through the ranks of other crafty bloggers, her newly hired publicist insisted she get media training. Her trainer always said, “Act like the CEO of your household, not an actual CEO. No one wants to be best friends with a CEO. No one wants to make pumpkin coffee cake with a CEO.”
Soldier #1 hands her a wooden plunger, and Catherine realizes, No one does want to be friends with a CEO. It’s not like she’s gallivanting out for girls’ nights—it’s not like she’s even invited out for girls’ nights. She doesn’t get e-mails from moms at school; she doesn’t make chitchat in the office kitchen about last night’s Rock N Roll Dreammakers.
In Twenty Years: A Novel Page 14
