Peter’s sisters bustled in the kitchen with Mrs. Fitzgerald. Her mother-in-law spotted them the moment that Caroline walked in, as the kitchen was a straight shot down from the front door.
“Caroline! Send in Savannah,” called Faith, Peter’s youngest sibling. “We’re coloring eggs. Mom bought Disney thingies.”
The baby of the family, ten years younger than Peter, Faith displayed the confidence of knowing there was always someone around to carry you.
Savannah sidled next to Caroline. “Come with me.”
“Sure, honey. Let’s take off your coat.”
Savannah tugged her blue wool coat tighter around her. “No. I want to wear it.”
“Savannah, you can’t dye eggs in your coat.”
“Why not?”
“What’s wrong?” Irene Fitzgerald came out wiping her hands on her bright holiday-themed apron. Yellow chicks circled the green grass printed on a bright blue background. Caroline had no idea where her mother-in-law found the fabric to make these things. Was there some special store? A website called bestmomsintheworld.com?
“Everything’s fine, Irene.” The name stuck in her throat. Peter reminded her time after time how much his mother would love Caroline to call her Mom, and why did she have to make such a big deal of it? “Because she’s not my mother,” Caroline would answer each time, embarrassed by her immaturity, even intractability, yet unwilling to move one step closer to absorption by the Fitzgerald clan.
“I want to wear my coat.” Savannah, usually the most obedient child in the world, when thwarted on something she deemed life or death, planted herself like a redwood.
“What’s the problem?” Irene asked. “Let her wear it. She’ll take it off when she gets warm enough.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to be dyeing eggs in her new coat.” Caroline forced out a smile that would never reach her eyes.
“Don’t be such a worrywart, Caro.” Irene was the only one who presumed to use Peter’s pet name for Caroline. “She can wear an apron.”
“I want to wear an apron, Mommy.”
“How about one with hearts?” Irene asked. “I’ve been saving it for someone special.”
Caroline couldn’t explain to Peter’s mother why she wanted Savannah to take off her coat. She didn’t want Irene commenting to the crowd about it—Savannah stood out enough already. The Fitzgerald nieces and nephews ranged from skeletal to skinny. Among the fourteen of them, with their fourteen shades of blond and red hair, most, Caroline guessed, landed smack in the 90th percentile for height and the 10th percentile for weight.
Caroline had to deal with Nanny and rid Savannah of the idea of normal and of beauty engendered by women’s magazines. She’d call her tonight, though she dreaded the conversation. Every time she took Nanny to task for something, the woman would act out somewhere else. Caroline would have found another nanny long ago, but as Peter pointed out, Nanny Rose genuinely cared for Savannah, and that quality meant more than almost anything else.
On the other hand, forcing poor Savannah out of her coat would hardly encourage good self-image. What a stupid idea, and yet Caroline wanted to tear the blue garment off her.
She longed to see the girl running around like her cousins, with her hair spinning out behind her and her shoes scuffed and dirty.
Savannah was such an anxious child.
No, Savannah was a well-behaved and accepting child.
Except occasionally she dug in her heels.
That was a good quality. Did Caroline want a yes-girl?
“Okay, honey.” Caroline kissed Savannah on the top of her head. “You can keep your coat on.”
Irene put out her hand as though to stop Savannah. “Remember, though, you might get it dirty.”
“But you’re giving me an apron, Grandma? Right?”
“Nothing stays perfect, Savannah.” Irene leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Don’t worry, dear. Dirt comes out, right?”
Caroline wondered if they had anything other than beer to drink. She’d thought of bringing a bottle of wine, offering it as a gift, but Caroline’s greatest fear when visiting Joe and Irene was of sticking out.
Caroline wandered into the empty living room. Irene’s most favored possessions, her crystal and figurines, were locked behind glass in a shelved wall unit that stretched across the entire wall. Joe’s mystery books and Irene’s volumes of craft magazines tucked in leather binders lined the open shelves.
Caroline knew she should either join Peter playing football outside or join his sisters helping Irene in the kitchen. The grandchildren were scattered throughout the house—at least, those old enough to be out of a parent’s arms or eyeshot. But instead she sat on the deep-cushioned couch.
Seasonal Hummels sat on the glossy, dark Colonial coffee table. Irene changed them monthly. Caroline ran her fingers over the little boy painting Easter eggs, the two girls with scarves tied under their chins patting a bunny. Trees and flowers in the unmoving grass held hidden Easter eggs. Grandchildren fought for the privilege of touching the miniature statues, none of them daring to go near them without permission. Even the tiniest child knew not to touch. How did Irene do it? How did she keep all the children—young, middle-aged, babies—in her steady sway?
Caroline picked up a hidden pink egg and rolled it in her palm.
“Better not lose that.” Peter’s older sister, Sissy walked in. “Unless you want my mother to drum you out of the family.”
Caroline opened her hand, so that the egg lay still in her palm. Sissy picked it up with two fingers and returned it to its hiding place.
“Why all alone? Too good for us?” Sissy delivered her dig with a big smile, lifting her freckled cheeks toward her bright blue eyes. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail and then released it back to its natural curly state.
“Just tired,” Caroline said.
“So you thought you’d come play with the Hummels?”
“I’m admiring them.” Caroline patted the egg-painting boy’s miniature head with her index finger.
“Right.” Sissy snorted. She couldn’t stand Caroline. Peter denied it, but Caroline knew it was true. On the other hand, Faith was Caroline’s champion. Faith admired Caroline for being a doctor, for speaking three languages, and for what she thought of as Caroline’s elegant lifestyle, all of which drove Sissy crazy.
“Your mother has quite a collection,” Caroline said.
“Who do you think you’re kidding? Look at your house. Mom’s house is probably a joke to you. Bad taste, circa 1985.”
“I don’t think that. I think your mother’s house is lovely.”
Caroline spoke the truth. In 1985 Irene went on a Laura Ashley kick, and things had stayed in flowered-English-cottage mode since that time. It might not be exactly her taste, but she found the place warm, preferring it to the cold white McMansion in which she and Peter lived.
Sissy looked around, as though trying to see her mother’s house through Caroline’s eyes. “Come on, compared to your house?” She took the springtime display statue from Caroline’s hands. “You’re such a liar.”
CHAPTER 16
Tia
“Wake up, David.” Tia pushed at his arm, and then poked him when he didn’t respond. Her hangover was minor, thankfully, but it still made her want to shove him out of her bed so she could be alone with her headache and queasy stomach. She was three weeks into a relationship with a man she didn’t even think she liked.
Tia hadn’t ever slept around. After losing her virginity to Kevin, she’d closed up shop for so long the boys taunted her by calling her the Ice Queen. What was this?
“Go ’way,” David said into the pillow.
“Gotta go to work,” she said.
“No. Going in late,” he mumbled from under the covers.
“Not you, me.”
“Bye.” He snaked a hand from under the covers and gave a limp wave.
Tia wished she could blink her eyes and make him disappear. Or wiggle her
nose. Or dive out the window.
“I have a cup of coffee for you,” she said. “Come on, I have to leave in five minutes. You have to go.”
“Leave me a key.” He sounded awake now, and trying to sleaze a key. “I’ll lock up,” he said. “Don’t want you to be late.”
Tia stared at the empty glasses on the nightstand. One stained brown with whiskey, one red from the cranberry juice in a Cape Codder. His spring drink, he’d said. Perhaps the mark of an alcoholic was having seasonal drinks. Maybe her father switched to eggnog laced with rum every Christmas.
She’d never have brought David home if she hadn’t gone to Doyle’s.
Way to be easy on herself. Perhaps she’d never have gone to Doyle’s if she hadn’t been seeking a David.
Dear God, why did she ever let him in her bed? Becoming imprinted on a man was too easy. Sleep with one damned man in five years, boom, you’re marked. Being wanted, even by the worst of them, opened the door to that awful gratitude brought on merely by the knowledge of that desire. Couple that with the simple pleasure of a warm body and having someone who’d know if you died in the night, and zap, you could end up married to anyone.
Tia poked him with her big toe. Then she did it again, and then she did it harder.
“Jesus, what’s wrong with you?” He whipped off the sheet and sprang out of bed.
“Good. You’re up.” Tia handed him the coffee, now lukewarm. “Drink up.”
• • •
Tia’s desk at work mirrored what her life had become: messy, unkempt, and requiring more energy than she could muster. She used to pride herself on her orderly work spaces, her lovely apartment, the treasures she uncovered at flea markets and yard sales. Tiny glass stars. Copper candlesticks. Hand-quilted pillows.
“What’s wrong?” Katie asked. “You look tired.”
“I got to sleep late last night.” Tia made a kind of plan. She’d sort all the crap into two piles—files and loose papers—and organize them after her meeting with Mrs. Graham.
Katie raised her eyebrows. “Anything good?”
“Nothing even remotely exciting. Just insomnia.”
“What’s happening with David?”
Tia regretted ever letting him drive her to work. Katie had sauntered down the street just as David dropped her off, leaving Tia no choice but to make introductions.
“He’s just a friend.”
“Friend with benefits?”
“Just a friend.” Tia gathered her notebook and Mrs. Graham’s file.
Tia slipped a piece of candied ginger from her purse, attempting to quell her nausea for the third time that morning.
She had to get rid of David. Now. Find someone normal.
Sometimes it seemed that Nathan had slurped up her entire life, and she couldn’t refill the cup. After lovemaking, they’d talked for hours. Nathan’s stories of his parents’ escape from Hungary opened up a world that made history books pop into three dimensions, making her think about possibilities she’d never known she could have. Childhood dreams flooded back.
“This will sound insane,” she’d once told him, “but as a kid, I wanted to—don’t laugh—grow up to be someone like Elizabeth Blackwell. I mean, not that I could be the first female doctor, but something meaningful. Someone who could change people’s lives.”
Nathan hadn’t made a joke out of it, he’d said, “It’s hardly too late.”
“Actually, I think it’s kinda late to be the first anything,” she said.
“It’s not about the when, it’s the if.” He’d lain beside her with his hands behind his head, staring at the map of Paris hanging opposite them.” Why Paris?” he asked.
She swung a leg over his. “I think it’s pretty.”
He shook his head in gentle disagreement. “That’s not true. People choose maps for a reason. Do you want to go there?”
She’d never told him flying terrified her. There were already too many ways in which she was the weak one in the relationship. Waving Paris away with her hand, she tried to make her dreams seem unimportant. “There are many places I’d like to visit. But I don’t know how I’ll ever get to them.”
He rolled over and pulled her until they were face-to-face. “You can do anything. You’re a capable, smart woman. But, and this is a big but, you have to start rooting for yourself.”
That hadn’t been the advice she’d wanted. What she’d wanted was a great big hand lifting her out of herself.
Tia grabbed her tote bag and stuffed in Mrs. Graham’s folder. She shuffled the paper and files on her desk into neater stacks, even digging out her to-do list and placing it on top. After Mrs. Graham, she’d really dig in. “Don’t worry,” she said to Katie, “I’ll let you know when to look for a wedding outfit.”
Katie grinned as though already planning what she’d wear to Tia’s wedding.
Tia sometimes wondered if she had even the slightest grasp on the realities of her relationships. Was it possible that Katie really liked her?
Smiling wider than usual, Tia turned back and waved as she walked out the door.
Mrs. Graham waited patiently on the bench. Tia gave up trying to beat her to their appointments long ago, after she’d realized that Mrs. Graham had no place to go but medical appointments and here. Arriving early allowed Mrs. Graham extra time to feel a part of the world.
“Morning, Mrs. G.” Tia slung her bag over her shoulder and gave Mrs. Graham a pat on the arm before inserting a key into the client-office lock. “Marjorie,” she whispered.
“Another one died yesterday.” Mrs. Graham followed Tia in and plunked down her purse.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Who?” Like all her clients, Mrs. G started the day by reading the obituaries, though it wasn’t as fruitful a search these days. She had more dead friends than living ones. Poor Mrs. G hardly had anyone to search for anymore.
“Alma Kelleher.” Mrs. G sighed out her sadness. “We went to Saint Clare’s High School together. Alma was the prettiest thing you ever saw.”
“I’m sorry. That’s so sad.” Tia paused as Mrs. Graham settled herself in the easy chair across from Tia’s aging wingback, “So, how are you today?”
“Not so good.”
“What’s wrong?” Tia wondered if she could disengage from David without drama, without even talking. Were they already too involved for an email breakup? Or, even better, could she simply ignore his calls and emails and text messages, and all the other ways he’d thrust himself into her life?
“Sam. I can barely get him to move around so I can . . . wash him properly.”
Tia refocused on Mrs. G and scratched “Help w/Sam—nurse” on her pad. “We need to talk about help for your husband. It’s important.”
“If you people really wanted to help, you’d get me a cleaning woman. How’s a person supposed to keep up with all this?”
“All what? Tell me.” Tia peered at Mrs. Graham. Clients in crisis looked disheveled, often unbathed. Mrs. G wore the same blue-red lipstick as always, her hair was combed into the usual stiff grey helmet of curls, and her lavender cardigan looked clean and wrinkle free.
“The dishes, the washing, the floors—oh, trust me, my dear, old age is no cure for housework.” Mrs. Graham pulled her purse closer to her, stroking the brown leather like a pet.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. G.” Tia leaned forward and again patted Mrs. Graham’s veined hand. She wished she could hug her, whisk her off on a cruise staffed with men and women willing to treat her like a queen. “We can’t get cleaning people for you, but that would be the point of assisted living. You wouldn’t have to do everything and take care of Sam. He’d be bathed and . . . ”
Tia searched for ways to reference Sam’s accidents—his growing dependence on Mrs. Graham for his toileting needs—without offending her client.
“ . . . and made comfortable in every way.”
“Why does everyone jump to the conclusion that Sam and I should be put away? Why not shoot us? Push us out on an ice floe?”
/> Tia moved her chair closer, hating how agitated she’d made the poor woman. It wasn’t like Mrs. G to get so testy. Her mother had been right. Tia should watch her mouth. She shot off too quick.
“Believe me, I didn’t mean to imply that you’re incapable.” Mrs. Graham needed admiration, not manhandling; complaining was her right. “In fact, you’re doing a spectacular job. You put most of the people I work with to shame.”
She praised Mrs. G for a few more moments, eager to finish their hour with positive reinforcement, and her client did seem mollified when Tia gently squeezed her shoulder in place of a good-bye handshake.
At four in the afternoon, after three more appointments, a meeting with the Department of Children and Families, a visit to a client in a rehab, and a home visit, Tia was ready to steal an hour and leave early. She jammed the last of her folders and papers into her bottom drawer, shoving a bit to get it closed so Katie wouldn’t comment about Tia’s sloppy desk again.
“Oh, Tia, do you need some help? Your desk is just a mess.” That’s what Katie said the other day.
“Then don’t look!” Tia had wanted to say when Katie complained, but she was too embarrassed—her desk did look awful. Tia couldn’t defend the indefensible jumble.
• • •
Tia marched down Washington Street to Doyle’s. “Coffee with,” she told the bartender, the flat-faced one who barely acknowledged her existence. She didn’t care. He knew what she drank, and he poured with a heavy hand.
The initial swallow hit fine. First it warmed her throat, then her heart, and then her stomach.
After the second one, the picture in her mind of sad Mrs. Graham and all the rest of her clients receded just enough that Tia could breathe freely.
David slipped onto the stool next to her.
“How about some company?” he asked.
Tia examined David. His face held no hint of worry. Soon he’d drink, and then he’d hold forth on the evils of sales tax, or the long-range considerations of the euro, to which apparently only he was privy.
The Comfort of Lies: A Novel Page 15
