The Balance Project

by Susie Orman Schnall

  I can tell Katherine’s buzzed, and I don’t want to get into it. She starts to hand me some cash, but I push her hand away and tell her not to worry about it.

  “Okay, at least let me have Pancho give you a ride,” Katherine says and asks Theo to call Pancho who was probably on his way home. Theo heads toward the house phone. I don’t object. It’s the quickest and certainly the cheapest way for me to get from the Upper West Side down to Union Square. “Here, take a coat,” Katherine opens her hall closet and hands me a long black wool Burberry coat. “It’s really cold out.”

  “Thanks,” I say and then I leave.

  “Thanks for everything you did today,” Katherine calls after me down the hall, but the elevator door is closing, and I just don’t want to hear it.

  Lucy: I’m so sorry, Nick. I’m on my way. In the car. Should be there in 15 minutes.

  When Pancho pulls up to Union Square Cafe, I practically jump out of the car while it’s still moving. When I get inside, I look around the bar, scanning the faces of all the calm and happy-looking customers. I think I see Nick sitting at the bar, but when I get closer I realize it’s not him. As I’m standing there, turning my head from side to side, making sure I’ve looked everywhere in the bar, I hear someone call my name.

  “Are you Lucy?” the bartender asks, shouting over the noise of the restaurant.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “I have a note for you from Nick.”

  “Thank you so much,” I say, smiling, relieved as I take the small slip of folded paper from the bartender.

  I walk outside, unfolding the paper as I go. I look down and read what Nick has written in careful script. And then I reread it several times, allowing the words to sink in.

  Fuck you.

  Every Sunday night the entire Cooper family gathers in my mom’s cozy dining room for dinner. That is, at least lately, the entire Cooper family but me. My three older brothers, their families, and my mom all live in Rye, New York, a perfect little suburb about thirty miles north of New York City in Westchester County.

  I loved growing up here. When I was a kid, it seemed like everything in Rye was based around families. It almost felt like small-town America—or at least what I thought small-town America was from seeing it depicted on TV and in the movies. Rye has community celebrations for every holiday, town leagues for every sport, a local Y, a beach, nature preserves, historic sites, and even the famed Rye Playland amusement park that was featured in the movie Big. Rye also has a gentrified downtown, a stretch of Purchase Street about a mile long, where you can get anything from a box of specialty macarons to the latest best seller, from a suitcase to a luxury watch, from a new pair of jeans to a fine meal. Plus you can get your hair cut, your clothes dry-cleaned, your dog groomed, your film developed, your check cashed, and pretty much anything else American capitalism can deliver.

  On the cab ride from the train station, which is on one end of downtown, to my mom’s I get a thrill seeing all the old stores and restaurants I used to hang out at with my friends as well as some new places I’ve recently started visiting. We pass Starbucks, Longford’s Ice Cream, The Smoke Shop (where we bought candy, not smokes! . . . well, maybe a few smokes), a cool new decor store called Nest Inspired Home, and as we get toward the other end of the downtown area, we pass my favorite bookstore, Arcade Books, and I crane my neck to see what they’re displaying in the window.

  My mom, Cindy Cooper, has lived in Rye for her entire life. The house she was raised in is only a couple blocks from the house she lives in now, the house she raised her kids, us, in. It’s a tidy white colonial with navy-blue shutters and a matching navy-blue front door. There’s a postage-stamp lawn out front dotted with six square pavers that lead from the cracked and uneven sidewalk, where I learned to ride a bike, to the three brick steps that approach the front door. Two small lights, that are on a timer and go on every night precisely at dusk, flank the front door, and an ancient metal mailbox, where the on-foot mailman still deposits the mail every day precisely at 3:00 p.m., hangs to the right of the door. There’s a narrow driveway that leads to a one-car detached garage behind the house. And attached to that garage is a basketball hoop that has seen more games than Madison Square Garden.

  “Well, look who’s gracing us with her presence!” My oldest brother Matt shouts joyfully in his booming voice as I get out of the cab at the curb in front of my mom’s. “I thought we might see you tonight,” he says and smiles at me. There’s a basketball game, to no surprise, going on in the driveway.

  “Hey, guys,” I say, a huge smile on my face as my middle brother Tommy launches a hard chest pass to me. I shoot and it goes in. Easy. My nephews, JJ and Parker—Matt’s two boys, cheer and give their Aunt Lucy a kiss.

  “These two boys playing with you can’t be Henry and James, now can they?” I say in mock shock. “Henry and James are little boys. But these two boys in front of me are huge!” I say about Henry and James May, who live next door with their mom Grace and dad Darren. I’ve always really liked my mom’s neighbor Grace, and whenever I’m home for an extended period of time, I like to hang with her at her house and hear her hilarious stories of all the crazy moms in her kids’ school. The same elementary school I went to when I was their age. Grace writes a health column for a wellness website so we always have a lot to talk about, and she’s always really interested in the work I’m doing for Green Goddess. She’s also really interested in what it’s like to work for Katherine Whitney.

  “Why didn’t you call us?” Matt asks. “I would have picked you up at the train station.”

  “I wanted to surprise you,” I say.

  “Is that Lucy I hear?” my mom asks, coming outside, wiping her hands on a dishtowel as she approaches me and gives me one of her famous Cindy Cooper hugs. I almost start to cry, it feels so good to be home, to be with my mom, but I hold it together. And soon enough I’m involved in a characteristically competitive Cooper sibling game of two-on-two. All three of my older brothers (the youngest, Sam, had come outside when my mom did) played basketball all through high school and college. Sam and Tommy played Division II ball, but Matt, my favorite brother, played for Duke which is part of the reason I wanted to go there, even though he graduated eight years before me. Because they were always playing basketball, I was always playing basketball. They needed a fourth.

  We finish the game, my brothers and I sweaty and happy, my nephews hoarse from cheering, and head inside to wash up for dinner.

  There are eleven of us at the table. Sam and his wife, Allie, who is pregnant with their first baby; Tommy, his wife, Kelly, and their two-year-old daughter, Ella; Matt, his wife, Shannon, and their two boys whom you already met: JJ is five and Parker is three. And my mom and I. Eleven.

  My dad, as I mentioned before, no longer lives here. He and my mom finally got divorced toward the end of my senior year in high school. She ended up calling the cops on him one night when he was really drunk, and angry, and pulled a knife out of the kitchen drawer. Rye doesn’t see that much crime, so when there’s a domestic violence call, all the cops come. Our street was lit up like Times Square on New Year’s Eve. Neighbors spilled out of their tidy colonials to see what was going on at the Cooper house. My dad begged my mom not to press charges. Apparently, I would find out later, she told him that the only way she wouldn’t is if he would sign divorce papers and get the hell out. The very next day, he packed his car and drove to Maine, where he grew up. I haven’t seen or spoken to my dad since. He tried to contact my brothers and me at the beginning, but none of us would speak with him. Eventually he gave up.

  My mom had a difficult time after my dad left. She was relieved that he wasn’t there anymore to mistreat her, but she had to deal with picking up the pieces and moving on with her life. Years of therapy helped her transform from the shell of a woman she had become at the hands of my father into a strong woman who no longer felt powerless, victimized, or frightened. It was a true metamorphosis. The loving, grandmotherly Cindy C
ooper of today bears no resemblance to who she was seven years ago. She doesn’t like to talk about it.

  “It’s so great to have you here, Lucy,” my mom says as we pass heaping platters and bowls filled with roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, roasted vegetables, pasta, fruit salad, green salad, and steamed spinach. Cindy Cooper loves nothing more than cooking Sunday dinner for her family.

  “Yeah, sorry it’s been awhile. I’ve really missed these dinners,” I say loading up my plate. “Things have been so busy at work. By Sunday afternoons, I usually want to just crash and get to bed early.”

  “And look at her. She looks so, what should I call that? Pretty!” Tommy says.

  “Hey!” I say.

  “Of course she looks pretty. She always looks pretty!” Tommy’s wife, Kelly, says, smiling at me.

  “Well she’s come a long way from her old tomboy days,” Tommy says.

  “Old tomboy days,” I say. “I just beat you in basketball!”

  “True, true. You got me there,” Tommy says.

  “But yeah, losing my tomboy ways was no easy feat,” I say, laughing. “Especially because I grew up with three older brothers telling me that I was a boy,” I say.

  “They told you you were a boy?” Allie asks. “I’ve never heard that story.”

  “We were all so happy when our parents told us there was going to be another baby. We needed a fourth for all of our games! But when she was born and she was a girl, we all cried because we didn’t know any girls in our neighborhood who liked to play sports. So we decided that if we told her she was a boy, she’d like sports,” Matt says proudly.

  “I think you decided that, Matt,” Tommy says.

  “Whatever. Minor detail. But as she got older some of that girl stuff just came out on its own,” Matt says.

  “Thank the Lord for that,” my mom says, spooning more mashed potatoes onto JJ’s plate.

  “Yeah, I’m still not what anyone would call girly, but at least I was able to grow my hair out, finally. No thanks to you, Tommy,” I say, and my brothers all start to laugh.

  “I don’t know if you girls ever heard that story,” my mom begins, clasping her hands together, looking at my three sisters-in-law.

  I see Shannon and Kelly give each other knowing looks. They’ve heard this story before, on more than one occasion. But it might be the first for Allie.

  My mom continues, “When Lucy was five, her hair was finally long enough to put into pigtails. She looked so adorable. But one afternoon I heard her screaming upstairs. I ran up and found Tommy holding a pair of scissors in one hand and both of Lucy’s pigtails were on the floor beside him.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Tommy says. All’s well that ends well. As I said, you look pretty.”

  “Thank you, Tommy. I’m glad you think so,” I say, taking a sip of my beer.

  “Speaking of people who think you’re pretty, what’s Nick up to tonight?” Matt asks. They get along great. Duke basketball in common and all.

  “Nice segue. Nick just felt like staying home,” I say, clearing my throat. I try to be nonchalant. My brothers don’t catch on and continue stuffing their faces, but my three sisters-in-law and my mother know something’s wrong. And the combined female empathy and concern radiating out of their eyes thicken the air. I look from face to face and then I can’t help it anymore. I start to cry.

  I’m sitting next to Shannon so she puts her arm around me and they all ask in their combined female voices, “What’s wrong?”

  I tell the whole story. About how things have been completely overwhelming at work. About how Katherine may be able to handle this balance thing, but it’s not working out so well for me. (I don’t let on that it might not be working out so well for her either.) About how Nick’s been fluctuating between concerned and annoyed since I’ve put our relationship completely on the back burner. And then, the pièce de résistance, the proposal: “He asked me to marry him.”

  The room is silent. Even Ella, who’s been fussy, and the two boys, who have been kicking each other under the table, sense that they should be quiet. Matt whoops with joy and slaps his thigh with his hand. But the women know better. They all look at my finger. My sad, naked finger. And then, I explain all the reasons I said no as everyone continues to eat and I continue to cry.

  “That’s crap,” Matt says coarsely, breaking the silence when I finish my account. Ella resumes her fussing and JJ and Parker resume their under-table horseplay.

  “What’s crap?” Matt’s wife, Shannon, asks. She and I have always been the closest among the sisters-in-law. I’ve known her the longest, and she’s the most good-natured of the three.

  “If she loves him, she should marry him, simple as that,” Matt says stuffing a chicken leg into his mouth.

  “Well, she’s entitled to not know if she fully believes in marriage,” Shannon says, defending me.

  “Of course she believes in marriage,” Matt says emphatically, banging his hand on the table.

  “Hello, Matt, I’m right here,” I say.

  “Well, I’m sorry,” my mom says quietly, wringing her napkin and prematurely starting to clear the table, “that I had anything to do with your having a negative impression of marriage.”

  “Oh, Mom,” I say. “I’m not blaming anything on you. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  My mom looks so sad. I see her purse her lips and shake her head back and forth. I feel badly bringing it all up. She sits up straight and sternly says, “Do not make any decisions about marrying Nick based on how your father and I ended up. You two are nothing like us. Please do not form your entire opinion on the institution of marriage based on ours. That would be an absolute shame, Lucy.”

  “Yeah, you can’t base it on Mom and Dad,” Tommy says.

  “They knew each other for less than a year when they got married. They were kids. You and Nick are totally different,” says Matt, taking a sip of his beer.

  “I know, but what if it doesn’t work out?” I ask no one in particular. My appetite is completely gone. I push my plate away.

  JJ and Parker politely excuse themselves from the table. Sensing a boring adult conversation, they head toward my mom’s sunroom where she has a Wii player set up for them.

  “You can’t live your life with what ifs, Luce,” Matt says, scrunching his face and gesturing with his hands. “What if I die tomorrow? What if there’s a terrorist attack? What if shit. That’s a stupid way to live your life, and we raised you better than that.”

  “Matty,” my mom and Shannon bark at the same time, suggesting he ease up on me a bit.

  “It’s fine. Lucy can handle it,” Matt says raising his voice a little. “I just don’t want my little sister to live her life controlled by fear. Fear is stupid, Lucy.”

  “Okay, jeez,” I say to Matt. “But marriage isn’t for everyone. And just because you’re all happily married does not mean that I have to get married also. I am my own person.”

  “I think what Matt’s trying to say,” Shannon says gently, “is that we all want the best for you, Lucy. Life is so uncertain, and no one knows what’s going to happen in the future, so when something really good comes around you should grab it with everything you’ve got and never let it go.”

  “And about that whole balance thing, Lucy,” Tommy’s wife, Kelly, says. “It’s hard. It’s really, really hard. I started reading Katherine’s book that you gave me and, to be honest, she makes it sound so easy. It’s not.” Kelly was an assistant district attorney before she had Ella. She tried to go back to work when her maternity leave ended but she said it was too stressful because her job was unpredictable and demanding. Plus, she said, she realized that she really wanted to be a full-time mom.

  “Well, I do want to work, at least I think I do,” I say. “How am I supposed to know now what I’m going to want to do when we have kids? And that might be a deal breaker for Nick. He says he’d be flexible, but I know he’d prefer his wife to be a stay-at-home mom. How fair is it for me to marry him when I
don’t know that I could give him that?”

  From across the table, I see Sam and Allie give each other a look. A sad, imploring look. They’ve both been quiet throughout this whole conversation. Sam catches my eye.

  “Look, Luce, marriage isn’t easy,” Sam says.

  “Sam,” Allie pleads quietly.

  “No, Al, it’s fine. They should know.”

  “Know what?” my mom asks in a nervous voice.

  “Allie and I have been in counseling. And it’s primarily for this whole reason. I want Allie to stay home when the baby is born, and she doesn’t want to give up her job,” Sam says.

  Allie is a physical therapist. She gets up from the table and rushes to the kitchen. Kelly follows her.

  “Oh, Sammy,” my mom says in a disappointed voice. Primarily, I think, because of how he upset his wife but also, I’m sure, because of her concern for his marriage.

  “Look, Luce.” Matt pipes up again. “No one is trying to say that marriage is easy. Or that these decisions about working or not working are easy. They’re not. But if you don’t give things a chance because you’re afraid of what might happen, then you might as well crawl in a hole and shrivel up because that’s not living.”

  “I agree with Matt,” Tommy says. “It’s not like you barely know Nick, Luce. I mean, it’s Nick we’re talking about. You guys have been dating longer than Kelly and me have been together.”

  “And Allie and me,” Sam chimes in.

  “Just give it some thought,” Shannon says. “Don’t be so sure you want to let Nick go because you’re not sure what you want out of life. And definitely don’t let Nick go because you don’t believe in marriage right now. That’s worth thinking over some more. When a marriage is for the right reasons, and when two people know each other so well and for so long, like you and Nick have and like Matty and I have, it can be wonderful.” She turns to Matt and they smile at each other.