Pink sunburn was beginning to spread across the shoulders of both girls, and Jane stopped the game and asked if they had any sunscreen. “In the house maybe,” the older one said and ran inside.
“What’s your name anyway?” Jane asked the little one, who had moved close to her knees again and was eyeing the lace on her nightgown.
“Calliope. My sister is Polyhymnia.”
Jane nodded and smiled. “Those sound like fairy names.”
“Actually, they’re muses,” the girl said.
“Oh, right,” Jane said, remembering now that they were, indeed, the names of two of the Greek muses. “They’re beautiful names.”
“Thank you,” she said.
The older sister returned and handed Jane a bottle of Coppertone number four, which did not seem sufficient for their white skin, but she rubbed it into both of their shoulders anyway, then dabbed it on their faces too.
She was rubbing some into her own shoulders when the man tapped her lightly on the arm. “Hey, thanks, I owe you one,” he said.
Jane rose and handed him her empty glass. She had been planning to say something cutting to him when he returned or at least shoot him a rude look, but the sight of him only engendered a sense of relief. She almost threw her arms around him she was so grateful for his return.
“How long are you in town?” he asked.
“All week.”
“We should get a beer. Talk about old times.”
She wondered what old times they would discuss since they had no real shared history, but didn’t point this out. “Okay,” she agreed, then wondered why she had. Surely having a beer with this man was not a good idea. “Maybe,” she added.
“Stop by whenever you like.” He grinned at her and she had an impulse to touch his white skin. She thought it should feel cool and solid like marble, though of course it wouldn’t.
“I’m Jane, by the way,” she said.
“Rex.” He offered his hand for a shake.
His skin was cool and smooth but soft, and Jane found herself disappointed by his ordinary name. She thought he might have an exotic name like his children: Mercury, perhaps, or Dionysus.
She waved to all three of them, then set off in the direction of Ivy’s house, feeling slightly revived, lighter than when she’d arrived.
When she finally reached Ivy’s house, she found Ivy and Ramona sitting side by side on the front step. They both stood up when they saw her, a frown crimping Ivy’s brow as she said, “We were worried.”
“Yeah, she was so worried she woke me up,” Ramona said with a smile.
“She was gone a long time,” Ivy said.
“Sorry,” Jane said. “I shouldn’t have cursed in front of the kids.”
“That’s what you’re apologizing for?” Ivy crossed her arms over her chest. “Saying fuck in front of the kids?”
Jane nodded, uncertain. Was there a grander offense she hadn’t registered?
“How about sorry for disappearing for an hour and a half in your nightgown? How about sorry for not telling me what the hell is wrong with you?” Ivy was speaking quietly but with a steady anger Jane hadn’t heard from her friend in many years.
“Nothing is wrong with me,” Jane said, feeling an odd calm settle over her. “I’m just hungover, and the kids were driving me crazy, and I snapped. That’s it. It happens sometimes.”
“It’s more than that,” Ivy said. “I can tell.”
“Well, I did lose my job.”
“More than that,” Ivy insisted.
“That’s not enough?” Here was her chance to tell them both about Adam, about the months of discomfort and sadness, about her stupid kiss with that coworker and her realization that she no longer wanted to be married, but she found the words were stuck deep inside her, and she had no idea how to lodge them free.
REX
He did remember her now. After she’d left, walking away in the red nightgown he’d wanted to ask her about but hadn’t, an image from high school floated into his brain out of nowhere. He had been at the Mormon dance on a Friday night one of the first weeks of school, and he’d noticed a girl who obviously did not belong. She was dressed in what had looked like a costume to Rex at the time: a hot pink dress, sort of Madonna style he understood now, with a tight bodice and frilly short skirt covered in black polka dots. Beneath this, he’d been shocked to see her black fishnet tights, ripped across both knees and cut off midcalf, paired with scuffed biker boots completely inappropriate for the dance. He was awed that she’d been allowed past the chaperones. Her hair, almost as white-blonde as his own, had two thick pink stripes in the front, which is how the memory came loose now all these years later. They were bolder versions of the thin stripe of pink he’d noticed in her hair today.
He wanted to call her or go find her and tell her about this memory. It seemed important, though he couldn’t say why. But the idea of walking over to that house with the red door and knocking felt wrong. He had a sense that he would be deeply unwelcome.
He called the girls in from the driveway and asked them to go take a shower. Calliope argued against this for a few minutes but was eventually dragged away by Polly to the bathroom. When he heard the water running, Rex went back out front and lit a cigarette, then sat down in the folding chair where Jane had been less than an hour ago. He thought about what he’d looked like at that same dance all those years ago. His short, skinny frame encased in dark slacks, a short-sleeved white button down and striped tie. His hair was short, almost a buzz cut then, and his face had been pudgy and dotted with zits. That girl in the crazy outfit, Jane, had been standing only across the room but seemed to have landed from another planet. He recalled a strong desire to go over and speak to her—no one else was near her at all—but just as he was working up his nerve and walking toward her, a giant, beefy boy swooped in and took her off to dance.
“Dad?” He turned around in his chair and saw Polly on the front step. Her hair was slicked back from the shower, and she had changed into a pink leopard-print sundress her mother had picked out that Rex always thought was too grown-up for his daughter, bordering on slutty. Leopard print had crossed the line into mainstream, he knew, but his old Mormon self still thought of it as the fabric of dancers and hookers.
“What’s up, kitten?” he smashed his cigarette out on the driveway, then rose and walked toward her, tossing the butt behind the sagebrush.
“What am I supposed to pack to go to Death Valley?”
The question stopped him cold. He’d forgotten Kristina was taking the kids there tomorrow. “I guess you pack very cool clothing and sunscreen. And a hat. And maybe a snakebite kit since there are a ton of rattlesnakes there.”
“I don’t have a snakebite kit.”
She looked upset now, a crease in her young, perfect skin, and Rex regretted his words. “You’re only going for the day, right? You should be fine. Besides, your mom will take care of the first aid stuff.”
Calliope appeared beside her older sister on the step, and it was obvious from her troubled expression that she’d heard his warnings about snakes through the screen door. “I want to stay here with you, Dad.”
“I want you to stay here too,” he told her but then amended. “But it’s important to spend time with your mom. She’s going through a tough time.”
“Are you going through a tough time too?” Polly asked.
“Sure I am,” he said. “But that’s okay. That’s what life’s all about, getting through these times together.” He almost added “as a family” but caught himself.
Inside the house, the front room still possessed the museum-like quality Kristina had cultivated, but every day the order was being chipped away, despite Rex’s struggle to keep the space intact. The long white couch, which the kids were now forbidden to sit on, had a stripe of black across a back cushion, and a pile of comic books had been left on the kidney-shaped coffee table. The framed photos above the buffet were coated with a thin skin of dust—he could see that no
w with the sun burning through the front windows—and the wood floor was cluttered in one corner with toys. He considered telling the girls to get their crap out of the front room, as he did almost every day, then decided against it. He was tired of this command; he would clean it himself before Kristina came to get the kids.
It was essential that she saw he could take care of this place, since one of her numerous complaints had been his inability to help out with anything, including cleaning up the house. Sometimes he wondered if that would have been enough. If he had simply cleaned once or twice a week, would she have stayed? It seemed too simple, not a true solution to their multilayered marital problems, but the idea still nagged at him that a few minor actions would have kept her close, if only for a few more years.
Kristina arrived at exactly two o’ clock to pick up the girls. Rex ushered her inside then called out for Polly and Callie. The front room was now spotless. He’d spent an hour going over it and hoped Kristina wouldn’t walk beyond this space into the rest of the house, which had not been given the same care.
It had been a week since he’d seen her, and she seemed smaller than he remembered, with darker hair. She’d had it cut, that was certain, and he told her it looked nice.
“Thanks,” she said, reaching up to tug at her new bangs. “I needed a change.”
Rex chuckled at this—he couldn’t help himself—and immediately understood this was the wrong thing to do, but how could she talk about change with such a straight face? They’d been officially divorced for four months—separated for three before that—and every single thing in his life felt different.
She frowned, then walked past him to the hallway and called out, “Light a fire, guys. We’ve got things to do.”
“Their stuff’s all ready, right here,” he said, pointing to the twin backpacks beside the front door.
She seemed not to hear him, but walked deeper into the house, down the hallway toward the kitchen. He followed, wishing he’d finished this morning’s dishes or wiped the crumbs off the counter, but she didn’t give any of it a second look, just moved to the screen door and slid it open. At the sight of their mother, the girls jumped up from their space on the grass and ran to throw their arms around her. Rex watched the three of them as if from a distance, wondering how he had become an outsider when the four of them had once been a single, breathing unit. The sight made his chest feel tight, and he placed a hand over his heart as if to still it, then leaned over the sink and pretended to inspect something in the depths of the garbage disposal.
When he could breathe normally again, he righted himself and left the kitchen, then sat on the white couch in the front room and waited for them to leave. Kristina emerged from the hallway first; she perched on the arm of the couch beside him and crossed her legs. “Polly’s trying to find her magnifying glass. She wants to bring it to Death Valley.”
“Seems like a long drive for one day,” he said.
“We’re going to spend the night. At some place called the Furnace Creek Inn.”
“Oh,” he said. “I didn’t know that.”
She nodded, and they were both quiet, listening to the distant sound of their daughters’ voices.
“Who are you going with?” he finally asked.
Her skin flushed at the question, but she shook her head. “Just a friend.”
“Anyone I know?”
She shook her head again.
The knowledge that she was bringing someone on this trip—a new boyfriend, he guessed—filled him up with a slow buzzing, so that he couldn’t hear his own thoughts. The information was both new and something he seemed to have known all along.“I’m going to take them camping next week,” he told her, just now deciding. “Up to Pine Creek.”
“That will be nice.”
Polly and Callie seemed to explode into the room, all bright laughter and yelling, and Rex was anxious to have them gone now and just sit here in utter silence. He hugged and kissed them each good-bye, then stood on the front step and waved as Kristina drove them away.
Instead of heading back inside to the silent house, as he’d imagined, Rex started walking up the street, shoving his hands into the pockets of his shorts and staring at each foot as it hit the pavement. He tried not to think about Kristina, but his thoughts kept circling back to her, each one with an image attached: a day at the beach in San Diego, her smiling face shielded by a giant floppy hat as she turned to him; her sleeping form the morning after she’d given birth to Polly and the desire he’d had to crawl into the skinny hospital bed beside her; her red-eyed look of pleading over a plate of pad thai at the restaurant they liked on Eastern; her stiff, angry form when he’d recently arrived at her work unannounced.
When he reached the end of the long street, Rex stopped and looked up toward the Black Mountains, then turned and headed back in the direction of his house. It was only one night, he told himself. His daughters would only be gone for one night, then they would be back home, and their presence would distract him from his thoughts. He didn’t want to picture the man they might meet tonight at the Furnace Creek Inn or how this new man might be introduced. Rex would try with every cell of his being not to ask his daughters about that part of the trip, though he could already feel the hairline cracks forming in his resolve, and the questions that would stream through those cracks and damage everyone a little bit more.
RAMONA
Ramona watched Jane’s kids play in the shallow end of the pool as she held Lucky on her lap under the blue umbrella. He was starting to fuss, so she bounced her knee a bit, then lifted him and made a face. She finally solved the fussing by handing him one of her long braids.
“I can take him,” Ivy said.
Ramona shook her head. “He’s happy now.”
Ramona and Jane were wearing their bathing suits and drinking iced tea, but Ivy was wearing a silky blue cover-up over her suit and had forgone the iced tea for a margarita in preparation for Jeremy’s visit. He was bringing over a tray of food, samples of what he would make for Lucky’s party on Friday, if Ivy decided to hire him.
“I still can’t believe he’s a caterer,” Ramona said again.
“He always liked to cook,” Ivy said and shrugged.
“I was hoping not to have to see anyone else from high school while I’m here,” Ramona told them. “Other than you guys and Frank I mean.”
“Sorry,” Ivy said.
In fact, Ramona had already had one run-in with a person from high school. On the drive in, she’d stopped at a gas station to find Jim Wall from art class peering into her window, asking her questions, telling her all about his pregnant teenage daughter as if Ramona were some sort of expert on the subject. She hadn’t been able to place him at first since his long hair had been buzzed off and he’d added at least thirty pounds to his frame, but then she saw his broad, square hands and recalled the time she’d let him rest his palm on the growing mound of her belly, the way he’d covered most of her stomach with his giant hand, then lifted it quickly away and shook it out as if he’d just burned his fingers.
“I especially don’t feel like seeing that jerk,” she said now about Jeremy, recognizing that she was still thinking mostly of Jim Wall, mentally blending the two men into one person for her to despise. She hadn’t told either Ivy or Jane about the early morning run-in with Jim and considered doing so now, but decided against it. Lucky gave her braid a sudden tug, as if defending his mother’s ex-boyfriend, and Ramona looked down at him and gave his back a light pat. “No offense,” she told him, then looked over at Ivy. “But I never liked the way he treated you.”
“I know,” Ivy said. “We can just try his free samples, then send him on his way and never see him again. I haven’t officially hired him yet or anything. I don’t even know why I called him, to be honest.”
“Frank and I talked her into it,” Jane said. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. I don’t remember him being such a jerk.”
“Well, he was,” Ramona said.
“Whatever you say,” Ramona said, then smiled to soften the comment.
The doorbell rang, and Ivy ran inside, then reemerged with Jeremy, who looked exactly as Ramona remembered: skinny and tall with badly cut black hair, tight black clothes, black shoes. He carried a large silver tray covered in wax paper and ran his eyes all over Ivy as they crossed the pool deck together, talking.
He said hello and set his tray down on the table, then lifted off the wax paper to reveal a colorful array. “Okay,” he said, clapping his hands, then rubbing his palms together. “Black and white minicupcakes, sweet potato purses, goat cheese and honey canapés, salmon and dill on rounds of pumpernickel. Oh, and these are peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, right here, for the picky kids.” He pointed to a cluster of tiny sandwiches in cut-out shapes of hearts, stars, and moons, then looked up at Ivy and smiled expectantly. “Dig in,” he said, and Ivy reached for a sweet potato purse, which looked sort of like a soft fortune cookie.
Jane reached for a salmon and dill round, and Ramona picked up a minicupcake and popped it in her mouth. The flavor was rich, true vanilla with dark chocolate. It was a lush, perfect cupcake, and Ramona had to admit she was impressed.
“Wow, this is amazing,” Ivy said. “What’s in this thing?”
“Well,” Jeremy said, “It’s sort of like a wonton wrapper on the outside, then the inside has sweet potato, of course, and a little bit of shallot, but it’s the sharp cheddar that makes it sing. Oh, I almost forgot, I have one more thing in the car.” He rushed back inside and they could hear the front door open and close.
“I think you should hire him,” Jane said, popping one of the canapés into her mouth. “This shit is good.”
“Maybe he bought it all at a gourmet food shop,” Ramona said, “then put it on his own tray.”
“Why would he do that?” Ivy asked, frowning.
Ramona shrugged. “To get back into your good graces. To rob your house, sell Ecstasy to your kid, raid your liquor cabinet.” She smiled to show she was half-joking, then popped one of the sweet potato purses into her mouth, bouncing Lucky on her hip as she stood and chewed. “Wow, this is good.”
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