Kalen jumped in directly behind her. Too modest to look closely at his body, Samantha smiled in his direction for a brief moment before she dove under the surface and swam out farther.
Swimming in a pond instead of the pool from yesterday brought her back to the summer she was six and her father had taught her how to swim. Every summer growing up, she had paddled in a much smaller pond a couple of miles inland from Calmer. She remembered the security of her father’s arms holding her up on the water’s surface while she kicked her feet, until gradually she relaxed enough to discover her own buoyancy. How she’d trusted him at first not to let her go, then trusted him when he told her to try it on her own. How had he known when she was ready? She visualized his proud face looking on, when at last, for the first time, she swam by herself.
Samantha’s throat went dry. For heaven’s sake, grow up, Sam. Act your age. When she saw Kalen approach her doing a swift crawl, she was grateful her eyes and cheeks were already wet from the swim.
With his arms low and smoothly arcing past his shoulders, he sluiced through the surface, closing the gap between them in a half-dozen strokes. “Refreshing, isn’t it?” he asked, his grinning face close to hers. Tiny beads of water clung to his eyelashes and goatee, sparkling in the sun.
“It’s awesome,” she said, concentrating on treading water.
“So you spent the evening with Ben,” he said. “You know, Veronica didn’t seem to enjoy the party much. I bet she expected Ben to change his mind and show up, and when he didn’t, she just got more and more crooked.”
Samantha couldn’t help but notice the curly fluff of blond hair on his chest as he kept treading water beside her, though he looked younger with his hair wet and plastered to his head.
“Well, that’s too bad for her, then. Ronnie always expects to get her own way. I guess she’s finding out she can’t manipulate Ben the way she wants to.” She looked over at Gina and Mandy, laughing and swimming the backstroke together.
“If you ask me, I think they’ll patch things up. Do you think Ben will take her back? He didn’t say anything to you last night? He’s been awfully sweet on her up to now.”
Samantha felt a sharp urge to tell Kalen to shut up. Nobody asked you what you thought, she wanted to say. But she held her tongue. Instead, she shrugged her shoulders and swam over to the girls, leaving him in her wake.
“Look, Gina, Sammie won’t even take off her bra,” Mandy teased, her grin so wide you could see her gums.
Her pert little breasts looked like half-moons on the water’s surface. The many freckles on Mandy’s slender body reminded Samantha of her friend Leah, but that’s where the similarity ended. The Leah she knew would never have skinny-dipped in a gazillion years.
“She’s shy, that’s all,” Gina said. “It’s a free country.”
“It’s much freer without clothes!” Mandy said, turning and swimming to the shore. When she emerged from the water, she climbed up on a wide, flat rock and stretched out on her belly to sun herself.
Obviously, Samantha gathered, shyness for her was unheard of, and she wondered again what it felt to live life so uninhibited. She tried not to stare.
“Very good, guys,” Gina said. “I think we should head back to town now. I’m meeting Charlie in an hour.”
Kalen reached the shore ahead of them. Samantha snuck a quick glimpse of him and his white buttocks before he pulled his clothes back on. She and Gina followed suit. Her wet underwear chafed under her clothing as she climbed back into the heat of the pickup.
“I wonder how Charlie did this morning,” Kalen said, pressing against her. Samantha wondered what he was talking about.
“Hopefully, they’re making better time,” Gina said. Popping a fresh stick of Juicy Fruit in her mouth, she turned to Samantha. “My boyfriend is rowing in the Regatta next Wednesday. Isn’t that great? He and his crew have been practising down at the lake every morning this summer, since they decided to sign up for the races. It’s his first time. You going to the Regatta?”
“Most likely,” Samantha said. “The youth center is closed for the holiday, so I plan to check it out. Seeing as I have never been.”
“Yeah, just about everything closes down for Regatta Day. Never been, eh? Should be a bit of a hoot for you.” Gina smiled at her brother Joey, who waved them through a gravel section of the highway, a cloud of dust billowing up from her tires as they drove toward the city.
Gina dropped the pair of them off on the same corner she’d picked them up. Her stomach empty and rumbling, Samantha told Kalen she had to go home to change and have lunch.
“Yeah, I should head back too and finish packing my stuff for the big move,” he said.
“Where exactly are you moving?”
“Rita’s new place is on Queens Road, not far from here. I’ll have you over sometime. See you later, Sam.”
“Bye, Kalen.”
When Samantha got home, she found her mother in the middle of a phone call. Her face still creased with sleep, she sat hunched at the table, staring into her mug of coffee. Samantha knew by her tight expression something was very wrong.
“…but Jack? It’s kind of premature to be telling me about it, don’t you think…I didn’t need to hear this right now, Jack, you’re being cruel…I don’t care.” Darlene rubbed her eyes. “Still. You could’ve waited.”
What fresh and sassy new hell was this? Samantha thought with dread, sinking down into a chair. She watched as Darlene got up and replaced the receiver.
“What is it?”
Her mother sat down again, clutching her mug with both hands. She looked down into it like she was reading tea leaves. “Never mind, Sammie,” she said quietly. “I got your message and I called your father. Yes, it’s great that he has another, better job. I don’t need to hear about the details of his personal life, that’s all.”
“Tell me. What is it?”
Darlene sighed and looked her daughter in the eye. “He felt a need to tell me about his new…I don’t know a good way to say this…he’s seeing someone.”
Samantha gaped at Darlene. She found it hard to breathe, as if someone kicked her squarely in the midsection and knocked the wind out of her. “Oh, Momma,” she finally managed to say. She recognized the defeat in the slump of her mother’s shoulders, how weary she looked, and the lines of worry framing her eyes. Seeing her this way made her want to hit someone or break something into a million pieces.
“Why does he love to hurt you like that? Damn him after all!” The tiny shred of hope she had held in her heart, that elusive dream of her parents reuniting, evaporated. So he was telling them all, with one phone call, that he had moved on for good. Her father was creating a new life that didn’t include any of them.
“We shouldn’t be surprised by this. Least of all me. Your father made up his mind he was done with this marriage long before today.”
“He must have his mind made up that he’s done with his children too. How does he expect us to react? It’s like he’s divorcing us too!” Samantha wondered what Veronica would say when she found out. She’d been acting like she didn’t care. Will she care now?
“He’s still your father. He loves you and you know he always will. Nothing or nobody is going to change the way he feels about you girls. He wanted me to tell you that.” Darlene went to the sink and rinsed her mug. “I’m getting a bath. I feel a headache coming on, so I think I’ll lie down again after.”
Samantha went to her bedroom and closed the door. She’d forgotten all about her need to change her damp clothes, and her appetite for lunch had vanished, crowded out by a heavy numbness in her throat and under her rib cage. She sat woodenly on the edge of the bed, staring at nothing, feeling the thick wave of pain rise and crest. But only when she heard her mother’s bath water running did she let the tears come.
Chapter Ten
“I have dreamt in my life, dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they have gone through and through me, like
wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.”
- Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
Samantha woke up an hour later. The broken sleep from last night coupled with the swim today must have made her extra tired. Flipping over on her back, she realized she’d dreamed of her beloved, healthy Nana for a change. Trying to hold on to the happy remnants of the dream that lingered sparked a mosaic of childhood memories in Samantha. She revisited the fall afternoons picking blueberries with her grandmother, behind their house where they grew in high, bountiful patches. Nana’s large, blue-stained hands picked the juicy berries much faster than she ever could, filling her salt beef bucket before Samantha could fill her own small beach pail to half.
If you didn’t eat so many, you’d have more, Nana would say with a smile; her broad, ample bottom in stretchy slacks jutting up at the sun as she stooped over the lower bushes.
One time berry picking, Nana had surprised Samantha by grabbing her under the arms, sweeping her up and away from the ant hill she had stepped in, and frantically brushing dozens of red fire ants from her bare legs. She’d gotten them all off so quickly, Samantha hadn’t received one bite, although Nana did get one on her thumb that had swelled up as big as a grape because she was allergic—she had to take Benadryl. Samantha had no time to realize any threat of danger and never tired of hearing her grandmother retell it.
On another summer morning, Nana had laundered all of their stuffed toys in the washing machine and pinned them on the clothesline in the front garden. The teddy bears, stuffed bunnies, and Pound Puppies—and even her and Ronnie’s Holly Hobbie dolls—hung in a long line from their clothespins; stretching across their yard, dancing and bobbing in the lively breeze. When they were dry, Nana had prepared a tea party picnic to set up on the grass and enjoy together, with all their little dolls and animals sitting in a circle with them.
While their father had fished and their mother worked in the plant, Nana did most of the cooking and cleaning for them when she was still in good health, even while their grandfather was alive. She baked a batch of bread every Monday, and partridgeberry tarts, apple pies, or crisps every Saturday. She followed a rigid housecleaning schedule each day, and a menu of home-cooked meals for each night of the week that made Samantha’s mouth water just thinking of it.
Of course on Sunday, which she called the Lord’s Day, Nana would never do housework outside of cooking. After she’d peeled vegetables and started dinner roasting in the oven, she dressed the girls and styled their hair for church and took them with her. This was the convention every Sunday morning, no matter what. Samantha realized she missed the order and predictable routine of those tender years nearly as much as she missed Nana.
It was a sad realization, but Poppy had rarely been approachable, even when she was very small. Call it a sixth sense she had, but she never felt comfortable in his presence. One night when she was little and her grandfather was still living, Samantha had overheard her mother on the phone with Aunt Donna who lived and worked as a newspaper columnist in Nova Scotia. Darlene was assuring her sister how she would never leave her or Veronica alone with him, that she wouldn’t take that chance. She’d tried to find out what it was all about and questioned her mother, but Darlene remained tight-lipped on the matter. Samantha had a weird inkling it wasn’t entirely about his drinking problem.
She heard the front door open. Changing into leggings and a tank top, she went to look for something to eat. She steeled herself in anticipation of another one of her sister’s diatribes. Grabbing a banana, she devoured it in three or four bites.
“Where’s Momma?” Veronica asked.
“She had a headache. Probably lying down.” But when Samantha checked Darlene’s room, no sign of her was evident. Returning to the kitchen, she filled Veronica in on their father’s news. Perversely, she felt better after unloading the burden, feeling a cruel satisfaction in dumping some of the hurt on her sister.
Veronica stared at her. Her lip curled. “I’m beginning to hate men, you know that? You can’t count on ’em, you can’t trust ’em as far as you can fling ’em. They’re all arse-wipes!” She fled upstairs to her bedroom, banging the door so hard, Samantha jumped.
Everyone was changing. There’d been a time when it was next to impossible to make Veronica that angry. The Ronnie she had known up to now had been happy-go-lucky, full of jokes and fun. Sometimes the fun-making had been at Samantha’s expense or at the expense of another unsuspecting target of her derision, but she rarely got upset over trivialities like her younger sister did. Granted, this latest revelation could hardly be called a triviality. And her outburst was proof to Samantha that Veronica did love their father after all.
Samantha took an inventory of their groceries later, hoping to find something to fix for supper. Mealtime was approaching and Darlene had yet to return. She’d probably gone shopping or something, Samantha guessed. Maybe she’d recovered from her headache and made other plans. In any event, it was close to five o’clock and it wasn’t like their mother not to leave a note or tell them if she wasn’t joining them for supper, so she should be arriving at any minute.
She was stirring leftover spaghetti sauce and boiling pasta when a knock came on the front door. When she answered it, her heart beat faster. It was Ben.
“Hi, Samantha,” he said. “How’s it going?”
“Okay. What are you up to?”
“Just got off work from the bookstore.”
“Coming in?” She wondered for a nanosecond whom he had come to see. But what a foolish girl she was for wondering at all.
He stepped into the hall, a troubled look on his face. “Is Veronica back from work yet?”
“Hang on, I’ll get her.” Samantha didn’t think it was possible for her mood to sink any lower, but it did. She tapped on her sister’s door. “Ben’s here.”
“Ask him what he wants,” she answered. “Or who, I should say.”
“He wants you.” Samantha went to tell Ben she would be down soon, then returned to the stove to give the bubbling sauce a quick stir. He followed her into the kitchen and waited.
Veronica appeared, looking soft and sexy in a new clinging sundress and flats, her golden hair loose and shining. She exuded her trademark fragrance of floral perfume. Her mouth, however, was set in a stubborn pout, gashed with bright red lipstick.
“Can we go somewhere and talk?” Ben asked. “Let me take you out to supper someplace.”
Samantha saw her sister’s face break into a smile, smug and self-satisfied. Those irresistible dimples once again graced her cheeks. And once again, as she watched them leave, her hatred for Veronica was rekindled.
Maybe Darlene would come home to eat with her. Maybe she was waiting for a ride or she missed a bus. Samantha waited for another half an hour, thinking how she’d hardly eaten anything all day. Finally, she sat at the table, forcing herself to eat some of the supper she’d prepared before the pasta clotted into a gelatinous mess. A wriggling thread of worry underlined her thoughts as she peered out the kitchen window.
***
“…so I guess you could call me a Regatta widow,” Gina laughed. She took a mouthful of Coke, her eyes closed and her mane of dark hair tossed back as she drank.
Next to her, Mandy puffed on a cigarette, flicking ash on the sidewalk. It was late in the evening, the shadows were deepening, and the threesome sprawled lazily on Samantha’s front steps. While Samantha struggled not to ruminate and obsess to herself over Darlene’s whereabouts, Gina told them how Charlie went back to his house early to crash, wiped out from rising at dawn for rowing practice again. She missed hanging out with him, she complained, but it had become the new normal ever since he’d joined the team.
Mandy smiled like she hadn’t a care in the world. Samantha surmised she was happy to have her best friend to herself again.
“Anyway, Sam,” Gina said, “It appears Ben and Veronica have gotten over their rough spot. We saw her, practically sitting in his lap, she was,
while they were driving around downtown.”
“Damned if I care,” Samantha blurted. And damned if she was going to let these two see any hint of her jealousy.
All evening she’d been steeling herself against thoughts of betrayal, building a wall between herself and the renewed hurt. She had no real grounds to be angry with Ben. Besides, he had nothing on her father. “I told you we were just friends.” The familiar heavy mask fell back into place.
“Yeah. Fuck ’em,” Mandy said. Gina chuckled, digging an elbow into her friend.
An orange taxi pulled in, parking by the curb in front of them. Samantha couldn’t see who sat slouched in the back seat, but she knew of only one person it could be. The driver emerged and quickly opened the rear door, leaning in to help his customer get out.
“Is that your mother?” Mandy whispered.
Sweet. Gentle. Jesus. Of course it was. And she’s shit-faced drunk.
“Is this the right address?” the taxi driver asked, helping a giggling Darlene stand on her unsteady legs. He guided her toward the steps but it was slow going. Looking girlish in a floral skirt and a peasant blouse, she struggled to free herself of him, trying to loop the strap of her purse over her shoulder at the same time.
“Yes, she lives here,” Samantha said. Her careful facade of cool detachment faltered and fell away in the presence of this drunken display. She jumped to her feet, her face flaming in the dusky light.
She’d never experienced this kind of shame for anyone, not since that Easter Sunday long ago when Poppy had lain passed out in her driveway. Now, it seemed his daughter was auditioning for a repeat performance. Samantha avoided the looks from her companions, who scurried off the steps and out of the way, murmuring quick good-byes. She was relieved to see them go.
Calmer Girls Page 10
