Barefoot (35 page)

Vicki was about to mention Melanie’s unprecedented ecstasy to Brenda, but Brenda beat her to it. “What is
up
with her?” Brenda said. “She’s been Suzy Sunshine lately.”

“I know,” Vicki said. “She’s happy.”

“But why?” Brenda said.

“Does there have to be a reason?” Vicki said.

“Don’t you think it’s strange?” Brenda said.

“Maybe it’s the pregnancy hormones,” Vicki said. “Or maybe she just loves it here with us.”

Brenda looked skeptical. “Oh, yeah, it’s us.” Her cell phone started its strangled jingling. “I’m certainly not going to answer that.”

“What if it’s Josh?” Vicki said.

Brenda checked the display. “It’s not Josh.”

“Not Mom?”

“No.”

“Your lawyer?”

“Mind your own business, please.”

Melanie came bouncing up, swinging the shopping bag in her hand. “Okay!” she said. “I’m ready!”

Brenda furrowed her brow. “If you’re taking happy drugs, it’s time to share.”

“What?” Melanie said.

“Onwards!” Vicki said.

They hit Vis-A-Vis and Eye of the Needle, Gypsy, and Hepburn. Brenda looked long and hard at a reversible Hadley Pollet belt at Hepburn but then declared loudly that she couldn’t afford anything new. Vicki thought this sounded suspiciously like fishing, but she let it go. They moved on.

Vicki bought a straw hat at Peter Beaton. The salesgirl was careful not to stare at Vicki’s head when the scarf came off; Vicki could feel her not-staring, but she didn’t care. She caught up with Brenda and Melanie at the top of Main Street. Melanie was standing outside Ladybird Lingerie, gazing at the door as if waiting for it to magically open.

“Do you want to go in?” Vicki asked.

“No, no,” Melanie said. “What use do I have for lingerie?”

At Congdon’s Pharmacy, the three of them sat at the lunch counter and ordered chicken salad sandwiches and chocolate frappes. Brenda’s cell phone rang again. She checked the display.

“Not Josh,” she said.

“I feel guilty,” Vicki said. “Having this much fun while someone else is watching my children.”

“Get over it,” Brenda said. “You deserve a morning like this. We all do.”

Melanie lifted her frappe in a toast. “I love you guys,” she said.

Brenda rolled her eyes and Vicki almost laughed. But this was the old Melanie. Before Melanie became obsessed with having a baby and devastated by Peter’s betrayal, she had been one of the finest girlfriends around. She was always up for a twirl outside the dressing room and for cozy lunches where she would propose lovey-dovey toasts.

“Cheers!” Vicki said. They clinked glasses. Brenda joined in reluctantly.

“Oh, stop being such a sourpuss,” Melanie said. “I got you something.”

“Me?” Brenda said.

Melanie pulled the Hadley Pollet belt out of a small shopping bag at her feet and handed it to Brenda. “For you,” she said.

“No . . . way!” Brenda said. Her expression was one Vicki remembered from childhood: She was excited, then suspicious. “What for? Why?”

“You wanted it,” Melanie said. “And I know I horned in on your summer with Vicki. The house is yours, too, and I’m grateful to you for letting me stay. And you’re taking such good care of Vicki and the kids. . . .” Melanie’s eyes were shining. “I wanted to do something nice for you.”

Brenda cast her eyes down. She wound the belt around her waist. “Well, thank you.”

“That was really thoughtful, Mel,” Vicki said.

Brenda narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure there’s not something else going on?”

“Something else?” Melanie said.

S
omething else.

Later that afternoon, the phone rang in the cottage. Vicki was in bed, napping with Porter, and the phone woke her up. She was the only one home; Melanie had taken the Yukon to her doctor’s appointment, and Brenda had walked with Blaine to the swing set on Low Beach Road. The phone rang five, six, seven times, was silent for a minute, then started ringing again.
Ted,
Vicki thought. She climbed out of bed carefully, so as not to disturb Porter, and hurried through the living room for the phone.

“Hello?”

There was silence. Somebody breathing. Then a young, female voice. “I know you’re sleeping with him.”

“
Excuse
me?” Vicki said.

“You’re sleeping with him!”

Carefully, quietly, Vicki replaced the receiver. For this she had gotten out of bed? She poured herself a glass of iced tea and repaired to the back deck, where she stretched out on a chaise longue. The sun was hot; she should go back inside and put on lotion, but she was so dopey from her nap that she indulged herself for a few minutes. She thought about the phone call and laughed.

A little while later, the phone rang again. Vicki opened her eyes. Took a deep breath. She had been working hard on visualizing her lungs as two pink, spongy pillows. She rose and went to the phone; she didn’t want it to wake up Porter. Though God knows if it was another wrong number, or the same wrong number, she would take the phone off the hook.

“Hello?” She tried to convey impatience.

Silence. This was ridiculous! But then, a throat clearing. A man.

“Uh, Vicki?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Peter. Peter Patchen.”

“Peter Patchen.” Vicki couldn’t disguise her shock. “Will wonders never cease.”
You jerk,
she thought.
You coward.

“Uh, yeah. Listen, I realize you probably hate me . . .”

“To be honest, Peter, I haven’t given it that much thought.”

“Right. You’re busy with your own stuff, I get it. How are you feeling?”

“I’m feeling fine, actually.”

“Yeah, that’s what Ted told me. That’s great.”

Vicki didn’t want to discuss her well-being or otherwise with Peter Patchen. But being on the phone with him made wheels turn in her mind. Melanie had told Peter about the pregnancy; this Vicki knew, and while Vicki was glad it was now out in the open, she didn’t necessarily think Melanie should take Peter back right away.

“What can I do for you, Peter?” Vicki said.

“Well, I was wondering if Melanie was around.”

“No,” Vicki said. “She’s out.”

“Out?”

“Out.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Would you like me to tell her you called?” Vicki said.

“Yeah,” Peter said. “Tell her I called. Tell her I miss her.”

Vicki rolled her eyes.
Yeah, you miss her now. Jerk! Coward!
Still, this was what Vicki wanted to see: Peter coming back on his hands and knees, groveling.

“I’ll tell her,” Vicki said.

Later, when the Yukon pulled up in front of the house, Vicki stepped out onto the flagstone path.

“I know what’s going on,” she said as Melanie got out of the car.

Melanie stared at Vicki; she had one hand resting on her belly. All the color drained from her face. “You do?”

“I do,” Vicki said. “Peter called.”

Melanie looked at Vicki strangely. She undid the latch of the gate and stepped inside slowly and carefully, as though Vicki were holding a gun to her head. “He did?”

“He said he misses you.”

“He
did?
” Now Melanie looked perplexed.

“He did. He called, I told him you were out, he said, ‘Out?’ I said, ‘Out.’ He said to tell you he called. He said, ‘Tell her I miss her.’”

Melanie shook her head. “Wow.”

“‘Wow’?” Vicki said. “‘Wow’? Yeah, wow. That’s right, wow. This is exactly what I said was going to happen. Didn’t I tell you he’d come around?”

“He only cares about the baby,” Melanie said.

“Maybe,” Vicki said. “But maybe not. Are you going to call him back?”

“No,” Melanie said. “Not today.” She rubbed her belly. “My hormones are all over the place, Vick. I don’t know what I want.”

“Right,” Vicki said. “I can understand that. I’ll tell you what, it was weird having him call.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet.”

“In fact, I got two weird phone calls this afternoon.”

“Who else?”

“Some girl,” Vicki said. “Some crazy girl. A wrong number.”

The longer Vicki felt good, the more frequently she wondered when the other shoe was going to drop. Could the worst be over? Vicki had three weeks of chemo left, then she would have another CT scan, the results of which would be sent to Dr. Garcia in Connecticut. If her lungs looked okay, if the tumor had shrunk, if it had receded from the chest wall, then Dr. Garcia would schedule the surgery. Now, because Vicki was feeling good, she allowed herself an occasional glimpse at herself
after
surgery: She pictured herself waking up in the recovery room, attached to an IV and five other machines. She imagined pain in her chest, soreness around the incision, she pictured herself bracing her body when she coughed or laughed or talked. All this would be fine because she would have survived the surgery. She would be clean. Cancer-free.

Vicki felt so good for so many days that one night at dinner she mentioned she was thinking of letting Josh go.

“I can take care of the kids myself now,” she said. “I feel fine.”

Brenda made a face. “I promised Josh work for the whole summer. He quit his job at the airport for us.”

“And he has to go back to college,” Melanie said. “I’m sure he needs the money.”

“It’s not fair to fire him at the beginning of August just because you feel better,” Brenda said.

“I can’t really imagine the rest of the summer without Josh,” Melanie said. She set down her ear of corn; her chin was shiny with butter. “And what about the kids? They’re attached.”

“They’re attached,” Brenda said.

“They’re attached,” Vicki conceded. “But would it devastate them if he stopped coming? Don’t you think they’d be happy to have me take them to the beach every day?”

“I promised him a summer of work, Vick,” Brenda said.

“I think the kids would be devastated,” Melanie said. “They love him.”

“They love him,” Brenda said.

“Do they love him, or do you guys love him?” Vicki said.

Brenda glowered; Melanie stood up from the table.

“Oh, who are we kidding?” Vicki said. “We all love him.”

The next day Vicki invited herself to the beach with Josh and the kids. Josh seemed happy to have her come along, though he might have been pretending for her sake.

“I can help out,” Vicki said.

“That’s fine,” Josh said.

“I know you guys have your own routine,” Vicki said. “I promise not to cramp your style.”

“Boss,” Josh said, “it’s fine. We’re happy to have you come with us. Right, Chiefy?”

Blaine locked his arms across his chest. “No girls allowed.”

Vicki ruffled his hair. “I’m not a girl,” she said. “I’m your mother.”

“This is where we usually sit,” Josh said, dropping the umbrella, the cooler, and the bag of toys in the sand. “As you can see we’re spitting distance from the lifeguard stand and close enough to wet sand that we can build sand castles.”

“And dig holes,” Blaine said.

Josh put up the umbrella, laid out a blanket, and set Porter in the shade. Immediately, Porter grabbed the pole of the umbrella and pulled himself up.

“He normally stands like that for five or ten minutes,” Josh said.

“Then he chews on the handle of the orange shovel,” Blaine said.

“Then he gets his snack,” Josh said.

“I see,” Vicki said. She had brought a chair for herself, which she unfolded in the sun. “You guys have it all figured out.”

“We’re all about routine,” Josh said, winking at Vicki. “We’re big fans of
consistency
and
sameness
.” He waved at a woman down the beach who had two little girls. “There’s Mrs. Brooks with Abby and Mariel. Blaine
loves
Abby.”

“I do not,” Blaine said.

“Oh, you do so,” Josh said. “Go ask her if she wants to dig with us.”

“Hey, Josh,” a man’s voice said. Vicki turned around. A tall, dark-skinned man with a little boy Blaine’s age and a baby girl in his arms waved as he moved down the beach.

“Omar, my man!” Josh said. Then to Vicki, he whispered, “That’s Omar Sherman. He brings the kids to the beach every morning while his wife talks to her patients on the phone. I guess she’s some hotshot psychiatrist in Chicago and deals with a bunch of complete basket cases.”

“Geez,” Vicki said. “You know everybody.”

She sat back and watched as Abby Brooks and Mateo Sherman helped Blaine and Josh dig a hole and then a tunnel in the sand. Porter stood holding on to the umbrella pole, and then he tired out and plopped onto the blanket. He reached for his orange shovel and started chewing. Vicki watched all this with the distinct feeling that she was a visitor. Josh was 100 percent in control. At ten-thirty, he pulled snacks from the cooler: a bottle of juice and box of raisins for Blaine, a graham cracker for Porter. Blaine and Porter sat on the blanket and ate neatly and without complaint, like a model of two children having a snack. Josh produced two plums from the cooler and handed one to Vicki.

“Oh,” she said. “Thank you.” She took a bite of the cold, sweet plum, and juice dripped down her chin. Josh handed her a napkin. “I feel like one of the children,” she said, wiping her face. Vicki liked this, but it made her feel guilty, too. Guilty and unnecessary. She was the children’s mother and they didn’t need her.
No girls allowed.
Josh was taking care of everything and everybody.

Josh sat on the blanket. Porter pulled himself up to standing, holding on to the umbrella pole in a way that reminded Vicki of an old man on the subway. Blaine had dutifully collected the trash from snack and walked it over to the barrel behind the lifeguard stand. “You’re a model citizen,” Josh said. Blaine saluted. He joined Abby a few yards down the beach, where they busily filled up buckets with sand and then water.

Vicki couldn’t believe she’d been thinking of letting Josh go. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she said. “With us, I mean.”

“I like being here,” Josh said. “With you.”

“I don’t mean to embarrass you,” Vicki said. “Or get all serious on you.”

“You can be as serious as you want, Boss.”

“Okay, then,” Vicki said. “I don’t know what we would have done this summer without you.”