The Drowning Girls (20 page)

JUNE 19, 2015
6:32 P.M.

LIZ

When we backed out of the driveway, I saw them immediately—our neighbors were now circled in a clump under one of the palm trees in front of the Mesbahs’ house. All of their heads turned at once. Deanna took a step forward uncertainly and stopped.

Only Fran was on her side of the street, the sunlight catching her unruly curls and the silver spokes of Elijah’s wheelchair. I rolled down my window and leaned across Danielle’s lap.

“Liz, my God. What happened?” Fran asked. Elijah’s wheelchair was between us, and in it he sat wide-eyed and alert.

“There was an accident with Kelsey Jorgensen,” I told her. “I don’t know how it happened, but she fell in the pool.”

“Dear Lord. I saw her earlier today, just wandering around in front of your house. I wondered what she was doing.”

“We’re going to the hospital now. Will you—tell the others?”

“You mean the vultures? Sure.”

And then I pressed down on the gas, gunning the engine through the winding streets of The Palms while Danielle clutched the door handle, leaning in to the turns. I remembered Phil’s explanation for why there were no straight lines in the community, how it made for an interesting streetscape and a sense of seclusion and privacy.

Phil
. However irrational, it would be nice to lay this blame at his feet. At the very least, he’d brought us here in the first place, almost a year to the day. No matter what, he should have been here to see us out.

We turned to the west, the sun an angry orb sinking lower in the sky. I half expected to see the ambulance in front of us, just around the corner. Stupid, of course—we’d lost time bandaging my foot and then more time as I’d looked through Hannah’s cell phone. It felt as though my car understood the rush and was propelled forward by sheer adrenaline. I had to brake hard to stop myself from taking the curves too fast.

Halfway to the freeway there was a turnout in one of the driveways leading to a ranch, and I slowed down, then came to a stop. Here the land was a brown-brown, the result of a drought that seemed endless. White stalks of weeds cropped up here and there, impervious. In the spring, this had been a pretty drive, green as far as the eye could see, the white wind turbines on the distant Altamont as lovely as children’s pinwheels. Now, only a few days into the official grip of summer, the hills were a rolling brown, and in the rearview mirror, only a single windmill turned listlessly on the horizon.

Danielle gaped at me. “Why’d you stop?”

“Because you’re going to tell me the truth. What was the surprise? What were you going to do to Kelsey?”

“What do you mean?”

All I had to do was stare at her, and she caved.

DECEMBER 2014
LIZ

On the first days of our winter break, Danielle and I finally decorated the tree, which was considerably flattened on one side from leaning against the back of the house, and we’d baked a dozen different kinds of treats, working mostly in silence side by side.

That last week at school had been difficult for Danielle, I knew—anonymous notes had been passed to her in class, a used tampon placed in her PE locker. The Gay-Straight Alliance had taken up Danielle’s cause, actively campaigning against hate speech. Well-meaning students had conducted class visits preaching tolerance and calling for a stop to the shaming. Although the message was a good one, it kept implicitly reflecting back on Danielle and the crush she didn’t have on Kelsey Jorgensen.

All she needed was two weeks off, I figured. In January, the silly rumor from Winter Formal would be yesterday’s news, replaced by some new drama. That was the way scandals worked in the adult world, too. Politicians banked on our short memories.

In the meantime, she’d struck up a friendship with Hannah Bergland, who’d brought over some of her mom’s homemade peanut brittle. The two of them ate the entire plateful watching a movie in our den.

Allie and Mom arrived the Tuesday before Christmas. The previous day, Allie had flown to SoCal, renting a car at the airport and reversing the route in the morning with Mom for their trip north. I’d been waiting for them all afternoon, calculating the time it would take for them to get off the plane, visit the bathroom, retrieve luggage, pick up the rental car and follow the route prescribed by GPS all the way to our front door.

I was already halfway down the sidewalk when Allie stepped out of the rented white Hyundai.

“What is this place, Xanadu?” she called.

“Wasn’t that an island?”

“No idea,” she admitted, collapsing into my hug. “I refuse to watch movies everyone else insists I must watch.”

“God, you’re skinny,” I commented, pulling back. Allie’s hip bones had dug into my hips with the ferocity of her hug. “Don’t they feed you in Chicago? Isn’t that the home of the deep dish pizza?”

“She’s too skinny. I said the same thing,” Mom said, opening the passenger door. I came around the side of the car to help her, but not before she’d already found the curb with her foot.

Allie grinned. “I’m going to take Mom with me every time I travel from now on. Priority seating for the plane, plus we got to ride around in one of those little carts with the driver honking at everyone to get out of our way. It was great, wasn’t it, Mom?”

“Not so much for me,” Mom said. She gripped my arm tightly as we headed up the walkway.

“Where’s your cane?” I asked. “Didn’t you bring it?”

“And let everyone know I’m blind?” she sniffed. Over her head, Allie and I rolled our eyes. Mom’s ever-present dark glasses, perched on her nose day and night, were as obvious as any white cane, and a lot less practical for getting around.

“Don’t worry. I packed it in her suitcase when she wasn’t looking,” Allie said. She’d thrown open the trunk and was stacking bags on the curb.

“Grandma! Aunt Allie!” Danielle ran out of the house in her socks. Allie grabbed her in a tight hug and rocked her side to side.

“When did you get taller than me?” Allie demanded, holding her back for a closer look.

Mom reached a hand, feeling the air around herself as if she were looking for something. “Where’s Phil?”

Allie glanced at me quickly, and I shook my head, meaning that nothing was settled, that things were just as bad as I’d hinted. Worse, if you considered that we were no longer talking, and that twice in the past week, Phil hadn’t come to bed at all. I’d found him asleep on the couch in the den when I went downstairs.

“He’s over at his office. I’ll take you there later, on the grand tour.”

“The grand tour,” Allie repeated. “Mom, you remember that show, right?
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
?”

“‘Champagne wishes and caviar dreams,’” Mom said, not missing a beat.

It felt like the first time I’d laughed in months.

* * *

Danielle carted suitcases—to the downstairs suite for Mom, furnished with the full-sized bed that had come from our house in Livermore, and to an upstairs room I’d hastily thrown together for Allie, complete with a blow-up mattress and an old IKEA nightstand retrieved from the stack of furniture in the garage.

“Holy wow,” Allie commented, entering the house. “There really is an echo.”

“What does it look like?” Mom asked.

Allie jumped in before I could say anything. “Well, there’s lots of beige. Or is that not the right word?
Neutral
, then. It’s very...neutral. Also, huge. If you moved this place to Chicago, you could rent it for about nine thousand a month.”

“So, cheaper than here,” I commented.

Allie laughed. “Touché.”

I had coffee and pumpkin bread waiting in the kitchen, which Allie pronounced “bigger than my entire apartment.”

I fetched the creamer from the refrigerator. “Mom? Can I pour you a cup?”

Mom was feeling her way around the kitchen, bumping against the bar stools, opening drawers and cabinets. She ran her hands over the granite counters. “It’s beautiful, Liz. Such a beautiful home.”

I thanked her, then busied myself with the mundane details of plates and napkins, cups and saucers. It was beautiful, but that had little to do with me. And I’d come to think of it as an ugly beauty, contradicting itself over and over, too expensive, too cold—impossible to love.

* * *

Outside, Allie pulled off her socks and boots and insisted on putting her feet in the pool. The automated cover was in place, but I rolled it back so she could get up to her calves, her jeans bunched high on her legs. “I can’t believe it’s so warm,” she said. “Can we go swimming later?”

“If you want. I haven’t been in for a month.” Phil had put the cover up after Thanksgiving, and we hadn’t bothered to move it since.

“Not me,” Mom said. I’d held her arm, walking her between the house and the pool several times, so she could get a sense of the distance. She’d been a vigorous swimmer when she was younger. There were even pictures of her as a teenager with her dark hair in one of those old rubber swimming caps, festooned with dozens of white petals. Blind, she worried that she wouldn’t be able to find the edge, that she would become entangled in something beneath the surface of the water, that she would lose a sense of which direction was up.

“It’s cold out here, anyway,” she announced. “I think I’ll head inside.”

“It’s fifty-five degrees,” Allie said. “This is like late spring in Chicago.”

We did throw on heavier coats for the walk around the exterior of The Palms. Mom insisted she didn’t need her cane, so Allie and I each took an arm and the three of us walked close together, laughing at how out of sync we were, like kids in a six-legged race.

Phil was finishing up in his office when we arrived, and he hugged Allie and Mom as if everything were fine. Allie looked between the two of us and back at me. I’d been vague in our weekly phone calls—
stress
,
problems
,
fighting
, as if our biggest issues were over who was going to do the dishes and whose turn it was to take out the trash.

Phil shut down his computer, waiting until the screen went black to leave his desk. “I was just about to lock up and check out the progress on a few homes in Phase 3 on my way. Would you ladies like to join me?”

I looked at Allie, who shrugged.

But Mom smiled; she was charmed by Phil’s accent, the formal, almost courtly way he treated her. “Of course.”

He locked the door behind us and took Mom’s arm, walking her through the clubhouse toward the main exit.

Allie pointed to a flier on the community billboard. An Un-Christmas Party. “Is that like an ugly sweater party? We had one of those for the PoliSci department. Of course, most of those guys had a dozen sweaters they could have worn from their regular rotation.”

I sighed. “No. This is Janet Neimeyer’s big thing. She’s one of our neighbors. I guess the basic idea is that everyone gets together the day after Christmas in party clothes, and brings some kind of ugly gift they received.”

“Like a white elephant party?” Mom asked.

“Right. Also known as another excuse to dress up and drink.”

“Sounds like fun. I’ll wear my best jeans,” Allie said.

“No, don’t worry. We don’t have to go.”

Phil turned around. “I told Janet we would come. I figured after a couple of days together, you’d be dying to get out of the house.”

Allie laughed. “Really? We practically have a thousand square feet each. It’s not exactly a chicken coop.”

“No, you kids should go,” Mom said, smiling up at Phil. “I’m no good in those types of situations. I never have any idea who’s talking to me.”

Allie said, “Well, why not? I can borrow something of yours, can’t I?” We were crossing the parking lot at this point. It was empty, save for a few cars on the far end that belonged to Parker-Lane employees.

“Please. Whatever I have would fit you like a tent.”

“I guess I could borrow something from Danielle, then.”

“You’re killing me right now, you know that? You’re actually killing me.”

Allie and I slowed our pace, falling behind Phil and Mom. He was pointing out the features of the communal area, as if Mom were a potential buyer who would be making use of the tennis courts and the putting green. Allie and I linked arms, leaning against each other.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” I said.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” she countered. “I mean—look at this place. It’s amazing. Your thousands of snarky comments didn’t really do it justice.”

A golf cart was coming off the last hole, rounding the little path around the clubhouse to the parking lot. We stopped for a moment, watching the twosome in their khakis and windbreakers.

“I have a confession to make,” I blurted.

“Do tell.”

“I’ve always thought that golf is a stupid sport.”

Allie threw back her head and laughed so loudly that the men in the cart turned, spotting us. “I knew it. I
knew
it.”

“Phil doesn’t play, either—not really. He’s been talking about taking lessons.”

“I could see him in a lime-green polo.”

I smiled weakly. “Don’t forget the checkered pants.”

Allie wheezed with laughter. “Stop, or I’m going to commit a public act of urination in your beautiful community.”

I pulled her along. “Better not. They’ll put you in the stocks.”

* * *

Six of the homes in Phase 3, an entire cul-de-sac’s worth, were in the final stages of completion, and two of the owners were planning to move in on New Year’s Day. There was a general contractor who provided specific oversight, but Phil had taken an active role in monitoring progress and finessing the details. It had been his ongoing project for months, far more rewarding than listening to petty complaints about the club’s dining room or monitoring surveillance cameras that captured grainy images of our neighbors driving by, jogging by or walking by.

The contractor was waiting for him at the first home, and the two of them splintered off to check out the tile work in an upstairs bathroom. It was a huge house, made larger by the absence of furniture and the reverberation of our voices off the mahogany floors. A strip of plastic had been taped down the middle of the hallway to serve as a walkway.

“Don’t worry, Mom,” Allie said. “You’re not going to hit anything. You’ve literally got fifty feet before you run into the back wall. Just stay on the plastic.”

“High ceilings,” Mom commented, listening to the echo.

We stopped in the kitchen. Concrete countertops had been poured, and the white cabinets were still encased in plastic wrap.

“Very eco-chic,” Allie commented, running a hand over the concrete. “Who buys one of these places, anyway? Doctors and lawyers? Who else can afford this?”

“You can’t throw a stone without hitting a doctor or a lawyer around here. But also investment bankers, wealthy ex-wives, people who own real estate. And don’t forget,” I said, raising a finger, “high school counselors.”

There were footsteps on the stairs, and we heard Phil saying, “Well, the decorator is coming in on Monday. So before we get to the actual furniture stage...”

“No, absolutely,” the contractor said. “I’ll get someone to come in here on Friday. That’s got to be taken care of.”

“Ready to hit the next one?” Phil asked, taking Mom’s arm. I’d gotten so used to him not looking at me that it was strange to see him actually paying attention to other people.

“Where’s the below-market-rate section?” Allie wanted to know.

The contractor laughed. “There’s a three-hundred-square-foot shed you might be interested in.”

“Lead the way,” she said.

* * *

What amazed me during those days was how normal our lives were. We were like any other family getting together for the holidays, eating our way through a bag of red and green M&Ms one afternoon, slurping up eggnog at night. We opened gifts—a telescope for Danielle, black sweaters and tunics for Mom. Allie and I exchanged books, as we always did—our favorites from throughout the year. Phil had asked for new dress shoes, and he modeled them with his jeans rolled to his knees, making us silly with laughter. Phil’s present to me was a silver necklace with tiny onyx beads, as well as a folded note, wedged in the top of the jewelry box. I unfolded it to read:
IOU. Anywhere in the world you want to go, it’s on me
. I refolded the paper along its precise creases and tucked it away.

* * *

For Christmas dinner, Phil smoked a turkey outside, Mom made a pecan pie and Allie and Danielle mashed a five-pound bag of potatoes while I tackled the green vegetables. Phil moved his office junk, and we covered the folding table in the dining room with a fancy tablecloth and ate until we felt sick, the adults telling stories about our childhoods. Mom told an oldie but a goodie—the time Allie had handcuffed herself to the cafeteria service line, protesting the poor food selection. “She’d been reading about Gandhi and civil disobedience,” Mom sighed. “And that was her big social stand.”