The Hazards of Sleeping Alone (31 page)

Gingerly, Charlotte repositions the cabinet door to its original angle, then takes a breath and peers into the hall. Coast clear. She picks her way down the funhouse staircase, listening to the medley of voices from below. In the kitchen, all three roommates are hard at work. Walter is chopping vegetables. Emily is checking a pot on the stove. Anthony is setting the table. The
scene is comfortable, homey. Someone has lit a mismatched assortment of candles: squat, tapered, votives swimming like minnows in glass bowls. The windows are taped with brilliant autumn leaves, like an elementary school classroom.

“Hey Mom,” Emily says, waving an oven-mitted hand. “You're just in time.”

“What can I do?”

“You're not doing anything,” Emily says, steering her to the table. “Have a seat. Try my artichoke dip.” She plunks Charlotte in front of a bowl of something tinted an unnaturally bright green.

“Watch it,” Walter says over his shoulder. “That's spicy.”

“Mom's a spice eater now, Wal. We had Thai, remember?”

“What's in it?” Charlotte wants to know.

“Green chiles,” Anthony says, sounding ominous. “And pimentos.” He dunks a hunk of bread in the green, slurps it up, and raises both eyebrows. “Hot,” he confirms, then takes a slug of the beer sitting on the table. “But good.”

“He's exaggerating,” Emily says.

“I'm not exaggerating. It's hot but good. What's wrong with hot but good?”

“Can I get you a drink, Mom?” Emily says, ignoring him. “Water? Wine?”

“Any other biblical liquid?” quips Walter.

“Water's fine,” Charlotte says, as Emily opens the refrigerator. Unlike her own, Emily's refrigerator door is plastered with a mishmash of things: movie listings, cartoons, phone bills, invitations, scrawled Post-it notes.
Phone bill. Radishes? Good luck today—I love you!
In the center is a photo of a teenage girl in a red-and-white cheerleader's uniform, pompoms thrust in the air.

“Who's that?” Charlotte asks, pointing.

Anthony smiles. “That's Mar. She was captain of the cheerleading squad in high school, believe it or not.”

Emily sets a glass of water on the table. “She hates that picture.”

“But we love it,” he adds. “Isn't it hilarious? It's so—
American.
We keep it up to remind her how far she's come.”

Charlotte takes a sip of water. She'd thought the picture looked cute. As she's wondering what things from Emily's teenage years the roommates might find “hilarious” and “American,” something slithers between her legs. “Oh!” she yelps, almost knocking over her water glass, and looks down to find a cat rubbing itself wholeheartedly against her shins.

Emily laughs, then runs over to scoop the cat up. “Ooh, look who came to say hi!” she says, nestling the animal against her chest. It's orange-striped, rail-thin. “Maggie Mae!”

“Her name's Magda,” Walter adds.

“Don't bother Mom, Mags,” Emily whispers into its fur. “She's not an animal person.”

Anthony looks up from his utensils, all of them lined up on the same sides of the plates. “You don't like animals?”

“It's not that I don't
like
them,” Charlotte says, hoping she hasn't offended him. “I just don't have that much animal experience, I guess.”

“Magda's a sweetie-pie,” Walter says, wiping his hands on a towel and coming over to scratch behind her ears. “Aren't you, kitty-cat?”

“I don't think I knew you had a cat,” Charlotte says, knowing she didn't. “Did I?”

“She's Mara's,” Walter explains. “She rescued her from the side of the road a few months ago. We put up signs, but nobody claimed her. Probably she was abandoned. Looks like she was attacked too. See?”

Charlotte realizes that the cat's left ear is mangled. What's left looks like a piece of bitten orange felt.

“Poor baby,” Walter says, and the cat starts purring under his hand. He leans in, as if to gather the cat from Emily, and for a moment Charlotte has a flash of what they will look like as parents, passing a bundled infant from arms and arms.

Then Emily snaps: “I'm allowed to
hold
her, Walter.”

He pauses. Magda, sensing tension, leaps to the floor. Emily returns to the stove, shoving the oven mitt back on her hand, and Walter turns to Charlotte. “She's not supposed to touch the cat.”

“That's not true,” Emily says, turning around. “It's not the cat. It's just the litter box. You're the only one freaking when I get near the cat.”

“I'm not freaking—”

“Why can't you touch the litter box?” Charlotte asks.

“It's a pregnancy thing,” Emily says, turning to the counter again.

Anthony is suddenly concentrating intently on napkins.

“But why?”

“Because of cat feces,” Emily says. “Which can sometimes contain parasites, which can cause toxoplasmosis, which can infect a pregnant woman, which can then infect her baby.” She recites this data almost mechanically, but Charlotte is in Walter's camp: alarmed.

“It's more serious than that,” he adds, which doesn't help.

“It is
not
more serious than that.”

“Em.” Walter's voice is firm, almost parental. “You told me you're not even supposed to breathe near the stuff. That it can cause stillborns. Miscarriages. All kinds of mental—”

“I know what it can cause, Walter. I'm the one who told you about it in the first place.”

“Then why aren't you more careful? You scared the hell out of me about it and now you act like it's no big deal.”

It isn't the same way Walter argued with her back in New Jersey. There his jabs were playful, flirtatious. They don't sound playful now.

“A month ago you were on a goddamn crusade,” he continues. “Then as soon as you had me convinced, you stopped caring. That's what you do, Em. You throw yourself into something, but soon as you convince everybody—soon as there's nothing to fight against—it's not worth believing in anymore.”

He's right, Charlotte thinks, and is surprised at the simplicity of the explanation. But it's true. If Walter had remained unconvinced, Emily would be handling the cat with plastic gloves and surgical mask.

She looks at him evenly. “What do you want from me? You want me to live in a bubble? You can catch anything from every-thing.” She heaves open the oven door, looks inside, and slams it shut. “I could get toxoplasmosis by touching raw meat, you know.”

Walter leans against the counter, arms crossed loosely across his chest. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“It's not supposed to mean anything. I'm just stating a fact.”

“No, you're not. You're implying because I eat meat, I get no say. Or because you
don't
eat meat, I should lay off when you're rubbing the cat all over your face.”

Charlotte is losing patience. “Why can't you just get rid of it?”

All three of them look at her.

“Get rid of the cat. I mean, just until the baby's born.”

“We're not getting rid of Magda,” Emily says firmly. “She's
Mara's cat. What am I going to do, put her back on the street?”

“Hey,” Anthony interjects. “Like Mara said, I can totally take her to D.C. until—”

“You're not taking her to D.C.,” Emily cuts him off. “It's a totally negative environment down there. Mara doesn't want Magda near her mother. We all know that.”

This is absurd, Charlotte thinks. It's a cat! Who cares about the environment! Just get it out of here!

“I'm just saying”—Anthony shrugs, placing the final napkin on the table“—it's an option.”

Walter returns to his chopping. His back is rigid, knife moving in tense, measured strokes. Emily lifts the lid off a pot, her face obscured by a cloud of steam. Anthony picks up his beer and wanders toward her. Charlotte wonders how practiced he's become at deflating tension in this house.

“Table's officially set,” Anthony announces, and peers over Emily's shoulder. “Smells good, little woman. What is it?”

“Gravy.”

Charlotte watches, alarmed, as Anthony reaches around her and pours half his beer in the pot.

“With veggie sausage,” she adds.

“Veggie sausage, huh?”

“I made it for Walter.”

Walter pauses, mid-chop.

“Pseudo meat!” Anthony proclaims, flipping his hair away from his face. “Quite a concession, Em.”

“That's right.” She looks at Walter. “Fake sausage. If that isn't real love, I don't know what is.”

Walter leans over and presses his lips to her shoulder. She smiles at him as he raises his head. “But if it was real love,” he says, picking up the knife again, “it would be real sausage.”

Emily's smile folds. Walter looks back at her, mouth open, but she turns away. He shakes his head and resumes chopping, loudly, muttering something under his breath.

“People, people,” Anthony sighs. “Can't we all just get along?” He grabs a
New Yorker
from the floor, bops them each on the head with it, then heads outside into the cold, waning sun.

“Ta-da!”

The tinfoil is whipped away like a magician unveiling a flock of doves. The revelation is soft, pale brown, vaguely turkey-shaped.

“It's a tofurkey,” Emily says proudly.

Anthony pokes it in the side. “More information, please.”

“Tofu, shaped like a turkey, stuffed with bread and garlic and mushrooms.” She is beaming. “With a mandarin mustard sesame seed glaze.”

“It's very impressive, honey,” Charlotte says.

“Not only can the kid cook,” Walter adds, “she can sculpt.” He pinches off a bite of fake drumstick with his forefinger and thumb.

It may be the oddest Thanksgiving feast ever assembled. In lieu of cranberry sauce, Emily has made chutney with raisins, apples, cranberries, cloves. There's steamed asparagus, sweet corn, artichoke hearts. Walter's contribution is a squash-andgreen apple bake. By contrast, Charlotte's dishes all look unnaturally dense, overly compact. It occurs to her how
real
the rest of the food is, how naturally occurring, all the ingredients existing in the earth. She, on the other hand, has forced gelatin and pretzels into the same Tupperware bowl. The only thing more awkward is an unceremonious six-pack of a beer called Red Hook
and the vegetarian sausage gravy, which sits off to the side, as if taboo.

“Try my lau lau,” Anthony says, holding out a plate to Charlotte. It's a Hawaiian food, apparently, resembling egg rolls wrapped in paper. “Rice, fish, and vegetables, rolled in banana leaves.”

“How interesting.” She perches two on the lip of her plate.

“She must really like you, Ant,” Emily says, “because it's absolutely killing her to eat those.”

“What's this?” Walter is peering through the side of the strawberry pretzel. “Are those pretzels in there?”

“Baked pretzels,” Charlotte says quickly. “With Jell-O. And Cool Whip and cream cheese.”

“Pretzels and strawberries,” Anthony breathes, reverently. “That's genius.”

Walter digs in, his plate already heaped with squash, yams, potatoes, a soft wedge of tofurkey, even the fake sausage gravy, his allegiances spread everywhere.

“It used to be one of Emily's favorites,” Charlotte adds.

“Really!” Anthony props his chin on one hand. “What else used to be Emily's favorites? Did she love buffalo burgers? Please tell me she loved buffalo burgers.”

“Yeah.” Walter smiles and picks up his fork. “Give us some good Emily stories. This'll be fun.”

“Wal.” Emily holds his wrist. “Before we eat, we all have to say what we're thankful for.”

He sets the fork down. Charlotte feels her heart start. Why wasn't she warned about this? Can't she just enjoy her meal without any impromptu public speaking?

“I'll go first,” Emily says, sitting up. Walter folds his hands in his lap. “I am thankful for our warm and wonderful house. I'm
thankful for this fabulous meal.” She smiles at Charlotte. “And I'm thankful my mom is here to share it with us.”

“Hear, hear,” says Walter.

Emily twines her arm around Walter's, kisses his cheek. There's no accounting for the sudden affection, but Charlotte doesn't question it. “Okay, Wal,” Emily says. “Your turn.”

“Let's see. Things I'm thankful for …” He tilts his head back, musing to the ceiling. “The smell of cut wood. The colors of the fall leaves. A good dessert. My family. My faith in God. And”—he looks at Emily—“the incredible woman sitting right here.”

“Awww,” Anthony chimes in. “And
I'm
thankful I get a few days off from you two freaks this weekend.”

All three of them laugh, then turn to Charlotte.

“Well.” She racks her brain, feeling the pressure of their collective stare. “Well, let's see. I'm very thankful for my daughter.” Then, not wanting to offend Walter: “And I'm thankful for you, Walter.” And not wanting to be rude: “You too, Anthony.”

They laugh again. Anthony reaches for his fork.

“And,” she says quickly, “most of all, I wanted to say, I'm thankful for the new baby.” Her eyes dart around the table. “That's it.”

“Amen to that,” Walter says, blessing himself.

Anthony raises a speared lau lau, and he and Walter clink forks. “This time next year, huh, guys?” he says, popping the entire lau in his mouth.

“Damn right.”

“So that means—” Anthony calculates, chewing. “Taurus or Gemini?”

“The due date's May twenty-first,” Emily pipes up. “So she'll probably be on the cusp.”

“What's the cusp?” Charlotte asks.

“It means the baby will have some qualities of one sign and some of the other. Children born on the cusp are very complex.”