The Summer of Good Intentions (11 page)

“Hey, look.” Mac nudged her and pointed in Virgie's direction. “Looks like your sister has a new admirer.” Sal had shown up a few minutes earlier carrying a cooler. After saying a quick hello, he'd planted himself next to Virgie and the kids. Maggie watched while Virgie said something and flipped her hair.

“Sal's not really new,” she corrected. “He's been in love with Virgie since we were little girls.” Maggie suspected that, as with each passing summer, Sal hoped he could persuade Virgie to be his love interest for the time that she was here. Maggie was curious to see if her sister would mention Jackson or if she would she play it coy. It was difficult to know with her baby sister; Virgie was accustomed to having her cake and eating it, too.

“Where's my s'more?” Mac asked now.

“Sorry, honey, it's every man for himself tonight.” Maggie reached into her jacket pocket. “But I did manage to score us this.” She held out the Hershey's chocolate bar, its tinfoil shining in the moonlight. He dove for it, but Maggie was quick. She broke off a small piece and passed it to him.

“This,” he said, plopping the chocolate in his mouth, “is all I need to make my life good. You, the kids, fireworks, a cold beer.” He paused, stroking her hair. “The only thing that could possibly make it better would be that entire Hershey's bar.” She laughed, took another bite, and snuggled in closer.

Just then, another big boom exploded overhead. Maggie watched the bright tendrils of color drift down to the water like streamers.

“Good one!” Luke shouted, and the kids whooped in unison.

The scent of woodsmoke hung in the air. She could taste the bittersweet mix of beer and chocolate on her tongue. This was summer. Sticky fingers. The smell of mosquito repellent. The wind whipping up, then settling down again. Her husband's arms around her. The sound of the kids laughing.
Yes,
thought Maggie.
You're right
. Now, if she could just work up the nerve to tell Mac what she'd been dreaming about for the family.

But she stopped herself. Right now she wanted to enjoy the moment, take it all in.

It was Friday night. Already. How on earth did the first week of vacation pass by so quickly? she wondered. Jess climbed the stairs and poked her head into the kids' room before getting ready for bed. After a full day of swimming, Lexie and Sophie were sprawled out on the top bunks, zonked. Teddy had crawled into bed with Grace, his warm body pulled into an S. On the other bunk, Luke snored softly, surrounded by his army of stuffed pigs. She honestly didn't know how her nephew managed to keep track of them all. She blew them kisses, then shut the door behind her and went to grab a fresh towel from the linen closet. When she pressed it to her face, she was hit by the familiar scent of lavender.

Jess was trying to relax, soak in the summer, but it was proving difficult this year. The fact that she and Tim had had a fight this morning wasn't making it any easier. Two days into vacation, when he asked her how old the milk was in the fridge, she'd refrained from snapping that milk had an expiration date like anything else and why didn't he just check the carton? And they'd had a decent Fourth last night, hanging out with Mac and Maggie to watch the fireworks. They'd even gone for a walk and
talked
about things, remembering summers past. It almost felt like old times.

Almost
.

She told herself she couldn't expect Tim to perform a 180-degree reversal, going from hardly present in their marriage to a devoted husband in a week's time. But she didn't expect him to further piss her off either. And that was exactly what he'd done this morning.

They were sitting out on the deck drinking iced coffees. It was hot for so early in the day, the heat sending off shimmering waves above the sand. The kids were busy building sand castles a few yards down the beach. She and Tim talked casually about the usual stuff.
Did the kids have enough sunblock on? Wasn't it great to have some time to kick back? What should they do for dinner?
Jess allowed herself to think for a brief moment,
This is good. This is what we should be doing every day
. And then somehow the conversation tumbled disastrously into free fall. She mentioned that when they got back to Boston she would need to go into work for a week in August and did he think his mom could help cover with the kids?

“Do you really think it makes sense to ask my mom to help out over the summer?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” Jess asked, thinking perhaps he was implying it was time to hire a nanny, something she'd suggested over a year ago, when she started her job.

“I don't know.” He gazed out over the water. “I'm just wondering if it's a fair trade; you have to give up a week of your summer with the kids so you can go into a job that drives you crazy and hardly pays anything.”

She couldn't believe she'd heard right. “Excuse me?” She was still willing to give him a chance to explain himself. Give him an out.

“I don't know. I've just been thinking. With your job, we've brought in some extra money, and I'm not saying it's not important. It is. But, do you really think the stress is worth it?”

Jess licked her lips, trying to parse her words, to understand the motivation behind Tim's sudden second-guessing of the one job in the world she loved, where she felt she was making a difference. Sure, it was crazy, but all jobs were crazy to some extent. Was he implying that her job wasn't important or that the kids were missing out on mommy time while she toiled away at her little
hobby
?

She felt her blood pressure shoot up, her heart thumping in her chest. She spoke carefully, not wanting to say something she would regret, words that would irretrievably damage their marriage.

“Yes, Tim. I think it's worth it,” she finally spat out. “It's the whole reason I went back to school. You might even say it's my passion, after the kids. I think it's important for them to see their mother engaged, doing something valuable and that it trumps any inconvenience it might create during the month of August. Plus, that little bit of money you refer to isn't like our pin money. That money helps pay the bills, like groceries and heat and clothes for the kids.”

He held up his hand. “Whoa. You don't need to go ballistic on me.”

“Well, sorry. I feel like you kind of did on me. Is this what you've been thinking my whole first year as a principal?”

“I'm sure you're great,” he said tightly. “I just happen to think our kids need you more than the punk kids you work with at that school. How many of them end up dropping out anyway?”

She couldn't believe it. He was more or less insinuating that her job was one big hideous joke. “God, you're patronizing!” she cried and jumped up from her seat. She flew into the house, up the stairs, and hid in the bedroom. For an entire hour, while she lay on the bed and wiped her tears, she felt zero regret for her fling with Cole. Tim deserved every little heartbreak he got. How he could be such a consummate asshole astounded her. As if the responsibility of raising their kids was hers and hers alone. It wasn't like he was bringing in huge sums of money either. It worked because there were two of them!

It took every ounce of willpower she had not to call Cole at that moment. How she wanted to! But she knew it wouldn't solve anything. It would only make things worse. So, instead, she popped two Xanax and sank into a deep sleep, one that she didn't wake up from until later in the afternoon.

Not until after dinner did Tim apologize. “I'm sorry,” he said, sneaking up behind her when she was reading a novel on the couch. “I didn't mean to upset you. I was just thinking practically. You know, the economics of it all.”

“Mm-hmm,” said Jess, unconvinced.

“Let's not let it ruin our vacation, okay?” He sat down beside her and took her hand, his fingers lacing between hers. Had he sensed, like she had yesterday during their walk, that they both still wanted this marriage to work?

“Don't worry. I don't intend to let it ruin
my
vacation,” she huffed. She took in his small eyes behind the glasses.
Squinty eyes,
she thought. Somehow they made her even angrier.

“Jessie,” he said softly. “Come on. I was stupid to say anything, but don't make it worse than it was.”

“Belittling my entire career is pretty low, Tim. It's like . . .” Her voice trailed off while she searched for the right word. But there was no single word. “You don't value me beyond what I do for the kids.”

“That's not true,” he argued. He cast around the room nervously, as if making sure none of the kids was in earshot.

“Well, that's how it sounded. I mean if we're talking about the
economics
of it all,” she snapped. “It kind of negates all that intangible stuff, right? Like helping kids who otherwise wouldn't have a chance of going to college?” She knew she was entering dangerous territory, where their ideologies on larger issues sometimes clashed. But if it was truly how he felt, she needed to know.

“Jessie, you know that's not what I meant,” he ventured again. “What you do is amazing. It helps a lot of kids. It's just that I see how stressed out you get. And when it starts to affect our own family life, I guess that's when I start to wonder if all that stress is worth it.”

When he put it that way, it sounded marginally better. She decided not to point out how the long hours he logged at his office “affected their family life” as well. It was true that her job was stressful for nine months of the year. But it was the adrenaline rush that she craved; it made her feel important, needed. How could she make him understand that?

Now, with the passing of a few more hours, she could see how her reaction might be construed as a bit much. After all, here she'd been craving honesty and open conversation with her husband over the last year. At least they weren't trading Post-it notes. But if the dam had splintered, well, there was a lot of emotional wreckage waiting behind it. Tim's words smarted.

She hung the bath towel over the rack and flipped off the bathroom light. Quietly, she tiptoed down the hallway that was lined with pictures from summers past, many of them shots of the family posing on the dock. Everyone was getting so big! Even Teddy's face had shed the fat baby cheeks she'd loved to kiss a hundred times. She traced her finger across those cheeks. Where had the time gone? How had things gotten so confused?

At the bedroom door, she could make out Tim's body already in bed. She slipped in next to him and felt the rough sand at the bottom of the sheets, an unavoidable hazard of sleeping at the summer house. She kicked it down further toward the end of the bed. Tim rolled toward her and circled an arm around her. She was surprised that he was even half-awake. She felt him inch his way closer, pressing his body up against hers, and for a second, her mind darted to Cole. It startled her, the way he wormed his way into her head even when she was doing her level best not to think about him.

She hadn't returned any of Cole's texts or messages, and in fact, after fifteen missed calls, she'd finally blocked his number entirely. If she'd quit caffeine cold turkey (as she had when she'd gotten pregnant with Grace), then, her reasoning went, she should be able to quit Cole cold turkey, too. Cole wasn't the reason her marriage was in the pits. She'd read enough self-help books to understand he was a mere symptom of her troubled marriage. That she had allowed herself to fall for him in the first place and return his kisses was further testament to the fact that her marriage wasn't working. She wasn't
in love
with Cole. He was practically a kid, for goodness' sake, eight years younger.

But she couldn't remember the last time Tim had snuggled up to her, when the atoms between them had buzzed with attraction. It hadn't always been this way. It used to be that he would want to be intimate as soon as he got home from work, before she could even get dinner on the table. He would sidle up behind her, running his hands under her shirt and over her waist while she stood at the stove. But with the kids, first Grace, then Teddy, sex had taken a backseat. Never like this, though. Never for months at a time.

“Jessie, come here,” he whispered into her hair. He pulled her closer and nibbled on her ear. Her husband smelled of beer, sunblock, and something sweet—honeyed peanuts, perhaps? Slowly, he kissed her hair, her cheeks, her lips. His lips were chapped. She worked to conjure up the boyish image of him when they'd first met in an Irish pub in South Boston—flashing dimples, brilliant green eyes, straight white teeth. The boy she'd fallen in love with. He was here, somewhere in this same skin.

“You know what the best part of making up is, right?” he asked. But it was Cole's soft lips, his tanned skin, his muscled arms that flexed when he opened a bottle of wine that kept swimming through her mind while her husband kissed her.