All Dressed Up (17 page)

“From me?”

“It would be
handy to have some from you.”

“And you think
doing medicine was a fuck-up?” Sarah didn’t use the expression
often, either.

“You haven’t
answered the question.”

“If you think
your life is fucked up you have to do something about it, for sure.
What about Charlie?”

Charlie.

“You still
haven’t answered the question.”

“Of course you
have my support. How much is it going to cost? I mean, how much of
the expense of your emotional support will I personally have to
wear? Because as far as I’m concerned this is part of the fuck up,
Emma, that your crises are always so goddamned expensive to
everyone else.”

“You’ve read
the note. I said. I’ll pay Mom and Dad back for medical school, and
the wedding.”

“I’m not
talking about money.”

“Of course
you’re not. But that’s the only kind of expense I can guarantee to
take responsibility for at the moment. You’re probably right, I’m
hideously emotionally expensive, that’s a discussion I’ll have to
have with Charlie if he’s interested. Is that why you took away the
photo, Sar, to see if he’s interested? Could we forget the expense
and talk about whether it’s worth even trying, you and me?”

“I’m not sure
where you’re trying to get to. The photo, I don’t know. He
called.”

“He called?
Here?”

“No. Me. On my
cell. When I was still in Saddle River. I told him I’d taken the
photo. I didn’t think you’d want him to think it was you.”

“No. Yes.
Okay.”

“Are you mad
about any of that?”

“No. No, I’m
not.” She thought for a moment. “You took the right picture. Of the
three, that was the one to take.”

“I know it
was.”

“And he
called, so you had to tell him.”

“That’s what I
thought.”

Emma closed
her eyes, thankful. “All right. Good. Well, that’s a start, isn’t
it?”

“Listen,
Lainie and I are going to get the dress cleaned and perfect for you
if we possibly can. Whether you care about it or not. She’s feeling
terrible about it. But I’ve said this to you already…” she lowered
her voice. “… there’s no way you’re having Billy. No way.”

“Billy is not
like my dress.” Emma lowered her voice, too. Billy must not hear
this.

“No.
Exactly.”

“And I’m not
talking about having. I’m talking about feeling right about.
Instead of so, so wrong. Not even knowing him. Not sure if I dare.
Bit shocked at your attitude. I want you to understand, Sarah.”

“Talk to me,
then.”

“I think I
only did medicine in the first place because, you know, having
given Billy up, gone that route – taken that cop-out, really – I
had to be perfect from then on to justify it. I had to stop smoking
and wear my school uniform neat and study five hours every night
and get top grades and go to the best college and get in the best
med program, because Mom and Dad took Billy so that I would be free
to do all of that. They didn’t take him so I could drift around and
goof off the way I did in London, and fuck up another way and have
any doubts about what I wanted to do with my life. Medicine is the
thing you do when you’re the best, and I had to be the best, so I
had to do it.”

Sarah looked
at her, wary and wide-eyed. Since she clearly wasn’t going to speak
yet, Emma added, “And I’ve hated it from day one.”

Sarah still
didn’t say anything, but she sighed without knowing it.

Emma said,
“And you’re right, it’s been expensive. Emotionally. And I’m
sorry.” Because what else could you say?

After a
moment, Sarah shrugged and told her, “That’s okay.”

Which was
infuriating. “You always do this, Sarah! I can’t stand it! You
refuse to get angry when someone needs you to, so that the person
who does get angry is the person who loses the contest. You hide
behind this I’m-so-good-I’m-going-to-let-you-get-away-with-it
fob-off that leaves all your tube-fed, goddamned in-vitro,
life-support precious grievances protected and safe and
unchallenged, and not this time, okay? It is not okay! Don’t say
that to get rid of the subject. Don’t say it because we’re both too
scared to talk about it. It’s not okay yet. But you don’t seem to
want to tell me what your problem is and if you’re waiting for me
to guess, don’t you know by now that that’s not my area? I’m not
going to play those games. Just tell me upfront how I stuck it to
you so bad by giving Billy to Mom, when as far as I’m concerned,
from what Dad has said – ” She stopped.

“What has Dad
said?”

“ – Billy
pretty much saved your life.”

He’d heard his
name. He looked up from the beach.

“It looks
great, Billy,” Sarah called out quickly. He’d begun to make one of
his golf ball bobsled tracks in the sand.

“Oh, are we
protecting Billy from your problems, too?” Emma asked, dropping her
voice back to where it should have been. She wanted to yell, but
they couldn’t, given the subject matter.

“Don’t say it
as if I’m the main conspirator,” Sarah told her. Billy stood up and
wandered on the sand. He’d soon want to head up to the house for
something to eat. It was clear that Emma and Sarah had to wind up
this conversation. “Of course we’re protecting him. How is it
relevant for him to know about any of it? Tell me what Dad has said
to you. Has Mom said anything?”

“Mom doesn’t
like rocking the boat. She thinks you’re okay, Sarah. She thinks
you’re grounded in your priorities, with your kindergarten teaching
and starting to get over Luke. She’s proud of you. I thought you
were okay, too, but that’s admittedly – ” Because my own stuff has
been too important and hard, and I haven’t paid much attention to
yours.

“ – because
you haven’t taken much notice,” Sarah finished for her. “It was ten
years ago. I am okay. Although maybe the kindergarten teaching is
not how I totally planned to – ”

Emma pounced
on the word okay. “Yes, because Billy saved your life.” Sarah again
made a move to challenge the statement, question it, demand detail,
but Emma held her off. They had both stood up on the dock, making
it rock a little harder. “And I don’t care if it was ten years ago.
It was ten years ago for me, too, and I’m still a mess, and I want
to make some progress. Think about it, okay, Sarah? Before you
definitively conclude that the grievance is all on one side?”

“I’m not
concluding that.”

“Get back to
me when there’s a chance we can both give each other a fair
hearing.”

Then she
slipped into the water to hide.

Charlie.
Charlie.

She sank way
down to the cold, gooey sand and swam breaststroke at sand level
all the way back to the shore.

Chapter
Eight

“Lainie, I’ve
had a call from my cleaner – the stains won’t shift.” Angie said
‘my cleaner’ the way a Hollywood actress says ‘my stylist’.

Lainie
answered weakly, “Oh, they won’t?”

It was
Thursday and for nearly three days Lainie had been hoping so hard
that no news was good news. She’d pinned a stupid amount on Angie’s
promises about ‘my cleaner’. She stood by the office copy machine,
printing out the agency’s flyers for this weekend’s open houses.
There was no Stop button to press while she talked. The flyers just
kept on printing, an irritant of a process that underlined her own
helplessness.

“She doesn’t
want to try anything stronger on those delicate feathers,” Angie
said. “She’s suggesting replacing them instead.” She sounded
distressed about it. How had she inserted herself into this
situation? What was the distress intended to imply?

“So there is
that option?”

“Yes, she’ll
do it herself. She has all of those skills. But she says she can’t
promise that there won’t be a visible line.”

“A stitching
line?”

“No, a
difference between the original feathers and the replacements. That
they’ll be a slightly different type, or will sit differently. She
says the other option is to put a different trim on those lower
couple of inches altogether and not even try to match the
feathers.”

“Not even try
to match? So with what?”

“Beading. Or a
third option is to shorten the hem. It’s only a few inches. And
have the bride wear a lower heeled shoe.”

“But there is
no bride.”

“I didn’t want
to tell her that.” Angie didn’t say why. Because it was
shaming?

The copy
machine fell silent. Lainie squeezed the phone between her ear and
her shoulder while she took out the bundle of pages. The action
pulled her tailored jacket too tight across the broadest part of
her back. If there was a least favorite part about being a realtor,
most days she would have said it was the clothes.

“Anyhow, what
Carol wants is for the bride to go look at the dress and decide
what she wants her to do. I told her I’d find out a good time and
get back to her.”

“I can get
back to her. There’s no reason for you to be involved in any of
this, Angie.”

A stiff moment
of silence. “I’m just trying to help.”

“I – I – Yes,
I know you are. I can’t give you a time now. I think Sarah needs to
look at it, too.”

“Sarah?”

“We’re trying
to keep Emma out of it. Sarah says Emma is too – ” Lainie stopped,
with a sudden familiar feeling that she was saying too much,
confessing things that weren’t her business to confess, things that
Angie would know by instinct not to confess. And that it wasn’t
sensible of her.

“Angry?” Angie
suggested. She sounded almost hopeful.

“Fragile,”
Lainie admitted.

“Fragile.” She
sounded hopeful about that, too.

“Well, of
course, Angie, under the circumstances.”

“Let me give
you Carol’s number. I’m sure whatever you and Sarah decide, she’ll
do a fabulous job.”

Emma hid in
the woods when Lainie came to collect Sarah on Saturday afternoon
to visit the dress at Angie’s cleaner. Mom had gone grocery
shopping. Sarah had said yesterday, “But, Emma, if you want to go
with Lainie instead of me…”

She
didn’t.

The dress had
such poisonous associations. She knew she needed to still care
about it in some way, since it had cost half a car…

No, not
because of that. Because she still loved Charlie.

Which was also
the reason the dress was so poisonous. It bore living witness to
the fact that she’d obsessed over all the wrong things.

The wedding,
instead of the marriage.

Being perfect
for him, instead of finding out how much he would forgive.

She didn’t
want to go anywhere near the dress, and she didn’t want to see
Charlie’s mom.

Skulking in
the woods, she first watched Dad and Billy set off in the car for
their hike to the point of Tongue Mountain. Dad went every year. He
used to take Emma, once upon a time, but he hadn’t since Billy was
born.

Today, she’d
almost asked, “Can I come with you?” But hearing Billy’s chirpy,
enthusiastic voice saying it was going to be hot so they’d better
take plenty of water, and debating with Dad about the ingredients
in their trail mix…

He adored Dad,
and Dad adored him.

She couldn’t
do it.

So she hid out
by the doggy graves instead, weeding the undergrowth, neatening up
the childish arrangements of stones, sweeping the dirt. Ralphie had
died fifteen years ago, and Peaches a few years after that, not
long before the family went to London. They’d never gotten another
pet, she wasn’t sure why.

Billy should
have had a dog. In a flood of wild, irrational impatience that
lasted about thirty seconds, Emma wanted to go look at puppies for
him right now.

But here was
Lainie’s car. Sarah had been watching for it from the house. She
hurried down the porch steps to save Lainie having to come in – her
breasts bounced at every step but she still managed that lovely
dancer’s grace, she skimmed and rippled – and they drove away, far
more at ease with each other than Lainie and Emma would have
been.

She remembered
the day she’d found out Charlie had been raised by a single mom and
didn’t know who his father was.

Second date.
The one where you swap biographical detail over a more expensive
meal than you had the first time. You tell the other person what
your parents do. And how many brothers and sisters you have. You
reveal your ethnicity, if your appearance and name haven’t already
given it away.

“My mom is
great,” he’d said.

Retro Italian
restaurant on Ninth Avenue in Manhattan.

“And your
dad?”

“Him, you have
to call an error of judgment, I’m told.” Slight drawl, colored by
humor.

“Oh, right.”
Bright, middle-class smile. Instant flash of London Guy.

Yeah.

Squash it.
Forget it. Pretend.

“Do you – ? I
mean, does she – ?” she had tried to ask him, but the words
stuck.

I think I
deliberately shut Lainie out from that night on, even before I’d
met her.

“Bear a
grudge?” Charlie had suggested.

“No, I mean
think about trying to contact him?”

“Oh. Oh,
right, no, she asked me if I wanted her to.” He leaned on the
table, letting his eggplant parmigiana grow cold. “I told her no. I
didn’t need it for me. She says she doesn’t need it for her. She’d
prefer not.”

“You’ve
evolved your own way of being a man,” she said, and he liked this
perception, she could see it – that he’d kind of sprung up out of
the earth fully formed, with only Lainie.

Should she
have told him about London Guy and Billy then? Surely not so soon.
When would have been the right point? There must have been some
point between too soon and too late that would have been just
right, but she missed it somehow, and then it only grew harder and
harder.