Brain Child (3 page)

“Hi! What drags you down here? I thought you’d be up at the new place driving everyone crazy and spending the last of our money.” Though he was smiling broadly, Ellen felt the sting of criticism, then told herself she was imagining it.

“I’m meeting Cynthia Evans,” she replied, and immediately regretted her words. To Marsh, Cynthia and Bill Evans represented all the changes that had taken place in La Paloma. Of the fortunes that were being made, Bill’s was one of the largest. “Don’t worry,” she added. “I’m not buying, just looking.” She offered Marsh a kiss, and when it was not returned, went to perch uneasily on the sofa that sat against one wall. “Although we
are
going to have to do something about the tile in
the patio,” she added. “Most of it’s broken, and it’s impossible to match what isn’t.”

Marsh shook his head. “Later,” he pronounced. “We agreed that for now, we’d only do what we have to to make the place livable.”

“I know,” Ellen sighed. “But every time Cynthia tells me what she’s doing with the hacienda, I get absolutely green with envy.”

Marsh set his pen down on the desk and faced her. “Then maybe you should have married a programming genius, not a country doctor,” he suggested in a tone Ellen couldn’t read.

While she tried to decide how to respond, her eyes surveyed the office. Despite Marsh’s objections, she’d insisted on decorating it with rosewood furniture. “This isn’t exactly what I’d call shabby,” she finally ventured, and was relieved to see Marsh’s smile return.

“No, it isn’t,” he agreed. “And even I have to admit that I kind of like it, even though I flinch every time I think of what it cost. Anyway, is that why you came down here? Just to terrify me with the idea of your shopping with Cynthia Evans?”

Ellen shook her head and tried to match his bantering tone. “Worse. I didn’t even come down to see you. I came down to pick up the corsage for Alex.” Marsh looked blank. “The prom,” she reminded him. “Our son? Sixteen years old? Junior prom? Remember?”

Marsh groaned. “I’m sorry. It’s just that there’s so damned much to keep track of around here.”

“Marsh,” Ellen began, “I just wish … Oh, never mind.”

“You wish I’d spend less time here and more at home,” Marsh finished. “I will,” he added. “Anyway, I’ll try.”

Their eyes met, and the office seemed suddenly to fill with the words that both of them had spoken so often they knew them by heart. The argument was old, and there was, both of them knew, no resolution for it. Besides, Marsh wasn’t that different from most of the
husbands and fathers of La Paloma. They all worked too many hours a day, and all of them were more interested in their careers than in their families.

“I know you’ll try,” she said. Then she went on, her voice rueful in spite of her intentions. “And I know you’ll fail, and I keep telling myself that it doesn’t really matter and that everything will be all right.” Once again Ellen regretted her words, but this time, instead of looking irritated, Marsh got up and came to her, pulling her to her feet.

“It will be all right,” he told her. “We’re just caught up in a life we never expected, with more money than we ever thought we’d have, and more demands on my time than we ever planned for. But we love each other, and whatever happens, we’ll deal with it.” He kissed her. “Okay?”

Ellen nodded, as relief flowed through her. Over the last years, and particularly the last months, there had been so few moments like this, when she knew that she and Marsh did, despite the problems, still belong together. She returned his kiss, then drew away, smiling. “And now I’m going to get Alex his flowers.”

Marsh’s expression, soft a moment before, hardened slightly. “Alex can’t get them himself?”

“Times have changed,” Ellen replied, ignoring the look on her husband’s face and trying to keep her voice light. “And I don’t have time to listen to you recite the litany of the good old days. Let’s face it—when you were Alex’s age, you didn’t have nearly as much to do after school as he does, and since I was going to be in the village anyway, I might as well pick up the flowers.”

Marsh’s eyes narrowed, and the last trace of his smile disappeared. “And when I was a kid, my school wasn’t as good as his is, and there was no accelerated education program for me like there is for Alex. Except he’s probably not going to get into it.”

“Oh, God,” Ellen said, as the last of their moment of peace evaporated. Did he really have to convert something as simple as picking up a corsage into another
lecture on his perception of Alex as an underachiever? Which, of course, he wasn’t, no matter what Marsh thought. And then, just as she was about to defend Alex, she checked herself, and forced a smile. “Let’s not start that, Marsh. Not right now. Please?”

Marsh hesitated, then returned her smile, though it was as forced as her own. Still, he kissed her good-bye, and when she left his office, she hoped perhaps they might have had their last argument of the day. But when she was gone, instead of going back to the work that was stacked up on his desk, Marsh sat for a few minutes, letting his mind drift.

He, too, was aware of the strains that were threatening to pull his marriage apart, but he had no idea of what to do about them. The problems just seemed to pile up. As far as he could see, the only solution was to leave La Paloma, though he and Ellen had agreed a year ago that leaving was no solution at all. Leaving was not solving problems, it was only running away from them.

Nor was Alex’s performance in school the real problem, though Marsh was convinced that if Alex only applied himself, he could easily be a straight-A student.

The problem, Marsh thought, was that he was beginning to wonder if his wife, like so many other people in La Paloma, had come to think that money would solve everything.

Then he relented. What was going wrong wasn’t Ellen’s fault. In fact, it was no one’s fault. It was just that the world was changing, and both of them had to work harder to adjust to those changes before their marriage was torn apart.

He made up his mind to get home early that evening and see to it that nothing spoiled his wife’s pleasure in their son’s first prom.

Alex Lonsdale leaned forward across the bathroom sink and peered closely at the blemish on his right cheek, then decided that it wasn’t a pimple at all—merely
a slight redness from the pressure he’d put on his father’s electric razor while he’d shaved. He ran the razor over his face one last time, then opened it to clean it out the way his father had shown him. Not that there was much to clean—Alex’s beard, a month after his sixteenth birthday, was still more a matter of optimism than reality. Still, when he tapped the shaver head against the sink, a few specks appeared, and they were the black of his own hair rather than the sandy brown of his father’s. Grinning with satisfaction, he put the razor back together, left the bathroom, and hurried down the hall to his room, doing his best to ignore the sound of his parents’ argument as their raised voices drifted in from the kitchen.

The argument had been going on for an hour now, ever since he’d left the dinner table to begin getting ready for the prom. It was a familiar argument, and as Alex began wrestling with the studs of his rented dress shirt, he wondered how far it would go.

He hated it when his parents started arguing, hated the fact that as hard as he tried not to listen, he could hear every word. That, at least, would be something he wouldn’t have to worry about when they moved into the new house. Its walls were thick, and from his room on the second floor he wouldn’t be able to hear anything that was going on in the rest of the house. So when the shouting matches began, he could just go to his room and shut it all out. Every angry word they spoke hurt him. All he could do was try not to hear.

He finished mounting the studs, shrugged into the shirt, then began working on the cufflinks, finally taking the shirt off again, folding the cuffs, maneuvering the links halfway through, then putting the shirt on once more. The left link was easy, but the right one gave him more trouble. At last it popped through the buttonholes, and he snapped it into position.

He glanced at the clock on his desk. He still had five minutes before he had to leave if he wasn’t going to be late. He pulled on his pants, hooked up the suspenders,
then eyed the cummerbund that lay on the bed. Which way was it supposed to go? Pleats up, or pleats down? He couldn’t remember. He picked up his hairbrush and ran it through the thick shock of hair that always seemed to fall across his forehead, then grabbed the offending maroon cummerbund and matching dinner jacket. As he’d hoped they would, his parents fell silent as he appeared in the kitchen.

“I can’t remember which way it goes,” he said, holding up the garment.

“Pleats down,” Ellen Lonsdale replied. “Otherwise it’ll wind up full of crumbs. Turn around.” Taking the cummerbund from Alex’s hands, she fastened it neatly around his waist, then held his coat while he slid his arms into its sleeves. When he turned to face her once more, she reached up to put her arms around his neck and give him a hug. “You look terrific,” she said. She squeezed him once more, then stepped back. “Now, you have a wonderful time, and drive carefully.” She shot a warning look toward Marsh, then relaxed as she saw that he was apparently as willing as she to drop their argument.

“Gotta go,” Alex was saying. “If I’m late, Lisa will kill me.”

“If you’re late, you’ll kill yourself,” Ellen observed, her smile returning. “But don’t rush off and forget these.” She opened the refrigerator and took out Lisa’s corsage, along with the white carnation for Alex’s lapel.

“You should’ve gotten red,” Alex groused as he let his mother pin the flower onto his dinner jacket.

“If you wanted a red carnation, you should have gotten a white jacket,” Ellen retorted. She stepped back and gazed proudly at Alex. Somehow, he had managed to inherit both their looks, and the combination was startling. His dark eyes and black wavy hair were hers; his fair complexion and even features, his father’s. The combination lent his face a sensitive handsomeness that had earned him admiring remarks since he was a baby, and, in the last few months, an unending
string of phone calls from girls who hoped he might be tiring of Lisa Cochran. “Don’t be surprised if you and Lisa don’t wind up the king and queen of the prom,” she added, stretching upward to kiss him.

“Aw, Mom—”

“They still have the king and queen of the prom, don’t they?” Ellen asked.

Blushing, Alex nodded his head, checked his pockets for his keys and wallet, and started for the door.

“And remember,” Ellen called after him. “Don’t stay out past one, and don’t get into any trouble.”

“You mean, don’t drink,” Alex corrected her. “I won’t. I promise. Okay?”

“Okay,” Marsh Lonsdale replied. He handed Alex a twenty-dollar bill. “Take some of the kids out and buy them a Coke after the dance.”

“Thanks, Dad.” Alex disappeared out the back door. A moment later Ellen and Marsh heard his car start. Marsh arched his brows. “I don’t believe he’s actually going to drive all the way next door,” he said, unable to suppress a smile, despite the fact that it was Alex’s car that he and Ellen had been arguing about all evening.

“Well, of course he is,” Ellen replied. “Do you really think he’s going to pick up Lisa, then walk her down our driveway? Not our Alex.”

“He could have walked her all the way to the prom,” Marsh suggested.

“No, he couldn’t,” Ellen said, her voice suddenly tired. “He needs a car, Marsh. After we move, I just can’t spend all my time ferrying him up and down the ravine. And besides, he’s a responsible boy—”

“I’m not saying he isn’t,” Marsh agreed. “All I’m saying is that I think he should have earned the car. And I’m not saying he should have earned the money, either. But couldn’t we have used the car as an incentive for him to pick up his grades?”

Ellen shrugged, and began clearing the dinner dishes off the table. “He’s doing just fine.”

“He’s not doing as well as he could be, and you know it as well as I do.”

“I know,” Ellen sighed. “But I just think it’s two separate issues, that’s all.” Suddenly she smiled. “I’ll tell you what. Why don’t we compromise? Let’s wait until his grades come out, and see what happens. If they get worse, I’ll agree that getting him the car was a mistake, and you can take it away from him. I’ll cope with the transportation problem some way. If they stay the same, or improve, he keeps the car. But either way, we stop fighting about it, all right?”

Marsh hesitated only a second, then grinned. “Deal,” he said. “Now, what say I help you with the dishes, and we try to put together something with the Cochrans?” He offered his wife a mischievous wink. “I’ll even drive over next door and pick them up.”

The last of the tension that had been vibrating between them all afternoon suddenly dissipated, and together Ellen and Marsh began clearing away the dinner dishes.

Alex carefully backed his shiny red Mustang down the driveway, then parked it by the curb in front of the Cochran’s house next door. He picked up Lisa’s corsage, crossed the lawn, and walked into the house without knocking. “Anybody here?” he called. Lisa’s six-year-old sister, Kim, hurtled down the stairs and threw herself onto Alex.

“Is that for me?” she demanded, grabbing for the corsage box.

“If Lisa isn’t ready, maybe I’ll take you to the dance,” Alex replied, peeling Kim loose as her father’s bulky frame appeared from the living room. “Hi, Mr. Cochran.”

Jim Cochran raised one eyebrow and surveyed Alex. “Ah, Prince Charming descends from the castle on the mountain to take Cinderella to the ball.”

Alex tried to cover his feelings of embarrassment with a grin. “Aw, come on. We’re not moving for two more weeks. And it’s not a castle anyway.”

“True, true,” Cochran agreed. “On the other hand, I haven’t noticed you asking if you can rent Kim’s room. We’ll happily throw her out.”

“You will not,” Kim yelled, aiming a punch at her father’s belly.

“Will too,” her father told her. “Want a Coke, Alex? Lisa’s still upstairs trying to make herself look human.” He dropped his booming voice only slightly, still leaving it loud enough to fill the house. “Actually, she’s been ready for an hour, but she doesn’t want you to think she’s too eager.”