Relative Happiness (11 page)

“Not so tight,” she grumbled.

Lexie pretended she didn't hear.

Susie and Todd dragged Donalda off the stage as the lights dimmed. By the time they unrolled her, she was as red as a beet. She coughed, “Where is she? I'll kill her.”

Lexie had already left the theatre.

Beth gave her a lift home.

“You deserve an Academy Award for knocking off poor Donalda,” she said. “The music from
Psycho
played in my head.”

Lexie's hot water tank leaked one Sunday morning. She was in a dither about what to do, so she called Rory. Poor guy. As the only one in his immediate family who knew a thing about tools, he got stuck with his widowed mother's repairs, his own and now Lexie's.

Rory was easygoing. How he ever managed to connect with Beth was a mystery.

He carried his toolbox into the house. “What have you done now?”

“God only knows. I hate stupid machine things.” Lexie followed him into the cellar. He poked around and did stuff. He told her what was wrong and how to fix it. She tried to pay attention but forgot everything by the time they went back upstairs.

“You deserve a cup of tea and a nice piece of blueberry pie.”

He sat at the table.

She put a big slab on his plate, then brought over two mugs of tea and sat with him.

“Oh, boy.” He wolfed down a huge bite. “I wish Beth baked like you.”

She looked to the heavens. “For pity's sake, don't let her hear you say that.”

“Why are you guys always worried about what Beth thinks?”

“You're kidding, right?”

He shovelled more pie in his gob. “No, I mean it. She's an old softie.”

“Stop talking with your mouth full.”

He grinned and showed her his blue teeth.

Lexie shrugged. “I suppose because she always screamed the loudest.”

Rory finished the pie and drained his mug. “That was good.” He wiped his mouth on a napkin and sat back in his chair. Lexie loved to look at him. He was a doll. He gave her a little smile. “Can I tell you a secret?”

She was intrigued. She and Rory never got a chance to talk together one on one. “Sure.”

“Beth's jealous of you.”

Five seconds of silence went by.

“Okay, don't believe me.” He folded his arms on the table, quite unconcerned.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean she wishes she could be like you.”

“But that's not possible. Why would she be jealous of me?”

“Because you're artistic and you went to university and you're independent.”

“She shouldn't feel like that. Look what she does. Raising a large family is a tremendous job.”

“I tell her that but she doesn't believe me.”

Lexie couldn't get over it. “Gosh. Beth always struck me as having supreme confidence.”

“It's an act. You're creative. Gabby's Gabby and Kate's as smart as a whip. She feels like nothing.”

“What do you tell her?”

“She's everything to me.”

“She's the luckiest girl in the world.”

Susan came over to help Lexie paint the living room. She decided on eggplant and lime green, in spite of Marlene.

Susan poured paint into the tray. “I'd never have the nerve to paint a room this colour.”

“That's because you've never had a house of your own.”

“So nice of you to remind me, Lex.”

“Sorry. I didn't mean it like that.”

“I know.” Susie took the long roller and wrote her name on the wall.

“Stop that. That's all I need—the name ‘Susie' emblazoned across the room forever.”

“What's wrong with it, may I ask?”

“Not a thing. It's better than Lexie.”

“If you could be called anything else, what would it be?”

She didn't have to think too hard. Lexie Davenport.

“Good God,” her mother said, “It looks like a bordello.”

She came over to the house to bring Lexie swatches of material—stuff she'd never use.

“Thanks Mom.”

“Oh dear, I didn't mean it like that. Don't be so sensitive. I mean it's colourful!”

“Do you know what a bordello looks like?”

Her mom decided to play along. “As a matter of fact I do. It's how I put myself through teacher's college.”

Lexie laughed. They headed for the kitchen to make a cup of tea. Sophie was on the dryer, in the back porch. Her entire mass covered the top of it. She shook to the rhythm of a dark load. Her mother looked at the cat. “I don't know why, but that looks vaguely obscene.”

“It's how I get my jollies.” She reached for the mugs she made in ceramics class and waited for her mom to tell her not to be vulgar, but there was only silence.

As she busied herself with the tea, she stole a furtive look. Her mother stared out towards the back garden, now covered with snow, her hands clasped in front of her on the table. She looked lonely. She looked different. Lexie felt scared.

Handing her mom a napkin and the tea, she said, “You're far away.”

“Yes.” Her mother took a sip and looked down at her cup. Lexie got nervous.

“Is something the matter?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God. You're not sick are you?”

Mom shook her head.

Lexie was in a panic. “It's not the babies?”

“No dear, the girls are fine.”

She breathed easier, and then came the body blow.

“Your father's having an affair.”

Her mother left. Lexie carried her aching body up the stairs and sat in the tub until the water was cold.

Men hurt you. Men betray you, but not Dad. Not her dad. She couldn't picture it. She couldn't make the connection between the sweet man who gave her bear hugs and the man who cheated on his wife. She tried to remember what Mom said.

“Close your mouth, Lexie, you'll catch flies.”

She sounded like Mom again. Lexie could deal with her better that way. The tea seemed to revive her. Her mother shook her head and smoothed her hair away from her face.

Lexie waited until she couldn't stand it any longer. “
Well?
”

“Well what?”

Lexie crossed her arms across her chest and sat stiff as a board. “Well, I don't know. You tell me.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Shit Mother, this isn't twenty questions. You can't drop a bomb like this and make me drag it out of you.”

She sighed. “I know. I don't know where to start.”

“Before you do, can I ask why you're telling me this? Why I need to know?”

“There's no one else,” she pleaded. Her voice got higher and that made Lexie uncomfortable. Her mother was always in control. “Think about it, Lexie. Who do I tell? The gossips at Club? The UCW? My Women's Institute group?”

She got up and paced the kitchen floor, her hands clenched together. “Everyone in this damn town worships your father. Everywhere I go, people tell me how much they adore him. Do you know what it's like to hear women I don't know talk about the time your father brought their children into the world, or saved their child's life.”

She sat again. She sounded bitter. “Would you have me tell Beth? A girl so tired she can't see straight. How about Kate? It takes me forty-five minutes to try and reach her voice mail at that stupid university.” She threw her hands in the air. “And I can't tell Gabby because she's disappeared off the face of the earth.”

“So I'm the last resort. I'm the loser who doesn't have anything better to do than hear all about it.”

Lexie could see the hurt.

She looked down at her lap. “You're the only one I could think of.”

Tears fell down Lexie's face. “Mom, do you know how hard this is? I love Daddy. I can't believe he'd do something like this. I can't believe it and I can't bear it.” She stopped to grab a tissue out of her pocket and wipe her nose. “A man I cared about walked out on me without a word not long ago. But I always knew there was one man who wouldn't let me down, and that was Dad. And now you tell me he's having an affair? What am I supposed to do about it? How am I supposed to feel?”

Her mother didn't say anything.

Lexie's anger built and she had nowhere to go with it. She grasped at straws. “How do you know this anyway? Maybe some idiot got the wrong idea. You could have it backwards.”

“I saw him come out of her house.”

“So what? That means nothing. He always wanders in and out of people's houses. He still make a few house calls.”

“At four in the morning?”

She couldn't believe this. “You snuck around someone's house at four o'clock in the morning?”

“I'm not proud of it but I had my suspicions and I wanted to know.”

“Have you asked him about it?”

“Yes.”

“What did he say?”

“He denied it.”

“So maybe you're wrong.”

The wind out of her sails, she slumped forward, her energy gone. “Oh God, maybe I am.”

They were quiet.

Lexie finally asked. “Who is it anyway?”

“Lillian Holmes.”

That's when Lexie knew her mother was right.

A few years before, Lexie's friend Martha invited her to Halifax for a comedy festival. She was looking forward to it and went over to ask her parents if they'd feed Sophie. They stood around the island in the kitchen and picked at cold cuts and sliced cheese.

Lexie picked up a piece of smoked meat. “This stuff will clog your arteries.”

Dad said, “What a way to go.”

Her mother laughed. “You better not say that at the conference.”

Lexie swallowed. “What conference?”

“A medical conference in Halifax this weekend,” Dad informed her.

“You're kidding. I have to go too. Can we drive down together?”

She waited for her dad to say, “Sure Princess…let's ride off into the sunset.” But he hesitated. “Actually, I have to take a few colleagues with me. I'm afraid we'd be too crowded.”

Mom said, “I didn't know some of the staff were going.”

He was vague. “Yeah, it's part of some new orientation.”

Mom laughed as she put the leftovers on the same plate. “I'm glad it's you. Imagine having to sit through boring presentations by all those stuffed shirts.”

Lexie and Martha spent the day in Halifax window-shopping. They caught up on all their news, and stopped for lunch at a local pub, where they sat at a table out on the terrace. They had a beer and shared a plate of chicken wings under a large umbrella.

That's when Lexie saw her father. He was stopped at the corner across the street waiting for the light to turn green. Lillian Holmes was with him. She was one of the social workers who worked at the hospital. Dad would recommend her to his patients. Lexie liked her: she'd stop Lexie if they ran in to each other to ask how things were. She was interested in hooked rugs, and wondered if Lexie would ever sell her one.

“There's my Dad.” Lexie started to wave, but stopped. Lillian looked like a young girl, as she chatted and gestured with her hands. Her face lit up as she threw her head back and laughed. Dad laughed too. He put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer. The light turned green and they walked away from Lexie, arm in arm.

“Was that your mom?”

“No, a good friend.”

She convinced herself it was too much wine at lunch. After all, this was her father. She enjoyed the comedy festival that night and never thought of it again.