Something Borrowed (12 page)

Claire looks up from her Palm Pilot. "Perfect beach weather."

"Perfect golf weather," Hillary says, looking at Dex and Marcus.

"Any interest?"

"Urn, maybe," Dex says, glancing up from the sports page. "Want

me to call and see if we can get a tee time?"

Darcy slams her cards onto the table and looks around defiantly.

Hillary doesn't seem to notice Darcy's objection to a round of golf

because she says, "Or we could just pop over to the driving range."

"No! No! No! No golf!" Darcy pounds the table again, this time

with her fist. "Not on our first day! We have to stay together! All of

us. Right, Rachel?"

"Guess that means no golf today," Dex says, before I am forced to

become involved in the great golf debate. "Darcy's orders."

Hillary gets up from the table with a disgusted look on her face.

"I just want us all to be together at the beach," Darcy says, putting

a benevolent spin on her selfishness.

"And you make the prospect seem so pleasant." Dex stands, walks

over to the sink, and starts making coffee.

"What's your problem, grouchy bottom?" Darcy says to his back as

if he is the one who just told her how to spend the day.

"You are

being such an old stinkweed. Sheesh."

"What's a stinkweed?" Marcus asks, scratching his ear.

It is his

first contribution to the morning conversation. He still looks half

asleep. "I'm not familiar."

"Just have a look at one right now," Darcy says, pointing at Dex.

"He's been in a bad mood since we got here."

"No, I haven't," Dex says. I want him to turn around so I can read

his expression.

"Have too. Hasn't he?" Darcy demands an answer from the rest of

us, looking at me specifically. Being friends with Darcy has taught

me the art of smoothing over. But sleeping with her fiance has

dulled my instinct. I am not in the mood to chime in.

And nobody

else wants to become embroiled in what should be their private

argument. We all shrug or look away.

In truth, though, Dex has been somewhat subdued. I wonder if I

have anything to do with his mood. Maybe it bothered him,

watching me with Marcus. Not full-blown jealousy, just the

territorial pangs that I experienced. Or perhaps he's only thinking

about Darcy, seeing her for the controlling person she is. I've

always been aware of Darcy's demands you can't miss them but

lately, I have been less tolerant of her. I am tired of her always

getting her way. Maybe Dex feels the same.

"What are we doing for breakfast?" Marcus asks through a loud

yawn.

Claire glances at her diamond-studded Cartier. "You mean

brunch."

"Whatever. For food," Marcus says.

We discuss our options and decide to skip the crowded East

Hampton scene. Hillary says that she bought the essentials the

day before.

"By essentials, do you mean Pop-Tarts?" Marcus asks.

"Here." Hillary sets bowls, spoons, and a box of Rice Krispies on

the table. "Enjoy."

Marcus opens the box and pours some into his bowl.

He looks

across the table at me. "Want some?"

I nod, and he prepares my bowl. He doesn't ask anyone else if they

want cereal, just pushes the box down the table.

"Banana?" he asks me.

"Yes, please."

He peels the banana and slices it into his bowl and mine,

alternating every few slices. He takes the bruised section for

himself. We are sharing a banana. This means something. Dex's

eyes dart my way as Marcus flicks the last neat cylinder into my

bowl, leaving the nasty end piece in its peel where it belongs.

Several hours later, we are finally ready to go to the beach. Claire

and Darcy emerge from their rooms with their stylish canvas bags

filled to the brim with plush new beach towels, magazines, lotions,

thermoses, cell phones, and makeup. Hillary carries only a small

bath towel from the house and a Frisbee. I am somewhere in

between with a beach towel, my Discman, and a bottle of water.

The six of us walk in a row, our flip-flops smacking the pavement

with that satisfying sound of summer. Claire and Hillary walk on

either end, flanking the house couple and the possible couple-tobe.

We cross the beach parking lot and climb over the dune,

hesitating for a second to take in our first collective glimpse of the

ocean. I am glad that I no longer live in landlocked Indiana, where

people call Lake Michigan "the beach." The view is thrilling. It

almost makes me forget that I slept with Dex.

Dex leads the way down the crowded beach, finding us a spot

halfway between the dunes and the ocean where the sand is still

soft but even enough to spread our towels. Marcus puts his towel

next to mine; Darcy is on my other side, Dex next to her. Hillary

and Claire set up in front of us. The sun is bright but not too hot.

Claire warns us all about the UV rays, that these are the days

when you really have to be careful. "You can get severe sun

damage and not even realize it until it's too late," she says.

Marcus offers to put suntan lotion on my back.

"No, thanks," I say. But as I struggle to reach the middle of my

back, he takes the bottle from me and applies the lotion,

meticulously maneuvering around the edges of my suit.

"Do mine, Dex," Darcy says cheerfully, shedding her white shorts

and squatting in front of Dex in her black bikini. "Here.

Use the

coconut oil, please."

Claire bemoans the lack of SPF in the oil, says we are too old to

keep tanning and that Darcy will be sorry when the wrinkles set

in. Darcy rolls her eyes and says she doesn't care about wrinkles,

she lives in the moment. I know I will get an earful later, that

Darcy will tell me that Claire is just jealous because her fair skin

goes straight from white to bright pink. "You'll regret it when

you're forty," Claire says, her face shaded by a huge straw hat.

"No I won't. I'll just get laser resurfacing." Darcy adjusts her bikini

top and then coats more oil on her calves, using quick, efficient

strokes.

I have watched her grease up for more than fifteen years now.

Every summer her goal was to have a savage tan. Often we would

lie out in her backyard with a big tub of Crisco, a bottle of Sun-In,

and a garden hose for periodic relief. It was absolute torture. But I

suffered through it believing that dark pigmentation was a virtue

of sorts. My skin is pale like Claire's, so every day Darcy would

surge further ahead.

Claire remarks that cosmetic surgery won't cure skin cancer.

"Oh, for Pete's sake!" Darcy says. "Stay under your damn hat

then!"

Claire opens her mouth and then closes it quickly, looking injured.

"Sorry. I was just trying to help."

Darcy shoots her a conciliatory smile. "I know, hon.

Didn't mean

to snap at you."

Dex looks at me and makes a face, as if to say that he wishes both

of them would shut up. It is the first direct communication we

have had all day. I allow myself to smile back at him.

His face

breaks into a glorious grin. He is so handsome that it hurts. Like

looking at the sun. He stands for a moment to adjust his towel,

which has folded over in the wind. I look at his back and then

down at his calves, feeling a surge of remembrance. He was in my

bed. Not that I want a repeat performance. But oh, he has a nice

body lean but broad. I am not a body person, but I still appreciate

a perfect one. He sits back down just as I look away.

Marcus asks if anybody wants to play Frisbee. I say no, that I am

too tired, but what I am thinking is that the last thing I want to do

is run around with my soft, white stomach poking out of my

tankini. But Hillary is a taker and off they go, the portrait of two

well-adjusted beach-goers leaving the rest of us to our trifling.

"Hand me my shirt," Darcy says to Dex.

"Please?"

"The 'please' is a given," Darcy says.

"Say it," he says, popping a cinnamon Altoid into his mouth.

Darcy hits him hard in the stomach.

"Ouch," he says in a monotone, to indicate that it didn't hurt in

the slightest.

She winds up to hit him again, but he grabs her wrist.

"Try to behave. You're such a child," he says fondly.

His edginess

of this morning is gone.

"I am not," she says, sidling over to his towel. She presses her

fingers into his chest, poised for a kiss.

I put on my sunglasses and look away. To say that what I am

feeling is not jealousy is a stretch.

That night we all go to a party in Bridgehampton. The house is

huge with a beautiful L-shaped pool surrounded by gorgeous

landscaping and at least twenty tiki torches. I scan the guests in

the backyard, noticing all of the purple, hot pink, and orange

dresses and skirts. It seems that every woman read the same

"bright colors are in, black is out" article that I read. I followed the

advice and bought a lime green sundress that is too vivid and

memorable to wear again before August, which means it will cost

me about one hundred and fifty dollars per wear. But I am pleased

with my choice until I see the same dress, about two sizes smaller,

on a slender blonde. She is much taller than I am, so the dress is

shorter on her, exposing an endless stretch of bronzed thigh. I

make a conscious effort to stay on the opposite side of the pool

from her.

I go to the bathroom, and on my way back to find Hillary, I get

stuck talking to Hollis and Dewey Malone. Hollis used to work at

my firm but quit the day after she got engaged to Dewey. Dewey is

unattractive and humorless, but he has a huge trust fund. Hence

Hollis's interest. It was amusing to hear Hollis explain to us that

Dewey has such a "big heart," blah blah blah, trying in vain to

disguise her true intentions. I am envious of Hollis's escape from

firm hell, but I would rather be stuck billing than married to

Dewey.

"My life is so much better now," she chirps tonight.

"That firm was

poison! It was so stifling! I thought I might miss the intellectual

stimulation but I don't. Now I have time to read the classics and

think. It's great. So liberating."

"Uh-huh That's nice," I say, taking mental notes to share with

Hillary later.

Hollis goes on to tell me about their penthouse on the park and

how she's been working so hard on decorating it and has had to

fire three designers for not adhering to her vision.

Dewey

contributes nothing to the conversation, just crunches his ice and

looks bored. Once I catch him staring at Darcy's butt, packed

neatly into a pair of tight magenta Capri pants.

Marcus is suddenly beside me. I introduce him to Dewey and

Hollis. Dewey shakes his hand and then continues to mouthbreathe

and look distracted. Hollis promptly asks Marcus where

he lives and what he does for a living. Apparently his Murray Hill

address and his marketing job don't quite measure up because

they find an excuse to move on to more worthy guests.

Marcus raises his eyebrows. "Dewey, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Dooo heee have a stick up his ass or what?"

I laugh.

He looks proud of his joke, pleased to make me laugh.

"So, are you having fun?"

"I guess so. You?"

He shrugs. "The people here kind of take themselves seriously,

don't they?"

"That's the Hamptons."

I survey the party. It is a far cry from neighborhood barbecues

back in Indiana. Part of me feels satisfied that I have expanded my

horizons. But a larger part of me feels uncomfortable every time I

come to a party like this one. I am a poser, attempting to mingle

with people who consider Indiana to be mere flyover country necessary terrain to cross on their trips to Aspen or Los

Angeles. I watch Darcy making her rounds with Dex at her side.

There is no trace of Indy left in her; to watch her you would guess

that she grew up on Park Avenue. Her kids will grow up in

Manhattan, for sure. When I have kids, if I ever have kids, I

intend to move to the suburbs. I look at Marcus, trying to imagine

him dragging our son's Big Wheel out of the street. He looks down

at our little boy, whose face is streaked with dried Popsicle, and

instructs him to stay on the sidewalk. The boy has Marcus's short

eyebrows pointing up toward each other like an upside-down V.

"C'mon," Marcus says. "Let's get another drink." "All right," I say,

keeping my eye on the blonde in my dress. As we walk toward the

poolside bar, I think of Indiana again, picturing Annalise and

Greg with their neighbors, all spilled out on the freshly cut

Midwestern lawn. If somebody wore her same pair of khaki shorts

from the Gap, nobody would care.

After the party, we find another party, and then do our usual

finale at the Talkhouse, where I dance with Marcus again. Around

three o'clock, we all pile into the car and go home.

Hillary and

Claire head straight for bed while the two couples remain in the

den. Darcy and Dex hold hands on one love seat; Marcus and I sit