The Big Bang (34 page)

“And apparently a little bit of daddy thrown in for good measure,” he added, checking out the offending white van inching around the foot traffic. “That looks like Star Warranty.”

The van approached and pulled into the Pierce-Cohns’ driveway. The Star Warranty logo faced the central section of the yard sale.

“How timely,” Tim said. “I think I’ll go over and pester the technician about when we’re on the schedule.”

“Would you?” Theresa asked. “Those cracks beneath our bay window feel like they’re growing.”

“Why don’t I take the babies with me so you’re freed up to look around?”

Theresa eyed a table filled with toddler clothing. “Sure you don’t mind?”

“Not if you don’t mind that I’ll get to show them off first.” Tim beamed at his infant daughters.

“I think I’ll make my way in Hope’s direction. I promised Lauren I’d talk to her about doing her room as soon as the repair work is done.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

They kissed and he took off with stroller in tow toward the Pierce-Cohns’ house and the workman who was unloading something from the back of his van.

“What a good husband and father he is,” Maryellen said, giving herself a surreptitious pinch for any worries she might have entertained otherwise.

***

9:51 a.m.:

“Hey Laney,” Warren Mickelson said, holding two matching art deco prints. “Fowlers all excited about their big move?”

“Very.” She forced the most syrupy of smiles. “But housing’s awfully expensive in California.”

“With that raise, I’m sure he won’t even notice,” Warren said.

“And there’s the diversity issue to deal with.”

“The diversity issue?”

“Sarah is married to someone of color and all,” she leaned over the table and stage-whispered, “but between you and me, I don’t think she’s all that comfortable living in an Oakland kind of environment, if you know what I mean.”

***

9:55 a.m.:

People were busy shopping, socializing, and having fun all around her.

Frank, who’d just finished negotiating a 10 percent kickback from the ice cream truck in exchange for a parking spot beside the playground, parked himself on the pavilion and was chatting it up with the other fathers.

Hope looked downright blissful holding one of the babies as she talked not only animatedly, but utterly unselfconsciously, with Theresa and Tim.

Maryellen even saw Roseanne Goldberg smile, admittedly not over the sale itself, but her own conversation with the Star Warranty tech, whom she’d accosted at just about the same time as Tim on Will’s driveway.

Best of all, Eva, who wasn’t currently speaking to either her or Frank, appeared from inside the house. Her prolonged silence would have been much more concerning had she not come out of the house by nine, made a beeline across the lawn, and stationed herself beside the table filled with assorted mall baubles and Forever 21 castoffs she’d insisted on organizing, merchandising, and now straightening for the sale.

Maryellen smiled herself as she put a sold sign on a table and chair set bound for the first home of an adorable newly married couple who’d left to fetch their bigger car.

***

9:59 a.m.:

By letting the kids pay her instead of taking the crap they picked up in her
teen
section to the checkout tables, Eva figured she could pocket at least $100.

An hour in and she’d already siphoned off fifty, thanks in large part to Heather. No longer wanna-be African American, she’d tossed her hip-hop clothes, taken out her cornrows, dyed her blond hair black, and had snapped up pretty much anything at the sale that could pass as Goth.

Lauren, on the other hand, who’d shown up with her, fingered a bracelet or two, but her eyes never left Tyler’s very closed front door.

“Haven’t seen him yet today,” Eva said.

Lauren’s not-quite-lifeguard bronzed cheeks went splotchy. “He said he thought he might be playing golf or something.”

Something like playing his unwilling part in Eva’s Plan B.

On the night he got home from Florida, Eva had filled him in on the basics of her plan to run away. It was only after he refused to take part in a
passing of the Athame
hookup that she realized she hadn’t thought things through enough. Not only had the spell to break Lauren and Tyler failed, he was like really in love.

Meaning she couldn’t trust him not to rat her out to her parents.

If her dad found out, there was only one thing that would keep him from sending her to that damn camp.

“Probably better if we don’t do anything,” she’d said, thinking up an instant but crucial addendum to her plan.

“Glad you agree,” he’d said. “I just can’t. I mean, Lauren and me—”

“I’m late,” she’d said.

“I should be taking off too,” he’d said.

“No, I mean, I’m like late, late.”

“Like you might be… ?”

“I’m not always on time or anything, so I’m not totally worried, but—”

“But what?”

The look on his face—a mixture of confusion, disbelief, and sheer panic told her he’d keep his mouth shut, at least long enough to get her plans finalized so she could take off.

“I’ll keep you posted.”

He’d been alternately texting to find out if she knew anything for sure and trying to avoid her ever since.

“Everything cool with you guys?” Eva asked Lauren.

“Every time I ask, Tyler says everything’s good.” Lauren sniffled. “He’s acting weird though.”

“Probably just having his boy period or something,” she said.

“You think so?”

“I think these would look great on you.” Eva handed Lauren a pair of skinny jeans she’d worn once but hated because they bunched at the knees. “They were mine.”

“Totally cute,” Lauren said. “I can’t believe you’re getting rid of them—they’re Hudson.”

“I loved them when I got them, but they’re tight or something all of the sudden.”

“That’s a bummer,” Lauren said.

Eva smiled. “Guess I’m getting kinda fat or something.”

***

10:36 a.m.:

“I’m thinking she looks a tiny bit bloated,” Stephanie Mitchell said.

“Hope Jordan would never retain fluid.” Laney squinted and turned her head sideways. “Unless Will Pierce-Cohn somehow knocked her up after the potluck.”

“What?” Stephanie asked.

“Laney thinks she saw Will in Hope’s house.” Lisa Simon shook her head. “You were high that night and you must be high now. Remember, we’re talking P-C here, so even if you did, what could have really happened? Besides, Hope’s belly is flat as a board.”

“Speaking of which, did anyone ever figure out who brought those brownies to the potluck?” Julie Connors asked.

“Nope,” Laney said.

Stephanie raised an eyebrow. “Rumor has it, it was you, Laney.”

“Wasn’t me.” Something about being credited with a night that would forever be part of neighborhood lore made Laney smile. “But, you know what I always say, treats and surprises are the key to a fun-filled, successful event.”

***

10:51 a.m.:

“Great yard sale.” A well-dressed, older woman, who was standing nearby, said to her equally well-dressed friend.

“They usually are around here.” The other woman picked up a table lamp and examined the shade. “They all buy like they have money.”

The comment might have bothered Maryellen had a sudden stir not filled the air.

“There he is,” one of the kids yelled from the playground. “Hey, Randall!”

“Go Raiders,” another kid yelled and a swarm headed in the direction of the Fowlers, who’d just arrived and were standing on Laney’s driveway.

Randall graciously began signing autographs for the neighborhood kids.

“Who’s that?” the woman holding the table lamp asked.

“One of our neighbors,” Maryellen said sweetly. “He just signed a multimillion dollar deal with the Oakland Raiders.”

***

10:52 a.m.:

Laney found a pair of earrings that looked suspiciously like the hoops she’d left at the Raymonds’ after a particularly drunken hot tub party, and was headed over to ask Jen Raymond what she knew about them when she heard
Randall
ring out across the cul-de-sac.

About fainted when she saw him standing there with Sarah on her driveway, blocking her play—the run for it into her house she’d planned if they happened by the sale.

She searched for a nearby table piled high enough to hide behind, looked down, and pretended to examine jewelry she’d already milled through while she rummaged through her brain for an alternate escape route.

Carolina Herrera perfume warned her in advance of Sarah’s imminent approach.

“Slumming it one last time?” she managed the second she spotted those perfectly manicured toes in gold-trimmed sandals she knew to be Prada.

“Laney, I’ve been calling and calling.”

Laney looked up. “I haven’t been answering.”

“I’m sorry,” Sarah said.

“I don’t accept.”

Neither said anything.

Laney pretended to look through a box of scarves.

“Laney, it’s not like I can help my husband got traded.”

“We’ve been through this once before.”

“I’m really sorry.”

“You should have told me.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Lie.”

“I’m not lying.”

“You knew he was in talks.”

“But I didn’t know if anything would come of them.”

She didn’t want to cry. She couldn’t let herself cry. She began to cry. “I shouldn’t have had to hear it on TV.”

“I know, honey.” Sarah came around and wiped a tear from Laney’s cheek. “I know.”

“You don’t know. I’m so hurt.”

“I know, I know. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

“How are you going to do that?”

“For starters,” Sarah said, “I’ll come to visit and you’ll visit me.”

“And?”

“How about you list my house?”

***

11:05 a.m.:

“You like to play hardball, huh?”

“Depends on who I’m playing with.” Emboldened by the success of her morning, Maryellen added a Laney-style wink, and then almost laughed out loud for doing so.

“I hear ya,” the antiques dealer said. “I’ll give you $125 for the standing mirror and the china.”

“$150.”

“Prime yard sale time’s dwindling,” the antiques dealer said. “And it’s gonna rain.”

Bright sunshine was preferable on paper, but too much heat cooled down sales. Best as she could tell, the scattered clouds that had rolled in were having the opposite effect, heating things up by providing the most optimal temperature for shopping Maryellen could have requested. “There are still lots of shoppers and it’s not raining yet.”

“When it does, your sale’s over.”

She glanced up at the cloud cover coming from the west. When she looked down, she couldn’t miss Laney and Sarah, whose heated argument appeared to have evolved into a nearly as passionate, definitely as public, hug of forgiveness. “How about we split the difference?”

“Deal,” he said.

She watched Sarah light a cigarette, take a drag, and place the cigarette between Laney’s lips.

As she shook hands with the antiques dealer, Laney and Sarah walked together to the Estridges’ side gate and disappeared into their backyard, hand in hand.

***

12:04 p.m.:

How she went from burping peppermint tea all morning to craving a condiment-covered beef product the moment the coffee and bagel sale transformed into a hot dog stand was a mystery.

Hope’s mouth watered as she squirted mustard across the top of her steaming hot dog and took a bite.

A miracle.

Despite the on-and-off queasiness, the sale had been the perfect distraction. Maryellen wouldn’t assign her to do much of anything, insisting the donation of her house and storage was more than enough, but work had found her. Not only did she and Theresa talk about more redecorating, three other clients had taken her aside about projects. One, a potential landscaping job, happened by chance when she came over to chat with Frank Griffin, who’d introduced her to the woman standing beside him and ducked out of the conversation to help an elderly lady carry a heavy kitchen appliance. When no one could find Laney to determine the price on some of her Tupperware, Hope stepped in with a catalog she happened to have lying around.

As she savored the second juicy bite of hot dog, she watched Will Pierce-Cohn say good-bye to the Star Warranty guy and drop his daughters at the toys.

He seemed to be whistling as he made his way over.

Once she knew he was way more interested in whatever she’d said about the playground than anything related to tucking her into bed, she’d all but let go of her embarrassment. Coming clean about the drainage problems, the bunny “relocation” site that was far too close to a highway for her comfort, and her agreement to work on the playground because of Renata’s prediction seemed to have cleared the air between them entirely.

Renata’s startlingly accurate prediction.

A new life is ready to come through very soon.

“Good as they look?” Will asked, joining her at the pavilion.

“Better.” She took a bite. “I’m thinking I’ll have to have another.”

“Hold that thought.” He headed for Larry Mitchell, who was manning the stand. “I assume you want it with everything?”

“You know it,” she said.

***

1:18 p.m.:

Contrary to the antiques dealer’s prediction, business was still brisk. Maryellen buttoned up her sweater. Unfortunately, the weather was getting a little too brisk.

***

1:25 p.m.:

Maryellen made the call to leave outdoor items on Laney’s lawn, but dispatched the teardown committee to condense the remaining yard sale items and put everything on tables in her garage.

***

2:10 p.m.:

The rain didn’t seem to distract or detract shoppers by all that much, if at all. In fact, people seemed to enjoy the cozy, indoor bazaar experience.

***

2:45 p.m.:

Maryellen called half-price among a rush of end-of-the-day bargain hunters who’d arrived sopping wet, but eager to load up on overlooked finds they knew they’d pay double for at the thrift store.