The Time of Her Life (20 page)

Finally she agreed to meet Maggie for lunch and talk with her because she knew that otherwise Maggie might come to the house
and worry Jane herself. She had given in when Maggie had said, “Look, meet me for lunch and we’ll talk it over. I can take
it as a business lunch. It comes off my taxes, you know.” And Claudia had agreed, but she had wondered, also, if all those
little problem-solving luncheons with Vince had been tax-deductible, too.

She went out into the cold and snow to meet Maggie at Belden’s, and just the effort of getting there was unpleasantly adventurous.
She and Jane, for several days, had made only the most selective forays into the world. They stayed out of the way of people;
they had gone to a grocery store across town where they wouldn’t meet anyone they knew who might ask them how they were, and
they agreed to this obliquely.

“Let’s go to the Safeway downtown,” Claudia said; “maybe the produce is better.” And Jane would slouch down in her corner
of the front seat with only the back of her head visible through the window.

When Claudia walked into Belden’s in the middle of the noon crowd, she felt horribly exposed, as if all the little nooks and
crannies of her sorrowing were illuminated and revealed. To be abroad in the world
while harboring these little secrets of loss was oddly shameful.

Claudia was so taken aback, in fact, as she stood at the entrance behind two other waiting couples, that she refused to give
up her coat to the attendant; she simply clasped it around her and shook her head. And the attendant was surprised by her
face. He glanced back at her as she moved away. There is a certain masked, waxy, impermeable expression that he was accustomed
to seeing on the faces of the crowd that moved in and out of the restaurant when he was on duty. It is a protective expression,
a bit arch, carefully nonanticipatory. That was not at all how Claudia looked; her face was so rigid with dread that she was
alarming to see. But when she caught sight of Maggie already seated across the restaurant, so bright in a red sweater, so
amiable and good-intentioned with her long frame canted sideways in the little chair and everything about her bespeaking kindness,
Claudia relented. She smiled, and as she walked across the room, she relaxed and was even pleased at the prospect of the meal
ahead.

They were seated in the modish restaurant at a fragile and tiny table for two under the latticed ceiling hung with a jungle
of plants in large clay pots. And throughout the room were partitions made up of small forests of ficus trees in thick leaf
and tall, feathery palms. Claudia knew that the plants were supposed to counteract the bleak landscape rolling away beyond
the huge windows, but so much greenery in the wrong season made her uncomfortable. Belden’s was relatively new and very popular
with a clientele Claudia never saw anywhere else. The rooms were filled with well-dressed
men and women in their late twenties and early thirties who seemed to exist only at lunch. Claudia always wondered where these
people came from. She never saw them around campus or at PTA meetings or at Kroger’s. She sat there with Maggie while they
waited for their Bloody Marys and decided that these people came straight down the interstate from somewhere and then were
right back on the highway after lunch in a ritual and bright migration of all the snappy little cars that filled the parking
lot.

After greeting Maggie, though, Claudia was not talkative. She was pleased to be there, and she settled her coat on the back
of her chair and around herself like a little nest, but there wasn’t anything she wanted to say to anyone, really.

Maggie seemed unusually placid. Most of the time she was filled with conviction and enthusiasm about one thing or another,
but when she leaned toward Claudia, her voice was soothing. She lightly touched Claudia’s arm, but then she drew her hand
back as if Claudia might easily bruise. “You look so good. Are you all right? How are you?”

Claudia looked back at her a moment; she watched as Maggie leaned inclusively toward her. There was a note in Maggie’s voice
that suggested that Claudia was even more damaged than Claudia might know herself.

“I’m fine, Maggie.” But she felt slightly apologetic when she said so, because she had the clear impression that it was not
what Maggie wanted to hear, and of course, Maggie knew it wasn’t true.

“No, I mean it, Claudia. I know how hard it is. And you do just the opposite thing than I do when you’re upset. I turn into
a stick. Just a string bean. But as a
matter of fact, I like your face fuller like that. Not so sharp. I turn into a stalk when anything bothers me, but you look
wonderful. Really voluptuous. Vince always says you’re like a ripe peach, anyway.”

Claudia looked beyond Maggie out the window. Her eyes stung slightly with fatigue. She thought of her own disgusting habits,
pacing the house in the middle of the night with a glass of wine in one hand and eating, eating as fast as she could. A peanut
butter sandwich, an old and crusty piece of Brie, a leftover roll of chicken Kiev, cold, with the herbed butter congealed
at the center. She felt nasty now, reminded of it. She felt sullied.

“Well, Maggie, sensual pleasures are my best thing! Ripe peaches are just the ticket. Vince has the right idea.” She surprised
herself with her unquavering snappishness; it was so rare that she bothered to be cross at anyone she didn’t care about inordinately.
She surprised Maggie, too, who looked abashed and didn’t say anything for a moment. She fluttered her hand and shook her head
to suggest that Claudia had taken this all wrong.

“Listen, Claudia, I’ve really been awfully worried about you and about Jane. Avery’s worried, too, you know. He didn’t have
any idea that Jane was staying away from school. He thought she was only missing her music lessons. I talked to him, and he
said he was going to call you. You know how he feels about me, though. He’ll go to any lengths to avoid advice from me, and
I’m not sure he sees what a problem Jane’s having.” She smiled across at Claudia, acknowledging disarmingly that she
was
intruding, that she even sympathized with Avery’s reluctance to listen to her. But there was also a look of
conspiracy in her gently self-deprecatory expression, as though she and Claudia were in this together in opposition to Avery.
“I’m not going to betray Jane to him,” she went on, “but what does he think you ought to do about her? Is there anything he
can do to help?”

Maggie’s whole person indicated genuine concern, and Claudia could hardly stand it. She had not talked to Avery about Jane
at all. She looked around the restaurant at the stained glass windows in the bar and the old oak atmosphere there that changed
into a gardenlike setting upstairs where they were eating. Claudia wondered if someone had thought this out, had perhaps done
a market survey and concluded that exactly what was needed in Lunsbury, Missouri, was a restaurant that combined an English
pub and a gazebo. Avery hated this restaurant, but Claudia sat back and regarded it with interest. And people turned to look
at her, too. Even in her plain brown wool dress that was now a little snug through the bust and hips she was striking with
her huge, hooded eyes and the corners of her mouth drawn down tight. Maggie reached over again and touched Claudia’s arm to
elicit her response, to catch her attention.

“I understand what she’s doing,” Maggie said, “but I’m really worried about her. She doesn’t want to admit that Avery’s gone
for good this time. That he’s moved out. That’s perfectly natural. It really wouldn’t even mean a thing to her to explain
that he’s staying sober and working on his book. He’s her father. And I think it’s hard for a girl especially. If she faces
her friends at school, she’ll have to deal with it. But you know, she’ll have to deal with it eventually, and it isn’t ever
going to get easier. Sometimes I think that those children are so
sophisticated that they already take comfort in each other’s disasters.” Maggie was trying to keep her intention light; Claudia
saw that, but she was astounded that Maggie would sit there and say these things to her. She just stared at Maggie, and Maggie
tried again. “Well, it’s classic denial, I guess. But it’s gone on over a week. I’m worried about her.”

By this time the waiter had brought them their drinks, and Maggie stopped talking to consider the menu. Claudia was watching
her with excruciating attention. The flat winter light was filtered over their table through the fronds of a large palm, and
shadows shifted slightly over all the surfaces so that Claudia couldn’t fix Maggie’s face; she couldn’t decide if it was because
of the shadows or if Maggie’s expression really was so elusive. But she did see a tiny muscle twitch beneath Maggie’s eye
as Maggie turned a concern equal to that she professed for Jane upon the decision of what to have for lunch. And Claudia abhorred
every single thing about her all at once. Suddenly Maggie was enlarged in Claudia’s perception, and monstrous. Every small
line and crevice of Maggie’s freckled skin, the white blond hair on her forearms, the pale lashes and eyebrows—these things
disgusted Claudia, and when Maggie looked up, she was met with an expression of unquestionable loathing. It was so forceful
a look that Maggie instinctively leaned back in her chair, and after a moment her whole manner changed. The sweetness of her
sympathy and concern left her, and she was matter-of-fact.

“You know,” she said, “I didn’t know anything about how to be… kind. I didn’t really know about empathy or compassion until
Celeste was born. I was only ambitious. I don’t mean I thought it through like that.
I didn’t even have enough information about myself to think it through. But what I mean is… Well, don’t you think that the
only way to get out of absolute self-absorption is by having children? It’s such an incredible connection. God! I became completely
absorbed in Celeste! You
become
your child. Well, I mean, for a while there your two egos are the same! And then it gets harder. Then you have to separate
yourself from your children. You can’t define yourself by your children’s reaction to you. Don’t you think that’s true? I
mean, don’t you think that’s the hardest thing to learn?”

Maggie put this question so tentatively, and with a slightly embarrassed laugh, that it seemed entirely reflective. And Claudia
didn’t have an opinion because she wasn’t sure she grasped exactly what it was Maggie was getting at, but she was appeased
a bit by Maggie’s concession to their mutual humanity.

“Listen, Maggie, Jane’s just sad,” Claudia said. “She’s as sad as I am.” She hated to admit her own sorrow to Maggie, but
she had to throw up some barrier to protect Jane from Maggie’s ferocious scrutiny. “When Avery and I get this settled, she’ll
be fine. It’s not as though she’s missing anything academically. Jane can judge that for herself. My God, Maggie! You know
Jane! She’s not childish. She’s just sad and tired, and so am I.”

Maggie sat back and didn’t say anything while the waiter served them. She looked around the room and reached up to smooth
her short, spiky hair into place. She studied her chef’s salad thoughtfully when it was put in front of her, as though someone
had asked her opinion of it. “Oh, Claudia…” And she seemed tired, too. “Well… you’re thirty-two years old, and Jane’s
only eleven. She
is
brilliant.” And she gestured with her fork to hold Claudia at bay for a moment. “There’s no question about that, and there
are things she can do. I think that probably she has things she wants to do. But she’s so self-destructive right now. She’s
hostile to all her friends if they phone her, and those little girls aren’t completely without sympathy. If nothing else,
they like the sheer drama of the situation. And Diana is really devoted to Jane. Jane’s a powerful little girl in her own
circle. But she
is
childish, Claudia. She can’t decide what’s best for herself.” She looked down at her plate and carefully speared a bit of
everything—a little ham, some turkey, a shred of cheese, an olive—but then she stopped short as she brought the fork toward
her mouth. “Look, Claudia, I don’t want to betray Jane in any way at all. I’ll be absolutely honest, sometimes I’m furiously
jealous of her for Diana’s sake.” She looked at Claudia beseechingly, to see if this admission would mitigate the rest of
what she planned to say, but Claudia didn’t react one way or another. In Claudia’s opinion it was perfectly reasonable that
Maggie would want her own daughter to be more like Jane. Maggie lowered her eyes again to study her salad.

“It’s a sign of real trouble, though, you know. I think you ought to know about it, Claudia. I’m pretty sure Jane’s stolen
some things from our house. I’ve missed loose change from my dresser, and what worries me most is that twice, now, a prescription
has disappeared. The first time I didn’t worry about it. I just thought I’d lost it, but now I’m really upset. It’s a prescription
for Percodan. It’s a narcotic. I don’t really think that Jane would use it, but it’s missing. The second bottle. And
Jane was definitely around. I’ve talked to my three kids, Claudia”—and she glanced up apologetically across the table—“and
I really do think that it must have been Jane who took them.”

Claudia had never understood how to parry back and forth, how to cajole or purposely be charming in order to defend herself,
but she did think that she was being attacked, and in this case Jane was being attacked, too. Claudia just looked at Maggie,
and she was absolutely at a loss, because she was filled with fury, but all she was able to do with it was to assess the immediate
moment and tell the truth. It often rendered her childlike, so much younger than her own daughter. “Oh, Christ, Maggie!” And
she didn’t pretend that she wasn’t angry. “She did not either!”

Maggie had said what she had come here to say; she had got it over with and was relatively unperturbed. She was eating her
salad. “You might keep an eye on her, though. You might want to look around and see if my prescription turns up. It’s a small
bottle. It really does worry me.”

And then Claudia frightened herself as much as she ever had because overhead there was a faint quiver in the air and a sudden
downshifting draft, and a twenty-inch pot of English ivy crashed directly onto their table, shattering the clay pot and the
two salads, and spraying both of them with shards of terra-cotta, lettuce, ham, blue cheese dressing, coiled roots and vines,
and potting soil. Maggie leaped out of her chair, tumbling it backward and she was shaking and enraged while Claudia was still
just sitting there amazed.