Triangles (35 page)

685/881

It will take some thought. A few

days at the ocean sounds amazing.

But Monterey is where we honeymooned.

A HONEYMOON

Used to be all about discovery.

Sampling the artichoke, peel by peel, on the way to the heart, and once past the thistle, oh what delightful plunder.

Now, however, a honeymoon

isn’t

so much a pleasant education

as it is an extravagant vacation.

Who these days gets married

without taking a test drive?

An electric connection is not

a promise

of compatible preferences,

nor equal appetites. Dipping

a body part into unevaluated

fluid to analyze temperature

seems like a wise approach.

It’s a

long way from wedding night

till death-do-us-part, and if

the grass appears ever so much

greener, right over there, forever

becomes a matter of

let’s wait

and see.

Andrea

WAIT AND SEE

That’s Marissa’s plan for her marriage, such as it is. I’ve given her my view, more than once. But it’s her decision, so I’ll back off, though it’s unpleasant to watch her husband’s phony

cheerfulness and over-the-top attention.

I have no clue how she can stand it, or how she could have agreed to go

to Monterey with him this weekend.

Make or break,
was Mom’s opinion.

Personally, I think it will all fall down,
but Marissa wants to try, so okay.

Monterey is supposed to be her big

birthday celebration, but all things considered, we thought she deserved a small party at home, with the kids and our parents. Chris invited the new caregiver too, so Shelby, Shane, and Mom 688/881

could get to know her in an informal setting. I figured he’d hire some cool drink of water in a tall, shapely glass, but Pamela is more like hot cocoa in a mug.

Warm, and sweet enough, but plenty of nutritional value. She knows her stuff and handles Shelby with respect for her feelings as well as her needs. I like her. Wish someone would have thought to hire her on sooner, instead of allowing Missy to lose herself inside her focus on her child.

Then again, my sister is obsessive about her duty. Last night, she had to force herself to let Pamela take over Shelby’s CPT, thread her into a lovely party dress, and put her in the stander. When Shelby coughed, Chris would have to stop Miss from interfering with Pamela moving to help. It will be a learning process, as will Chris’s ability to become anything resembling a “normal” husband, if that’s really what he has in mind. Hard to 689/881

believe is all, and none of his obvious butt kissing appears organic to me.

But it
is
Missy’s life. And even if all this only comes down to more help for Shelby and her, I’ll keep my lips zipped. For now.

IN THAT DEPARTMENT

My mother and I have come to uneasy agreement. It’s more important for

Mom, who will be living in Missy’s

house for a little while, even beyond the coming Monterey trip.
After much
internal debate, I told your father
that I’m tired of the nomadic life.

I want to find a little place here,
close to my girls and their children.

I’m even finished with Burning Man.

When faced with the ultimatum

of agreeing or moving on without her, he decided it might be okay to reroot in northern Nevada. Burning Man,

however, was not on the table for him.

He plans to spend Labor Day Weekend on the playa, Mom or no Mom.
It’s
tradition, man. Three days on my own
won’t kill me, not that I’ll exactly be
691/881

alone out there. If I have to settle into
suburbia again, I think I deserve
a little wanton partying first.

Once, that might have boiled into

a down-and-out. Mom has definitely

mellowed.
This way I’ll be here
for your birthday too,
she told me.

Burning Man often conflicts.

Not that it really bothers me.

I hardly ever do anything special

for my birthday anyway, except

maybe take Harley to the fair. This year, she plans to go with Steve.

Or, more likely, with Chad. Despite the hurt of him putting the moves on Bri, Harley’s still all moony over the creep.

I can tell every time she comes back from Steve’s, though she doesn’t talk about it much to me. At least the thing with Mikayla opened up the channel

692/881

to discuss pregnancy prevention.

I WASN’T GENTLE

She already got all the basics in sex ed at school. It’s those gritty, little details—

like a guy promising you won’t get

pregnant because (choose one or more): One: you told him you’re a virgin,

and it’s physiologically impossible for it to happen the very first time.

Two: he’s Catholic, and after much

practice he has become an expert

at the withdrawal method.

Three: he must be sterile because

he’s never, ever, as far as he knows, gotten anyone pregnant before.

Beyond the humorous rhetoric, I told her how the body responds to stimuli.

Digital. Oral. Even something as simple as a kiss, once heat curdles it from sweet into lustful. And because the moment was right, and I felt like I should, I gave her the lowdown on Steve and me—

why we got married in the first place.

694/881

Her:
You mean, you never loved Dad?

Me: “I thought I did, at the time.” Her:
Why did you divorce him, then?

Me: “Because I loved you more.”

TRUTH IS A SHARP SPEAR

I hope, on the heels of the news

about Mikayla, it will pierce all

sense of “It can’t happen to me.”

Especially since she’s camping

with her dad, Cassie, and Chad

for a couple of days. School starts soon. It’s an end-of-summer thing.

Which means I have the evening

to myself. I pop a Lean Cuisine

into the microwave, pour a glass

of wine, and take it into the living room to find some crass reality TV

program. As I pick up the remote,

the doorbell rings. Weird. No one

ever comes over. But maybe it’s Mom.

Nope. The peephole outlines a shaken Jace. I swing the door wide. “Jace?

Are you okay?” Everything about him confirms his
No. Not really. May
I come in?
His face is pale, but his cheeks are flushed windburn red.

696/881

“Uh, sure.” I stand back to let him by.

Notice his odor—sweat, the obnoxious kind that comes from anger or worry.

This must be about Mikayla. I trail Jace to the living room. “Do you want a drink? I just poured myself some wine.” He glances at the glass on the coffee table.
Sure. Why not?
He sits on the sofa, waits in silence until I return from the kitchen, matching wineglass in one hand, bottle of merlot in the other. Pretty sure we’re looking at a second round.

I pour his glass full, watch without comment as he fortifies himself with a couple of swallows before finally asking,
What do you know about Bryan?

Most unexpected. Jace studies my face, trying to interpret whatever expression the pointed question might encourage.

“Bryan? You mean the one from Holly’s writers’ group? Not much. He’s a teacher …”
No! I mean what do you know about
697/881

him and Holly? What has she told you?

Please, Andrea, tell me the truth.

I pull my chair a little closer, look him straight in the eye. “Jace, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I don’t think I’ve ever so closely noticed the color of his eyes before—the dark of coffee, speckled gold. A sudden swell of anger deepens the brown; the flecks disappear.
All those nights she said
she was with you. Did she lie to me?

My first reaction is total denial.

But then I remember a time or two

when she asked me to cover for her.

I can’t do that now. “I’m not sure.

Look, Jace. Where is this coming

from?” He reaches for a small journal, sitting beside him on the couch.

I was looking for her address book
and found this.
He hands me the leather-bound notebook.
She says it’s fiction,
and some of it looks like it could be.

698/881

But a few entries mention him by name.

I start flipping through as he finishes his first glass of wine, pours another.

I take the first sip of mine now.

There’s poetry in there too. Stuff
he wrote for her. Read it. All of it.

I … I just can’t believe she would …

THE REST

Falls into his glass, muffling the sharp voice of his pain. He drinks while I read. Partway through, I start to drink in earnest too. I see more than Bryan here, but her obvious love for him far outweighs her licentiousness.

I’ve waited all day, just to hear him say hello the voices of my family white noise behind escalating need. Bryan, where are you?

The sexy stuff isn’t all fiction, in my opinion.

I don’t need to tell Jace that. He knows it.

When Holly mentions girls’-nights-out excuses, a hot wave prickles my skin. How dare she?

And why write it down, or save his poems?

We shed our clothes like snakeskin, inch by shuddering inch, take pleasure in the slow abandon of denim, satin, and tenuous morality.

Two wine bottles sit, empty, on the table.

But they are no more empty than the wet night of Jace’s eyes. I move beside him, slip my hand over his, to calm the tremors. “God, I’m so sorry.” His head tilts into my shoulder and a tiny drum roll begins in my chest. The rot scent of merlot 700/881

cloaks his sweat, the blend masculine, primitive.

We don’t speak. Something very wrong and very right is at work here. Some convergence we can’t fight. So we don’t. And suddenly, we’re kissing.

CONVERGENCE

Eyes fall

into eyes—

green,

you think, but no.

More the still amber

flight of

summer,

untethered.

She too considers

hue, the salt

marble of your irises—

blue,

but not

quite, like the silver

sky,

one blink

before dawning light.

And in that solitary

measure, universes

collide.

Holly

COLLISION COURSE

Subconsciously, I understood

that’s where my life was headed.

But somehow, I convinced myself

things would work out just fine.

I didn’t know how, or in which

direction the dominoes would start

to fall, but I didn’t think they’d

all go at once. Stupid, stupid me.

Okay, maybe the truth is I never

looked at those black and white

tiles I was stacking. Did not for

more than a finger-snap moment

consider what a growing diet

of raw hedonism might come

to mean for my husband

and kids. Boring isn’t so bad.

Is a little fun worth shredding

a sure thing? Do I have any choice

now or has the decision been

wrested completely from me?

The biggest question remains.

Even if I could find a way

to make Jace forgive me,

703/881

is that really what I want?

FOR EVERY ACTION

There truly is some reaction,

though just how opposite

or equal depends on the original

move, or on a whim of God.

Kick cornice ice, you might send