CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Jill
Friday
Jill was in her element. Six couples, all sipping wine and nibbling appetizers, encircled her. This would be a good crowd. They were chatty and pleasant. She just hoped old 202 didn’t poke a hole in the evening.
“We’ll start with a game called Two Truths and a Lie.” They listened with eager faces, and Jill plumped with satisfaction. “Each of you will introduce yourself and where you’re from, and then state three things about yourself: two things that are true and one that’s a lie. We’ll go around the circle and everyone, except your spouse or companion, will guess which of the three was your lie. When someone guesses correctly, they earn a point. Whoever has the most points after everyone has had a turn wins a bottle of wine.”
She pointed to a bottle of Cabernet wrapped in cellophane and tied with raffia. Everyone seemed on board, and they were all still smiling.
“I’ll go first, just as an example, but it won’t count.” She stood and faced the group. “My name is Jill McCloud and I’m from Scotch Derry, born and raised.” She held up her index finger. “Number one, at age ten I won a blue ribbon at the state fair for the longest pigtails.” Her middle finger joined the index. “Number two, I collect salt and pepper shakers.” She gestured a number three. “And finally, I have a tattoo of a nimbus on my left hip.”
“The tattoo is the lie,” a male voice called from the doorway.
Jill looked up to find Keith and Jocelyn striding across the room.
“Are we too late to join in?” Jocelyn asked. “This is my favorite of your games.”
Pink slapped to Jill’s cheeks. Where had they come from? Why were they together? And what were they doing here? Especially now, of all moments, when she stood in front of a group talking about pigtails and tattoos. She pushed at her dangling beaded bracelets until they clamped snugly around her freckled forearm.
“Everyone. This is my sister, Jocelyn, and her . . . friend Keith.”
All eyes lifted to the newcomers. They did make an attractive pair.
“If no one objects, then I guess we can make room for two more.” Though she’d never say so, she herself objected, inwardly reliving a lifetime of memories where Jocelyn had found Jill’s loose thread and tugged. Jill was crushed to think, after all these years, that some kind of rivalry persisted.
“So are we going to play this one out?” asked a middle-aged man with a Fu Manchu mustache, muscled biceps, and a tight white T-shirt.
“Yes. As an example.” Jill could still feel the sting in her cheeks. “We’d now go around the room and everyone would state which they think is the lie, except, of course, for my sister.”
“I think it’s the tattoo,” Fu Man said.
As the rounds were made, ten out of the twelve guests guessed, correctly, that the tattoo was the lie. Jill was confounded. Normally the fact most people didn’t know—with any real certainty—what a nimbus was or looked like quite ironically rendered it more plausible. She couldn’t help but feel Keith’s comment had come across as insider knowledge, all the more embarrassing considering the two Parsons chairs which Jocelyn had dragged to the circle were so intimately positioned that the blue of Jocelyn’s denim melded into the faded black of Keith’s cargoes.
Fu Man, whose name was Victor and who was from Minneapolis, offered to go first. His truths were he kept a ten-foot python and was a volunteer firefighter; his lie that he was afraid of clowns. It wasn’t a bad lie, but Jill knew immediately—as did most of the guests—that this guy wouldn’t easily admit to many fears.
His companion did better. No one suspected that the full-figured bohemian with her long gray hair and ankle-length skirt was a member of Mensa.
202 was still an enigma to Jill. All three of his statements seemed like fabrications, and Jill had an odd feeling he didn’t enjoy the spotlight. Possibly, he was discomfited by the fact that one of his wife’s statements, that today was her birthday, was not the lie. Jill noticed him lift his eyes to the ceiling in self-reproach.
Last were Jocelyn and Keith. Jocelyn played the shock card with her three statements: one, she had implants; two, she could ask “Which way is the bar?” in five languages; and three, Hugh Grant asked for her phone number after she gave him a hot and heavy massage. The way her boobs jiggled when she reenacted the neck rub was a dead giveaway. Everyone knew they were real.
Keith started by stating he had helped build a school in Thailand. In this game, Jill reminded herself, altruism was rarely the lie. He also claimed to have climbed Mount Fuji. Jill recollected that he was not a driven athlete. He played high school football to please his father and could serve himself out of trouble on a tennis court, but had himself claimed it more recreation than sport. Mountain climbing. She just couldn’t picture it. Finally, he said he’d contracted malaria in Kenya and had lain on a cot in a small village clinic with dirt floors and flapping canvas walls for ten days. The school turned out to be the lie, which Jill couldn’t help but admit as clever. She also noticed his travels got a lot of oohs and aahs from the group, which ironically made him slouch and Jocelyn preen.
After the game, the guests drifted away, most of them to walk in the garden. Jill hurried to her room and grabbed a wrapped gift off her dresser. It was a birthday present for her friend Hen, whom she’d be seeing on Sunday. She bustled down to the patio where 202 was engaged in conversation with another guest while their wives walked through the roses. Jill tapped him lightly on the shoulder and he turned. She briefly displayed the small square box and then slipped it into his jacket pocket.
“A silver bracelet, simple but elegant. Should you not require it, you can return it to me tomorrow. Should it be of some use to you, we can settle up later.” Judging by his reaction, he’d be visiting her, checkbook in hand.
Upon returning to the parlor, she found Jocelyn and Keith still in their seats. Jill poured herself a glass of wine and sat opposite them.
“When did Victor and his sister check in?” Jocelyn asked.
“This afternoon. And why do you think she’s his sister?”
“It was obvious. I knew they weren’t a couple the moment I laid eyes on them.”
“How could you know that immediately?” Jill asked.
“It’s a gift. I don’t know why you always question it.” Jocelyn crossed her legs. “Let me guess, separate rooms.”
“Yes,” Jill said with reluctance. She herself hadn’t given much thought to their arrangements. Separate rooms were not unheard of for new couples.
“Anyway, the sister gives off some serious spoken-for vibes, while Victor’s on-the-market signal could blow you to Nebraska.”
“How do you know he’s not just looking for a little side action?” Keith asked.
“Nothing alike,” Jocelyn said with a slash of her hand. “When free and clear, a guy puts out something earthy and green. If cheating, it’s musky and brown.”
If eligible had a scent and a spoke on the color wheel, as did monogamy, as did infidelity—Jill wondered how her own brand of loneliness would register. Was she off the chart, as in negligible, undetectable? It wasn’t as if she had lived an entirely chaste and cloistered existence. There had been several brief affairs, and she and David Skovel had dated for five years. He wanted to marry her, help raise Fee, and have one or two of their own. Her reluctance had been annoying, even to herself. He had been sweet with Fee, having known her from age four to nine, and had repeatedly offered to make legal Skovels of both of them. Ruby had salivated at the very idea of a wedding in the family. Her own slapped-together affair and then two never-the-bride daughters were the great regrets of her life. Knowing she’d never marry him, Jill had finally broken it off. But that had been years ago; before yesterday, she hadn’t been kissed by a guy since . . . she didn’t even know.
“Like I said, Victor’s green is interesting, and it went from mossy to grassy. I think he fancied someone in the room,” Jocelyn said with a lift of her eyebrows.
Jill snapped to, realizing she’d missed a portion of what Jocelyn had said. “What?”
“Have I mentioned how pretty you look tonight?” Jocelyn asked.
“What? Me?” Jill asked. “Forget it. I don’t go for the biker type.”
“I don’t know about any of Jocelyn’s extrasensory stuff, but did you notice?” Keith moved forward in his chair, addressing Jill. “He was the winner. Victor was the winner.”
“So?” Jocelyn asked.
Keith continued to look directly at Jill. “And Peter, he got off to a pretty good start, but then he fizzled out.”
“I don’t get it,” Jocelyn said.
Keith sat back in his seat. “Just a little philosophy I have about names and destiny. You haven’t forgotten, have you, Jill?”
Of course she hadn’t forgotten. And, yes, she had noticed; Victor anyway. The Peter one got past her.
“How cute. You two still have your own language.” Jocelyn stood. “If you’re ready to go, Keith, I’ll drive you home.” She gazed out the large picture window to the gardens. “Oh, look, Jill, your winner’s coming up the path. And he’s all alone.”
Jill had enough. She stood and lifted two dirty wineglasses and a stack of cheese plates from the coffee table. “Time for me to call it a night, anyway. See you in the morning, Jocelyn.” The good night exchanged with Keith was far more awkward. Neither bringing up the fact that it could be good-bye for who knew how long, forever a real possibility.
Sucking in air so thin she felt light-headed, she hurried to the kitchen, where she found Ruby staring out the kitchen window toward the garage.
“Dear God in heaven,” Ruby said. “That’s William with Jocelyn.”
Jill set the dishes down and came to stand behind her mother.
“That’s not William, Mom.”
Ruby’s hand shook as she raised it to the side of her face. “He seems fine, doesn’t he?”
Jill looked out to where her mother was looking. “Mom, that’s Keith. You know Keith. Jocelyn’s driving him home.” Jill spoke calmly, feeling her own breathing grow steadier. “William was Keith’s father. There was a family resemblance, but William is dead. He died a couple years ago.”
“I know. I killed him.”
“No, Mom. He died in Florida. Of a heart attack.”
Ruby nodded her head up and down. “Like I said. I killed him.”