She was wearing a light green dress that they’d all seen before—perhaps at last year’s gala, perhaps the year before.
“I’m hoping to buy a ticket at the door,” she said as she boldly approached Caroline.
A chill crawled from Dana’s fingers to her toes.
“Kitty,” Caroline said, recovering in an instant because she was still Caroline Meacham, after all. “I can’t imagine why you’ve come, but it’s not appropriate.”
“Why not? I used to live in New Falls. I raised my children here, or perhaps you hadn’t heard. And I’m prepared to make a large donation. I’m about to come into two million dollars, in case you haven’t heard that, either.”
“Keety,” Bridget said, and Dana might have, too, if only she could speak, if only she could look at the woman and not see big-hearted Sam’s face. “You don’t want to cause more trouble, do you?”
But Keety raised an eyebrow. “I’ve only come to reclaim my rightful position in this godforsaken town.” Her eyes were distant, filmy, as they traveled the room. “But do tell: Has my successor come as well?”
Dana deduced that Kitty was drunk.
Caroline stayed composed. “Yolanda purchased tickets in advance,” she said, then cupped Kitty by the elbow. “Now I must insist that you leave.”
“But wait,” Kitty said, “I see her now. She looks rather shrunken standing next to that beautiful redhead—oh, look! That’s my daughter. It seems she’s stolen her, too.”
“Kitty, stop it,” Dana said, at last finding her voice. “Get out of here before you ruin the whole event. Which, in case you didn’t notice, has nothing to do with you.”
But before Kitty made another sound, her eyes suddenly grew wide and her unlifted jaw went slack. “My God,” she said, her voice thundering now, “is that little hussy with child?”
Like the audience at a runway show, coiffed heads rotated toward the subject at hand, who now stood in profile to them.
“Mon dieu,” Bridget said again, “it surely looks that way.”
Kitty laughed. Then she took off toward Yolanda before the wives could shout, “NO!”
They watched in horror as Kitty wagged her finger at Yolanda’s face. “I suppose you’re going to try to say that baby belongs to Vincent.”
Yolanda blinked, but did not answer. She turned her back.
“Mother, go home,” Elise said, placing a protective arm around Yolanda’s shoulder.
“Go home? Well, my darling daughter, I don’t have a home.”
Her voice continued to hover above street level. The orchestra slowed, the sole focus turned to the pregnant young woman in pink, the redhead in yellow, the disheveled woman wearing last year’s light green.
Caroline raced toward the musicians, telling everyone along the way to please have a good time, that everything was under control.
But it wasn’t.
Kitty laughed again.
“You might fool the others, you little slut, but just so everyone knows, my husband could no longer father children. After Elise was born, Vincent had a vasectomy. A vasectomy. Do you know what that big word means, little girl?”
Thankfully, Dana spotted Detective Johnson, even though he wore a tux. She was grateful that, this time, Steven did not step forward, knight in shining armor that he so often was.
She signaled the detective with a plea for help.
He approached, he smiled, he whisked Kitty away, her final refrain resonating through the hall:
“That baby is not Vincent’s! Vincent had a vasectomy! That baby belongs to some other worthless soul!”
The rest of the evening was a little edgy. Yolanda and Elise departed right after Kitty, which meant there were two empty chairs at their table after all, not counting the spaces where Lauren and Bob should have been. Caroline acted distracted; Jack was unusually quiet; Dana and Steven, Bridget and Randall remained out of duty. Shortly after they presented Caroline with generous checks, the Fultons and the Hayneses gladly left.
Randall suggested they stop somewhere for a nightcap, but Dana had a headache and said thanks anyway. She did, however, notice the way Bridget held Randall’s arm as they left Hudson Valley Centre. She didn’t think she’d ever seen Bridget do that.
“Maybe they had a nap together before coming tonight,” Steven said when Dana mentioned it in the car on the ride home. He was, of course, referring to the “nap” they’d had together, after Steven slept most of the day and woke up wanting sex again as if the first time hadn’t been enough.
They’d decided make-up sex was so much fun that they should fight more often.
In between, Dana managed to spend some time with Ben (actually, while doing his laundry and repacking his bags for Dartmouth), long enough to be reassured that Cozumel had not changed him into a boy that she no longer knew, not the way New Falls had changed his twin.
“It’s nice,” she said to Steven now, “that sometimes there can be happy endings, like with Bridget and Randall.” She didn’t mention that Sam and Ben had gone back to school while Dana and Steven napped, leaving a lame note that cited wanting to miss traffic.
Nor did she mention that she’d seen the sheets of Post-its stacked where she’d left them, as if Sam no longer cared who’d murdered his lover’s husband.
Talking about those things wouldn’t have made them go away, though it might have cushioned the surprise when they pulled into the driveway and saw Sam on the front steps.
“Hey,” Sam said, standing up awkwardly. It was the first time he’d spoken to his mother since she’d told him to put on his shirt. “How was the gala?”
“Boring,” Steven said. “Except that Kitty showed up. She caused quite a scene.”
Dana winced.
Sam cowered. “You look nice, Mom,” he said.
She glanced down at her silver Marchesa gown that looked less tired than she felt.
“Can we talk?” he asked.
“Sure,” Steven said, “but I thought you boys had already gone back to school.”
“Not yet, Dad. But I really just wanted to talk to Mom.”
“Oh,” Steven said. “Well, sure.”
He went inside the house because Steven was a good dad and a good husband and knew that mostly this was between Dana and Sam and he’d be called for advice if needed.
“Honey,” Dana said, “it’s a little chilly to stand outside.”
“It’s okay, Mom. I’m not a little kid.”
Apparently he thought she was concerned for him, not for herself, which was every kid’s mother-child relationship, wasn’t it?
“I couldn’t go back to school until I apologized. Until you know how sorry I am for what I did. And for the part about you finding out.”
“Which is it, Sam? The fact you slept with Kitty or the fact I found out?” Her tone was biting; she wished it wasn’t.
“Either. Both.”
She might have said it was okay, but she wouldn’t have really meant it, until she saw the big tears that had sprung up in his eyes. “I told Ben we had to turn around. I told him you and I had a fight. I’m sorry, Mom. I’m so sorry and ashamed.”
Sorry and ashamed. She sighed. She knew those were tough words for anyone to say. Anyone, let alone her sensitive, too-caring son.
Sorry.
Ashamed.
And then Dana remembered when she’d heard those words before. They were in a note, written by her father a long, long time ago. Written on a piece of paper that had been sent from a jail cell, accompanied by her mother’s obituary.
I’m so sorry.
And ashamed.
She sat down on the steps. “I’m sorry, too, Sam. I didn’t mean to judge you. Sometimes parents…well, sometimes we overreact when we think our kid’s welfare is at stake.” That was what her father had done, hadn’t he?
“But you were right, Mom. It was wrong, what I did with Kitty. It doesn’t matter if it was her fault or mine. It was wrong. I knew that all along.”
He sat next to her and she put her arm around him. And that’s when she decided it really didn’t matter if they ever learned who’d murdered Vincent. It really didn’t matter if Bridget ever knew that Dana knew Aimée wasn’t Randall’s daughter, or if the entire town knew Caroline liked women. It didn’t really matter if Lauren resurfaced after the supposed quarrel with Bob.
What mattered was taking the time to try and understand one another. Having patience, learning tolerance. What mattered was forgiving and being forgiven.
“Honey,” Dana said, stroking Sam’s hair, “how would you like to help me with a little project?”
He groaned. “I’m off the case, Mom. I’m thinking of changing to corporate law instead of criminal stuff.”
“What if it’s something we can do on your ‘indispensable Internet’? Something simple, like a missing person search?”
He sat up straight. “Missing person?” He might be like his father, but he had Dana’s knack for gathering details, for wanting to craft the world’s problems into a solvable puzzle.
“Yes,” she said. “We need to start in Indiana. It’s time we found your grandfather.”