Trudy, Tammy, Mercy, and Fenton are sitting at the table, eating Hamburger Helper. Speckles finishes licking her bowl in the corner of the kitchen and comes over to lay down under Mercy’s chair. Mercy puts her bare feet on the dog’s back, her toes digging into the soft, warm fur.
Trudy turns to her sister. “I think our mother is having sex in a truck in the driveway.”
“Disgusting,” says Tammy.
“Probably true, though.”
Fenton gets up and clears the plates, walks over to the sink, and runs some water. He froths up the soap with his hands and whistles a little tune.
Tammy shakes her head. “I can’t believe it. I sort of felt like he didn’t really exist.”
“I know.” Trudy is pretty sure she doesn’t want to be there when Claire and Darren come inside. She’s just not up to it. She doesn’t want to see their faces, all flushed and happy. And she doesn’t want to hear any explanations. Not yet. It always seems to her that the things that most need explaining (like why you left your children, for example) can’t really be explained. She hates explanations. They are never good enough.
She still has her mother’s car keys in her pocket. Maybe she will just go for a little drive before work.
Maybe she’ll drive by Jules’s place and see if he is back yet.
But just as she is about to make her move, there they are in the doorway: love’s not-so-young dream. Larger than life, standing arm-in-arm, radiating some kind of magic. Making the brown linoleum seem like the gleaming dance floor at the fairy-fucking-princess ball.
Claire walks up behind Tammy’s chair and puts her arms around her daughter and nuzzles into her hair, her neck. “My baby is home.” Tammy shrugs, closing the gap between jaw and shoulder, squeezing her mother out. Claire is undeterred. She kisses the top of Tammy’s head and squeezes her hard.
Tammy turns her face to the side, tears streaming down her face.
Mercy drops to the floor and lays her head down on the dog’s soft back.
Trudy gets up from the table, keys in hand. She passes Darren on the way out, gives him a brisk pat on the shoulder as if to say, You better get in there, pal. This is your moment.
Darren walks over and squats down beside Mercy and Speckles. “Come on, you two. Let’s go for a little walk.”