I WENT TO THE KITCHEN, heading straight for the pot of coffee I knew Lupe always had going. It was that or a stiff swig of something eighty proof.
Lupe sat at the center counter polishing silver. My mother had at least four sets of silverware, which she actually took pride in polishing herself. Though her bed schedule of late had left the silver flatware to its own devices.
The timer rang on the oven and Lupe set the rag and silver down, pulled off the rubber gloves, before she went and pulled out a baking sheet of cookies. While I’m not a silver freak like the rest of my clan, I had grown up around it my whole life and could polish the stuff in my sleep. Right then it sounded like the perfect thing to do. Like meditation. Giving me time to clear my brain and figure out how to proceed.
The truth was that all the money in Willow Creek couldn’t make a person truly acceptable in society. It had to be accompanied by grace, wit, style, and a sense of noblesse oblige. While I could count noblesse oblige among the girls, given the money their families would be contributing to the symphony, I was hard-pressed in the remaining three categories.
My cell phone rang and I saw that it was my office. “Yes?” I said.
“Carlisle, it’s Pam.”
Actually, it sounded like “Car… it… mmmm” given the bad connection.
“Pam, I can’t hear you.”
She added something about big news.
“Let me call you back on the land line,” I told my assistant.
I flipped my cell shut and went over to the phone on the kitchen wall. I dialed my office number.
“Miss Cushing’s office.”
“Pam, it’s me.”
“What is Wainwright House?”
“What?”
“On the caller ID, it says ‘Wainwright House.’”
“Oh, it’s… ah, where I’m staying. What were you saying before?”
“You won’t believe it! Mel Townsend, the richest guy in Boston, he called and wants to talk to you about handling his divorce! I swear, Carlisle, we are going places! I mean, you are going places. You have to come back.”
I admit, my heart did a little jig, or maybe a big jig. But what was I going to do? “Pam, I can’t come back now. I’m in the middle of my mother’s divorce.”
“But this is Mel Townsend we are talking about! How can you say no?”
“Give me his number and I’ll call him.”
After taking his contact information, I hung up. Talk about feeling conflicted. Mel Townsend really could solidify my career, but how could I walk away from what I had promised to do here?
With Lupe bustling around the kitchen, I picked up the gloves and soft rag, and got to work, needing time to think more than ever. Piece by piece, my hands fell into a rhythm until my brain finally stopped spinning. I was halfway through a set of antique silver handed down from generation to generation when the phone rang.
Lupe answered, but I barely noticed. I was only vaguely aware that she was her less-than-pleasant self to whoever had been unlucky enough to disturb her work.
“She no available, I tell you,” she said with an impatient sigh. “You bother me. I tell you. She working. Polish sealver. Who these?” She listened. “Feel up?”
This got my attention. Feel up? I started to smile before my eyes went wide and I lunged for the phone, silver clattering to the floor.
“Phillip!”
Lupe huffed and I pressed the receiver to my chest. “I’ve got it!”
She muttered something I didn’t understand.
“And let’s keep this call between ourselves, okay, Lupe?”
“Bah,” she muttered and marched away.
I waited until she was out of earshot before I took a deep breath. “Phillip,” I said again, this time into the receiver.
“What is going on there?” he asked.
“Nothing, nothing. Just polishing silver. Lupe didn’t want the job interrupted.”
“Is Lupe your mother’s boss?”
“Ah—”
“Have you gone home only to be put to work at menial tasks?”
“Ah—”
“I thought you were working on a divorce case.”
Short on answers, I went with diversion \di-ver-sion\ n (17c) 1: “How did you get this number?”
“Pam. She just told me about the Townsend deal.”
“She shouldn’t have done that.”
“What, give me the number? Or tell me that you are thinking about passing up a jewel of a case?”
Both?
“Phillip, I haven’t passed on anything. But I have to finish here first.”
He sighed. “Listen, I’m getting ready to start a big case, and before I do I thought I could come down this weekend. We can talk, figure this out.”
“No!”
I could almost feel Phillip’s stiffening shoulders.
“I mean, this weekend isn’t good. Things are crazy here.” I launched into a detailed summary of the divorce case to distract him.
“The judge dated your mother?” he asked.
“Exactly! So I’m swamped. But I promise, as soon as things are a little more settled I want you to come down.”
The doorbell rang in the distance.
“But if I came down now we could talk strategy,” he persisted.
“Phillip, that’s great of you but right now I need to get my thoughts together.”
“Well…”
I heard Lupe answer the door, then voices approaching. When the door pushed open, Jack appeared.
The minute he entered he saw me, stopping to look at me, his brow furrowed.
“I miss you, Carlisle.”
“What?” I focused on the phone with effort.
“I said, I miss you, Carlisle.”
With Jack studying me, I might have blushed. Even Lupe stopped and watched me too.
What could I say in front of an audience? “I appreciate that, Phillip.”
Yet again I hadn’t provided the answer that would win any prizes. And what did that mean? That I didn’t want the prize?
I shook the thought away, pulling up the reassuring image of Phillip and his kind green eyes, his sandy blond hair, the way he could make me breathe easily regardless of how stressful my day had been in court. The day he proposed, he took me out on a Swan Boat in the Public Gardens. The grass had been so green, the willow trees lining the water’s edge, the centuries-old buildings surrounding the public space standing like sentinels at the perimeter of the park. When he asked me to marry him, he turned me to face him on the narrow plank seat and told me how proud he would be if I would agree to be his wife. I had said yes so fast that I knew right then and there it was meant to be. I loved him. With this man, I could be filled with love and not feel as if I were drowning.
“I’ve got to go,” I said over the phone. “Someone’s here about the case. I’ll call you later.”
Hanging up, I pretended I didn’t hear Phillip saying something as I put the phone in the cradle.
“You up to somting,” Lupe noted.
“You are an astute woman, Lupe,” Jack added. “Who’s Phillip?”
“Hello. None of your business.”
Lupe raised a brow. Jack just laughed.
There was silver polish all over the receiver, and rather than have to look at Jack and potentially do the weak-kneed thing, I peeled off the rubber gloves and got a paper towel.
Janice pushed through the door. She stopped when she saw all three of us standing there. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“Mees Carlisle talking to feel up.”
“Feel up?”
“Lupe, I asked you to keep that to yourself.”
She just shrugged.
I turned to my sister-in-law. “Let’s not mention this, okay?”
“Sure.” She headed for the refrigerator.
The door pushed open again. “What’s going on?” Savannah asked, clipping into the room on dainty kitten heels. Though at the sight of Jack she cocked her head in surprise, then made another of her “enemy’s lawyer” cracks, adding “engaged” and “unavailable” this time.
Janice stopped and looked back. “Carlisle is doing something with a feel up on the phone, whatever that means.”
“Janice!” I said.
“Sorry,” Janice explained, “it just came out. Besides, you know how hard it is to keep anything from Savannah. She’s like Chinese water torture and the Spanish Inquisition rolled into one. Might as well give in right away and get it over with.”
“True. But you, Janice? Giving in to her? I always thought you were stronger than that.”
Frankly, she looked disappointed in herself.
I had the sudden thought that Janice’s entire existence was being challenged. Moving back to her hometown, her husband constantly working, her daughter wanting to be a debutante, and Janice herself working hard to make the event, well, successful if not overly debutant-ish. She had to be questioning whether all the strides she had made after leaving Willow Creek had been real.
Savannah’s smile was wicked. “So, getting a little feel up, I take it?” she asked.
“Lord have mercy,” my mother demanded, pushing into the kitchen, “what kind of talk do I hear going on in my very own home?” Then she saw Jack. “What is this? Fraternizing with the enemy?”
Savannah smiled her most wicked smile. “She likes doing that lately.”
Mother glared.
“Mrs. Ogden.” Jack greeted her with a smile that rivaled Savannah’s.
“Carlisle appears to be engaging in phone sex,” Savannah went on.
My mother, Savannah, Janice, and Lupe studied me, then glanced at Jack, looking him up and down.
He raised his hands. “Don’t look at me. I have nothing to do with this.”
“Stop! All of you. Jack, why are you here?” I asked, my jaw tight and starting to ache.
“I just got word that Judge Howard has removed himself from the case.”
My mother sighed. “He really was such a nice man.”
“He’s being replaced by Judge Theodore Weston.”
“Oh, my, Theo is lovely. I dated him too, you know.”
We all looked at my mother.
“Who haven’t you dated?”
She just laughed and flitted away. Lupe, Janice, and my sister followed suit. Jack didn’t budge.
“So, tell me, who’s this Phillip guy?”
Like I was going to tell him. I might have snorted. I didn’t believe for a second that Jack would keep any information I told him a secret. He’d probably use it against me in court. And for the record, my not telling him I was engaged was completely different from his not telling me because mine was actually a secret. Could anyone expect me to tell Jack I was engaged before I had told my own mother?
“None of your business,” I said.
“Come on, Cushing,” he teased. “We’re friends, remember? You can tell me.”
Another thing I didn’t believe, despite what I had said before, was that we could ever be friends. We had already tried it.
In college, as has been established, my roommate’s boyfriend spent an inordinate amount of time at our house, as did his friends. It was the same every time I walked into the kitchen. A shift in the room when Jack looked at me. The completely crazy awareness.
Beyond that, there was something else between us that had always been there. I had kept people, especially guys, locked out. I was not and would never be my mother—I think I’ve been more than clear on that point. But that first day in high school, then again that day he saved me from Roger Dubac, he had gotten in, even if it was only for a second. No matter how hard I tried to close him out, somehow I couldn’t, at least not entirely.
Things changed the day I was alone in the little house just off campus, making a grilled cheese sandwich. Jack showed up at my front door, his motorcycle parked out front. “I left my economics book here yesterday.”
That was the thing about him. Massive bad boy who was massively smart. Though most people couldn’t see beyond the wildness to what lay beneath it.
He grimaced. “Damn, is something burning?”
No one had ever accused me of being Wolfgang Puck.
I yelped, then wheeled away, but Jack beat me to the kitchen. The cheese from my sandwich had dripped onto the heating element of the toaster oven, a flame starting to spark. Before I could say “Oh, dear,” he yanked out the plug, picked up the appliance, and dumped the sandwich into the sink with a sizzle.
Side by side, we stared at my ruined lunch. Then he turned and leaned his hip against the counter. “You want to go to a movie?”
“So much for the expected trajectory of conversation. Are you asking me out?”
“I suppose I am.”
A thrill raced through me, which I promptly squelched. “Sorry, no can do. I don’t date.”
He raked his hand back through his hair. “What does that mean?”
“What’s so confusing?”
“I mean, who doesn’t date?”
His tone suggested freaks, losers, morons, et al.
“Not everyone is hormone crazy.”
I didn’t add that I didn’t have time. Couldn’t afford to get sucked in. Refused to be like all the other girls. The list was long.
I studied him for a second, then couldn’t help myself when I blurted, “I suppose I could do friends.”
He chuckled grimly and those dark eyes ran the length of me. My mind started screaming Danger, Will Robinson!, but all I could do was smile back.
“Friends, you say?” he said.
“Heck, why not.”
“Living on the wild side?”
Based on the hitch in his smile, I was pretty sure his idea of the wild side differed vastly from mine.
Over the next few days we went to the movies, bookstores, the library, all as Friends. Jack seemed fine with the arrangement, if you discounted how every once in a while he would distractedly curl a strand of my hair around his finger or simply stop doing something to study me.
“What?” I’d say.
But he’d just smile, then turn back to his reading.
At least that’s how it went until late one night when he walked down the hall to my bedroom and woke me.
“Hey, Jack,” I said, my voice rough with sleep. “Is something wrong?”
He sat down on the edge of the mattress. “I don’t want to be your friend, Carlisle.”
What was I supposed to say? My brain doesn’t work all that well in the middle of REM cycles, and it really didn’t work well with Jack sitting on my bed with me wanting to forget everything I had witnessed my mother experience with men.
My eyes started adjusting to the dark room and I pushed myself up on the pillows.
I blinked. “Oh, my gosh! You’re hurt!”
“It’s nothing.”
“Nothing!”
I scrambled out the other side of the bed, forgetting that I only wore a T-shirt to sleep in, and turned on the lamp.
“Oh, my gosh!”
“You already said that.”
“What happened to you?”
His left eye was red and swollen, and I knew given the rate at which blood coagulated, it would be black and blue by morning. His knuckles looked like ground beef.
He fell back against the mattress and I raced to my bathroom and collected the closest thing I had to medical supplies. I doused a washcloth with water and grabbed a bottle of alcohol. When I got to work, I cleaned him up, then put the alcohol on his knuckles.
He barely flinched, but he closed his eyes. “My brother asked me to go to law school.”
I couldn’t imagine Jack anywhere near a law school, unless it happened to be next door to a county jail.
“And?”
“And fuck, I owe him.”
It was the first time I wondered what it would be like to live in the shadow of someone as legendary as Hunter Blair. Nobody had to tell me how a family member’s life could affect you.
“So you were mad you owed him so you got in a fight with him to… what?”
He looked at me as if I were crazy. “I didn’t fight my brother.” He eased back. “I went out afterwards, and some guy started mouthing off…” He shrugged, then grimaced in pain. “Shit happens.”
He didn’t say anything else, just lay there until I thought he was asleep. Not sure what to do, and somehow not able to kick him out, I pulled my comforter over him. When I backed away, he caught my hand and pulled me close.
Oh, dear.
He tugged me down to him. As much as I would like to say that I pulled away, I have always had an out-and-out aversion to lying. He felt hot and cold, and quite frankly, I felt pretty much the same. I told myself we were both coming down with the flu. Probably an epidemic. Good news, I wasn’t so delirious that I believed it.
“Jack, this isn’t a good idea.”
“It’s the best idea I’ve had all night.”
“Maybe it doesn’t make sense to you, but I have dreams. Goals. But somehow girls get distracted when they fall for a guy.” This, however, I believed with all my pounding heart.
Not that this fazed Jack. He ran his fingertips down my arm, and my body started doing crazy things.
“This can’t happen,” I managed.
“Why?”
I tilted my head back and looked at him. “Ah, because, I’ve never been kissed before.”
That surprised him. “You’re kidding. You’re in college.”
“I’ve been busy.” I sort of smiled. “You know. Those goals.”
He hung his head, then chuckled grimly. But when he started to roll away, my fingers curled into his shirtfront.
“Fuck,” he whispered, then kissed me.
Given that I had never been kissed before, this wasn’t as easy as it sounds.
“Open your mouth, Carlisle,” he instructed softly.
And we know I am nothing if not good at taking instruction, at least of the educational sort.
When his tongue touched mine, my body went crazy. The kiss was slow and deep, hot. I reciprocated, and felt certain, based on his slow deep moan, that I was earning an A, and not just for effort.
His hands explored while I did some investigating of my own. I felt on fire as he pushed up my T-shirt. Yep, I went from never been kissed to getting felt up in one easy step. Clearly I had more of my mother in me than I had bargained for.
He rolled over, his thigh crossing over mine, and when the phone started to ring I barely heard it. He came over me, his shirt long gone, his mouth moving over my skin. But just when I ran my hands up his back, amazed at the feel of hard muscle, my mother’s voice came through the answering machine that was beside my bed.
“Where are you, Carlisle?” my mother cried. “Bernard is seeing another woman. You have to help me prove it!” She sniffed back her tears. “We’ll take Ernesto’s truck over to his house to see who he’s with.”
I pushed up with a jerk, leaped for the machine, and hit the hang-up button. My mother had always taken great pains to make sure that no one in Willow Creek knew of her completely unacceptable nighttime driving and spying habits. Jack and I stared at each other and I could see he was trying to figure out who had called.
“You better go,” I told him, pulling my shirt down.
“Carlisle—”
“Really.”
I could tell he wanted to ask questions, but really, what was there to say about my mother and her never-ending dramas revolving around men?
Before he could say anything else I pushed him out of the room. “Go, Jack. Just go.”
I slammed the door behind him, then fell back at the thought of my mother. But what was I going to do? She was my mother.
In the kitchen I found my keys and I went to Wainwright House. In the dark, we drove to Bernard’s apartment building, parked out front, and waited. The only thing that had changed over the years was that I no longer had to sit on a phone book when the time came to drive my mother home.