IT’S LENNIE’S BIRTHDAY party. The children sit at the kitchen table, assiduously eating, under a sparkly banner that says MANY HAPPY RETURNS, while the mothers stand around and chat with glasses of pinot grigio. The room looks gorgeously festive, all color and shine and glitter, and I think, as I so often do, how fortunate Karen is to live in this beautiful house, with the space to be hospitable. I wonder if Sylvie minds that I don’t give a party for her, but when we talk about it, she never seems very concerned.
Sylvie looks happy today. She’s sitting next to Lennie, and they’re blowing bubbles into their grape juice through curly straws and giggling. It makes an alarming slurping sound, and I briefly wonder whether I ought to tell Sylvie to stop, whether Karen would expect that, but I love to see Sylvie playing about, just like a normal child.
Michaela comes to talk to me. She’s wearing a leopard-print cardigan, with half the buttons undone. You can see the deep crack between her breasts.
“Grace, I’d been meaning to tell you, we got the place at Little Acorns. We’re so thrilled.”
“That’s great,” I tell her. “I’m sure you’ll be happy with it.”
“Sylvie still loves it there?” she says.
“Yes, absolutely,” I say.
I can’t tell her that Sylvie’s been asked to leave, can’t face it: imagining her expression, shocked, concerned, perhaps a little distanced. Not wanting to talk to me quite so much.
“That garden room is gorgeous,” she says. “And Mrs. Pace-Barden seems to have such a lovely touch with the children.”
“Yes, doesn’t she just?”
I’m worried what else she will ask me, but Fiona is holding the floor, telling the story of how their cat ate their hamster. They thought that the cat had a sock in its mouth, then they heard this terrible sound of crunching, and all that was left was a sad little bit of brown fluff. The children weren’t too bothered, but Fiona needed counseling . . . Everyone listens raptly, and I’m glad of this distraction.
I glance at Sylvie and Lennie. They’ve moved their chairs together so they can drink from the same paper cup. As they suck on their straws, their heads are almost touching. Then Karen brings out homemade biscuits decorated with sweets, and Sylvie feeds Lennie some of the Smarties from her biscuit. I smile as I watch them playing. Sylvie has the solicitous air of a mother feeding her child.
When tea is over, Karen produces the cake. She’s made it herself, a Barbie castle with lots of extravagant sugar turrets and towers. She carries it into the living room, places it on the coffee table. The children and mothers follow. Sylvie comes to find me and slips her hand in mine.
“Are you having a good time, sweetheart?” I ask her.
“Yes, Grace. We blew big bubbles.”
Her breath has a scent of chocolate, and her lips are stained red from the grape juice. I kiss the top of her head.
We watch as Karen lights the candles. Then Leo turns out the lamps, so only the cake is illumined. We sing the birthday song for Lennie. I always love this moment—the tiny, shimmery flames, the sense of ceremony.
There’s a tense, expectant silence as Lennie draws breath to blow her candles out.
Sylvie tugs on my hand and pulls me down toward her. She cups her hand against my head to whisper in my ear, a loud stage whisper, every syllable weighted, bell clear in the stillness.
“They shouldn’t sing that, Grace,” she says.
“Shh,” I say. “Shh.”
“They shouldn’t, though. She isn’t Lennie, Grace.” A little impatient with me for not understanding this. “She’s not the real Lennie,” she says.
The silence is a hollowness around us; her words land in the hollowness like a handful of stones. Everyone is looking at us. Lennie frowns at her cake with a look of great concentration. I’m praying she’s preoccupied, that she didn’t really hear. My face is hot.
“Sylvie, just stop it,” I hiss in her ear.
She turns her face away from me. “You’re spitting, Grace,” she tells me.
Lennie blows, and we all applaud. The room fills up with noise again, and I let it wash over me, grateful. The children crowd together, and Sylvie slips away. Karen takes the cake to the kitchen to cut it into slices.
Leo refills our glasses. He has his genial party smile, and he’s wearing a flashing bow tie. He gives me an inquiring look, and I’m worried he’s going to make some comment about what Sylvie said.
“So, Grace. I’ve been meaning to speak to you. Did you find the name of that place that you were looking for the other day? That marvelous stretch of coastline?”
I’m relieved that this is all he wants to say.
“Yes, I think so,” I tell him. “I think it’s a village in Ireland.”
“And?”
“A fishing village. It’s just a place that Sylvie liked the look of,” I say.
The flashing bow tie is disconcerting.
“Oh, come on, Grace, there must be more to it than that.” He touches my bare arm teasingly. “Don’t leave me in the lurch like this. I’d had such high hopes of you, Gracie. Don’t disappoint me now.”
“But you know how children can be—when they get an idea into their heads . . .”
Leo frowns slightly. “So why the air of mystery? I mean, I was quite convinced that you and Karen were up to something. You both had a very conspiratorial look. But she wouldn’t tell me.” He studies my face for a moment. “And you’re not going to tell me either, are you?”
I smile at him. I don’t know what to say.
He brushes my arm again with one warm finger.
“I’ll have to keep working on Karen,” he says. “Maybe try the thumbscrews.”
He moves on, fills Fiona’s glass.
Michaela is talking about her house renovations. She’s making the blinds for her dining room from Hungarian linen cart covers, and her builder is an ex-marine and has the most beautiful abs. “Really. Kind of architectural. To die for . . .”
I’m only half listening to her. I feel a vague unease. I glance around the room, and see that Lennie is calling for her mother. Her face flares red, her eyes are bright with tears. Sylvie is beside her, looking quiet and demure. Maybe too quiet. I edge toward them through the crowd of children.
“Mum!”
Lennie is shouting, insistent. But Karen is in the kitchen slicing up the cake.
Lennie’s voice sharpens.
“Mum! She said that thing again. She said it again. Mum!”
I rush toward them, but it all happens so quickly. Sylvie says something to Lennie, but I can’t make out the words. Lennie spins around and punches her hard in the chest. For a moment Sylvie doesn’t react, doesn’t cry, nothing. I wait for a scream that doesn’t come. Then she bends down, sinks her teeth in Lennie’s arm.
I reach Sylvie, pull her away. Lennie looks in outrage at the exact red mark on her skin. There’s an instant of silence as Lennie draws breath, and then she starts to cry—at once appalled and furious. Karen comes in and goes to her.
I hear Karen trying to comfort her. Her voice is rather loud.
“She shouldn’t have said that. Sylvie’s like that, darling, you know that. She does say horrid things. No, of course she shouldn’t have said it . . .”
I pull Sylvie out into the hall. I press her face between my hands, forcing her to look at me. Her skin is so cold against mine.
“Sylvie, you must never, ever bite people. Only babies bite . . .”
Her face is still and closed. My words feel vacuous, meaningless, as though they just slide off her. I’m doing this for me, really, because the other mothers expect it—bringing her out here, telling her off. I know it won’t change anything. I know I can’t reach her.
“She hit me, so I bit her,” she says. Very calm, a simple statement of fact.
“She hit you because you upset her,” I say. “If you hadn’t done that, then none of this would have happened.”
Sylvie doesn’t say anything. She squeezes her eyes tight shut so she can’t see my face.
“Why did you do it? Why do you say all these things? Why did you upset her like that? And it’s her birthday, Sylvie.”
“She shouldn’t have hit me,” she says.
I take her back into the living room.
“I’m so sorry,” I mouth at Karen. But she isn’t really looking in my direction, and perhaps she doesn’t notice. She has her arm around Lennie, who is still yelling vigorously while looking with a kind of pride at her very visible wound. You can see the tooth marks. I know Karen must be angry—with me, with Sylvie. Anybody would be.
Fiona comes to speak to me, her face composed in a look of careful empathy.
“Poor you,” she says. “It’s awful when they do that.” She shakes her head a little. Her earrings have a hard, metallic shine. “You feel so awful, don’t you? It’s so hard to know how to handle it.”
I nod, take a mouthful of wine. I tell myself she’s just being pleasant, but somehow I feel accused.
“My Alex was a biter,” she says. “When he was smaller, of course—you know, quite a lot younger than Sylvie is now. He once got into this total scrap with a load of other boys—it was like a rugger scrum, really, and he just piled into the melee and chose a nearby hand and bit it. I’ll always remember the look on his face when he realized it was his own . . . He was only two then, of course.”
“She’s never done it before,” I say.
Fiona has a skeptical look. I can tell she doesn’t believe me.
“I know it probably sounds a bit old-fashioned,” she says, “but I always think there’s nothing like a really good sharp smack. There are times when nothing else gets through. It can be the only language that they really understand . . .”
I murmur something, move away, go to the kitchen to top up my glass.
I stand for a moment by the window, looking out into the garden. It’s almost completely dark now, except in the sky toward the west, where there are still a few tatters of apricot light. The glass reflects the party room, the balloons and brightness and laughing people, but the shapes seem frail, ephemeral, against the gathering dark—as though only the dark has substance.
Karen comes over. I’m so happy to see her, wanting someone to pull me out of this rather mournful mood.
“Grace, I wanted a word,” she tells me.
There’s a seriousness about her, and this makes me uneasy.
I wait for her. I can tell she’s angry. Her lips are thin and hard.
“Grace, look, I don’t know how to say this, but to be honest, I don’t think this is working really, do you?”
I stare at her. I can’t speak. I can’t believe she’s saying this.
“Sylvie and Lennie,” she says. “Their friendship.” A crimson flush spreads over her face. She wraps a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’m just not sure that we should carry on. I’m not sure it’s any good for them. For either of them, really . . .”
It’s like being hit.
“But—they’re so fond of each other.” My voice is high and shaky and seems to come from somewhere else. “I mean, Sylvie adores Lennie. And most of the time they play together so well.”
She shakes her head slightly. “I thought perhaps we should give it a rest,” she tells me. “Just have a break for a bit.”
I feel a thread of panic.
“So—won’t I ever see you?”
There’s a little pause, as though this is something she wasn’t quite prepared for.
“Maybe you and I could go out for a drink together?” she says.
“But—you know I can’t. I don’t have a babysitter.”
“Yes, I’m being stupid. Don’t worry, I’m sure we can work it out,” she says, and leaves me.