6
Harper
“I can’t miss school tomorrow,” Jojo announces from the doorway of the parlor where Remy and I are sitting.
Remy came over after work and made dinner while I was still at work. He ate with us when I got home and helped clean up. We came into the parlor to have a glass of wine and talk. We even lit the old limestone fireplace. It’s gas now, but when Remy was little, it was wood burning. He has fond memories of sitting in this parlor, playing chess with his grandmother and listening to his father and grandfather argue politics.
“You have to stay home tomorrow.” I reach for my wineglass. “Your sister is coming home.” The words sound dreamlike because I know this can’t really be happening. After all these years, all the prayers, all the tears, Georgina really is coming home.
Jojo plants one hand on her hip in one of her preeminent “obstinate teenager” poses. She’s wearing pink plaid booty shorts, which she is absolutely not allowed to wear outside the house and if I catch her in them again, they’re going in the trash can. And an Ursuline Academy basketball sweatshirt that’s two sizes too big. It’s an interesting juxtaposition, the tiny skin-baring shorts and the enormous gray sweatshirt that seems to be wearing her more than she’s wearing it.
“You said you didn’t know what time the social worker was bringing her over,” Jojo whines. “You said it could be anytime tomorrow. I have to go to school. I can’t miss English again. I have no idea what’s going on in Fahrenheit 451. It’s the stupidest book I’ve ever read. Tried to read,” she adds.
I take a sip of my pinot noir, delaying my response. It’s a technique I’m working on, on Remy’s advice. He tells me that nothing bad can happen if I wait a beat or two before responding to Jojo, but all kinds of bad things can happen if I speak before I think.
I don’t know what the wine is; I didn’t even look at the label when Remy showed it to me before opening the bottle to let it breathe before he poured. He’s a bit of a wine connoisseur. He has a small wine cellar downstairs. I don’t know a thing about wine and I don’t have a palate for it, not really. I just know what tastes good to me and what doesn’t and it rarely has anything to do with the price sticker. I think he said this bottle was from Argentina. Or maybe Chile. I’m not always a good listener when Remy is talking wine.
“Fahrenheit 451 is a great book.” Remy’s input to the conversation. He’s also delaying responding to the subject at hand. “I love that book. It cautions us as individuals and a nation against suppressing dissenting ideas. That’s why they burn all the books in the story. So no one can express an opinion beyond the ruling opinion.”
We get an eye roll from our beautiful daughter.
I squint. I wear contacts, but by the end of the day, my distance vision isn’t great. Of course my up-close vision isn’t, either. I’ve been known to put on a pair of readers while wearing another pair around my neck and a third on my head. “Are you wearing eyeliner, Josephine?”
She makes a face and takes a step back. “No.” She says it as if I’ve mortally wounded her, making such a foul accusation. I know she wears it to school sometimes, but usually she’s smart enough to take it off before arriving home. Georgina’s return has us all off our game.
Jojo crosses her arms over her chest. “I’m going to school tomorrow. It’s taco day.”
“You’re not going.” I take another sip of wine. It’s my second glass and I’m finally starting to unwind a little. All day, since I got the call this morning saying that someone from the state would be bringing Georgina home tomorrow, I’ve been wound tighter than one of the springs in the Broussard family heirloom clock on the mantel. I begged the social worker to let me see Georgina today; I even called Remy’s little sister, our attorney, but everyone seemed to think that if I had waited fourteen years, I could wait one more day. They wouldn’t even tell me where they were holding her. As if I’d try to somehow sneak in and see her. Which I probably would have.
The whole last week has been a blur. It really is a wonder I’m not on that psychiatric ward. Tuesday the maternity test came back positive. I was angry they didn’t bring her home immediately. A judge had to approve Georgina’s release to us. The same woman who took Georgina from her stroller, apparently had her right here in New Orleans all this time. How did I never see her? How could my baby have been right here all this time and I didn’t know it? I can’t even begin to process that information.
I’m relieved, of course; a woman kidnapped her, not a man. The social worker said there seemed to be no evidence of sexual abuse or any abuse, based on interviews with the woman and Georgina. She said Georgina was well cared for. I hope it’s true. I pray it is, but right now I can’t begin to think about that woman who stole my baby. I just can’t.
I shift my gaze to Remy, who’s sitting on the leather couch beside me. The old piece of furniture should have been replaced years ago, but neither Remy nor I could bear to send it to the dump. Or even have it reupholstered. It belonged to Remy’s father and his father before him and sat in their Carondelet Street law offices Remy’s whole childhood. The leather is creased and faded but it still smells so good. Some of my best memories of Georgina are of us sitting on this couch. I have an adorable photo in the hall upstairs of one-year-old Georgina on this couch.
I stare into my wineglass. “Tell her she’s staying home,” I say to Remy.
“Dad, tell her I’m not.”
Remy gets up, raising his hands, palms out, as if he’s being held up at gunpoint. Which he is, in a way. “Ladies, I’m not doing this. You know I don’t do this. I’m neither judge nor referee with you two.” He turns his attention to our daughter. “Don’t you want to be here when Georgina arrives?”
“Why?” she deadpans. “Isn’t she staying?”
Jojo’s tone plucks a nerve in me and I start to come off the couch, but Remy catches my eye—a warning—and I ease back down. I take another sip of wine. He’s so good with Jojo. So much better than I am. I’m too controlling, too . . . too wrapped up in every aspect of her life.
Remy tells me all the time that I need to take a step back and a deep breath. He says we’ve raised an amazing girl who will become an amazing woman, if we’ll just give her the chance. But I worry so much about her. I only want what’s best for her, and the world is such a terrible place. No one cares about Jojo like I do. No one wants to protect her the way I do. Not even Remy. It pisses him off when I say that, but I know it’s true. I think it’s true of all women. I carried Jojo in my womb. Her body was an extension of mine, like my leg or my arm, before she was born. And she’ll always be an extension of me. Just as I knew Georgina always would be, even if she never came home.
“Jojo,” Remy says, “I know you’re nervous about meeting your—”
“She’s not meeting her,” I interject. “Georgina’s not a stranger. She’s Jojo’s sister.”
Again, I get a look from Remy. Again, he turns back to Jojo. I stick my nose back in my wineglass.
“She is a stranger,” Jojo says softly. She’s looking at her dad like she’s going to burst into tears and suddenly I feel guilty. I’ve been so caught up in my own feelings that I haven’t taken the time to think about Jojo’s. She’s got to be so excited. And maybe Remy’s right, maybe she is scared. She must be worried Georgina won’t like her. All teenage girls worry about being liked.
I take a breath. Compromise. I know I should compromise with Jojo sometimes, that I can’t always get my own way. Which I disagree with because I’m the parent, right? But I decide to go with it. I don’t want to make waves tonight, not on the eve of the biggest day of our lives. “How about if you go to school in the morning, and your dad can pick you up early if Georgina is coming before the end of the school day? The social worker said she’d text me in the morning with an ETA.”
Jojo looks at Remy, ignoring me. “I have a makeup quiz after school.”
I snap my head around to look at her still in the wide doorway, framed by the white molding like a picture frame. “What quiz did you miss? You haven’t been absent in weeks.”
“I think you better take the deal on this one,” Remy tells our daughter. Now they’re both ignoring me. “I think it’s the best you’re going to get.”
Jojo exhales loudly. “Fine.” She turns on her toes, a prima ballerina for an instant, and retreats down the hallway.
Remy runs one hand through his hair that should by all rights be thinning because mine is, but isn’t. “She’s fourteen, hon. This is a lot to take in for a fourteen-year-old.”
“It’s a lot to take in for a forty-four-year-old.” I raise my glass in a toast and take a drink.
He smiles at me and I feel like I’m melting a little. It’s the smile I fell in love with when we met at Tulane as undergrads. It’s the smile I still love. I pat the place beside me. “Sit. I want to talk to you about something.”
“Sure. We need to go over logistics. My family is dying to come over tomorrow and visit and I know you want to take Georgina by to see your dad. And of course Ann and George and Makayla want to stop by, but I think it should just be us tomorrow.”
I nod. “Absolutely. I already told Ann I’d call her when I think Georgina, we’re up to visitors. But that isn’t what I wanted to talk about.” I pat the place beside me on the couch again.
“Okay.” He sounds suspicious. He slides onto the couch.
I take a breath, turning to him, pulling one leg up so that my knee touches his thigh. I changed into sweatpants after work. I never wear my scrubs in the house; they’re too gross with animal byproducts. “Now, I want you to hear me out because I know this is going to sound crazy.” I glance at the fire in the fireplace. “Because let’s face it, a lot of things I say do sound crazy.”
“Harper,” he murmurs, taking my hand. It’s the gentlest of reprimands. I’m not supposed to say things like that about myself. Or so Ann . . . and Remy tell me.
“Remy . . .” I meet his gaze. “I think you should move back in.” I say it in a rush as if I don’t get it out quickly, I won’t be able to say it at all. I set my glass down so I can take his hand between mine. “When Georgina was taken, we were married. That’s the mommy and daddy she knows. You and I loved each other and that . . . that was why our girls were so happy. So well adjusted. You always said that was true. Georgina was a happy little girl.”
“She was a happy little girl,” he says carefully
I let go of his hand and run my fingers down his arm. He has nice biceps; he always has. He does lift weights some, and he runs, but he’s never been obsessive about exercise. He just has good genes. His dad had been an attractive, muscular man until his death of a heart attack a few months before Georgina was abducted. “Remy,” I say softly. “We’ve talked about this before, about . . .” I look into his dark eyes and my own cloud with tears. “About . . . trying again. You know I’m not happy without you. I—”
“Didn’t you just tell me last week that you were thinking about going out for a drink,” he interrupts, pointing a finger at me, “with that drug rep who’s been asking you out for a year?”
I look down. I’m still holding his arm. “But everything’s changed.” I lift my gaze and search his dark eyes and remember that those are Georgina’s eyes. “Everything is going to be different now. We have our miracle.” I choke on my happiness. “Remy, it’s going to be so wonderful. Our baby is coming home and we’re going to be a family again. You should be here for that. Don’t you want to be here for Georgina? For all of us?” I lean into him and he rests his forehead on mine. I close my eyes. He breathes and I breathe with him. His soft beard brushes my cheek. “I miss you, Remy,” I say, holding back my tears because if I start to cry I’m not sure how I’ll stop. “I miss you at night so much. I feel so alone in our bed by myself.”
He’s quiet for a long moment and I’m afraid I’ve gone too far, that I’ve pushed him too far. But he kisses my temple and sits up, looking into my eyes. Connecting with me in a way I don’t think we’ve connected in a very long time. “I want to be here, I just . . .” His brows draw together. “What if it doesn’t work? Jojo is so okay with our arrangement. I’m sure Georgina would be, too. She’s sixteen; she must have friends whose parents are divorced.”
“But I want you here.” I tighten my grip on his arm. “Don’t you want to be here with us?” I know I sound a little bit like I’m begging, but I don’t care. I’m willing to beg him to make our family whole again. Truly whole.
Now his eyes are teary. “I do want to be here.”
“With me?” I whisper. “Do you still want to be with me?”
With his thumb, he wipes away the tear on one of my cheeks. “Harper, sex between us has always been good.” He smiles, a sadness but also an underlying joy in his voice. “Even after we divorced.”
I laugh and sniff and reach for my wineglass. I wasn’t exactly talking about sex, but I suppose, in a way, I am. Our relationship is odd in every sense of the word. I know that. We still love each other deeply. We’re still best friends. I admire him more than anyone I know. And he loves me, even in my craziness. And we do still occasionally have sex. I honestly think that the reason he moved out was because he just couldn’t live with my pain anymore. And I couldn’t live with his.
He leans back on the couch. He’s considering my proposal. I can see it in his face.
“I know. It’s a terrible idea,” I admit, wondering why I ever thought, for a moment, he would go for it. Losing Georgina was awful, but what I put my husband through in the years following her kidnapping may very well have been worse. At times, I was such a nut job.
“Harper—”
“Just say it. It’s a terrible idea.” I take another breath and exhale. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to ruin the evening.”
“Harper—”
“I don’t mean to ruin Georgina’s homecoming.”
“Harper, let me finish,” he says, catching my hand and threading his fingers through mine. “I think it’s a good idea.”
I look up at him and I’m melting again. Tears spring from my eyes. “Yeah?”
“I can’t make any promises, but . . .” He exhales. “I’m willing to give it a try.”
“For the girls,” I say.
He leans and presses his lips to mine and I feel a little thrill that’s more than just a physical reaction; I feel it in my heart. “For us,” he murmurs against my lips.
I lift my gaze. Our noses are touching. “Are we talking with benefits?” My tone is teasing and dare I say just a little bit sexy. At least sexy for a forty-four-year-old woman who is perimenopausal and has been having sex with the same man since her sophomore year in college. Albeit sporadically the last couple of years.
“Oh, we’re talking benefits.” He definitely sounds sexy. He slips his hand around my waist. “I assumed that’s what you were offering.”
I laugh and he laughs with me and kisses me again and then sits back. For a moment we just sit there looking at each other, pleased with ourselves. I can’t believe we’re doing this. But we’re doing it.
“I’ll go home and get some things.”
I nod. “I’ll talk to Jojo about the plan. Unless . . . you think you should? I don’t think we should . . . Georgina doesn’t need to know right off, does she?” I pick up both glasses of wine and hand him his. I’m feeling a little flushed. Maybe it’s the tannins in the wine, or the fire in the fireplace that’s made the parlor warm. Or maybe it’s my ex-husband. I feel giddy. Georgina and Remy are coming home. Thank you, God. Thank you, Mary, Mother of Jesus.
“No, I don’t think so. I don’t want to overwhelm her,” he says.
He touches his glass to mine; it makes a delightful sound in the old parlor and for a moment I think about how many times that sound has echoed in this room. The house was built in 1909 by his great-grandfather. Four generations of Broussards have celebrated life in this room: weddings, births, financial and professional accomplishments. But no one has ever celebrated the return of a child thought dead, I’m sure of that.
“I’ll talk to her. I’ll just tell her . . . we’re not making any promises, that . . . that we’re going to see how things go.”
He nods. “And remind her that we love her. Whether you and I are living together or not, we love her and we love Georgina.”
He holds up the bottle. I nod and he pours me a half a glass more, finishing off the bottle.
“I think we need to take things one day at a time.” He sets the dead soldier on the antique coffee table. “This isn’t going to be easy.”
I lift my gaze to meet his as I reach for my glass. In all my excitement, my disbelief that Georgina really is coming home to us, I haven’t really thought much about the adjustment. I wanted to redecorate her bedroom but Jojo nixed that idea. She said no sixteen-year-old girl wants her mother decorating her room, or even being in it. So I’ve had to be content with removing all the storage boxes I’ve dumped in there over the last ten years, and the garbage bags of donations I haven’t had a chance to take down to Goodwill. The only thing I’ve bought so far for Georgina is a mattress and box spring for the queen-sized bed Remy helped me bring down from the attic. And some sheets. Pink, because every teenage girl likes pink, doesn’t she? The idea of shopping with Georgina excites me. I’ve never been much of a shopper, but the idea of seeing what my daughter likes and being able to buy it for her thrills me. What sixteen-year-old doesn’t like to shop?
“I should get going.” Remy rises from the couch. “If I’m going to pack some things and come back tonight.”
“Oh, you’re coming back tonight.” I get up, and grab a handful of his shirt and kiss him, feeling a little unsteady on my feet. More overwhelmed by the situation than the wine.
“You could come with me.” Remy slips one arm around my waist, pulls me against him, and kisses me again, this time teasing my upper lip with the tip of his tongue.
His kiss sets my perimenopausal, far-sighted body thrumming. I close my eyes, tempted. Sorely tempted. “Jojo,” I say.
“Not invited.”
I groan. “I can’t leave her here alone. At night.”
“We won’t be long. Come on,” he cajoles. “A little celebration?” His breath is warm in my ear.
“I don’t like to leave her home alone.” I lean against him, my cheek to his chest so I can feel his heart beating. “You know that.”
“She’s fourteen years old. She can stay home alone for an hour.” He kisses my temple. “We’ll tell her to lock the doors. Set the alarm system. She’s got her cell phone. We have ours.”
I groan again and pull away from him. “I don’t like to leave her. Especially now without a dog.” Our dog died more than a year ago, but I haven’t been ready to do the puppy thing again yet.
“But you need to learn to be able to leave her,” Remy says, an edge to his voice.
I look up at him. “I know. I’m trying. I’ll try harder,” I add, not wanting to anger him. Wanting to go with him and make love with him on his double bed in his sparse apartment. “Just not tonight, Remy. Okay?”
He kisses me on top of my head. It’s the chaste kiss of an ex-husband, not a lover. I hope I haven’t killed the mood. “I’ll be back in an hour.” He heads for the door, pointing at the coffee table. “Save the wineglasses. We’ll open another bottle.”
I wrap my arms around myself, watching him go. Thinking I’ll take a shower and maybe even dig something out of my drawer to wear to bed besides a baggy man’s white T-shirt and a pair of cotton boy-short panties. And I’ll make love to my husband and sleep with him tonight and tomorrow Georgina will come home and life will be perfect again.