What a coup for Ten Chimneys! people constantly told Erik after Kelly accepted the offer. And though I know he wished the board had chosen anyone else, he couldn’t help but be pleased by the “KJ effect.” She mentioned Ten Chimneys on Entertainment Tonight, and once the staff got over being irritated by the host’s lame joke (“Ten Chimneys? That sounds like a roofing convention!”), they were ecstatic. The board had been right. Kelly was generating amazing publicity. “So, tell us about this Ten Chimneys place,” Ellen DeGeneres asked her. More jokes. “Wisconsin, huh? How do you feel about cheese?” Tours of the estate were in huge demand.
As much as I might have liked to believe, as my mother did, that Kelly’s coming to Ten Chimneys was about her wanting to see me, Erik didn’t buy it. “Your mom just wants a happy ending,” he said. “But to think Kelly orchestrated all this? How would that even work? She…what? Somehow got the entire board to unanimously choose her?”
“It’s not that my mom thinks Kelly orchestrated it, just that once the board approached her, maybe she did a little intel of her own and found out I was here.”
“Is that what you want?”
“What I want is for her to not come at all.”
I planned to lie low during those two weeks, go to Chicago for some of it. If Kelly wanted to see me, I’d be available, but if she didn’t know I was here, there wouldn’t be any surprises. Erik and I decided too that I’d tell Annabelle and Eva that Kelly and I had been friends once and that we’d had a falling-out. I didn’t want them to be blindsided if someone made the connection or Kelly mentioned Rehoboth. “At least we can stop pretending to be so thrilled about her visit,” Erik said.
“You’ll still have to pretend at work.”
“I’m surrounded by theater people.” He laughed. “Pretending is what we do.”
There was something calm in me that spring that I loved. I ran my six miles a day, started two collages I was excited about, took the train to Chicago to meet with the gallery. The six of us attended a Ten Chimneys fundraiser with Alan Alda and went to Hattie Magee’s, and on our weeks without the kids, Erik and I did what we always did: exercised, cooked, watched TV, made love. We were hungry for each other as we hadn’t been since the first year of our marriage, kissing in the foyer after a night out, keys falling to the floor, coats strewn on the stairs as we laughed and groped and fumbled our way to the bedroom.
In April, the twins started T-ball, and as the days grew warm, Annabelle, Spencer, and I—sometimes Erik and Scott—spent afternoons on aluminum bleachers at the elementary school, watching games. The sky a swirl of yellow and pink, the crack of bats from the older boys in the next field, shouts of “Way to go!” or “Keep your eye on the ball.” Spencer, who didn’t like the crowds or the noise, paced at the edge of the field, counting his steps and anxiously repeating his phrases, or sometimes sat in the car where we could see him, head buried in a library book. “I can’t imagine doing this alone,” Annabelle said a few times, following him with her eyes. “Every mom should have one of you.”
“A friend?” I teased.
She leaned into my shoulder. “You’re way more than that, Claire.”
Still, I put off telling her and Eva about my friendship with Kelly. There was always an excuse. Gabe threw Eva a lavish fortieth-birthday bash in early May, and I didn’t want to spoil that. A week later, he was made senior partner, which we celebrated at Pizza Man on a rainy Friday night. And then Phoebe and Hazel came down with strep, so Spencer stayed with us for an extra week while the girls stayed with Annabelle. “You do realize Claire and I are perfectly capable of taking care of sick kids too,” Erik griped to her, but she had a dozen reasons why it was better for the girls to be with her, Spencer with us. “The last thing we need is him getting sick,” she insisted. True, but the changed schedule wreaked havoc with him. He was anxious and upset the entire week. And so, we got in the habit of taking long drives after I picked him up at the diner. He’d hold his spiral-bound Maps of Waukesha County on his lap and trace our progress.
Had I been alone, the windows would have been down, the radio cranking, but even a breeze agitated Spencer, and the radio “made the air feel bumpy.” And so these were silent, almost claustrophobic, drives. But the motion soothed his anxiety, as did tracing the route, knowing exactly where he was and what was coming: a small town, a railroad crossing. It comforted me too. I wasn’t aware of how lost I’d felt after Kelly accepted the offer until Spence and I were driving and I realized the untethered feeling—as if I were floating over my own life—had disappeared.
In late May, when Eva phoned to tell me she’d made the short list of fellowship applicants, I wasn’t surprised. “Was there ever any doubt?” I said to Erik when he came home.
“It’s not a done deal yet. Eva’s got some stiff competition.” Erik bent to give me a kiss and snagged a piece of broccoli. I’d been cutting vegetables for tempura. “No one expected this level of interest.” While Ten Chimneys had promised to prioritize local applicants, stage actors from across the country were vying to work with “KJ” to put on a play Alfred and Lynn had acted in.
“I feel like the crappiest friend in the world, but I don’t want her to get this fellowship.”
“Well, that makes two of us.” He shrugged out of his blazer and stood next to me to survey the bowls of cut-up veggies.
“I’m meeting Eva and Annabelle at the diner tomorrow,” I said. “I need to rip off the Band-Aid. Tell them Kelly and I were friends.” I took a sip of wine. “It makes me nervous.”
“Of course it does.” He pulled the bottle of Maker’s Mark from the freezer and got out a glass. “But the worst that will happen is Annabelle pouts for two minutes because you never told them, and then she’ll have a thousand questions.”
“That’s what worries me.” I set down my knife. “I don’t want this to turn into a big deal.”
“Ahh, cue up the diner.” He grinned. “Have you decided what booth you’ll sit in? What to wear?”
“Don’t you laugh.”
He held up his hands. “Have I said anything?”
He didn’t have to. He’d told me a hundred times that for someone professing to know nothing about theater, I was masterful at creating scripts and orchestrating scenes. And he was right. I’d asked them to meet me at the diner because it was too small, too loud, and too public for a serious conversation, which I didn’t want to have. The diner was where we waited for Spencer’s bus or grabbed coffee before some event at Ten Chimneys. We were just checking in when we were there: How was your morning? we’d ask; What’s on your plate for the day? It was what I wanted the conversation about Kelly to be. I’d mention that I knew her, mention that we’d grown up in the same town. Mention that we’d been friends. Mention.
“I know I’m overthinking this.”
“How can you not?” He held my gaze and I felt an unexpected coil of sadness push against my breastbone.
“You really think Annabelle’s going to be upset?” I said.
“At first. Only because you guys have talked about Widows so much.”
“And then all this hoopla about Kelly coming and neither of us has said a word.” I sidestepped Erik to rinse my knife. Outside the trees were flat shapes in the almost dark, the grass a dense glossy black. When I turned to look at him, he was at the stove, rolling up his sleeves. His tie off, collar open, he looked rumpled and handsome. I watched as he dunked a broccoli floret in batter, then dropped it into the pan of hot oil.
“So, will you mention she was your sister-in-law or just leave it at friend?”
“Friend.” I leaned against the counter next to him. “I don’t want them knowing we once shared a name. It’s too close.”
He nodded. “That’s probably good.”
“I figure they’ll assume what you did, that Kelly’s connected to my marriage ending, which will also explain why I left Rehoboth.” I took a sip of wine. “Who wants to stick around and watch your best friend cheating with your husband?”
“Jesus. Talk about too close,” Erik said.
“What do you mean?”
“Best friend cheating with your husband? Annabelle will shut that down in a hurry.”
“Yikes! I never even thought of that.” Annabelle and Gabe. It rarely crossed my mind. It had been so long ago. Ten years? Eleven?
“Well, that’ll take care of Annabelle asking questions,” Erik said. “And Eva won’t let herself get anywhere near that.”
I watched as he dunked more vegetables into the batter. The stovetop was splattered with grease. “I didn’t realize how messy this would be,” I said.
“The tempura?” He arched an eyebrow. “Or the conversation?”
“Both, I guess.” I watched him tong a piece of cauliflower from the pan. “What did you mean, Eva won’t let herself get anywhere near?”
“Nothing. Just…” He furrowed his brow. “I don’t know why I said it like that.”
“You don’t think she knows, do you?”
“About Annabelle and Gabe? Jesus, no. But she’ll also never put herself in a position where she might find out.”
“So, you think she suspects?”
“I really don’t.”
I stared at him, unease spiraling through me. “You promise?”
“I do. Honestly. The Kelly thing’s just weirding us out.” He flicked off the burner. “Are you hungry? Because I think we’re about ready.”