Chase and Sebastian were in rare form at the grocery store. That sounded like it might be something good—rare form, like a rare painting or a rare coin—but it definitely was not. Because Jeremy was staying at the hospital after all, Lu had let the boys stay up too late watching Lego Batman, hoping they’d sleep a little later and allow her to get some work done. But the late bedtime had thrown off their rhythms and they’d woken up earlier than usual. In fact, they’d woken Lu up by jumping on her bed at seven minutes past six, so she’d lost on both ends.
Also she’d taken down half a bottle of her favorite inexpensive white wine—Josh Sauvignon Blanc—and had woken with the beginnings of a headache. Now Chase was hanging off the edge of the cart, and Sebastian, who was really too old for such things, was riding inside. Lu hadn’t wanted to come shopping at all, but her attempt to borrow sugar from the neighbor had been unsuccessful and she needed a few other items too.
She was getting behind, and soon people would start to notice. She had to knock it out of the park with the essence-of-summer cobbler.
She examined a package of strawberries. Her grocery costs were going to triple this summer, and that was no small consideration. Jeremy would notice. He’d want her and the boys to eat meals with his parents more often. People thought that doctors were rich, but it took years and years and years to start making real money. Jeremy had only completed his fellowship two years before. Rich was a long way in the future. Even out of debt was a long way in the future. Lu took a deep breath, thought about the money in her secret account, and felt immediately better.
Just then she heard someone say, “Lu Trusdale?” She whipped her head around to see a woman with a strong, square chin, indented with a perfectly round dimple. “You’re Lu, aren’t you?”
Lu looked at her warily. Her insides felt jumpy. She nodded.
“I’m Jessica!” The woman leaned toward Lu, like she expected to be congratulated. “My mom is super-best-friends with your mother-in-law, and we’re here for the summer too. You probably don’t remember this, but I was at your baby shower!”
“Of course,” said Lu. “Jessica, of course.” Lu didn’t remember a single thing about her baby shower except for a feeling of near panic that came over her in waves. Jeremy’s mother had planned the whole thing, and there were so many people there that it took two full hours to open the gifts. The day had made Lu feel unnecessarily extravagant and spoiled. Also, she hated to be the center of attention, unless there was a judge and a jury involved, so by the end of the event her face hurt from smiling so hard and so insincerely.
Jessica wasn’t shy about looking in Lu’s shopping cart. “Oooooh!” she said. “Artichokes! How brave of you. What are you making?”
Lu didn’t say, Broken artichoke heart salad to go on the side of pasta puttanesca. She said, “I don’t know. Something very simple. Truth be told, I’m not much of a cook.”
“Yes, you are!” said Chase. He was kicking at the wheel of the shopping cart. “You cook all the time!”
“Oh,” said Lu, growing flustered. “His definition of cooking and mine are a little different.” She could have stopped there, but something made her go on. “You know kids! You throw some chicken nuggets on a sheet pan and they think you’ve cooked for them!”
Jessica nodded appraisingly. “Well,” she said finally. “We should definitely hang out. I’ll get your number from your MIL.” She actually said the letters, not the words: M. I. L.
OMG, thought Lu.
“Great!” said Lu. “Definitely do that.” She waited until Jessica had turned in to the frozen food section and then she allowed herself to exhale in relief. She hated not being anonymous while she shopped or cooked. She didn’t like surprises in any form: she liked to be the one who doled out the surprises, controlled them. She told Chase to hold on to the cart so he wouldn’t get lost and she hightailed it toward the register and paid as quickly as she could.
There was a man in a gray T-shirt perusing the display of mass-market paperbacks near the register. From the back, she didn’t recognize him, but when he turned slightly to reach for a book she saw that he was her neighbor, the grumpy one who didn’t have any sugar and didn’t invite her inside and hardly said two words to her. Lu watched as he picked up a book and flipped through it. As it turned out, Lu, who read everything, had read that book. Because she believed in second chances, she said, “That one was good. You should get it.”
The man looked up at her, startled. “Oh!” he said. “Hey, it’s you. The sugar lady.”
“It’s me,” she said. She gestured toward her cart. “But don’t worry, I bought sugar.”
“Leonard Puckett,” said the man thoughtfully, massaging the cover. He chewed on the side of his lip and finally said, “I’ve heard he’s overrated.” He looked for a long time at the book and then he turned it over in his hands and studied the author’s photo, which took up much of the back cover. The photo was of an older man with a head of white hair and eyebrows that were full and stern and foreboding.
“I mean, I guess you could say that,” Lu conceded. “Those kinds of books do start to blend together after a while. But they’re pretty reliable entertainment if you just want to sit on the beach and read.”
“You’re probably right,” said the man. He smiled; he had a very nice smile, which almost disguised the fact that his eyes drooped down at the corners in a way that made him look either sad or tired. He put the book back, then picked it up again. “I apologize for being rude the other day. I—I wasn’t myself. I should have been friendlier. I usually am friendlier. I didn’t even introduce myself. I’m Anthony.”
“Lu Trusdale. And this is Chase, and this is Sebastian.” Chase and Sebastian were engaged in a thumb war, so she said, “Boys!” until they looked up and smiled. “Do you have a last name, Anthony?” Lu asked. She always liked to get the full story.
He looked down at the book again and then back up at Lu. “Anthony Jones. I’m Anthony Jones.” He slipped the book back inside the rack. “I’m not going to get this. I don’t really even like to read!”
“Oh, too bad,” said Lu. “I love to read. I’m pretty undiscriminating—mysteries, literary, biography. Cookbooks!” Her new neighbor seemed nice enough, but she’d never understood people who didn’t like to read. When Lu was in college she thought she might go to graduate school for English literature, until her favorite disgruntled professor told her there was neither money nor glory in that path. The law, if pursued correctly, promised both.
Sebastian was starting to move around impatiently inside the shopping cart, making it rock dangerously.
“Hey, buddy,” said Lu’s new acquaintance. “Careful in there. I wouldn’t want to have to send the PAW Patrol out.” Sebastian grinned and stopped moving around.
“You know your way around four-year-old boys,” said Lu. This guy didn’t present like a dad. Maybe he was an uncle.
“Lucky guess,” he said. “See you around the hood.” And he was gone as quickly as he’d appeared.
In the grocery’s small parking lot, Lu watched Anthony as he hesitated, then crossed the street and entered a place called Poor People’s Pub. A surprising feeling of envy washed over her. When she worked at the law firm, every Friday she and the other young attorneys would step across the street after a long day to sip martinis and unwind. She had loved the camaraderie of those evenings, the fatigue that came after a day worked to its fullest. If the boys weren’t with her she might have called to her neighbor to see if he wanted company. It would be nice to have a new friend.
But new friends—new male, childless friends who were heading into bars—weren’t practical in her current circumstances, under her current agreement with Jeremy, the way they would have been in her former life, so there was nothing to do but pack the boys and the groceries in the car and head back to Corn Neck Road.
Where she saw her mother-in-law’s car in the driveway. “Fuuuuuck,” she said, under her breath.
But not under her breath enough. “Mommy!” said Chase.
“What?” She glanced in the rearview mirror. His face was screwed up in appraisal and, well, for lack of a better description, disapproval.
“You’re not supposed to say that word.”
“What word?”
“I’m not allowed to say it,” Chase said staunchly. “I won’t.”
“Fuck,” said Sebastian pleasantly. He was tracing a shape on the car’s window and lounging in his booster seat. “You’re not allowed to say fuck.”
Lu massaged her temples with two fingers of each hand. “I was about to say funny, boys. I’m not supposed to say something is funny?”
Chase squinted at her and shook his head strictly.
“Look!” said Sebastian, pointing. “It’s Grandma.” Lu’s MIL’s face appeared in the front window, and she began to wave in a friendly (or frantic) manner. Had Lu not locked the door? Or did Nancy have her own key? Perhaps, as the person paying the rent, she felt entitled. Maybe she’d marched herself down to the Island True Value the minute she’d signed the lease for Jeremy and Lu and made herself a set. Or maybe Jeremy had made Nancy a copy and not told Lu. Either scenario was very possible.
“Fantastic,” said Lu, trying to work some false cheer into her voice. “A visitor!”
She was really, absolutely, definitely, no question going to need to find somewhere else to go to work.