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“I think every kid fantasized about that,” Scott answered.
Joanna uncrossed her legs and crossed them the other direction. “So the fair shows up. I’m so excited I can’t sleep the night before opening day. And I get up really early, before the sun is even up, and I run down there. And there’s already a line of kids waiting. They’d gotten up earlier than I did. I had no idea how—I mean, I guess they just didn’t sleep at all. And so finally someone comes along and lets us all in. There were only five rides, not even a roller coaster. Just a merry-go-round, a Ferris wheel, swings, some lame-ass fun house, and a tilt-a-whirl. ”
Her voice caught on whirl, but she swallowed fast, trying to pass it off as nothing. “I only went that one morning,” she said. “I spent the rest of the summer at the pool. ”
Scott nodded. He bent his knee in and out, making his joint crack.
“I don’t know what made me tell you that story,” Joanna blurted. “It has nothing to do with anything. ”
Scott took another sip of his drink. “Maybe it has to do with a lot of things. ”
Joanna picked at a loose thread on the knee of her jeans. She should thank him for accompanying her here, and then go inside to her old bedroom and go to sleep. This could still be explained to Charles. She’d come to the house looking for Sylvie, maybe, but Scott had been there instead. She’d been distraught, and he’d offered to come. She just needed some company, someone to take the edge off her mother. It was hard, coming down here alone every time.
She was still unmarred, unharmed. She could still look Charles straight in the eye.
Scott’s eyes burned into her. Taking a deep breath, she raised her head and stared back. Electricity passed through them. She could almost see it, a blue snap through the air. He knew what she wanted. He had to. He knew what was going on inside of her, but he was going to make her work for it. He was going to make her ask.
Hank and Carla’s parrot screeched. The same sob rose up inside of her. She felt so terrible.
The moment broke, and Scott looked away. Joanna lowered her shoulders and looked down, too, disappointed that he hadn’t acted on the moment, then ashamed by her disappointment. She made a tight fist with her hand. “Charles told me about that time you hit him, you know. ”
Scott stopped rocking. “Oh yeah?”
“Uh-huh. He said you did it for no reason. ”
The ice rattled in his glass. “Is that what he said?”
“Yes. ”
“Then he didn’t tell you everything. ”
“What’s … everything?”
“There was a reason I did that. ”
“And that would be … what?”
He stubbed out his cigarette.
“Come on. ”
But he stood, not answering, and opened the screen door and walked inside the house. Joanna felt confused. Did that mean something more had happened than what Charles had told her? Or was that just what Scott wanted her to think?
Scott opened the freezer; cold, blue light shone against his face. She heard the crack of the ice cube tray, and the clank of the cubes hitting the glass. This was probably just a game for Scott. A mind-fuck.
She stood up, too, and made her way slowly down the hall to the first-floor bedroom that was always set up for her. She would sleep on her old childhood twin bed, its creaky mattress as stiff and loud as the paper liner on an examining table at a doctor’s office. Scott, of course, would sleep on the couch.
Chapter 14
Geoff’s house was hidden behind a heavy wrought-iron gate. A video camera watched Sylvie as she idled in the driveway, and she imagined her image being fed by wireless signals to a closed-circuit television. The gate swung open, and she pulled up behind the other cars, parking next to a black Audi. It was very possible she had parked next to this very same black Audi at the last party here, the last one she and James ever attended together.
“Sylvie,” Geoff’s young wife, Melinda, cried when she reached the door, throwing her arms open. Sylvie stepped in, wrapping her arms around Melinda and feeling the sharp edges of her shoulder blades. “Happy birthday,” Sylvie murmured.
“Thanks,” Melinda answered. They both stepped back. The only spot of color on Melinda’s pale face was her dark red lipstick. “You look lovely,” she added to Sylvie.
Sylvie ducked her head and shrugged out of her coat. Melinda swept right over her, her expression not faltering, not giving away that she might know something that Sylvie didn’t.
All afternoon, Sylvie had tried to get in touch with Scott, eager to hear about the meeting earlier today. He wasn’t in the house. He wasn’t in his apartment. His phone had been turned off. She hadn’t known where else to call. She even tried looking up the number to the sneaker shop his friend owned in the city, but she didn’t know the store’s name.
She thought someone at Swithin would call her with an update, but no one did. She had paced the house, trying to imagine what could have happened. Scott’s bed in his old bedroom was unmade, his clothes strewn about all over the floor. An iPod was on the pillow along with an overturned magazine about cars. He’d still been living here the last two nights, but he’d holed up in his bedroom, not speaking to her. How dare you put me in this position, she’d said to him. His face had crumpled with contempt. And now he was punishing her, not even telling her whether or not he’d gone.
“Drinks are back there,” Melinda instructed, pointing. “And … oh! There’s Kristen and Bill!” Her face brightened at another couple that had come in after Sylvie, two younger people Sylvie didn’t recognize.
Sylvie picked up a cocktail and looked around the room. The party was already packed, everyone milling around with drinks in hand, the caterers weaving through the crowd with big trays of crab puffs and pot stickers. Geoff stood in the corner surrounded by a bunch of men in dark suits similar to his own. He caught Sylvie’s eye and waved but didn’t come over.
Sylvie had walked this very route of rooms the day before James had died. Oh how annoyed she’d been at him at that last party. He’d agreed to accompany her, but moments before they were supposed to leave, she found him in his office, fiddling on his computer, wearing a stained polo shirt.
“We’re going to be late,” she said. “You need to get dressed. ” He didn’t move. “I’m not really in the mood tonight. I feel tired. Maybe you should go by yourself. ”
Tired. Was that due to the impending aneurysm? Was it an early warning that it was going to happen the next day? But she hadn’t known. She’d thought he was being difficult. “You have to come,” she said. “You promised. ” She didn’t like navigating parties by herself any more than she had when she was a student at Swithin or a freshman at Swarthmore.
Grumbling, James finally trudged down the stairs and got his coat. As they were getting into the car, he looked at her and said, “I never make you come to my business parties if you don’t want to. But I guess Swithin’s more important, huh?”
James knew it hurt, in the same way all of his little your-things, your-family, your-life-is-more-important-than-mine comments always hurt. Gone was the sweet, agreeable man who revered everything about her family, who said they could keep Roderick intact as long as she liked. And once that wound was open, others opened, too. That night she had started picking on James about how he hadn’t gone to dinner at Charles and Joanna’s apartment in the city a few nights before. They wanted to show off their Christmas tree, but James had blown them off entirely. “Charles wanted you to come,” Sylvie harped. “You could have at least sent him an e-mail saying you weren’t coming instead of letting me make the excuse for you. ”
“I was stuck in meetings until nine that night,” he answered. By this time, they were getting out of the car, walking up Geoff’s driveway. “What was I supposed to do? Not work?”
“Why can’t you be kinder to Charles?” Sylvie blurted out. “You know how sensitive he is. ”
“Sylvie …” James raised h
is hands in protest. “Jesus. ”
They had reached the door by then. Melinda took their coats just as she had today. As soon as they got away from the throng of guests, Sylvie picked up on the thread of the fight. “Why don’t you care about Charles?” she hissed. “Why don’t you ever try?”
“Of course I try,” James answered tightly. And then after a moment’s thought, “Maybe he doesn’t see it. Maybe you don’t see it. It’s like everyone’s minds were made up about me and him a long time ago. ”
Sylvie stepped back. “How can you turn this around and make it his fault? How can you act so blameless about everything?”
James’s eyes narrowed, obviously sensing what was coming next. “Jesus,” he whispered. “Don’t turn this into an argument about that. ”
“How can I not?” she cried. The faceless woman, tall and sophisticated, the kind that wore bold, modern jewelry, pulsed in Sylvie’s mind, suddenly present. “How can I not make everything an argument about that?”
James’s gaze fell to the ring on Sylvie’s right hand. That’s why, his look said. “I’m so tired, Sylvie,” he whimpered. “I don’t want to be here. ”
She turned away from him, hurt. Never in a million years did she imagine this would happen to her. Other people, yes. Her mother, yes. But her mother deserved it. Why had James turned to this woman years ago? Because of their rift over the kids? From resentment over Sylvie’s unquenchable respect for her grandfather? To get back at the Bates-McAllisters because they didn’t give him a job? But how could he still be angry about that? He had succeeded in his own right. He had achieved without her family’s help. Wasn’t that better?
A hand touched her arm now, and Sylvie turned. Martha Wittig, her fellow board member, was putting the last of a canape into her mouth, delicately wiping her chin. “Long time no see,” she joked. She kissed Sylvie on both cheeks. “Did you see their new painting yet?”
Sylvie blinked, feeling light-headed, her emotions whipping around too fast. “No,” she murmured.
Martha looped her arm through Sylvie’s and guided her to the left. “Melinda’s birthday was just a ruse to get us all here and show the thing off, don’t you think?” She led her into the grand living room, which had not one, but two fireplaces. “It’s not my taste, of course. And have you noticed how thin Melinda looks? It’s not very becoming. Do you think it’s because of all the financial trouble they’re in? I hear they’re short-selling their Florida house. ”
Sylvie murmured a noncommittal answer and followed Martha to the enormous canvas that Geoff and his wife had bought at a Sotheby’s auction a few weeks ago. The painting was dark and muddy, completely unremarkable, but the throng of people in front of it oohed and ahhed as though they were amazed. Sylvie wondered if, once they were safe in their own cars, they would cut it to pieces, wondering aloud why on earth Geoff had paid so much money for something so ugly.