“It hasn’t been too bad,” Melanie said faintly. The truth was, she and Gabriel were headed toward the most amicable divorce on record. They still had a joint bank account, and the only argument about money I’d heard so far was when Mel told my mother she thought it was “icky” to demand alimony and my mother said, “You’d be an idiot not to.” She’d made Mel meet with a lawyer, but after one meeting Melanie said the lawyer was way too “negative” and refused to go back. I got the sense that neither she nor Gabriel really wanted to deal with divvying things up, so they just limped along, sharing the house and his money. He wasn’t the type to cut her off and she wasn’t the type to take advantage of his generosity, so it worked out.
“Well, lucky you,” Maria said when it was clear Melanie had nothing more to add.
The MHW (maid/housekeeper/whatever) returned with the mimosas and handed them to me and Melanie, who accepted one meekly despite her earlier refusal. “Cheers,” Maria said, watching us closely. I obediently gulped at the drink. It was good. Melanie took a tiny sip of hers.
“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Maria said.
“I’m driving,” Mel protested.
“It’ll wear off by the time you leave.”
We joined the others around the coffee table, where there was way too much food, as usual. You’d think they’d learn. Or eat something now and then. One or the other.
“All right, then,” Tanya said, punching her phone off. “I don’t have a lot of time today so we have to keep things moving. I’m in charge of the fifth-grade campout and that’s this coming weekend, plus I’m organizing the faculty appreciation luncheon for next week, so I’m losing my mind with everything I still have to do. I’m sure I’ll be getting tons of calls all morning long.” She eyed her BlackBerry with a weird mixture of pride and resentment. “Anyway, I wanted to make sure I read you something I got a few days ago.” She smoothed out a piece of paper on her lap. “This is an e-mail I received. It’s from”—dramatic pause—“Dr. Sorenson.” She looked up to gauge our reactions to the mind-blowing news that the head of the entire school had taken time out of his busy schedule to communicate with her.
I yawned. Linda played with a cushion tassel. Maria took another sip of her drink. But Melanie made an encouraging noise.
Tanya cleared her throat. “Okay. So here’s what he wrote: ‘To the Event Hospitality Committee: The Autumn Festival was a huge success, thanks in large part to your efforts. With gratitude, Mark Sorenson.’ ” She looked up. “Isn’t that nice?”
“Very nice,” Melanie said.
“Now, moving on to the next big thing—”
“The next big thing?” I repeated in a desperate whisper to Melanie. “There’s a next big thing?”
“Shh,” she said, but not before Tanya had heard me.
“There’s always something else coming up,” she said seriously. “I didn’t want to tell you all the big news right away because I needed us to just get through the festival first—”
“What news?” Linda asked.
Tanya sat up even straighter. “At the last Parent Association meeting, they decided to split the fund-raiser into two parts this year. An adult-only evening this winter and an outdoor family concert in the spring. They’ve never done anything like this before.”
“Two fund-raisers?” Carol Lynn said. “Are they nuts? It’s hard enough to get one event off the ground.”
“People were sharply divided on which one would be more successful, so a subcommittee was formed.” She raised her chin proudly. “I was on the subcommittee. In the end, we decided doing both was our best option, but I promise you we did not make the decision lightly.” She smiled her tight smile. “I know it’s more work, but I think we’ll have fun with this.” I wondered what her definition of fun was. Definitely something different from mine. “The first thing we need to focus on is the adult event,” she continued. “It’s going to be a casino night. Doesn’t that sound like a hoot? We only have a couple of months to prepare, since it’s in January and of course nothing gets done over Christmas break. So there’s real time pressure here. Any thoughts about the food? We’ll need to give the caterer some direction.” Her eyes fell on me. “Any ideas, Rickie? You’re young and creative.” I didn’t know how she came up with the creative part, but I couldn’t argue too much about the young.
I fidgeted as everyone looked at me. “Um, I don’t know. I guess… well, it’s a casino night and casinos make everyone think of James Bond, right? So we should probably serve martinis—”
“Shaken, not stirred,” Maria put in.
I spotted croissants on the platter in front of me. “We could serve these,” I said, picking one up. “Croissants. That’s very European.” I bit into mine.
“Too breakfasty,” said Melanie, to my annoyance—she wouldn’t have publicly disagreed with any of the other women. She turned to Tanya. “You know what would be cool, though? Little tiny lamb chops that you can eat with your fingers. I had those at a party once and they were so good. And elegant.”
“We’d have to price those out,” Tanya said. “We have a couple of caterers we’ve worked with in the past. Why don’t you and Rickie meet with them and let them know the kind of thing we’re going for and see what they suggest and how their prices compare.” It was phrased as a question but it wasn’t a question. It was a command. “You’re also welcome to call a few more caterers on your own, of course.”
“Us?” Melanie said. “Really?” I was thinking the same thing, only I was thinking “Us, really?” with total dread and horror, and she was saying it with total delight like someone had just told her we were going to be starring in the next Leo DiCaprio movie.
“I don’t know…” I said.
“We’d love to do it,” Mel said firmly. “We’d be honored.”
“Honored” was not the word I had in mind.
Maria pulled me aside once the meeting had ended. “I had an idea,” she said. There was something imprecise about the way she was talking, and her movements were a little sloppy. I wondered if she often got wasted in the morning. “Austin’s birthday party is the weekend after next. He’s only inviting a few of the boys in the class, so we’ve been keeping it kind of quiet, but I think you should bring Noah.”
“Does Austin want Noah to come?”
“Of course.” She waved her hand a bit too extravagantly and accidentally hit Tanya, who was walking by—right in the chin. “Oops, sorry,” Maria said with a giggle before turning back to me. “I think it would be good for Noah. He seems like such a sweet kid—he just needs to connect more to the other boys.”
“He’s weird,” I said.
“All boys are weird.”
“He’s weirder than most.”
She waved her hand again but fortunately didn’t hit anyone this time. “I’ll e-mail you the invitation. You can stay and hang out with me, and if he’s not having fun, you can always take him home.”
I wanted to be grateful but inside I was groaning at the thought of having to go. I knew Noah would spend the whole time glued to my side while the other boys played together, and history had taught me that we’d return home depressed and more certain than ever that he’d never fit in with his classmates. But I thanked her and said I’d check the calendar.
Carol Lynn caught up to Melanie and me just as we were walking out of the house. “Hey, I need to talk to you two.” The gardeners had moved on—you could hear a mower off in the distance, but Maria’s property was relatively quiet as we all moved together down the walkway. “So here’s the thing,” Carol Lynn said. “My adorable little cousin is moving to LA. I love this guy. He was in a fairly serious relationship in Chicago but she refused to move with him.”
“That’s too bad,” Melanie said.
“Oh, she was awful,” Carol Lynn said. “We’re actually all thrilled they broke up. Anyway, his mother—my aunt—asked me if I knew any nice young women in LA who I could fix him up with, to kind of smooth o
ver the whole transition. And I thought of”—she hesitated, looking back and forth between us—“well, both of you, I guess. Mostly you, though, Melanie. No offense, Rickie, you’re just a little young for him.”
And a little tattooed and pierced, I thought. I could just imagine what her aunt would say if he brought me home and informed her that Cousin Carol Lynn had set us up. “No worries.”
“Oh, wow,” Melanie said with a forced smile. “That’s so nice of you. But I don’t know—”
“Come on, Mel,” I said. “Why not?”
“He’s really cute,” Carol Lynn added. “And I’m not just saying that because he’s my cousin.” The sun was bright and she reached into her Prada purse and pulled out sunglasses, which she settled on her over-straightened nose. “He’s also sweet as can be.”
“Sounds like your kind of guy,” I said to Melanie.
“I think you should date him,” Mel shot back. “You’re the one who really needs a man in her life—for Noah’s sake, as well as yours.”
“Carol Lynn thinks you’re a better fit.”
“I’m happy to set you up with him, too, Rickie,” Carol Lynn said with a shrug. “Honestly. Who am I to say what will work? He was crazy about this other woman and I couldn’t stand her.” Then, realizing what she had just said, she added quickly, “Not that you’d be like that or anything. I’m just saying that attraction is a complicated thing.”
“Give him our home number,” I said. “We’ll figure it out from there.”
“All right, then,” Carol Lynn said. “His name’s Matt. Matt Quinn.”
“We’ll look forward to his call,” Melanie said tonelessly.
8.
The sun was blazing hot that afternoon, so when I picked Noah up from his first day of assistant coaching I expected to find a discouraged, sweaty, miserable kid.
I had forgotten that the basketball teams practiced in the air-conditioned gym.
He came running toward me as soon as I came in. “Look at this!” he said excitedly, thrusting a clipboard at me. The paper on it was covered in scribbles and names. “I helped Coach Andrew come up with a new play and the girls totally did it! See? This X here is Allison and this squiggle is Pammy, and Allison passed to Pammy who bounce-passed it to Lulu and Lulu threw it in the basket! They totally scored!”
“That’s awesome, Noey,” I said.
Andrew was surrounded by a group of chattering girls, half of whom were wearing cheap gym pull-on blue jerseys, half in white ones, but he spotted me and extricated himself from them. “Noah did great,” he told me as he came over, trailed by the girls. “Completely turned things around for Team Blue.”
A girl with long brown hair who was as tall as me said, “Are you Noah’s mom? Oh, my god, he is so cute.”
A smaller girl ruffled Noah’s hair. “I am so totally in love with him,” she said to me. Her braces gave her a slight lisp. “I just want to take him home with me.”
Noah smiled a little smile down at his toes.
“He’s already made a lot of fans,” Andrew said.
“Older women,” I said. “Clearly that’s the secret to success.”
Andrew raised his eyebrows. “I’ve got to remember that.”
“I’ve seen your girlfriend. You’re not exactly hard up.”
“I blew the whistle twice!” Noah told me. “Only the first time I wasn’t supposed to.”
“But we worked out a system, right, Noah?” Andrew said.
“I can only blow it when Coach Andrew tells me to,” Noah explained.
“Do you need a babysitter?” the dark-haired girl asked me. “Because I’d totally love to babysit him.”
“Me too,” said the braces one, and a third girl, who had red hair cut in a bob with a fringe and who had been shyly hanging back until then, took a brave step forward to say, “I want to too.”
A mom entered the gym with a small white puppy cradled in her arms, and all the girls squealed and raced over to pet it. One of them stopped and turned and beckoned to Noah, who obligingly trotted toward her. She put her arm around his shoulders and they walked together to join the circle around the dog.
“Wow,” I said to Andrew. “He made friends fast.”
“I’m glad I put him with the girls’ team. It was love at first sight.”
“Yeah, it would have been harder for him with boys, I think.”
He nodded absently. “Hey, can I ask you a personal question?”
“Those are my favorite kind!” I said.
“Is Noah’s father in the picture at all?”
“Oh, that personal question.” I lowered my voice. “The truth is… there is no father. Noah was cloned from one of my eyebrow hairs.”
He shot me a look. “I’m fairly certain clones have to be the same gender.”
“You’d think, wouldn’t you?” I said agreeably.
“Seriously—”
“Seriously, no, he’s so much not around that he doesn’t exist. Which is fine.”
“Have you ever thought about getting Noah hooked up with the Big Brothers organization?”
“The one that tortures people by putting rats on their face?” I said. “He can be annoying but I don’t think he deserves that.”
“I was thinking of the other kind of Big Brother,” he said. “The ratless kind.”
“Oh, I get it!” I said like it was all just dawning on me. “You think Noah needs a father figure.” Then I said, more normally, “Noah has my dad, you know.”
“Does he take him outside once in a while, throw a ball with him, stuff like that?”
I grinned at the thought. Man, the guy did not know my father. Or Noah, for that matter. I said loftily, “Don’t you think that’s a little sexist? Why couldn’t I be the one throwing a ball to Noah? Or my mother? Or my half sister? He spends time with all of us.”
“You could,” Andrew said calmly. “Does anyone in your household throw a ball with Noah or watch football games on TV with him?”
“No,” I admitted. “He doesn’t want to do that stuff. But we do lots of other things together—the kid gets plenty of attention. Probably too much. But if he gets a sudden overwhelming urge to play catch, I’ll tell him to give Coach Andrew a call. How’s that?”
“Good luck,” he said. “My home number’s unlisted.”
“Don’t you even want to rescue him from his miserable home life?”
He started to say something, then stopped. Then just said quietly, “I’m glad you’re letting Noah do this. We have a game on Friday, right after school. Can he come? It’s here.”
“If he wants to, it’s fine with me.”
“All right, then.” He walked away.
I watched him go, twisting my mouth sideways, aware that I’d sounded pretty snarky. But the whole “you need a man around” thing got under my skin like nothing else. I didn’t need a man around. Noah didn’t need a man around. We were fine.
“Mom?” Noah said, coming up to me with an uneven hopping skip that was weird even for him.
“What?”
“The dog pooped and I stepped in it.” He lifted his foot to show me he wasn’t lying. “You need to clean it.”
I looked around, but he was right: the job was all mine.
* * *
I called Ryan that night and asked him if I could come over. He said it “wasn’t a good idea.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m supposed to meet Gabriel and Sherri for dinner and a movie.”
“Would that be poor broken-hearted Gabriel?” I said. “Sounds like he’s really suffering.”
“Give it a rest. I’d invite you to come along, but you’d say stuff like that.”
“Forget it,” I said. “Have fun.” I hung up.
I had already put Noah to bed, so I wandered down the stairs, wondering, not for the first time, what it would be like to be living with a guy who would help me tuck Noah in and then curl up with me to watch TV or read in our own master bedroom.
/> I heard voices and followed them to the kitchen.
My mother and Melanie were talking at the table, both of them cuddling cups of tea. Mel looked distraught. Mom looked concerned.
“What’s going on?” I joined them at the table.
“Halloween,” Mel said with the kind of tragic tone one didn’t normally associate with a fun holiday.
“What about it?”
“Gabriel’s mother is making a big deal out of how she wants to see the kids trick-or-treat. So he’s asking if he can have them that night.”
Now I understood. That would be tragic, from Melanie’s perspective. I wondered how I would feel if I couldn’t trick-or-treat with Noah, but it was pretty hard to imagine: I never had to fight anyone for time with Noah. I had to beg people to give me time away from him. “Can you split up the evening so you can both do it?” I asked.
“It’s too hard on the kids. They’d be exhausted.”
“I was saying we should just invite Gabriel and Sandra to come here,” Mom told me.
“I don’t know if I can stand that.” Melanie’s mouth trembled. “I mean, to be together like we’re still together—you know what I mean—and have his mother there and then the kids all excited… It sounds unbearable.”
My mother put down her mug. “You have to think about what’s best for Nicole and Cameron.”
“I know, I know,” Melanie said. “I just don’t know if I can stand it.”
“Then don’t do it,” I said. “You’re the one who’s dealing with getting their costumes ready and all that stuff. What right does Gabriel have to start making demands?”
“He’s their father,” my mother said. “He has every right. And he’s asking, not demanding.” She clearly didn’t like that I wasn’t agreeing with her. She turned back to Melanie. “I know it won’t be easy. So you’ll have a glass of wine first.” She shrugged. “Maybe two. But it will make the kids so happy.”