Oh, shit.
“Yeah?”
I guess I’m leaning too hard on the passenger door because she glances over and then hits the power-lock button. Like I would’ve put a little more weight into it and the door would’ve flown open. I can’t look over to see how fast we’re going because I don’t want Mrs. O’Donnell to think I think she’s speeding, which she’s not but still. It feels like borderline speeding. Fast enough so if the door opened I’d fall out. I’d end up in a wheelchair peeing into one of those bags hanging on the side.
We’re passing Byron’s hot dogs where you pick from a million toppings and they have the world’s best French fries they put in brown paper bags to soak up some of the grease. I used to have two hot dogs and a whole bag of cheese fries just for myself (the boys always split the fries) but then I went vegetarian and now I order the garden burger, which isn’t half bad considering it’s a hot-dog place.
“You were in a carrel near the librarian’s desk,” she’s saying.
“I was in a hurry so I couldn’t stop to say hi and it’s a library so I couldn’t call out to you. Sorry.”
A little faster and I bet I’d die. If the door flew open. Even with the seat belt on I’d get sucked out by the wind like a movie plane crash and my head would hit the pavement and Mrs. O’Donnell’d be so shocked she’d take a second or two to hit the brakes, which wouldn’t do any good since by then my neck would’ve snapped back so hard my head would be hanging by a bloody thread.
“You looked lost in thought,” she’s saying.
“Huh?”
“At the library. Were you working on a paper or something?”
Last week before the grounding I finally got up the courage to go inside. Ricky’d been on my case to check it out when he wasn’t busy trying to get into Missy’s pants and lecturing me on drugs. He was right, it took about five seconds to Google her. Luckily there aren’t many Geraldine Wilkes in the world. At least not in the Midwest. Anyway, Ricky’s all, we went to all that trouble to find your mother and now you’re chickening out? At least see what she looks like.
The door felt heavy when I opened it and the springs were tight so it pretty much hit me in the ass when it shut. Totally embarrassing except no one saw. Thank God because that could’ve been the first time she ever laid eyes on me. My hands were shaking so bad I shoved them into my pockets and since my pockets are low on my baggy pants, the ones with the peace sign stitched on the butt, it makes me look like a frigging terrorist. I should have worn something else. It’s the first time I’ve ever thought that … and it’s only because I wouldn’t have wanted to scare her and make her wish she hadn’t spawned a child of darkness. People call us that. That or freaks. They think it doesn’t hurt feelings and maybe some people don’t care but it makes me feel like shit. I see them looking at me and staring and they wonder why I hang back. I just wish I could be invisible. I try to stay in the background but I still get the looks.
I was surprised at how nice it is in the library, all high ceilings and big armchairs facing the window. Most of them taken up by old people reading newspapers that hang on bamboo poles. There’s a whole section of phone books so if you want to call someone in North Dakota, no problem. A few of the long tables have people actually doing work with big textbooks, some of them writing fast like they’re taking a timed test. Everyone else is at the computer section either using them or waiting to use them. People standing around looking over the shoulders of the people but they’re not really in line so I wonder what happens if two people lunge when a computer gets free. The ones pacing back and forth probably fight it out. The guy in the pimped-out wheelchair’ll get first crack of course. There are a couple of blue-haired ladies so old they look like they can’t eat solid food anymore. I see tons of old people like them piling out of buses at the Sears Tower, with matching plastic badges hanging from their necks. I’m sure they’re waiting to check e-mail to see if their grandkids have written them. My grandparents are dead but I don’t think I’d e-mail them if they were alive. In pictures they don’t look like the type to e-mail. Not the cruise-ship, denture type.
I’ve been picturing her sitting there at the front desk with glasses on a string around her neck, quietly sitting in her chair using one of those little pencils with no eraser, the kind that are impossible to sharpen. But there are like a million librarians and they’re all busy like it’s a yard sale. I set myself up at the end of one of the long wooden tables. I took out my biology homework like I’m really going to work on it. Yeah right. I watch for a while but not one of the women coming and going with double-decker book carts look like me. Not one. I gave up around dinnertime because it’s pizza night at home and I forgot to tell Samantha to order me the deep-dish veggie one with no onions. She’ll get thin-crust cheese and the boys’ll wolf it down and I’ll only get two pieces and I’m sick of that.
“Is it time for midterms yet?” Mrs. O’Donnell is saying. She puts her blinker on to turn left and the ticking of it seems louder than it should. Like she’s timing my answer.
“Oh. Um … no. It’s not midterm yet,” I say.
We pull up to our house and as usual the boys have trouble with the side sliding door because Mrs. O’Donnell forgets to hit the power unlock when she parks. They’re so psyched to get home it’s ridiculous. Nine times out of ten they push through the front door at the same time and since they have backpacks and coats on they get stuck until I push them all the way through.
Then I walk into the hell that is my life. Bob’s home early from work for some reason and he’s holding out shoe boxes to me like ooooh, you just won the lottery. I dump my bag and start walking to the kitchen until he says:
“Don’t you want to know what’s in these boxes?”
“Um, shoes?” Duh.
He opens them up like I knew he’d do anyway he’s so obsessed with shoes he can’t ever wait long enough for someone else to look inside he’s like a kid on Christmas. A pig in shit, Monica would say.
And then, like he’s expecting the angels to sing for the unveiling, he pulls out … a cleat.
“Those look a little big for the boys,” I say. I try to move past him to the kitchen but then he smiles his dorky smile that shows his yellowing teeth. “Dad, two words. Crest. White-strips.”
He’s still blocking my way.
“Dad. Move. I’m starving.”
“They’re for you! You’re on the soccer team!”
That’s when the bomb drops.
“What?” I manage to push the word out of my mouth.
“I talked to the coach and he says you can start tomorrow. Practice is right after school. You meet up outside the gym and walk over to the field at the lakefront. It goes for an hour and a half.”
“Yeah right. I’m not going just so you know.”
“Oh, yeah, you are.”
Samantha comes in from the kitchen where I know she’s been huddling by the door listening.
“I don’t even play soccer. Nice try. I’m getting something to eat now.”
Samantha says, “You are playing soccer. Starting tomorrow. And don’t get any ideas about skipping out. The coach is going to call us every day after practice to fill us in.”
For some reason Bob looks at her like she’s saying something he didn’t expect her to say. Whatever. I’ve stopped trying to figure them out.
“Why don’t you just put me on a chain gang on the side of the expressway picking up trash,” I say.
“We considered that,” Bob says. He actually thinks he’s being funny but even Samantha doesn’t laugh. So he goes, “Well, I’m done” like he’s wiping his hands clean and when he goes up the stairs to his goddamn computer I hear him sigh like oh woe is me my daughter’s such a fuck-up. Samantha watches him too.
“Look, I’m sorry, okay,” I say. “Please don’t make me play soccer, Mom. Please.”
“It’s a done deal.”
I hate when I cry when I’m mad. I can’t control it. It makes me look
sad when I’m not.
“Mom, come on. They’ll kill me out there. Or in the locker room. Swear to God, they’re hard-core. And I’m like …”
“What? You’re like what?”
“I’m a freak! You think I don’t know that? I see the way you look at me, you think I don’t but I do. Please, Mom. Please don’t make me do it. I’ll do anything else but sports. I’ll do the dishes for a year. I’ll clean the whole house every weekend, swear to God. Please.”
“Nope.”
“Mom. Come on. Like I’m really going to go? I’m not going.”
“Yeah, Cammy. Yeah, you are.”
At least she can walk upstairs away from the shit. I’m stuck in it and it just keeps getting deeper.
I hate my life.
And I’m not going to soccer. No fucking way.
Samantha
“Andrew! Come here and let me get a Band-Aid on you.”
“I don’t need one,” he calls back as he’s coming off the soccer field toward the mini bottled waters. Other parents move in and hover but I try to give him space because the parents who move in during halftime give me the creeps. Let the kids be on a team, I want to tell them. Let them bond. Let them talk about the first half. Let them do anything but be smothered by people they see every other second of their lives.
On the other hand, here I am calling my son like that old spaghetti commercial where the mother is hanging out her apartment window calling down a city block.
“Just come here for a second.” I motion him over. He rolls his head back and drags himself slowly toward me like he’s a fish being reeled in.
I hunt through my purse past packets of Kleenex, tampons, lipsticks, my camera, datebook, my cell and finally find a lint-covered Band-Aid.
“Give me your arm.”
“I gotta go—he’s about to blow the whistle.”
“Two seconds. There. Go.”
From the distance someone calls sorry and a small soccer ball rolls within inches of me.
“No problem,” I say, and a gorgeous brunette is walking toward me reaching for the ball. The sun is behind her. She flicks her shiny brown hair over her shoulder. She looks like she’s walked out of a shampoo commercial. Or out of the ocean in a James Bond movie. In slow motion. Her purse swings from the crook of her arm, looking expensive. Her ballet flats have miraculously avoided the patches of mud littering the sidelines.
“We haven’t exactly mastered our kicking.” She smiles, motioning with her head toward her daughter. “Thanks.”
“Been there,” I say, smiling back. I look at the beautiful girl who looks like she’ll inherit her mother’s classic bone structure. “Here you go. How old are you, honey?”
“Five.” She eyes me suspiciously before hiding behind her mother’s thin legs.
“I have sons who’re just a little older than you. Are you on the 5G team? Yes? Wow. My sons, Jamie and Andrew, are on 8B.”
I hold out my hand to the woman. “I’m Sam Friedman.”
“Hi,” she says with a firm handshake, “I’m Evie Riggs. This is Lexi. And we better get going, sweetie, I see the coach pulling everyone together, so I think the game’s about to start. Anyway, nice meeting you. I’m sure I’ll see you around.”
Oh. My. God. Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod.
I swallow back vomit. I watch her walk away. She’s happy. She’s stunning. She’s perfect. I feel nothing but pure raging jealousy. I’m in a trance, moving to keep her in sight. I walk to the end of the field by the goal so I can get a better view. I watch her from a distance, her posture, her ease with the other parents, throwing her head back to laugh at something someone says to her. Terry, Sophie’s mother, is talking to me but I can’t hear her. Craig’s not there, thank God. I don’t know how I’d deal with that, Jesus Christ. Can’t even imagine. Evie cheers and claps for Lexi’s team. Someone moves in toward her so I walk farther from the boys’ game, closer to her field. She’s talking to another woman. They look like good friends, the way they’re leaning in. Someone else comes up to the other side of her … she’s like the Pied Piper the way everyone’s drawn to her. Damn, I can’t see her now. A woman is setting up her folding hammock chair right behind her. God, she’s beautiful. I can’t believe he didn’t mention it. Then again, what would he say? Oh, by the way, my wife’s a knockout. Of course he didn’t mention it. Not to me. I bet his friends shake their heads in awe at his luck. The two of them together are probably worshipped. Like movie stars. Their friends probably hold them up as the perfect couple. They throw the best dinner parties or did you hear what he did for her fortieth? So romantic or they really have it together, so in love after so much time. How could he not be attracted to her? I guess, now that I think about it, he’s never said he wasn’t attracted to her, he’s just talked about how they don’t have sex.
I look down at my sweatpants and my muddy old running shoes. My hair’s dirty, so I have it in a messy ponytail. Here’s what would happen if I walked up to her and said, I know everything about your husband. And you. I know what side of the bed you sleep on. You don’t snore but you toss and turn. I know you don’t like to travel much anymore. I know you don’t cook. You like tea, not coffee, and you tried to get Craig to like it, too, but he hates it. Your best friend’s worried about you and you don’t know it but she mentioned something to your husband about you being depressed. You like reality TV. You finished The Odyssey in two weeks. You like classical, not Top 40 like Craig. He’s my best friend. I’m his. You don’t even know this part of his life. I think we’re infatuated with each other. She’d laugh. Hard.
I mean, look at me and look at her. She’s perfect. Exquisite. And me, I’m … what am I? Okay, fine, I’m attractive. I can pull it together. But I’m no Evie Riggs. Not by a long shot.
I’m openly staring at her. Memorizing everything about her. She’s reaching into her purse for something. What is it? I move in front of a family waiting for the next game. She’s putting her hair back. Into a ponytail. Of course it’s a perfect ponytail. All her hair makes it in so it looks polished, like she’s stepped out of a Ralph Lauren ad. And Lexi … she’s gorgeous, too. I can see she’s a happy child. The kind of happy that comes from having loving, doting parents. I want to scoop her up and swing her around just to see her laugh. To see if she has his smile. I want to hug her, hold her close, inhale her. I realize I love her, too. I love her because he loves her. I love her because she is a piece of him walking around.
“Earth to Mom! The game’s over, jeez.” Jamie shakes my arm. “Can we go?”
“We’re hungry,” Andrew says.
I crane my neck to see what she’s doing. Ah. Lexi’s running her tiny little legs back onto the field. Evie’s clapping like everyone else.
“Don’t you wanna know who won?” Jamie asks.
“Oh, sorry, honey—I watched the whole thing! Of course I know who won, silly. You guys played great. Good job! So fast down the field—especially in that last quarter, Jamie. You two are so good!”
Andrew kicks the ball back and forth all the way to the car. I don’t know how I manage to walk, but somehow we’re standing outside the car and Jamie’s pulling at the door handle.
“I didn’t play the second half,” Jamie mumbles.
“Mom, the door’s locked,” Andrew says.
“Can we go now?”
She’s cupping her hands to yell to the players then smiling. I bet she says stuff like “nice try!” or “good job” or “next time, next time.”
The boys have climbed into the minivan and I hit the button that slides the side door closed automatically. As it seals shut I let myself cry. A quick, gulped-back cry. I can’t fall apart now. I don’t have time. Do not fall apart now. Pull it together, Sam.
But I can’t. I’ve never felt this way about another human being. Ever. But I want … I just want …
I want to be her. I want to be Evie Riggs.
I take the long way home from the lakefront, past their house. Lately I’ve
been doing this but never with the kids in the car. Not that it really matters, though. Craig’s driven by our house, too. He confessed it to me a few weeks ago.
“Can we get McDonald’s?” Andrew calls from the backseat. “Jamie, stop. Mom make Jamie stop poking me. Jamie, stop. Mom!”
“Ow! Stop it.” Jamie’s turn now. “Mom, Andrew just punched me.”
“Boys, cut it out.” The words have no muscle behind them.
“Where are we?” Jamie asks. “Can we get McDonald’s?”
“Yeah. In a minute,” I say, slowing to about ten miles an hour. “Just a second.”
“We can?” Andrew asks. “Yessss!”
“You never let us have McDonald’s,” Jamie says.
“Shut up,” Andrew hisses at him. “She’ll change her mind.”
They live in a beautifully restored Victorian with a wraparound front porch and matching wicker chairs. The hedge along the house has been trimmed the way only professionals can trim. They probably have a team descend once a week to take care of the stuff we never do. Raking. Weeding. Pushing wood chips back onto the flower beds.
“Mo-om,” the boys whine in unison.
“Okay okay okay.” I turn my eyes back to driving.
At the drive-through they lean forward and blurt their orders out to me: “Hamburger but no pickles” “Chicken nuggets with the honey sauce” “Can we get two fries so we don’t have to share?” “Yeah, I’m starving!” “Coke” “Sprite” “Wait, they’re doing Transformers—can we have Happy Meals?” “They don’t have hamburger Happy Meals!” “Yeah, they do—Mom, can we get Happy Meals, the ones with Transformers?” “I want mine with a hamburger.”