This cruelty Brooke understood. “Yes, she is,” she said loyally.
Mrs. Carr was as short as her mother, but plump and buxom where Magdalena was slim. Mrs. Carr favored pink and cream to complement her frosted blond hair, and her pink manicured nails—hands and feet as Brooke noticed through the open-toed sandals—were soft and unused looking. Blue eyes just a shade too large, and a mouth clearly too thin, created a mom who passed muster in the PTA swift-glance gauntlet, but appeared to Brooke as lacking her own mother’s true beauty. Magdalena’s brown eyes, always alert and rimmed with mascara to emphasize her long lashes, seemed like a face much more worth looking at. Her brown skin, slim body, and rough hands looked like the epitome of womanhood to her daughter.
“Your mom’s from Mexico,” said Abraham, the elder brother, pronouncing the country as if he were talking about rat droppings in the kitchen.
The three of them were on the dock, but still wearing regular clothes instead of swimsuits. Brooke was told she had “the run of the house,” the friendly Mrs. Carr saying so, but instead made her way to the water where she could survey the mansion from a comfortable distance. Cicadas added their laconic complaint to the heat of the day, and Brooke watched smoke rise in some alarm, but it was only the rose-clad Mrs. Carr moving coals on the outdoor grille.
“Yes, she’s from Mexico, but she’s American,” replied Brooke. She wished the boys would go away and leave her alone. She liked squinting up at the house, sprawling white on the top of the rise, and pretending it was hers.
“No, she’s not. My dad said she’s illegal. He’s just hiring her to be nice.”
“Like today,” added Ezekiel. “We have to spend the day with you guys just to be nice.”
“She’s not illegal!” Brooke stood up at this. “My mom is a citizen, and she has every right to be here!” She wanted to shove that boy into the lake. He was placidly sitting there, legs dangling, shoes nearly touching the water, unruffled.
“Maybe if she marries someone and gets her green card,” he said.
She felt her cheeks flush. Always this aimed at her, and with no rejoinder she’d ever developed to pull out of her pocket and devastate inquirers. Where was her dad? And who was he?
“You just don’t know!” she fired at them both, mildly smiling up at her. The calm of the empowered. “She’s married! She’s just . . .”
“She doesn’t wear a ring,” Ezekiel pointed out.
“My dad’s a great guy, and he has so much more money than your dad!” she lied. “His house is like a huge mansion, and it’s three stories high!”
“Then why’s your mom a maid?”
“It’s just a job,” Brooke sputtered, before she turned and ran back up the hill, fragrant from a recent mowing, past the beds of lilies and irises, the weeping willow with a wrought iron bench beneath its natural curtains.
She was out of breath before she reached the house. She paused to wipe tears off her heated cheeks. There was something wrong with being a maid, she could tell by the boy’s tone as he said the word. She hadn’t known before that there was anything shameful to it. A maid, a cashier, a policewoman: what difference did it make?
Mrs. Carr was bent over, snapping a white linen tablecloth on the outdoor table, and didn’t see Brooke pass her.
Brooke stepped into the kitchen where she’d last seen her mother. It was a huge shining affair, with cupboards lit from inside like museum cases, displaying blown-glass bowls and goblets. An island as large as Brooke’s entire kitchen held dominion.
Her mother wasn’t here. Brooke went into the living room with its lifeboat-sized sofas and built-in bookshelves. Ancestor portraits were here, the original Abraham and Ezekiel who had traded wampum with the Indians and promptly built fences on the land they purchased. Enormous picture windows gave onto the lake, where she saw the two boys still sat on the dock.
She padded along to the foot of the staircase, which curved in double lines like the one where Cinderella made her grand entrance at the ball. Brooke knew it was wrong to walk around someone else’s house—but she liked the thrill. And after all, Mrs. Carr had said, “Mi casa es su casa,” and Brooke’s mom had immediately congratulated her on her accent.
“I’m learning!” Mrs. Carr had said. “It’s good to have you around. Maybe the boys will pick up some Spanish.”
So Brooke didn’t pause too long before climbing the stairs, gliding her hand up the fat, polished banister.
“I’m going up to bed,” she pretended, banishing the boys from her head. She daydreamed that upstairs held only a bedroom with a canopy bed for her. Even Mrs. Carr, she decided reluctantly, would have to go, nice as she was. Brooke wanted her own mom in the master suite.
And handsome Mr. Carr?
Maybe he could stay.
After what seems like a slow workday, Anthony shows up at 5:06. Brooke ignores Maria’s sly grin and gets her purse, thinking about how carelessly she’d shaved her legs in the shower that morning. Had she known, she would’ve taken more time.
Because, if she lets Anthony in, it’ll be just for one night.
The woman who moves to a new city every half-year or so and adopts a new identity can’t get deeply involved. Fielding questions, letting them get to know her: it can’t happen. So she’s made the decision in recent years to allow only one-night stands. If Anthony says the right things tonight, he’ll get everything he wants from her, and then she’ll throw him back like a fish, for his own good as well as hers.
“I was wondering if you like Thai food?” he says as they stand on the sidewalk outside the coffeehouse.
“It’s not really my favorite,” she reluctantly admits.
“How about a burger, like a good one?”
“That sounds perfect.”
“There’s a gourmet burger place a few blocks away that doesn’t take itself too seriously. We can walk there.” He gestures the way with his hand still in his trench coat pocket so he looks like a magician brandishing his cape.
They start out, and their paces match each other’s. She’s always been a fast walker, veering around people slowly meandering down the middle of the path.
“Well, you’re not vegetarian; we’ve got one thing figured out,” he says.
“No. But I’m sure if I went to see how the animals are treated, I would be.”
He smiles. “A convenient ignorance always abets a carnivore.”
She almost stops walking at that. He’s out of her league, this guy who uses the word abets in casual conversation.
“What are you?” she blurts out.
“What do you mean?”
“Are you a . . . you look like a stockbroker.”
“Thanks! I think. Assuming that’s
