and was so sure he loved me.
Right now, I don’t even know my next move. Let me figure that out first. Then I’ll sic Alex on him.
So instead of leveling with them, I resort to diversionary tactics. “Palm Beach is too stuffy.” I sink into the couch cushions and slant a glance at Rainey. I catch her almost imperceptible eye roll.
“Come on, Kate.” Alex scowls at me. “You’ve managed to pooh-pooh every suggestion we’ve made tonight. South Beach is too wild. Palm Springs is too boring. Napa’s too far.” She says this in a singsong voice that makes me want to jump out of my skin. “New York’s too… What was wrong with New York?”
I shouldn’t have come tonight, but after what happened today, I’ve been running on autopilot, trying to regain my equilibrium. Quite unsuccessfully, I might add. So I can’t blame them for being annoyed. I’d be irritated with me, too. Especially since this girls’ getaway is the last one we’ll take as thirty-somethings.
Yep, the big four-oh looms right down the pike. For each of us, one right after the other. Boom, boom, boom. I’m the first of the three to cross that dubious threshold in May. Alex turns right after me in August—
Turns.
Turns? That’s horrible. It sounds like one day we’re light and lively and the next day we’re soured milk. I’d never thought of it that way and wish I hadn’t, because it gives me yet another reason to dread turning forty. Anyhow, Rainey is the baby of the bunch, the last of us to outlive her shelf life. She turns in November.
We started the annual girls’ getaway the year of our thirtieth birthdays. So in a sense this year is a double celebration—ten years of annual getaways and our foray into the fabulous forties. I guess that makes me a double party pooper.
“Must we decide this tonight? It’s late.” I stand up and prepare to leave, ignoring the pair of disapproving looks. Rainey levels me with a stare that screams stop being so difficult.
“Palm Beach is perfect. It has spas and shopping. What more could we ask for? All in favor of Palm Beach?”
As I pull my car keys from my bag, the two of them raise their hands, voting yes, looking at me with equal parts exasperation and impatience.
I hitch my Coach bag onto my shoulder. “Okay, fine. Palm Beach. Whatever.”
At this point, I’ll agree to anything, even though I have no intention of actually going. I just want to leave before the walls close in on me. Later, I’ll think of a plausible excuse to bow out of the trip. Maybe I’ll even tell the truth.
Ha. The truth. What a novel idea.
I don’t have to tell them about my suspicions, mind you. The other truth is that my six-year-old, Caitlin, hates it when I go away, which is not very often. So I can’t go because Corbin’s not a good babysitter. He’s a good dad, and Caitlin loves him as if he were a prince. But when it comes to bedtime, she wants me.
God, that’s lame. They’ll never buy it.
Well, we’re all adults. Alex and Rainey will understand. Eventually.
Alex makes a satisfied noise. “This is going to be a blast.” She does a little merengue step. “We’re going to get every imaginable spa treatment known to woman-kind, then we’re going to par-tay and we’re going to shop— Oh, Kate, that reminds me, I still have your pearls. Let me run upstairs and get them before you go.”
She’s out of the room before I can tell her not to worry about it. Rainey and I stand face-to-face for an awkward moment. I can tell she’s going to ask what’s bugging me. So I drop my purse onto the chair, pick up my champagne flute and carry it to the kitchen.
She follows me.
The room is too small for both of us and the pregnant questions wedged between.
I keep my back to her and wash my glass.
“Are you all right?” she finally asks. “You haven’t been yourself all night.”
“I’m fine. Tired.”
My composure wavers. In my mind’s eye I see hysteria reaching up to trip me, yanking my poise out from under me like an old rug. I have that sense of slow-motion disorientation, like when you see yourself suspended in midair a split second before a hard fall.
But I’m still standing.
If I stand perfectly still, not moving or speaking or breathing, I will not go down.
I will not come undone.
For a full minute I let the water run over my hands and stare at the vivid cobalt and yellow in the Spanish tile backsplash behind Alex’s kitchen sink.
My eyes haven’t teared. No surprise. For the past twelve hours, I’ve felt as if I were locked inside a wooden cask of a body, incapable of emotion. Numbed by the hard exterior that’s settled around me.
Movement reflected in the kitchen window catches my eye. I see Rainey’s reflection. She’s just standing there. Not pushing or needling or prodding. Somehow, without even looking directly at her, I sense she’s reaching out through the murky stillness. I know in that instant I could fall backward, and she wouldn’t let me hit the ground. But I can’t right now. I just can’t.
I turn to her and say, “I’m fine, Rainey. Really.”
Alex enters with my pearls. They were an anniversary gift from Corbin. She drops them into my hand, and I get the absurd vision that they’re an abacus tallying Corbin’s transgressions.
One precious pearl for each sin against our marriage. I’m sober enough to realize I’m just tipsy enough to let my imagination run rampant, but I’m okay to drive. I wouldn’t get behind the wheel otherwise.
Fingering the pearls, I grab my purse, say good-night and escape into the chilly cloak of moonless night, wishing it would swallow me whole so I wouldn’t have to go home and face my husband.
During my twenty-minute drive to Winter Park I realize I need to come up with a game plan. I’ve had since ten o’clock this morning when the mail arrived to think about it. Yet I still can’t force myself to go there. What in the world am I going to say to Corbin when I get home?
“Sweetheart, I received the strangest letter in the mail today. It said, ‘Ask your husband what he’s been doing all those nights he claimed to be at the hospital.’” Then I’ll laugh to prove I’m confident the note’s a prank.
Then he’ll laugh, and it will become our own private joke. He’ll pull me into bed and make love to me to show me how absurd the letter was.
We haven’t made love in months. Why would tonight be any different? Especially when I’m pretty sure he’s not going to be overly thrilled about getting his own dinner. When it came time to go out, I fed Caitlin and let her go play at the neighbor’s house. I was in such a fog I didn’t even think about fixing his dinner. I hope I locked the door.
I can’t think straight for all the bells and whistles sounding in my head warning that something’s rotten in the Hennessey household. If I ignore my gut feeling I’ll be just like all the other pathetic women who know damn well
