Mrs. Perfect (25 page)

Entering the rental house, I stop and sniff. The house has a heavy, sour smell. Like onions and boiled cabbage. Mrs. Slutsky must be cooking.

“Hello,” I call out, setting my purse on the couch and then taking off my coat and dropping it there, too.

Mrs. Slutsky emerges from the kitchen with laundry beneath her arm. She looks at me and then my coat. “I cannot make the children responsible for their things if you do not set a good example,” she says disapprovingly.

I glance at the couch, see my coat. “I’ll put it away—”

She shakes her head and with a
tsk-tsk
ing sound walks out.

I make a face at her back. My girls aren’t the only ones missing bubbly, blond, and fun.

Chapter Twenty-Three

It takes me fifteen minutes to get rid of Mrs. S, a half hour to get rid of the smell of cabbage and potato soup, another twenty minutes to get a dinner of shrimp risotto going, and then fifteen for me to shower and wash my face, re-applying makeup to repair the damage done when I cried.

I’m working on opening a bottle of wine when Marta arrives.

“Perfect timing,” I say, answering the door with the bottle of wine in my hand. “Come in.”

As she enters the house, she slides off her black leather jacket. It’s a biker jacket, something a Hell’s Angel—or Ray—would like. “Thank God it’s Friday.”

With the wine under my arm, I hang up her jacket and lead her into my itty-bitty kitchen. Marta looks around and examines the changes I’ve made.

“This house is amazing. It smells amazing, too.” She takes the glass of wine I’ve poured her. “What is that? Saffron?”

“I’m making shrimp risotto, and if you’d been here an hour ago you would have smelled something very different.”

Marta grins. “Well, you should be proud of yourself. You’ve turned an ugly house into something charming. I’m pretty good with basic design, but I couldn’t have done this. This required some serious imagination, never mind a lot of elbow grease.”

I shrug off the compliment and head for the dining room table, where I’ve put out small dishes of olives, hummus, goat cheese spread, and crackers. “I like making things pretty. It’s easy for me.”

“It’s not easy for everyone.” Marta sits at the dining room table and takes a cracker. “You can do things most people can’t do.”

“They could if they tried.”

“You can’t be nice to yourself if you tried.”

I groan, rub at the bridge of my nose. “You’re already my boss. It’ll give me nightmares if you’re also my shrink.”

She laughs and runs a hand through her long dark hair. “I hate shrinks. But that’s probably because I need one more than anybody.” Then without skipping a beat, she changes the topic. “So what did you do to deserve being excommunicated from the Points auction committee?”

The lump returns to my throat. I shake my head.

“They had to have a reason,” she persists.

I struggle to get out the words. “I haven’t been financially responsible.”

“With the auction money?”

“With Nathan’s and our money.”

“But that’s your money. That’s personal. You haven’t been irresponsible with anyone else’s money. You’re not irresponsible with people’s time.”

“But it doesn’t work that way, and the horrible thing is, I knew it, too. I learned when I was growing up if you goof in your personal life, you’ll suffer in your public life. One mistake and you’re labeled.”

“Only if you let yourself be labeled.”

If only that were the way life worked.

“Taylor, if you have a fault, it’s that you give people too much power. People aren’t that powerful. They can’t hurt you—”

“Yes, they can. They can and they do.”

“Because you let them!” Her voice rises with frustration. “You’ve told yourself that others are more important and more valuable than you—”

“I haven’t.”

“Then why does their opinion matter more to you than your own?”

I don’t have an answer.

“It seems to me that you’ve decided if people have money, they have more power, and clout—”

“Well, they do,” I say shortly. “People with money are respected. People with money are listened to.”

“You think you need money to be respected?”

I think of South Pasadena, where I grew up. I remember how my dad’s business suffered when Mom left, I remember the gossip and scandal. Cissy and I were mocked. Teased. Dad was demoralized. He hid.

“Maybe.”

“You know, Taylor, if money brought respect, why do I respect you more now than when you were the head honcho of everything?”

She must see my expression because she nods. “And I don’t just respect you, Taylor, I’ve realized I like you. I even admire you.”

“
You
admire
me
?”

Her gaze holds mine. “You do things many women are afraid to do. You tackle enormous projects, hard-core projects. Someone needs help, you offer your time. Someone needs a hand, you’re there in person. You do something lots of people don’t do anymore. You give. You give of yourself, and you don’t ask for anything in return.”

There’s something so honest and kind in Marta’s voice that I look down into my wineglass before she can see how much her words touch me. She doesn’t realize how much I needed to hear something good about me, something positive.

“You’re a lot like my Eva,” she continues. “Eva really wants everyone to like her. Eva wants everyone to approve of her. Not because she isn’t wonderful, and not because she truly needs approval. It’s because she’s sensitive. She cares about other people. She likes making other people happy, but as I’m trying to teach her, you can’t hinge your happiness on other people’s. It’s impossible to always make others happy. Some people just don’t want to be happy. Others are looking for someone to blame.”

Her expression is concerned. “Perhaps it’s time you stopped listening to that little voice in your head and grew a new voice. One that’s nicer to you than the one you’ve got talking at you now.”

“Marta,” I protest, but she looks at me so long that I squirm.

“We’re not so different. I actually don’t think women are all that different. Somehow we’ve all ended up with mean little voices in our heads. Voices that say we’re not good enough and we’ll never be good enough.”

“You have those, too?”

She grimaces. “
Yes
. And one day I just got sick and tired of all that crap in my head, so I stopped letting the voices yap away. I kicked them out, and I think you need to do that with the nasty voices in your head, too.”

I look at her skeptically. “What did your voices say?”

“I was unlovable. I was bound to fail. That no one would ever want me. That no one would ever be faithful.” Her shoulders shift. “They’re not uncommon fears. But I was just sick of them. Sick of them making me feel bad all the time.” She leans forward, taps my arm. “Maybe it’s time you stopped focusing on what you do wrong, Taylor, and start celebrating what you do right.”

Later that night after Marta leaves and my girls are in bed, I stand in the kitchen at the sink, finishing the dinner dishes, and think about everything Marta said.

Marta said a lot.

She said so much that my brain still hurts.

But one thing stands out: I don’t trust myself right now, and I don’t trust the little voice in my head because it is warped. It does say mean things . . . it says mean things about me. And it talks endlessly, a constant dialogue critiquing everything I think and feel and do.

You blew it
.

You did it wrong
.

You always do it wrong
.

You messed up
.

You can’t get it right
.

You can’t get anything right
.

You’re stupid
.

You’re lazy
.

You’re foolish
.

You’re dreamy
.

You’re impractical
.

You’re selfish
.

You’re bad
.

You’re bad. I silently repeat the last one as I load the dishwasher, knowing these voices are part of that horrible, hollow feeling inside of me. Knowing I’ve somehow created this horrible, hollow feeling inside of me. But I’m not hollow, and I’m not horrible. For all my mistakes, I do love my girls, and I try my best to take care of them. For all my flaws and my vanity and my pride, I do love Nathan, and I love him with all my heart. The truth is, I do try. I always try.

Maybe Marta’s right about something else. Maybe trying your best, and doing your best, even if it’s not perfect, is enough.

Maybe it’s unrealistic to think I can be perfect.

Or to put it in Marta-speak, that’s why we have religion. God’s perfect. We’re human.

As I turn off the water, I reach for a sponge. Wouldn’t it be amazing to stop expecting perfection and focus more on being real? Being human?

Wiping off the counters, I have another thought. Maybe Dad’s biggest mistake wasn’t being left by Mom, but cowering. Apologizing. Hiding.

My fingers grip the sponge so hard, I squeeze water all over the counter.

I’m so sick of apologizing.

So sick of feeling less than. I want to be happy with me. I want to finally like me. Would that be so wrong?

“Mommy, I’m thirsty,” Tori says, suddenly appearing in the kitchen doorway in her pink princess sprigged pajamas.

“You’re supposed to be asleep,” I say, dropping the sponge in the sink and turning to face her.

“I can’t sleep. There are too many spiders in my room.”

“There aren’t any spiders,” I say, fighting exasperation.

“Yes, there are.”

“Tori.”

“Come see.” She holds out a hand to me, her expression determined as well as resigned.

I take her hand and we walk back to the little room she shares with Brooke. A small night-light is plugged into the wall, illuminating one wall with soft yellow gold light. I look around the room and see nothing. “There’s no spider,” I whisper. “Now go to bed.”

“There is a spider.”

“Tori . . .”

“Look.” She slips her hand from mine and walks to the foot of the trundle bed and points at the wall. “See?”

I go look and see. A spider not quite as big as my palm sits on the wall just a few inches above the heating vent. It’s big. It’s blackish brown. It is not—on the plus side—hairy.

“See?” she repeats.

Bless her. “Yes, I do. Just a sec.” Back in the kitchen, I get a wad of paper towels, then I grab the spider and take it outside and dump it in the bushes next to the front door.

My arms are covered in goose bumps as I close the door, but Tori’s beaming at me. “You did it! Hooray!”

I lift her onto my hip. “Do you think you can sleep now?”

She wraps her arms around my neck. “If I can sleep with you in your bed.”

She looks at me so hopefully that I can’t tell her no. “Only if you promise not to pee the bed.”

In the morning I wake up and slide quietly from beneath the covers so I don’t disturb Tori, who is still asleep and sharing my pillow. After closing my bedroom door, I check on the other two. They’re still asleep, too.

I make coffee, then sit at my computer at the dining room table, check e-mail, and see that I’ve got two messages, one from Nathan and one from Marta.

I open Nathan’s first.
T, I’m sorry I missed your call. I want to talk. N

I read and reread his e-mail. He wants to talk . . . he wants to talk . . . he wants to talk. What does that mean?

I type a brief answer:
Call when you can. I’m just home hanging out with the girls today
.

Next I read Marta’s e-mail.
Taylor, do you want to be auction chair again? Marta

Wow. Interesting question. A good question, too. I get up from my chair, pace the kitchen and living room.

Part of me would jump at the chance to be auction chair again. I started working on the auction months ago, before school even ended last year. Our first meeting was last August, and Patti and I poured ourselves into organizing and motivating the committee.

Being auction chair meant so much to me then. It doesn’t mean as much now. Having my family together again, that’s what’s important now.

I sit back at my computer, answer Marta’s e-mail:
If I could have anything, I’d have Nathan home with us again.

After pushing send, I get up and pace again as the old fear comes back at me, the fear of being less than, the fear of being forgotten, abandoned. But instead of running to my beloved box of Cheerios, I face the fears that I’m no one and nothing and realize it’s not true. I am someone. A very flawed someone. But flawed or not, I matter. I matter to a lot of people. Even more important, I matter to me.

The girls end up sleeping in, and after they wake up we just hang out, enjoying being lazy. I’m glad. It’s Saturday and a gorgeous day already, too, with clear blue sky and morning sunlight streaming through the kitchen windows and bouncing off the small antique crystal chandelier I hung in the kitchen light fixture.

Delicate rainbow prisms splash on the opposite wall. Little crystal knobs I rescued from a thrift store catch the light and dress up the creamy white cabinet doors.

Brooke enters the kitchen with my box of Cheerios under her arm and sees the splinters of light shimmering across the narrow room. “Rainbows, Mom.”

I’m standing next to the counter, making a grocery list. “It’s pretty, isn’t it?”

“I like this house,” she says, putting down the box and coming to stand next to me. “It’s little and old, but you made it nice.”

“Thank you.” Someday, I think, I’ll miss our old house, but for now, I’m determined to focus on the things I can do, the things I can make, and the things I can paint. “Did you and your sisters still want to get out some of the Christmas decorations today?”

“Are we going to get the tree, too?”

“Maybe.”

Jemma enters the kitchen with a stack of catalogs that came in yesterday’s mail. “I don’t want to do the tree today. I want to start our baking. We haven’t made anything yet.”

I add peanut butter to the list before looking up at the girls. “Maybe we can do the tree today and the baking tomorrow.”

“Or maybe we can do the baking today and the tree tomorrow,” Jemma answers, hauling herself onto the kitchen counter to look through the new Victoria’s Secret catalog. She loves all the catalogs, always on the lookout for something interesting or new. I used to be like that. I loved the opportunity to browse and shop. Every glossy catalog filled me with ideas of how life could be. Every purchase hinted at the person I wasn’t yet but hoped to be.

“Some of the girls in my class are already wearing a bra,” Jemma says, studying pictures of the world’s supermodels in delicate bra and panties sets.

“Girls develop at different ages.” I chew on the end of my pen and wonder if I’m going to finally have to give the birds and bees talk, something I’ve carefully avoided almost as much as Jemma has. She never asks questions about how babies are made, and I’ve never tried to explain . . . yet. But I should. My mom never explained it to me, and I found out through trash talk from friends.