The Good Wife (4 page)

“Everything okay?”

“Sarah’s a wreck, and JJ just wanted to talk.”

“What did he have to say?”

Meg hesitated, studying Jack’s strong, patrician features and unsmiling mouth. He didn’t smile much anymore, and suddenly she wondered if he ever had. “He talked about Grandma and Grandpa, and how much Grandpa would miss Grandma. He said they were best friends. I agreed. And then he asked . . .” Her voice trailed off as she struggled to voice JJ’s question. “He asked . . . if we had ever been like that. Best friends. And I told him yes.”

Jack didn’t say anything. His expression didn’t change. But Meg felt that acidic knot return to her stomach, the one that seemed to live there all the time, making her reach for Tums and Rolaids several times a day.

“What?” she prompted, trying to see into Jack’s brown eyes, trying to read what he was thinking.

“A long time ago,” he said finally.

She pressed the pillow closer to her cheek. Her face felt so hot, and yet on the inside she felt so cold. “Not that long ago.”

“Seems like forever.”

“We’ve had a hard year.”

“It wasn’t good before that.”

He was referring to her affair. Her affair, her fault, her responsibility. And it was no one’s fault but hers. She’d be doing penance forever, not because anyone asked it of her, but because she owed it. She’d messed up, badly; and nine months later, she still found it impossible to forgive herself. Maybe one day she could. Maybe when she and Jack were good again, solid again. She looked forward to the day. Prayed for the day. It was hard living with so much self-hatred. “It’ll get better.”

“I’m not happy.”

Meg exhaled slowly. “I’m sorry.”

“Are we working?” he asked.

“I’m not unhappy.”

“But are you happy?”

Her eyes stung and the acid from her stomach seemed to be bubbling up her esophagus and into her throat. “This is a kind of tough time to be talking about happiness. Mom’s just died. The funeral was this morning. We had two hundred and fifty people over to the house—”

“But that’s the point. We’re all going to die. Death is inevitable. In fact, some would say we’re dying every day.”

“I disagree. As long as you’re alive, you’re alive. When you’re dead, you’re gone—”

“Unless you’re not really alive. Unless you’re just going through the motions.” Jack’s mouth flattened, and a small muscle pulled and popped in his jaw. “Like we are.”

You mean, like you are,
Meg silently corrected, closing her eyes, shoulders rising up toward her ears.

“This isn’t working with us, Meg.”

She didn’t want to hear this, not now, not today. She was too sad. Things had been too hard. “We’re tired, Jack, worn out—”

“I leave tomorrow for D.C., and I think we need to really think about the future and what we want. We’re not getting any younger. We deserve to be happy. You deserve to be happy—”

“I’m not unhappy, Jack!” she cried, sitting up, knocking away a tear before it could fall. “I’m just tired. It’s been a rough couple of weeks, and a very long day, and I will not lose you now, not after everything we’ve been through. We’re good together. We have the kids. We have a history. We have a future.”

“But maybe it’s not the one I want,” he answered quietly, his voice cutting through the dark room, and her heart.

Meg’s lips parted but no sound came out. She balled her hands into fists and pressed them against her thighs. She wouldn’t cry. She wouldn’t. Things would work out. They always worked out. She just had to be strong. “Have faith, Jack! We
will
get through this.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Jack.”

“I’m not trying to be mean, Meg. I’m just being honest.”

Palm Sunday.

A beautiful Palm Sunday, too. Cloudless blue sky. No breeze. Seventy-two degrees. How could it be better than that?

Thirty-four-year-old Lauren Summers laughed softly, a low, rough laugh. Pure irony.

At least she’d made it here. That was something. It’d been months and months since she’d come. But today . . . today she’d made the drive to the Napa cemetery from Alameda. No traffic. Ninety minutes.
Easy.

More irony.

God, she was funny. Full of gallows humor. And why not? If you couldn’t laugh at yourself, what was left? Nothing. And nothing begets nothing . . . leaving one with . . . nothing.

Lauren ran her hands up and down and all around the steering wheel. Her stomach cramping, hurting, already wishing she hadn’t agreed to meet her parents here today.

She should have just met them in town for brunch. Gone somewhere public, somewhere loud, somewhere with lots of distractions. She still needed the distractions.

The air caught in her throat. Her eyes burned.

She missed him. Missed him so much. People said it’d get easier. People said it was just a matter of time.

Squeezing the steering wheel tightly, Lauren clamped her jaw, teeth grinding. She wasn’t going to lose it today. Wasn’t going to cry.

Blake had hated it when she cried. She remembered how as a little boy he’d put his fingers into the corners of her mouth and lift her lips.
Smile, Mom
.

The lump in her throat grew, filling her chest. She swallowed, hard. She wouldn’t crack. Today she was going to be strong. Today she was going to get out of her car, and walk across the expanse of grass to his grave and . . .

And then what?

Lauren frowned. What would she do once she reached his grave?

Her phone rang, breaking her concentration. Reaching for her phone, she saw it was her mom, Candy Summer. The family ranch was a fifteen-minute drive from the cemetery. Her parents were supposed to meet her here. They were all going to do this together. Visit Blake. Bring him flowers. Her mother had the flowers.

“How far away are you?” Candy asked.

“Still a little way out,” Lauren answered, needing more time. This wasn’t easy doing this . . . coming here. She hadn’t wanted to come. Her parents asked. They liked to come see Blake, their grandson. They didn’t understand that for her it was so much harder. Make that impossible.

He was just a boy.

How could she outlive her son?

“Did you hit traffic?” Candy asked, concerned.

Lauren closed her eyes and lifted her face to the sun beating through the glass. “No.”

“But you left almost two hours ago.”

She couldn’t do this. Wasn’t ready to do this. “I’m turning around.” Her voice was low, tight. If she wasn’t careful, she’d start crying. “I’m heading home.”

“How far away are you?”

“I can’t do this, Mom. I can’t.”

“But we made plans.”

“You and Dad can still come. Bring the flowers—”

“Lauren.”

“I love you, Mom. I’ll call you later.”

“At least come to the house. Come see us. Have lunch with us.”

“I’m already on my way home. But I’ll see you soon. Okay?”

Lauren hung up quickly. She dropped the phone into her lap. She stared blindly out the window. Blake.

And then from nowhere a voice whispered,
Love doesn’t end.

Tears prickled the back of her eyes. Lauren drew a slow, deep breath.
That’s right, baby,
she whispered.
Love doesn’t end. And I will love you forever.

Lauren numbly started the car, eased into drive, and headed for home.

* * *

A
half hour away in Santa Rosa, Jack and JJ remained at the house while Meg and Sarah took the younger kids to the Palm Sunday service.

Sarah secretly wished she had stayed behind, too. In Tampa, Sarah rarely went to Mass. Her kids didn’t attend Catholic school either, or Sunday school, and as she watched Ella and Brennan during the service, she knew they didn’t really understand what was going on. Over the summer her parents had talked to her about getting Ella and Brennan enrolled in her local parish programs, thinking that both children were of an age at which they’d benefit from Catholic education, but Sarah had been bored silly by her years of such schooling and wasn’t in a hurry to sign the kids up.

Now, as they fussed and whispered and stared up at the ceiling, she felt guilty for not doing more.

Maybe it was time her children learned more about their faith. Or maybe she’d continue to wait until Boone retired and they moved somewhere, and were settled somewhere, for good.

After Mass, they returned to the house, where Meg made brunch and the girls helped Sarah set the dining room table.

During the meal, Gabi and Ella talked about Easter next week, and dyeing eggs, while Meg’s son, JJ, said he was looking forward to Opening Day of baseball season on Thursday.

“How does Uncle Boone think Tampa Bay will do this year?” he asked, between enormous bites of a Belgium waffle dripping with strawberries and whipped cream.

“He’s hopeful, as always,” Sarah answered, reaching over to place a restraining hand on Brennan’s arm to stop him from flicking any more bacon bits across the table at Tessa, who—judging from her annoyed expression—had had enough.

“What?” Brennan demanded, pushing Sarah’s hand off his arm.

“Stop,” she corrected him under her breath.

“Why?” he asked, preparing to launch another bacon bit from his spoon.

“It’s not appropriate,” she answered firmly, taking the spoon from him and tucking it onto the far side of her plate. “Boone had a great spring training—” She broke off as Brennan flung a strip of bacon with his fingers.
“Brennan!”

“What?” he said innocently, smiling at her so broadly that his dimples flashed on either side of his wide mouth. Boone had the same dimples. Ella had inherited them, too.

“Knock it off,” she whispered. “You know how to act at the dinner table.”

“But this isn’t the dinner table. It’s breakfast.”

Sarah’s eyes widened, and before she could say anything, Meg suggested that the kids who had finished eating clear their plates and be excused.

All the kids but JJ left, carrying their dishes with them. JJ reached for another waffle and doused it with mounds of strawberries and cream.

“Starving,” he said cheerfully, cutting the waffle into quarters and stuffing one into his mouth.

“Boys,” Meg said indulgently, leaning back in her chair.

Sarah lifted her coffee, which had gone cold a long time ago. She wrinkled her nose as she drank it. “Exhausting,” she said. “I don’t remember JJ being this hyper at this age.”

“JJ was busy,” Meg said. “And so we learned to tire him out before he tired us out. By the time he was in first grade, he was playing five sports a year, and some of them overlapped.”

“Not my call,” Jack interjected. “I didn’t think it was necessary to have JJ play so many sports, but Meg disagreed.”

“I never made him,” Meg corrected. “JJ loved anything to do with a ball. Football, basketball, baseball—he wanted to do it all.”

“But it was up to us as parents to provide some guidance,” Jack retorted.

Meg’s brows tugged. “We did provide guidance. And we’re still providing guidance—”

“Really? Because it doesn’t feel like it. Seems to me we’ve allowed the kids to do whatever they want in life. The girls have had no exposure to art or culture—”

“That’s not true,” Meg interrupted. “Tessa dances. She eats, sleeps, and breathes art.”

“Fine, but they don’t play instruments.” Jack shrugged. “And JJ doesn’t do anything but play sports.”

JJ stabbed his fork hard into another wedge of waffle. “You make that sound like a bad thing, Dad, but I like playing sports.”

“You would have benefited more from music lessons. Would have helped make you a well-rounded person.”

JJ shrugged as he chewed. “I’m happy the way I am,” he said, around his food.

“I just want you to know that I’d do it differently next time,” Jack said, looking at JJ, acting as if JJ was the only one in the room. “I wouldn’t acquiesce to your mom so much. I’d make sure you learned the things I wanted you to learn, the things you needed to learn—”

“Next time?” Meg interrupted, eyebrows arching ever so slightly.

Incredibly uncomfortable, Sarah glanced from Meg to Jack, thinking now would be a good time for someone to make a joke, ease the tension.

“Our kids aren’t academic,” Jack added. “I would have liked to have one child who cared about art, literature, history, culture—”

“Hey, Dad,” JJ said, swallowing his bite and waving his fork, “you know I’m still here, right? I can hear everything you’re saying.”

“I’m not blaming you, JJ. It’s not your fault you don’t know anything about the world but what you’ve learned off the Cartoon Network and ESPN, because we’ve allowed it to happen. I’m just as guilty as your mom. I should have stepped up earlier, insisted you learn something of the world, something that mattered.”

JJ wiped his mouth with his napkin. “Sports matter, Dad. They’re a metaphor for life. They symbolize man’s struggle to survive and the need for people to believe in something and to belong to something. And yes, I did say ‘metaphor’ and ‘symbolize.’ I may like sports but I’m not an idiot. I’m taking three AP classes right now and getting A’s in almost everything, so lay off. Your bad mood is just bringing us all down.” Then, with a nod at his mom, he stood up, lifted his plate, and carried it to the kitchen.

“Smart-ass,” Jack muttered as JJ disappeared, before glancing at Meg. “Does he really have straight A’s?”

“He has a B right now in physics, but the rest are A’s,” Meg said evenly, her expression serene.

“His grades weren’t that good last year, were they?”

“It’s his junior year. He’s taking school seriously this year.”

“It’s about time.”

Meg opened her mouth to answer, but closed it without speaking, shaping her lips into a small, pleasant smile.

Jack stared at her moodily a moment, fingers drumming the table, before abruptly rising and stalking out.

“Wow,” Sarah said quietly once Jack was out of earshot. “That was . . . weird.”

Meg’s serene expression melted, leaving her features naked and sad. She swallowed and picked at a bit of frayed lace in the tablecloth. “It’s . . . uh . . . yeah.”

“What’s going on?”

She shrugged. “This.”