The Invisibles (15 page)

And if she did, when had that happened?

And what else in God's name was she hiding?

O
zzie was pacing around the living room when Nora let herself in the front door. A vein, wide as a shoelace, was pulsing in the middle of her forehead, and her jaw was thrust so far forward that it looked disjointed. The only other time Nora could remember seeing her in such a state was when they had talked about their mothers back at Turning Winds. And even then, Ozzie's anger had been fleeting, a sudden release of something that she had been able to bottle again, like water. This was bigger. And this time, Nora wasn't sure if she was going to be able to put a cap on it.

“Hey.” Nora tried to keep her voice steady. “Oz. You okay?”

“I'm fine.” She threw her phone on the couch and walked over to the window. “Goddamned motherfucker.”

“Ozzie.” Nora walked toward her. Ozzie's hand, clenching one end of the curtain, was trembling. Nora put a hand on her shoulder. “Oz. Please. Talk to me.”

Instead of answering, Ozzie dropped the curtain. She scrubbed
her face with her hands, the skin along her fingertips turning pink and then white, and then sank into the couch, shaking her head.

“Does he call you names like that a lot?”

“Oh, he was just worked up.” Ozzie's fingers were clenched so tight that the knuckles were turning white. “We both get like that. We fight a lot. Obviously. He's pissed that I came and left him with the kids.”

Nora blinked, still uncomprehending. The Ozzie she knew would never stand for a man who would call her such disgusting names or deny her freedom. It didn't make sense. What was going on?

Ozzie's eyes filled with tears, and she brushed them away with two brusque flicks of her fingers. She got up again from the couch and yanked the curtain back once more. “Fucking asshole. Goddamned motherfucking asshole. The only other time I've gone away in twelve years—in twelve goddamned
years—
he did the same thing. Called the whole time and made me feel like shit about it. I should've known better.” Without warning, she reached out and pounded the wall with the side of her fist. “I should've never come.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “I should've stayed home and never fucking left.”

“What is it that . . . he . . .” Nora struggled for the right words. “Is it that he doesn't trust you?”

“Probably.” Ozzie's voice was dull now, resigned. “Or he doesn't have a goddamned life of his own, so he resents me having one.” She turned, taking Nora's hands. “Listen, I'm sorry I got you involved in this. It's not fair to you, and it was never my intention. It's not even that big of a deal really, okay? I have a husband who gets a little crazy sometimes. That's all. But I'd appreciate
it if you wouldn't say anything to anyone else. About the call, I mean. Or what I just said about him. All right?”

Nora opened her mouth but didn't say anything.

An exasperated noise came out of Ozzie's mouth. “The last thing I need right now is anyone else knowing this shit and getting all worked up about it. Especially with everything else we've got going on with Grace. Come on, Norster. This weekend is about her, okay? Not me. And especially not my marriage.”

Nora swallowed.

“
Nora.
” Ozzie squeezed her hand a little too hard.

“Okay.” She took a breath. “But you know, it's not okay that he calls you names like that.”

“Oh, I know.” Ozzie sighed. “Believe me, I call him worse.” Her eyes searched Nora's as if peering at something in deep water. “I gotta go lie down,” she said finally, dropping Nora's hands. “I'll see you in a little while, okay? For dinner?”

“Okay.” Nora's voice was small. She watched Ozzie walk from the room, and she didn't move until she heard the door to Ozzie's bedroom close. Then she headed upstairs.

She needed to lie down, too.

T
he entire right side of the room that Nora and Monica were sharing, a neat, small space with yellow walls and white trim, was almost completely taken up by Monica's luggage—two enormous Louis Vuitton suitcases and a Gucci carry-on bag. Eyelet curtains tied back with pieces of yellow fabric hung over a single window, and the beds had been made up with patchwork quilts and matching pillows. There was a bureau too, and a throw rug on the floor that matched the colors in the quilts. Another one of
Grace's paintings hung above the bureau, this one framed with gold edges. Another bruise, although not as dark as the ones downstairs, with the same scribbled moniker in the corner.

Nora lay down on one of the twin beds and pressed her hands over her eyes. They were trembling. She felt drained inside, exhausted, like the time she'd tried to swim too many laps at the pool and emerged from the water breathless and shaking. So much had already happened in such a short span of time. Grace getting so angry at the lunch table. And now the scene with Ozzie and the phone. Nora shuddered as the sound of Gary's voice drifted through her head again, the way he'd emphasized the
t
in that awful word, as if spitting it at her. Then there was everything else still waiting on the horizon. How long was it going to take for that final, dreadful night at Turning Winds to be addressed? Because it would have to be, wouldn't it? That's what this trip was ultimately all about—coming to terms with their actions that night, and somehow, in some way, making peace with them? Nora wasn't sure if she could do it anymore, if she possessed the physical or emotional strength to withstand what was to come.

She sat up as her door opened.

“Hi,” Monica said. “I thought I heard you come in. I was just getting myself organized in the bathroom. How was your walk?”

“Nice,” Nora said, lying back down. Did Monica know anything about Gary? Had Ozzie let anything slip during the few conversations she'd had with her over the last few days? Or was Nora really the only one who knew?

Monica walked over to the other bed, taking in the room with a few sweeping glances as if seeing it for the first time. She had changed into white cashmere sweat pants and a matching hoodie,
revealing just the slightest edge of a pink camisole beneath. Her hair was swept up, held in place with a tortoiseshell clip, and her heels had been replaced with delicate leather thongs.

“You guys weren't arguing just now, were you?” Monica asked. “I heard Ozzie down there. She sounded pretty loud.”

“No, no.” Nora wondered if Grace had heard anything. Or Henry. “You know Ozzie. She talks like that about everything.”

“Yeah.” Monica laughed. “So what'd you guys talk about on your walk? Anything about me?”

“No, nothing about you.” Nora folded her arms behind her head and tried to smile. “Grace, mostly. And Ozzie's husband.”

“Oh, Gary.” Monica sounded disgusted.

“Why do you say it like that?”

Monica shrugged, running a fingertip over a line of stitching on top of the quilt. “I don't know. Just that I don't think Ozzie's all that happy with him.”

“She said that?”

“No. Not exactly.” Monica's finger paused. “It's just a feeling, really.”

“What kind of feeling?”

“Oh, just something inside.” Monica looked up. “Ozzie never wanted to get married in the first place. Remember?”

Nora nodded.

“You gotta wonder, you know? What was it about this guy that convinced her to do something that she'd always been so against? I mean, we're talking about
Ozzie
here. He must've been pretty . . .” She shook her head, letting the room swallow up the rest of the sentence. “I don't know. It's none of my business, anyway. It's her life.”

Pretty what? What word would Monica have used just now if she had let herself? Nora wondered. “I heard him on the phone,” she heard herself say, immediately wishing she could put the words back in her mouth. Not ten minutes ago, she had given Ozzie her word that she wouldn't talk about it with anyone else. And yet the admission had come so naturally, as if by instinct. A red flag had just been thrown into the ring. The others needed to know.

“When?” Monica turned. “On your walk?”

Nora nodded. “He was awful to her.”

“What do you mean? In what way?”

“He called her a . . .” Nora could not bring herself to say the word out loud. “You know, the
c
word.”

Monica went rigid. “He did not!”

Nora dropped her eyes, as if she had been the one to commit the offense.

“Why?”

“I don't know. She had the phone on speaker, and we were talking to the kids, and he just came on all of a sudden and started cursing at her.”

“In front of their kids?” Monica sounded incredulous.

“I guess so. They must've still been around.”

They looked at each other for a moment, waiting, it seemed, for the other to provide a perfectly reasonable explanation for the incident. Except of course there wasn't one.

“Well,” Monica said finally, shaking her head. “Honestly, if it was anyone else, I might worry.”

“But it's Ozzie,” Nora concurred softly.

“He shouldn't be calling her anything even remotely close to
that. But she's got a mouth of her own that she uses. I'm sure she can handle it.”

Nora nodded. She hoped so. Whatever “it” was.

Monica kicked her sandals off and lay back on the pillow, positioning the heel of her right foot on top of the toes of her left. “Are you tired?” she asked.

“A little.”

“Do you want to sleep? I'll leave.”

“No,” Nora said. “Stay.”

“I'm not that tired after all. And even if I were, I don't think I could sleep if you gave me ten Ambien. My brain is just racing.”

“About what?”

“I just can't stop thinking about all of us back at Turning Winds. It seems like yesterday, doesn't it? And now here we are, all these years later, and everything from back then is still so much with us. Maybe even more so.”

Nora couldn't go into all of it again, just after the discussion with Ozzie; if she did, something might explode inside her head. Instead, she turned so that she could look at Monica's profile. She stared at the perfect arch of brow above her black eyelashes, the alabaster skin that barely moved, even when Monica rested the tips her fingers against it. “What's it like being beautiful?” she asked softly.

“What?” Monica looked startled.

“Is it fun? Being so pretty?” Nora could feel her neck getting hot. “I just . . . I always wondered what it would be like.”

Monica sat up. For a few seconds, her eyes roved over Nora's face, as if trying to figure out where her voice had come from. “Don't you think you're pretty?”

Nora muffled a laugh with the back of her hand. “Come on, Monica.”

“No, really!” Monica got off her bed and sat down next to Nora. She pushed Nora's brown hair off her face and tilted her head, studying it.

“What're you doing?” Nora said.

“You have gorgeous bone structure,” Monica said. “And everything is so natural! So real! I'd give anything to have that back, you know that? I've been pulled and pinched so many times now that my skin's natural elasticity will probably never be the same.”

Nora pulled back. “Well, why'd you get pinched and pulled, then?”

“Oh, all the women in New York do it. Getting your face done is the thing to do these days. I haven't had that much done. A brow lift, some Botox. I got my nose done too, but that was more because of my deviated septum than anything else. I can actually make it through the night now without snoring. And my teeth. Liam offered to get my teeth done.” She shrugged, a little pink rising along the swell of her cheeks. “God, remember how my teeth used to look? Like a jack-o'-lantern! And those horrible whistling sounds I used to make when I talked? You guys didn't call me Har-Monica for nothing. Seriously, how could I say no?”

“Do you like it better?” Nora asked. “The way you look now?”

“Oh my God, yes!” Monica touched the edge of her hair. “There's no comparison! I looked like a little gnome back then!” She shivered. “All that dry, orange hair, that horrible pimply skin. And chubby too. God, I was always at least fifteen pounds overweight.”
She looked out the window. “No wonder no one ever asked me out in high school. Ugh. I was just a dog.”

Nora thought she saw something flit behind Monica's eyes when she said that. Boys weren't the only ones who hadn't wanted her in high school. She'd had no siblings, and after her grandmother died, there was no one else who had ever put Monica first again. Maybe not even until she met Liam. Maybe Monica wasn't the only one who fought so hard to hold on to love. No matter what shape it took.

“Well, I'm glad for you,” Nora said now, touching the sleeve of Monica's hoodie. “Really, I am.”

“Oh, Nora,” Monica squeezed her hand. “God, you were always so sweet. You still are, baby doll. You're just the sweetest thing.” She gazed at her for a moment and then said, “Do you wear any makeup? At all?”

“A little bit of Vaseline on my eyelids.”

“Will you let me do your makeup? For dinner tonight?” Nora opened her mouth to object, but Monica pounced. “Oh, don't say no! Please! Let me put some makeup on you—just a little, I promise—and then you can see if you like it. If you don't, you can just take it off again. No hard feelings. Okay?”

Nora hesitated only a moment more before relenting. It had always been hard to say no to Monica, who rarely if ever asked for anything. She'd always been the one who insisted that Grace and Nora share the umbrella on rainy mornings as they walked to school, or let Ozzie have the last chocolate chip brownie after dinner, even though they were her favorite. And she had never, not once during their entire stay at Turning Winds, asked for anything else but a hug during every Who Wants What part of
their Invisibles meeting. It took a lot for Monica to ask for anything really big for herself, although that had changed apparently, now that she could.