The Life You've Imagined (31 page)

I gasp and clutch my chest. He said that to my mom, just before she went into the hospital that very last time. As if she got sick on purpose, just to hurt him.

Movement to my left catches my eye. Anna strides across the grass, looking very lawyer-like, despite her capri pants and ponytail. She walks right up to my father and smacks him in the chest with some papers.

I suck in a sharp breath, but he seems to be so stunned all he does is take the papers and frown at them.

“You’re being sued, asshole. For the money you stole from your daughter.”

“C’mon, Cami,” she says, and walks backward to her car, one eye on my father, who is reading and becoming more scarlet by the moment.

“Sherry! You coming?” I say, doing my own backward walk. She just shakes her head.

Please?
I mouth the word to her, across the lawn, pointing at the car.
C’mon!

She shakes her head slowly, waving her hands at us.
You go on.

Anna does a Y-turn and drives off in the opposite direction of the sirens.

“She’ll be okay. The police just got a tip about a drunk and disorderly. If we’re lucky, he’ll get in his truck and start driving so they can get him for that, too.”

“Lucky, yeah.” I say, sinking back in the seat and taking out my family picture to look at myself in my pig-tailed youth. “We could use some of that.”

Chapter 46

Maeve

I
’m in front of my bathroom mirror, primping. When was the last time I bothered? My freckles stand out bright against my skin, like someone scattered dust across my chest. Robert won’t mind, though. He used to kiss them, pretending to kiss each one individually, until . . .

I haven’t felt this way in so very long.

I stayed up most of the night finishing the dress. Sally did ask me what I was working on, and I just told her I wanted a new summer outfit.

I wish I could get a full-length view, but we don’t have a full-length mirror in the place. I’ll have to content myself with admiring the neckline in the bathroom cabinet mirror, and trust that the hem is even.

The last day of the Nee Nance. The day I see Robert again. There’s a certain poetry to that.

My wedding ring is in a zippered pocket in the lining of my purse. It would be exposed if I wore it with this dress and its scoop neck, and I don’t want Robert to leap to any conclusions if he sees it there.

I hope I can put it back on my finger, though. And soon.

I have makeup in my purse, too, which I haven’t worn since the last wedding I went to, which was probably two years ago now. I dare not put it on yet; Anna would ask too many questions. Anyway, it would fade off in the long drive to Cadillac.

It was good of Veronica to lend me her car, since the Buick died, and agree to keep an eye on Sally for me. I’d brought her a cake from the bakery in the next block by way of apology for blowing up at her earlier suggestion Anna was “cracking.” I told her I was hoping to get away for some personal time, and she readily agreed to help, telling me I should ask for assistance more often.

Anna will watch the register today. I told her I didn’t want to be there for the end of it all, and she could close up whenever she felt like. There’s no point in commemorating the last sale or the last customer. I’ll be punching a register again anyway.

I walk back to my bedroom and put a pair of medium-high heels into my large bag and slip some flat sandals on for the drive.

I may buy some perfume on my way out of town. I sniffed some from my old collection, but they all whiffed vaguely of vinegar.

I come down the steps, catching sight of my own legs in the dress, and the effect is dizzying, because I mostly wore dresses around Robert. If I don’t look too close, my legs could be those of a twenty-year-old.

At the bottom of the stairs, I do a double-take at the store’s bones sticking out. The shelves emptying, the advertising posters taken down, the sign with our hours gone.

“Hi,” says Anna, then she stops sweeping, leans on the broom. “Well. Don’t you look pretty.”

“Feels like an occasion, somehow.”

“Sure you don’t want me to put a sign up? People around here might be sad to know they missed out on the Nee Nance’s last day.”

“They can come gawk at the wrecking ball.” That came out as more venomous than I meant it. I take a deep, deliberate breath. “You know I don’t like a spectacle.”

“Right. No fanfare.” Anna resumes sweeping. “So, Cami’s bringing Sally to Veronica’s house. She sure is being a sport about this, and lending you a car, too.”

“That she is. I just don’t want you two to have to worry about Sally while I make this little escape.” I laugh to cover what I just said, though there’s no way Anna could know what I’m really doing.

I will tell her, and soon. And by then I hope to make her understand. She has been less guarded lately, since she rescued that girl. Maybe all is not lost for father and daughter.

I step forward to hug her, and I don’t feel her stiffen under my arms like she has so often. She rests her chin briefly on my shoulder, curving down to do so. It’s still time-warping, feeling my daughter loom over me, when I used to hold that chubby little hand, reaching up to grasp my pinky finger.

“I better go. I need to get going . . .”

I turn away hastily before Anna can ask me what’s wrong, quickly wiping under my eyes as I walk out the front door and the Nee Nance jingle bells clang against my knee.

T
here’s too much time to think on this drive. I should have brought along some tapes. I can’t abide talk radio, all those people yelling at each other. I have no use for current music. I hear enough of that thumping out the car windows of wannabe gangsters cruising Shoreline Drive.

I flip on the oldies station, having long ago reconciled myself to being out of date, when I was still young enough to try being hip. I always felt older than my peers, partly due to my mother’s strict rules for my clothing and comportment, and partly because of my own mysterious preference for the movies and songs of a previous era. I’ve always been nostalgic for a time I can’t even remember.

The Eagles start wailing in harmony about giving me the best of their love.

Two memories assail me at once. Robert crooning that to me over the phone, badly on purpose, trying to make me laugh after a fight with my mother.

And that day at the bowling alley.

I was working for my uncle Mike, waiting tables from the snack bar. Certain memories are so fierce they crystallize, complete with smells, sounds, full color, slow motion, and instant replay. Fresh smoke and sweat, the thunderous crashing of ball into pins, and echoing hoots of victory, and yes, even the Eagles singing over the tinny speakers about the best of their love,
sweet darling
,
every night and day . . .

There was this guy. That’s all he was, I tried to tell myself, just a guy, of a certain type who liked to be lewd. I certainly never invited this with my conservative attire, but for a certain malicious subset of his kind, it was like blood in the water to wear a high-necked, shapeless blouse.

I had learned to step away from grabby hands and to lean away when setting down drinks. But waitressing—even at a bowling alley—forces physical proximity. No protective counter or cash register.

There was nothing special in how his hand grazed my breast when he reached for a napkin and I set down his friend’s drink. Nothing revolutionary about the smack on the bottom he gave me when I walked away or the jeering I got for refusing to cooperate with a sexy wink or a knowing smile.

This is what I told myself when holding my hand over my heart behind the bar, trying to breathe.

Uncle Mike was so busy that night—a Saturday—that he barely glanced my way, and anyway, I was a big girl, right? I was eighteen, after all. A grown-up. I was afraid he’d fire me if I couldn’t handle the customers, and then my mother would accuse me of asking for the attention.

Then Robert and Sean and the gang came in. My heart leaped; I was saved! But they chose a seat so far away from that man, they’d never see a thing.

I served them some sodas, and when Robert asked me what was wrong, I smiled at him and said nothing’s wrong, everything’s fine.

Moments later, I steeled myself to approach the Wolf Man’s table. As I was trying to hear his buddy’s snack order, I found myself in the wolf’s lap, encircled in his meaty arms. I pushed against him and he squeezed tighter. I kicked my feet and he laughed, his oniony breath in my ear, my hair. I could feel his erection under my thigh and I hollered, “Let me go!” and wanted to cry with how pathetic and fearful I sounded.

The next moments happened all at once. The chair was knocked down, and in a moment I was back on my feet and Robert was on top of the man, pummeling him in the face. His buddies were closing in and pushing up sleeves.

“Robert!” I screamed, because he was not a big man, and the other men were, in fact, all rather large.

At last Uncle Mike and my cousin Sean and a couple other friends of ours finally swooped in. The wolf and his whole pack were ousted into the parking lot, banned for life, and threatened with jail and worse if they ever came near the place, especially that night.

Uncle Mike pleaded with me not to tell my mother. No doubt he feared her wrath, too, that this should happen under his watch.

He insisted I take the night off. I tried to refuse, playing it cool, though my hands trembled in my lap like I’d been taken with some kind of palsy. He sent Robert and Sean to guard my walk to my car.

Sean beat it back to his bowling game the minute he established that there were no villains lurking about.

Robert put his arm around me for the rest of the trip across the parking lot, and I still tried to play the woman of the world.

“It was nothing,” I said. “Some horse’s ass.” The curse word felt strange in my mouth and sounded too quiet for the circumstances.

“It wasn’t nothing. He was scaring you, and doing it on purpose, which makes him one sick prick. You don’t ever let anyone do that to you, Maeve. You come get me, or if you can’t, get somebody. Don’t ever let anyone hurt you like that.”

He squeezed my shoulder and helped me into the car, even slamming my door for me. He stood in the circle of light under the parking lot lamppost until he disappeared from view in my rear mirror.

Rumble strips startle me back to the present with a loud, grinding growl.

I aim the car straight again and roll down the window, tuning the radio to a talk station. No more daydreaming allowed. The real thing will be in front of me soon enough.

Chapter 47

Amy

W
hen I see myself in the mirror, I turn to look over my shoulder. My mother thinks I’m looking at her, and she smiles and gives me a thumbs up, tears carving furrows through her makeup.

In truth, I thought for just a moment that this reflection belonged to someone else, and I was turning to see the other bride in Agatha’s, wearing my dress.

Now that the dress has been ordered to size and altered to fit me just so, the effect is astonishing. My waist has never looked so tiny, and the special strapless bra I ordered makes it look like I even have a chest.

I vow I will not let one sweet, one carb, one glass of wine, pass my lips until after the big day.

My bridesmaids were horrified that I cancelled my bachelorette party. I told them to go get drunk without me, and I think they’re going to do exactly that. Considering how close I came to not having this wedding at all, “celebrating” my single life hardly seems worth the effort.

No one has been speaking. They’re waiting for me, I realize, Agatha and my mother.

“It’s beautiful.” My voice breaks.

“You’re beautiful,” Agatha says, fluffing out my gown here and there, pulling on bits of the dress to make sure it fits. Of course it does; she’s a genius, and every bride in town knows that.

My mother starts to speak and has to clear her throat and start again. “I wish . . .”

She doesn’t have to finish her sentence. She sits behind us on a cushioned bench, wearing a column-shaped lavender dress with a jacket. It falls nearly to the floor. The embroidery on the jacket echoes the lace on my dress. It’s perfect; rather, the best Agatha could possibly do.

“You look lovely,” I tell her.

“Not hardly,” she answers, but waves away further protest and starts digging in her purse. I know enough to give up at this point. Persistent argument will only escalate, and she’ll just get more and more vicious with herself in an effort to convince us she truly is hideous.

I notice Aunt Agatha has paused in her dress-fluffing to rub her hands. They look knotty, like branches on a dying tree.

“Are you all right?”

She seems to only just realize what she’d been doing. “Oh, this. My arthritis is kicking up. I don’t know how many more weddings I can do. I’m just glad I held out for yours.”