The Most Fun We Ever Had (15 page)

Since their dinner with her parents, Ryan had dipped back down, not quite as far down as he’d been but still concerningly low. He slept through her morning sickness and last week had failed to accompany her to her twelve-week checkup; her discussions of the future—maternity leave, things they needed to buy—seemed to overwhelm him. And on a most primitive level, he failed to be there for her, physically; he failed to rub her back when she kept herself up at night worrying; he failed to appear concerned about her well-being as she worked harder than she ever had, burdened with the additional responsibilities accompanying her tenured position; he failed to satisfy her in the most basic way, scratch the itch that surged, she supposed, as a result of her hormones, that caused her to find herself rubbing against the corner of the kitchen table just to feel
something,
that caused her to find herself in bed with a man who enjoyed commercial crime fiction.

She tried to picture herself from a few beats away and found she couldn’t get a firm handle on what she looked like, couldn’t conjure the image of herself—wide-eyed, mousy-haired, meticulous—doing something so fucking stupid. She’d just been so
horny,
and so desperate for something easy, for the pleasure of doing something simply because it felt good, fallout be damned. She and Ryan hadn’t had sex since that disastrous morning three months ago, the anomalous morning that had gotten them into this mess in the first place. His ability to perform had been a one-off, apparently. It seemed radically unjust that the fallout was so tangible, that she was left in another man’s bed, swallowing down nausea caused by a baby who likely wouldn’t be able to rely on its father.

“That was lovely,” Marcus said from beside her, reaching tentatively to pull her toward him. She was considering, now, too late, how stupid it was that she’d approached someone from work, someone who would henceforth be able to accurately X-ray his gaze through her blouse at faculty meetings. But it was late afternoon and the spring semester had finally ended and she was in the roomy Ravenswood studio of a man who had just dipped his face between her tented legs and kissed her until she came. It
was
lovely, except for the inconvenient fact that there was a baby percolating in her belly—still a fetus, she had to argue, as a feminist and a scientist and a woman in deep denial—and the fact that the father of said percolating fetus-baby was at home, probably watching
CSI
in a uniform of depressed-person sweats and a T-shirt from an erstwhile cybersecurity conference.

A good one:
she had a suspicion that her current behavior would not earn her such a title.

“It was,” she said vaguely, shifting against him. “Thank you.” The baby was now, according to the Internet, the size of a Meyer lemon. She was unsure of how this was different from a regular lemon.

Marcus laughed. “Thank
you
.”

Marcus, who’d complimented her shoes the first time she met him so she thought he was gay. Marcus, who’d never been married and who, in the classroom, turned inward and grave, peering up at his students from behind big black frames. Marcus, who had two cats, Sally and Walter, Sally after the
Peanuts
character and Walter after Mondale. Marcus, whose name was Marcus and who went by
Marcus
.

Marcus, who didn’t ask questions except for “Would you like a glass of wine?”

To which she said, rousing herself, “Sure, what the hell.”

Her mom claimed that she never drank when she was pregnant but the previous generation certainly had: pregnant women all across Chicago swilling Manhattans and chain-smoking. Her parents had turned out all right.

Just a glass. One, after they’d dressed, on Marcus Spear’s balcony; she twirled the stem of her wineglass between her fingers, looking down at the sidewalk below, a passing pit bull tethered to a hipster by a retractable leash. Her parents couldn’t have been completely happy all the time when they were her age. But there was also no way, she knew, that her mother would ever sleep with another man
ever,
let alone while harboring one of her impending daughters in her belly. Her nausea surged again, and she couldn’t tell if it was owing to her pregnancy or her disgust with herself, and at that moment her phone dinged with a text from Ryan—
don’t think I’m up for your parents’ house tonight—
and she swallowed once more, this time a painful lump in her throat, suddenly life-endingly tired, and she wanted very desperately to have someone take care of her for once, and as she sipped her wine, as it slid pleasantly down, numbing the lump, she turned to Marcus and asked if he’d drive her to the house on Fair Oaks.

—

O
ne thing Jonah couldn’t get over was the common thread in the family of owning fucking ginormous houses, enough square footage combined to accommodate a dozen football fields. The first floor of Wendy’s condo was larger than the Danforths’ entire house. Now it turned out that David and Marilyn’s house was huge, too, but felt more like a home where actual human beings lived, wind chimes and a motley jungle of plants, bikes propped up on the front porch—expensive bikes, Cannondales—and a wooden glider with worn flowered cushions opposite a red porch swing. The house was a stately red-brown brick with stained glass geometry in the windows, a row of purple flower bushes running along the perimeter like a fence. The tile of the porch was terra cotta, the kind that made a terrible chalk noise against the bottoms of his sneakers. He felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“You ready?” Wendy asked him. She’d been entertaining in the car, going down the roster of each of her sisters, describing them physically—“Liza’s really pretty but she has that terrible color of hair that’s, like, not even a color?
Ecru.
Like a Band-Aid”; “You won’t be meeting Gracie but she kind of looks like a Cabbage Patch Kid”—and itemizing their past offenses—“If you ask her she won’t admit to it, but Violet unquestionably stole this macramé bracelet my high school boyfriend made for me”—and now, on the porch, she touched his shoulder. “Entirely unintimidating, I swear. They’re more afraid of you than you are of them.”

“They’re afraid of me?”

“Well, no. I mean—no. Poorly phrased.” She squeezed his shoulder again and an Infiniti pulled into the driveway, and Violet climbed out. “Where are the boys?” Wendy asked.

“Home with Matt.” Violet flushed. “I just figured this might not be, you know, a child-friendly evening.”

“Are you anticipating knife fights? Paternity tests?”

He watched Violet turn even redder before she said, “Wendy, can you not? Please?”

“I just think it’s weird that Matt didn’t come with you.”

“We couldn’t get a sitter, okay? Jesus. Drop it. Can we just go inside?”

She hadn’t even said hello to him, hadn’t even bothered to ask if he was enjoying himself in the home where she’d basically abandoned him, but then she was ringing the doorbell, and then the door opened, revealing David and Marilyn, holding hands like those fucked-up twins from
The Shining,
a black dog between them the size of a horse.

“Why did you ring the bell?” David asked, letting go of Marilyn’s hand to push open the storm door. She reached to take hold of the dog’s collar.

“I just thought—” Violet faltered. “I just figured because—”

“It’s the big reveal,” Wendy said. “The grand, dramatic, reality-show premiere.”

He liked Wendy, for the most part. She was rich and crazy, but she made him laugh, and she let him watch
The Daily Show,
and she seemed to know the best thing to say, always, like now—even when it deliberately made everyone uncomfortable. They stood frozen for a few seconds, David’s arm propping open the door and Marilyn hanging back.

“Come in, come in,” Marilyn said finally. “Please. Hi. Come in.”

Wendy went first, waving him in behind her. They all stopped again in the front hallway, David and Marilyn still by the door and he and Wendy and Violet over by the big wooden bookshelves that framed the entrance of the living room.

“Mom, Dad,” Violet said, stepping forward. She reached out as if to touch him but instead her hand just hovered a couple inches over his shoulder, like he had lice. “This is Jonah.”

David came over and extended a hand. He was tall and athletic, grayish black hair, fingers smudged with grease. “Sorry, I was fixing up Marilyn’s bike this afternoon.”

He took the hand and they shook.

“I’m David. It’s a real pleasure to meet you, Jonah.”

“Me too,” he said. “I mean—you too.”

“And this is Loomis,” David said, taking the dog’s collar.

He instinctively stiffened, backed up a couple steps, bumping into Wendy.

“Oh, no, are you afraid of— Sorry. He’s a gentle giant, but we can— Honey, can we—”

His face burned—such a fucking stupid thing to be afraid of, a big dumb horse-dog. Marilyn was studying him with intensity; he wasn’t sure but it looked like there might be tears in her eyes. Fucking shitshow—crying, mutant dogs, old people holding hands.

“Right,” David said. “Never mind. I’ll— Let me just go put him in his room.”

“His
room
?” Wendy said. “Jesus. The dog has his own
room
now?”

“Why don’t you come see it, Wendy?” David said.

He watched curiously as she shut up and followed her father down the hall, leaving him alone with Violet and his grandmother.

“Mom,” Violet said again. “This is Jonah. Jonah, this is—my mom. Marilyn.”

“Hi,” he said, and the next thing he knew he was being hugged, arms pinned to his sides.

“We’re so happy you’re here,” Marilyn said, finally pulling away. Now he could see that she was crying for real. “Just excuse me for a second,” she said, and with that she was gone, disappeared up the stairs, leaving him alone with Violet.

“Christ,” Violet whispered, sounding irritated. “Shit. Sorry. Just— She’s happy. They’re both really happy, I swear. Let’s— Why don’t we go in the kitchen. Are you actually afraid of dogs? I should’ve asked. Loomis is harmless though. Coddled and innocuous. Do you want—water? Or—my parents don’t really—”

“I bought soda,” David said, appearing in the doorway without the dog.

“You bought
soda
?” Violet asked. “You’ve never bought soda in my entire—”

“Special occasion,” David said. “I thought Jonah might like it.”

“Thanks, sir,” he said, an address that popped into his head from a James Bond movie, and David gave him a puzzled half smile. The next thing he knew, Marilyn was back, ushering them all into the dining room; he could hear her clanging around in the kitchen as the rest of them sat at the table. David rose to go check on her. He watched as Wendy and Violet made elaborate eye contact across the table.

“It’s totally fine,” Wendy said. “She’s fucking insane, but she’s totally benign.”

“Wendy,”
Violet said.

“Sorry, do you—what, you disagree with that?”

“Knock it off,” Violet said.

“This is like the most interesting thing that’s happened to her since Grace was born,” Wendy narrated to him. “She’s a mostly well-intentioned basket case.”

“Yes, that’s exactly what I meant by
knock it off,
” Violet said. She turned to him. “This is just difficult for her. Not because of you. It’s because of me. She’s fine. Ask them anything you’d like, okay? They’re so excited to get to know you.”

“Jesus, tone it down,” Wendy said. “It’s not like they’re—”

“The chicken is just a
tiny
bit overcooked, I think,” Marilyn said, appearing in the doorway with a platter. He could hardly keep his eyes on her, she was moving so fast, setting the plate on the table on top of a pot holder, messing with one of the tall blue candles, stopping to pick an invisible piece of lint from David’s shirt. “Violet, sweetheart, am I correct in my assessment that Matt and the boys won’t be joining us?”

“The sitter canceled,” Violet said.

Wendy snorted, but Marilyn got to work again, sweeping around the table, lifting three extra place settings. There was a momentary silence and then Marilyn was doing something with her hands; in his peripheral vision, he caught Wendy rolling her eyes.

“In the name of the Father,” Marilyn said, “and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”

“Amen,” Violet said, and he thought he heard Wendy laugh.

“Liza has a faculty meeting,” Marilyn said. “She’ll be over for dessert.”

“Dessert?”
Wendy said.

“Dad baked a pie,” Marilyn said, and this time Wendy definitely laughed.

“Apple,” David said. “With salted caramel.”

“Excuse me, Gordon Ramsay,” Wendy said. “Are you serious?”

“Your father’s an excellent cook. All it took was getting him out of medicine; who knew? Violet, honey, can you start the brussels sprouts?”

“Who’s Gordon Ramsay?” David asked, and Jonah, before he realized he was speaking, said, “He’s a chef who has this show where there’s these people trying to be the best cook and they’re all mean to each other and, like, sabotage their opponents.” Lathrop House had gotten cable specifically so this one fucked-up kid with Asperger’s could watch it.

Everyone was looking at him.

“Ah,” David said. “Maybe we’ll have to start watching that, sweetheart, huh?” He accepted the bowl of brussels sprouts from Marilyn. “Are you interested in cooking, Jonah?”

“Oh,” he said. “No. I mean—not really, no.”

“He’s a ceramicist,” Violet said, sounding like Hanna. “Aren’t you, Jonah?”

“Um, sort of,” he said. “I— Do you mind if I go to the bathroom?” He just needed a break from them. Just a minute where he didn’t have to be listening to a million people at once. The Sorensons seemed to produce a different kind of chaos from the kind he was used to; a product of having money, no doubt, but there was also an electricity running among the people at the table, facial expressions that meant one thing to a specific person and nothing at all to everyone else, things that made Wendy crack up that didn’t seem necessarily funny, the way David and Marilyn always seemed to be touching each other in some way, her hand over his or his arm over the back of her chair. He was used to being the quietest one at the table—the staff at Lathrop House often cited his
tranquillity
—but he wasn’t used to feeling so
observed;
he was the occasion for this dinner; he wasn’t sure he’d ever been the occasion for anything.