The Never Never Sisters (24 page)

WHEN I WOKE
up, Dave was standing over me. I nudged myself upright, and he ran a finger along
the length of my hair, tugging at the ends. “I think your clique is waiting for you.”

“My clique?”

“You know, those strange bloggers overtaking our apartment?”

“Gawd. They’re overtaking things.”

“You know what they say about fish and houseguests smelling after three days.”

“Tell them I’m still sleeping. I need a break from hearing about which corner of the
city they’re going to tramp around. Find the spiciest little corner of dirty food
and—” I mimed taking a snapshot.

Dave laughed, even though we both knew I was being unfair. The one thing about this
summer that had been beyond reproach was the gusto with which I’d eaten: noodles,
breakfast gelato, more Hershey’s Kisses than I could count. The snugness of my clothes
seemed inevitable. One of those five-day juice cleanses my mom did—that’s what I needed.
I would start the second we were able to ditch our houseguests. Family boat day—bigger
than Christmas, the way my mom had been yammering on about it—was in two days. I could
get through that and then show them the door, gulp the juice, emerge from it all detoxified.

“Don’t you need to get ready?”

I lay back down. “First clients aren’t until ten.”

“Nice work if you can get it. I’ll go be your hatchet man.” He leaned down to kiss
me—a real kiss, not a peck—and closed the door behind him. I heard low voices, and
then the front door shut.

I lay immobilized until I heard the door close a second time. I forced myself to stay
in bed for another twenty minutes just to be safe, keeping silent even when my mom
called. I hadn’t talked to her in a few days, but I would see her tomorrow, I reasoned,
and I wouldn’t know what to say if I picked up anyway.

When I opened the door to my bedroom, it was after nine. There was a note in the front
hallway and next to it, Bandito was curled up on his dog bed. He lifted his head and
stared at me mournfully.

“Are you really that sad, or is it just your face?” I asked this out loud and promptly
felt crazy. Bandito didn’t answer, but he did follow me and cocked his head when I
read the note to him.

Hey,

Went to the Cloisters as planned. Call if you can come—it’s actually pretty easy to
get there. After that, off to Flushing.

—S and G

P.S. Don’t worry about Bandito the Burrito. He can take care of himself. We’ll clean
the pads when we get back.

It was friendly, sure, but come on.
I have a job, people
.

“Bandito?” He looked up. “Can you take care of yourself as promised?”

He wagged his tail, and together we went to the laundry room where Bandito had already
left a little lump of a present. I flushed it down the toilet with him at my heels.

“I think they oversold your self-sufficiency, Bandito.” He looked at me. “But talking
to you does feel normal.”

Bandito licked his leg, no argument. He followed me around the apartment, sitting
on the bath mat and licking the floor when I showered, waiting patiently by my closet
as I got dressed and coming expectantly with me to the door.

“You’re a fair-weather friend, Bandito. I don’t recall getting this much attention
when anyone else is home.”

He stared at me, did a little tap-dance.

“Okay, fine.” I snapped on his harness and leash, but once we got outside into the
sun, Bandito stopped cold. He wasn’t such a good walker, it turned out, so I carried
him most of the way to my office.

“Oh.” Helene Jacoby stopped halfway through the door. “A dog.”

Bandito had curled up under the desk, asleep.

“Who’s this?” Scott approached him and, crouching, leaned forward with his hand out.
He made a gentle tsking noise, and when Bandito raised his head and licked Scott’s
hand, Scott scratched between his ears. “I love dogs.”

Bandito followed Scott over to his chair and curled up underneath it. Helene gave
a tiny, uncomfortable smile. Of course she was uncomfortable. After my impulse that
weekend to mash my face against Percy Stahl’s, I’d had a taste of what it felt like
to fail your own standards, to know that deep down you were as weak as the next fool.
I pushed this out of my mind. “Who wants to start telling me about the journals?”

“I will,” said Scott.

“Okay.” I braced myself for an explanation of how the idea wouldn’t work and the trust
between them was too damaged for him to follow the journaling exercise through.

“The thing is,” said Scott, “we didn’t read them to each other.”

“But you wrote them?”

“Three.”

“I wrote four,” said Helene.

“We thought we could each pick one and read it to each other in here,” said Scott,
“as long as we don’t have to reflect afterward.” Was that a shadow of a grin?

“I promise, no reflection. Go ahead.”

With one hand stretched under the chair on Bandito, Scott began to read:
“Delmarva Peninsula
.
”

Before he could get any further, Helene started to laugh, a real throw-her-head-back,
belly kind of laugh, and Scott chuckled with her. “I still think they should have
gone with WareLandIa.”

“What’s Delmarva?” I said.

“It’s where Delaware, Maryland and Virginia come together. We went there once on a
road trip to see the”—Helene started laughing again—“feral ponies.”

“They populate an island out there,” said Scott.

“Was it a good trip?”

“No.” Scott shook his head and started chuckling again. “It was not. Well, it was—”

“
We
had fun,” said Helene, “but we went down on sort of a whim, thinking we were so spontaneous.”

“We couldn’t get a reservation,” Scott said, “because it was spring break.”

“People see the ponies on spring break?”

“No.” They were both laughing. “But we stopped at Ocean City on the way because”—Scott
was laughing harder—“it sounded nice.”

“It sounded nice,” repeated Helene. “But have you ever been to Ocean City?” I shook
my head. “Of course you haven’t, because it’s a pit. Is that what your journal entry’s
about, Scott?” She cracked a smile. “Is that your way of telling me we’re doomed?”

His smile froze right there on his face. “Let me keep reading.”

“Okay,” said Helene, immediately sober. “Sorry.”

“
It wasn’t just that the weather was sunny and beautiful or that we were on vacation
and I hated my job
. Remember that?”

“Those assholes at System Optics.” Helene nodded. To me, “Sociopaths.”

“
I’m supposed to write about trust and what it means to me, but when I sat down to
write this, it’s what came out
.” Scott took a shaky breath, removed his hand from Bandito.
“If I think about that trip, I can conjure it, just how I felt with you, standing
in the lobby of the Safari Hotel with those drunken high schoolers doing headstands,
thinking about the ponies, cursing System Optics
.
”

He paused and looked up at Helene’s shiny eyes. “I remember it, but not like a memory.
I remember the feelings too. I just couldn’t figure out how to put it into words.”

“It’s okay,” Helene said. “You said it perfectly.”

I lived for these moments, when I could see a couple’s unearthed connection, palpable
as a cord from one to the other. After a few moments, Scott passed the journal to
Helene so she could read aloud too.

Sloane and Giovanni were curled up on the couch watching a movie when Bandito and
I got home. “There he is!” Giovanni scooped up the dog, held him above his face.

“He was a therapy dog today,” I said.

“Ah, we’re glad he made you feel happy.” Giovanni paused the television. “That’s what
he does best.”

“Not me,” I said. “I took him to work saving marriages.”

“How did he do?”

“Quite nicely. How was the Cloisters?”

They smirked at each other. “Amazing.” Giovanni paused the TV. “We’re watching
The Devil’s Own
.” In response to my raised eyebrow, he said, “Because it was filmed there!”

“Enjoy.” I walked past them into my room. I was in my bathroom washing my makeup off
in rough, broad strokes when Sloane came in a few minutes later.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

“Thanks for taking Bandito.”

“My pleasure.”

“Thanks for letting us stay here.”

“Of course.” It wasn’t her fault. It really wasn’t, and she certainly wasn’t the monster
I remembered, but since the trip, every time I saw Sloane, I wanted to run away. She
had a roughness around the edges, a misplaced intensity, that made me anxious. “How
long do you think you’ll be staying?”

“Are you mad about something?”

“No.”

“Really?”

“Well, I feel like—” I put down the cotton ball. “I feel like you’re not totally with
me on the Dave thing.”

“Actually, I’m all for you getting to the bottom of it.”

“Exactly. You’re a little
too
with me that way.”

“Don’t fall into the trap, Paige.”

“The trap?”

“The sweep-everything-under-the-rug trap.” Her eyes got a little crazy. “The accept-what-you’re-given
trap. The don’t-ask-questions trap.”

“See, I feel like those are all concerns that might apply to you and your”—I wiggled
my fingers, grasping for the right word—“dynamic. But they aren’t necessarily helpful
here. You’re projecting.” That was it. That was the right word: “projecting.”

She gaped.

“It’s very common.”

“You’re in denial. Also very common.”

“I’m not. I’m not saying things in my life are perfect, Sloane. Or that I wasn’t trying
to find out what really happened, but you have to agree—it’s between me and Dave,
right?”

“Yep.”

“I only just met you, and Dave has been my family for years.” I could tell I had hurt
her. “I’m not trying to make you feel bad, Sloane. I’m trying to explain. I have to
go about this in a way that makes sense to me, okay?”

She raised one shoulder and set her jaw.

“Let’s change the subject. Are you and Giovanni bringing a change of clothes to boat
day? I don’t know if I should, but it’s not like we’re going swimming, right?”

“Boat day sounds like hell.”

“You’re going, though, right? You and Giovanni?”

She didn’t respond.

“You’re going to boat day, Sloane.” I kept my voice even. “What were you just saying
about sweeping things under the rug?”

My phone started to ring and shake on the bathroom counter. Lucy. “I’ve got to take
this.”

Sloane gave another half shrug and stalked out, pissed. “I’m not trying to be mean,
just honest,” I called after her.

“Hey, Luce.” With my free hand, I saturated a cotton ball in toner and dabbed at my
face. “What’s happening?”

“Where are you? This week is almost over!”

It was easier to not get into it. “I’m going to have to push things back.”

“Why? Come out! It’s getting boring.”

“Really?”

“No, not really.”