The Summer Cottage (7 page)

C
HAPTER
8

 

A
s soon as the dishes were done, Thomas washing, Helen and Pammy drying, and Charlotte doing what Thomas called fake drying, the Thompson children, as per instructions given the previous evening at the dinner table, walked out the kitchen screen door and into the yard. Claire, who had gone outside as soon as she’d finished her last bite of barbequed chicken, was sitting on the picnic table, legs crossed, one foot marking time. She had already put the plastic orange bases in their places. She had pumped air into the red rubber ball that they would soon be kicking into the air and throwing at one another. Family kickball was mandatory in the Thompson household, even if Claire could insist that Thomas take a night off from work and Charlotte stay around until dark only two or three times a summer. Thomas didn’t mind all that much because he worked too many hours each week already. But Charlotte had become increasingly petulant about board or outdoor games of any kind and inured to her mother’s pleas for family unity or passive-aggressive attempts at making Charlotte feel guilty about wanting to opt out. John emerged from the garage, where he had been in the process of gluing a lamp that Helen had knocked over the day before in her exuberance in answering the telephone. It didn’t ring often, so when it did, chances were good that the news and the caller were important.

“Everyone ready?” asked Claire, expecting head nods or verbal assent.

Helen was the only one who responded. “You bet!” she said, using one of her father’s phrases. If Charlotte had said the same words, the tone and implied meaning would have earned her a reprimand. There was no danger of these mood-dampening utterances occurring, however, since Charlotte was, momentarily, staging a silent protest.

“Who wants to be a captain?” Claire was now up off the table, rubbing her hands together as she sometimes did when she was excited. No one responded, not even John, whom Claire could usually count on to step up if no one else did. “This is uncanny,” she said, hands on hips. “I can’t believe no one wants to be a captain. In my experience, being captain is a position of honor.”

“There is nothing honorable about family kickball,” said Charlotte, switching to a verbal protest.

“Let’s see you bring some honor to the game, then, by being a captain. Thomas, how about you? Will you be the other captain?”

“Only if I can choose the name of my team.” Thomas was smiling, a common practice for him. His white teeth, which he brushed three times a day, were a stunning complement to dark hair worn longer than Claire liked and his tanned skin. Claire, who had to be more and more careful in the sun as she aged, insisted that Thomas looked exactly like her grandfather, a lanky man whose college education was not wasted because he made his living outdoors. John liked to think that Thomas looked a bit like him. But he and Claire were agreed that Thomas, whoever he looked like, was as unassumingly handsome as he was most-of-the-time good.

“Go ahead,” said Claire.

“The Poopheads!” he said. “The name of my team is the Poopheads. Now, who wants to be a poop?” Helen shot her arm into the arm.

“Honestly, Thomas.”

“I’m honest and serious,” said Thomas. “Helen, get over here.”

“Hey, who says you get to choose first?” asked Charlotte.

“You haven’t even named your team yet.”

“Okay,” said Charlotte. “My team is the Tampons.” Claire closed her eyes and shook her head. “Look,” said Charlotte, “if you’re going to force us to play kickball like a bunch of grammar school kids, the least I can do is try to elevate the game to the high school level.” Charlotte looked at her dad, who winked at her. “I choose Dad.”

“Well then, I choose Mom,” said Thomas. “And, just in case you were wondering, we are going to officially kick your butts.”

Pammy was standing by herself while the others chatted. It was obvious, of course, that she was going to be a Tampon, but she was uncertain if she could join the team until she was actually summoned. For a good two minutes, while the houses rules were reviewed and debated, no one acknowledged her. It wasn’t until they were all about to take the field that Thomas turned around and called, “Let’s go, Miss Pammy. You, Charlotte, and Dad are up first.”

The lot they played on was between their cottage and the Hendersons’ cottage next door. Jean and Frank Henderson had eight kids, many of whom were out and about every night after dinner. Often, three or four of the younger ones would wander over if they saw the Thompsons in the yard. Charlotte liked it when they joined in, mostly because her mother was less outwardly competitive when outsiders were part of the group. When it was just the Thompson family playing, Claire was relentless in her pursuit of any kind of triumph, whether it be kicking the ball over her husband’s head or earning a run. Winning was the best, but it was even better if, in Claire’s words, she buried the other team. However, fair play was above everything else, which somewhat tempered Claire’s zest for victory. The Hendersons were noticeably absent on this night. Charlotte guessed they had piled into the two family station wagons and headed for the Dairy Queen in town. Or maybe they were on their way to the drive-in theater. Charlotte and her boyfriend, Rick, had gone to see
American Graffiti
the other night, but they had made out through most of it.

“Shall I pitch?” It was a rhetorical question. Claire, ball in hand, was standing where the pitcher would stand.

“Oh heck, why don’t you go ahead, Mom,” said Thomas. He was standing midway between second and third base. Helen was on pop-fly duty in the outfield. She stood on the Thompson side of the road, as anything that was kicked beyond the road was considered out of bounds and an automatic out. This was one of the rules that Thomas had brought up for review earlier. He thought that a physical specimen such as himself should be able to boot the ball into the stratosphere. Claire disagreed, to which Thomas said he never thought he’d hear her admit that women were weaker, that they couldn’t kick the ball past the road. Claire had replied that the rule was in place so that the outfielders wouldn’t spend the entire night chasing balls—and dodging dog poop—in the Walshes’ yard. Thomas had very reluctantly agreed.

“Who’s up?” Claire asked.

“I am,” said Pammy, who backed up several feet behind home base, so she could take a run at the ball.

“I wish all you Tampons the best of luck!” shouted Thomas from the field.

Claire rolled the ball toward Pammy, who, still giggling from Thomas’s remark, missed it completely with her right foot.

“How many strikes in kickball, Mom?” It was Thomas again.

“None,” said Claire. “But we’ll give Pammy another go. Pammy, you’ve got to focus, honey. If you’re not focused, you don’t have a chance.”

Pammy backed up behind home base again. Thomas and Helen moved in. When Pammy did make contact with the side of the ball, it spun toward third base. Thomas had the ball in his hand before Pammy was halfway to first. He took two steps toward his sister and then fired the ball at her moving legs, striking them just before she crossed the base. “You’re out!” he shouted.

“I know, Poophead!” Pammy shouted back, circling around toward her teammates.

John gave her a high-five when she approached him. “Nice try, pumpkin. Your brother’s got a good arm.”

“Yeah, well, it helps if you kick it more than six feet,” said Charlotte.

“Sorry,” said Pammy, using the word that came out of her mouth most often during family competitions.

When it was the Poopheads’ turn to kick, the Tampons had earned three runs. Charlotte grabbed the ball to pitch just as Pammy was moving toward it. “Got it!” said Charlotte gleefully, snatching it up from the ground.

“You pitched last time,” said Pammy.

“That’s because you stink.”

“I do not stink!”

“Let’s take a vote.” Charlotte raised her voice and looked at each member of the family. “Raise your hand if you think Pammy stinks.”

“That’s enough,” said John. Pammy was close to tears.

“It may be enough,” said Charlotte, “but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.”

“Oh for God’s sake, Charlotte, pitch the ball,” Claire said. “Pammy, take your place in the infield and ignore your sister.”

Ignoring Charlotte was a challenge. Number one, her large and loud personality was hard to disregard. And number two, in this instance, she was right. Pammy did stink. Everyone in the family knew this, including Pammy, in spite of her protestations. And all the Thompsons accepted it, even Charlotte, who teased her sister only when she was especially put out by Claire’s mandates. Charlotte’s stink message on this particular evening was aimed more at her mother than her sister. Sure, she teased Pammy about all kinds of things—boys, pimples, being flat chested, the usual sister stuff—but she did not kid her often about her gamesmanship. As far as Charlotte could tell, it was genetic, and Pammy didn’t have it. It was not her fault. Teasing people about stuff they couldn’t change seemed, to Charlotte, both unfair and mean. She knew that her attempt at irritating her mother injured Pammy. So Charlotte stopped, just as quickly and unpredictably as she started.

Claire did not take this viewpoint. She did think that teasing people about things out of their control was cruel, yes. But she didn’t think genetics were to blame for Pammy’s athletic failings; she thought her middle daughter simply didn’t try hard enough. And Claire, who had put all the effort she could muster into swimming for more than ten years, had little tolerance for a daughter who gave up before she’d warmed up. It had been this way with Pammy since she was very little. Claire had tossed her into Long Island Sound when she was two, like she had with Thomas and Charlotte, and Pammy was the first Thompson child to sink.
“Kick!”
Claire had screamed, using the word she had taught Pammy for moving her legs up and down
. “Pump your legs!”
she had called, running after Pammy, who was wobbling down the street on the tiny two-wheeler her older siblings had both learned to ride when they were four years old. Two bloody knees and two scraped elbows later, John had insisted that Pammy be allowed to ride her own bike, with its pink streamers jutting out of the handles, banana seat, and training wheels.

“If you coddle her,” Claire said in bed that night, after John had cleaned his daughter’s wounds and covered them with plastic bandages, “she will never succeed.”

“Claire, she’s five,” said John, turning out the lamp on the bedside table.

“But then she’ll be six, and ten, and fourteen, and, then you’ll be telling me that ‘she’s just fourteen.’ ”

“I think she’ll be riding a two-wheeler at fourteen.”

“I know you think it’s a big joke,” said Claire, rolling on to her side to face her husband. “But she has got to learn about effort and the fact that it’s the key factor to success. Sure, some people are born with abilities and inclinations, but those who put in the effort are the ones who rise to the top.”

“Not everyone needs to be at the top, Claire.” John put his arm over his wife’s shoulder.

“Would you rather have her at the bottom?”

“Of course not. But if you push too hard and she still doesn’t live up to your expectations, she will feel like she’s at the bottom no matter where on the spectrum she sits.”

“Fine,” said Claire, who could see she was getting nowhere and was tired of the discussion.

But it wasn’t fine. And Claire continued to push and coax. It wasn’t until several years after Helen was born that Claire eased up on Pammy. This was not because her husband’s gentle lectures were finally getting through, or because Pammy finally upped the amount of effort she put into various athletic activities that her mother had encouraged her to try. No, it was because Helen was a natural athlete. And Claire shifted her attention from a daughter who couldn’t hit a Wiffle ball with a plank of wood to one who could do it every time. Seeking her mother’s shifted attention, Pammy did try harder for a while—and Claire was pleased with her attempts. But Pammy’s results were never as good as Helen’s, who could ride a two-wheeler before her fourth birthday, who ran faster than everyone in her elementary school, including the boys, who won the town tennis tournament the summer she first picked up a racket.

As soon as darkness descended from the sky and closed in the yard, John called the game. The Poopheads won, even though Thomas had earned a number of outs for his team by booting the ball over the road, just, as he said, so everyone knew he could. Claire picked up the bases, as she always did, and walked them to the garage with her husband, who carried the ball. Helen and Pammy headed for the back door and their mother’s homemade brownies in the kitchen. Thomas said his good-byes and then walked down the street to the duck pond to meet his friend Eddie. Charlotte jogged through the cottage and up the stairs to her room, where she touched up her makeup for her date with Rick. She had her period still—thus the name Tampons for her kickball team—so he would have to be content with just feeling her up. Sometimes she liked that better anyway. She had been more interested in
American Graffiti
the other night than in the back seat of Rick’s car. She looked at her watch. Maybe they could go to the late show.

C
HAPTER
9

 

“D
id Charles ever treat you like that?” Pammy and Helen were back at the house, sitting on the porch with their bare feet up on the wicker coffee table in front of them. They had talked about Thomas and Charlotte, briefly, and now were back to Pammy and her quest for the right man. Claire, at the other end of the porch, in the preferred sitting area, was still sleeping. The sisters talked in quiet voices.

“I was lucky with Charles.” Helen took a sip of water from one of the glasses she had filled in the kitchen and brought to the porch for Pammy and herself.

“Why can’t I be lucky? Why am I a forty-three-year-old woman wondering who my next boyfriend will be? I always thought boyfriends would be irrelevant after my twenty-fifth birthday.”

“City life is different.”

“Helen, there are lots of married people in Manhattan.”

“I know. But they must have met elsewhere. I don’t think anyone meets and falls in love there.”

“Bill and Donna met in the city.”

“Exception to the rule. Think of another example.” Pammy hesitated. “See?” said Helen. “What you need is country life. Then you can meet and marry the local doctor or dentist.”

“Don’t kid me.”

“I’m not. Move out of that ignominious city. Leave the entrapments behind and start again.”

“You can’t start anything at forty-three,” said Pammy, wondering if she could.

“I’m going to,” Helen said, patting her sister’s hand. “I just can’t decide between chess and ice hockey.”

Pammy laughed. “Let’s go into the kitchen,” she said, getting up from the couch. “I brought some fabulous stuff from the bad city for dinner.”

“Normal or gourmet,” said Helen.

“Very normal, very good.”

“I’ll be there in a moment,” said Helen, glancing at her watch. “I’m going to wake Mom. She’s been asleep for almost two hours.” When Pammy left the porch, Helen stood and walked the several steps to her mother’s chair. She watched her for a minute, looking as she sometimes did for clues to her longevity. There were none any different from those of the weeks and months before, from when Claire had decided to stop the chemotherapy treatments so that, as she said, nature could take its course. Her hair was beginning to fill in, curlier than before, and the color had come back to her face. She looked healthier now than she had in the midst of her treatments. But Helen knew better. The cancer had spread, as the doctor had prognosticated, leaving Claire with a life expectancy of weeks, maybe months, instead of years.

It was shortly after this discussion with the doctor that Claire decided a summer family reunion was in order. Well aware of Helen’s attempts at getting her siblings together, of the declined holiday invitations to Thanksgiving and Christmas in Stonefield, Claire decided to take control of the situation. What, she wondered, would make them want to reunite? Since family unity didn’t seem to be enough, Claire wondered if she could do something that would force them to gather, other than die. Once she had asked herself that question, it wasn’t long before she came up with an answer. If they want to be included in my will, Claire told Helen over tea on Mother’s Day, if they want a share of this cottage, they will come to the shore for a long weekend over July Fourth. Upon hearing this, Helen didn’t talk to her mother for a day and a half. When she did talk, she said, “It’s a mean, idle threat.”

Claire’s eyebrows moved up an inch. “I can assure you it’s not a threat, Helen.”

“Well, it sure is mean.”

“I’ll grant you that,” said Claire. “But a little bit of meanness, with good intentions behind it, builds character. Life is not all rose gardens and pleasant moments. It can be difficult and disappointing and frustrating and, yes, mean, Helen.”

“So if life can be so crappy, why do you need to add to that pile of crap with threats and ultimatums? Is that how you like to be treated?”

“I was treated like that my entire swim career.”

“And my question remains: Did you like it?”

“Whether or not I liked it is immaterial. It’s effective, Helen. It works.”

“I’m not so sure.”

“How else are we going to get them to the cottage, Helen? Pammy will come, moaning and groaning about her latest drama, but Charlotte won’t, and Thomas won’t either. I’m running out of time here, Helen.” Helen said nothing. “I can’t pussyfoot around.”

“Since when have you ever pussyfooted around anything?”

Claire smiled at her daughter. “Work with me, Helen. You don’t have to like it; you just have to communicate it. You can blame the whole thing on me. I suspect they’ll do that anyway.”

So Helen had dutifully called Pammy, Charlotte, and Thomas, and relayed the loaded invitation from their mother. Pammy, who said she was deeply hurt, told Helen she would come, whether or not she was included in the will. Charlotte, who laughed, said she wouldn’t miss this final throwdown for all the money in the will. And Thomas said he would see if he could fit it in. When Helen reported back to her mother, with the information that Pammy and Charlotte were definite yeses and that Thomas was a maybe, Claire had clapped her hands. “I love a good competition,” she said, grinning.

And here it was; July Fourth was almost upon them, and Pammy, good to her word, had already shown up. Helen gently laid her hand on her mother’s cheek. Claire responded by opening one eye. Not looking at Helen she asked, “Who are you?”

Helen bent down so her face was at the same height as her mother’s. She looked into Claire’s dark brown eyes, the very color and shape of her eyes. “Three guesses, two don’t count.”

“Ah,” said Claire through a two-second smile. “I recognize that voice. Hello, Helen.”

“Did you sleep well?”

“I did,” said Claire. “Have I been out long?”

Helen again looked at her watch. “About two hours.”

“Good Lord.” Claire sat up and reached for her glasses. “Where’s your sister?”

“In the kitchen.”

“Get me my walker,” said Claire. “Let’s join her.” Ten minutes later, they had righted Claire, stood her up, positioned her in front of her walking device, and taken a few deep breaths. Claire watched as Helen folded the blanket that had been covering her. “Fifty years ago, I would have completed my warm-up in the pool in the time it took me to get out of the chair and ready to walk with this stupid thing.” Claire, a scowl on her face, rattled the aluminum walker.

“Oh yeah?” Helen said. “Well, fifty years ago, I wasn’t even born yet.”

“Ha-ha!” Claire laughed. “That’s funny, Helen.”

They made their way through the living room and dining room and into the kitchen. When they walked in, Pammy didn’t see them right away. She was standing at the stove, her back to them, with the radio turned up—big band tunes. Claire started to sway with the beat. “Tommy Dorsey!” she cried out. “I bet you a hundred dollars this is Tommy Dorsey!”

Pammy wheeled around. “It
is
Tommy Dorsey!”

“Since when have you listened to Tommy Dorsey?” Claire’s hips were still moving.

“Whenever I feel like it,” said Pammy, shrugging one shoulder.

“Lord, he’s good,” said Claire. “I saw him once—did I ever tell you that?”

Pammy raised her eyebrows at Helen. “I think you did,” Helen started. But there was no stopping Claire.

“At the Rainbow Room in New York. It was a wonderful evening. Your father, of course, was there. We went with one of his patients and her husband. Your father had saved her child’s life, you see, and her husband, who was in the entertainment business, was able to get us a prime table.” Pammy knew what was coming next. “Do you ever get to the Rainbow Room, Pammy? You live right in New York.”

“I have been there,” Pammy responded. “It’s lovely.”

“More like swinging!” Claire was now doing her best to snap her arthritic fingers.

Helen loved seeing her mother this animated. This was the woman she remembered from her childhood, the woman who moved from one task or activity to another from just after it was light outside until she eased herself into her reading chair after dinner. She had always been active, full of energy, especially at the cottage. When she wasn’t swimming or playing tennis or weeding the garden, she was chatting with neighbors or organizing a kickball game in the cottage side yard. Occasionally, she opted out of her evening reading so she could join Helen at catching fireflies in glass jars. She was a good cook, too, making everything from scratch. The kitchen was a well- and often-used room; it was where Claire was most at home. In the early morning, coffee mug nearby, she made sauces, marinated meat, baked bars, cookies, and pies for her children and husband, her friends, and for those temporarily incapacitated by a sprained ankle or broken wrist. She tidied up after herself along the way, telling the girls that a messy cook was a lazy cook. Claire also did her own housekeeping, even though many families at the beach had someone in once a week to dust, sweep, and change the bed linens. And she was not a complainer, until recently, which Helen found extraordinary. Most people Helen knew griped about their children or their parents or their husbands or their finances, as if they were the only ones dealing with such universal issues. When Helen was young, she thought there was nothing her mother couldn’t do. It was the reverse now. So seeing her mother dance, albeit with a walker, was a moment to be celebrated and encouraged.

“Somebody’s refreshed from her nap,” said Pammy. “You look good, Mom.”

“And you,” said Claire, wheeling herself over to the stove to see what was cooking, “were never much good at fibbing.” Pammy reddened and looked at Helen, who cocked her head. “Charlotte,” Claire continued, stirring the pot with the spoon she had taken from Pammy’s hand, “now there was a fibber. She wasn’t much good at it either, but that didn’t stop her from doing it. She’d put on her best innocent countenance and then tell me she needed to go to the library after dinner to work on homework. She didn’t realize, until much later, that I knew the librarian, who knew the two of you, but had never laid eyes on Charlotte. She thought I had two daughters.”

Helen laughed. “Charlotte never went to the library?”

“Not according to Nellie Potts, who was the director for twenty-five years.”

“Wonder where she was all that time,” said Helen, anxious to see what her mother knew.

“You know as well as I do,” said Claire, turning to look at Pammy and Helen. “Off with whatever boy would have her. Literally.”

“Why didn’t you stop her?” asked Pammy.

“You can’t stop something like that.” Claire turned back to the pot on the stove. “Lord knows I tried. Your father tried, too. But if I had told her that she couldn’t go to the library, she would have found another way out. Charlotte, as your father and I discovered when she was still very young, has always been determined. You two were more manageable.”

“I was the most well-behaved,” said Pammy, batting her eyelashes playfully.

“Except when you weren’t.” Claire turned down the heat under the sauce. “Let’s see. You first smoked when you were thirteen years old. You lost your virginity to Michael Johanson your senior year in high school. You first got drunk the night you lost your virginity. And you didn’t brush your teeth for two weeks straight when you were six years old, hoping to lose them all and make a bundle from the tooth fairy.” Helen laughed, loving their mother’s recollections about her childhood. “Oh, I’ve got tales about you as well.” Claire winked at her youngest.

“Me?” Helen said, splayed fingers to chest, feigning surprise.

“You snuck out of the house fourteen times the summer you were ten years old, which put you in competition with Charlotte. You went swimming at night with Thomas, without our permission, half a dozen times that summer. And you went to the tracks with your responsible older brother the very night your dad grounded you for going to the tracks at night.”

“What about her virginity?” asked Pammy, egging her mother on.

“I’m not sure she’s lost it yet.” Claire grinned at Helen.

“Well,” said Helen, smiling back. “Somebody
did
have a good nap.”

“What is this, Pammy?” asked Claire, returning her attention to the pot.

“It’s a mushroom cream sauce, with chive.”

“What are we going to do with it?”

“Pour it over ravioli stuffed with lobster.”

“Must be big . . .”

“Ravioli, yes, I’ve heard that one, Helen,” said Pammy.

“If you’re so smart, Miss Pammy, where’s my glass of wine?”

“Coming right up,” she said, crossing the kitchen to open the refrigerator. “Mom?”

“Count me in,” said Claire. “I’m going to need at least half a glass if I’m going to swallow a whole lobster wrapped in pasta.”

“This is the absolute last time,” said Pammy, twisting the corkscrew into the bottle, “I bring you two anything more interesting than hot dogs and beans.”

“I love hot dogs and beans,” said Claire.

Pammy handed her mother a glass of wine with one hand, and feeling oddly affectionate, briefly hugged her with the other.

 

After dinner, Pammy and Helen washed the dishes. Claire didn’t offer to help because she never had. John Thompson had established early on that since Claire planned the menus, then shopped, chopped, mixed, baked, sautéed, and boiled, she was exempt from washing and drying, which he did until the children were old enough to do it reasonably well. So, before Helen and Pammy cleared the table, they helped their mother into her favorite chair on the porch and lifted her legs onto the ottoman. When they left, Claire closed her eyes and listened to the crickets sing to each other. She could never understand why some people found them annoying, closing their windows at night and cranking up their air conditioners, preferring a cold, silent vacuum to summer’s natural sleep aid. She and John used to sit and listen almost every night. They would take their regular coffee to the breezy porch and drink two or three cups and never have trouble sleeping. Charlotte had dubbed them Count and Countess because they each had their special chair (Claire was sitting in hers at that very moment), from which they quizzed their children about who was going where and with whom before letting them pass through the front screen door into the fading light. After all the children were out or upstairs for the night, Claire and John would discuss them, turning to one another to find solutions to the everyday problems they faced. How long would they ground Charlotte this time and what should be the parameters of the punishment? She had broken her curfew three nights in a row. Should they give her another half hour? Would it matter? Claire was grateful for John’s interest in their children. Other beach fathers played golf or poker on the weekends and during vacations, but John stayed with his family. If he accepted a golf game, it was because Thomas was included.