The Vacationers: A Novel (17 page)

Carmen took a break and squatted down until her butt hit the ground, extending her legs out in a straddle position. If Bobby had asked her to go with him, she would have. If he came outside right then and told her that he loved her and kissed her on
the cheek and apologized for interrupting her night’s sleep, she would have forgiven him. If he had waved out the kitchen window even, and smiled at her! Carmen folded over the space between her legs, resting her hands on the rough concrete. He didn’t understand anything at all.

A certain learning curve was to be expected—she was an adult when they met, and he was something else, half boy, half man. Maybe more than half boy, if she was being honest with herself. The first few years hadn’t even counted, not really. He was learning how to balance his checkbook, how to order wine at a restaurant, how to separate his lights from his darks. Bobby had been so sweet, gobbling up every piece of practical information. She was an oracle of the real world! Franny and Jim Post paid someone to clean their house, so no wonder Bobby was confused when his toilet bowl began to show signs of use. They paid someone else to do their taxes, so no wonder he didn’t know what he could deduct, which receipts to save.

And still, the Posts looked down at Carmen. She could feel it, she wasn’t stupid. Certainly not as stupid as they thought she was. She heard their muttered remarks, saw their rolling eyes. She had given up trying to impress them years ago, thinking that it was her newness, her eagerness, that got under their skin. Now she wasn’t sure that she’d ever had a chance. It was a strange feeling, to be someone else’s lightning rod, the glinting piece of metal in the storm. The scapegoat’s scapegoat. She saw how hard it was for Bobby to relax around his parents, and she wanted to help. But she couldn’t help if he didn’t let her.

Carmen rolled back up to a seated position and slid her head from side to side, stretching out her neck. He had five minutes to come outside and talk to her. She could see them all through the window, smiling and laughing. He had five minutes.

Jim wanted to spend the afternoon alone, so he drove one of the cars down the hill to Palma. The countryside was satisfying for only so long. Palma was big enough to get slightly lost in, with narrow streets and dead ends, just the way he liked. There were still some Moorish buildings, and some leftover evidence of the conquering hordes, and some interesting architecture tucked beside the chain restaurants. Let Franny plan the itineraries—Jim was happy to stroll with no destination in mind. He had a notebook in his pocket in case anything occurred to him, but the notebook had stayed in his pocket thus far.

The last time Jim had applied for a job, he was twenty-two years old. Loyalty was more common in the old days, when fact-checkers became writers became editors, none of this bouncing from career to career like younger people seemed to do, as if art school and business school made sense on the same résumé.
Gallant
had been his professional home for decades, for his entire adult life. It had been another marriage, just as complicated and nearly as satisfying. But now here he was, a
cool sixty, with no Monday mornings ahead. He turned left and walked up a cobblestone street that led into a small plaza with some cafés and outdoor seating. Jim chose a table in the shade and ordered a coffee.

His thoughts moved in spirals: If this, then that. If they divorced, then they’d sell the house. If they sold the house, then he’d have to move. If he moved, where would he go? If he stayed on the Upper West Side, was that pathetic? Was it aggressive? Was he supposed to surrender the zip code? Was Riverside Drive too far, too remote? Could he live in the nineties? He remembered the nineties when they moved in, how anything above 86th Street felt like it was overrun with drug dealers on stoops. If they didn’t divorce, would they ever have sex again? And then Madison Vance appeared again, as she often did, her hair still wet from the shower but already wearing her makeup, her naked body pressing against his leg like a blind saluki. She licked his neck and then his earlobe. She began to whisper. Jim took a sip of his coffee and tried to make Madison disappear.

Telling Franny was worse than the conversation with the board. It wasn’t easy to surprise someone after thirty-five years of marriage, but he’d done it. She’d laughed at first, thinking he was joking, the way they had often joked about murdering each other’s parents, or accidentally amputating a digit while making dinner. They were sitting in bed, Franny with her nose tucked behind a book, her back slumped down like always. Half a dozen chiropractors had scolded her, but what was she
going to do? Stop reading in bed? When he started talking, she held her finger between the pages, keeping her spot, but as he went on, she turned the book facedown onto her thighs. When Jim thought about the worst moment in his marriage, he thought about watching Franny turn her book over, the straight line of her mouth. It was what he’d avoided thinking about when Madison was in front of him, when he thought he might be twenty-five again, if he wanted it badly enough. But there was no getting out of one’s only life. Franny was a fact, and Madison was a mirage. She should have been a mirage. She should have been a jerk-off fantasy, a pretty picture, but instead Jim had let her walk through the looking glass and into his arms, and he couldn’t take it back.

Jim tried to take another sip but discovered the coffee had gone cold and thick. He dropped a few euros on the table and wandered on, turning right and left and right again, eventually finding himself standing across a busy road from a crowded beach. He was sweating through his shirt by now, his long sleeves curled up and cuffed. He jogged across the street, dodging cars, and took off his shoes and socks. The sand was hot, and Jim stepped lightly over people’s towels, side by side like floor tiles, until he stood at the water’s edge. The water lapped in lightly, covering his toes. He absently wished that Franny had come with him, almost looking for her in the crowds of people in their bathing suits. But he would have to get used to doing things on his own.

Carmen insisted on helping Franny make dinner. Together they tore the ends off green beans, mixed a vinaigrette, roasted a chicken, and made a pie. Franny was surprised at how easy it was—Carmen had fair knife skills and wasn’t afraid of using salt or fat, as long as it wasn’t for herself. They passed bowls back and forth, and ducked around each other to reach into cabinets or to open the oven door. Sylvia helped out in the kitchen when pressed into service, but would happily have eaten takeout every night instead. It was pleasant to have another body beside her, helping without complaint.

“I think we’re all done!” Franny said. She broke off a tiny, crunchy piece of fatty chicken skin and let it dissolve in her mouth. “Mmm.”

“Table’s set.” Carmen was nothing if not efficient.

“Thank you,” Franny said. She was moved by the tiniest gesture—it had been a longer week than she’d anticipated, being the chief of an unruly tribe. It would not have been much of an exaggeration to say that she might have cried, if only Carmen had been a little bit younger and a more suitable match for her son. “Soup’s on!” she called into the living room and up the stairs. One by one, they trickled in, Sylvia and Bobby from their respective bedrooms, Jim and the boys from the living room, where they’d been drinking some cocktails. Maybe it
was easy, after all, having everyone together. Maybe everyone just needed a few days to settle into their new space, to relax. Maybe they were all going to start having the best vacation of their lives, right now. Franny brought the chicken to the table with a smile on her face. When Sylvia came into the room, still wearing her pajamas, Franny gave her a kiss on the forehead.

Everyone filed in, sitting mostly in the seats they’d assigned themselves at the beginning of the trip, the way students in a classroom will always sit in the same place, whether or not they’ve been told to do so. People were all creatures of habit, the Posts no exception. Franny and Carmen brought all the food in, and Charles moaned with pleasure as he usually did, no matter what had been prepared. It was important to have at least one enthusiastic eater on hand at all times. After all the food had been set down, Carmen slid behind the row of chairs to take her spot beside Bobby, wedged in between his right elbow and the wall. He was barely speaking to her, still, even though she was quite sure that it was her right to be annoyed, not his. This was what Bobby did when he felt wounded—he turned all the hurt feelings inside out, so that his pain at having
caused
pain was tantamount. No matter what Bobby had ever done, it would be Carmen’s job to soothe him. An apology was not forthcoming.

Jim carved the chicken and sent the platter around. Lawrence slid a few spears of asparagus onto his plate and then passed the platter in the opposite direction. The meal worked like clockwork for a little while, everyone taking what they
were hungry for, if not a little bit more, not saying much except polite
thank you
s when a serving dish appeared in front of them. This was what Franny liked the most about being on vacation, the moments when no one was worried about what they should or should not be doing and just did exactly what was right.

Sylvia ate one asparagus spear at a time, letting the long green stalk hang out of her mouth as she made it disappear bite by bite. Jim tried not to be amused. There was little noise except chewing and the clinking of forks and knives. Franny made an excellent roast chicken. Even Carmen was eating, which Franny considered enough of a coup to comment on it from the far end of the table.

“So glad you like it, Carmen! It’s nice to see you dig into something other than your green juice.” Franny mimed the mixing of the powders, a mad-scientist-gone-bodybuilder. “Not that there’s anything wrong with green juice, of course. I did a juice cleanse once, for a week, for a magazine. Remember that, Jim? I lost four pounds and my sense of humor.” Franny laughed at her own bad joke, another sign that things were improving.

Carmen glared at Bobby. He didn’t look up from his plate. None of this was her fault—she had done nothing wrong. Carmen wanted to be the kind of woman who was above pettiness, who didn’t believe in taking an eye for an eye, but she wasn’t. They had talked about how he was supposed to behave with his family, how he was supposed to present her, how he should treat her, and here he was, acting like a teenager.
Carmen had done so much work to make him into the right kind of man. If he didn’t respect her enough to not behave like an asshole, well, then she wouldn’t respect him enough to carry on his little charade.

“Bobby sells them, you know.”

This made him look up. His eyes widened, and he shook his head back and forth, imploring her not to. No matter what he’d done, Bobby never thought that Carmen would sell him out, not like this. Not at the dinner table, without warning. She plowed ahead.

“Bobby sells the powders, I mean.” Carmen straightened up and tossed her hair over her shoulders, enjoying the sensation of having everyone listen to her for once. She thought she might never stop talking.

Franny puffed out her lower lip. “What do you mean?”