At Penn Station, we made our way through a confusing stairway to the arrivals board where our father always met us. On the train, our mother had gone into the bathroom right before we arrived and put on some more lipstick and a big spray of Chanel Number 5. “For Jessica,” she’d said. “I need to look professional.”
After twenty minutes beneath the clattering arrivals board with no sign of my father, she asked me, “Is he always late like this?” When she asked things like that I always felt like she was keeping notes somewhere of every single thing he did or didn’t do.
Cody said, “He’s always standing right here when we come up the escalator. He always has flowers for Madeline and a new Brio train for me.”
“What?” she said.
A few years ago, when she had wanted to get Cody a train set for Christmas, our father had called it an extravagance and refused.
“So you have a train set at Daddy’s?” she asked.
“Yeah. And it’s got a drawbridge and two tunnels and about fifteen hundred trains,” Cody said. “Where is Daddy, anyway?”
I was just about to strangle Cody when I saw the most beautiful sight: Ava Pomme. She was walking toward us, her hair shiny and her clothes perfect.
I waved like mad. “There’s Ava!”
Our mother spun around to look.
“Why’d he send her?” Cody mumbled.
Ava and our mother had never actually met. This was the first time I’d seen them side by side like this. Ava was a good five inches taller, with long rich brown hair falling over the collar of an oversize, below-the-knee camel cashmere coat, the sight of which made me embarrassed by my mother, standing there in her meager Old Navy pea coat. Ava wore black cigarette pants and boots with heels that my mother couldn’t walk on to save her life. She wore stupid shoes that she bought in Chinatown—fat black things with a strap across the instep. My mother looked short and dumpy. As Ava got closer, she reached out her hand, her legs so long and thin that all I could think of were deer running through meadows. My mother was more like a chipmunk.
“It’s a real pleasure,” Ava was saying.
“Where’s Daddy?” Cody demanded.
“His plane is late,” she said with a shrug. “He’s coming in from Chile and he has sweaters for all of us.”
She said Chee-lay as if Spanish were her true language. I practically swooned.
“Oh, goodie,” my mother said sarcastically. “Even me?”
Ava laughed. “Maybe. You can never tell what Scott might do. So,” Ava said to me, “let’s get going, shall we? Marthe has the baby and I promised we’d come right back.” She turned her attention back to Mom. “Marthe’s our nanny. Honestly, she runs our life. We wouldn’t be able to get out of bed in the morning without her.”
I adored Marthe, even though I never understood anything she was saying. She smelled like sweet cinnamon buns, the kind my mother used to make for breakfast on snowy mornings. I missed those mornings, Mom and Dad bustling around the kitchen and Cody and me drawing pictures at the kitchen table. Thinking about it, I can almost smell the strong coffee brewing and the rich cinnamon of those pastries.
“Do you want to share a cab downtown?” Ava was asking Mom.
“No, thanks,” my mother said.
I wondered if she had imagined sharing a cab downtown with Dad while she was in the bathroom on the train, foolishly putting on lipstick and perfume. I found myself wondering what Dad would do if he saw her right now, smelling good and looking almost hopeful. Deep down I knew he would do absolutely nothing. He was married to Ava now. I kissed Mom as fast as I could, gulping a big dose of Chanel Number 5. It was weird standing between Mom and Ava. I just wanted to get out of there.
Cody clung to her leg whispering, “Mama, Mama, don’t leave me like this.”
I disentangled him. I wanted to get away from my mother and melt into life with my father and Ava. We only had the weekend. Every minute counted.
“Good-bye!” I shouted to her, dragging Cody along by the elbow. Even his sniffling couldn’t ruin my mood. I felt lighthearted and happy.
I linked arms with Ava. Everyone who saw us would think she was my mother. “Tell me everything you and Daddy have done since I was here last.” I hoped my mother saw me walking out like this, arm in arm with Ava Pomme, the Tart Lady.
Chapter Four
DEAD MOTHERS