“They’re having a good time,” Zell said. It felt good to be part of something, but Lilah gave her a look that told her she’d gone too far. Sometimes when Lilah looked at her, she thought that the child knew the truth even though she couldn’t possibly. Zell saw the scar on Lilah’s pencil-thin leg, forever white against her tanned skin, and remembered the day the girl had gotten it. That had been the beginning.
Lilah turned to Jencey’s girls to introduce them to her father. “These are my friends Pilar and Zara,” she said, waving her hands at them. The two girls giggled and waved, but the third girl—the one who’d been tagging along just today—stood silent and overlooked. Zell’s heart went out to her.
“Nice to meet you,” Lance said, his tone formal as he shifted his weight and looked around the pool, perhaps wondering why he’d come, where he fit.
“Will you throw me, Dad?” Alec asked, his voice husky and reserved in front of the girls.
“Sure, buddy,” Lance said, looking relieved to have something to do. He glanced over at Zell. “Thanks,” he said to her, and then he let Alec lead him away. She tried to catch the other little girl’s eye, to give her a smile of encouragement. But she turned away too quickly, intent on following the other girls, her eyes focused on staying in step with them, her legs hurrying to keep up.
JENCEY
She hurried back to her chair, fuming internally over her stupid mistake. She straightened her towel and threw herself down. What was she thinking, saying yes to Bryte’s invitation? She’d been caught up in nostalgia, maybe, her resolve weakened by the heat. She had no business attempting a social engagement of any sort, much less a social engagement with her old best friend and her first love, now married to each other and living in the same neighborhood they’d all grown up in.
She was in no shape to see Everett again, much less Everett flanked by his wife and son. She had enough on her plate without adding that stressor. Her therapist back in New Canaan would have had a fit. Of course, therapists were a luxury from the past. Ironic that now that she had real, actual problems, she could no longer afford one. Of course her parents would help pay for a therapist if she really needed one, but to ask for that was to admit she needed help both financially and mentally. She was loath to admit either.
From the opposite side of the pool, she watched as Bryte fed Christopher sections of apple, smiling like a woman who had the world by the tail. Through slitted eyes (she’d forgotten her sunglasses), Jencey studied her former friend, marveling anew at just how lovely she’d become. Gone was the awkward uncertainty that used to characterize Bryte. In its place was a glow that radiated from within, as if that inner beauty people used to talk about when referring to Bryte had finally, over time, worked its way out.
When they were friends, she used to tell Bryte she was pretty, reassure her that, even though her chest was flat and she had thick glasses, she still had a lot of good attributes. But she was mostly just trying to make Bryte feel better, and they both knew it. Bryte, Jencey had believed, would always be the sidekick. But something had changed. Bryte had gone from looking like Velma in Scooby-Doo to looking like Audrey Hepburn. Jencey’s reassuring little lies had come true: Bryte had come into her own.
Old friends or not, Jencey didn’t want to see more of Bryte and her idyllic existence than she had to. Not when her own life had turned to shit. She could be happy for her friend without having to witness the happiness. She had to come up with an excuse to get out of the evening, and fast. The little boy was crying and probably getting tired, ready for his nap. She would get Bryte’s phone number before she left, then take the chickenshit way out and text her regrets. It wasn’t a very grown-up way to handle things, but it would get the job done.
She stood up and hurried back over to catch Bryte before she disappeared and left Jencey with no other option but to show up at the address Bryte had enthusiastically rattled off. “It used to be the piano teacher’s house. Remember? You could always hear music when you walked by?”
Jencey nodded. She remembered the house well: a white two-story with black shutters and a front porch much like the other houses in the neighborhood—not big but not small, just right for the middle-class neighborhood they’d all called home.
“Seven!” Bryte had said. “See you then!” Then she’d scurried away, leaving Jencey to feel the regret whoosh through her veins.
At seven she was usually preparing for her nightly walk. At seven she was still promising herself she wouldn’t end up in the hideaway as darkness fell, playing remember when. Last night she’d heard twigs snap as if someone was walking around, someone who’d also come to those woods. She’d sat quietly until the sounds disappeared, then bolted out of the woods, running nearly all the way home, the bad memories nipping at her heels.
Now she moved almost as quickly to get to Bryte before she left, her eyes locked on her and not much else. Which is how she ran smack into the man she’d noticed earlier. He was handsome, in a dad sort of way, a way Arch had never succumbed to. She’d once been proud of this, the way Arch had remained distinctly “Arch,” without giving himself over to the domesticated look that seemed to seize most of the men she knew. And yet, in hindsight, maybe that hadn’t been for the best. Maybe a surrendered man was a trustworthy one.
“I’m so sorry!” she apologized as she steadied herself, using his forearms to stop the force of their impact from knocking them both to the ground.
He stepped back, gazing down at her with a look that was half amusement, half confusion. “It’s OK,” he said, looking embarrassed even though he’d done nothing except wander into her path.
“I’m so sorry,” she said again.
He laughed. “So you said.”
She glanced over at Bryte, who was obliviously gathering her things. She wasn’t gone yet. That was good. “I was rushing to speak to my friend.” She pointed in Bryte’s direction. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.”
“No worries,” he said. The little girl who’d been playing with her daughters for the past several weeks sauntered over to them.
“Dad,” she said, addressing the man, “I thought you were going to play with us.” She looked up at the two adults. A giddy look crossed her face. “Are you two talking about the sleepover?”
“What sleepover?” they both asked at the same time, with the same degree of alarm in their voices. Then they both laughed.
“We want to have a sleepover. All three of us.” The girl said it in a huff as if they, the adults, were just so slow.
“Well, uh, now might not be the best time,” the man said, shifting uncomfortably as he spoke. He looked over at Jencey with a pained expression. “I’m, um, a newly single dad and not really ready to host an, um, event for the kids.”
Jencey waved her hand, dismissing his apology. “Oh, gosh, sure. I don’t blame you. I get it.” She refrained from explaining just how much she got it.
She looked over. Bryte was on her way out. She was going to miss her. She needed to get away from him, yet her southern manners prevailed. Her friends in Connecticut used to tease her about her accent, her sense of decorum, her general southernness. Try as she might, she couldn’t shake it.
She spoke quickly. “We’re just in town visiting my parents for a bit this summer, so I can’t really, um, host guests, either.” She patted his daughter’s wet head. “You guys can see each other here at the pool, OK?”
The girl sighed deeply. “OK,” she said. Deflated, she slumped away with heavy, dramatic footsteps.
“Well, nice to meet you,” Jencey said, offering parting words.
He turned to her with that same amused/confused look on his face. “But we didn’t really meet, did we?”
She looked up at him and blinked, then glanced over at Bryte again. Thankfully, she had stopped to talk to someone. “Oh, I guess not.” Obliged, she thrust her hand out. “I’m Jencey.”
He shook her hand briefly, then squinted at her. She noticed that his eyes were exactly the same color as his hair. She liked the uniformity of it, how utterly congruent he was.