“I need to take this stuff to my mom’s house. The girls’ things.”
Jeanie nods, her grin widening. “Sure. Do what you’ve got to. I can be ready in an hour. Or you can park in my garage overnight and David won’t have a clue. So you’re in?”
Chelsea steps out of her minivan and looks up and down her street. This neighborhood should be a haven, but it’s a prison. This is a place where instead of reaching out to help their less fortunate neighbors, the HOA mails letters detailing every step out of bounds. Who is hiding in their house, hoarding food and paper goods, and who has left, and who is sick or hurt or dead? There’s no way to tell. From the outside, everything is fine. If not for the high grass, that overturned car, and the one pile of blackened rubble, it could be any day here for the past ten years. She would’ve thought a group of people living behind the same high fence and gate would bond together, reach out to help one another, but here they are in a crisis, more separated than ever.
No, she will not be sorry to leave this place.
She’s almost tempted to set the house on fire herself, leave David just as adrift as she feels now because of him.
But she can’t. Once everything is back to normal and the courts and insurance companies catch up, that house will represent all the money they have, and she needs whatever resources she can find for her girls, even if David will fight like hell to keep her from getting what’s hers.
Yes, Brian is a good lawyer, or at least a cruel, scrappy one. But for the first time, Chelsea thinks that maybe she can get to a place where she, too, can have a lawyer who believes in her rights.
“Sure. Yeah. I mean, why not? I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
Jeanie does a little wiggle of happiness. “Good. I’ll go make a playlist and put together snacks.”
As she drives to her mom’s house, Chelsea lets herself hope. She considers what it will be like, leaving with Jeanie, under no threats from David. Singing songs, eating hamburgers and fries and milkshakes, playing trivia games. If she thinks of it like a road trip, it’s easier somehow. Less permanent. Less real.
She doesn’t want to fight anyone, but then again, she doesn’t really want to do anything except hug her daughters.
When she gets to her mother’s neighborhood, Homer doesn’t wave and open the gate. Instead, he steps out of his little guardhouse, unsnapping the holster where he keeps his gun.
“Sorry, Ms. Martin, but you’ve been removed from the list. I can’t let you in.”
Chelsea’s heart drops, her cheeks burning. “But my girls are in there!”
Homer frowns like a basset hound with bad news. “I can’t do anything about that. I’m just doing my job. Mrs. Lane said you could leave their things with me, and she’d take possession of them later.”
Yeah, that sounds exactly like something her mom would say.
Chelsea holds back another flood of tears as she helps Homer unload the garbage bags and backpacks containing the clothes and blankets and toys she gave her girls, remembering each item and how it came into their lives. Brooklyn’s favorite hoodie, bought to keep out the cold on a chilly night at Disney World. Ella’s pillow in the soft, faded, ragtag cover they sewed together on a Girl Scout retreat. Memories on memories, stuffed into bags like so much trash. She leaves them piled behind the perfect little guardhouse and drives away.
Of course. Of course she won’t get to see her girls one more time.
Her mother always has to get in the last word.
A strange new rage builds in her chest like a fire smoldering.
Perhaps, she thinks, she won’t mind fighting someone after all.
19.
Patricia doesn’t really think of herself as a day drinker, but within four hours of having both of the girls in her custody, she’s already on her second glass of rosé. No matter how she begged, cajoled, or demanded, Homer refused to bring her the girls’ things, even though his job is basically to sit there doing nothing, so she finally had to go fetch everything, hoping desperately that no one important would see her heaving garbage bags into her backseat. So embarrassing. Chelsea must’ve loved the thought of her mother wrestling with what looks like trash instead of packing the girls’ things into luggage like a reasonable person.
Now she’s trying to relax in the reclining chair under the patio fan and the girls are in their bathing suits—far too skimpy; they’ll need new ones immediately—and splashing in the pool. It’s perfectly safe, since they get their shots tomorrow. Sure, there might be a few mosquitoes around that have escaped the sprays, but Dr. Baird explained that the vaccine is therapeutic, so it cures those who are infected while inoculating everyone else.
Brooklyn is an attractive child but terribly wild, and Ella is a lost cause, somehow both meek and ornery, not that Patricia isn’t going to try to get her up to snuff. At the very least, the older one is a decent babysitter for her younger sister, taking some of the pressure off Patricia to Nana, look at this and Nana, watch me.
Exhausting.
She’s already made several calls. Dr. Baird will be by tomorrow morning, her regular girl at Dillard’s is setting aside a full wardrobe in each girl’s size for Patricia to peruse behind locked doors, and the warm coats they’ll need for Iceland are on order. Once she explains the situation to Randall, he’ll handle whatever paperwork they’ll need to take the girls overseas. Amazing how much can be accomplished if one has the right phone numbers, a warm but firm tone, and a black credit card.
The girls are making far too much noise, and Patricia is glad the Pattersons and Herberts have already vacated and therefore won’t be sending snippy little texts about noise control and headaches and the importance of maintaining standards. The neighborhood is quiet and orderly, and the only families with young children have such large properties that no one has to hear all the squealing and shouting, thank goodness. As she glances around the yard, she makes a mental note to hire a lawn service to take care of things while they’re out of the country. With Miguel, Rosa, and Oscar completely out of the picture, things will soon get out of hand. Being gone is no excuse, as everyone in their circle is always summering or wintering somewhere else, most of the time. If only Chelsea had accepted her first, very generous offer, she wouldn’t have to worry about anything other than her daughter’s black thumb and utter lack of a work ethic.
The door opens, and Randall steps out onto the patio in his suit, his armpits swamped with sweat. Patricia holds up her watch and tsks. He’s rather early. She’d hoped to have the girls dressed and primped and cowed into cheerful silence by the time he arrived.
“What’s all this now?” he asks, frowning at her.
Oh, how she hates that frown.