Tapestry of Fortunes A Novel

13


At five in the afternoon, I head for Travis’s room to tell him it’s time for Mike’s mother to come, they’d better wait downstairs, she’d called saying she was in a hurry. Outside the door, I hear the sound of muffled giggling. I smile, wait. I want to eavesdrop a little. Sometimes I write down the good stuffin a journal I’ve been keeping since Travis was born.

Apparently they are on the phone with someone. “Tell her you’ll meet her at the movie,” Travis says, and I hear Mike say, “Okay, so why don’t I meet you right outside the movie. Seven o’clock tonight.” He hangs up and the boys begin giggling louder.

Oh, what is this? I think. They’re too young for dating! Then I hear Travis say, “How long do you think she’ll wait?”

“Probably about five hundred hours,” Mike says. They laugh again, louder, little hyenas; and I understand that Mike has no intention of going, that whoever the girl is will be standing there, holding her plastic purse and not looking around anymore after a while, just standing there. I push the door open, announce brusquely to Mike that his mother is coming, he should get downstairs and wait for her. Then, pointing to a Baggie full of chocolate-chip cookies, “Are those the cookies I made?”

“Yeah.” His collar is turned up in the back and I want to stomp forward and turn it down. Hard.

“Give them back to me,” I say.

“Mom!” Travis yells.

“Sorry. I need them.”

Mike hands me the bag. He looks quickly at Travis, then away. He will tell his mother on me, no doubt. “You know Mrs. Morrow?” he’ll say, “the one whose husband dumped her? She’s nuts now.” Well, the hell with him. The hell with his mother.

Later, I will make Travis call that little girl back and set her straight. Then I’ll tell him that he’d better learn some things about how to treat girls, starting right now. I can’t wait to give him this lecture. If he interrupts me, I will take away MTV from him for one hundred years. And what a pleasant century it will be.

“Whoa! You look great,” King says, when I open the door.

“Well,” I say. “Thank you.” I am wearing a cobalt blue dress, belted tightly at the waist. It’s short, shows off my legs, and the color has always been good for me. I do look nice, even if the weight I’ve gained recently is making the belt feel like a pretty instrument of torture. I have makeup on for the first time in weeks, and I’ve fancied up my hair with hot rollers. Joy is at each of my pulse points.

King, dressed in a gray sweat outfit, is carrying two videos. “Terminator One and Two,” he says, “do you mind?”

“I don’t care what he watches. I’m mad at him.”

“How come?”

“Oh … long story,” I say, and look away. Because the truth is, I realize now, I overreacted. I don’t know all the circumstances. Maybe the boys had some legitimate complaint against this girl. Maybe she had done something really terrible to them. But if so, they could have handled it another way. It’s David I was punishing, not them.

“Where are you going tonight?” King asks.

“Oh, out to dinner, some fancy place. I don’t want to go. I’m a nervous wreck. This feels so silly. Dating. What a dumb word!”

“You’ll relax after you meet him. It’s hard, this part, the part right before they ring the bell. Doesn’t feel great to be on the other side of the door either, take it from me. Why don’t you come and sit down with me.”

I follow him into the kitchen, sit at the table opposite him. It feels so strange, sitting in this homiest of places wearing heels and sheer-to-the-waist panty hose, and a dress I have to be careful not to spill on. I hope there’s nothing smeared on the seat of the chair, making a mark to which my date will point later, saying, “There’s, uh … I believe there’s something on your dress.”

The kitchen light is such a nice yellow when it’s dark out like this. It’s so cozy. Why can’t I just stay home, change into my own sweatpants, and watch movies with the boys, make some popcorn drenched with butter, loaded with salt? Why do I have to walk around outside in high heels, feeling the bitter November wind at my ankles as though it is sniffing them, asking Are you crazy? Why don’t you have socks on? It’s supposed to flurry tonight, maybe it could get bad. I’d better stay home.

“I’ll bet I know what you’re thinking,” King says.

“What?”

“You’re thinking of what you could possibly do to stay home.”

“I am not.”

“Listen, forget about it. Stop thinking about what might happen. Just sit here and let’s talk. About anything.”

“Okay.” I fold my hands before me, try to think of something to say. My mind is absolutely blank. I am an imbecile. When my date tries to make conversation with me, I will only smile vacantly, like a Kewpie doll with feathers sticking out of her brain.

Finally, King says, “So. Got any job prospects for Monday?”

“Oh! I’m glad you said that, I meant to tell you. They did call me. I can have my choice—Laundromat attendant or receptionist. For a whole week!”

“Take the Laundromat thing.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No.”

“But isn’t that kind of … humiliating?”

He smiles. “Why?”

“I don’t know. Have you done it?”

“No, but I would. I like those kinds of jobs.”

I nod, then say gently, “Didn’t you ever think maybe you’d like to go to college, you know, get a good education, some great job?”

“I went to college.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I just assumed …”

“It’s okay.”

“Where did you go?” I ask casually. I’ll need to be careful, tell him without seeming insincere that it doesn’t make any difference, really, where you go to school.

“MIT,” he says, and then, “do you have any popcorn?”

I point to the cupboard over the refrigerator. “MIT?”

“Yeah.”

“The Massachusetts Institute of Technology?”

“Yeah.” He pulls down a package of popcorn, brings it over to the microwave.

“What did you study?”

“Astrophysics.”

“And did you finish?”

“Sure.”

“So … why do you walk dogs?”

He turns around to look at me. “I like it.”

Travis comes into the kitchen, sits down at the kitchen table. “Hi, King,” he says pleasantly. This is so when he’s nasty to me it will have a better effect.

“Hi, Travis,” King says. “Want some popcorn?”

“Sure!” He stares sullenly at me. I stare back, then make a face at him. I’m good at this. I used to sit at the kitchen table with Louise, fighting silently behind our mother’s back. Oh, the venomous stares we mastered, the contemptuous fury we could communicate in a split second’s time.

The doorbell sounds and I start so hugely my hands fly apart.

“Mom!” Travis says.

I am going to throw up, right now.

“I’ll get it,” Travis says. And then, from the hallway, he yells, “Mom! It’s that guy for you. He has flowers!”

Oh God, I think.

I look helplessly at King.

“Well,” he says, “where do you keep the vases?”