“What is it? Why won’t you relax, Charlotte?” The evening growth of his beard was rough on my shoulder and his breath was warm. “Don’t be upset with J.C. She had a lot to drink tonight. Would it have been better if she had invited Hugh into her room?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, no one else saw them, so you don’t have to worry about gossip. I know how you hate that. You and my mother. Two of a kind.”
“What do you mean?” I shifted away, grateful to have my irritation as an excuse to no longer have his body touching mine.
“I mean you’re like my mother in a lot of ways. You worry about what people will think. Who’s to know besides us? And you were spying on them.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Though I was secretly glad that he thought I was like Olivia.
He stroked my head. “My sweet, sweet Charlotte. Sometimes I think you’re too good for this world.” He said it softly, without a hint of irony. Within two minutes, he was snoring.
So it was decided. We would say nothing. But I couldn’t stop thinking. Hugh was probably a temporary diversion. J.C. had spent the whole evening flirting with Hugh in front of Press. Either what she was doing in the garden was yet another bid to get Press’s attention, or she was simply a well-dressed tramp.
Why was it that everything good and gentle seemed to have died with Eva? Everything around me had come to seem distastefully carnal: the slides, the things Olivia had shown me. The insinuations that I knew would be made about my father and Nonie. J.C. and Hugh/Terrance. Even Rachel seemed to be obsessed, complaining that Jack didn’t want to have sex with her. It was too much.
I was worried about my father. Nonie would telephone if he weren’t doing well, I knew. If everything were all right, she wouldn’t spend the money on a long-distance call even though I had told her to reverse the charges. I envied her being back in the tidy house where I’d grown up. Two stories, four bedrooms, two easy sets of stairs: one in the front of the house and one in the kitchen. A fenced yard where Michael might roam safely. In contrast, Bliss House was endless. Unpredictable.
Then there was the chasm between Press and me that had everything to do with Eva. My guilt was certainly between us. Though we’d both lost Eva, it seemed now like I was the one who had lost more. He didn’t miss Olivia, and I still felt like he didn’t really miss Eva, no matter what he said. What kind of father didn’t miss his dead child?
I saw the red fingers of dawn reflected in my dresser mirror before I finally fell asleep.
When I woke, Press was gone from the bed and it was after nine o’clock. My heart began to pound when I realized that Michael would have awakened by eight, and Nonie was not there to get him from the nursery. Any thoughts I had about the previous night were gone. Throwing on my robe, I hurried from the bedroom.
The nursery door stood ajar, and Michael’s crib was empty. A wet diaper and soggy plastic pants lay on the changing table. As I left the nursery to go downstairs, I saw that J.C.’s door was open as well.
Chapter 21
Invitation
“Well, here’s Precious Bride!”
I said good morning to both Press and J.C. and went straight to Michael, who was in his high chair, happily eating dry cereal from a bowl. I noticed the canned peaches in a second bowl. His fingers, which promptly grabbed for me as soon as I came near, were covered with both sticky peach syrup and flakes of cereal.
“Mama! Mama!”
“Yum, yum, yummy.” When I kissed him on top of his head, I found that his hair was also sticky with syrup. He had been busy.
J.C. was wearing the silk robe I’d seen the night before, but I could see the outlines of a gown beneath it. A thick, peach-colored terrycloth turban was wrapped around her hair, so that her head looked too large to be supported by her reedy neck. The daylight made the fine lines at the corners of her eyes more pronounced, though without her makeup she looked five years younger than she had when she arrived.
Press cleared his throat. “Look, darling. Terrance has sausages.”
Terrance stood behind J.C.’s chair with a platter, and I knew Press had been hoping for just that moment. He was determinedly straight-faced, but I felt myself coloring with embarrassment.
“Oh, my, yes. They are delicious. A marvel.” J.C. stabbed a sausage link with a fork and held it out in front of her. “What did you say these were, Terrance? I keep forgetting.”
“Venison sausage, Miss Jacquith.”
Maybe I was carried away with relief that Michael was safe, but I suddenly also found Terrance and the sausages funny. I turned my head, trying to suppress a giggle. But when I couldn’t, I pretended a small coughing fit.
“Precious, are you all right? Do you need me to slap you on the back?”
As J.C. pushed back her chair, I waved her away.