THE DYNAMICS OF the ride home have changed, now that Aja is with us. And I remember why a threesome of children never worked on the playground—someone is always left out. In the car, that person is me. When Aja isn’t plugged into his iPad, he and Jubilee talk. Constantly. About strange things, things that I’ve never heard of, and I don’t even know if they’re real, like anatidaephobia, the irrational fear that no matter where you are, you’re being watched by a duck. Aja laughed so hard at that in the backseat, he was doubled over, clutching his belly in pain.
They talk so much, our conversations have dwindled to hello, yes-or-no questions, and her reply of “Tomorrow” every time I drop her and the bike off and say, “See you tomorrow?”
So it doesn’t make sense then that I find myself eager for the day to end. That my limbs feel lighter the closer I get to the library. That with her—even when she’s talking about ducks—is where I most want to be.
Friday is no different. The entire ride home, they’re on the topic of inventions, although it’s more trading facts than a conversation.
“The lady who invented chocolate chip cookies sold the idea to Nestlé for a dollar.”
“Bubble wrap was an accident. They were trying to make three-D wallpaper.”
“The inventor of the Fender Stratocaster didn’t even know how to play guitar.”
It’s like there’s an extra pocket in their brains where they tuck away useless facts like someone keeping a snotty tissue up their sleeve in the event they may need it again.
By the time we reach Jubilee’s house, it occurs to me I won’t see her again until Monday, and the thought tugs at me. She reaches for the door handle. “I finished Dolores Claiborne,” I blurt out. It’s not exactly true, I’m only halfway done.
Her hand pauses. “What’d you think?”
“I wouldn’t want to be the one to piss her off.”
She laughs.
“So, do you wanna—” My lips are dry, and I dampen the bottom one with a quick flick of my tongue. “I know it’s the weekend, but maybe we could—I don’t know. Get together. Talk about it.”
She directs her gaze at the darkened windows of her house, as if the answer will be taped on one of the panes. “Um . . . yeah,” she says. “Sure. Do you want to come over tomorrow? I don’t—I’m off work.”
“Yeah, great,” I say. “That’s great. I’ll bring lunch. It’s a date.”
“OK,” she says, then slips out of the car. In what has now become routine, I get out, collect her bike from the trunk, deposit it behind the gate, and then make sure she’s securely in the house before I get back in the car and put it in reverse.
“Did you just ask her on a date?” Aja pipes up from the backseat.
“No. No, of course not. She’s just helping me with . . . something.”
“Oh,” Aja says, and turns his attention back to his game.
AS SOON AS we get to Jubilee’s on Saturday, Aja slinks over to the armchair, slips his earbuds in, and starts tapping on the screen of his iPad, leaving Jubilee and me to stand awkwardly staring at each other. For once, I’m thankful for that stupid machine and the opportunity it’s affording me to talk to her alone.
“Want some tea? Coffee?” she asks.
“Yeah, coffee would be great,” I say, even though I’ve already had two cups this morning and really shouldn’t have more. But I’m leaning closer to just admitting defeat on my cutting-back plan. I swipe my wool beanie off with my free hand. In the other, I’m carrying a paper sack of hoagies. I go to offer it to her, but she turns and walks out of the back doorway of the room. I watch her leave, wondering if I should just sit and wait, when she calls out: “You can come back here.”
I follow her voice through the den into an outdated kitchen with eighties appliances and yellowed wallpaper lined with cherries. Jubilee’s standing at the counter, her back to me. I try not to notice the way the sun coming through the window highlights the reddish gold in her hair. Or how the locks fall down her back, reaching nearly to the dip of her waist. The way she’s got all her weight on one foot, causing her rounded hip to jut out, the curve of her . . .
“How do you take it?” she asks over her shoulder.
I clear my throat. “Um . . . black is fine.”
She turns with the mug in her hand and gestures for me to sit at the small table. I set the sack down in front of me and she places the mug in front of that. I stare at her gloves, as they seem to be the safest place to train my gaze. Why in God’s name does she always have those blasted things on?
“So.” She slides into the seat across from me. “Dolores Claiborne.”
“Dolores Claiborne,” I echo. The table is small—a two-foot-wide circle. A sweetheart table, I think they call them, and now I know why. Because you’re sitting so close to the person you’re with. So close that if you reach out, just a few inches, you could be touching.
“What’d your daughter think of it?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “She liked this one line.”
“Let me guess—the one about how being a bitch is sometimes the only thing a woman has to hold on to?”
“No,” I say, reaching in my back pocket for the notebook that I folded over and stuck there, and flip to the right entry. “I understood something else, too—that one kiss didn’t change a thing. Anyone can give a kiss, after all.”
“Hmm,” Jubilee says, sitting back.
“Yeah, that was my reaction, too. I mean, do you think she’s already kissing people? Boys?”
“Well, she’s fourteen.”
“Only fourteen,” I say. “Were you kissing people at fourteen?”
“No,” she says quietly, looking down at the table. She’s blushing so fiercely, I immediately feel bad for asking the question.
After a few seconds of silence, I grab the paper sack. “I brought hoagies,” I say.
She stands up and retrieves plates and napkins from the cabinet. I take a sandwich out to Aja and put it on the coffee table in front of him. He doesn’t even look up.
When I return to the kitchen, Jubilee says: “That quote’s pretty derisive. Doesn’t sound like you need to be so worried about her romanticizing love.”
Her words hit me in the gut and I realize Jubilee was right—I would rather Ellie be an idealist when it comes to love than a cynic. And I’m worried that if she already is a cynic, that it’s my fault. How can a kid believe in love when her own parents ran out of it?
“So which one are you reading next?” Jubilee asks while we eat. “Carrie or Misery?”
“I don’t know.”
“You should ask her. See what she thinks.”
I let out a small, sad chuckle. “Yeah. I don’t think that—I’m not sure that will work.” Jubilee cocks her head beside me. I know I need to tell her the truth.
“Ellie’s not talking to me. She hasn’t, for, oh”—I do the math in my head and cringe—“six months now. Except for one text, essentially telling me to leave her alone.”
“Oh,” she says, and I wonder what she’s thinking. Or rather, I know what she’s thinking, what she has to be thinking, and I hate it. “Why?”
The million-dollar question. I don’t know how I’m going to answer it until my mouth opens and the words fall out.
“I called her a slut.” As painful as it is to admit, it’s such a relief to say it, to unburden myself of the terrible secret. To confess. I have a sudden and unexpected flash of insight into Stephanie’s weekly visits to her priest for her own admissions of guilt.