So many numbers and so few people I could talk to. I called Annie.
“What’s wrong?”
Right at this moment, everything. I inhaled and exhaled. “Why does something have to be wrong?”
“You’re on vacation, remember?”
“Oh, right. I just wanted to say hi.”
“You are not a ‘hi’ person.”
“Maybe I am now.”
“And this metamorphosis happened because…”
“Fine, I need your advice.” What should I do about Simon? “What do I wear to a book club?”
“You’re going to a book club?”
“Yes.”
“Since when do you read?”
“An old friend invited me and I want to make a good impression. And I’ll have you know I used to read all the time. And I’m going to start again.”
“Wear your blue dress.”
“Very funny.”
“Don’t worry about it. You always make a good impression.”
“You’re no help.”
“Always glad to be of service!” Annie said. I rifled through the dresses and chose three, put back two, chose another one. “I read your e-mail about Mr. Thomas but I didn’t reply because, you know, you’re on vacation. I knew you could close that deal. I’ll tell Simon tomorrow. If he has any questions he’ll call you and—”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“I don’t want him to call me.”
“Okay, I’ll tell him to text you. Or e-mail you.”
“I need time away, Annie. From everything.” I hadn’t realized how much.
“He’s your boss. I mean, I know he’s more than that but—”
“Can’t I have a break?”
“Yes, I suppose you can. And this one sounds exotic, let me tell you! You’re going to a book club. A book club! What’s tomorrow? A trip to the mall or a game of canasta?”
If she only knew.
“Everything else going okay?” I asked. How well the work hat fit when I was avoiding the real-life hat. “The Halsted-Tyler wedding? The Pierson retreat? The Bella Dolce photo shoot? What about the—”
“Make up your mind. Do you want to talk about work or not? Because I can go over twenty minutes’ worth of notes from this morning’s staff meeting if you want.”
“I do,” I said. Then I shivered.
*
If I didn’t pick a dress and head out for Josie’s in five minutes, I’d be late for book club. I shimmied into my turquoise and coral Lilly Pulitzer sheath, then dropped it and stepped out, leaving it on the floor. I settled on an indigo silk shirtdress with a subtle stamped lemon print that I’d bought in Miami at a trunk show. I pulled my hair into a ponytail and added a faux-tortoiseshell headband, but left the heart necklaces on the dresser. I didn’t want to answer any questions. The bottle of wine winked at me as if asking to come along.
That’s right! I should bring something to Josie’s besides myself. My mother was a stickler for manners and all things socially acceptable. Hostess gifts were at the top of my mother’s must-do list. Had anyone ever invited us over, they’d likely have been wowed.
What did I have, what did I have, what did I have? I twirled with each inquest and fell back on the bed.
Wrinkled silk be damned.
“What did I have to show you” had been a game Celia and I played since the first time she came home from overnight camp the summer we were nine. Camp Shamash was somewhere I never wanted to go and my mother never would have agreed to anyway. Celia and I walked around my bedroom that August day, and I showed her every and any bit that I’d accumulated in the three weeks she’d been gone. Later we’d done this in our dorm rooms, our apartments, and her house, simply finding things to share that the other hadn’t seen, holding them out, describing them as if willing the other into its origin. We knew each other’s life by heart and by tchotchke.
What did I have to take to Josie’s tonight? A half sleeve of Ritz. Cinnamon Altoids. Half a bottle of Ohio Pinot.
My camera.
And good intentions.
*
I closed the door and locked it. I jiggled and twisted the brass embossed doorknob twice, even though I knew I’d done it right from a lifetime ago of practice. I traced the swirl of the banister and looked at my finger for dust, but there was none. I heard movement upstairs—not footsteps exactly, but someone was on the second floor. I wasn’t alone. It was as comforting as it was disconcerting. I turned back to yell hello, but I was already pushing my book club luck.
I stepped out onto the porch and a horn beeped. I headed down the steps and the passenger-side window of a black SUV disappeared down into its crevice.
Josie waved. “I figured you’d want a ride but wouldn’t ask. Get in!”
I opened my mouth in protest, but the truth was, I didn’t want to walk. I also didn’t want to be a burden, or burden myself with expectations.
“You didn’t have to.” I buckled my seat belt and set my camera bag at my feet.
“No big deal. Just figured you could use a little help getting where you needed to go.”
*
Josie’s house stood like a castle at the end of a solar lamp runway. It was bright white brick with black shutters and a second-story Palladian window revealing a chandelier that I knew loomed over the foyer, Phantom of the Opera style. Josie style. The other houses on Rose Court were either two-story colonials rehabbed in the seventies, or 1940s bungalows that had never been face-lifted. There was one modest folk Victorian on the corner. The wannabe, my mother had called it. If there was ever a kettle-calling pot, it was Joyce Lerner. She also said you shouldn’t have the biggest house on the block (likely because ours was not). Josie needed hers to be. As we parked in the three-car garage I pictured Josie’s childhood home not far from mine, nor far from here, with its sagging-roof carport and gray-painted siding. I hadn’t wanted Josie’s house but I had wanted her sisters, the two younger ones with whom she shared a bedroom.
“I always loved your house,” I said.
“I love it too, thanks. It’s a work in progress.”
“I mean the one you grew up in.”
“Really?” Josie turned to me as the SUV hatch opened. “I always wanted your house. That’s why I went with white brick for this house. It always looks so clean and uncomplicated. Of course with a husband and three boys what’s inside is neither clean nor uncomplicated, but what are you going to do?” Josie chuckled and motioned to the door with her chin. That door led to the mudroom, something I’d never heard of until one was on Celia’s must-have list when she was house shopping with Miles. Must-haves could be moot in Chance, but Celia had gotten what she’d wanted. Josie had built what she wanted. “I have something in the back of the car,” she said. “Go ahead in.”