“You want pesticides on your children’s food? Pass me the cucumber, will you? Bottom right.”
Jamie answers Ryan, “We make money every time our parents swear.”
Ryan wipes the blood from his re-opened wound onto his shorts and studies his elbow again.
“Slice thinly,” Bob says. “Make it last because that’s the last million-dollar cucumber we’re eating.”
“It’s awesome,” Andrew is saying to Ryan, “they swear a lot. I bought a transformer with the money I made last year.”
“I wish my parents swore,” Ryan says. Now he’s licking his bloody finger. “I want that new iPod nano.”
“Boys! We do not swear a lot,” I say. Great. Just great. Kerry Kendricks’ll find a way to make it seem like we’re horrible parents. “Stop picking at that, Ryan. You need a Band-Aid. Let’s wash it off first, sweetie.”
“Ryan just drank his own blood,” Andrew says to the room. “Dad. Did you see that? Dad. Ryan’s like a vampire. He just licked his own blood.”
“I’m serious, Sam,” Bob says. “No kidding.”
“Boys, go on upstairs, I’ll call you when the pizza gets here. Jamie, get Ryan a Band-Aid when you go up will you?”
“Can you get out the tomato?”
He leans in and lowers his voice. “We’re hemorrhaging money.”
“The other tomato. I think that one’s not ripe yet.” “Seriously, Sam. We’ve got to cut out the spending.”
“You still want me to buy the scotch? Now, that would save some money. Cutting out the liquor.”
“Fuck you,” he mumbles, twisting the cap off.
The boys race in from the living room.
“Swear!” “F word!” “That’s fifty cents!” “I said it first it’s mine.” “No way!”
I look up from the chopping board to see Bob plink the quarters down in front of the boys and stalk out of the kitchen.
“Can we play Nintendo?” Andrew yells from halfway up the stairs.
I stare out after Bob.
“Did you straighten your room like I told you to do yesterday?” I ask.
“Yeah. Can we?”
“Yes. You can play until dinner. Don’t run too hard up the stairs.”
Soon, Ryan gets picked up and the night fills with busy emptiness punctuated by parental barking. “Brush your teeth.” “Pick out a book we can read before bed.” “Go tell your sister to come down here.” “Well, bang on the door until she hears you. Tell her I said to turn the music down.” “Clothes go in the hamper guys, not on the floor.”
The other side of the bed is empty; Bob’s at the computer. The sheets are cool. We don’t say good night to one another anymore. Fine with me.
Shoot, did I set my alarm?
For the first few minutes of going to sleep it’s that airplane kind of sleep where you’re aware that you’re drifting but you’re not quite in deep sleep yet. But then a random muscle twitches and your head jerks and you realize maybe you were sleeping after all. It’s during that, before the jolt, that my mind circles around whatever’s been bugging me during the day. I want to call out to Bob to come, to turn off the computer and come to bed. I want to tell him I’m sinking. We’re sinking. We’ve become that couple I always felt sorry for, the couple with nothing to talk about. It’s too hard worrying about us all the time. Worrying alone. I want to tell him I need help, I didn’t think this would be so hard. I want him to hold me and tell me everything’s going to be all right. I want him to tell me he’ll take care of everything for a while.
I’m pretty sure I set the alarm. I better check. I have a parent meeting before school starts tomorrow and Kerry Kendricks is a bitch if you’re late. Then lunch at Spiaggia. I can use the parking lot in the Bloomingdale’s building. Or wait, I should take the train down.
It’s Wednesday and I have to meet three gossipy women I’m on a school fund-raising committee with and frankly I’d rather jam a chopstick in my eye than go but I’ve canceled twice so this time I have to go. For about twenty minutes we’ll talk about the event—a 5K walk/run that’s meant to raise money for new auditorium seating. The rest of the time will be spent picking apart this parent or that. This kid or that one. I mostly listen and try to fly under the radar so I’m not a target when I’m not with them, even though no one’s safe. Bob calls them the harpies. Sandy Kweller will end up drinking three glasses of wine and Marty Kozlowski will end up pretending she has to drive Sandy home because she wants to see the new curtains in the living room even though we all know it’s because Sandy’s too drunk to drive. No one talks about Sandy’s drinking.
I’m glad I decided to take the el because parking’s a nightmare downtown so this is easier. The train pulls up and I take a seat while a recording announces, “This is the red line. Bryn Mawr is next. This is the red line.” The recorded voice is calm and nonethnic. Not robotic, just nondescript. I wonder what he looks like and how long it took him to record all these street names. I wonder what kind of feat in engineering it must have been to create the system that trips off the announcements. “We are approaching Bryn Mawr. The doors will open on the right at Bryn Mawr.” Across the aisle from me is a well-dressed woman about sixty-five with her look-alike daughter who is probably about my age. The mother is listening intently to her daughter who is explaining how difficult it is to get home from work at a decent hour so she can spend at least a few minutes with the kids before they go to bed. This younger mother is impeccable. She is wearing low heels with a toe that curves just right. Her Godiva-chocolate brown bag is far too large for her frame, which means it too is perfectly current. She has a severe haircut, but it suits her. Her mother is murmuring something to her about day care or nannies and whatever she’s saying is agreeing with her daughter, who is nodding her head.
I wish I could ask my mom to save me from the mess I’ve made of my life. She’d know exactly what to do to make it right. I’d tell her this isn’t exactly how I pictured my life. She’d have seen the warning signs years ago and she’d have sat me down and told me how to keep from capsizing. I close my eyes and picture her under soil and silt and grass and dandelion roots, random footsteps thumping overhead every once in a while. I picture her casket lowered into the ground in Graceland cemetery at the corner of Clark and Montrose where buses idle, so it feels more like a construction site than a final resting place. I hate visiting her grave so I never really do. Before Cammy came along I would go on Mother’s Day, but that was too depressing so I tapered off and as Cammy got older the day was taken over with hearts and cards with backward letters and uneven pottery made in art class.
At the next stop a man in a suit takes the seat next to me. He comments he’s running late for work. He slides his leather briefcase into the space between his feet and I look at it and think it’s pretty gross to do that. The floor is filthy. In front of us a sleeping janitor still in his uniform from a night shift wakes suddenly to check the stop. When I pull my purse off the seat to make room for my seatmate I notice he’s handsome. Very handsome. I push a loose strand of hair back behind my ear and then I remember reading somewhere that when men and women are checking each other out they touch their hair. Oh, Jesus, now he thinks I’m checking him out. I go back to reading—I have to finish this book before book club next week and I don’t particularly like it so it’s taking me forever to slog through. A Ghost From Afghanistan. Homework reading. All the names are similar and I have to keep backing up to see who’s who. Two stops later he shakes the front section of the Wall Street Journal closed and takes a sip from his commuter cup of coffee.
“Man, that’s good,” he says to himself mostly, but I can tell from the way he’s shifted in his seat it’s meant for me, too. He’s the chatty type. I hate that. I try to keep reading but I can’t concentrate. What the hell.
By the time we pass Addison we’ve half swiveled in our seats in friendly conversation. Turns out he and his wife had looked at a house two doors down from us but didn’t buy because it had mo
ld in the basement. I tell him about the Silvermans’ house for sale up the block from us but he says they already bought a house nearby. The train stops midway between Addison and Belmont and the conductor comes on to say that the train in front of us has some mechanical difficulties so it would be a few minutes before we start up again. Could we please be patient? he says. My seatmate introduces himself. Craig. Craig Riggs. He looks like he stepped off the cover of Men’s Health or Runner’s World. He looks like he’d be more comfortable on a mountain bike or rappeling off a cliff than in a suit on the way downtown. He’s charismatic. Good posture. He talks about his work at a foundation he started a decade ago, and what strikes me is how passionate he is about it. Some kind of environmental mission. Cleaner water, more efficient fuel sources. I haven’t met that many people happy with their jobs at this stage. Our friends all say they wish they’d done anything but what they ended up doing. Just last week Lynn’s husband, Mike, said he dreams about killing his boss. I can’t remember the last time Bob said anything positive about his job.
I ask Craig about his children and he tells me his only child, a daughter named Lexi, has just had her fifth birthday.
“A princess tea party,” he says.
“That’s the best age,” I say and he nods.
He asks random questions about me. Have I always lived in Chicago (pretty much), how long have we been married (nearly twenty years), where did I go to school (Boston College), do I ever go to Cubs games (yes, but not that often). There’s my hand darting up to check my hair again. Damn—it’s like I have no control over it. Thank God I’m not in sweats. I have a blemish on my left cheek and I don’t want him to see it. I knew I should’ve put something on it last night. My mom used to say toothpaste was good for clearing up skin but I flip over in my sleep and the toothpaste would be all over the sheets and the bed would smell minty fresh. When I saw it in the mirror last night I figured who cares, I’m not the vain type. Slowly I sneak more glances at him. He has a wonderful smile that changes the whole shape of his face.
We have the same sense of humor and soon we’re laughing about everyone on the train.
“Oh, my God, it’s Donald Rumsfeld,” he says quietly. “What’s he doing getting on the train at Lawrence?”
“There’s J-Lo,” I say. “Actually if J-Lo and George Stephanopoulos had a love child that would be her.”
Why did I have to reference J-Lo? It sounds like I’m trying to be younger than I am. All his references are political. When he brought up Paul Wolfowitz I nodded and laughed and said, “That looks exactly like him!” even though I’m not sure who Paul Wolfowitz is. World Bank? And what is the World Bank anyway? I’ve always wondered. I hope it wasn’t a test. Naw—he doesn’t look like the type to try to catch someone in a lie.
By the time we get to the heart of downtown I have laughed harder than I have in I don’t know how long. Something about the whole thing makes me feel like a kid in high school. I feel light. The taped voice calls out, “We are approaching Lake Street,” and I feel heaviness, all the things I’ve forgotten about in this half-hour ride start seeping back into my brain.
A few seconds before we get to our stop he turns to me and says:
“Can I ask you something?”
I laugh in anticipation of another joke. “Sure.”
“No, seriously,” he says. The train is inching to a stop.
“Okay,” I say. “Shoot.”
His eyes are wide-set and deep brown and lock onto mine but not in that uncomfortable way so I don’t look away. He’s searching my face. His eyebrows furrow then lift in a question.
“Do you ever want to walk away from your life?” he asks.
“Doors open on the left at Lake Street,” the recorded man says.
The train is a sneeze away from stopping and he is searching my face for a reaction.
“Do you? Do you ever think this life is not exactly what you had planned?” he asks with urgency. “Do you ever crave something, anything, that could wake you up?”
I clear my throat and stand up, pushing my purse straps onto my shoulder. I’m caught between wanting to burst into tears and wanting to break into a run.
He says, “Sorry. I thought maybe …”
“No, no, it’s fine,” I say, fiddling with my purse, looking at the seat to make sure I haven’t left anything behind. I brush a make-believe hair off my shoulder.
“I just got the sense.” He trails off.
I clear my throat and wait for the doors to open. I don’t know why this has thrown me. We’re standing in awkward silence, facing out.
For lack of anything else to do and because it seems like a polite thing to do, on the platform we exchange e-mail addresses. He stands aside so I can walk down the steps first. We wave at each other at the corner of Lake and Michigan. But then I stop before I cross the street.
“Craig!” I call to him. He turns around from halfway across the street. “Yes,” I yell over the people still crossing. “I feel the exact same way.”
It’s a relief to say it out loud. Now the tears come. Why the hell am I crying?
He walks back to me fast, with purpose, with intent, and it makes my breath stop. I don’t know what he’ll say.
And right there, on Michigan Avenue with lunchtime crowds pouring out of buildings lighting cigarettes, he envelops me, this stranger from the train. We say nothing. He squeezes me before letting me go. We nod at each other. He’s gone before I can figure out what to say.
I can’t get his question out of my mind. I’m preoccupied during lunch with this strange question that does not strike me as strange at all. Sandy semi-slurs the words pledge sheet and Kinkos at cost and I’m wondering how can this man ask me something like that, something so personal? Marty clicks her pen shut indicating “business” is over, time for fun, and I panic that I seem so obviously unhappy. I must if a complete stranger is asking me if I want out of my life. And that hug. Oh, my God, that hug. On the way back home on the train I look for him but I know he won’t be there. I finger the paper with his e-mail address on it, looking at his name, constructing an e-mail in my mind.
It’s wonderful to have a few hours with a crush. What’s wrong with that? Here is another soul walking around the world feeling the same way I do and he’s not afraid to talk about it with a complete stranger. I can honestly say he was hot. Thick hair that makes him look younger but salt and pepper to add character and sexiness. Great hands. I watched his hands when he was talking about when he and his wife first moved to Chicago from Seattle and I don’t remember what he said, I just remember wondering why he doesn’t wear a wedding ring. That’s kind of tacky, men not wearing wedding rings. It’s sort of playerish. Like he’s trolling. Maybe he’s that guy. The guy that says he doesn’t wear a wedding ring because he doesn’t like wearing jewelry but then wears a watch. Or maybe he uses the “we don’t need a material symbol to prove we’re married,” but I’ll bet his wife wears something material. Something big and shiny and bright. He doesn’t need a symbol of his love but she does? Um, no. Married men should wear wedding rings, period.
But he thinks about the mess of his life, too. That look, those eyes of his, the completeness of that hug … that’s not something a player does. It was more friendly than steamy. I wish I hadn’t worn these pants. I always forget how they make me look like I have a huge stomach because they pucker out when I sit down. I was so preoccupied I didn’t think to smooth it out. Great. Now he thinks I’m fat.
I walk in the door and listen to messages. The school called, Cammy is in the nurse’s office feeling nauseous. She’s been sick a lot lately and I make a mental note to get her to the doctor. Bob called and said he can’t pick up Jamie from piano because he has a conference call with some famous basketball player. So it’s a scramble to race down Broadway to Cammy’s school. Then to pick up the boys, drop Jamie off at piano, run Cammy and Andrew home, throw dinner together for later, pick up Jamie, stop at Staples for poster board, then home and and
and.
I’ve set a new record with the smoke alarm tonight. It’s gone off three times and I know I’ll forget to put the nine-volt battery back in and we’ll all end up charred in a burn unit somewhere because I’m too scatterbrained to reload it.
Bob’s behind me at the sink drying the roasting pan. We’d had pot roast for dinner and I always regret having pot roast for dinner when I’m scrubbing the pan. I fight the urge to throw the damn thing out.
“Oh, I forgot to tell you,” I say, “I’ve gotten fifteen hundred dollars in pledges for Race for the Cure. And I still haven’t asked anyone in book club yet!”
I turn to look at him. He’s propped himself up against the counter, lost in a smiling thought.
“What’re you thinking about?” I smile and turn off the water.
When he focuses back to our standing there his smile shadow fades, his eyes harden. I fight the impulse to ask if he is daydreaming about another woman. I won’t ask him that. There might not even be another woman, I don’t know.
“Huh?”
I take his arm. “Come with me.”
“Where?”
“Just leave that and come with me.” I take his hand and lead him into the garage—the only place that’s quiet and somewhat private.
“What?” he asks once we close the door behind us. “Is that goddamn ceiling panel peeling back again? Are we getting water in here?”
I pull my sweater over my head. I’m wearing my good bra—the push-up one that cuts into my shoulders.
“What the hell’re you doing? Jesus, Sam …”
“Come here,” I say.
“You’re going to scratch the hood of the car. I’m going back inside, it’s freezing in here. Sam, seriously.”
“Come here … just for a second.”
“I’m beat,” he says.
The door closes behind him and I pick my sweater up off the concrete garage floor. I shake off the sawdust we sprinkled to soak up a leak. From the small window facing the house I can see him trudging back in and I want to run after him and shake him out of his stupor and say what’re we doing? I want to yell where did we go? I want to ask him why we ended up like this. I consider throwing the sweater away—it’s never really been flattering. I take a deep breath and open the door to the golden warmth of the kitchen. I step back into my nice little life.