By her second inhale, she was laughing as hard as the rest of us . . . especially when we began the book discussion.
“What I’d like to know,” she said, waving her hands like she was drying her nail polish, “is how many times y’all said, ‘Oh, that’s disgustin’,’ while readin’ this book.”
“Your accent’s coming out,” said Merit.
“Well, I know something is,” said Faith with a giggle. “But I thought it was all rational thought.” She fanned her fingers in front of her face. “Anybody else see sparks when I do this?”
“Faith,” I said, “you didn’t drop acid, you just smoked a little grass.”
“Well, it’s not like I’m seeing a meteor shower,” she said haughtily, “just a few little sparks is all.”
Merit watched her hands intently as she flicked her fingers. “I don’t see any sparks, but I do think I can see the blood rushing through my veins.”
“Merit,” said Kari, “you know who you look like? One of Chopin’s études.”
I laughed. “You guys are stoned.”
“People, I was about to say something,” said Slip, and she looked up at the ceiling as if her answer hovered there. Apparently it did. “In response to the question you asked about a mile ago, Faith; I think I said ‘Oh, that’s disgusting’ about a hundred times. And I think I said it the loudest when I was reading about fellatio.”
“Are you kidding me?” I said. “You don’t like giving blow jobs?”
They shrieked like a bunch of old ladies whose purses had just been snatched, and then in unison they all cried, “Blow jobs!”
I stared at my friends; as far as I could tell, their indignation was real.
“Really, you’re kidding, right?” I lit a cigarette now that the joint had been all smoked up. “Are you telling me you don’t give them . . . that your husbands don’t like them?”
Faith stared at me for a moment, her mouth open, before her upper body collapsed under a big tidal wave of giggles.
Of course the rest of us were knocked over by it. If anyone had come in at that moment (like the cops, I thought, but pushed aside the thought, not willing to let a really good high get spoiled by a little paranoia), they would have seen five women sprawled across the furniture, holding their various-sized middles, helpless with laughter. When it seemed the wave had crashed and we were bobbing along in calmer water, someone would say something and away we’d go.
“Well, I’ve tried it a couple times,” Slip said, “but I never get very far.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Either Jerry says ouch or I say, ‘Air! I need air!’ ”
The tidal wave crashed in again and we laughed until our faces were wet with tears.
“Wade pesters me to try it,” said Faith, hugging a pillow to her stomach, “but he always stops me right in the middle. He says the sound of my gagging turns him off.”
We were dying. Caught under a tidal wave and dying in my living room.
“How about you, Kari?” I asked, emboldened by the dope. “Were you willing to service Bjorn?”
“My lips are sealed,” she said, shaking her head, and it took just a second for the pun to sink in and the storm of laughter raged again.
“Oh, my gosh,” said Merit finally, her eyes sparkly with tears. “If Eric could hear us now. Oh, my gosh.”
“If any of our husbands could hear us talk,” said Faith.
Slip, wiping her eyes, asked, “Holy strange scenario, could you imagine them getting together and talking about the kinds of things we talk about?”
“Actually, I could imagine them talking about sex,” I said. “I mean, don’t men love to share their tales of conquest?”
“Maybe in high school or as frat boys,” said Slip, “but once a man is married I don’t think he talks about his sex life to his friends. I think Jerry would think it was an invasion of our privacy.” Cupping her hands to her face, Slip shouted in the direction of her house, “God, I love you, Jerry!”
“I don’t think I can move my legs,” said Merit. “Should I be able to move my legs?”
“Only if you have somewhere to go,” I said.
Merit frowned. “I don’t think I do . . . do I?”
We body-surfed on another wave of laughter.
“I think Slip’s right,” said Kari.
“Right about what?” said Slip. “What’d I say?”
“Right about men not talking about themselves with other men. In fact, Bjorn once said that he thought women were the more evolved species because they felt much freer in sharing their stories with one another.” She laced her fingers and stretched her arms out in front of her. “So yabba dabba doo.”
“Did you just say ‘yabba dabba doo’?” I asked, the laughter welling up inside of me like bubbles in boiling water.
Slip shook her head. “No, what she said was ‘yabba dabba doo.’ ”
“Isn’t that what Huckleberry Hound says?” asked Merit.
“Merit, you are so far off, you’re not even on the map,” said Faith. “Fred Flintstone says ‘yabba dabba doo,’ not Huckleberry Hound.”
“I thought it was Anne Boleyn,” I said, “when she saw Henry the Eighth for the first time.”
“I thought it was Gauguin,” said Slip, “when he first stepped on the white sand beaches of Tahiti.”
“Hey, I just moved my foot,” said Merit. “I moved my foot!” She looked around, her face awash in rapturous beauty.
“My God,” I told her, “your face is awash in rapturous beauty.”
“Hey, I just moved my other foot!” said Merit, and, then, smiling at me, she said, “Yabba dabba doo!”
We laughed for about a lunar year, and then Kari said, “This reminds me of how Bjorn and I used to laugh sometimes,” and then we were all quiet. It was only recently—only since the arrival of Julia, really—that I felt comfortable asking Kari about Bjorn, only recently that Kari seemed capable of talking about her dead husband without sounding like she was standing on the corner of Heartbreak and Pain.
I said as much and then, hearing the words out loud, added, “Wow, I am stoned.”
“No, you’re right,” said Kari. “My heart broke when I had my miscarriages and then it broke a little more when Bettina was taken away, but when Bjorn died, it shattered. I mean it; there was nothing left but shards and dust.”
“Shards and dust,” said Slip reverently, nodding.
The atmosphere of the room changed then; it was like all those waves of laughter went back out to sea, and we were left floating by the shore, not exactly sad, but spent.
“But you know what I have found?” Kari asked, and I was startled by her smile and how it could transform her plain face. “I have found I’m very glad I tried marijuana—my gosh, you don’t get that combination of hysterical laughter and peacefulness very often—but I’ll never smoke it again, or at least not until Julia’s all grown up.”
The blood in my face took a hike in temperature. “If you think I’m endangering my children or something, if you think I’m a pothead, don’t hint around, Kari; come right out and say it.”
“I wasn’t saying that at all, Audrey,” said Kari right away. I regretted my paranoia; I could tell by her voice that she meant it. “I was just saying—”
“You were saying something about shards and dust,” said Slip. “I want to hear more about that; it sounded like a poem.”
“Shards and dust,” said Merit, “crumbs and rust. That’s all that was left. Left of my heart.”
We stared at Merit as if she’d just revealed the secret of the pyramids.
“I can’t tell if that was really bad or really good,” said Slip finally, and then, turning to Kari, she said, “Now, what did you mean by that?”
Kari smiled as she touched the hollow at the base of her throat. “How you can keep a train of thought is beyond me.” She stroked her neck. “Oh, yes—what I learned about hearts. I learned they’re like lizards—they can regenerate. Lizards are
the ones whose tails grow back if they’re chopped off, right? My gosh, Audrey, I wish I could wear short skirts like you—your legs are about a mile long!”
“Only a half mile,” I said, flexing my foot to admire my ankle.
“Well, mine are half a foot,” said Slip, standing up to model her legs, which were stocky and muscular. Sucking her cheekbones in, she pirouetted, her hands resting on the chain belt that held up her corduroy miniskirt.
“Kari,” said Merit as we laughed, “tell us about the lizard and your heart.”
“There you go again,” said Kari, “expecting me to hold on to a conversational thread. Let me think.” She stared at her wedding ring for a long while. “Oh, yes. Well, I thought there was nothing left after Bjorn died, but then I got a baby—I got a baby!—and my heart put itself back together.” With her bright blue eyes, she looked at each of us as if she wanted to include everyone in the celebration of this discovery, and we all sat there waiting for her to say more, because everything was sounding so very profound, but all she asked was, “Isn’t it time to eat yet?”
“WELL, THAT WAS AN INTERESTING EVENING,” said Faith as she brushed crumbs off the coffee table and into her open hand. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Merit so . . . animated!”
“She had to have been stoned out of her mind.”
“What she did with that bratwurst! I thought I was watching a burlesque show.”
I laughed. “Well, it was Slip who was egging her on. Don’t make me think about it again, I’m already sick from laughing so much.” I helped myself to yet another one of the brownies Kari had brought to offset my sexually explicit but gastronomically tepid refreshments. “What I can’t figure out, Faith,” I said, catching with my pinky nail a blob of chocolate that fell out of my mouth, “is why you were so Carrie Nation about even trying it.”
Twin roses bloomed on Faith’s cheeks. Merit’s the classic beauty of our bunch, but to me, Faith’s face brings to mind that wonderful nineteenth-century word fetching.
“Well, I hate to be the one to tell you, Audrey, but smoking marijuana”—this she pronounced as “mary-wanna”—“is illegal.”
“Yeah, but come on, Faith, you’re usually the first one in line to have some fun. I mean, you certainly like your liquor.”
The roses deepened in color. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She had the same defensiveness in her voice that I had when I thought Kari was accusing me of being a pothead. I shrugged, stacking a few of the dessert plates in front of me. “It means nothing, Faith. All of us enjoy a nice drink. I just thought you might have had a bad experience or something, the way you were so adamant at first.”
Faith’s flared nostrils were perfect little O’s.
“Audrey, I have never smoked marijuana in my life—what makes you think I have?”
I shrugged again—was she touchy or what?
“Is that what you think of me?” she asked, the twang in her voice cranked up. “That I’ve had some wild pot-smokin’, drug-takin’, lawless past?”
“Faith, why would I think such a thing? Geez, calm down. Take a deep breath. Some people get a little paranoid when they smoke, and I think you might be in that category.”
“Well, maybe so,” she said, and took in a big gulp of air. “I do feel sort of—”
But I didn’t hear how she felt because I was suddenly on my feet, racing through the dining room and up the stairs.
Horror filled me as I flew into the bedroom and to the crib where Michael was sleeping.
“The sheet’s wrapped around his neck!”
I raced to unwind the bunched-up sheet and picked my baby up. A gasp and then a wail erupted from his little mouth, and the awful blue color of his face faded to a milky white and then to pink.
“Oh, thank God!” I cried, collapsing on the rocking chair with Michael in my arms. “Thank God!”
From the doorway, Faith stared at me, her mouth an Edvard Munch oval, holding on to the doorjamb as if she needed the support.
“HE SAYS HE DOESN’T see a need to bring him in,” I said after talking to the doctor on call at my clinic, “as long as he’s breathing fine and doesn’t seem to be lethargic or different in any way.”
“Thank God,” said Faith, her face pale against the frame of her shiny black hair.
“Feel my arms.”
Faith leaned over to touch a trembling bicep.
“That’s probably why Michael’s so smiley now,” I said, wishing I could smile myself. “Babies like vibrations.”
“Can I get you anything?” asked Faith. “Some coffee? A drink?”
“Would you light a cigarette for me?” I asked, and as she did I murmured to the sweet baby boy in my arms, “How did that sheet slip off the corner of the mattress? How did you get all twisted up in it?”
Mikey smiled behind his pacifier, and one little arm reached for my pendant.
“Oh, my precious little boy,” I said, tilting his head as he pulled on the chain. “My big strong precious little boy.”
I took the cigarette from Faith and inhaled, blowing the smoke toward the ceiling.
“How did you know he was in trouble?” Faith asked quietly. “I didn’t hear him cry. Just all of a sudden, whoosh—you’re running up the stairs.”
Clamping the cigarette in my mouth, I reclaimed my pendant from the baby’s grasp and replaced it with the watch I slipped off my wrist. Mikey seemed happy with the trade, focusing his mighty baby attention on the ticking second hand.
“I . . . I just saw a picture in my head. A picture of him not breathing.”
Faith’s shoulder twitched in a shiver.
“Do you see . . . pictures often?”
“Well, today seems to be a banner day for them. I guess it’s true—when it rains it pours.”
“What do you mean?”
I sighed, so tired, yet wide awake. “It’s just that sometimes I see pictures, and sometimes I just sense things.”
“So these pictures or these sensings aren’t because of the marijuana?”
I shook my head. “Right before book club tonight I sensed—in a big way—that Paul’s fooling around.”
She exhaled a slow breath. “Oh, Audrey, what are you going to do?”
“I haven’t figured that out yet.” I felt tears pooling in my eyes. “Right now I’m just going to revel in the fact that my baby’s all right.”
For a long time we sat quietly finishing our cigarettes and watching Mikey play with my watchband.
Finally I asked the question I didn’t necessarily want an answer to. “You don’t think I’m a freak, do you?”
Faith shook her head. “No, I don’t think you’re a freak, Audrey. I had a friend whose grandmother could see things.”
“You did?” I asked, feeling my heart quicken.
“My friend DellaRose,” she said, nodding. “Grandma T—I don’t know what the T stood for, but that’s what everyone called her. Anyway, she called it her gift, or her third eye. We used to play a game, looking through her hair trying to find it. Part of me half expected to find an eyeball buried in her scalp somewhere, but other than that, I don’t know how seriously I took it, even though DellaRose told me Grandma T always knew when someone had died or when someone was going to have a baby.” Faith looked at the Manet print on the wall with a funny look on her face. “Can you see into the past too, or do you just see the future?”
Mikey scowled at me as my laughing jostled him. “Faith, it’s not like I’m a mind reader or a fortune-teller, for God’s sake. I just get these pictures, these feelings.”
“Yeah, but these pictures or feelings—do you get them about everyone? I mean, could you look at me and get a picture or feeling about what happened to me this morning or last year or when I was a kid or something?”
I laughed again, and Mikey once more lowered his little brows at me before closing his eyes. “Faith, you sound so serious.”
The funny look on her face—like a kid’s who’d just
realized she hadn’t made it to the bathroom on time—didn’t budge.
“And why do you want to know?” I asked, my voice teasing. “Is there something you don’t want me to see? Are you hiding something, Faith?”
Her face mottled with color, and then her laughter (which sounded awfully polite) joined mine.
“Yeah,” she said, “I’m terrified you’re going to discover that I’m a secret agent for Interpol, working to break up all the subversive activities on Freesia Court.”
“Otherwise known as Operation Stop Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons.”
Faith nodded. “Exactly.” She looked around at the still messy dining room. “Well, I guess we should finish this cleanup so I can get home and see if Wade ever got the kids to bed.”
She began picking up dishes as I looked down at Mikey, who had fallen asleep. Bile rose in my throat, thinking what might have happened had I not run upstairs. After a moment, I looked up to see Faith staring at me.
“Thank God he’s all right,” she said.
I nodded, tears welling up in my eyes.
“Whatever you saw,” Faith said hesitantly, “whatever made you go to Mikey—well, like DellaRose’s grandmother said, it’s a gift.”
“Or my third eye,” I said in my best Bela Lugosi voice. I swallowed hard. “Still,” I said, “don’t tell anyone about it, okay? I’d feel weird if it were, you know, public knowledge.”
“Your secret is my secret,” said Faith.
“And vice versa,” I said, not exactly knowing why.
August 1970
Dear Mama,
For tonight’s book club meeting, I had a centerpiece of red, white, and pink carnations. The twins “helped” me make a pink heart-shaped cake (three-year-olds are not particularly skilled at cracking eggs) as well as heart-shaped sugar cookies (three-year-olds are not particularly skilled at sifting flour).
Looking at the table, Audrey said she was going to go into insulin shock, and then Kari said, “That’s exactly how I felt reading the book.”