Half of What You Hear Page 6

  I shrug. “I’m sorry I haven’t.”

  “I’ll have to tell you about her sometime,” she says, smiling. “But now, let’s talk about your article. I have to warn you, you’re going to have to be careful.”

  “Careful?” I say.

  She laughs. “I might keep you around here a little longer than you’d like to be,” she says. “I get the sense that you and I could have some fun together.”

  “Oh,” I say. “Thank you.”

  “I like you, and I don’t like everyone.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” I say, though honestly I’m not sure I should. The past twenty minutes of conversation have felt like being batted through a pinball machine. What am I getting myself into?

  “So let’s get started!” Susannah says, clapping her hands together. “I don’t know where Cindy is with those drinks. Let’s go find her. Do you want to see the house?”

  “Yes!” I say, brightening at the offer of a change of scenery. “Yes, I do.”

  She swings her legs around, planting her feet on the floor beside the bed, and motions for me to help her up. I hand her the cane from beside the bed, then step aside so she can get past me and lead the way. I’m surprised by how tiny she is—a full head shorter than me, barely five feet. Her presence—and the clothes—makes up for it, I guess.

  We start down the worn carpet on the grand staircase, me holding her cane, her gripping the stair rail. “I used to sit right here and spy on my parents’ parties,” she says. “It was funny what you could learn just by watching people—who finished their drinks the fastest, which men lingered around the wives who weren’t their own. It was quite an education.”

  “I can’t imagine what it must’ve been like, growing up like this.”

  “No?” she says, leading me down the front hall. I notice that she doesn’t bother apologizing for the state of the house, which makes me wonder whether she notices it. “How did you grow up?”

  “More modestly,” I say.

  “Probably better,” she says, but before I can ask her what she means, she turns to me. “I’m so sorry,” she says, leaning against the wall and placing her hand against her side, like she has a cramp. “I don’t know if I got up too fast or what, but I am suddenly not feeling so well. Can we continue this next time?” She closes her eyes, wincing.

  “Oh!” I say, looking down the hall for Cindy. “Yes, yes, of course! Can I do something? Get something for you? Can I get—” My heartbeat quickens. If Susannah Lane collapses in front of me . . .

  Cindy suddenly appears behind me. She looks unfazed. “I’m right here,” she says. “How about I let you out, Bess?” She smiles, motioning toward the front door. It’s clear that it’s time for me to leave. And it seems like this is something Cindy’s used to.

  I turn back to Susannah. “I hope this wasn’t too much.”

  “No, no,” she says, smiling weakly. “It’s just taking longer than I anticipated to recover from that wreck. I’ll be fine. Just need to rest.”

  “Okay,” I say. Cindy opens the front door for me, and I start toward it, my heart still pounding in my chest. “Are you sure I can’t—”

  “She’s fine,” Cindy says, cutting me off. She nods efficiently, silently telling me to move along.

  “Okay,” I say, glancing back at Susannah as I step outside. She’s hunched against the wall, holding her stomach. “I hope you feel—”

  The heavy door closes behind me before I’ve finished the sentence. “I hope you feel better,” I say again, just under my breath. I start down the stairs, careful, in the blinding sun, that I don’t miss a step.

  Six

  FRIDAY AFTERNOON

  PERKINS VARIETY AND HARDWARE

  “Bradley, I hear that your daughter-in-law is working with our old friend.”

  “Yes, that’s true, Jenny. Writing about Cricket for the Washington Post.”

  “Well, isn’t that something?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “That gonna be strange for you?”

  “Why would it be?”

  “I remember how you two were. I may be up in years, but my memory’s sharp as a tack. The two of you were like . . . well, I’ll tell you, I was just fifteen or sixteen, but I could see how in love with you she was.”

  “Oh, now, Jenny, come on. That was another lifetime ago.”

  “I guess so. . . . Does Diane ever get—”

  “Jenny . . .”

  “I’m sorry, sometimes my imagination runs wild!”

  “Yes, it does. Now, why don’t you let it run off somewhere else.”

  She laughs. “This all for you? Just the Drano and the gum?”

  “Yup, that’s all. Here, take this. Keep the change, Jenny.”

  “Bradley, you don’t have to—”

  “No, no. Keep it.”

  “Well, tell Diane I say hello.”

  “I’ll do it. See you next time.”

  Seven

  Bess

  I’m smiling.

  I’m nervous, my stomach all gurgling flutters, but I am choosing—or trying—to ignore it. This is going to be fun, I tell myself, using the same cheerful and determined tone that Cole and I did in May when we told the kids that we were moving here. It is the same tone I would use to buoy myself up before the twenty-hour days that preceded state dinners at the White House; the same tone I would use to bolster the enthusiasm of my team in the East Wing, who needed to execute every event flawlessly or my neck would be on the line.

  I am smiling.

  This is going to be fun.

  Cole takes my hand, giving it a little squeeze as we step off the long, winding driveway and onto the flagstone path that leads to the front door of the Barkers’ sprawling brick home. He told me on the way over that they inherited it from Greg’s parents.

  Must be nice to have a house like this passed down to you, I think, taking it all in. Bedsheet ghosts sway from the limbs of the oaks that dot the manicured lawn. Plastic skeletons, their jawbones open in perpetual screams, have been positioned to look like they could rise from the grass at any moment. The spotlights in the shrubbery cast a spooky green glow against the brick. Gauzy spiderwebs are stretched across the windows. Greg and Mindy have gone all out. I’m impressed.

  “You said these two have been together since middle school?” I ask.

  “Yep.” Cole nods.

  “Remarkable,” I say, though it really isn’t, not here. I nibble on my lip.

  “What if I can’t remember anyone’s name?” I say.

  “Nobody expects you to,” he says.

  I grip his hand a little harder. “Okay.”

  “Are you ready?” Cole says.

  “Now or never,” I say, waving my hand in front of my face. A machine hidden somewhere in the bushes is pumping out smoke and bubbles. Very high school prom, I think, and then immediately scold myself. I get bitchy when I’m nervous, I know that, but I need to get my attitude together. I take a deep breath to settle my nerves. It feels ridiculous to be so anxious, but I can’t shake the feeling that I’m going to be under a microscope tonight, a bug splayed on a slide to be examined and picked apart.

  We’ve been to a few other events together since the move—a Labor Day barbecue, a start-of-school picnic on the Draper Hall campus, a happy hour we threw for the employees at the inn—and Cole’s done plenty of socializing on his own, meeting his old buddies for drinks and the like, but this is our first big social event as a couple since becoming official Greyhill residents. Cole can’t wait. He’s been ramping up for this for weeks, but that’s to be expected given that this is his hometown. His homecoming. His people.

  The bottom line is that I don’t want to be unenthusiastic about my social prospects here. I want to love it here. I need to. Because while neither of us has ever said it out loud, it’s presumed that this move is meant to be permanent. This is where we’re putting down roots. The wagon stops here. And the people on the other side of the Barkers’ front door, wh
ere I can hear the muffled sounds of party chatter and the refrain of “Purple People Eater” blaring, may very well be the people I will be surrounded by for the rest of my life.

  * * *

  Jack-o’-lanterns flank the front door. But—I notice these details, was paid to, once upon a time—there are no janky triangle eyes here, no crooked toothy grins carved with plastic child-friendly tools, no errant pumpkin goop hanging from inside. Each features a carefully whittled Halloween scene—a witch on a broom, a cat with its back arched in fear. Surely Mindy hired someone to do them?

  I smooth the front of my blue gingham dress, looking down at my ruby-red slippers. My Dorothy costume is from last year, when we had a masquerade party at the White House for the East Wing staff. The First Lady arrived dressed as Hermione from Harry Potter, a nod to her love for children’s literature. She’s made early-childhood education, and reading in particular, her main initiative while she’s in office.

  She should have come as the Wicked Witch of the West, I had whispered to Anna, my deputy. I shouldn’t have said it, but we had had a long day, and the First Lady had snapped at me earlier that afternoon when our planning meeting ran long and she realized she would have less than thirty minutes to get into costume. The First Lady hated to be rushed, but she also loved to talk and had no sense of time, and keeping her on task was an aspect of my job I had been coming to resent. In any event, I shouldn’t have made the Wicked Witch joke. It was one of the many comments that would come back to haunt me, I think now, my stomach clenching at the memory.

  Cole is the scarecrow. Livvie had been thrilled to draw two circles of my red lipstick on her father’s cheeks before we left for the evening. “Be careful with your mother’s lipstick,” Diane had directed from her perch on one of the barstools in the kitchen. “Not many women can pull off that color.” As usual, it was unclear whether she meant this as a compliment.

  Diane is watching the kids tonight. She brought over a tuna casserole, taking tiny steps as she carried the dish across the street from her house in a special insulated tote that zipped up around the dish. My mother-in-law is the kind of woman who has special totes for her casserole dishes. “Do I really have to eat that stuff Grandma brought?” Max had whispered to me before we left. The kids love their grandmother—she reserves any iota of sweetness she has for them. It’s a good thing. Of course it is. I just wish that my own parents lived closer, so the kids could see what it’s like to have a grandmother who doesn’t grumble about their sugar intake or their messy rooms.

  I ran my fingers through Max’s hair and pulled him in for a hug, whispering for him to do his best. Sometimes he seems like every bit of his twelve years, all giant sneakers and grubby sweat, and on other days, all I can see when I look at him is the chubby toddler who’d slept with his matchbox cars clutched in his fists. He’s just four minutes younger than Livvie, but sometimes it seems like there are years between them, especially lately. Maybe this is true for all twins, I’ve wondered, or maybe it is simply the difference between boys and girls.

  * * *

  Cole presses the doorbell—a glowing button in the middle of a gold fleur-de-lis—and I notice that one of the circles on his cheeks is already beginning to smear, probably because of those bubbles we waded through. I lean to fix it, giving my thumb a quick mom-lick first. “Stop!” He laughs, swatting my hand away. He is in a very, very good mood. The door swings open and the sound from the party rushes out, breaking the nervous chatter in my head. Mindy Barker is dressed as a sort of vampy witch, in a glittery black sheath that is slit to her hip and a wig made of long, tumbling black waves.

  “Co-ooo-oooole Warner!” she sings out, somehow stretching Cole’s name into three syllables. “And Bess! Look at you!”

  “Hi!” I blink. Mindy’s costume is . . . well, it’s not what I expected. “Thanks so much for having us!”

  “Come on in!” Mindy bats her spidery fake eyelashes and wags her long silver nails at us.

  “You look great,” I say. Cole, his arm around me, pinches my waist, and I nudge him back subtly.

  Mindy wiggles her hips in acknowledgment, the drink in her hand spilling a little, and waves us in. The only other time I’ve met Mindy was at Bully’s, the local grocery. Mindy’s youngest (Are there three? I think now) was tugging at the hem of her windbreaker, stretching with his other hand toward a box of Cap’n Crunch on the shelf. I remember this detail, how I’d felt the pang of nostalgia for that time in my kids’ lives like a splinter in my chest. Mindy and I had chatted about teachers. She knew all of them, of course, and not only because of her kids. At least half the staff are alumni who grew up in town.

  I look at her now, how she shimmies in her tight dress down two stairs into a sunken living room. I suddenly feel warm in my gingham dress and tug at my skirt.

  Mindy looks over her shoulder at us. “You two are adorable!” she squeals over the noise.

  The room is crowded with goblins and football players, a trio of Pink Ladies from Grease, an Elvis, Cleopatra. Cole takes my wrist and links my arm around his, and I notice that he’s already beginning to shed the straw that he’d attached with duct tape to the inside cuffs of his button-down.

  I squint up at the recessed lights, wishing I knew these people well enough to suggest that they dim the overheads and move some of the guests into another area. When we went to our friends’ parties back in DC, they ribbed me for this occupational hazard—my inability to just have a good time when there was a tray of food I could refill back in the kitchen or a drink I could refresh.

  Cole carves us a path to the bar, shouting his hellos along the way. Hey, buddy! So glad to be back in town! Been a long time!

  I grin and smile, grin and smile, noticing how some of the guests’ eyes linger on me and how a few, farther back, thinking they’re outside my sight line, tilt their heads toward each other and whisper. I keep smiling. I say hello.

  The party is in full swing, all laughing and screeching and clinking glasses. It’s a little fratty, honestly, especially for people our age. Behind me, someone starts singing along to the opening lines of “Thriller.” My heart pounds, and I take a deep breath and then push it out, annoyed that I’m nervous. I’ve made polite dinner conversation with everyone from the German chancellor’s husband to the Japanese prime minister, I remind myself. I’ve clinked glasses with more than one Supreme Court justice.

  I lean into Cole. “I’m nervous,” I whisper.

  He puts his arm around me, waving to someone across the room with his other one. “You’ll be fine,” he says. “Don’t worry. Let’s get you a drink.”

  A Frankenstein steps aside to give us room at the bar, and I recognize the bartender, James, from the inn. He’s a young guy—maybe twenty-three—and has only been working there for a year or so. Cole loves him, not just for his work ethic but also because of his ideas, which is why he recommended him to the Barkers for their party.

  On the night I met him, he made us his latest creation—a bourbon drink poured in a glass that he flavored with hickory smoke, something James said he and his buddies invented while camping one weekend. It was bizarre and delicious, and it made me think of the president, who loves a good whiskey drink, especially after a long evening. I always made sure to have one sent up to the residence after formal events downstairs.

  “Hey, James,” I say to him when we finally squeeze into the bar.

  “Oh, hey!” he says, wiping the sweat off his brow with his forearm. “Mr. Warner, how are you?” he says, clearly surprised by the sight of his boss in costume.

  “Please, James, call me Cole, especially tonight,” Cole says. “I don’t deserve any respect dressed like this.”

  “Right on!” he says, the relief evident in his voice. “I guess I forgot you would be here. The costume is pretty sweet. Yours, too, Mrs. Warner.”

  “Bess,” I tell him.

  “Right, right,” he says.

  “So what can I get—” Cole starts.

 
; “Excuse me!” a voice yells behind us. “Excuse me!” When I turn and look, I see a Superman, but a quite short one, with a sizable belly, a bulbous nose, and a ruddy complexion. More Newt Gingrich than Clark Kent.

  “Greg!” Cole says. “Hey, buddy! The party’s great.”

  Greg tips his chin at him, but the expression on his face is not particularly congenial. “Cole, what’s up!” He puts a finger out before Cole can respond. “Just give me a sec, dude. Gotta talk to my bartender.”

  I look over at James, who looks like he’s going to throw up. Greg leans into him and whispers something angrily in his ear.

  Cole clears his throat. “Anything I can help with, guys?” he says.

  “No,” Greg says. “Think we got it straight now.” He raises his eyebrows at James as if to confirm this, and James nods.

  Greg rounds the bar and puts his hand out to me. “Greg Barker,” he says, smiling in a way that looks like it pains him. He’s clearly still worked up about something. “Thanks for coming.”

  “Everything okay?” Cole says, a little under his breath so James doesn’t overhear him.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Greg says, cuffing a hand around Cole’s shoulder. “The guy’s fine, but, you know, sometimes you can’t trust these guys from out in the country. The kid probably grew up drinking Mad Dog and firewater. I don’t know how skilled he is at martinis and manhattans without following whatever recipe book you keep behind the bar at the inn.”

  “Right,” Cole says, and then, unbelievably, laughs a little.

  Why is he agreeing with this buffoon? I can’t help myself. “Actually, there isn’t a recipe book behind the bar at the inn,” I say. “And James made me a great drink just a few nights ago.”

  He turns to Cole, pointing a thumb at me. “She your new GM?” He smirks, and then, unbelievably, Cole laughs along with him. Again.