Jack’s face blurs, and, to my horror, I roll away to cry.
Immediately, he sits and scoops me close. My tears come even faster then, because heismy safety net, and I’ve fallen a huge distance. How calm and organized my life was six days ago, how in control. And now?
Safety nets don’t ask questions or murmur empty platitudes. Safety nets don’t say anything at all. They’re simply there, holding you until you exhaust yourself. Then, maybe they wipe at your tears with their fingers—or Jack, with the heel of his hands. And still they say nothing until you, and only you, speak first.
A safety net doesn’t need apologies, still I feel the need to say, “I’m sorry. That was a poor show of defiance.”
“Are you kidding?” this safety net asks and turns back into smart-mouthed Jack. “Look where we are. Look what we’re doing. Look what we’re wearing.”
“Or not,” I say in a meek quip. “But crying?”
“Anne sobbed through the funeral. You did not. This is your time.”
I give him ayeah, rightlook, which may or may not have registered, since my eyes are still wet, so I say, “Crying for Tom? I’d like to take credit for that, but it’s so much more.” Hearing the words, I stop, look at Jack, see his curiosity. I owe him.
“It’s Paul,” I say very quietly.
He frowns. “Paul.”
“My father.”
“Paul?” His brows rise.“Paul?”He makes a face of utter disbelief. “ThatPaul?”
I feel an unexpected spark of protectiveness. “What’s wrong with it being him?”
“Uh, nothing—nothing,” Jack stammers, looking as muddled as I must have back at the cemetery with Paul. “It’s just—how?”
I tell the story quickly, sharing as much as I’m able, because, while Paul’s revelation isn’t as strange the second time around, it remains upending. I barely make it through the basics before the bottom line returns. Paul is only the final straw in a muddled haystack. “I come back for a week, and my life is turned upside down!”
“Or right side up,” Jack says.
While on mute, my phone has been busy. There are texts from Joy, from Chrissie, from Margo. There are three VMs from New York, one each from my Sotheby’s broker, my stylist for Saturday’s shoot, and the hair salon reminding me that I have an appointment for a cut next Tuesday.
I read Joy’s texts before I’m even dressed. She says she’s on the beach with her cousins and when will I be there?On my way,I text back, and quickly addTwenty minutes,to which she immediately replies,Bring Jack. He’ll die at who I’m with,to which I reply,Who are you with?to which she simply sends an angel emoji.
I read the texts from Chrissie while I’m in the bathroom, knowing I’ll feel like a fool if I start crying again. I don’t. But I ache.I’m sorry sorry sorry,she writes, you are the one person I never ever wanted to hurt.In a follow-up sent seconds after the first, she writesI can’t bear to lose both a sister and a friend. If we can’t be sisters, can we be friends?And a third text nearly on top of the second,I love you, Mal.
Not knowing what to say, I say nothing.
We’re back in the Tahoe when I open Margo’s texts. The first reads,You OK? I’m worried.The second reads,Anne told Bill. He wants wedding, she says no.And the third,Dan wants to stay to Sunday. Should we call Watch Hill or is crowded OK?
Jack squeezes my thigh, which his hand has not left since we both buckled in. “Anything good?”
I sigh. What the hell. My sister hates me anyway. And Jack doesn’t gossip. “Anne is pregnant. Only you don’t know that. She just told Bill, who wants to get married, and she’s resisting.”
“Why?” he asks halfway between curiosity and disbelief.
“Maybe,” I reply with no small amount of guilt, “because we thought Bill was a loser—well, until we got to know him. Face it. His past isn’t stellar.”
“Nor is mine.”
“You were never in prison. And okay, he got cleaned up and is on the other side of the bars, but there are those tattoos—and okay, I’m fine with them, too, but maybe Anne isn’t. Maybe she worries about the people he’s with all day long. Maybe she thinks Mom would be turning over in her grave.” With a jarring realization, I add a bleak, “Or Dad.”
Jack squeezes my hand to grant the sympathy of that. Despite what he knows now of Paul, he thinks the way I do. Tom Aldiss raised me. He is Dad.
But the subject is Anne. “Maybe she’s afraid of marriage,” he offers.
I’m startled. “Why?
