Second Chance. Elizabeth Wrenn

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СКАЧАТЬ with the girls because Kurt ‘doesn’t like to ski.’ I grabbed the cleanser from under the sink and shook some into one side of the aged white porcelain sink. When we’d redecorated the kitchen several years ago, I’d wanted one of those high-tech composite sinks, but couldn’t justify the expense. The porcelain was still perfectly good, albeit chipped and dulled. I stopped scrubbing. One of my good dish towels lay in the other side of the sink, a wet orange wad.

      ‘Did you use the dish towel to wipe up orange juice?’ I asked, barely keeping my voice calm in my rising tension. So that was the tacky spot.

      ‘No, it was there. Dad must’ve.’

      ‘Goddamn him!’

      ‘Mom! You owe me a dollar!’ Lainey said, looking first stunned, then gleeful. Shit. Shoot. She was right. I was trying to curb their use of expletives and so charged them a dollar each time. I never swore. Until recently. And although I usually didn’t actually collect from the kids, just warned them that next time I would, I felt compelled to pay up.

      As I walked to my purse and handed her the dollar, I got back to the subject at hand. ‘And this Kurt said Sara can’t go shopping with you and Nan? Does Sara want to go?’ I asked, scrubbing at a stain left by Neil’s tea bag.

      ‘Oh, jeeze, Mom!’ Course she does. But guys don’t like shopping. And, you have, like, certain responsibilities when you’re boyfriend and girlfriend. So you need to take us now, okay?’

      I knew I should make her rephrase that, put in a ‘please’ somewhere. Instead, I scrubbed harder at the stain, partially regretting that Neil and I had revoked Matt’s driving privileges when, backing out of our one-car garage, he’d smashed the side-view mirrors on my old Camry wagon. Both of them. First he’d scraped the driver’s side nearly off, leaving it hanging by just the wires. But then, in his panic, he’d pulled forward into the garage, then backed out again, overcorrecting, and cracked both the plastic casing and the glass of the other side mirror. Poor guy. I think he was almost relieved to be absolved of the responsibility of driving. It wasn’t a complete surprise. When he was three he’d practiced riding his new tricycle in the garage for a week before he would head out onto the wilds of the sidewalk. I guess he was doing the same thing with my car.

      With Sam’s tuition at Stanford, I was, more than ever, pinching every penny. So the mirrors of my car were decoratively held on with half a roll of duct tape. And Lainey was already agitating to get her learner’s permit. Oh, Lord.

      ‘Mom! Will you drive us or not?’

      I rinsed out my sponge, pleased with the clean spot where the tea-bag stain had been. ‘I guess. Okay. Maybe I’ll do the walking course. Get a little exercise.’

      ‘Yeah. You should.’ She must have heard how that sounded because she came over and hugged me briefly before she turned and headed back upstairs to gather her things.

      I was stopped at a red light with Matt, Lainey, and Nan all sitting in the backseat. I remembered when my kids used to fight over the front seat and who would get to sit next to me. It wasn’t that long ago. But it was.

      All three were now engaged in a lively game of rock, paper, scissors. As I watched the light, listening to their repetitive counting to three then bursts of laughter, the hot flash began. Streams of perspiration started from my underarms and slid down my sides. I didn’t have to check the rearview mirror to know that my face was flushed to nearly purple. I could feel my scalp moisten. Then the rivulets started down my face.

      ‘Whew!’ I said, unlatching my seat belt, pressing the window button down. ‘Warm in here.’ Now I couldn’t help glancing in the rearview mirror. Matt and Lainey exchanged knowing looks with each other, rolled their eyes and turned toward Nan.

      ‘She does this a lot lately,’ Lainey said. ‘You might want to put your coat on.’ Matt, his long sandy bangs shaking back and forth with his head, blushed.

      I was struggling to unzip first my fleece vest, then my sweat jacket, having worn a thin tank top beneath. I’d learned to dress in layers. The vest was easy, but I wrestled with the jacket zipper, which was stuck at the bottom. The light turned green and the car behind me immediately honked. A kid about Matt’s age in a red Mazda Miata.

      ‘Mah-ahm! Go!’ Lainey cried. In the rearview mirror I saw Matt looking out the window, suddenly very interested in the look-alike condominiums springing up like a bad rash on what used to be rolling farmland. I had one arm in a sleeve and one arm out. I grabbed the wheel with my free hand and pulled into the intersection, slowly, because I had not yet rebuckled my seat belt. I stuck my sleeved arm out the window and leaned my head out too, the delightfully cool air rushing over my face, blowing my ponytail out behind me as I picked up speed.

      ‘Mah-ahm!’ Lainey said. ‘You look like a dog!’ The backseat erupted in a different kind of laughter.

      Miata kid honked again, then sped around me, cutting off a woman in a yellow bug in the other lane, then pulling back in front of me. Yellow bug honked and Miata kid gave me the finger out his window.

      I quickly redid my seat belt, still half in and half out of my jacket, my heart pounding from being assaulted by a sixteen-year-old’s middle digit. And the laughter from the backseat.

      As I pulled into the main drive of the mall, the kids started gathering their things for a quick getaway. Matt was meeting friends and knew he’d be safe from me at Scourge of the Underworld, or whatever the arcade was called. But as I pulled into a parking space, Lainey felt the need to lay down the law about my proximity to her.

      ‘Mom, just so you know, we want to hang out alone.’ I pictured the girls floating deliriously in and out of various teeny-bop clothing shops, and those olfactory overload candle and body-liquid emporiums; I assured them it would not be a problem. I’d go for a good walk, then buy myself a skinny latte and go sit on the leather couch in Pottery Barn and stare into space. A middle-aged woman’s nirvana.

      As the girls clamored out, I yelled, ‘Shall we meet back at the food court at twelve thirty?’ Lainey waved without looking back as they ran off.

      ‘See ya,’ said Matt. He ambled off, careful to affect the loose-kneed, slumped-shouldered australopithecine walk of teen boys.

      ‘Twelve thirty! Food court!’ I said to his back.

      I found the beginning of the mall walking course, strategically located next to Godiva chocolates. What were they thinking? Well, selling chocolates to fat people is obviously what they were thinking. But I was motivated and strode right past. I successfully made it past the Orange Julius, too. But it did remind me of the dish towel, and that nameless anger surged through me again. Still striding along, and getting increasingly breathless, I pulled my cell phone out of my purse and punched in the direct dial to Neil’s cell phone, which I was pretty sure would be off. As I’d hoped, I got his voice mail’s brief greeting, then the beep.

      ‘Neil. For the hundredth time (puff, pant) in our marriage, please do not use the dish towels (gasp) as floor mops. We have paper towels, or an actual floor mop (wheeze), for just that purpose!’ I hung up and kept walking, stuffing the phone back in my purse.

      My stride slowed somewhat at the Popcorn Palace, but I kept moving. Three assaults and still standing. Maybe starting my new exercise program in the mall wasn’t the best choice given all the temptations, but my anger was like a fuel, propelling me forward.

      Ten minutes later, however, I was again panting with fatigue, but СКАЧАТЬ