All the Little Pieces. Jilliane Hoffman

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СКАЧАТЬ toss it over Maggie’s bare feet. It landed instead on her head, completely missing the bottom half of her body and covering her face. Not exactly what she’d intended, but perhaps better, she thought as another jagged streak of lightning lit the sky, so frighteningly close you could almost touch it. Cha-Cha would help mute the thunderclaps and block the wicked flashes that lit the car up like a Christmas tree.

      Faith popped the two Advil she’d found in her glove compartment and downed them with a slug of ice-cold Racetrak coffee left over from the afternoon drive up to her sister’s. Had she really made this same drive only, what? Ten hours ago? She sighed and looked again at the shrouded tiny figure in the back seat as another round of thunder rocked the car. Even though the fight with Charity wasn’t Faith’s fault – and it certainly wasn’t how she’d envisioned her sister’s birthday party ending – she was going to have to make it up to Maggie for the way they’d had to leave tonight, rushing out in the rain with all those strangers watching, her cousins witnessing the mother of all breakdowns happen live from their bedroom window. She’d take her to a movie, or skating at Incredible Ice tomorrow. Or maybe she’d let her stay home from St Andrews and they’d bake cookies; Maggie would’ve missed school anyway if they’d stayed up in Sebring as originally planned. God knows that, after what had happened tonight, Faith could use a Mental Health Day herself.

      The memory made her heart hurt. No matter how much she wanted to forget, her thoughts kept returning to her sister’s kitchen, to the crowd of gaping, snickering strangers gathered around the makeshift bar at the dinette table watching the family drama unfold as if it was part of the evening’s entertainment. Charity had chosen the path she’d chosen in life and the man she’d chosen to walk it with, and it was time for Faith to accept that and stop trying to fix her little sister’s problems, because she obviously didn’t want them fixed. For years, everyone had been blaming Charity’s shortcomings on her idiot sloth of a husband, Nick, but maybe it was time to place that blame where it really belonged. And tonight … well, tonight was the last straw. Angry tears slipped down her cheeks.

      Even cold, bad coffee couldn’t get rid of the icky-sweet taste of the hurricanes that Nick had insisted she try when the night was young and the party was in full swing and all was going well. The back of her throat still felt like it was coated in Hawaiian-Punch-flavored wallpaper paste. She looked over longingly at the open glove compartment where she’d found the Advil. Inside, under a pile of napkins, was a stale half-pack of Marlboro Lights. Faith had picked up the habit back in high school, and had been trying to drop it ever since college. It had taken a bout of morning sickness to get her to finally quit the first time. She’d successfully stayed off the sticks for four years, but then came the phone call that changed everything last year and the first thing she’d picked up after she’d hung up was a Marlboro. It was like welcoming home an old friend, something that she definitely needed at the time. Not so much as a tickle of disapproval had sounded from her throat, and in no time she was back on a pack a day. Quitting this time around was proving much more difficult, though, and getting pregnant again to help her try and kick the habit wasn’t an option she was ready to consider.

      She reached over and slammed the glove compartment shut. No matter how much she needed an old friend right now, she couldn’t go there. Not with Maggie in the car. Nope. Jarrod, Faith’s husband, had no idea she was still trying to quit, and Maggie could never know she ever smoked. She’d be nominated for Bad Mother of the Year if she lit up with her young daughter’s clean lungs two feet away. She anxiously nibbled on a cuticle instead.

      The rain started to come down harder and Faith slowed to twenty. She looked at the clock. In six minutes, Charity would be turning the big 3-0. What was she doing at this very moment to celebrate? Was she passed out on the couch? Were Nick’s stupid friends still over? Was she having wild birthday sex? That thought made her want to gag. Was she even the least bit upset over how Faith had left?

      Originally, the plan had been for Faith to take Charity and her three kids – eleven-year-old Kamilla, five-year-old Kourtney and two-year-old Kaelyn – up to Disney next weekend, along with Maggie, to celebrate Charity’s thirtieth. No husbands – just the six girls and Mickey Mouse living it up in the land where everyone’s always happy. Faith had booked two rooms at the Walt Disney World Dolphin Resort well in advance. Ironically, the reservation had to be cancelled by midnight tomorrow – the last minute of Charity’s actual birthday – or Faith would have to forfeit her deposit. Of course she’d have to cancel, she thought as she wiped away more tears. There was no way things would be right between them by Friday. They might never be right again.

      After ten years of marriage, maybe Nick had wanted to finally show that he cared. Maybe he’d wanted to one-up Faith’s Disney trip. Or maybe throwing Charity a party was simply a good excuse for him to have a good time with his friends since Charity didn’t have many that he hadn’t slept with. Whatever his reasoning, Nick ‘Big Mitts’ Lavecki, the man who had forgotten his wife’s birthday more often than he had remembered it, had decided to throw Charity a last-minute surprise party. Last minute, as in he’d told Faith about it this morning.

      ‘Tonight, Nick?’ Faith had looked at the clock above the fireplace in her family room, which was in Parkland, a good two hundred miles from where her sister lived in Sebring. It was ten thirty on Sunday morning.

      ‘Nothing fancy. A bunch of friends, ya know, some beer, food from Costco, like those platters of wieners and chicken nuggets, that sort of crap, and ya know, a cake. I’m gonna get that at Costco, too. A chocolate cake. They can write “Happy Birthday Ya Old Bag” on it.’ He laughed. ‘Maybe they can put, like, a wheelchair decoration on the frosting or something.’

      Faith cringed. ‘Really, Nick?’

      ‘No! I’m only fucking with you, Faithey. But I am taking the kids so they can pick out black balloons and Over the Hill plates.’ He laughed again. ‘Char will get a kick out of that.’

      Faith had looked out her kitchen window at the toppled lawn umbrella and the chaise longue cushion that had blown into the pool that was close to overflowing. Jarrod had cocked his head at her from across the table and mouthed What? She shook her head at him. ‘The weather’s pretty nasty, Nick.’

      ‘It’s not so bad up here. Everyone says they’re coming anyway.’

      ‘Everyone? How many people?’

      ‘I dunno, about thirty or forty.’

      ‘Wow. When did you plan this?’

      ‘I dunno. A week or so ago.’

      ‘Thanks for the notice.’

      ‘Yeah, I thought I told ya. I get it if you can’t make it. We live so far away. What’s Jar call it up here? Bumfuck?’

      Three years later and Big Mitts was still holding onto the comment he wasn’t supposed to have heard. ‘He was kidding, Nick.’

      ‘Yeah, I know. I’m only busting chops, Faithey. Look, I get it if you can’t make it. The weather sucks and it’s a long drive. No big deal. Char will understand.’

      Of course Nick would understand if Faith didn’t make it, because he didn’t want her to make it. The kids had probably been bugging him all morning, asking if Aunt Faith and Uncle Jarrod and Maggie were coming to Mommy’s party. That’s likely what had prompted the phone call. That and Charity would be livid if she found out her only sister – her only sibling – wasn’t invited to her birthday party.

      ‘I’ll be there,’ Faith had said.

      What? Jarrod had mouthed again.

      ‘Great,’ СКАЧАТЬ