Social Lives (4 page)

“Come on, Sara. We could christen the closet.” He reached in with his head and kissed her neck, then ran his hand along the inside of her thigh.

Sara studied his face for the signs of kind deception. Could he really feel this way after three years and one demanding toddler? But what she saw instead was a handsome forty-one-year-old man who was turned on at the sight of his wife. Bright blue eyes, dark hair, the deadly combination that had lured her from her life into marriage and motherhood, and an easy way that
was as foreign to her as it was seductive. He pulled her to him with a soft hand against her bare back, and she closed her eyes, hoping to be transformed, transported from this place to another she could hardly remember. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she let out a sigh.

“It's a closet-
room
,” she muttered into the fold of his collar, and he laughed out loud, making her believe that he was still her comrade though he had been raised in Wilshire and had returned to it like a fish back to water. “It's a little early for a christening. Did you see all the work they didn't do today?” Sara started to pull away, her mind turning to Roy the Contractor and his piss-poor construction crew that was taking them for a ride and prolonging her daily misery of living in dust and chaos.

She waited for him to respond, to tell her that he saw it, too—that it was horrible, and of course, how could a person think of anything else when there was such trouble underfoot? She had her list of complaints, which she wanted to unleash into the space between them, and she waited for him to extend the invitation.

But none was forthcoming. Instead, Nick released his arms from around her waist and said nothing, though his disappointment and bewilderment stopped her from saying more. She felt her shoulders drop.

“I'm sorry,” she whispered, holding him again, and he squeezed her tighter. The feel of his cool starched shirt against her bare skin made her feel exposed beyond her apparent nudity, and it was surprisingly sexy. She reached for his belt and released the clasp. “Let's christen the closet.”

Nick hesitated, confused by the third mood shift in the scope of mere seconds, but she only kissed him harder, forcing out of the room the worries over the house, her clothing, and dishes and other nonsense. They fell to the floor, her bare body under his against the soft carpet.

He reached for the buttons on his shirt, but she pulled his hands away. “Leave it on,” she whispered. “Leave everything on.” She reached down and unzipped his pants, then pulled him inside her as her legs wrapped around the small of his back. With the lights glaring down upon them, Sara kept her eyes open, finding their image in the mirror that covered the length of the inner door. Nick in his suit, her beneath him on the floor in a moment of unexpected abandon was like a bolt of electricity short-circuiting the wires in her head. She could almost imagine that they weren't in Wilshire at all.

Reaching her hands around her husband, she grabbed hold of him. “I
love your ass,” she said, losing herself in a kind of passionate irreverence that felt forbidden in her new life. She wet his ear with her tongue and smiled as he moaned.

“Oh, Christ! Say that again. . . .”

“I love your ass . . . your rock-hard, massive ass. . . .”

“Christ!”

He was gone, and she was quick to follow, an unusual occurrence of late. Something about her private defiance, even for a few stolen moments, had lent a heightened sense of excitement, like screwing in the backseat of a car. It was a strange rush.
Good
, she thought, though she was equally disconcerted because it had nothing to do with her husband. Her mind felt as foreign to her as the thongs that rode up her butt all day long.

Nick was happily oblivious as he rested on top of her, catching his breath. “I love this closet-room,” he said.

Sara smiled, then kissed his neck as he nuzzled into hers. She fought to make conversation from thoughts that were spinning recklessly in her head. “Is this another suburban secret? Having big closets for doing the deed?”

Nick laughed, relaxed. Contented. “After that, I think it will be from now on. Let's just burn that bed. I mean, who needs it?”

They stayed there for a while, and as the time passed, Sara grew increasingly unnerved. Beyond her altered state and the abduction of her entire being by alien forces, she felt the question coming.

“Do you think we did it? Did we make a baby?”

He was so careful to hide his anticipation, his growing worry that they might be joining so many of their peers who couldn't have a second child, and the fact that he was being considerate felt like a giant knife of guilt plunging into her.

“We'll see.” Her tone was encouraging but also dismissive, and Nick quickly changed the subject.

“I'd better get my rock-hard ass in the shower so we can be on time.” He kissed her and got up from the floor.

“Thanks.” Sara smiled as she stood up, pulling the robe around her. She watched him turn the corner, heard the shower come on. Still, she couldn't move from where she stood. Her head was swimming—drowning, really—in a dull, unrelenting anxiety. Finally, she ran her hands briskly across her cheeks and turned toward the enemy she had been so terrified to
face. Embracing the sense of defeat fully now, she pulled on clothing, shoes, jewelry.

“I'm going down,” she yelled into the bathroom as she walked past their bed, ignoring the blue-and-green flowered spread, the one that matched the pale yellow walls and plaid draperies.
Shit
. She didn't even like French country.

Walking quickly to outpace the thoughts that were following close behind, Sara made her way to Annie's bedroom across the hall and peeked her head inside.

“She's asleep.” Their Brazilian nanny, who went by the name Nanna, was standing by Annie's bed, looking over the small child.

“I was going to kiss her good night,” Sara said.

“Oh,” Nanna answered, her face taking on a hint of pity. “You're too late.”

Sara felt a vise around her temples as she nodded and forced a smile. “We won't be late.”

Nanna smiled back and nodded but did not leave the room. And as Sara hurried down the hall to the back stairs, she closed her ears to Nanna's soft humming. She focused instead on gathering her belongings and fitting them into her clutch purse—keys, phone, lipstick from her other bag. She reached the kitchen and caught a heel in the plastic that covered the floor. Pulling off her shoes, Sara passed through the room to the back hall, where she set the shoes on top of more plastic, this time covering the antique pine benches that no one ever sat on and were, of course, very last year. The powder room door was closed, though this did little to keep out the dust and other debris from the tearing down of walls and floors in the neighboring rooms, and she fought not to notice as she went inside, closing herself in. She flipped the toilet lid closed and sat down, hanging her head between her knees, face in hands. She wanted to cry then, for so many things, but she held it back. There was nothing to be done tonight. Not about her marriage, her child, her ripped-apart, poorly decorated house, or her red van. Or the fact that she could not find one moment of happiness in a life with a two-million-dollar-a-year price tag, the life her husband slaved to give her.

Tonight, she would go to the party, an important party. She would make nice, safe conversation and look for the cheapest auction item to help a school that needed no help. She would drive home with her husband, force herself
to say nothing about the people who silently judged her, then pray for sleep. And in the morning, when her head was clear, she would think about what was wrong with her life. And if she found nothing, she would think about what might be wrong with her.

She took a breath and opened her purse. There was a hidden compartment with a zipper, which she opened slowly, methodically. She pulled out the contents—a round case with the multicolored pills that were keeping her body from becoming pregnant, fooling her husband. She flipped it open and checked the ones already taken. Then she popped out the one scheduled for this day. It was a tiny little pill, but the lie that it implicitly held was undeniable, and as she dropped it on her tongue and began to swallow it down, she could feel it sticking in her throat.

 

 

 

 

 

“A
RE YOU STILL THERE
?”

Amanda Jamison was on the line waiting for her answer, but Caitlin was busy making the adjustments. They were gone, out of sight. The golf cart with her father and younger siblings had pulled into the garage, and she was, mercifully, alone in the yard. In an instant, the taps were turned back on and the stream of new feelings was again flowing inside her, washing away the anger, guilt, and shame. All at once, the wicked girl, the ungrateful daughter, the poor role model, receded with the sound of the garage door closing, and of her friend's voice.

“Yeah. I'm here.”

And she was, fully. Caitlin Barlow was back from her alternate personality, the rude, cynical, unfeeling monster that lived inside the mansion she was now gazing at from the swing that hung from a giant oak. It was cold. But she didn't care. With a bare foot dangling from the wooden seat, she breathed in the smell of the decaying leaves and settled back into herself.

“So . . . you didn't answer me. Did you . . . you know . . .
finish the business
?” The anticipation oozed from Amanda's voice, and it made Caitlin smile. In spite of the trouble she'd had to weather, this confirmed it. She was now firmly entrenched within their elite circle of friends.

“It was so close, I swear. I mean, if Mr. Carter hadn't come in, it was
over
.”

“
Really?
” Amanda said, begging for details. “How could you tell?”

“You know—from the stuff you told me.”

“Hard, harder, then . . .”

“The grand finale . . .”

“Exactly. Only no finale for Kyle. Went home with a boner. Poor baby.” Amanda's tone was mocking, though they both knew Kyle Conrad was immune to their ridicule.

Caitlin smiled again, her mind now filled with the contours of the boy's face, his broad shoulders, and the smell of his cologne, which she had managed to capture on her not-so-subtle descent to her knees. Thinking of how awkward she'd been, how unsure—downright terrified, if she were being honest—made her shiver deep inside her body.

“Yeah, poor baby,” she managed to say through the devastating embarrassment she was now reliving.

“Well . . . don't worry about it. I'm sure you'll get another chance, and he's usually really quick. So how long are you grounded?”

There was a pause, a long hesitation as Caitlin connected the dots.
Of course, idiot
, she thought to herself.
You're not the only one.

“Two weekends, including this one.”

“Fuck.”

“I know.” Caitlin managed a response, though her mind was stuck somewhere between Kyle's smile as he stroked her hair, and the image of her new best friend getting him off in some hidden corner of their world.

“Sucks for you. Listen, I gotta get ready. . . .”

“Yeah. No problem. Text me when you get back?”

“Course I will. Love ya,” Amanda said. Then she was gone.

When Caitlin flipped the phone shut and saw the time, a heavy weight filled her body, and with it came the churning. It was a part of her now, as much as anything. As much as the exhaustion that crept in after lunch hour. As much as the hunger that she tolerated day in and day out, and sometimes in the night as she tried to sleep. It was the churning of the new. Her new friendship with Amanda and the informal club she was now a part of. Her new discovery of Kyle Conrad, and the feelings he stirred up. And at moments like this one, when she teetered between this new world and her life inside that house, it was driven by the impossibility of living in both.

She could see it in their eyes, each and every one of them. Her mother was more pissed off than worried. Cait was now interfering with her plan—the plan that had worked so well with her older brother, who was now a jock at Choate. Keep them busy, keep them on a schedule, and they will grow like structures off an architect's drawings. Cait's refusal to try out for varsity squash, her inability, which was taken as unwillingness, to get A's at the Wilshire Academy meant mommy dearest would need a different plan. Different drawings. Such a bother with all her charity work and luncheons and, of course, the incessant baby-making.

Her father, on the other hand, was more worried than pissed off. The vertical lines between his bushy eyebrows were becoming deep caverns drawn into his face. Nothing a little Botox couldn't fix, but Daddy was hardly the type for that, and even if he was, this thought did little to alleviate the guilt that was thrown into the brew that had infected Caitlin's blood. She was Daddy's little girl, his first girl, and the only one until Mellie was born. After her brother left, she'd been Daddy's best buddy, then an occasional buddy. Once upon a time, she'd loved board games, cards in particular, and he had taught her to play blackjack. Once upon a time, that had made her feel edgy and grown-up, listening to him talk about Las Vegas, how he would take her there when she was older. He'd taught her to drive, let her peel around on the grass in his coveted Creamsicle Corvette.