Social Lives (45 page)

She kissed Beth, then left her with her sweet dreams. She went next to Andrea's room. Her middle child was growing up so fast that she now appeared more like Hailey, a teenager, than a little girl. Still, she was just a child, and Jacks kissed her and tucked her in like a child, then moved on down the hall. Hailey's light was on, so Jacks knocked softly on the outside of the door.

“Yeah?” was the response. Her teenager was on the computer and not in the mood for distractions. Jacks walked in anyway and sat on the edge of her bed.

“What's up?” her daughter asked, turning her head for a brief second, then back again. “What's wrong with you?” she asked.

Jacks seemed surprised, then realized she'd been crying. She wiped her face and smiled. “Nothing. Don't worry about it.”

“What! What did they fill your mind with at that assembly?”

“Nothing, really.”

Hailey seemed angry. “Mom, I'm
fine
! Are you gonna cut back my curfew? Just tell me. What did they tell you to do?”

Jacks got up from the bed and stood beside her daughter. Then she leaned down and took her child's face in her hands, meeting her eyes. It was, she knew, one of the worst things a mother could do to her daughter, so she made it quick.

“I love you, you know that, don't you?”

Hailey looked away, squirming out of her mother's embrace. “Okay, yeah,” she said, and Jacks didn't make her give more. Instead, she kissed the top of her head and left her to her life.

In the hall outside, she took a moment to feel it. They were okay. These children were, somehow, still okay. She placed a hand across her chest as she walked to her room. David was waiting, still dressed and sitting on the bed, his head hanging low. He looked up when he heard her come in and shut the door. His face was anguished.

“Will you ever tell me?” he asked, and Jacks knew exactly what he meant. She had no more doubts about what was real or not real. And the reasons she had been unable to see this before no longer mattered, though she would remember them always. Her husband was sick. He'd been sick for years though she had no diagnosis, no name for the affliction that had spun him out of control, distracted him and made him careless, reckless with their lives. But that was not her job, to find the answers, to cure him. He needed help, and she would stand by him through it because losing the hope that he would return to her was not an option.

Would she ever tell him? No, she never would. What she had done to save their family was something she would carry alone and forever and it would exact a heavy toll. She would always wonder what might have happened if she'd confronted him the day she found that first letter. What had she been so afraid of? Facing the fact that he was ill, or that they might lose this life that they had come to covet? Or maybe the realization that everything she had become over the past seventeen years, the highly skilled professional wife and mother, only held value in the world if she was attached to a man. And so she had turned to Barlow as the only means of escape. She had held on to her conviction that everything, anything she did to save them was justified. But that was a lie. Now she had one job, and this time she knew her motives were pure. History would end here, in this room, tonight.

She looked at David, her mind swimming in all that had to be done. There was still a mess to be straightened out at the firm, with the investors. And David needed to get well. It would take most of the night to convince him of that. So she started with one word, an answer to his question.

Looking at him from the doorway, she shook her head.

“No,” she said. And he never asked her again.

 

 

 

 

 

E
VA FOUND HER EXACTLY
where Rosalyn said she'd be. Shivering from the cold because her skirt was too short and she had no hat or gloves, Caitlin looked right past Eva's car.
Teenagers
, Eva thought to herself as she parked.

The air was biting cold, whipping across the Starbucks patio like a swarm of ice pellets. The things she did for her friends. First Jacks, then Barlow. There was still the matter of poor Sara Livingston—she would handle that somehow, and in some way that would shield the truth. Rosalyn didn't need to know
everything.
Now this . . .

Sighing with dismay at what the world was coming to, Eva got out of the car and walked to the bench where Caitlin was huddled. Eva knew the sight of her would at first shock the girl then piss her off when she realized this could not be a coincidence.

“Don't say it,” Eva announced before Cait had even looked up.

Cait stood, her hands dropped from her pockets and her face in a state of shock. She started to speak, but Eva held her hand to her mouth. “Don't say it. I know.”

After the shock came anger, and Eva knew she'd have to let Cait say something now. Still, it was too damned cold.

“Can we get in the car first?”

Cait huffed as she followed Eva to the car. Eva had taken the Porsche because it would be harder for Cait to hate her in a Porsche, and because the seats were heated.

“Okay,” Eva said, closing her door and turning on the ignition. “
Now
you may speak.”

But Cait didn't speak. She just started to cry.

“Oh, shit. Here we go.” Eva handed her a tissue from her purse, then placed a hand on Cait's shoulder.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

Cait nodded. She was okay. Cold, but okay.

“I hate her,” she said when the tears subsided.

Eva nodded. “I know.”

“How did she know I'd be here?” The question was straightforward, but they both knew that Cait's worries went much deeper.

Eva groaned. It wasn't her place to give Rosalyn's teen-spying techniques away, but Cait was on to her now.

“Your iPhone has a GPS tracker.”

Cait shook her head. “Oh my God. How long?”

Eva could see her trying to remember everything she'd done, every place she'd gone without telling her mother.

“Your mother can be a real pain in the ass when she wants to be. But now that she's spoiled everything, can I drive you home?”

“No.”

“I wasn't really asking.”

The tears started again. “I hate her. I'll hate her for the rest of my life!”

Eva put the car in reverse, then turned on the seat warmers. “I know. But in a few seconds your butt's gonna be really warm. That's something, right?”

Cait wasn't amused, but it hadn't really been for Cait. Someday, if she was lucky, Cait would have a life where she could find pleasure in something so small. When all of this angst and pain would be gone and life would roll along the way it was meant to—not with trauma and crises and the continuous loop of drama that played like a top-forty hit, over and over until it was stuck in your head. If she was lucky, and Eva believed she was, she would fall into bed with her best friend and whisper that her butt had been nice and warm in the car. And that it had been a good day.

 

 

 

 

 

I
T WAS THERE, THOUGH
neither of them knew how to face it. Through the assembly, the casual chatter that followed, the drive home. Through saying good night to Nanna, discussing the schedule for the next week, locking up, hanging keys and coats. Through the climb up the stairs to Annie's room, where they took turns saying good night, kissing her and tucking her in though she hardly needed it after Nanna's close supervision.

It was there, right where they'd left it hours before, sitting in their bedroom waiting for one of them to acknowledge it. At the very least, it was screaming out for that.

Nick hesitated at the door, looking at his wife. But she turned away and he shook his head and carried on toward his closet on the other side of the room.

It had been building inside her all night, listening to Dr. Wright talk about mistakes that could change a life forever. Yes, the hallway blow jobs were red flags that something was wrong, but they were also, in and of themselves, events that would live on—transgressions against one's own self that would remain like little scars. She had thought then not of Caitlin Barlow, but of her own little scars and how they had resulted in that little girl who was asleep in the next room.
God
, how she loved Annie, but it was not what
she had planned for her life. And the truth was, had it not been for Annie, Nick Livingston would have left that bar alone four years ago.

She went to her closet and began to undress. It felt evil to think what she was now thinking—had she used him? Was that why she resented this life so much, this wonderful fairy-tale life? There was no doubt in her mind that she would have found another man like the one who'd left her alone and pregnant in the rain. Then another, and another. Annie was a godsend that way, changing her insides so she would want a man that could love her, really love her the way Nick did. Still, she had not asked to be changed that way. It had all been the result of a mistake, a misstep, and knowing this left her floating in a whirlwind of chaos. What was left to hold on to if you didn't even know your own mind?

She stopped undressing and walked across the room. Nick was hanging up his jacket. His back was to her and as she waited for him to turn around, she chased from her thoughts everything but this moment, this man, this feeling. When he finally saw her in front of him, searching his face for answers, he knew he couldn't give them to her. He only knew what he felt.

“I love you,” he said.

Sara walked to him and slid her arms around his waist.

“I know,” she said. “I love you back.” It was the truth. It was what she was feeling, and yet there was so much else. It had been so easy to stop loving him, those little hiccups when she saw his eyes light up at the Barlows' estate, on that golf course in Florida. How could love survive a lifetime when it could be chased away so easily by another man simply because he made her laugh?

Still, it was here now and it was real—Nick's arms around her back, his body pressed to hers and the way the smell of him made her feel safe and good. She wanted to create a wall around it, an invisible shield that would keep it inside. How could love be something that had to be constantly recreated, reinvented? Why had no one told her?

“We can move. We can change. Whatever it takes.” Nick was making promises now, and she was grateful. But she couldn't stop herself from wondering if he would stop loving her somewhere along the way if he gave up his dream just to keep her.

“We'll figure it out. Somehow, we'll figure it out.”

She made this promise to her husband, and to herself. Because, at the end of a day like this one, what else was there to do?