The Grown Ups (24 page)

“He never raised a hand to you.”

“So, because it never came to that? No harm done?” Suzie couldn't bring herself to say any more.

“You'll find out what it's like to be married soon enough.”

“I can tell you one thing. If Michael ever did to me what your husband did to you, I would be gone in a second. No, I take that back. If I even imagined he could ever be that kind of person I wouldn't be with him in the first place.”

At that moment the salesgirl knocked, opened the door, and stuck her head inside. “How's everything going in here?”

Suzie stepped back and allowed her to open the door all the way. She kept her eyes on the carpet. She remembered how she would watch Sarah get ready for dates with her father. How she was nearly giddy with anticipation, how unaware she was of anyone but him.

“Can I see the seamstress?” Sarah asked. “I want this one, but it needs some reworking.”

“Sure.” The salesgirl seemed to be hesitating, waiting for Suzie's approval also, but Suzie didn't look up.

When Suzie heard the door click shut she said to her mother, “I want you at my wedding. But if you cannot be there happily, then you don't have to come.”

For once Sarah looked at her and didn't immediately look away. Her eyes looked clear, as if she had understood what Suzie meant. “Mom?” Suzie prodded.

Sarah still said nothing. The silence was broken by a knock at the door: the seamstress. Suzie was prepared to send her away, to put the suit back on the hanger, to take her mother back to rehab without lunch, without ever saying another word again. They would walk past the flowers, across the cobblestones, into Suzie's rented car, and that would be that. No more forced attempts at mother/daughter pre-wedding bonding.

“Can you hold on a minute?” Suzie's mother asked, a tremble in her voice. She turned to Suzie. “Promise me you will give it some thought.”

“I have,” Suzie said. “I'm not changing my mind.” She paused. “So you have to come knowing that. You have to be there for me, for Michael. Will you?”

Her mother was still fussing with the fabric. She didn't appear to be paying attention. But then she nodded to herself, took a deep breath, and said, “All right, then.” She looked once again at herself in the mirror, the too-big suit falling from her frame. “All right.”

It was the most Suzie's mother was willing to give her, and Suzie was willing to accept that this was it; this was all it was ever going to be. Sometimes she forgot, as in that moment of panic, elation, and confusion when she had thought she was pregnant.
That neither of them had followed up seemed the solution, rather than the problem.

Suzie and Michael
were at a dinner celebrating Bella's job offer from Hunter. It was a job Bella had heard about from a former colleague in Iowa and had thought of as a long shot. But now here they were. It was too much good fortune for Suzie to comprehend and she tried not to jinx it, not even asking Bella about it until they knew it was a sure thing.

Suzie was late getting to the restaurant, and Michael had been even later. But they were finally all together. Suzie raised her glass of sparkling lemon water and clinked with Bella. Ted, who had seemed distracted since Suzie arrived, was looking the other way and chose not to join them in a toast. Suzie felt Michael put pressure on her elbow with his; he tried hard to like Ted for Bella's sake, but things like this always derailed him. She made eye contact with Bella, who smiled, but it was too wide, too bright, and a minute later Bella got up to go to the bathroom. Suzie followed her.

When Suzie opened the bathroom door Bella was standing at the sink staring into the mirror. She didn't turn to look at Suzie. Instead she said to her reflection, “Now, isn't this classic. Girlfriend hides in the bathroom because boyfriend pisses her off.” She wiggled the faucets, splashed some water on her wrists, and then turned them off. “You don't see him storming off.”

“You didn't storm off,” Suzie said as she leaned back against the door. “What's going on?”

“Ted doesn't think he's a New Yorker. He's not sure he can commit to a year here.” Bella's speech was clipped.

“But didn't he know when you came here that this was the
third interview . . . and that the third interview is usually when they want to make an offer?”

“Of course.” Bella sighed. “Everything was fine. I think—” She stopped and shook her head. “I don't know.”

“Did he think you wouldn't get the job? Is that why he's mad?”

Bella shrugged. “Ted loves me. He's a really great guy. I know you don't get to see that part of him. I can be difficult too, I guess, springing this on him. I don't want you to think . . .” She pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. “He's so smart, so brilliant, really. His poems, they are these delicate strings of words that just gut me. But his people skills . . .”

Suzie hated to see Bella so miserable. She looked as if she hadn't slept well in days; there were smudges of violet beneath her eyes. She hugged her. “Bella, we like Ted.”

“Really?” Bella rubbed her face against Suzie's shoulder. “I sound like a fucking toddler.” She lifted her head and pulled away, then glanced at her reflection and tried to fluff her hair. “Look at me, shit. I'm just fucking hormonal.”

“You can be angry at Ted, Bella. I'm not going to hate him.”

“I wanted this job, Suzie. I know it sounds lame, but I really like teaching.”

“Why shouldn't you?” Suzie answered, and thought:
and Ted thinks real writers don't teach, they write.
But she couldn't go there. Instead she said, “Ted will get used to New York. All the best poets and writers have been through here. What's more poetic than this city?” She smiled. Her stomach growled so loudly Bella heard it and laughed.

“You know, I had these silly daydreams of you and me together again, meeting for coffee, lunch, a movie. I mean, okay, we both have to work, but still. I couldn't believe I was going to
get a chance to be with you again. To talk to you every day just like we used to. To bitch about stupid things without making a phone call. So maybe I wasn't really thinking about how Ted would feel.”

Suzie stared at Bella, trying hard to compose her feelings into a mask of neutrality. Bella had lived in a cabin without running water just to be with Ted. Surely Ted could stand some indoor plumbing for a year. “Being a couple means compromises. Tell him how much you want it, maybe agree to let him go to Montana for a month here or there if that's what he needs to recharge. It could be the best of both worlds.” Suzie paused. “Show him some Woody Allen movies, early Woody, before he went European.”

Bella laughed and shook her head. “I overreacted.”

“He was being kind of a dick.”

“He was, wasn't he?”

Suzie nodded, and Bella smiled. “What do you think he and Michael are doing out there?”

“Michael deals with children every day. I'm sure they're fine.” Suzie said it quickly and a little more sharply than she intended. But Bella just laughed again.

“Can I tell you a secret?” Suzie asked.

“What? I should ply him with sex? Promise a blow job a week?”

“I'm pregnant,” Suzie whispered. It was three weeks shy of the agreed-upon date she had promised Michael. She sent a silent prayer of forgiveness to whoever was in charge of these things in the universe.

Bella's mouth fell open. “Suzie!”

Suzie grinned and touched her flat stomach. Bella put her hand over Suzie's. “Pregnant? Oh my God. No way. No freaking way.”

Suzie felt tears come to her eyes and before she could stop
they were spilling down her cheeks and running down her neck. “Now who's hormonal?”

“Oh my God, a baby!” Bella repeated. “We're happy? Right? You're happy? Michael's happy?”

“Everyone's happy,” Suzie assured her, wiping at her face with the back of her hand. “Deliriously happy.”

Bella leaned over, grabbed some paper towels, and handed them to Suzie. “I thought you were glowing. I thought something was up. I don't know what. Maybe I just always think you two look so much more in love than anyone in the room.”

Suzie considered that Ted usually looked miserable or out of place, and felt bad for Bella. “You can't say anything yet. I promised Michael that we would wait until the first trimester was over.”

“My lips are sealed. But how much longer do you have to wait?”

“Three weeks.”

Bella threw an arm around Suzie's shoulders and squeezed. “I'm going to be an aunt! That settles it, you know. Nothing's going to stop me from moving to New York now.”

Suzie tossed the paper towels in the trash. “That was my plan all along.”

When they returned to the table Michael and Ted were talking as if nothing had happened. Ted appeared engaged, at least from a distance. He looked up at Bella with a contrite expression and pulled out her chair. Bella leaned down and kissed him on top of the head. Michael shrugged at Suzie and handed her a plate of quesadillas that had arrived while they were in the bathroom.

The room was hot and busy, full of people laughing and talking, striving to be heard over the music. Michael rested his hand on Suzie's knee under the table. He and Ted had ordered a variety of small plates that slowly began appearing in front of them.
Suzie leaned against Michael's shoulder, her cheek finding a familiar place against the curve of muscle. She was hungry and drowsy at the same time, and she could have closed her eyes for a catnap right then. But if she had she would have missed Ted smiling at Bella as if she were the only person in the room. She wanted her best friend to be loved. Really loved. She wanted everyone she loved to be loved. Suzie smoothed the napkin in her lap and placed her palm against her abdomen. As much as she couldn't wait to share, she loved the idea of a secret.
Hello, hello, hello, little one,
she said silently.
I cannot wait to meet you.

M
ichael and Suzie had invited Sam to their apartment on
the Upper West Side for dinner. The apartment was in one of those buildings with a name and a doorman. Michael and Suzie didn't have Central Park views, but everyone knew the park was right there, which was good enough as far as Sam was concerned. But then again, good enough had always been his problem.

Sam had been working for a caterer because he wanted to be back in a kitchen but didn't know if he wanted to commit to a restaurant. The prep kitchens were in a warehouse building near the West Side Highway, and the food was what you would expect at a wedding for a hundred or so of your not-so-close friends. There were always a multitude of chicken dishes on the menu, as well as salmon puffs and shrimp rolls, and roasted red potatoes. These dishes traveled well on the Long Island Expressway en route to their location. It wasn't exciting work, but it was regular, and because Sam came with the most kitchen experience, he often was left alone to do as he pleased in the kitchen.

His name was not with the doorman at Michael's building, and the doorman was new so he didn't just wave Sam up. He had to call Michael. Sam could tell from the way he said
brother
with a question mark at the end, and how he repeated his name into the receiver, that Michael had forgotten they had invited him over. Even after he got the go-ahead Sam thought about turning around and leaving. But he really didn't want to go back to his crappy apartment and spend the evening avoiding his roommates.

Michael answered the door on the phone and wearing his coat. He held up a finger but ushered Sam in as he walked away, leaving him to close the door. The room was large but dark, the blinds shut, the air suffocating. Michael disappeared into the back of the apartment as Sam stood in the center of the living room. In front of the long windows were a table and chairs with the remains of what looked like breakfast: several cereal bowls and a milky mug of tea, as well as a substantial pile of old
New York Times Magazine
s. In the galley kitchen Sam could see a raw chicken sitting in its plastic wrapping on the counter alongside a bag of potatoes. Dinner was most definitely not being prepared.

Sam was thinking about ducking out and cutting his losses when Michael reappeared. The phone was still in his hand, but he didn't seem to be on a call. He seemed surprised to see him standing there. “Oh, Sammy.”

Sam grinned, but felt out of place. He wasn't sure if Suzie and Michael had had an argument or what, but he didn't want to be there to find out. He listened, but there wasn't a sound. No music, no one sobbing into a pillow. It felt weird. “Did I get the night wrong? Were we having dinner? I can go if it's not a good time.”

Michael frowned. “Listen, it's, it's Suzie.” Michael scratched
the back of his head. “She, well, she had a miscarriage this afternoon.” He squinted at Sam as he delivered the news, as if he didn't quite believe it himself.

Just a month before, Sam had met his father, Marguerite, Michael, and Suzie at a dim sum place in Chinatown to celebrate the pregnancy. They had raised their cups of green tea to the unborn Epstein-Turner. “Wow, oh shit. I'm sorry, Michael. Is she okay?”

“She's okay,” Michael said with a scrap of hesitation. “She's resting. I just gave her something. I wasn't here when it happened.” He shrugged. “If it's going to happen, this is the best way. Now, I mean. Rather than later.”

“Sure.” Sam nodded, although Michael looked entirely unconvinced by his own words. “Can I go get you guys anything? Food? What can I do? Leave? You name it.”

“We never should have said anything so early. We should have known better by now.” Michael walked over and collapsed onto the couch. He was still wearing his coat and it puffed up around him, the collar standing up around his ears. He held the hand with his cell phone over his heart. “I need a drink.”

“By now?” Sam asked as he glanced over at the bar cart by the table. “What do you want?”

“Something hard. I called Bella, she's coming over. I just need to get out of here. Do you want to go down the street? One drink?”

Sam shook his head, hoping he hadn't heard correctly. “Bella?”

Michael shrugged. “It's what Suzie wanted.” He sighed. “We've been through this before, I just don't know how much more . . .” He trailed off, shaking his head.

Sam didn't know what to say to Michael's revelation. He felt awful, but ill equipped to comfort or ease his brother's pain. All he knew for sure was that he wanted to get out of Michael's
apartment before Bella arrived. “Are you okay with leaving Suzie alone?”

“She probably won't wake up anytime soon.” Michael rubbed his face. “And anyway, she has Bella. She asked for her, that's what she wants.” Michael pushed himself up off the sofa with a soft groan and headed toward the door, so Sam followed him.

Michael was drinking
scotch on the rocks. He'd already finished two in fast succession and was now nursing his third. He and Sam were sitting in a booth by a pool table in a bar that was filled with people who looked like Michael.

As Michael drank he peeled off layers until he was down to a blue button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbow. On the table in front of him was his badge from the hospital, his wallet, phone, and keys. Sam had just started a second beer and had ordered them two roast beef sandwiches when Michael's phone vibrated. He tilted it toward him, peered at the screen, and put the phone back down. “Bella is there, says Suzie is fine.”

“Good.”

“This is the third time, you know? She knows what to expect.”

Sam was shocked. “I didn't know, Michael, I'm, I'm really sorry.” Suzie was a third-year resident in psychiatry at Mount Sinai, where Michael was on staff as a pediatric cardiologist, and Sam had thought this pregnancy was a surprise, considering everything they had going on.

“Yeah, well.” Michael studied the glass of scotch but didn't take a drink. “She really wants a baby.” He passed a hand over his glass, rubbing his pinkie along the rim. “She'll be all right.”

The sandwiches arrived. Sam was too hungry to pretend he didn't want to eat. He inhaled the first half while Michael picked
at his. “You should eat,” Sam said, gesturing toward his brother's sandwich with a spear of garlicky pickle.

Michael stabbed the bread with a toothpick and picked up his scotch. “We talked about kids. But in a far-off-in-the-future way.” He laughed. “And then in the moment I said: what happens, happens. But I didn't picture us here. Like this. Three failed attempts.”

“But you want kids? Still, I mean?”

“It's getting harder the more shit happens.” He shook his head. “Three miscarriages?” He frowned. “Is it all some master plan? I see kids every day, sick kids and their desperate parents. Do I want to be one of those?”

“Who says you would be desperate?”

“You can't fucking guarantee anything, Sam. Despite technology and intervention, we can't take away the chance that something will go wrong at any given time, or that I can't fix it when it does go wrong.” He stuck the toothpick in his mouth. Sam watched the muscles work in his jaw. “The miscarriages? They are the natural rejection of the body. They are not an indictment of our marriage or our incompatibility or my lack of enthusiasm to procreate.” He spit the words out along with the toothpick.

Sam had a feeling that Michael and Suzie had had this conversation before.

“Look.” Michael's voice softened. “You don't get this because you have no obligations, no real life you are committed to. No other person who can take your morning breath and dirty boxers kicked beneath the bed and still want to fuck your brains out and forgive you when you forget to pay the mortgage or pick up the dry cleaning or buy milk.” He paused and drew a circle with his index finger on the tabletop. “The thing about you is that you let
go of everything. You step out of something if you don't like it. You disappear. How could you even begin to get it?”

Sam flinched. How had this become about him and his faults? “You're right, I don't get this at all.” Sam picked up his beer and took a long swallow. What a romantic picture Michael painted of his marriage and Sam's wanderlust. “But maybe you are so critical of my life because you can look at it from the safety of yours.”

Michael leaned forward and jabbed an index finger on the tabletop. “She thinks she failed me,
me
. How twisted is that? She is upset because she can't make me a father.” He picked up his scotch and swirled it around once before he drained the glass.

Sam didn't want to know any of this. He wanted Michael to stop talking about Suzie. “Why don't you tell her?” he suggested. “You should be telling her this, not me.”

“Fuck!” Michael slammed his palms on the tabletop, making everything bounce. “You haven't been listening to me at all.” He swept his keys and wallet off the table into his lap. Spit clung to his lip. “I'm fine, Sam. It's not your deal.”

“Listen—”

“Nah, we're done, right? We're done here.” Michael opened his wallet, swaying slightly as he considered what to leave. He dropped a handful of money on the table. “That's good enough.”

Sam picked the bills out of his sandwich. Two hundred and sixty dollars. “That's too much.” He tried to hand most of it back but Michael waved him off.

“We invited
you
to dinner. Keep it. Keep the money. Give the money away. What the fuck do I care right now?” As he spoke he gathered all his clothes from the bench. His eyes were bloodshot little slits, the corners of his mouth clogged with spittle. There was a catch of a sob strangled in his throat that twisted Sam's gut. “I have to go home,” Michael said quietly. “I just have to go home.”

Sam walked beside
Michael the two wide blocks back to his building. They didn't talk. From beneath the canopy Sam stood on the sidewalk and watched through the double glass doors as Michael brushed past the doorman, refusing assistance, and waited for the elevator. Once Michael was gone Sam felt stupid for still standing there, as if Michael were going to reappear. The doorman caught him waiting and walked to the door and peered out, frowning. Sam had the feeling that he barely believed he was Michael's brother.

Sam smoothed down the dark gray down jacket Marguerite had given him for Christmas, and adjusted the collar of the denim shirt that was caught in the folds, self-conscious of his appearance. Sam had had to dig the coat out of a pile of crap on the floor in his room, so it could look and smell like death for all he knew. The fucking weather was more like February even though it was late April, and he was sick of the cold, sick of waiting for the seasons to really change.

Feeling stupid for lingering on the sidewalk, he held up his hand and waved to the doorman. The doorman did not wave back. Sam turned and walked south toward the subway.

He was about to round the corner, heading toward Broadway, when he heard his name. He turned and looked behind him. Bella was leaning against a streetlamp, shaking something out of her boot. She was wearing a dark coat and pink scarf, and her hair, under the fizzy light, looked like a halo. When she saw that he had stopped, she raised her boot in greeting. “Hey,” she called. “Sam? Can you wait up?”

She put her boot back on and shuffled over while he calculated the months (eighteen) between now and her witnessing his sloppy removal of Mr. Epstein at Michael and Suzie's wedding, and then before that (two, nearly three years) when they
didn't speak. When they finally were inches apart she got shy and looked down at her feet, then up at Sam from under a fringe of bangs. He couldn't ever remember Bella having bangs before.

“You were with Michael, right?”

“Yeah. How's Suzie?”

She ran her tongue across her top lip. “She's okay. I mean, I think this time she really thought . . . so . . .” She shrugged and reached up and adjusted the pink scarf. “She really just needs Michael now.”

“Sure.” Sam paused. “Is your hair different?”

“From what?” She gave Sam a funny look but didn't answer his question. “You heading home?”

“Yeah, yeah. I live downtown.”

She nodded. “Ted and I are in Morningside Heights. I'm teaching at Hunter, so it's kind of a pain-in-the-ass commute, but not too bad.”

“Are you, I mean, is it a full-time job?”

“Well, it's an independent contract thing. I have the position through the end of the year but I don't know what happens beyond that. It sort of makes it hard to plan. Especially for Ted.”

“Oh, what's he doing?”

“Well, he's working on a book.”

“Great.”

“Yes, yes it is. He is a brilliant writer.” Bella said the words quickly. The tip of her nose was bright pink. “So I'm working and my writing is kind of on hold anyway. It's a good time for him to finish his book.”

“Sure. Absolutely.”

“And Ted really misses the West. Eventually we'll probably head back there. He lived for three years in a cabin without running water or electricity.”

“Wow, impressive.” Bella's enthusiasm for Ted's resume was exhausting. “But until then, nice that you're so close to Suzie.”

“Yeah, and my dad, of course. He's glad I'm back for a while.” She paused. “How's your dad?”

“Happy. He's happy.”

“He looked great at the wedding.”

“Yeah, well, you know, or maybe you don't, he had a heart attack a couple of years ago. But he's good now.”

“I had heard that.” Bella nodded. “So now he's a changed man?”

Sam laughed. “Well, yeah, sure.” He wondered when Michael would tell their father about Suzie and the baby. Sam thought of the look on his face at the restaurant. His father hadn't said it out loud, but Sam knew he was thinking that he was glad to be alive to see his grandchild. “Hey, so was Michael okay when you saw him?”