The Trouble with Lexie (24 page)

“Well, I should hope not. Anyone who would do that in their right mind is very sick indeed.” Lexie felt Janet staring at her waiting for Lexie to open her eyes. She did, and then Janet looked away.

“We have something for you.” Don pointed to the glove com
partment. Janet opened it and pulled out a thick manila envelope that she handed to Don. He held his hand over the seat and Lexie took the envelope. “Your summer sabbatical money.”

“But aren't I fired?” Lexie opened the envelope and looked in. It was more money than she'd ever seen. When Lexie was a kid she always wished she'd find an envelope of cash. She'd take it straight to 7-Eleven and buy whatever she wanted for herself, Betsy, and anyone else who walked in. As she got older, she still wished for envelopes of cash—enough to start a nonprofit, and maybe buy a couple pairs of soft, leather boots, too.

“Count it later,” Janet said.

“You have been dismissed,” Don said.

“If I'm fired, why are you giving me summer sabbatical money?” Maybe if she had slept more, or if she hadn't done any drugs the past two days, things would make sense. Everything felt backward.

“Lexie,” Don spoke in his formal meeting voice. “Ruxton has an international reputation that we'd like to uphold. And we believe that if no one catches wind of your indiscretions, things would be better for the school as a whole.”

“So you're paying me off to keep quiet?”

“As we said,” Janet said firmly, “it's summer sabbatical money.” She stared at Lexie as if to drill information into her. A bubble of meaning popped into Lexie's brain. The Waites funded the faculty sabbaticals. This was hush money from Daniel Waite. That's why the charges had been dropped. Don and Janet were Daniel Waite's lackeys. Stoolies. Henchmen. Lexie felt worse for them than she did for herself. How terrible to be continually squirming at the well-shod feet of Daniel Waite.

“Are you going to tell the students I was fired?”

“We'll tell them you fell ill,” Don said.

“Well, feel free to kill off someone in my family if that makes the story any better.” Lexie opened the envelope again and peered in. The bills in front of each bundle were hundreds. She shifted the money around to see if there was a letter, a note, a single word on an index card.

“We're going to ask Amy to stay in Rilke for the last week,” Janet said. “I'm sure she'll be happy to send you anything you've left behind.”

“Can you give me her number? I don't have any numbers because Daniel erased my phone and changed the password.” Lexie waved her phone in the air as if to show them.

“Son of a gun!” Don said, and he slapped the center of his steering wheel. Lexie had never seen him angry like that. He turned to Janet, whose face was as tight as a childproof pill bottle.

“I'll tell Amy to email you as soon as we get in touch with her,” Janet spoke as if Don hadn't had his little outburst. Then she turned and pressed her back flat against the seat as she stared out the front window. Was that her good-bye?

“Let me see you to your car,” Don said, even though the Jetta was parked beside them. Just as he stepped out, Don's cell phone rang. He answered the call and then hustled out of hearing distance.

Lexie lingered in the backseat, waiting for Janet's final words, something she could report to Amy that they might later laugh at.

“Okeydokey,” Lexie finally said. She got out of the car and stood at the open door for a last look at the envelope she'd left on Don's backseat. Even a poor girl from a shit-hole town in Califor
nia could walk away from a pile of Daniel Waite's cash. Even a poor girl could value the truth more than money.

Lexie threw the door shut and went to the Jetta. She started the engine. Don paced as he talked on the phone; his eyes alit on Lexie every couple beats. There was no doubt Daniel Waite was on the other end of that call. After a minute, Don tucked the cell phone in his breast pocket and approached Lexie's window. She rolled it down.

“Be safe.” Don gave Lexie an awkward pat on the shoulder. When he shuffled back to his car, Lexie knew it was the last time she'd see him. Or Janet. They'd soon become memory, fictionalized. No more real to Lexie than characters in a book.

L
EXIE STOOD ON THE STEPS OF THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY. THE
baby was bound to her chest, face-out, in a contraption that reminded her of a parachute pack each time she put it on. She had one hand on the baby's belly and one hand under his warm rump.

“Hey.” Lexie smiled down at the baby, who grinned up at her, all gummy and fat-cheeked. At this age he was smiling a lot and even silently laughing. It seemed he was always happy to see her.

It was noon, bright and sunny out. Lexie descended the steps and quickly fell into the crowd at Copley Square. It was busy in a way that made Lexie feel not claustrophobic, but connected. She, like all these people around her, was a part of the city. At the lawn, Lexie turned in a circle so the baby could see the fountain, the old stone church, and The Hancock, a massive glass skyscraper that hovered above it all. Her walk from her apartment to work at The Charles Center—where Lexie counseled women who had recently been released from prison—led her through Copley Square. It was a beautiful walk, which she was happy to repeat each week or so
during her maternity leave in order to check on her patients' progress.

Today the blue sky was reflected on The Hancock so that it was camouflaged within the clouds around it, almost invisible. Like Lexie herself, she thought. Ever since her stomach had bulged out, and then once she'd had the baby strapped to her body, or nested in a stroller, men didn't look at her the way they used to. Women, sure. They caught her eye and then leaned over the stroller or peered at the package against her chest and asked how old, or was it a boy or a girl, or what was its name. But men didn't see her the way they once had. Lexie had been recategorized. That was fine by her. Currently, she had all the love she could handle; Lexie was overflowing with it.

The baby kicked his legs out and back,
keep going
, so Lexie walked past the church and toward the tower. It was the highest building in Boston, something that demanded to be seen, and yet Lexie had never crossed the road to go near it.

She paused on the sidewalk in front of the building. People poured out of the revolving doors: men in suits, women in suits, everyone looking like they were a busy working part of an elegant machine. And then she saw him. Daniel Waite. That giant rectangle smile opened up like a window; his eyes were glinting. Lexie planted herself on the pavement where she stood. Everything went silent, save the sound of blood rushing in her ears. Was she returning his smile? No. But her mouth was open in what she imagined looked like a perfect letter
O
. Lexie forced herself to close her mouth, bite her lip.

Lexie followed Daniel's gaze and realized he wasn't looking at her. He hadn't even seen her. He was beaming at the bone-legged
fawn of a woman on Lexie's right. Her slacks were so tight she couldn't have worn underwear with them. And her white blouse ballooned behind her so that her breasts were outlined in the front. She looked like she hadn't yet hit thirty.

Daniel reached the woman and kissed her on the cheek. He cupped her elbow in his palm and led her in Lexie's direction. Daniel was whispering in the woman's ear. Lexie knew what he was likely saying:
I've been thinking about you all day . . . you smell so good I want to eat you up . . .

The woman was smiling, looking straight ahead as Daniel leaned into her. As they closed in on Lexie, the woman stopped. “How old's your baby?” she asked. Her face was as smooth as poured cream. She looked like she'd never smoked a cigarette or had a whiskey or even had a bad thought in her life.

“He's three months old today.” Lexie looked up at Daniel whose complexion had turned the mealy white of cigarette ash. His face tensed and there was a pulsating rhythmic popping on either side of his jaw. The woman stepped closer and put her pointer finger on the baby's cheek. He beamed up at her with that big, gooey grin. “Oh my god, he's so cute. Daniel, look! Look how cute he is.”

“His name's Harrison.” Lexie watched Daniel as he took one stiff step closer to Lexie and peered at the baby.

“Like Harrison Ford?” The woman stroked the baby's nearly bald head and he gurgled.

“Yeah,” Lexie said. Her ultrasound had failed to show any protuberances, leading Lexie and the doctor to believe she was having a girl. She'd name it Dot, she'd decided. So when a boy slid out, Lexie and Amy (who was in the delivery room with her) were
stunned. Harrison had been Amy's idea. A way to still name the baby after Dot.

“Harrison! You're so sweet.” She looked up at Lexie and said, “What's his full name?”

“Harrison Waite James.” Lexie spoke deliberately. Precisely. She stared at ash-faced Daniel who refused to meet her eyes.

“Oh my god, Waite?!” The woman straightened and then whacked Daniel on the upper arm. “W-A-I-T-E, is that how you spell it?”

“Yes.” Lexie smiled at the woman, then she smiled at Daniel. He reminded her of a prisoner stubbornly standing before a firing squad. Choosing death over giving up state secrets.

“Oh my god, that's
his
last name!” She pointed at Daniel. “Maybe you're related!”

“Doubtful,” Daniel said, and then he took the woman's hand and pulled her toward himself. “Let's go. I'm hungry.”

A flash of irritation scratched across the woman's smooth face. And then she said, “Bye Harrison Waite James! You be a good boy for your mommy!” Daniel held the woman's wrist like a rope as he walked ahead, tugging her past Lexie, onward down the sidewalk.

Lexie realized her body was trembling, an internal earthquake of sorts. She put her hand to her mouth and pushed in on her lips to still them. Harrison made a chirping sound. Lexie leaned over him and inhaled his cottony, sweet baby smell. He was her Klonopin. Simply feeling him against her, breathing him in, stabilized Lexie in a way that nothing else could. When she looked up again, Lexie caught a glimpse of Daniel and his girlfriend—his height and her white blouse flashing like two beams of light. She lifted Harrison's tiny dumpling hand and shook it as if he were waving good-bye.
“Bye pretty lady,” Lexie said, in what she imaged Harrison's voice would sound like if he were to speak. “Bye Grandpa, you lying motherfucker.”

With rubbery legs, Lexie continued on, closer to the tower. Was it wrong not to run after the woman and set her straight? Lexie wondered. No, it would do no good. Lexie would come off as crazy. Love creates its own balloon of reality, Lexie now knew, and anything that defies that reality is efficiently bounced away. Until the balloon pops.

She paused at the base of the tower where the suits and skirts flowed past her like water around a rock. Once she felt solid again, Lexie extracted Harrison from the carrier. She held him up by his doughy middle and raised him to face the towering glass obelisk.

“Look at that!” Lexie swept the sky with Harrison, flew him from side to side as he happily paddled his arms and legs. She lowered him to face her and said, “One day, when you and your daddy, Ethan, are both a little more grown up . . .” Harrison opened his mouth and blinked his eyes like he was trying to focus on Lexie's words. She laughed and continued: “You might want to meet each other. And then . . . well, who knows where that could take you.”

Lexie kissed each of the baby's eyes and his fat, juicy cheeks. In a flash, she saw everything she had gone through to arrive here: a ruptured engagement, hurricane-force heartbreak, humiliation at a depth to which she had previously imagined herself too sophisticated to reach, jail time (!), and even a bacterial infection that had started with seventeen-year-old Skyler Bowden (aka Patient Zero).

“I'd do it all over again.” Lexie dappled the baby's face with kisses.

And Harrison, Lexie's one true great love, happily cooed.

I
FEEL INCREDIBLY LUCKY TO BE BACKED UP BY TWO TRULY AMAZING
and brilliant women: Katherine Nintzel and Gail Hochman. Thank you both. Enormous and heartfelt thanks to early and multiple draft readers and to those who frequently sat across from me and worked on their own stuff while I wrote this book: Geoffrey Becker, Bonnie Blau, Fran Brennan, Jane Delury, Michael Downs, Larry Doyle, Lindsay Fleming, Elizabeth Hazen, Elizabeth Lunt, Marisol Murano, Claire Stancer, Ron Tanner, Madeline Tavis, Tracy Wallace, and Marion Winik. Thank you to the experts consulted: Dr. Kathy Boling, Jessica Keener, and Don Lee. I am infinitely grateful to the kind, smart, and talented people of HarperCollins: Amy Baker, Gabriel Barillas, Cal Morgan, Jo O'Neil, Mary Sasso, Sherry Wasserman, Margaux Weisman, and Martin Wilson. Thank you to meticulous copyeditor Jane Herman and thoughtful proofreader Marcell Rosenblatt. I must thank my yoga teachers who have kept me moving through the work: Melody, Michele, and Rivka. And I am always thankful for my wonderful family: Mom, Dad, Cheryl, Becca, Josh, Alex, Satchel, Shiloh, Sonia, and all the fabulous Grossbachs of New York, especially the one named David who lives in Baltimore with me.