Things We Didn't Say (27 page)

“Yeah, so did I.”

Now Mallory leans into my chest. I’m forced to either hug her or stand there like a pole. I hug her back briefly. “Thank God he’s okay,” she murmurs into my neck.

I let go, and she lets me go, and I finally get that glass of water. My brain has gone numb, and there’s a buzzing in my ears.

“Well, let’s find you some pillows,” I say to Mallory, having thrown last night’s couch bedding down into the laundry pile already, not expecting she’d be here another night.

As I pass the living room on the way to the linens, I see Casey is snoring, taking up the whole couch.

I nudge her with my finger. She doesn’t move.

I suppose I could scoop her up and carry her to bed, like I might Jewel if she fell asleep on the couch.

Or she could stay there in her drunken sleep and throw up in her hair.

“Mal, you can take the bed. I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“Oh come on, just sleep in the bed. I won’t touch you, promise. I’ll stay way over on the other side.”

I hesitate, imagining what Casey would think if she saw us.

Mallory laughs bitterly at my hesitation. “I think I can resist your incredible allure.”

“Don’t bust my balls now, okay?”

Casey snores. Given her drunkenness, she’ll probably sleep until noon. I don’t relish the thought myself of sleeping on the wood floor, or trying to find a sleeping bag right now. Nor do I feel like making my children’s mother sleep on the floor, especially considering—miracle of miracles—she’s the sober one.

“Fine. I’m too tired to care.”

I drag myself upstairs, brush my teeth, and fall into bed, welcoming the sleep that overtakes me like a Mack truck.

“Daddy!”

Jewel is jumping on my chest.

I squint at her with eyes unfamiliar with bright daylight in my bedroom; I am typically up before the sun.

“Dylan’s home! He’s home!” She jumps a couple more times and I cough with her weight, but smile at her glee. I straighten her glasses and then pull her down for a kiss on the nose. “Yes, he is.”

“Hi, honey!”

“Mommy? You’re in Daddy’s bed again?”

I’d forgotten. Casey passed out on the couch.

Mallory stretches out her hand and ruffles Jewel’s hair, then pulls her in for a hug. Jewel burrows into the covers between us, and slips one slender arm around each of our necks. “Yay! Just like it used to be!”

I prop up on my elbow and put my serious Dad face on. “Hon, it’s just because Casey fell asleep on the couch and we didn’t want to move her.”

Mallory catches my eye over Jewel’s head.

“So Dylan’s awake?” I ask Jewel, craning my neck to see my alarm clock. Ten in the morning. This is late for me.

“Yeah, he made us pancakes.”

“He did?”

Mallory says, “Aw, what a great kid.”

I want to ask Jewel if he’s talked about last night, but she’s just a child. I don’t want her in the middle of this any more than she already is.

Knowing Dylan, he’s not saying anything, anyway.

I sit up and pull on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt from the basket of unfolded laundry. Casey normally folds the laundry right away. But normal is out the window.

Downstairs, I go first to the kitchen. Dylan is turning a pancake over onto a plate next to the stove. The stack is already about six pancakes high. Angel is at the table, texting. She’s already showered and dressed.

“Planning to feed an army?” I ask Dylan. I grab him in a sideways hug around the shoulders.

He blushes a little, and doesn’t answer.

“Thanks, pal,” I say.

He points with the spatula to the coffeemaker. He made some coffee, too. Would that I could forget all that happened, just ignore it all and go back to the way it was, and enjoy the fact that my son made us breakfast.

I pour some coffee, and Angel says, “Dad, can I go to a party tonight?”

“Geez, Angel, let me get my eyes open here, first. And good morning to you, too.”

She rolls her eyes at me.

The coffee’s too bitter, so I splash in some milk and with a sigh of resignation go to check on Casey.

I hear the shower turn on upstairs. Must be Mallory, freshening up. Good. I don’t need her hovering over my shoulder.

The bright sun reflecting off the snow outside bounces into the room and puts Casey in a spotlight. She’s got dried spittle in her hair, and she’s sprawled in much the same position as we left her last night.

She hardly looks like the girl I proposed to.

I crouch down next to her face and shake her elbow. I have to do this twice.

She groans to life and immediately throws her arm over her eyes.

“Oh, God,” she says.

“Well, good morning, Sleeping Beauty.” I wish that had come out playful, instead of hard.

Casey cringes under her arm. “I’m sorry,” she squeaks out. “I didn’t mean to get . . . I didn’t . . . Mallory convinced me.”

“So the devil made you do it?”

“I said I was sorry.”

She turns away from me, facing the back of the couch. She curls up, holding her midsection.

I lean over, whispering, so the kids won’t hear, “I left you in charge, and you got hammered. At a time like this.” I’m trying not to sound so hard, like Mallory thinks of me, the mean drill sergeant. I’m failing, my disappointment running away with me. I trusted her.

She curls up more, saying nothing.

“I need to be able to count on you. For better or worse.”

“The kids were fine,” she whispers back.

“But what if they’d come down with a fever in the night? What if Jewel had started throwing up? What good would you have been?”

“No good at all.”

She covers her eyes with her hands.

I want to feel sorry for her. But I’m tired of coddling. I did it too much with Mallory, for too many years.

I can’t think of anything nice to say, so I follow my mother’s advice and say nothing at all, instead standing up to go check on my kids.

Chapter 37
Casey

T
he sun is like knives in my eyes, and my gut feels like a wave pool.

I deserve every bit of it.

Hangovers are just as bad as I remember, but now, new and improved! With extra shame!

Since Michael walked off and left me here, in the few minutes that have passed, I analyze last night. It seems clear that Mallory tricked me. Like the biblical serpent. Of course that sounds hollow to Michael. I’m supposed to be the not-Mallory. The anti-Mallory.

Maybe all is not lost. I can rally. Buck up. Show Michael how sorry I am by being the best stepmom ever, his ally in this time of crisis.

First. Need water. And a smoke.

I stand up too quickly and crumple to my knees on the wood floor.

Jewel is walking past. “Casey? Are you okay?”

“I’m feeling a little sick, honey. I’m okay.”

“Do you need some medicine?”

“Thanks, honey. No, I’ll be all right in a while.”

“Oh. I’m going to get my checkers set. Dylan said he’d play me!”

I’m not the only one trying for redemption. Dylan can’t stand checkers.

My phone is still in my pocket. It beeps softly. Must have missed a call.

First, I drag myself to the kitchen for water. Dylan is putting a pan in the sink. I stand in the entry for a moment, watching him, savoring the relief of his presence. He notices me at last. “Hi,” he says, points at the pancakes. “Want some?”

I shake my head, my stomach curdling at the very idea of solid food.

Dylan looks me in the eye, and I recognize that look because I just saw it in Michael’s eyes.

Disappointment. In me.

I take the water and my parka out to the back patio.

It’s shady back here, and the snow comes up over the tops of my unlaced boots. The cold feels like a tonic. Cleansing. I dab some snow on my face, in fact, to perk myself up.

I sit in a patio chair and check my messages while I light my cigarette.

Five texts and three calls, all from Tony, with increasing worry. We missed our early-morning call.

I text back:
Dylan’s fine. I’m in trouble, though. I messed up.

A few puffs later, my phone chimes again.

Uh-oh. What?

Fell off the wagon. Hard.

Can I call?

Better not.

Want to meet?

Not now. Wish I could. GTG.

I let tears run down my face as I ponder how much I need to be around someone who would understand.

Upstairs, changing my clothes, I note that my side of the bed is rumpled. My side, the side I didn’t sleep in last night. Of course. Where else would she sleep? The wood floor?

I have to tell Michael the truth, I can see now. All the truth. Starting with my brother, and the drinking. He might not hate me if he knows why, not that grief is an excuse, I’ll make sure to say that. He’s had enough excuses, I know.

Trouble is, he’s got so much happening now with Dylan, and Mallory making herself at home.

If I can get just a minute alone with him, I can start to explain. I can fully apologize, tell him I have a lot to say, which will help explain it, and we’ll talk as soon as we can but I’m here for him, for Dylan, for all of them.

My hands shake as I button my shirt. I’m so dizzy I can barely stand. But no. A hangover now is not allowed. He needs me.

As I leave the room, though, I hear his low voice in Dylan’s room. They’re talking, no doubt, about last night and what else is going on that caused Dylan to do this crazy thing. Such a good kid, too, so we all assumed. Never gave us any trouble. Between Angel’s anger and dieting and Jewel’s stomachaches and the visitation drama we were so relieved that he was on cruise control.

Michael will handle it, because he’s a terrific dad.

As I descend the stairs, a memory worms its way out of my hangover fog. Mallory telling me that Michael won’t have another baby with me. This was probably part of her gambit, along with the booze and the fake girly friendliness.

But it is true he won’t talk about setting a date. And now I’ve fallen down on the one important job he gave me.

Angel is playing checkers with Jewel now that Dylan is having his talk with his father. But she’s texting in between moves. Jewel is chattering, waving at Angel, practically doing cartwheels.

“Your sister wants your attention,” I say to Angel. “Can’t you give the phone a rest?”

She sneers at me. “Whatever, drunk.”

Jewel’s hand halts in the air, hovering over a piece. She’s got an exciting double-jump all lined up, I can see. She gapes at me, her eyes wide with shock.

She shouldn’t need to know what drunk is, but she does, and she knows it’s something her mother did that got her in trouble. She knows it’s the reason her mother doesn’t live here anymore, much as Michael tries to convince himself that his explanations about how “people can’t stay living together happily” covered that part over.

Angel is smiling now. She puts her phone down. “Go ahead, J. Your move.”

Jewel looks down at the board, her face serious beyond her years, and barely picks up her checker as she jumps twice and takes Angel’s pieces.

I don’t see Mallory downstairs. I realize she’s probably in with Michael and Dylan. Of course, she’s the mother, and naturally she’d be involved in a serious conversation like this.

Jewel stands up, then. “I don’t feel like playing. I’m going to go read.”

Without glancing at me, she bounds up the stairs.

Leaving Angel and me alone.

I sit down in Jewel’s vacated chair and look Angel in the eye, doing my best to keep my face neutral and stay upright, though my head is hammering and I’m still hangover-dizzy.

“So, you think you know a lot about me, I guess.”

“I know enough. I know you’re a liar.”

“Not telling is not the same. And I’m going to tell your father. As soon as I get the chance, when things settle down.”

She slouches. “Yeah, that’ll go over well. You’re only ’fessing up now because I found your diary and you got drunk. That’s, like, a deathbed religious conversion. My dad’s a
reporter
.”

“That will be up to him, how he feels afterward. There’s context here you don’t know anything about.”

“Ha.
Context
makes it okay to call me a bitch.”

“I was
venting
. Getting out my frustration.”

“Whatever. You believe it, or you wouldn’t say it.”

I look up at the ceiling, as if begging God to help me. “You are awful to me sometimes. You treat me like a lackey. You roll your eyes so much I’m surprised you haven’t sprained them. You snort in disgust when I walk by wearing something you don’t like, and yet I’m expected to do everything you ask. I do it all, without complaint, and still you act like I’m some disgusting leper in your house. And that was before you ever saw a diary, so yes, I vented my frustration, in fact, my
hurt
, that you seem to hate me.”

“Oh, like you care how I feel about you.”

“Of course I do.”

“Because you
have
to, to marry my dad you have to win me over. You think I couldn’t see that, after you moved in, how you wanted to do my hair and take me for coffee, and act all buddy-buddy with my friends? It’s so fake.”

“It wasn’t fake,” I protest, but she is partly right. I stepped up my attention to her after I moved in. I wanted to make it better because I sensed a shift in her demeanor that day. I sensed her growing suspicion.

“And you’re so young you want to have another baby, and there I’ll be, a babysitter. Again. Like I practically raised Jewel.”

“I’m not like your mother.”

“No, you’re not. Because she loves me.”

“You just said yourself that you practically had to raise Jewel, and I’m telling you, I’m different, isn’t that a good thing?”

“Right, you’re so much better than my mother, tell me that again how she sucks. Please, I love hearing that.”

This conversation is speeding out from under me.

“Angel. I’m really sorry about what I wrote. I’m really sorry I got carried away last night. I’m sorry that I tried too hard and I’m sorry that I have hid things about my past I’m not proud of. I’m asking you a favor.”