Whole Latte Life (18 page)

But now life spins its web around her. “I had some things to think about and being near water helped.”

“What things?” Tom turns to face her.

“Never mind.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“No. This is not nothing.”

And it scares her, the tone of voice she hears. “Tom—”

He cuts her off. “Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t happy? I can’t read your mind. I’m busy, I’m working and supporting a family and home.” He drops a blouse in the suitcase, hanger and all. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I tried.”

“When?”

Sara shakes her head. “I don’t know! When I wanted to go away with you. Over breakfasts. There were times when I tried to talk and—”

“Come on, Sara,” he yells, cutting her off again. “Answer me this. One thing. You thought it was okay to disappear?”

“I wasn’t home anyway, so no one would notice. And I was coming back.”

“But what if something happened? What if I got in a car accident and Owen was hurt?”

“I had my cell phone, Tom.”

“Which was turned
off,
and which I left messages on that you
ignored.
”

“Well nothing happened to Owen. There was no accident.”

“But what if there was? You’re a mother and a wife. How can you be so irresponsible?”

“I wasn’t irresponsible. And I’m not
only
a mother and a wife.”

“You were more than irresponsible! You’re not seeing reality. Anything could have happened. To me or the kids. And we’d have no way of contacting you. How responsible is that? Or what if something happened to you, wandering around the city alone? Do you know how dangerous that was?”

“First of all, you’re very capable of handling the family for a few days. And I’m very aware of reality. The
reality
is I had to do something to change. I couldn’t keep waking up practically unable to get out of bed. I can’t be sad anymore. Because I had
plans
before Mom died. Forgetting that is not fair to any of us.”

“No. Here’s the reality. Ready? Go find yourself. Do whatever you have to do. But not while living in my house.”

“What?”

“It’s my house. I paid for it. I gave you a beautiful home to live in. I’m the one who worked for it.”

“You bastard. That’s my house too.”

“Maybe. Until you abandoned us.”

“What? It was three days! How can you abandon
me
?” She takes his arm and tries to squeeze in front of him at the bed, to face him while he packs. “I’m telling you I need life to change. Aren’t I worth three days away to sort my thoughts? Three days? Aren’t I worth your support? Your faith?”

“No. Not when you walked out of your life. Our life.” He zips her overnight bag and throws it on the floor. “We’re leaving. And you are not, under any circumstances, pulling any of this shit living in my house.”

“Stop saying that. It’s my house, too, and you know it.”

“Not anymore. Not after the stunt you pulled and what you put people through this weekend. I’ll take you to court for abandonment if I have to. We’re going back to Connecticut and you’re finding somewhere else to live while you figure yourself out.”

As he bends to pick up the suitcase, Sara Beth sees past him, sees Rachel having walked back in to hear enough to know things are bad.

So the compilation is complete. Sara Beth had originally set out to sketch herself today, her words the pencil shading in the form and shape. But instead, the afternoon became a study in composition and proved invaluable in that all these images, the varying forms and shapes and elements brought to substance today, would serve another purpose. She thought there would be only her sketch, but the ones of Tom and Rachel bring different perspectives. Together, they show her exactly how she will have problems with her friendship and how shaky her marriage is, making it difficult to assemble all the sketches in a study of the final, desired, work of art.

Chapter Twelve

R
iverbanks and coves and wide tree-lined streets edge the town of Addison. On the eastern side of town, Olde Addison is filled with those vintage homes Sara’s always loved. Saltbox colonials, farmhouses and old cape cods line the historic streets. Captains’ houses dot the riverbanks.

Ten years ago, they bought their Garrison Colonial in a tract of homes built in the apple orchard. The roads wind through the defunct orchard with apple names like McIntosh Lane and Cortland Drive. They planted tiny shrubs around the front of their house, along with a white birch sapling and Japanese maple tree. It was a hot summer that year, Tom pressing the spade into the dirt, feeling the soil shift. His plantings were a gauge against life, measured against the milestones: his children, becoming partner, anniversaries. They were proof of living, the way they filled in the yard in sync with his life filling in. He likes his home life the way it is and works hard to keep it that way.

He never dreamt his own wife would threaten it.

At the very least, Tom was relieved Sara Beth went for an exam with Dr. Berg. Physically, the doctor pronounced her fit. But the family’s different. Jenny walks home from school with friends rather than have her mother pick her up. Kat takes a new placating role, helping with chores and keeping to herself, searching for normalcy in her old diary entries. Tom stops outside her bedroom door when he hears her voice.
Last year at this time
, or
two months ago
, she says out loud before her finger traces the lines, her lips forming the words as she finds old ordinary days.

He’d assumed that once Sara Beth had her physical, this might all blow over like some temporary midlife crisis. When it doesn’t, Melissa helps, taking the kids for another weekend leaving Tom and Sara talking around the issue at first, skirting it with the mundane. The lawn needs trimming, instead of the kids need you here. They plan a stop at the nursery to replace a haggard Alberta Spruce, instead of a stop at a counselor. The car needs tires. Maybe they’ll trade it in for one of those smaller SUVs.

Tom worries about the kids sleeping away from home again. To him, mundane means normal. And normal means everything. Normal is sleeping in your own home. Normal is your wife living with you, not staying with her mother’s old friend on the other side of town.

He cooks dinner the weekend the kids are away, sets the plates out and talks with Sara about her escape. While sitting in strained silences at the kitchen table, the sliding glass door is opened and the evening’s summer sounds drift in…kids’ voices in the neighborhood, crickets, moths bumping against the screen. This is the life he wants. Not a life of separation.

Sara Beth looks out at their new deck, at the round glass table and big umbrella, matching cushioned chairs, a gas grill Tom bought this spring. Pansies wilt in the deck pot; she hasn’t been here to water them. But Sara Beth hasn’t really been here in his mundane, his normal, for a while.

“Let me see if I got this straight,” Tom says, the dinner dishes pushed aside, the wine poured. “You walked out of your life to find a way to save it?”

“You make it sound trivial. Like it’s some selfish thing I did. It’s not. I was coming back, Tom. I just took time to catch my breath. To be introspective. I’m not happy with the way my life is right now, I don’t know. It’s hard to explain.”

He sees the defiance in her eyes daring him to belittle this. “And you’re doing this introspection by asking for time for yourself? Wanting
me
to go grocery shopping now?”

“I see fathers there every week,
with
their kids, having a great time! So you could take Owen on Saturday mornings. Get out of the house with him. You should be more involved with the kids anyway. You never were. And is there something wrong with saying I need Saturday mornings for myself? Plus I don’t live here anymore, so there’s that.”

“Sara, come on. We’re drifting even further apart. You’re not living here, you need space on Saturdays. Maybe a divorce is what we should be talking about.”

“Isn’t that extreme? Just because I’m trying to work things out?”

“Well if you’re so unhappy. It seems like you’re finding your happiness alone.”

“No, that’s not it. I’m saying maybe we’d have a better home life if you were more involved with the children. Thus, grocery shopping with Owen.”

“I wouldn’t even know what to buy.”

“So I’ll make the list. But it’s not that hard. Cheerios, tomatoes and carrots, some cold-cuts, and have them cut a piece of cheese for Owen, a jar of instant coffee. Maybe a roaster chicken, hamburger patties. Really, Tom. A divorce? Is that what you want?”

If this is what their marriage comes down to, shopping, what’s the point? He hasn’t done regular grocery shopping since before the kids were born, when Sara would walk beside him in the aisles, her fingers hooked through one of his belt loops. He looks at her, remembering those days. “Fine. All right then. We’ll give it a whirl. Me and Owen.”

“That would really help. It gives me free time to get some things done.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Gardening. If you’ll let me do that here. In
your
home. And I’ve been thinking of starting piano lessons.”

“Since when? We don’t even own a piano.”

“Since my weekend away is when. Buying a piano would be good, and there are plenty of used ones for sale.”

Tom clears the table and after dinner, they talk more, kill the bottle of wine, and fall into bed. He watches his wife. Since her New York weekend, she’s turned a corner without him, leaving him a step behind trying to catch up. He traces a finger along the inside of her arm.

“Sara.”

“Mmmh?” Her eyes are closed.

“Did you call the therapist?”

“Tom. Even though I’m not acting exactly like who you want me to be doesn’t mean I’m not okay.”

“I know. I get that. But maybe it’ll help with our marriage, too.”

“Maybe, Tom. My first appointment is next week.”

“I’ll go with you?”

“No. Don’t worry,” she says as she opens her eyes and reaches for the hand that trails her skin.

He feels like he’s having a one night stand with a stranger.

But they are communicating, and there’s something hypnotic about her change. Before she leaves for the night, he starts to feel they can work their marriage out. Until the phone call came a week later.

“I’m calling about the car you have for sale?”

“Sorry. Wrong number.” Tom clicks off the cordless phone and glances at the clock. Eight-fifteen on a Friday morning, car shopping.

“Felt so relaxing to use my own shower. Was that the phone?” Sara Beth stands in the hallway outside the bedroom wearing a new kimono robe.

“Wrong number,” Tom answers as he ties his shoes. The phone rings again and he reaches for it.

“Hello.” It sounds like the same voice. “I’m calling about the car you advertised?”

“What number are you dialing?”

“Let’s see.” A newspaper page rattles and the caller reads Tom’s number.

“And which car are you calling about? The Volvo?” Suddenly something’s happening that he has to catch hold of. “Sorry. It’s been sold already.” He hangs up the telephone and when he sees that Sara’s not there, hurries down the stairs to the kitchen, pulling his tie through his collar as he goes.

Sara Beth’s back is to him as she stands at the kitchen table in her robe. The newspaper lays open to the Classifieds.

“Sara Beth?” he asks, turning the pages. “What the hell’s going on?”

“I wanted to see how much we could get for it. So we could plan.”

“What happened to our plan to wait until we see if we can make this work?”

She turns around then and tries to walk past him, but he grabs her arm. “I’m talking to you.”

She looks at his hand on her arm and he pulls her in closer. “Answer me.”

“Okay,” she relents. “Okay. If we got enough for it, I thought that we could look at minivans.”

“A van?” Upstairs the girls thump around, bickering with each other. That’s something new, that jarring interruption to conversations, to coffee. The pound of footsteps and thud of something thrown and angle of sharp words fall on him downstairs. It’s because their antenna tuned to Sara Beth has gone awry. They can’t find her, can’t bring her in clearly. Her sleeping here only occasionally, coming and going at whim, doesn’t help.