Chapter 11
At that moment, Sarah and Peter came downstairs for breakfast. Peter had bedhead.
His hair was all over the place and glowing with the morning light, whereas Sarah had obviously made herself up before she’d come downstairs.
She’d begun doing that a couple of years ago, as though she hadn’t been able to handle the idea of her parents and brother seeing her “messed up.”
“Morning!” Candice said brightly and fakely.
“What’s up with Uncle Henry?” Peter plopped two pieces of bread into the toaster while Sarah removed the eggs from the fridge and began heating oil in the skillet.
“It’s the will,” Sarah said. “Didn’t you hear him?”
Peter scowled, as though his sister had said outright that she thought he was stupid.
“We got an email from your grandmother’s assistant,” Candice said finally, deciding that her children could know everything.
What was the harm? “They’re going to start the redesign for the transitional house sooner rather than later.
We can stay here till the end of the summer, but it sounds like we’re going to play host to architects and construction workers. It might not always be comfortable.”
“Ooph. That’ll be loud,” Peter groaned.
Sarah shrugged, her eggs sizzling already. “It means we can just go back to the city when they get here, right?”
Candice felt a tinge of regret.
“We have to go back to the city anyway,” Peter said. He was probably thinking of his various sports camps. Sarah was probably thinking of her friends, of her favorite libraries and museums, and of NYU coming up soon.
Her children had things to get back to.
But what was waiting for Candice back in the city?
She thought of Nathan, alone in his city, typing up another brilliant novel.
She thought of her MFA students, all of whom knew that her husband had been having an affair with one of them as recently as last semester.
She didn’t want to hide from them, but she didn’t want to face them, either.
Henry returned a few minutes later, beaming. “We’re going to nip this in the bud,” he said. “Don’t worry about a thing, sis.”
Candice considered asking for details. But she knew that a bunch of legal jargon this early in the morning would only make her nervous at best and headache-y at worst.
Sarah slid two fried eggs onto a plate for Candice, then put it in front of her. Candice was surprised. Back in the city, she couldn’t remember Sarah ever cooking for her. “Thanks, honey,” she said.
“You must be hungry,” Sarah said. “You didn’t eat dinner last night, right?”
It was true that last night, Candice had suddenly felt so heartsick, so broken about Nathan and about her mother, that she’d hidden herself away in her mother’s study again, listening to records and trying and failing to write about her feelings.
She’d neglected dinner, and she didn’t feel that hungry right now, either.
But she took a bite of egg, smiling at her daughter.
Sarah had noticed her mother’s needs. It meant that somehow, some way, Candice had done something right when it came to raising her.
“When’s Dad getting here?” Peter asked.
“He said soon, right?” Sarah sat down and smeared her eggs with hot sauce.
“I thought,” Peter said, shrugging. He looked at Candice for answers, because she was meant to have them.
“I think he said the day after tomorrow,” Candice lied. “But I’ll have to talk to him.”
Peter and Sarah began to talk about something else, leaving Candice to stew in fear and resentment. She hadn’t heard from her husband in days.
After breakfast, Sarah and Peter went down to the water, and Candice returned to her mother’s study to call Nathan. Nathan answered on the third ring. He sounded miffed, as though communication between husband and wife hadn’t occurred to him.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Hi, honey,” she said, wondering if being extra-syrupy with him would make him feel guilty for doing whatever he was doing. If he was doing anything. “Wanted to check in and see how you are. The kids have been asking when you’re coming in.”
Nathan sighed. She could see his face in her mind’s eye, annoyed and exhausted, although he had no reason to be tired. “They really want me to come out, I guess?”
“They love you,” Candice said. “I love you, too.”
There was silence. Candice closed her eyes, willing herself not to cry.
“Well, I love you, yeah,” Nathan said. “I love all of you. Of course I do.”
Candace exhaled all the air from her lungs. She needed to change the subject. For a little while, she told Nathan about Henry contesting the will. All the while, she felt her blood pressure skyrocketing.
It wasn’t long before she got up the nerve to ask, “Is there anything you want to tell me? Anything you want me to know?”
“About what?” Nathan asked.
Candice felt cursed. Was he really going to force her to say it? It felt like some sinister game. It felt like something he’d set up for her, if only so that he could write about it.
“I don’t know. I just hope you know you can tell me anything,” Candice said.
“Sure. Of course. I always have,” Nathan said. He didn’t skip a beat.
After they got off the phone, Candice put back on that Dolly Parton record and told herself not to cry. Nathan was coming, and he wanted to fix things. He wanted to pretend that nothing was broken. That was beautiful, wasn’t it? Or it was a version of beauty that she had to understand was real.
Families were complicated. Marriages were complex. She needed to celebrate that. That was what writers always did.