Chapter 16
I was unpacking groceries while Di spoke to a client on the phone. She watched as though the food I was putting away were poison. Enough. I threw on my jacket, planning to go outside to meet the school bus.
Di hung up, repeated her mantra. “It stops in front of the house. Why wait outside?”
“Yes, you’ve mentioned that.” And to think, before coming to Woodfield, I’d been worried that Di was enjoying all the grandma activities I was missing out on because I lived far away.
The phone quacked, and Di was back in business.
From the porch, I saw Annie. Again. Did she not have anything better to do? I had to ask.
“Annie, where do you work?”
“Here and there, but mostly, I teach at the health club. We have a great aerobics class you’d like. It meets tomorrow. You should come. Tell me you’ll come.”
What else did I have to do while Callie was in school?
“Where? What time?”
“Give me your phone. I’ll plug it in.”
Again, Callie jumped into Annie’s arms. I waited like a second banana until she hugged me.
“We have lots of goodies in the house,” I said.
Annie focused on me. “After school is when Mac has a nutritious snack. I prefer apple, but Lisa believes strongly in avocado. Some people think avocado is a vegetable, but it’s fruit packed with vitamins and nutrients.”
Callie interrupted. “Grandma Jo, are we going to the library?”
“You have homework,” Annie said. “Routines are important. When I was in high school, I had a routine. I got up each morning and went to school. I graduated, and I haven’t been able to get back to my routine in years.”
We were going to the library. If we entered the house, Annie and her relentless chatter would follow.
At the library, I sat in the children’s section on a kid-size armchair, and Callie went immediately to the toy kitchen. Several girls younger and shorter than her were playing what I termed “house” as a kid.
A young mother—tiny nose, rosy face—claimed a seat next to me. She wore heavy brown sandals with woolly beige socks and pointed to a girl in rainbow-colored flashing sneakers: Birdie, her daughter. She seemed mystified when I said Callie was my grandchild.
“You’re babysitting? Does your daughter know how fortunate she is?”
“It’s not a big deal. I wish I lived closer so I could help more.”
“It’s not a big deal? Birdie is five. My mom has never offered to babysit. Never ever.”
“Well, maybe she’s waiting for you to ask her.”
She chuckled. “I’ve asked her.”
“What did she say?” I glanced over to where the girls played. Callie pointed a finger at Birdie. I supposed Callie was pretending to be the parent, Birdie the child. When my kids played, Lisa was the mother, Michael was the father, and poor Alex was always the old dying dog.
“Mom said she wasn’t a babysitting service. If she ever wanted to watch children again, she’d open a preschool and get paid for it.”
“Now that would be one top-notch preschool,” I said sarcastically.
“Right? She claims no one ever helped her.”
“Maybe that’s true,” I said. “But then, wouldn’t she want you to have what she missed?”
“My grandmother lived with us. She did the housework, cooking, and cleaning.”
Birdie’s mom reached for her woven sack, found a piece of paper, then a pen, and scribbled something down. “Here—give this to your daughter.”
I read what she wrote. It said, “You are blessed.”
I slid it into my wallet, kept it for myself.
Back at home, Callie played a game on an iPad. I asked if she wanted anything to eat.
“How much are you planning to feed that child?” Di said.
I asked Di if I could talk to her in the backyard.
I slid open the glass door to the deck, then walked out into the field. I didn’t want Callie to overhear our conversation. Looking forward to confrontation, Di tagged along. I turned to her by a hemlock tree. Hemlock—now there was a solution to this situation.
“Don’t tell me what I can and cannot do. I enjoy spoiling my granddaughter in the brief time she is with me. When Lisa is back in town, you can all return to your skinny-girl regime.”
She shrugged me off, lifting her shoulders. “Whatever. I have book club here Friday.”
How nice. She knew how to read.
“Usually, I host it at my home, which I prefer, but since I’m staying here, we’ll be in the living room. I expect a lot of people.”
I made a feeble attempt to show interest. “What book is your club reading? Novel? Nonfiction?” I was a big reader. I prized my book club in Florida, where we served dishes mentioned in each book. Often we had authors Zoom in.
“We don’t read books,” Di said.
“Then what do you do?”
“Drink. And after that, we drink.”
“Food, too, I guess.”
“If someone brings it,” Di said.
The concept of having people over and not serving as much as a thin potato chip was anathema to me. My bubbe kept a dish of toffee on the table. The same amount of candy in it forever. Once, I reached in to take a sweet. She said, “That’s for company.”
“But, Bubbe,” I had said, “your only visitors are family.”
“You never know,” she’d said.
When we came back inside, I could hear Callie upstairs shifting things around, singing a song I didn’t recognize.
“I hope my book club doesn’t keep you up,” Di said, as though we were friends.
“Oh, no worries,” I said.
“I wasn’t worried. Anyway, I’m off to show a house. Classical-music aficionados in their midseventies. They’re fans of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and dream of having a summer home near Tanglewood. The music festival.”
“I know it’s a music festival,” I said.
“In the summer,” she said.
“I know, Di.”
“Music isn’t my thing.”
So, books weren’t her thing. And music wasn’t her thing. Did she even have a thing?
“Later, Jodi. I have houses to sell.”
I realized she had gotten my name right for the first time. And I knew it was because I had told her off. She’d been pushing me to see how far she could go.
My phone rang. “Hi, Annie. What’s up?”
“Milton. Milton is up,” she said angrily. “I found him in bed with another woman. As in another, not me.”
Painful, heartbreaking. The poor kid. But why was she calling to tell me? I hardly knew her. Was she seeking motherly advice, or did she have no one else to confide in? “I’m sorry.”
“Did you say sorry? Jodi, sorry is what people say when someone has died. Milton is alive—until I kill him.”
“He wouldn’t be worth the jail sentence.”
“Would you visit me in prison?” Annie said.
“Sure, and I’d bring a friend.”
Her breath was heavy over the phone.
“Are you okay?”
“I will be. Once I figure out what I’m going to do next.”
“Stay calm, Annie. This could be the best thing that ever happened to you.”
“Right, I’ll look back and laugh.”
I wouldn’t go that far. “I don’t want you to be alone. Do you have somewhere to go?”
“Not really. Not in the state I’m in.”
That’s why she had called me, a person she barely knew. How awful, not to have a place to turn. I was not keen on Annie passing additional time at Lisa’s house, but I had empathy. I invited her to stay with me. She sobbed as she agreed.
An hour later Annie walked in with her eyes red, mascara smudged on her face. In true form, she started talking in the foyer and didn’t stop. I hugged her to my chest. She wiped her nose. She ranted, and I listened. She needed someone to listen.
“This situation rots on so many levels. It’s hurtful, but it’s also embarrassing. What a dis. Milton cheats on me? I wish you’d seen her. Repulsive. Is there a way I can take back every nice thing I ever did for him? I rinsed his dentures! Get this, Jodi—I dunked his disgusting bridge in water each night. I know you touch feet all day, which I can’t understand anyone enjoying, but you never saw a pair of feet as flat, dry, and disgusting as his. Flaking skin. Gnarled toes. And I gave him a foot massage whenever he asked. What a douche. Want to know something else?”
On she went. At last, I interrupted. “Annie, maybe this incident was bashert .”
“Buh who?”
“ Bashert means ‘meant to happen.’ Milton’s awful behavior can be your impetus to move forward.”
“And you won’t believe this—the worst part. She was old, the same age as you.”
Thanks, I thought.
“When she saw me, she grabbed a sheet and raced into the bathroom. Milton handed her a robe. My robe! I’ll have to burn it. And there’s something else. Milton prefers young women. But this time, he made an exception. All this is between you and me. Do not tell Di. Under any circumstance. You are sworn to secrecy. She warned me time and again he was a player. I can’t bear to hear ‘I told you so.’ Di thinks she’s right about everything.”
Well, in this case . . .
“What should I tell Di when she asks why you’re on the couch?”
“I don’t know. How about I drank too much to drive home? By the time I finish binging, it’ll be true.”
“Annie, would you like a drink?” I certainly needed one.
“Tequila, please.”
“I have to see if Lisa has it.”
“It’s behind the scotch.”
She was correct. I poured tequila over ice into a glass and brought it to her.
She took a gulp, shook her head as the tequila hit.
How did I go from my sunny, nondramatic life in Florida—albeit with a spouse following me around heartbroken about the loss of his job—to this soap opera in the country?
“I don’t know why I took up with that asshole in the first place.”
You liked his bingo card.
She curled up on the couch beside Callie’s stuffed animals. She turned a teddy bear into a pillow, her eyes fluttered until she nodded off.
I phoned Rizzo at the office.
“Everything okay?” I asked tentatively.
She laughed. “Absolutely. In fact, I must remind myself you’re out of town.”
Was she kidding? I wanted things to go smoothly, but I also wanted to be missed.
“Well, great. Not so great here. I love being with Macallan, but Lisa’s house is a circus. Grannie Annie and Brian’s mother are as good as in charge of my granddaughter—telling me what she should eat, when it’s time to do homework.”
“Well, if Lisa doesn’t need you, you might as well come home.”
“I can’t. I want to be part of Callie’s life.”
“Sounds like her little life is overcrowded.”
“Packed solid. Also, Brian has moved to Boston.”
“You know that’s how my marriage ended. Carmine relocated to the Bronx to live with his girlfriend.”
I had taken Brian’s move in stride. But maybe both Rizzo and Jake were right, and it was something to lose sleep about.
“Well, all is good here. Slivovitz handled the new patient we chose not to reschedule. She said he reminded her of her son.”
“A son she likes or a son she could do without?” I teased.
“You have nothing to worry about here. Save all your energy for the battle of the bubbes .”
When Annie awoke from some shut-eye, she had simmered down.
“I can’t stay over,” she said ardently.
“Why not? It’s fine with me. And I’m positive Lisa would feel the same.”
“If I sleep here, Di will know something is up.”
“I’ll cover for you.”
“She’s shrewd. She’ll figure it out. I refuse to see the ‘I told you so’ look on her face. She told me a million times it would come to this, but I always assumed she was being cruel because Milton was with me.”
“Are you going back to Milton’s?” Did she intend to have it out with him?
“I’ll stay with my girlfriend at her old man’s tonight and decide what to do tomorrow.”
“I’m glad you have a place to go.”
Suddenly, I heard rain pelting the roof. “It’s pouring, and you had a lot to drink. Maybe you should stay awhile,” I said. “Or at least have a cup of coffee.”
“Fine. Coffee,” she said as though she was doing me a favor. She followed me into the kitchen.
“Thanks for being here,” she said. “I guess I called you because I’ve always needed a mother.”
“My pleasure to serve,” I said.
She downed the coffee black, killed some time.
When she said she was okay to drive, I handed her a heavy sweater, scoured the hall closet until I found an umbrella.
“Remember, this never happened,” Annie said.
“Classified information.” I pulled the woolen crewneck over her head as though she were my child.