Chapter Thirteen #2
“I don’t think so, but she might like the garden club. She loves flowers. She worked at Ransoms—or what used to be Ransoms—when she was a girl,” Maeve offered.
“She grew up here?” Mrs. Walker said to Maeve’s reflection in the rearview.
“Mostly, yes. She and my grandparents came from Ireland when she was little.”
“I see.”
Maeve wasn’t sure what Mrs. Walker saw, but whatever it was had shut down the conversation.
Wendy said her mom was like the heirloom roses in their garden—showy and groomed and prickly.
It made Maeve smile, as she stared at the back of Mrs. Walker’s stiff hair, to think how much her own mother would not like the woman’s fussy ways.
Maeve’s mom didn’t wear makeup, except occasionally lipstick.
She did not paint her nails, though she kept them clean and filed.
Her hair was thick and straight, brown like Maeve’s, but instead of hints of red, hers was streaked with random silver strands that glinted like tinsel.
She cut her hair herself, evenly across the bottom, and pinned each side behind her ears.
She wore pants most days and a shirt that buttoned or a sweater that did not.
She was not much for chatter and would often hush her or Molly if they went on about most any subject.
“Enough talking,” she would say. But she was also playful and funny.
She was the first to take out board games or a deck of cards and, as far as Maeve could remember, had never turned down an invitation to take a magic carpet ride on the rug in the foyer, a flight of fancy Molly made up after hearing the story of Aladdin.
In Maeve’s literature class, her teacher lectured about a character’s interiority, the life and thoughts lived on the inside that are not meant for the light of day.
“A good character will have a rich interior life that either seeps out from the cracked and broken places or explodes under pressure.” Maeve could not imagine her mother’s interior life.
If Mrs. Walker was a prize-winning rose, grown for show, then Maeve’s mom was a wildflower cropped up in a field or a violet that could bloom in the cracks of a sidewalk.
She never talked about her childhood other than coming to America on the ship with Maeve’s grandparents, how she had been a quiet girl who kept to herself, and how she only bloomed after she met Maeve’s dad.
Maeve had to admit that it sounded romantic but also a little sad, too, like her mom was nothing at all without her dad.
He had tons of stories about growing up with his big sisters and a father who was a big talker and a big drinker.
But her mom’s childhood stories were flat as paper dolls.
Even when Maeve’s grandfather told stories about Faye, they were lacey, delicate, and filled with holes, like her inner life was dandelion fluff.
Wendy stole a look over her shoulder. Maeve smiled, shuddering to think what her mom would do if she could read Maeve’s mind.
What a mess! Maeve felt like two different people—one was some version of herself who made her parents proud, who learned from her mistakes, who didn’t lie or sneak around, and the other was this Maeve, the one riding in the back seat of some fancy car who wanted nothing more than to jump the bones of a girl smiling at her from the front seat.
Wendy lived in a centuries-old clapboard-sided house near the river, chosen by her mother for its history and by her father for the fact that it was close, but not too close, to the college where he taught political science.
“Leave your bag here,” Wendy said, once inside the door.
“Shoes too. She doesn’t like clutter.” The house was light and formal with curving furniture tightly upholstered, still-life paintings of fruit and flowers, maritime images of ships at sea.
A shining banister swirled up the staircase like the inside of a conch shell.
“Your house is really nice,” Maeve offered as they climbed.
“It’s a museum. C’mon.”
Her mother’s voice followed them up the stairs. “Doors.”
“Doors?” Maeve asked.
“Yeah, uh, no slamming doors, so close it super quietly.”
Wendy’s room was wallpapered with blue stripes, but everything else was white—the sheer curtains, the bed and dresser, the thick pile carpet, the lumpy quilt.
Posters of men papered the walls—Larry Bird, Bill Walton, John Havlicek, Kareem Abdul-Jabar.
A shelf of gold trophies, two rows deep, all basketball.
Next to the trophies, an eight-by-ten glossy photo of a women’s basketball team. Maeve picked it up. “What’s this?”
“Only the 1976 US Women’s Basketball team.
I saw them in Montreal, at the Olympics.
” She came up behind Maeve, rested her chin on one shoulder, her hand on the other.
“See there? Pat Head and Ann Meyers? They’re my favorites, but I like the guards too.
They all give me hope that I’ll be able to play in college. ”
Maeve set the photo back on the dresser and turned into Wendy, wrapping her arms around her waist. She had learned in the weeks since their first kiss where to put her hands.
She had also learned more about kissing, about closing her eyes and letting herself drift like she was doing now.
Wendy pulled away. “Um,” she said, looking over her shoulder.
“I’m going to open the door for a second, and let’s laugh and talk a little so she doesn’t start to wonder.
” She opened the door silently. Maeve realized that despite its age, this house didn’t creak like hers.
Wendy laughed at nothing, repeated what she’d said before about the basketball players, made some noise about going to the bathroom and left the room.
Maeve checked out the trophies idly until she felt eyes on her. Mrs. Walker was in the doorway. “Oh, hi again,” Maeve said. “I was looking at Wendy’s trophies.”
“You play basketball?” Mrs. Walker asked in a way that suggested she knew the answer.
“I used to. I wasn’t good enough for the team. I’m more into theater now,” Maeve offered, trying to sound interesting.
Mrs. Walker looked around the room.
“Wendy’s in the bathroom.”
Mrs. Walker smiled tightly and whisked herself away.
Wendy came back and closed the door gently.
She told Maeve to sit on the end of the bed, then she opened the closet, pulled out a hanger with a blue dress.
“Since you’re not going to prom, I wanted to show you this.
My mother wore it in college. I couldn’t imagine putting on some frilly thing, and she let me have it altered. What do you think?”
It was the most elegant dress Maeve had ever seen—midnight blue satin, liquid straight, with wide straps and a curved neckline, and a matching bow at the empire waist. She touched the fabric. “It’s so beautiful! I wish I could see you wearing it.”
Wendy glanced at the door, a mischievous look on her face. “Should I try it on quick?”
Girls got undressed around each other all the time in the locker room.
How was this any different? And yet it was.
She had never been in a locker room with Wendy, had never seen her bare skin.
They had touched each other under shirts, under the cover of darkness.
But here they were, in a bedroom, in Wendy’s bedroom. Maeve bit her lip, nodded.
Wendy took the dress off the hanger and laid it on the bed next to Maeve.
She shimmied out of her jeans, pulled her T-shirt over her head until she wore only tiny striped bikini underwear and a white cross-your-heart bra with a pink bow.
It was like putting a face to a name, seeing the skin she had touched.
Maeve felt the urge to meet Wendy there, to shrug off her clothes and stand naked.
Wendy’s stomach was hard and flat, her waist gently sloped.
“I have to take my bra off or it’ll show.
The dress has it built in.” She turned her back. “Will you unhook it?”
Maeve hesitated, not certain she even knew how to unhook a bra, which was stupid. Of course she knew. She wore a bra. She reached up, freed one hook and then the other. Wendy turned slowly, brushed her hair out of her eyes.
“Wen,” Maeve said. Maeve wanted to tell Wendy that she loved her, that she loved everything about her, loved her teeth and her eyes, loved how good she was at math and biology, how dumb it was that she only knew basketball stars and not movie stars.
She wanted to tell her she loved her even though she was kind of a bad driver, that her taste in music could be better. “I mean . . . You’re so pretty.”
The bedroom door swung open. “Wendy!”
Wendy snatched the dress off the bed and covered her naked breasts. “Mom! Stop it! I was showing Maeve my prom dress, and I didn’t know if the boys were home. Do you mind?”
Mrs. Walker swept into the room and stood between Wendy and Maeve, shielding her daughter. “Put it on. I’ll zip it up.”
Maeve was pinned in place, unable to move, let alone stand.
She knew her face was ablaze, as if they’d been caught between the sheets.
Girls do this all the time, she told herself.
This is fine, this is fine. But that cinched look on Mrs. Walker’s face, like she stepped in something filthy that Maeve had drug in.
When Mrs. Walker nudged Wendy toward the wall mirror, Maeve stood. “You look really good. That color is pretty.” She tried to keep the comment flat and unflattering.
“It was mine, you know,” Mrs. Walker said, admiring her daughter’s reflection. “I was a freshman in college when I got engaged to Wendy’s father. Not much older than you girls. I wore this dress. Who knows? Maybe Brett Overton is the one.”
“Mom, I told you,” Wendy said, aggravated. “Brett Overton is not the one. Now will you unzip me? Please.”
“I should go,” Maeve said, gesturing to the door.
“Yes, why don’t you wait downstairs for Wendy to get dressed. She’ll meet you outside.”