What I Thought Was True

Chapter Twelve

Mom catches Nic and me before we head out the door Monday morning. “Did Mrs. E. talk about how often she’s going to pay, Gwen? It would help a lot if I knew if it was every week or every two. And what about you, Nico? Marco and Tony still pay by the job? And did Almeida’s give you some at the end of the night, or . . .”

Nic and I look at each other. A barrage of money questions first thing in the morning can’t be a good thing.

“Like always, Aunt Luce. They bill the houses and then the owners send the checks. But Almeida’s paid.” He heads back into his room, returning with a roll of bills neatly wrapped in an elastic band. “Yours is in here too, Gwenners.”

I reach out my hand, but Mom’s faster. She takes the bills and begins leafing through them, her lips moving as she silently adds the denominations. Finally, she gives a satisfied nod, divides the money carefully in thirds, returning some to Nic, some to me, slipping the rest into her purse.

“Anything wrong, Mom?”

She blinks rapidly, which, if she were a poker player, would be her tell. “Nothing,” she says finally.

“Sure, Aunt Luce?” Nic asks, tapping each of his shoulders in turn. “Broad shoulders. Ready to listen. Man of the house and all that.”

Mom ruffles his hair. “No worries, Nico.”

Once she leaves, Nic and I have only to exchange a glance. “Damn, what now?” he says.

I shake my head. “If she starts taking in laundry, we’ll know something’s up.”

Taking in extra is what happened last winter when the hot water heater melted down, the Bronco needed brake work, and Emory needed an orthotic lift in one of his shoes because one leg is slightly shorter than the other. Grandpa Ben also began spending a lot more time at bingo nights, honing his card shark skills.

“Shit.” Nic rubs his forehead. “I don’t want to think about this. I just want to think about food and sex and swimming and sex and lifting and sex.”

“You’re so well-rounded.” I whack him on the shoulder with a box of Cheerios.

“I’m not supposed to be well-rounded,” he says, through a mouthful of last night’s leftover pasta. “Neither are you. And cuz . . . you can’t tell me you don’t think about it.”

“I don’t think about it,” I answer resolutely, concentrating very hard on pouring milk into my cereal.

Nic snorts.

We look up as the screen door squeaks open to see Dad standing there. He looks pissed off and for a second I’m afraid he overheard our conversation. Not a story he needs to know.

But then he drops his aged khaki laundry duffel inside the door, kicking it to the side wall with one foot. “Screen door’s still broken,” he mutters, scowling.

Nic fixes Dad with a stare, then returns his attention to the steady movement of his fork.

“Top step to the porch is rotting out too,” Dad says. “Fix it, Nicolas. Like I told you last time. Ben could put a foot through that. Or Emory, the state it’s in. A man takes care of his family.”

“Or he just bails on everyone,” Nic mumbles without looking up from texting on his cell. Grandpa Ben, coming in, fresh from the outdoor shower, sprig of lavender in hand to put under Vovó’s picture, gives Nic a warning glance, shakes his head. Dad is slightly deaf in one ear, but not immune to tone.

“What was that?” he asks, plunging his index finger into his ear. “What did you just say to me?”

“I said I’ll get to it, Uncle Mike.” Nic forks up the last of the pasta.

“Told you about it last month, Nico.” Dad grabs his bag again, dumps his laundry out on the kitchen floor near the washing machine in the closet. “A man tends to his own.”

My cousin scrapes back his chair, rolls his shoulders back, stretching, then clangs the plate into the sink. “Going to work. Then Vee’s. I’ll be back late.” He directs his eyes only to me and Grandpa.

“Too hard on the boy, Mike,” Grandpa says in the silence that follows the clap of the screen door.

“He’s not a boy anymore. He should be thinking first about pulling his weight, not lifting those.” Dad points to Nic’s dumbbells. “Where’s Luce?”

“Where is she always?” Managing to look dignified despite the towel wrap, Grandpa heads for the refrigerator. He takes out a grapefruit, setting it on the cutting board. “Working.”

Brows lowering, Dad looks at him sharply, but Ben’s face is innocent as the cherubs painted on the ceiling at St. Anthony’s.

Dad says, “You get a hammer and some wood glue, I can fix that door right now.”

“Why aren’t you after me to fix it, Dad? The ability to hammer a nail isn’t just for Y chromosomes.”

“Like I said, it’s the job of the man of the house.”

Grandpa draws himself up straighter, clears his throat.

“The young man of the house. You’ve fixed your fair share of doors, Ben. No one’s taking that away from you.” Dad reaches for the hammer I’ve pulled from the tool kit in the kitchen closet.

He gets the door fixed in about twenty seconds, all the better to slam it slightly when he leaves a few minutes later.

What was that about? I’m not even sure who provoked who more. Grandpa Ben reaches over and pats me on the shoulder. “Seja gentil, Guinevere. By Nico’s age, Mike owned a business, was about to be a father, pai.”

His dark brown eyes look old, watery, full of too much sorrow. “Then with two little babies. He didn’t have much chance for horsing around.”

I know every child of divorced parents is supposed to secretly hope their parents fall back in love and reunite. But I never have. Dad’s leaving removed a buzzing tension from the house, like a downed wire that might be harmless but could suddenly shock you senseless if you tripped over it. Grandpa Ben, Mom, Nic, me, Em . . . we’re peaceful together. É fácil ser gentil. Easy to be kind.

The Ellington house is eerily quiet when I arrive. I knock on the door, tentatively call “Hello!” but am met by nothing but silence. Do I just march in?

After several minutes of knocking, I kick off my shoes, head into the kitchen. The teakettle’s whistling on the stove, there are breakfast dishes on the table, a chair pushed back. But no sign of Mrs. E.

She’s not on the porch. Not in the living room or any of the downstairs rooms. Now I’m starting to panic. It’s my first day and I’ve already lost my employer. Did she go off to the beach alone? I’m right on time . . . wouldn’t she be expecting me?

Then I hear a crash from upstairs, along with a groan.

I take the steps two at a time, panic rushing up as fast as I do, calling Mrs. E.’s name.

“In here, dear,” she calls from a room at the back corner of the house, following that up with what sounds like a muffled curse.

I dash into the room to find her sprawled on the floor in front of a huge open closet door, covered with dresses and skirts and shirts. Seeing me, she lifts a hand in greeting and gives an embarrassed shrug.

“Guinevere, I must say, I am not enjoying being incapacitated! I was reaching for my beach hat with my cane, overbalanced, and took half the closet down with me. Just trying to get a hat. How I shall contrive to change into my bathing suit, I cannot imagine. And the ladies will be here any minute.”

I take her hand and try to pull her to her feet, but she’s too wobbly for that to work. Finally, I have to put a hand under each arm, haul her upright.

“Dear me,” she mutters, swaying, “this is pure bother. I’m so sorry, dear Gwen. How undignified!”

I assure her it’s fine and, limping, she makes her way slowly to a green-and-white sofa in the corner of the room. I walk behind her, which is awkward because she keeps stopping, so I bump into her back three times in the short distance. Luckily, she gives a low chuckle instead of getting angry or falling over again and breaking her hip. Reaching the couch, she sits down heavily, grimacing and rotating her ankle, shoving aside a big green leather case. It’s flipped open to reveal what looks like our junk drawer at home crossed with Pirates of the Caribbean—a crazy tumble of diamond rings, pearl necklaces, gold chains, silver bracelets, coral pins, an emerald necklace. I can’t help noticing this enormous diamond, so large, square, gleamingly clear that it reminds me of an ice cube. That thing could choke a pony. I would be afraid even to touch it. What would it be like to be so used to priceless things that you don’t set them carefully against the velvet, just toss them in like we do to the jumble of pens that don’t work, takeout flyers, flashlights, Grandpa Ben’s old pipes, discarded plastic action figures of Emory’s?

Mrs. E. gives another little groan, rubbing her ankle with a grimace.

“Should I get some ice—for your ankle? Or something to rest it on? Are you okay?”

She reaches out to pat my cheek. “My dignity is slightly sprained, but I shall recover. My wardrobe is in far more need of assistance than I—” She jabs her cane in the direction of the spill of clothing. “If you would be so kind?”

Rehanging the closet is like traveling through time—there are sequined dresses and wild seventies prints, sheaths Audrey Hepburn could have worn to Tiffany’s, full-skirted, tight-waisted outfits, bell-bottomed pants. Mrs. E. has evidently never parted with a single outfit. I have a flash of an image of her trying them on in front of the mirror like an aging little girl playing dress-up. When I finally rehang the last of them, I turn around to find her completely nude.

Before I can stop myself, I let out a little screech. Mrs. E., who was bending over, picking something up off the floor, sways and nearly falls. I rush over to steady her, and then don’t know where to grab hold. Luckily, she catches herself on the arm of the couch as I wave my hands ineffectually behind her.

“Gwen, dear,” she says serenely, stretching out her wrist, from which a black bathing suit is dangling. “I fear I am going to require your assistance here.”

This is not how I imagined my first day at work. Flipping burgers, sprinkling jimmies, and frying shrimp is looking really good. Or weed-whacking. Or simply hijacking one of the lawn mowers and getting the hell off island.

“Close your eyes, dear,” Mrs. E. says briskly, possibly seeing me visibly brace myself. Her own eyes look sad.

I squeeze them shut, then immediately realize I actually have to see what I’m doing in order to pull black spandex onto an octogenarian with a broken foot and a cane.

So, okay, I’m not that comfortable with my own body. Who would be when their best friend is Vivie the Cheerleader? When their school job is timing for a bunch of buff boys in Speedos? When your mom marks time by saying things like, “That was before I was such a blimp”?

But this takes body consciousness to a whole new level.

I’m bending over, yanking the suit over her soft, blue-veined calves, when she makes a little sound.

“Am I hurting you?” Oh God. I should have stayed at Castle’s, should have scrubbed toilets with Mom, should have. . . .

“No, no, dear girl, it’s just that after a certain age, one barely recognizes oneself. Especially in a state of undress. It’s rather like the portrait of Dorian Gray, if he were female and wore a swimming suit.”

“Yoo-hoo!” calls a voice from downstairs.

“That will be the ladies,” Mrs. Ellington says, a bit breathlessly, as I tug the swimsuit over her hips. “Go let them in. I believe I can manage from here.”

I open the door to find Big Mrs. McCloud, as she’s always called on Seashell (her daughter-in-law is Little Mrs. McCloud), Avis King, Mrs. Cole, as always clutching her tiny terrier Phelps like a purse, and, surprisingly, Beth McHenry, who used to work with Mom cleaning houses until she retired. They’re all wearing straw hats, sunglasses, and bathing suits. Among the ladies, there are no cover-ups, no sarongs, just brightly flowered suits with skirts, freckled skin that’s seen a lot of sun, wrinkles, and what Mom would call “jiggly bits.” I didn’t imagine my day would involve so many octogenarians in swimwear, but it’s kind of nice to see it all displayed so proudly. I usually wrap a towel around my waist when I’m in my suit in public. Avis King, who is built like an iceberg—small head, ever widening body—marches in first.

“Where’s Rose?” she growls, sounding like Harvey Fierstein with bronchitis. “Don’t tell me she’s still asleep! It’s high tide and perfect weather.” She looks me up and down critically. “Lucia’s gal, am I right? You’re the one hired to be her keeper this summer. Ridiculous waste of money, I say.”

Keeper?

“Hello, Gwen!” Beth McHenry says, smiling at me, then furrowing her brows at Avis King. “Lordy, Avis. Rose did get a concussion just a week ago. Henry’s only being careful.”

“Pish. Just because Rose has a few memory lapses and a bum foot!” Mrs. McCloud pronounces. “Twice last week I hunted for my reading glasses when they were on my head, and put my car keys away in a box of saltines. No one’s hiring me a watchdog.”

“I’d like to see them try,” Mrs. Cole murmurs in her sweet voice.

“Typical of Henry Ellington, though. Just like his father. Won’t come take care of the situation himself, hires other people to do it.” Avis King shakes her head. “How can you possibly know you’ve got good help unless you look them straight in the eye and interview them yourself? Any fool knows that.”

Help? My shorts and gray T-shirt suddenly morph into one of those black dresses with the ruffly white aprons servants wear in Grandpa Ben’s movies. I resist the urge to bob a curtsy.

Then I hear the slow thump and drag of Mrs. Ellington descending the stairs and hurry to reach her, but before I can, she appears in the doorway, smiling at her friends. “Shall we move on, girls, before the tide turns? Come, Gwen!”

After the beach, the ladies scatter, Mrs. E. lunches and naps. Then asks me to read her a book, and hands me—I swear to God—something called The Shameless Sultan.

Yup. Whatever else it may be, calm, quiet, well-ordered, lucrative . . . apparently the Ellington house is not going to be a refuge from the overdeveloped muscles and half-naked torsos that decorate most of the books at home.

But at least I don’t have to read aloud to Mom.

“‘Then he took her, as a man can only take a woman he yearns for, pines for, throbs to possess,’” I read softly.

“Speak up, dear girl. I can’t hear a word you’re saying.”

Oh God. I’m nearly shouting the words now—over the sound of the lawn mower rumbling from the front lawn. At any moment Cass could come around the corner to find me pining and throbbing.

I read the next sentence in a slightly louder voice, then halt again as the mower cuts off.

Mrs. Ellington waves her hand at me impatiently. “Gracious! Don’t stop now!”

That sounds frighteningly like a line from the book. I doggedly continue. “‘With every movement of his skilled hands, he took her higher, hotter, harder—’”

“Just with his hands?” Mrs. E. muses. “I was under the impression more was involved. Do continue.”

Was that the sound of the carport side door opening and closing? No, I’m getting paranoid.

“‘Waves of rapture such as Arabella had never dreamed existed swept through her ravished body as the Sultan moved, ever more skillfully, laving her supple curves with his talented—’”

Someone clears their throat loudly.

Mrs. E. looks over at the porch door with her expectant smile, which widens even further at the sight of the figure standing there. “My dear boy! I didn’t know you were coming.”

“No,” a male voice says, “apparently not.”