Blooming All Over (3 page)

“How about if I stay in the room with Julia and Joffe?” Susie suggested. “I can chaperon.”

Julia rolled her eyes. Ron laughed. Grandma Ida failed to share their amusement. “What,
two
of my granddaughters sharing a room with a man they’re not married to?
Oy vey ist mir
.” She dramatically pressed a fisted hand against her chest, as if the shock of Susie’s words was enough to trigger a coronary.

“Okay,” Ron interjected, stepping into the breach just seconds before Julia’s head exploded. “You and Susie can share the room. Your mother and grandmother can share the other room.”

“What about you?” Julia asked.

“Does Adam have a sleeping bag? I’ll sleep on the floor in his dorm room.”

Julia gazed up into Ron’s eyes. He would sleep on his not-yet-brother-in-law’s floor to keep her head intact. No wonder she loved him. “You don’t mind doing that?”

“Of course I mind. But it’s better than having Ida stroke out.”

A stroke, a coronary—obviously Ron shared Julia’s concern about her grandmother’s health. “It’s really not her business.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed,” Ron murmured, “
everything
is her business.”

“Check us in, Julia,” her mother said. “I want to unpack and freshen up. The sooner we’re settled in, the sooner we can go over to the campus.”

“Can we get some lunch?” Susie asked. “I’m starving.”

Julia tried to catch her sister’s eye. Susie seemed punkier than usual, her hair windblown and her eyes rimmed with dark liner and exhaustion. As usual, she wore black—black shorts, a black tank top and black sandals that exposed the butterfly tattooed onto her ankle. Her cheeks appeared gaunt. Julia wondered whether she’d lost some weight. Hard to believe someone who worked days at Bloom’s and several evenings a week at a pizzeria, and who was involved in a love affair with Casey Gordon, one of the bagel masters at Bloom’s, could lose weight.

She’d been so excited when they’d picked up the rented van yesterday afternoon. She’d yammered the whole ride downtown in the subway about how she was going to pretend to be a trucker, about how she’d seen a movie on TV once about a bunch of cross-country truckers talking to each other on CB radios, shouting, “Breaker, breaker!” “I have no idea what that means,” Susie had confessed, “but I want to drive in a truck and shout, ‘Breaker, breaker! Ten-forty!’”

So now she’d driven two hundred miles in the van—albeit without a CB to shout “Breaker, breaker” into—and she seemed piqued. Wan. Distracted. Thin.

Julia knew her sister well enough to sense when something was bugging her. Maybe it was just as well that Ron—her fiancé, her best friend, her red-hot lover—would be shacking up with Adam at the dorm
tonight. Susie was bugged, and as the Bloom in charge of fixing everything, Julia was going to have to debug her.

“All right,” she relented, turning to the nosy registration clerk and doing her best to cow him with a steely stare. “We’re ready to check in to our rooms now.”

S
usie stared at her reflection in the mirror above the sink. The fluorescent ceiling fixture shed a milky light, and a warp in the silvered glass created an odd ripple in her face’s reflection. She looked like someone whose nose was literally out of joint.

“Are you all right?” Julia called in from the bedroom.

How could she be all right when her hair was such a disaster? She’d had the window of the van open for the second half of the drive—the air conditioner had chosen to conk out somewhere around Middletown—and the wind had restyled her hair into a shape not far removed from a feather duster. The breeze hadn’t budged Grandma Ida’s hair, of course.

Not that Susie envied the immovable object that was her grandmother’s coiffure, but really, when you spent a fortune for a decent haircut, you ought to look good even after being blasted by a hundred miles of hot highway gusts. Susie had been patronizing an expensive salon for a year now. One good haircut and she’d committed herself to Racine—she had no idea why it was called that, since it had nothing to do with either the French playwright or the Wisconsin city. She’d come to understand that any salon with a single-word name charged twice as much as a salon with a two-word
name, like Snip City, where she used to get her hair cut years ago. Julia had always said she could do a better job with a hedge pruner than the Snip City stylists did with their scissors, but the cuts had been cheap. Racine’s haircuts were exorbitantly priced, but Susie was making enough between Bloom’s and Nico’s that she could afford them.

She wondered why she’d had so little hesitation about making a commitment to a hairdresser when she couldn’t bring herself to make a commitment to Casey.

Damn it, she
had
made a commitment to Casey. She hadn’t slept with anyone else since she’d started seeing him, which was more of a commitment than she’d ever made to any other man. Why couldn’t he be satisfied with that? Why was he pushing her to move in with him?

Probably because the subway ride from Forest Hills to SoHo was a bitch and a half. She ought to stop worrying about the forever-after implications; Casey had in all likelihood asked her to move in with him because he was sick of the IRT.

“Susie?”

She abandoned the bathroom for the bedroom. “That bathroom is gross. The walls are green. They made my complexion look like barf.”

As Julia stared at her, she fleetingly resembled their father—the dark, probing eyes, the narrow nose, the skeptical curve of her mouth. Ben Bloom had always appeared skeptical, as if he didn’t really believe Susie had gotten an A on her math test—he’d been right, she’d lied about the grade—or he doubted that Julia had memorized Shelley’s
Ozymandias
for her English class—misplaced doubt in that instance, because Julia had always done what she was supposed to do. She’d
been the perfect daughter. Susie had been the lousy-math-student-and-who-gives-a-shit daughter. Adam, who took after their mother except that he had the nose he was born with instead of a surgically sculpted one like hers, was the son, in a class by himself.

“You don’t look like barf,” Julia observed, “but you
are
a little pale. Are you okay?”

“Other than starving to death, yeah.” To avoid Julia’s questioning gaze, Susie wandered around the room, tugging on a drawer handle, pulling back the window drape to check the view—a parking lot and beyond it a small strip mall with a Boston Market, a Pizza Hut and a Chinese restaurant called Wok’s Up, Doc?
Food
. Susie sighed deeply. A veritable banquet awaited her just across the parking lot. So near and yet so far.

She felt Julia’s gaze on her for a moment longer. Then her sister turned back to the closet to hang up the dress she’d been holding. Susie had stuffed a few things into her suitcase, and they were probably so wrinkled that hanging them up now wouldn’t make any difference. “We’ve got two beds,” she remarked, waving at the pair of double beds, with their bolted-to-the-wall headboards and their cardboard-stiff green bedspreads. “I could sleep in one and you and Joffe could share the other. Or he could sleep in one and you and I could share.”

“Grandma Ida would stroke out,” Julia said with a sigh.

“There are worse things in the world,” Susie muttered, then shook her head, fending off a pang of guilt. “That’s a terrible thing to say.”

“You just spent four hours in a van with her,” Julia
said, her tone brimming with forgiveness. “You’re allowed to say terrible things.”

Susie flopped down on one of the beds. The bedspread felt as rigid as it looked. “She spent the entire drive lecturing me on how she and Grandpa Isaac built Bloom’s from a sidewalk pushcart into the biggest deli in the world. Her words,” she added before Julia could correct her. “And her other topic was, ‘Susie, what are you doing with your life?”’

Julia pulled a blouse from her suitcase and hung it next to her dress. How many outfits had she brought? This was a one-night trip, not a cruise on the
QE II
. “Did you tell her what you’re doing with your life?” she asked Susie, sounding just a bit too interested.

“I told her I was living it, more or less. I didn’t go into details.” Susie watched her sister, hoping she wasn’t going to interrogate her the way Grandma Ida had. Not long after Julia had become president of Bloom’s, she’d informed Susie that Grandma Ida had told her she thought Julia was a lot like her. Julia had laughed when she’d shared this tidbit with Susie, as if the idea was preposterous. Susie hadn’t even smiled. She could see in Julia more Grandma Ida than Ben Bloom: the stubbornness, the focus, the determination. The vaguely judgmental curiosity that made her want to hear Susie’s answers to Grandma Ida’s nosy questions. Julia was taller than Grandma Ida, and her hair was black thanks to nature, not the ministrations of Bella, the colorist from hell. But yeah, Susie could picture Julia fifty-odd years from now, dressing in cardigan sweaters and frumpy skirts and comfortable shoes, her wrists circled with gold bangles and her mouth pinched as she scolded a wayward granddaughter for
having crayoned a picture of purple bananas and orange grapes.

One of Susie’s earliest memories of Grandma Ida was of her criticizing Susie’s drawing of a tree with blue leaves. To this day, she saw nothing wrong with that childhood picture, and everything wrong with her grandmother for having disparaged it.

“So, what’s really bothering you?” Julia asked abruptly.

Susie propped herself on her elbows. “Huh?”

“Something is. I can tell.” Julia zipped her suitcase shut and placed it on the chrome rack next to the TV armoire.

“My stomach,” Susie said. “I want lunch.”

“Besides that.” Julia sat on the other bed, crossed her legs yoga-style and rested her chin in her hands. “I know you, Susie. I know when something’s troubling you.”

“My sister is troubling me,” Susie retorted. “And my grandmother. Let’s get some food. Joffe must be bored waiting for us in the lobby.”

“Joffe is probably in the motel restaurant, stuffing his face,” Julia said. “And you’re going nowhere until you tell me what’s wrong.”

“Who died and made you president?”

“Dad died and Grandma Ida made me president. Come on, Susie. I’m your sister. And I’m so sick of obsessing over my damn wedding. I’d much rather obsess over you for a change.”

Susie sighed. Julia might have certain Grandma Ida tendencies, but she was the only person in the world Susie wholeheartedly trusted. She wasn’t prepared to discuss her Casey situation with anyone yet—but if she
had to discuss it, Julia was the one to discuss it with. “Casey asked me to move in with him,” she said.

Julia’s eyebrows shot up. “You’re kidding!”

“Why should I be kidding?” Susie asked indignantly. “We’ve been seeing each other for a year.”

“No—I mean, he just strikes me as kind of…” Julia seemed to grope for the right words. “I don’t know. I would have expected him to ask you to marry him, not move in with him.”

Susie made a face. “You think I’d spend a year with the kind of guy who’d ask me to marry him?”

“No, I guess not.” Julia toyed with the lace of her canvas sneaker, but her gaze remained on Susie. “What did you tell him?”

“I said no.”

“Susie!” It was Julia’s turn to make a face. “You’re living with two roommates in that teeny-tiny disgusting walk-up in the East Village where the stairway always smells of fried onions, and he’s got a great big apartment!”

“In Queens,” Susie reminded her. “In Forest Hills.” Light-years removed from civilization.

Julia nodded. “Exactly. He lives in Forest Hills. A nice middle-class neighborhood. That’s why he’s the kind of guy who’d ask you to marry him.”

“He lives there because you can get more square footage for the dollar. Plus, he grew up in Queens and he has friends there, for some reason.”

“And family,” Julia pointed out.

“I don’t think that was a deciding factor.”

“I think it is.”

“Yeah, like you know Casey better than I do.”

Julia smiled. “I know he’s got long hair and a stoner smile. He’s still a family man. He refused to have sex
with you until he’d spent a lot of time with you, remember? He’s a traditional sort of guy, Susie.”

“More traditional than me,” Susie agreed dolefully. She couldn’t argue with Julia. Casey did have long hair, and his smile did have a vaguely druggy appearance, although in the year they’d been together the strongest drug she’d ever seen him take was Tylenol Plus. And he loved Susie’s tattoo, and he hadn’t been inside a church since his great-uncle Mike keeled over while watching WWE-Raw last October, and even at the funeral Casey hadn’t taken communion. But other than his hair and his agnosticism and his professed adoration for Susie, he harbored some pretty old-fashioned values. When they’d met, she would have happily jumped his bones within minutes of catching his eye. She’d walked into Bloom’s, made her way to the bagel counter and spotted him standing behind it, all six foot two inches of him, with his dirty-blond hair pulled back in a ponytail and his hazel bedroom eyes glittering as he’d handed her an egg bagel, and the saliva filling her mouth had been for him not the bagel. He’d been the one to insist that they spend some time learning about each other before they got naked.

She’d been intrigued. She’d never before met a man who actually cared more about getting to know a woman’s mind than getting her to spread her legs, but she’d admired his attitude. It had challenged and amused her, and their conversations had been great, and the sex, once they’d finally gotten around to it, had been even greater and…

Damn. She wasn’t ready to settle down yet. Not even with Casey.

“So…by turning him down, does that mean you’ve broken up with him?” Julia asked.

“I’m not sure,” Susie admitted. “He raised the subject last night. This morning I rented a van and drove to Ithaca. It’s not like we worked everything out.”

“In other words, you have no idea what you’re going back to.”

“A pissed-off boyfriend, I’m guessing.” Susie sighed. She didn’t want him to be pissed off. She wanted to return to New York City tomorrow evening, unload Adam’s junk from the van and then spend the night screwing Casey senseless. Somehow, she didn’t think that was the way things would proceed.

“I’ll be honest with you, Susie,” Julia said. “I like Casey. He’s done a fantastic job of running the Bloom’s bagel department with Morty—”

Susie snorted. “Yeah, that’s always a big item on my list. I sure don’t want to get involved with any guy who can’t do a fantastic job of running the Bloom’s bagel department.”

“And he’s crazy about you.”

If he were really crazy about her, he wouldn’t have put her on the spot with this stupid invitation. “I don’t want to break up with him,” she moaned. “But, I mean,
cohabitation!
It’s so serious! You’re marrying Joffe, and you’re still not living with him.”

“Technically,” Julia muttered. “And only because my apartment has another eight months on the lease.”

“And because you don’t want Grandma Ida to stroke out.”

“That, too. But you’re right, Susie. Moving in together is a big thing.”

“I love Casey. I really do. If he breaks up with me, I swear I’ll hate him.” She felt a tear tremble on her eyelashes and wiped it away, hoping Julia wouldn’t notice it.

No such luck. Julia climbed off her bed and onto Susie’s, butted hips with her and arched a sisterly arm around her shoulders. “I wish I could make it better,” she murmured. “If he breaks your heart, do you want me to fire him?”

“If you fire him, your bagel department will go to hell. And Bloom’s earnings support us all,” Susie pointed out.

“All right. I won’t fire him. I’ll just give him lousy hours or something.”

Susie managed a limp smile, even though that first tear turned out to be the drum major leading a whole parade of tears. One of the problems with warm weather was that she didn’t have long sleeves to wipe her eyes with.

After giving her shoulders a squeeze, Julia climbed off the bed and crossed to the bathroom. She returned carrying a tissue. “You’re right,” she said as she handed the tissue to Susie. “That bathroom is ugly.”

The phone on the table between the beds rang so shrilly they both flinched. While Susie mopped her damp eyes, Julia lifted the receiver. She said, “Hello,” listened for a minute, then said, “Okay,” and hung up. “Mom and Grandma Ida are unpacked and they want to head over to the campus,” she reported.

“Fine.” Susie sniffled and rose from the bed. “Let me just wash my face. We’d better get something to eat, too, or I’ll faint,” she warned as she wandered into the bathroom. She splashed some water onto her cheeks, then patted them with a towel and inspected herself in the mirror. Her hair had settled down somewhat, her eyeliner had survived her little bout of weeping unsmudged, but she still looked like barf. If Casey
saw her now, he sure as hell wouldn’t want her moving in with him.

Or maybe he would, because that was the kind of guy he was.

Why did he have to be so damn perfect? Susie wasn’t ready for perfect yet.

“That’s your best shot,” Mose taunted, “and you ain’t hit it yet.”