By the Numbers (4 page)

Of all my kids, I worry about Kelsey the most. While she's proved to be savvy and talented in many respects, graduating at the top of her class, nabbing a coveted job in public relations right after college, she's also demonstrated a tremendous lack of commitment to, well, everything and everyone.

Three months into her PR career, she decided she hated corporate America. She said that trying to sway public opinion about people and products was deceitful and underhanded. After two years of living in her sorority, she simply abandoned her sisters and her membership chairman position and moved into an apartment
off campus without telling anyone, having grown tired of the whole enterprise.

When Kelsey was in high school, I was never sure what persona she would adopt from year to year, bouncing effortlessly from “soccer star” to “hip-hop fly girl” to “Lilly Pulitzer–clad class vice president,” although more often than not, these phases related to her boyfriend or circle of friends du jour.

Let us never speak of the short-lived Bollywood phase, as I have no earthly idea where that originated. (
Slumdog Millionaire,
maybe? Thanks, Redbox.)

Yet remembering all those damn saris, bindis, and the chapati griddle gathering dust up in the attic is what broke me.

“Whoa, hold on,” I said, with a force that surprised us both. Even Barnaby was startled, but he quickly regained his composure. You don't last eighteen-plus years by being a nervous Nelson. “No, I'm sorry, you misunderstood. Buying your fiancé a second food truck wasn't one of the options. You realize that forty-five percent of food truck businesses fail within the first year, yes? And of those on the road, forty-one percent of them currently violate sanitation standards, and they can be shut down at any time. This is not happening. You're not taking the money I've been diligently shepherding
away
from risk for twenty-three years and placing it squarely in harm's way. You can have a wedding or a down payment on a home. You're not pissing away your future on a Jesus-themed truck
when you don't even attend church anymore
. Period.”

Kelsey sprang out of her seat, eyes damp with tears, arms wrapped protectively around her slight frame. “I should have known I couldn't count on you! No wonder Daddy didn't want to stick around.”

I glanced over at the crystal clock on the corner of my desk, an
award for managing the top-producing practice within my consulting firm for three years in a row. I thought of the weight of the crystal in my hand, the considerable heft of that leaded glass. I imagined for a moment what it might feel like to hurl the clock against the wall, watching the whole thing shatter into pieces, spraying the room with flesh-puncturing shards and bits of the very inner workings that kept the trains running on time, a satisfying burst of springs and wires and components.

Instead, I took note of the actual time and realized that I needed to make a call before I followed Kelsey down her rabbit hole of emotional blackmail. I steadied myself. “Kelsey, this is a joyful occasion and I truly don't want to argue with you. That's not what this is about. I want you to have what you want. We can work this out, but I'm supposed to call a Realtor now, so if you can give me five, then I'm yours for the rest of the afternoon for us to make plans.”

This was a capitulation on my part and we both knew it, but I tried to play it off like it wasn't. I needed at least a semblance of being in charge.

She narrowed her eyes at me. “Why are you calling a Realtor?”

“To finalize details about listing the house.”

Her brow furrowed. “But why?”

I explained, “Everyone's gone, and Barnaby and I certainly don't need this many square feet.”

Plus, I hated being alone in such a big, empty house. I loathed the sound of my sensible heels echoing down the hallway when I'd return from work at night. I abhorred paying to heat and air-condition so many vacant bedrooms. I despised writing checks to a landscaping company to maintain a yard I used only to curb my dog. And I wanted to sell while the market was still rebounding so heartily.

More than anything, I needed to get the hell away from the scene of the crime, as I actively avoided the living room now. Given the circumstances, everyone should have been glad I was selling the place and not, say, committing arson. Every day I didn't buy a blowtorch and a gas can should have been considered a victory. I didn't care how long I lived, I'd never get the image of the open bottle of wine, those two glasses, one with lipstick on the rim, and smooth jazz in the background out of my head, walking in to Chris and That Hussy on the couch when I returned home a day early from my business trip as a surprise.

Yes, indeed, I'd say we were
all
surprised.

“Where will you go?”

“I've been looking at town houses on the north side of the city, close to Cousins Patrick and Michael. Barnaby will still have a little patch of grass with trees and birds. Or maybe I'll live farther south and finally get to walk to work for the first time in my career. Doesn't that sound great, Barnaby?”

From his bed in the sunny corner spot, old Barnaby thumped his tail. He was the kids' dog and had previously preferred the company of anyone to me. But since we'd been on our own together for the past six months, we'd formed a solid bond. We may not have been best friends for his first eighteen years, yet here at the end of his life, he'd come to value my companionship as much as I valued his.

“Then who's going to live here?”

“I guess whoever wants to buy the house. Highest bidder, I suppose.” I calculated I'd have an offer on the house within a month, as the average market time in my area was sixty days. Given the amount of time it would take to close escrow, I estimated I could be living in downtown Chicago by the fall.

“What if I want to get married here?”

I picked up the Realtor's card and began to dial her number. “I'm sorry, what?”

Twin spots of color began to burn on Kelsey's fair cheeks. Oh, no, she was winding up. “I said, what if I
want
to have my wedding here? The yard is big enough for a tent with a huge dance floor. And they have those trailers with the upscale Porta-Potty bathrooms that can be wheeled in, too.”

“Is having your wedding here a possibility?” I asked, hanging up the phone, when really, what I should have been doing was battening down the hatches. “You've lived in this house your entire life and you've never once mentioned you'd want to be married here. You've talked about dozens of places—from the top of the Hancock to the Botanical Garden to Coachella to Italy to Forks, Washington [let us never speak of the brief
Twilight
obsession again], to the Rainbo Club downtown. The one place you've never mentioned is
here
.”

Her voice took on a shrill quality, pitched at the exact decibel that often causes spasms in my left eye. “So now I'm not
allowed
to have my wedding here? You're all, ‘You can have anything you want, except everything.' Nice. Real nice. Thanks a lot,
Mom
.”

I struggled to stay calm, and I could feel my head beginning to throb. My left eye began to twitch. I pinched the bridge of my nose to relieve some of the mounting pressure inside my sinuses. “Honey, I didn't say anything like that. Have your wedding where you want.”

At this point, she was practically shrieking. “Fine. My wedding will be
here
next year. One year from now.”

Barnaby looked at me out of the corner of his eye, his old brow wrinkled as if to say,
I do believe you've stepped in it now, Miss Penny.

Evenly, I said, “We can do whatever you want—but are you sure you don't need to discuss anything with Milo?”

Granted, I was anxious to move downtown and to get away from the unhappy memories here, but not at the expense of ruining Kelsey's dream, even one she hadn't thought to mention
once in twenty-three years.

I wasn't so selfish that I couldn't wait twelve months to downsize. I'd just continue to avoid the living room. I could put up one of those lovely Japanese rice-paper room dividers, perhaps. I'd simply remind myself every day that I didn't get mad—I'd gotten everything (including Barnaby), which is why the house was mine to sell in the first place. Chris had let me have it without any kind of fight.

But really, what else could he have done?

While my gut feeling was that Kelsey's decision came from a place of petulance, spite, and immaturity, I wasn't about to say that out loud.

“No, I don't. He
trusts
my decisions, unlike
some
people.” Then, and I'm not sure if I imagined this or not, she stomped her foot, exactly like she used to do when Chris denied her a second Popsicle.

I sighed, rubbed my left eye, and looked at the Realtor's business card again. “Then I guess I'm going to cancel my listing appointment.”

“I guess you are.” With a smirk and the grace of a trained dancer (largely because she took—and subsequently quit—ballet, contemporary, ballroom, Latin, swing, popping, locking, and Masai African–style lessons), she sashayed to the doorway before turning around to say, “P.S. this house needs major refreshing before the wedding, hashtag ExtremeHomeMakeover. I'd start with the powder room.”

She slammed the door on the way out, and for the first time ever, Barnaby growled at Kelsey. He rose from his bed to lick me once on the hand before lying down again, paying me his ultimate compliment.

As I heard Kelsey thump up the stairs, I viewed the account summaries again. I said to Barnaby, “I suspect this wedding is going to cost me so much more than I planned, in every possible way.”

And as I stand here now in the rectory, post memorial service, writing out a check to the bishop that includes an unanticipated comma, thanks to Kanye, I find myself thinking two things: First, Monday can't come soon enough, and second, Barnaby deserved this day more than my spoiled
daughter.

To: [email protected],

[email protected]

From: [email protected]

Date: June 4th

Subject: Do the right thing

Jessica,

The new issue of
Us Weekly
is out and there are still no shots of Mila Kunis pumping gas in the Stars—They're Just Like Us section wearing our Gabby 'n Gretch ostrich-skin booties. In your own words, “Those bitches at
Us
owe me, like, so many favors I can't even. Consider this a done deal,” but the photos have yet to materialize. It's been six months, Jessica, and we've been beyond patient. And now per your voice mail, you won't return the payment for our “guaranteed placement,” saying we should have gotten the terms of the deal in writing? Jessica,
that's why we signed a contract with you!
Don't force our hand here, okay? I told Gabby this all has to be a misunderstanding—so please just
do the right thing, return the payment, and we can all get on with our respective businesses.

Regardless of how large the fashion world might seem, it's actually pretty insular and people talk. Make sure the story everyone has to tell about you is a good one.

Best,

Gretchen Perillo

Founder

Swing into a shoe-nique experience at:

GABBY 'N GRETCH

48 Jane Street

New York, New York 10014

gabbyngretch.com

To: [email protected],

[email protected]

From: [email protected]

Date: June 4th

Subject: WTF, SINCLAIR

Nice ostrich-skin G 'n G booties on your latest Instagram, Sinclair. Pro tip: Next time you decide to wear stolen merch, post your ill-gotten gains on a private account.

See you in court, bitch.

Gabby Perillo

P.S. Ten bucks says you don't even know Mila Kunis.

Swing into a shoe-nique experience at:

GABBY 'N GRETCH

48 Jane Street

New York, New York 10014

gabbyngretch.com

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Date: June 4th

Subject: Status check-a-roni!

Hi, Jess! Okay, you said to stay off your jock while you were with the fam, but you got this weird thingie today and I wasn't sure what to do? A crease and desist something from Mila Kunis? That's so cool—I didn't even know you knew her!
Black Swan
, I die! Anyhootie, the letter's on your desk.

Also, the guy from the building's leasing office called and he sounds hella shitty. Can't tell if he's salty 'cause he's mad or if it's just 'cause he's Eastern Euro and they all sound aggro, 'cause they spit when they talk. Anyhootie, I've got everything handled here, so zero troubs!!

XO, Cassie

• • • •

“W
ell, that was . . . unique,” I say.

Jessica has been thumbing through videos on her phone and glances over at me in the driver's seat. “I'm glad Kelsey isn't too preoccupied with her important wedding plans to post Vines from the funeral.”

“Memorial ceremony,” I automatically correct.

“Memorial ceremony,”
she repeats. She taps the screen with a matte silver–polished nail. “I like this one where the baritone in the choir lifts Barnaby's urn all baby-Simba style during the ‘Jesus Walks' chorus. Wow. How does anyone still wonder why ISIS hates us?” Then, to herself, Jessica mutters, “
Someone
needs to learn to tell that girl no.”

I pretend I don't hear her. “Did you say something else, sweetie?”

“Negatory.”

Jessica and I are driving down Green Bay Road. We have the great pleasure (sarcasm intended) of riding home together, as I'd been settling the bill while Jessica was outside having a phone conversation that seemed rather heated. When we'd both completed our business, everyone else had scattered and she was faced with the choice of carpooling with me or hoofing it home in those crippling little booties she's wearing. And yes, I felt terrific when she seriously considered hobbling herself on the four-mile hike home in lieu of spending ten minutes in the car with me.

After Barnaby's memorial service, the immediate family went out to lunch so we could “continue to celebrate his amazeballs life,” according to Kelsey. She insisted not only on seating Barnaby's urn at the head of the table, but she also ordered him a plate,
daring me to object. She said I owed it to him for all the years I didn't allow her and her siblings to feed him table scraps.

If Kelsey only knew about all the chicken, cheese, and crackers Barnaby wolfed down in the past year and a half! I'm convinced my finally playing fast and loose with the treats is why he lived so long. He and I would settle in together to watch
Homeland
or
The Good Wife
and we'd play the one-for-me, one-for-you game. If the episode was particularly riveting—Julianna Margulies, you are a national treasure—sometimes I'd accidentally skip his turn. When that happened, Barnaby wouldn't drool, bark, or nudge. Instead, he'd ever so gently lay a paw on my thigh to prompt me. I imagined him sounding exactly like an old Southern gentleman, his accent as thick, sweet, and slow as if he'd been birthed on a plantation in the middle of the Mississippi Delta. I could practically hear him saying,
Begging your pardon, Miss Penny, but I do believe you've forgotten something, if it's not too much trouble
. And then I would give him two pieces of whatever I was eating to compensate for my grievous error.

Funny, although I was never much of a dog person, once all this wedding stuff is over, I'm seriously considering going to the shelter. Of course, Patrick says I need a man. I choose to interpret his advice to mean “male dog.”

Anyway, because Barnaby did not reassume his corporeal form in the canine version of Easter Sunday and join us at the table, his uneaten cheeseburger is now sitting in a Styrofoam container on the backseat. Topher will make short work of it later when he returns from the Cubs game, and he should, because it's
Kobe
beef. Honestly, we couldn't make the sacrificial gesture with the six-dollar ground-sirloin burger on the menu? We had to order the kind from a cow that received massages while listening to Bach
concertos? That's not a lunch; that's a spa day. And did our beloved yet now-deceased beagle really also need Parmesan truffle-oil fries, a side kale salad, and a blood orange milk shake as part of the sacrifice? Come on!

Topher consuming the Symbolic Sandwich will likely anger Kelsey, but I'm not tossing out a gourmet lunch, especially given the waste with the wreaths. She was adamant about the Doggie Death Flowers not being reused for the wedding, despite having lilacs, hydrangeas, and peonies as part of her floral design concept. Bishop Gartner said he could bring them to a parishioner's grandmother's wake tonight, so I hope they give comfort to another family. I personally ripped off the silk banners that read B
ARNABY—
B
EST
D
OG
E
VER
; no one needs to accidentally see that when they're trying to grieve for their beloved meemaw.

“I feel like I haven't talked to you at all since you've been home,” I say. “Except about wedding details. How are you? How's New York?”

I expect a diatribe here as there's nothing Jessica holds in higher esteem than her city. She fell suddenly and profoundly in love with New York when she went out for her college visits before her senior year, and she's yet to stop talking about all the ways in which the Big Apple reigns supreme over the Windy City, even in areas that aren't particularly brag-worthy, such as a supposed 1:1 rat-to-person ratio.

“Fine.”

Okay, we're doing one-word answers, then. How newsy and informative. I try a different tack. “Your recent blog post is very dramatic, with you balancing on the railing of the High Line in those heels with that striped Chanel skirt? Wow.”

“Thanks.”

Truly, her Web site is as much a paean to the city as it is to couture. If I hadn't been to New York so many times on business, I'd definitely want to visit after seeing it through Jessica's eyes.

I say, “Your Web site's more and more like a magazine every time I look at it. Is someone art directing you, or are you using a photographer or other stylists?”

“Tripod.”

Around the time Chris and I split up, Jessica started a fashion blog and styling business. She'd had an internship with a famous designer after graduating from FIT but didn't last there too long. She said she could have spent years toiling behind the scenes in the industry, but this way, through social media, she's actually setting the trends instead of chasing them.

Each week, she posts artfully posed pictures of herself in various spots around Manhattan, like the recent photos on the High Line, which is an elevated park created out of an old, unused section of railway line, spanning a couple of miles across the west side of the city.

Jessica's blog is consistent in that she's always photographed in her trademark red lipstick, carrying a bag that costs as much as my first car, with her eyes obscured by some fabulous pair of sunglasses. She's a modern take on Grace Kelly in her photos, more effortlessly cool and collected at twenty-six than I could ever hope to be. I follow all of her accounts, and she certainly seems to live a beautiful life, even if she chooses to tell me about it only one word at a time.

(P.S. I believe culottes are coming back.)

“I'd never know the snapshots of you weren't straight out of
Vogue
.”

“Thanks.”

Okay, I'm going to get a full sentence here if it kills me. I know. I'll find common ground, discussing her interests. “Who makes the shoes with the little metal studs on them?”

“Valentino.”

DAMN IT. Toss me a bone here! “Are they comfortable? You must have felt fairly steady in them to have been able to scale the railing like that.”

She did not inherit her sense of balance from me, that's for sure.

“Not even remotely. But I got the stiletto lift, so they're not unbearable.”

“Should I be familiar with that?” I ask.

“The stiletto lift is Botox for your feet. Basically kills all the feeling down there on a temporary basis, sort of like cosmetic cortisone. Makes wearing heels less painful.”

“Whoa,” I said, automatically touching my laugh lines. “I haven't even gotten Botox in my face yet.”

“No kidding,” she replies, but not with vitriol. No one's surprised that I'm not an early adopter, especially of anything that includes a level of risk. But I've been perusing the analysts' reports about Allergan's (Botox's parent company) stock and read about a predicted fifty percent increase in demand in the next ten years. Karin keeps insisting my time with the tiny needle is coming soon, particularly if I ever plan to pursue a man of the two-legged variety. (While I've taken fine care of myself, Father Time is kind of an unrelenting jerk.)

Until now, I've resisted invasive types of anti-aging, for fear of turning into Marjorie II, as my mother patronizes plastic surgeons like other grandmas frequent garage sales or Bingo night at St. Mary's. If it can be nipped, tucked, tightened, plumped, injected,
smoothed, lasered, or sandblasted, Marjorie's had it done. I live in fear of the day someone mistakes us for sisters.

She's never been able to fix her hands, though. Her knuckles bulge with arthritis, and deep tributaries of blue veins are prominent over the ridges of her metacarpal bones, the fat deposits of youth long gone. Her hands are her own personal portraits of Dorian Gray. She figures if she wears enough diamonds, no one will notice, and she's probably right.

Because I've had so much time inside my own head over the past year and a half, I wonder if a few cc's of Botox would have made a difference. Clearly something drew Chris away from me and to a woman half my age—was it because she had so much less tread on her tires? (Or is it more tread? Chris was in charge of buying our tires, so I might have the analogy wrong.) Given that sixty percent of all spouses cheat and that fifty percent of all unions end in divorce, I guess I should have been more vigilant, more diligent, or at least less surprised that it happened to me.

Few endeavors have a higher capacity for risk than marriage. Yet we still blithely walk down the aisle on our father's arm, a vision in a poufy white dress, surrounded by everyone we know, absolutely certain that we're going to be different; we're going to be the exception to the rule. Yet the fact remains in half of all marriages, we won't. I won't even explore the path of the sixty-seven percent failure rate for the second time around or the seventy-three percent likelihood of divorce in the case of third marriages.

When I mentioned these startling statistics to Karin, I said they made me want to become a cat lady. She corrected me, telling me the term I meant to use was “cougar.”

“No,” I replied, “not a cougar. I don't want to date a younger
man. I would rather get fifteen cats than ever go through any of this again. Can you imagine voluntarily boarding an airplane with those odds? ‘Thank you for choosing Fifty Percent Chance Air today, ladies and gentlemen. Our flying time to beautiful Maui will be eight hours, unless we plummet to the ground somewhere over Sacramento with such velocity that the impact scatters debris for three square miles, which happens about half of the time. Either way, enjoy the ride!' No, thank you.”

I guess my point is, if Botox leads to dating, dating might lead to a relationship, which will possibly lead to a second marriage and its sixty-seven percent failure rate, and I simply
cannot
at this point. I can't. However, I'm encouraged by Jessica's two-word response, even if said response set me off on a whole mental tangent I'd prefer to forget. I appreciate progress in any form, so I continue trying to eke conversation out of her.