If You Lived Here, You'd Be Home Now (17 page)

I jumped out of bed and looked down to see if I was decent. I had slept in sweatpants, so that was fine. I grabbed the sweater
I had been wearing the night before and threw it over my tank top to hide the fact that I wasn’t wearing a bra. I shoved my
feet into a pair of old Crocs that technically belonged to my mother, who used them for gardening, but that I stole from her
whenever mine went missing—which happened a lot.

I took a deep breath and turned to Noah. “Okay, I’m ready. Where is he?”

“I don’t know. Outside somewhere. Come on, Mom! Hurry, before he leaves!”

“You mean you didn’t let him inside?” I ran toward the doorway and he followed close behind.

“You always say I’m not allowed to let anyone in unless an adult is around.”

“I know, but—” I cut myself off. He was right. “Where are Grandpa and Grandma?”

“They went out somewhere. Aunt Mel too.”

“Shoot.” I raced down the stairs and over to the front door, which Noah had carefully closed, leaving Coach Andrew stranded
on the porch. Eleanor Roosevelt was standing sentinel in front of the door, barking at odd intervals, clearly trying to figure
out why this person wasn’t either coming in or going away.

I kneed her aside and flung the door open. Andrew looked at me quizzically. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I overslept.”

“Is it too early?” he asked. “Should I come back?” The guy was apparently a morning person: his eyes were bright and he was
freshly shaved and he smelled all clean and showered. Unlike me. I probably still had sand in my eyes.

I stepped back to let him in. “No, no, it’s fine. I should have set my alarm. I was up kind of late.”

“Doing something fun, I hope.” He came inside, his big net bag of balls and cones and stuff slung over his shoulder Santa-style.

“Baking cupcakes, actually.”

He winced. “Oh, man, I was just joking about those! You didn’t really need to make them. And you
really
didn’t need to stay up late to make them.”

“Well, I did. So what’s the plan? Baseball first? Football? Curling?”

“Maybe we should start by getting Noah dressed to go outside?”

That was when I realized that Noah was still in those embarrassingly too-small pajamas. I’d been in such a rush I hadn’t even
noticed. “Run upstairs, Noah, and put on some sweatpants and a T-shirt—and a sweatshirt too. It looks cold out.”

“It’s beautiful,” Andrew said. “Gracie and I went running this morning up in the hills. It’s one of those perfect days.”

“Too bad we get so few of those here in LA,” I said. “Only about every twenty-four hours or so. You guys go running together
a lot?”

“As often as we can. I can barely keep up with her, though.”

I realized Noah was still hovering and pointed up the stairs. “Come on, Noah—go get changed.”

Noah ignored me and said in a trembling voice to Andrew, “Why are you here to play with me? Is it because I’m such a loser
at sports? Did Dr. Wilson say you had to do this or he’d kick me out of school?”

Andrew put his net bag down on the floor then squatted down so he could look Noah right in the eyes. “Of course not,” he said
firmly. “This is totally my idea. I just thought we’d have fun playing some games together and then you’d have some new skills
to show off in PE. What do you think?”

“I don’t know,” Noah said. “I’m not sure I want to do this.”

“Tell you what.” Andrew gave him a friendly arm pat as he rose to his feet. “You go up and get changed and then we’ll head
outside and throw the ball around and play some games—whatever sounds like fun to you. If it’s the most
miserable experience of your life, tell your mom and she’ll let me know I shouldn’t come again.” He gave me a slightly evil
grin. “Knowing
her
, she’ll be happy to tell me I failed.” He returned his attention to Noah. “But if it’s kind of sort of a little bit fun,
then maybe we’ll keep doing it. Does that sound fair to you?”

Noah nodded slowly. “Only I’ll tell you if I don’t like it, not Mom. She never listens to anything I say.”

“Noah!” I protested.

Andrew laughed. “Women are like that, Noah. Get used to it.”

“Just go get dressed, will you?” I said. Noah finally turned and headed up the stairs, slowly dragging his feet to let us
know he still wasn’t sure about this whole thing.

“So…” Andrew said after we’d watched Noah disappear and the silence was starting to grow awkward. “How’s your weekend going?
You have fun at that party last weekend?”

“Yeah, actually. There were some nice moms there.”

He nodded. “It was a good group.”

“Maria Dellaventura kind of fascinates me. When I first met her, I thought she was a total Stepford Wife. But she’s nicer
and more interesting than she looks.”

“There are a lot of moms like that at Fenwick. You look at them and think they’re everything that’s wrong with the Westside
of LA—and then you talk to them and they’re actually incredibly nice. Of course, there
are
a few—” He stopped then said, “Wish we teachers were allowed to vote one or two off the island, if you know what I mean.”

“Good thing for me you can’t. I’d probably make the list.”

“Nah. Maybe a few weeks ago. Not now.”

I felt oddly pleased. And a little hurt. “So who
would
you vote off?”

He shook his head. “No way I’m telling. Not without being drunk. And Dr. Wilson would have to be in another country. He’s
like a dolphin—he can hear everything, even from miles away.”

“Do dolphins have good hearing?”

“I think so. I saw a special about it once. On PBS.”

“How very educational of you,” I said.

Noah came clattering back down the stairs. “I guess I’m ready,” he said. He was wearing sweatpants that Cameron had outgrown
and handed down to Noah, even though Noah was older. He was also still wearing his pajama top and had forgotten all about
a sweatshirt. No wonder it hadn’t taken him long to get dressed. I decided I didn’t care enough about the sweatshirt to make
an issue of it. He might get cold, but it was Southern California. He’d live.

“All right, then,” Andrew said, hoisting his bag of equipment back up on his shoulder. “Let’s check out this so-called backyard
of yours.”

I glanced out the window every now and then to see how it was going. They looked like they were having fun. Andrew pitched
balls to Noah, who would either catch them or hit them with a bat—the game varied from time to time. Every once in a while
he would hurl himself at Andrew, who would grab him and spin him around. You could hear Noah’s shrieks of laughter even through
the closed window.

Melanie and Mom came home while they were still outside. “What’s going on out there?” Mom asked, looking out the kitchen window.
“Who’s that guy?”

I had finished frosting the cupcakes and was passing the time instant-messaging a couple of friends on my laptop. I wrote
a quick “gtg” to them both, closed the computer, and
explained how Andrew had come to be at our house. “It was his idea. But Noah may refuse to let him come again.”

“I think you should insist on it,” Mom said. “This is just what he needs. And I’m happy to pay for it.” Her enthusiasm made
me wonder how awful an athlete she thought Noah was.

I said, “Actually, Andrew’s not charging us for this. He said just to bake him cupcakes.”

She frowned. “That’s not right. He should be paid for his services.”

“He said he didn’t want us to pay him.”

“I’ll talk to him.”

“No, don’t,” I said. “Stay out of it.”

She briefly pressed her lips together, annoyed. “You should have insisted on it right from the start.”

“I did,” I said. “That’s what you don’t understand. I
did
insist and he said no. So get off my back about it, okay? He’s a grown man. No one’s making him do this.”

My mother made an irritable noise and left the room.

Melanie was looking at me.

“What?” I growled.

“Can’t you be a little more patient with her?”

“Oh, for god’s sake!” I said and reopened my laptop to let her know that the discussion was over.

The boys came in a few minutes later, and I stood up to greet them. “You all done?”

“Water break,” Andrew said. “But we probably won’t go on too much longer.”

“I’m
really
tired,” Noah said. But he looked happy.

“Anyone want a cupcake?” I asked. “They’re all frosted now.”

“Those look great,” Andrew said. He and Noah each grabbed one.

Melanie had left the kitchen earlier, but now she came
running back in to greet Andrew. She welcomed him with an enthusiastic hug.

I wondered if that’s what mothers were supposed to do: give the PE coach a hug when they saw him away from school. That seemed
weird to me. I tried to imagine giving Andrew a casual hug and the thought made me squirm. “I wish Nicole and Cameron were
here to see you,” Mel told him. “They’d be so excited.”

“You should have them come next time,” he said. “I could use more kids.”

“Really? It wouldn’t be more work for you?”

“It would be great—we could play a lot more games.” He carefully peeled the paper liner off the cupcake. “Actually,” he said
to me, “I meant to tell you to invite some of Noah’s friends to join us, for just that reason.”

I checked to make sure Noah wasn’t listening. He had wandered over to the corner of the room, where he was idly leaning against
Eleanor Roosevelt’s broad back while eating his cupcake. “Don’t hold your breath,” I said in a low voice to Andrew. “We’re
not so strong in the friends department.”

He considered that for a moment, then said, “I noticed he was really hitting it off with Joshua at Austin’s party. They’re
very similar kids.”

“Right,” I said. “You can tell because they get beaten up by the same bullies.”

“Stop that. No one’s getting beaten up at our school.”

“I meant metaphorically.”

“What’s a metaphorical beating?”

“You know.”

“Do I?” He bit into the cupcake. “This is good,” he said through a mouthful of cake. “Even better than the other ones were.”

“Can I have another one?” Noah asked, coming back over to us and handing me the paper liner from his first one.

I looked at the frosting smeared around his mouth and said, “You’re covered in—” I stopped and gasped. “Oh, my god, Noah!”

“What?” He stared at me. They all stared at me.

“These aren’t gluten free! I totally forgot! I had to use one of the store mixes last night. It was so late and I couldn’t
find a GF one… Did you eat that whole cupcake?”

He nodded. His lip trembled. “I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I can’t believe I did that. Oh, Noah, I’m so sorry!”

“I don’t feel very well,” he said in a little voice and clutched his stomach.

“And thus endeth the baseball practice,” Andrew said as I re-entered the kitchen fifteen minutes later. “How’s he doing?”

“Much better. Lying down.” I didn’t feel like going into detail about how many times Noah had vomited before feeling better.
I slumped into a chair at the kitchen table across from Andrew. Melanie was pouring coffee at the counter. “I suck at being
a mother,” I said.

Mel came over with a couple of mugs and put one down in front of each of us. “It’s not your fault.”

“What are you talking about? I baked the cupcakes and served them to him. In what possible universe would that not be my fault?”

“You didn’t
mean
to do it. It was an accident.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Much as I’ve been tempted at times, I have never deliberately poisoned Noah. I only do it accidentally.”

“He’ll be fine.” Mel poured a mug of coffee for herself and joined us at the table.

“I know. That’s not the point.” I turned to Andrew. “Sorry about all this. I’m guessing this wasn’t exactly the way you wanted
the lesson to end.”

“Yeah, I prefer the kids to
sprain
something. Anyway, I think this is actually my fault. I asked you to make those cupcakes in the first place.”

“You’re right,” I said. “It is all your fault. You’ve had it in for Noah from the start.”

He cocked his head at me. “Just to be sure, you’re joking, right? I mean, you don’t still really think I’m out to get him,
do you?”

“I don’t know. It’s not like you’ve ever done anything nice for him, like coach him privately or anything.”

“Rickie isn’t good at expressing gratitude,” Melanie said to Andrew.

“That’s so not true,” I said. “But thanks for pointing it out. See how I did that?”

She ignored that. “Can you believe Thanksgiving is coming up so soon?” she asked, cradling her mug in both hands. “Do you
have any special plans, Andrew? Are you going away?”

He shook his head. “Normally I go home, but my parents decided to visit my sister this year. She moved to Canada and had a
baby.”

“What a jerk,” I said.

“Exactly. She couldn’t have had a baby in LA? Plenty of people do.”

I gestured to myself and Mel. “We did.”

“Right. So then Gracie said I should join her and her family, but they’re going on a Mexican Riviera cruise for the whole
week. I don’t have Monday and Tuesday off, and anyway”—he made a face—“Thanksgiving on a cruise? Doesn’t that sound depressing?”

We were agreeing with him when the garage door banged open and my mother entered the kitchen with Eleanor Roosevelt. “We came
back early from our walk,” Mom said as she unhooked the leash. “Someone was more interested in chasing squirrels than walking
nicely.”

“I thought we’d cured you of that, Mom,” I said.

“Very funny.”

Andrew held his hand out toward the dog. “Come here, you beauty.” He whistled and Eleanor Roosevelt came bounding over. He
caressed her ears and scratched down her back. “You’re a good girl, aren’t you? Yes, you are. Yes, you are.”

“She’s not
that
good,” I said.

“Oh, yes, she is,” he crooned, tugging gently on her ears. She half-closed her eyes, totally blissed out. “Oh, yes, she is.”

Melanie jumped up suddenly from her seat. “There’s more coffee, Laurel. Here, I’ll help you.” She pulled my mother over to
the counter. They started whispering. I wondered what they were conspiring about now.