The Drowning Girls (2 page)

“My oldest must be about the age of your daughter,” Carly continued. “Hannah. She’s fifteen.”

I smiled. “Danielle’s fourteen. Just starting high school. Where does Hannah go?”

Carly blinked. “Oh, no. She’s homeschooled. We won’t even
dream
of it anymore, with the state of public education—”

Myriam steered me away, her grip insistent. This was her task as a hostess, I realized, an obligation she was determined to fulfill so she could be done with me.

I recognized Trevor and Marja Browers as the couple who walked past my house each morning at sunrise, their two white heads bobbing in sync, their hands raised in benevolent hellos. I’d come to think of them as the grandparents of the community. Trevor was a laser specialist, officially retired from Lawrence-Livermore Labs, although he still consulted part-time. “He has
top-level
security clearance,” Myriam said. “And Marja,
dear
Marja...”

“It’s very secluded here,
ja
?” Marja asked, her Dutch accent strong. Her face was soft and friendly, accented with a slash of red lipstick.

I stopped myself, but only barely, from agreeing with a
ja
in return.

She smiled, revealing teeth that were charmingly crooked. “Sometimes too secluded, if you know what I mean?”

I did.

Oh, I did.

We were only a few feet away when Myriam whispered, “We call those
socialist teeth
,” with a wicked laugh at her own joke. I realized it was the same laugh she would utter when I left.
We call those sales-rack shoes
.

I decided right there that I hated her—that I hated all of them—as we worked our way through the room: the Roche-Edwardses, the Navarres, the Coffeys. They blended together, along with their details: the Mediterranean with the blue mosaic inlay, the husband in finance, the daughter who had been homecoming queen. I nodded along, my feet aching in my heels. Was it too early to leave, to grab Phil’s arm and make a run for it, claiming exhaustion or food poisoning or cramps? When I got home, I promised myself, I would toss these sandals into the depths of our walk-in closet, which was large enough to guarantee I wouldn’t have to see them again, ever. I would avoid all other parties, all fund-raisers and wine-and-cheese pairings. Where was the cheese, anyway? It was a horrible trick of advertising.

Victor passed, touching my shoulder. “Are you having a good time?”

In a mirror over the fireplace, I saw my own wine-stained smile reflected back at me.

Myriam pointed out Janet Neimeyer, who was anywhere between forty and sixty, her body toned and deeply tanned next to her white dress, skin stretched tight across her cheekbones. “She got the house in the divorce settlement,” Myriam said casually. “She likes her men, but if she settles down, she’ll have to kiss this place goodbye.”

“Oh,” I said, not sure how I was supposed to react. I looked mournfully at the half inch of wine in my glass, wondering where the rest had gone.

“And that’s Helen Zhang,” Myriam continued. I sorted through my mental file, remembering that Helen and her husband were both dermatologists, parents of twin boys. Helen had short, almost boyish hair that somehow framed her face perfectly.

“Oh, sure. I’ve seen her walking a dog around the neighborhood.”

“Yes,” Myriam said, her mouth tight. “Isn’t he the most
darling
thing?”

Too late, I remembered something else Phil had told me—that the Mesbahs had filed various complaints against the Zhangs, whose darling dog had a tendency to bark at inconvenient hours.

And then there was Daisy Asbill, former Google employee turned wife of a Google executive. She was young and slim-hipped in a gray silk dress. “Does your daughter babysit?” she asked me. “I’ve got twins, and sometimes it’s about impossible to find someone...”

I hedged, recalling that Danielle’s sole babysitting effort for a neighbor down the street in Livermore had been a semidisaster.

“Oh, I don’t mean all the time,” Daisy qualified, sensing my hesitation. “Only when the nanny has the day off.”

“Of course,” I said, savoring this one:
only when the nanny has the day off
. Allie would get a kick out of that.

Over and over I said
It’s so nice to meet you
and
We’re loving it out here
and took miniscule sips of cabernet, trying to make it last as long as possible. My mouth ached from incessant smiling. At one point, Helen asked if Myriam’s closet was finished, and half the crowd trooped down the hallway to see the improvements. I spotted Phil next to Rich Sievert, a fresh glass in his hand. He smiled at me, and I took a relieved step toward him.

“Oh,
here
they are,” Deanna called, stepping between us. At the front door, Victor was fussing over another couple, so tall and blond and perfectly paired, they might have been a set of Barbies.

“So sorry we’re late,” the woman said, giving cheek kisses as she moved through the entryway. Her hair was so blond it was almost colorless, her eyes a piercing blue. As she came closer, I realized that she was an older version of a girl I’d seen walking through the neighborhood, her head bent, thumbs tapping the screen of her cell phone. “Oh, hello.” She smiled at me. “I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Sonia Jorgensen.”

“Liz McGinnis,” I said, shifting my glass so we could shake hands. Sonia’s nails were pale silver, her skin buttery soft.

“Liz’s husband is the one with the yummy British accent,” Deanna put in, suddenly at my side.

“Australian,” I corrected.

“Don’t you just love British accents? It’s like those episodes of, what’s it called? On Netflix?” Deanna wrinkled her nose, thinking. “Oh!
Downton Abbey
!”

Sonia Jorgensen smiled at me, the sort of smile that made us coconspirators.
Isn’t she ridiculous?
She half turned toward me, her shoulders subtly angling Deanna out of the conversation. “We’re your neighbors right around the corner, I think. The two-story Grecian—”

“Oh, with the columns,” I said. When we’d first passed the house, Danielle had gaped. “Who lives
there
?” And I’d answered, “A dead president.”

“Yes! Tim—that’s my husband—said he wasn’t sure about them, but when I saw the designs, I just
knew
.”

“It’s a beautiful house.”

“Sonia’s a party planner,” Deanna said, edging back into the conversation. “She flies all over the world, just putting on parties. Can you imagine?”

“Corporate events, mostly,” Sonia explained. “I try to stay as far from weddings as possible.”

Deanna shook her head. “I’m so jealous it makes me sick. I try to get Rich to go somewhere, and he looks at me like I’ve got three heads.”

Sonia looked at her pointedly. “You just got back from Hawaii.”

“Right, but it was just Hawaii. We go there all the time,” Deanna pouted. Her effusiveness was both familiar and uncomfortable—a slightly more polished version of a high school student. “You’ve been to— Where did you just get back from?”

“Corpus Christi,” Sonia said. “Hardly exotic.”

“Still,” Deanna whined.

Sonia turned to me, her eyes crinkling in a smile. “Liz. Is that short for Elizabeth?”

There was something engaging about her, something that made me lower my guard, my mouth relaxing into its first genuine smile of the night. “No, just Liz. I always wanted to be an Elizabeth, though. I used to sign my name that way on my papers in elementary school.”

Sonia’s laugh showed teeth so straight and white, they might have belonged to a dental hygienist. “What did your parents think about that?”

“Oh, you know, typical kid stuff.” I took a careful sip of wine. Of course she didn’t know; it wasn’t the sort of situation a person could guess. My mom was fully blind by the time I was in elementary school, so she never saw my name on any work sheets or permission slips or report cards. And my dad wouldn’t have noticed—he was too busy seeing everything else.
Elizabeth
had been my own private rebellion.

“So,
Liz
, then. What do you do?”

I finished the last drop of wine in my glass. Funny—but after all the introductions tonight, Sonia was the first person to ask about me. “I’m a high school counselor,” I said. “Miles Landers High School, in Livermore.”

Sonia’s eyes widened, and I braced myself for the cocked head, the subtle up-and-down assessment. Was she calculating my salary, my overall net worth? Was she recalling the sudden appearance of my seven-year-old Camry in the neighborhood, remembering that most of our clothes had been packed in black plastic garbage bags, toted from my trunk to the house? But she surprised me by grabbing my arm. “Oh, my God. That’s wonderful.”

“Well...”
Wonderful
was overstating it a bit, although I did love my job. In seven years, I’d never had the same day twice. “This year will be interesting, because my daughter will be there, too. She’s going to be a freshman.”

“Oh, this is fantastic. You don’t understand... My daughter, Kelsey, is starting there in the fall. She’ll be a sophomore. She used to go to Ashbury Prep, but...well, that’s a story for another time. It turns out those other kids were such bad influences. But this is such a fantastic coincidence. It’ll be so nice for Kelsey to have some friendly faces at Miles Landers, not to mention another responsible adult in her life.”

Her touch was warm, as if we’d known each other for years. I recognized it as the
mom
connection
, a bond that had always been elusive for me. I’d been a single mom for most of Danielle’s life, those early years spent shuttling between her day care and my internships, and later between the carpool lane at her elementary school and the counseling office. There had never been time to get to know the other moms, and I’d envied their chummy closeness at back-to-school nights and honor-roll assemblies.

“That will be nice,” I agreed, allowing myself to get sucked into the moment. Of course, there was no guarantee that our daughters would be friends. Danielle spent most of her days with her nose in a book. Kelsey, from what I’d observed, was years ahead of her socially. I remembered her walking past in her microshorts and tank tops, her bra straps winking like a dirty secret.

“So, would it be weird...” Sonia began. “I’m just thinking out loud here, and you can feel free to say no. But maybe we could plan some kind of get-together for them?”

I grinned. “Like...a playdate?”

Sonia laughed. “Well—I don’t know. Is that silly? It could just be a little thing. I’d be happy to host.”

Deanna returned, as if she’d been listening in from just over my shoulder. “What a great idea! We could invite all the teenagers at The Palms. Let’s see—there’s Mac, the Zhang boys, Hannah Bergland...”

Sonia’s gaze crossed mine, tolerant and amused. How did she do it? How did she keep her composure, keep herself from laughing or rolling her eyes? Pay attention, I ordered myself, as if I were watching for clues on how to be a woman, on what to wear, on when to speak.

“Are you sure Mac would be interested?” she asked.

Deanna rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. He just hangs around the house all day doing nothing, driving me insane.”

And then I made the connection between the driver of the massive yellow truck and the name I’d heard often enough at school over the past three years. Mac Sievert, the chronic underachiever; Mac Sievert, the big man on campus. “I just realized Mac goes to Miles Landers. He’s a senior?”

Deanna laughed, taking an exaggerated sip of her wine. “Oh, poor you. I was waiting for you to figure that out. Just remember, when he fails Econ, the phone call goes to his dad, not to me. One of the benefits of being the stepmother,” she added with a wink.

“Noted,” I said.

“This is a great idea,” Deanna gushed. “I’ll go tell Helen.”

We watched her walk away, heels clacking on the hardwood.

Sonia cleared her throat. “Well, I guess I’m hosting the neighborhood. What about Saturday night? Would that work with Danielle’s schedule?”

“She gets back from science camp tomorrow, so—I’m sure that’s fine.”

Sonia mock-swooned, latching onto my sleeve. I was sure this was the most my arm had been touched, ever, and I had a blind mother. “
Science camp.
I love it. Hang on to that phase while you can. Kelsey’s into boys and clothes and drama. Fifteen going on thirty.”

I smiled. Danielle hadn’t yet discovered those things, but I knew it was coming. At the beginning of her eighth grade year, I’d had to hide her favorite pair of camo pants, purchased from the army surplus store, when she insisted on wearing them three days in a row. But for her graduation last month, we’d spent hours combing the mall for a dress. I commented, “Sometimes I think Danielle is still fourteen going on twelve.”

Victor breezed past, swapping out my empty glass for a full one, and Sonia and I smiled at each other. Wordlessly, we touched our glasses together, and they produced an inharmonious
clink
.

There was a burst of chatter as Myriam and the rest of the women filed back into the room, having exhausted the virtues of the remodeled closet. Janet Neimeyer just couldn’t get over the lighting; Helen Zhang was noting the name of the contractor.

I felt a hand on my back, a warm hand, the thumb running over the ridge of my spine. I glanced over my shoulder and Phil gave me a happy, sloppy grin, his cheeks flushed.

* * *

Halfway home, I propped myself against Phil and wiggled out of my shoes, not able to tolerate them for another step. I tipped to one side, laughing, and he caught me. Were the neighbors watching from their windows, behind their custom drapes, the slats of their plantation blinds? Somehow it didn’t matter as much anymore.

“So we survived,” Phil said. “It wasn’t the horror show we imagined.”

“I suppose it could have been worse.”

He pulled me close and I leaned against him, warm and light-headed. His breath smelled like the wine Victor had foisted on us, refilling our glasses until I’d lost count.