The Glass Wives (9 page)

Back in the dining room for another game of ring-around-the-table, Evie felt flushed and flummoxed. If there was a problem, Alan would have called, asked for clarification, told her he’d “run the numbers again.” That’s what money people do, and Alan was a money guy—a financial adviser, CPA, and a longtime instructor at the local community college. He and Beth were the couple with the answers, with words and solutions to live by—even for someone like Evie.

The clock on the sideboard ticked. The second hand hiccuped around the dial once, twice, three times. A knock at the door broke Evie’s trance.

Alan arrived alone with one small envelope in his hand. It reminded Evie of how the doctor walked into the private waiting room of Lakewood Hospital after she’d been waiting there for word, for hope, for someone to say it had all been a mistake about Richard. But it hadn’t been a mistake, and this wasn’t either. Alan was usually energetic, approaching with verve even a mundane task he could afford to pay someone else to do, like leaf-raking or snow-shoveling or car-washing. Today he stood straight and looked buttoned-up even though he wore a Northwestern sweatshirt.

They sat in the dining room, usually cordoned off for holiday meals, gift-wrapping marathons, and homework sessions. The facts were indisputable.

“I’m sorry,” Alan said. “I just never thought … we didn’t plan…”

“You really mean I can’t touch my own money?” Evie’s voice rose, then drained to a raspy whisper. She drummed her fingers on the papers in front of her. Her knee bounced frenetically under the table.

“It’s not that you can’t, you just shouldn’t. Really shouldn’t. If there is any possible way to avoid it.”

“There’s no way around the taxes and penalties? Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

The meticulous planning that had seemed so sensible now felt like a trap. With the massive hit Alan said she would take, her savings seemed like a mirage.

No. This was a time for action. For navigating around the rules that already existed. For making her own rules. Maybe Alan would make an exception for Evie, his wife’s best friend, and figure out a way around the rules. What a joke. Alan was a rules guy. But there had to be a way she could get the money she had saved for herself. Maybe she shouldn’t have made it about her. Maybe that money should always have been about the kids. No, that money was separate. Separate from savings bonds the kids were given at birth. Separate from the child support and the maintenance, meant to support them, the house, and their lives. The judge—and she and Richard—had agreed. She should put this money away for her future.

Except no one had imagined
this
future.

“I believe you,” Evie said, deflated. It was no one’s fault, although off-loading guilt sounded delightful at the moment. “I wanted the money away until I wasn’t getting support anymore, wasn’t even working part-time. That’s what I asked you to do and that’s what you did.”

Evie hadn’t considered the ramifications of paying taxes and penalties on her money if she needed or wanted it before she turned fifty-nine.
Why should she have?
Richard had been fit and healthy and arguably happy in his new life. Weren’t happy people supposed to live longer? So much for that theory.

Nicole’s suggestion that she and Luca move in with Evie and the twins poked at the back of her thoughts. The idea was ludicrous. Having her ex-husband’s widow (was there a word for that?) living in her house … Who would do that? Why would she do that? Evie knew why. She’d do it so that she could pay the bills while she figured things out. Could she cope with Nicole as a long-term houseguest? A boarder? A tenant? And what about Luca? Babies meant diapers, toys, gates, locked cabinets, and covered outlets. It would be inconvenient, absurd, and disruptive. But at this point, what wasn’t?

Alan had grown paler than usual. One sweat bead danced on his temple, and Evie wanted to offer him a napkin to sop it up, but instead she brought him iced tea and a plate of cookies. He touched neither. He hated bringing bad news, and Evie knew it. And that was also why Beth had stayed behind.

“I have to ask you, Evie, didn’t Richard have a life insurance policy? Shouldn’t that be enough to take care of the kids?”

“Yes, he did, but no, it’s for college. After that, it’ll help a little every month.” Evie’s jittering stopped and she slammed her hands on the table. “But Midwest Mutual is giving me the runaround. I have no idea why. I have no idea what’s wrong. And I have no idea when it will be over. Do you know why they would do that?”

Alan grimaced and shook his head. “If there’s a legal glitch—or any issues with the policy…”

“I know,” Evie whispered. Her knee started bouncing again.

“We can loan you some money until you figure out what’s going on,” Alan said.

Evie took Alan’s hands. She shook her head; her words crackled. “Thank you, but no.”

“How about your folks?”

Evie shook her head.

“Your sister?”

Lisa would help if Evie asked, but she wouldn’t ask. She shook her head again, out of words, out of ideas, almost out of hope—but that was not an option.

“I could move to a different house.” That’s what her parents and Lisa—and Laney and Beth—wanted anyway. “But I really don’t want the kids to go through any more changes.”

“In this housing market, I’m not sure it would do you any good to sell the house. And for what it’s worth, I think you’re right about the kids. They’ve had enough.” Alan’s unease dug lines around his eyes. He adored the twins and had stepped in many times after Richard had moved out, playing the role of “guy anxious to play catch with on a warm Monday evening” or “neighbor well versed in Thursday-night volcano construction.”

“Sorry, it’s none of my business.” But it was his business because he cared. Alan walked to the kitchen and Evie followed. “You do what you think you have to do.” He deposited his full plate on the counter and his glass in the sink, just as Beth would have. “Whatever you decide, your friends will support you, whether or not they like it.”

Evie wondered if he meant Beth, his wife, who seemed to understand everyone and everything to a fault—or if he meant the blunt, beloved, and unsinkable Laney Brown.

Walking behind Alan to the front door, Evie stopped. “You know, it’s not just about the kids. Why should I have to give this up? I love this house!”
There, I said it.
Was it stupid or just selfish of Evie to think things were going to fall into place when their lives had been blown out of a cannon like pieces of confetti?

Alan turned to Evie with a resigned smile as Beth showed up at the door for
her
shift of Evie-care.

“You okay?” Beth asked. Evie didn’t have to be okay around Beth, and that’s what made her such a good friend. Beth had expectations of herself—like being president of the school board for the four years Cody was at Lakewood High and folding cloth napkins in swans or tulips for a Tuesday luncheon—but she didn’t inflict those expectations on anyone else. Suggested, perhaps. Strongly suggested. But she always said
please
. “Please let me cook dinner for you and the kids tonight, please. I’ll bring it over later.”

Evie nodded. It would be nice to have something dropped off again, and it would be nice if it wasn’t made of sugar.

“You’ll figure it all out,” Beth said.

Evie sat at the desk, one step closer to paying the bills. Beth, in perpetual motion, swept the table and countertop with her hand, dusting any crumbs into the sink and rinsing them away, and then she started opening the cabinets, the fridge, the freezer.

“There has to be a way for you to have more income while you look for a job, get the kids settled back into school, and sort through the mess. Maybe even a way for you to have help with the twins and give you a break. Everyone can use a break sometimes. You know, just a
temporary
solution.” Beth was about as subtle as a rocket launch. Evie was silent. She had not mentioned Nicole’s ludicrous proposal. She had thought about it, but she hadn’t mentioned it. Somewhere in Lakewood, Laney’s eyes were twitching, her best-friend radar picking up what Beth was suggesting. What Evie was considering.

“Oh, and I’m going to the grocery store, so I’ll bring a few things by later. You said the kids are going back to school Monday, so I’ll get special treats for their lunches.” Beth reached into her pocket and pulled out her smartphone. “Let’s make a list of everything you need.”

Evie knew what she needed, and Beth wouldn’t find her at the grocery store.

Chapter 6

T
HE BASEMENT WAS DUSTED, VACUUMED,
and rearranged. It looked as comfortable as any studio apartment, but was much better equipped than the one Evie had lived in with Richard during grad school. There was cable TV
and
a coffeemaker.

The bathroom sparkled. Evie had emptied the medicine cabinet. Towels were stacked on the vanity. They weren’t new towels, they weren’t matching towels, but they were hole-free, clean, and folded towels. The sheets and pillowcases Evie washed that morning did match, purchased for the sofa-bed guests who rarely visited. The linens filled one shelf in the narrow bathroom closet. Toilet paper and cleaning supplies took up space on another. A new plunger rested diagonally on the floor. Everyone deserved a new plunger.

Evie walked into the center of the large, windowless room for a final check. She picked up the sofa cushions, pounded them into fluffy rectangles, and repositioned them. She crouched, looked under her nineties, tufted, cabbage-rose, pullout couch and discovered one dog-hair tumbleweed that had escaped the vacuum’s wrath. She grabbed the fuzz ball and surveyed the floor one more time. The solid-oak dresser, the one Evie had refinished before the twins were born, stood in one corner across from a white, up-to-code, wooden crib. Sam’s and Sophie’s DVDs and board games were stacked in another corner, half-hidden by a twenty-five-year-old minifridge. Evie had stocked it with soda and apple juice.

Beth had given her the names of baby-safe cleaning products and bought a few of the latest baby-proofing items. Laney said Evie was crazy, cleaning for Nicole, but helped her anyway. Evie wanted to present her home in the best light possible, even if that light was fluorescent tube bulbs in a drop ceiling. Evie succumbed to the ease and lure of looking frumpy, but she would never abandon her house to the same fate. This had been her home—in one familial configuration or another—for a dozen years. She knew that no matter who lived there, or didn’t, this house was filled with vestiges of her past and dreams for her future.

Evie clung to both to save her own life.

*   *   *

Nicole held the banister and peeked down from the fourth step.

“Oh my God, it looks amazing.” She looked around the basement, mouth open. “It doesn’t look like the same room.” She sank into the couch. “Reminds me of my first apartment back home. So cozy, so
lived in
.”

Was it a compliment, or was Nicole expecting Ethan Allen to have made a delivery? Evie sat, leaving one cushion between them. She crossed her legs, leaned back, and admired her handiwork. “Thanks. I’m glad you like it. Amazing what packing up ten years of toys will do.”

“What’s the occasion?”

Evie smiled. “I have been thinking about your idea.”
No turning back now.
“And if you’d like to move in here with Luca, just until we’re both on our feet, I think that would be okay.”

“Really?” Nicole’s face expanded with a broad smile. “What made you change your mind?”

“I figure it’s a win-win.”

“I was right, wasn’t I? You can’t pay your bills.” Nicole looked at her lap. “You don’t want me to move in, do you? You
need
me to move in.”

Evie noticed a smirk but decided to ignore it. “It’s a combination.” It was 99 percent need, but that 1 percent still constituted a combination.

“That’s okay. I like being needed. And I like honesty.”

The irony choked Evie.

Nicole smiled and put her hand on Evie’s hand. It was an unfamiliar touch, somewhat unwelcome. Evie stopped herself from recoiling.
I can pay the bills, I can pay the bills, I can pay the bills, until I find a job or the insurance comes through, or both.
So, if Nicole wanted to play house, Evie would play house.

“What do you think Richard would say?” Nicole said, fingering her wedding band.

Evie had long stopped caring what Richard thought or said about anything she did. But for Sam’s and Sophie’s sakes, she pondered. “I guess he’d be glad his kids are together.”

Nicole rocked in silence. Her mouth frowned, her eyelids drooped as if she were dozing, and she continued playing with the ring, drumming it, twirling it, feeling it. “It’s good, isn’t it?” she said, perking up, then reverting back to stoic. “Making the best of a bad situation is good, right?”

“I think it’s practical. And practical is good. For now.”

*   *   *

That night, with just the kids and herself upstairs in their bedrooms, Evie felt safe, at ease, content. The money from Nicole offered her a short respite from worrying.

“I don’t feel good,” Sophie said at Evie’s bedroom door.

A short respite, indeed.

Evie hug-walked Sophie back to her room. Evie smoothed the curls out of Sophie’s face and felt her daughter’s forehead with her lips and a subsequent kiss. Cool. She drew back the blanket, and Sophie scampered beneath it.

“You’re fine, sweetie. Probably just extra-tired. It was an exciting day.” Change prompted sleeplessness and stomach pains in Sophie. As a baby, she needed her solid foods introduced at half the pace of Sam. Richard insisted they take Sophie to the pediatrician, convinced the cranky nights, baby belching, and explosive diapers were a result of trendy food allergies. The doctor said no, she was just sensitive to changes in her diet. When they heeded his word, Sophie ended up with a bigger repertoire of foods on her “will eat” list than Sam, only it took them months to find that out. The divorce did the same thing to Sophie—she couldn’t sleep and walked around during the day complaining of stomachaches. The stomachaches were real, but never accompanied by a virus or fever. Postdivorce visits to a therapist gave her an outlet for her feelings, but didn’t diminish the physical effects. Just as when Sophie was a baby, what she needed was time.