The Guest Cottage (2 page)

Zack gave Sophie a pleading look. “She makes me feel young again.”

Sophie nodded. “I can understand that.” After a moment, she said, “I don’t want the children hurt.”

“Christ, Sophie, do you think I do?”

No, Sophie thought, Zack wouldn’t want to hurt the children. On the other hand, he never thought of his children unless she prompted him. He had never been a natural family man. She took a deep breath, gathering herself. If Zack was the hunter, Sophie was the mother lion, shielding her cubs. Protecting the family.

This was humiliating, but maybe the right thing to do.

Sophie forced a pleasant tone. “I was planning to discuss this with you—Susie Swenson called yesterday. An old friend of mine from college. She has a summer home on Nantucket she wants to rent out for July and August. They call it the guest cottage, because the main house was next door, but they’ve sold that off and subdivided the land. Whatever, this place sounds like a mansion: six bedrooms, three baths, everything furnished from linens to lobster crackers. I thought it might be good for you and me—and the kids, of course, but especially for you and me. We could walk on the beach. Drink margaritas. Get in touch with each other again.” She watched her husband as she spoke. His eyes did not light up; his face did not brighten.

“How much?” Zack asked, avoiding her eyes.

She named a sum and Zack snorted. “Nantucket.” He shook his head. “No. No, I’m not paying that kind of money.”

“Do you
want
to go?” She reached across and touched his arm. “Would you like to try again?”

He patted her hand, as if it were the morose muzzle of a clingy old dog, and drew away. “No. And I don’t think it’s fair for you to expect me to spend that much for you and the kids. You and the kids can stay in the house. I’ll move in with Lila.”

“For how long?”

“Well, for good. Now that we’ve gotten it out in the open, I think we should proceed. First, a separation. I’ll move in with Lila while you and I make the arrangements for the divorce.” She observed his eagerness. He was ready to jump out of the chair and leave the house this very moment.

“No, Zack, wait. Give us some time. We’re a
family.
Maybe—things—will
change.” The idea of the house on Nantucket shimmered like a beacon in the dark confusion of her marriage. She’d been dreaming about it ever since Susie called. She wanted this. She
needed
this. “I’m going to take the kids to Nantucket for July and August.”

Zack bridled. “Where are you going to get the money for that kind of rent?”

Sophie smiled. It was the first time she’d smiled during this conversation. “Aunt Fancy,” she said.

Aunt Fancy’s motto had been: “If I’ve gotta go down, I’m gonna go down in style.” She used the last of her inheritance to buy a new wardrobe and have her hair colored red when her husband left her in 1970 when she was just twenty-four. These changes promptly attracted the attention of Fred Lattimer, a wealthy divorced man twelve years older, who wooed Fancy, married her, and gave her the four children for whom she’d been longing.

Sophie had always admired Aunt Fancy, who lived with so much more flair and gusto than Sophie’s own mother, Hester. Hester’s idea of dressing up was putting on her white coat and stethoscope. Hester could save lives in the emergency room, but she had no sympathy for malingerers. If you wanted a bit of wickedness and fun, you went to Aunt Fancy. For Band-Aids and a healthy meal, you went to Sophie’s mom.

Sophie wished she could now run to Aunt Fancy, who’d probably suggest they go out to a bar together and pick up some men. “If the horse throws you, climb right back on” was another motto of Aunt Fancy’s. She had a lot of mottos.

Fabulous Aunt Fancy had died on her sixtieth birthday while parachuting from an airplane. On the up side, it was exactly the way Fancy Lattimer would have liked to go. But Sophie had counted on her aunt having a long life, serving as a role model and a playmate for Sophie as she got older.

In her will, Aunt Fancy left most of her money—and there was a lot of it—to her four children. But she also left a nice big chunk of money for Sophie to use for what Aunt Fancy called “mad money.”

When Sophie started dating, or what passed for dating at age fifteen, her mother sat her down to discuss birth control. Aunt Fancy had given her a pretty quilted coin purse with a flower-shaped clasp. Inside were tucked two ten-dollar bills.

“When I was growing up,” Aunt Fancy told Sophie, “my mother made certain I carried mad money. All the girls carried mad money, which came in handy if some guy had us out in a car and thought he had us trapped, or if he got fresh during a movie and tried to put his hand up our dress. We always had money for a taxi and a way home back then. It gave us independence.”

Mad money.
Sophie was certainly mad at Zack. She was also mad in
general—demented,
flustered, heartbroken, mentally blitzed,
psychologically
wacko. Sophie had always been a cautious person, a good girl. The idea of spending her inheritance to rent a house, sight unseen, on Nantucket, a resort island she had only visited on day trips, was downright
epic
for her.

“I’m going to do it,” Sophie said aloud, to herself as much as to Zack. She left him standing in his office and went off to find her cell before she changed her mind. She phoned Susie.

“Susie, I want the house.”

“Really?” Susie squeaked with surprise. She hesitated. “Look. I have to be honest with you. One of the reasons I don’t want to go through a rental agent is that they will take a big chunk of money for a commission. This year I need all the money I can get, and I don’t want to share it with my spendthrift cousin Ivan. But we can talk about that another time. Another reason I’d like to do this privately is that not many people would rent a place with a family member stuck in the apartment attached to the house.”

“A family member,” Sophie repeated.

“It’s my grandfather, but not the one who bought the property on Nantucket. The other one, Connor Swenson. He moved in this winter after our grandmother died. He’s a nice old guy, perfectly harmless, I promise, but he’s kind of let himself go in his grief. Plus, he was a farmer in Iowa and he totally doesn’t get the whole island thing. I’ve been out to visit him a lot, but he pretty much keeps to himself. He’s not crazy, I swear on my life,” Suzy continued, “but he’s sad and perhaps a bit confused. He’s sort of holed up in the apartment. I can’t ask him to move out.”

“Do you want us to do anything to help him?” asked Sophie. “Buy him groceries, drive him to the library, that sort of thing?”

“Not at all. He brought his old pickup truck. He buys his own groceries, cooks his own food, and as far as I can tell, spends his time watching television, doing jigsaw puzzles, and whittling.”

“Whistling?”

“
Whittling.
You know, carving.”

“I didn’t know people still whittled. Does he whistle while he whittles?” Sophie’s mind was all over the place; she was light-headed with excitement.

“So you don’t mind if he’s hanging out back there?” Susie asked.

“I don’t see why,” Sophie said.

Sophie and Susie were friends, so there was no need for any kind of legal contract. Sophie agreed to send Susie a check and Susie said she’d send Sophie the keys and a map to the house.

Aunt Fancy would have approved.

A
s Trevor Black sat in the waiting room, his knee jiggled up and down with anxiety. Was he doing the right thing, talking to a child psychologist about his four-year-old son? In a way, he felt he was betraying Leo; he knew at Leo’s preschool the teachers told the children not to “tattle.” But Trevor was a parent, the only parent, and he was concerned.

Before Trevor could change his mind, the receptionist showed him into Dr. Warren’s office. Dr. Warren rose to shake his hand. A pleasant older man, he wore a suit but no tie, which oddly made Trevor feel more comfortable, less
judged.
Trevor ran his computer business from his home and only wore suits when he had face meetings with certain clients.

The therapist gestured to a chair. “How may I help you?”

“It’s about my son,” Trevor said, and all at once he was on the verge of tears. “Leo. Leo is four. He’s a really good little guy. But his mother, my wife, Tallulah…” Trevor took a deep breath. “She died in November.”

“I’m so sorry. Was she ill?”

Trevor hesitated. “It’s all confidential here, right?”

“Of course.”

“I wouldn’t want Leo to know. He wouldn’t understand. And I don’t want to disrespect Tallulah. She was an actress. She got a lot of roles in local Boston theaters, and in suburban ones, too. She loved acting. Her whole world was acting. When I first met her, she warned me, she told me, ‘The only thing you need to know about me is that I’m an actress.’ ”

Trevor paused, remembering when he met Tallulah at a party in Cambridge. She took his breath away. Tallulah had silky red hair that fell in a curtain past her shoulders and was parted to drape enticingly over one eye. She had a figure that wouldn’t quit. She had a deep, husky voice that she later told him she had achieved by smoking, talking, and singing when she had a cold so that her vocal cords were slightly damaged. That was proof, she reminded him, that all she cared about was being an actress.

“I’m warning you,” she’d said. “Don’t get serious about me.”

Of course Trevor, being the kind of not-arrogant but pretty damn self-confident guy he was, took Tallulah’s words as a challenge. Trevor had been twenty-four years old then, a good-looking, clever, laid-back guy who pretty much always got what he wanted. All his life, things had come easy for him: good grades, high school quarterback, any girl he wanted, entrance to MIT, and a computer business that kept him busy and rich. Tallulah made their relationship even more stimulating by not responding to his charms as easily as most women did. He had to pursue her. That was kind of fun. He didn’t understand her and he enjoyed a puzzle. So his brain was as attracted to Tallulah as his body. Okay, maybe not quite as much as his body.

How arrogant he’d been back then! How young!

“Mr. Black?” Dr. Warren said quietly, pulling Trevor out of his reverie.

Trevor cleared his throat. “Okay. Okay, here it is. Tallulah never was into the whole
housewife/mommy
bit. Still, she was Leo’s mommy. She was my wife. We loved her, and even though she was
unusual—demanding,
not nurturing, I guess you could say—we all made it work.” This was harder than Trevor had known it would be, this talking business.

“How did she die?” Dr. Warren asked.

“Um. Tallulah, you see, wasn’t around a lot normally. Rehearsals, auditions, buying clothes—I don’t know, we were used to it. Recently she’d seldom been home. I thought she was at rehearsal. But then—” The memory made Trevor stumble over his words. “In November—it was morning—Leo was at preschool, the police knocked on my door—I have an apartment in Cambridge. Okay. They told me—and they were
respectful—they
told me Tallulah was dead. She had died of an overdose of heroin she’d been smoking at the apartment of another actor. Tallulah had always said that Wilhelm was one of the most gifted actors of their generation. But, um, the thing is, both Tallulah and Wilhelm were naked when their bodies were found.”

“How difficult for you,” Dr. Warren said, with no judgment in his tone.

Trevor bit his lip. “Right.” He was having trouble breathing. “So, anyway, I had to figure out how to tell Leo. I mean, he was used to his mother being gone for hours and even days at a time. I’d always been the main parent for him, right from the start. Tallulah had never been keen on discussing preschools and play groups or Christmas presents and birthday parties, that sort of thing. Still, she was Trevor’s
mother.
He loved her. He
adored
her.” Trevor swallowed back a sob.

After a moment of silence, Dr. Warren urged, “Go on.”

“When I told Leo that afternoon—” Trevor had been much more reserved telling the other parents at the school, the teachers, and his friends about this. He hadn’t wanted it to get back to Leo. Now he was afraid he was going to cry. “When I told Leo, we were at the apartment after school. I had given him juice. We sat on the couch. I said it as gently as I could, that his mommy had died. He knew about death from animals in school, television. We had talked about it. He kind of understood. So I told him.” Trevor swallowed. “Leo said, ‘No, Daddy,
please.
’ ”

Trevor cleared his throat. Dr. Warren waited.

“I hugged Leo. We cried together. I told him Mommy lived in heaven now, a beautiful place where Mommy was always happy. Mommy had been sick, I told Leo—” He glanced at the psychologist. “Really, in a way she had, right? I told Leo it had happened suddenly, she had just gone to sleep. Well, that was probably true. I said Mommy would always be looking down on him with love. Leo wanted to know where she was, and I said up in the sky, and Leo jumped up from the sofa, raced to the balcony door, and stepped up to the railing. He, um, Leo
waved at the sky.
He yelled, ‘Hi, Mama!’ ” Trevor brought his hands to his face and forced himself not to cry. Embarrassed, he said, “I thought I’d cried myself out.”

“It’s fine,” Dr. Warren told him. “It’s good. Take your time.”

Trevor reached for a tissue from the box on the coffee table and blew his nose. After a moment, he got himself back together.

“So we went on. We made a small shrine to Tallulah in Leo’s room. Gradually, when Leo was at preschool, I removed some of Tallulah’s less conspicuous stuff—the shoes, cosmetics, wigs, secondhand clothes—so the apartment opened up a bit. We have three bedrooms—one is my office—I have a computer business. One bedroom is Leo’s, and for the first couple of months I slept with him.” Trevor thought of the nights in Leo’s room, curled around him on the small twin bed. He could only hope they brought as much comfort to his son as they did to him.

Dr. Warren rose, went to a side table, and poured Trevor a glass of water.

“Thank you.” The cool water revived him. Setting it on the table, he began again, more in control now. “So that’s why I’m here. Leo. I’m troubled about Leo.”

“Go on.”

“I mean, at first, Leo was sad, quiet. He dragged his feet when we went to the park and didn’t even want to get ice cream. He spent less time painting and drawing and more time curled up on his bed with his arms around Tubee, his pet giraffe. Other times, the slightest problem—a broken cracker, dropped soap—sent him into tantrums. I spoke with his preschool teacher, who said Leo was quieter and less playful but in general seemed happy enough. I talked with other parents. They told me Leo was young and children are resilient.” He glanced at the psychologist for confirmation.

“Yes,” Dr. Warren agreed. “That is usually true.”

“Usually?”
Trevor shifted on the sofa. He was glad he had come. “Okay, then, here’s what bothers me. In January, Leo started doing things that disturbed me, but I also thought maybe they were signs of, well, moving on. That’s why I wanted your advice.”

“What kind of things?”

“Well, at night, before Leo goes to sleep, he takes out all his clothes for the next day and arranges them on the floor of his bedroom in an absolute unchanging order. Briefs, jeans, T-shirt, socks, sneakers, sweatshirt. He’ll eat his lunch only if I pack the same thing day after day: a cheese and mustard, not mayonnaise, sandwich on whole-wheat bread, a banana, yogurt. One day I was out of bananas and put an apple in the lunchbox. When Leo got home that afternoon, I opened the box and saw Leo hadn’t touched any of the food.”

“Anything else?”

“Well, he’s gotten kind of obsessed with Legos.”

For the first time, Dr. Warren smiled. “He’d be unusual if he weren’t obsessed with Legos.”

“Good,” Trevor said, relaxing a bit. “That’s good to know.” He waited.

After a moment, the psychologist said, “I think Leo is dealing with the loss of his mother by trying to take control of his own small universe.”

Trevor nodded, listening hard.

“Leo has to do something,” Dr. Warren said, “and these are actually not worrisome actions. If they continue, or become worse, then I’d like you to bring him in. He could have OCD. Obsessive-compulsive disorder. OCD is an anxiety disorder related to the transmission of serotonin in the brain. But I think it’s too soon to be concerned about that.”

“What can I do?” Trevor asked.

“Summer is almost here. Perhaps you could take him on a vacation, somewhere the child has never been with his mother. A new environment might provide a break for the boy’s grieving. Is that a possibility for you with your work? Financially?”

“Yes, sure,” Trevor said, nodding.
God,
it felt great to have an expert advise him.

“It’s good that you built the shrine,” Dr. Warren continued. “Good to talk about Leo’s mommy, try to get him to talk about his feelings. It would help if you found a way to deal with your own grief, too. Children are remarkably sensitive to their parents’ emotions. Leo is very young.
You
are not so very old—how old are you? Thirty?”

Trevor nodded.

“You both have a great deal of life before you. I’m sure you will find a way to make it a happy life for your son and yourself.”

Driving home after the appointment, Trevor thought about the psychologist’s advice. There was so much Trevor hadn’t said, he felt guilty. For months before her death, Tallulah had been all over the place emotionally, staying out all night, losing weight, having rages, shrieking at her puzzled son to leave her alone. He’d suspected she was using some kind of drug, but heroin? If he’d even suspected, he would have tried to help her. If only he had tried to help her!

Trevor parked in his driveway and sat in the car, thinking. Leo was going to a playdate with his best friend, Cassidy, after preschool and wouldn’t be back for a couple of hours. He scrutinized his apartment building. It was kind of a dump, although the neighborhood was safe. An old three-story, three-family house, he’d first rented it back when he was a graduate student at MIT. After Leo’s birth, Trevor had suggested buying a house in one of Boston’s many suburbs—he had the money. This freaked out Tallulah. Maybe they needed a bigger condo, she said, so the crying baby could have his own room, but no way was she going to become a suburban mom. The city was where the action was.

Tallulah treasured the location, so near theaters, shopping, and the T. She hadn’t cared about interior decor—hell, she hadn’t even cared about comfort. Tallulah’s basic needs were, in order of importance, a closet for her many clothes, a bathroom with a shower and a large mirror so she could put on her intricate makeup, and some kind of bed to flop on at the end of the day or the long night. They had turned the sun porch into Trevor’s office, and turned what had once been his office into a bedroom for Leo. His son’s room held the only new furniture in the apartment. It never occurred to Tallulah to suggest replacing Trevor’s ancient sofa and chairs with pieces that didn’t sag or list.

Tallulah was not a monster. She’d cuddled her son, and even though she didn’t nurse him because she didn’t want to ruin her breasts, she learned to give him a bottle. As he grew older, she discovered he was the best audience she had ever had in her life. She tried out for
Shear Madness,
a long-running comedy, and won the part of the ditzy beauty shop assistant. For a long time, she was happy. She taught Leo songs from Broadway musicals; she taught him to say a few time-honored lines. The line that stuck was:
To be or not to be, that is the question.
At two, Leo pronounced “To be” like “Tubee,” as if it were a person. He named his favorite stuffed animal, a giraffe, Tubee.