The Hot Flash Club (5 page)

She’d be damned if she’d let Alison Cummings change that.

5

FAYE

The sound of the mail falling through the brass mail slot was so familiar that Faye believed she could hear it from wherever she was in the house. If she couldn’t actually
hear
it, certainly she could sense its arrival.

She was still in her turquoise kimono when the mail arrived, and, as usual, she took it back to the breakfast room to peruse while lingering over a cup of coffee.

She got a ridiculous number of catalogues. She thought of the waste of trees, and the toll it took on the letter carriers’ backs. On the other hand, she did buy a lot from catalogues, and often looked through them as if they were magazines. Her best friends lived in other states, and since Jack’s death, some of her married friends had fallen away. The catalogue models’ faces were familiar and amiable, and it cheered her lonely days to see them. A free kind of therapy, then.

No bills, but a smattering of ads and a postcard from one of their friends, retired and on a cruise, and—oh! An invitation to a retirement party for Eloise Linley, whose husband Frank had worked at the same law firm as Jack. Over the years, Faye had seen Eloise at Christmas parties and other functions. Occasionally they’d met in smaller groups at private dinner parties in someone’s home. Faye had always admired Eloise, who worked as a personal secretary for one of the vice presidents of a colossal corporation. When Jack died a year ago, Eloise had sent her a note of condolence, and when Frank Linley died six months ago, Faye had returned the favor. She’d contemplated calling the other woman to ask her for dinner or tea, but somehow had never gotten around to it. Now Eloise was retiring, and the company was throwing her a party.

Faye was pleased to be invited, but she wouldn’t go. She wasn’t close to Eloise. She rose to toss the paper into the recycling bag.

“What’s that, Mom?” Laura asked, coming into the room. Barefoot, in a robe of Faye’s that hung on her, her hair tied back in a ponytail, she looked about twelve years old, except for her swollen breasts in their nursing bra.

Laura and Megan had moved in for a few days, because Laura had a killer cold that made her sneeze and cough incessantly. When Laura wasn’t sneezing, baby Megan was screaming, and Laura was exhausted. Faye was glad to help, and she agreed that Laura wasn’t much of a seductive sight at the moment; it might not be a bad thing for her marriage if she and the baby were away from Lars for a few nights. On the other hand, was it wise for Laura to desert her home when she thought her husband might be having an affair?

Laura picked up the invitation. “A party? At the TransWorld building? Cool!” Dropping into a chair, she blew her nose.

Faye poured a glass of fresh orange juice and set it before her daughter. “Oh, honey, I won’t know anyone there.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Laura sipped, then said, “You’ll know Eloise. You’re bound to know someone else. The munchies should be terrific, and I’ve heard the building’s astounding.”

“But I don’t have anything to wear,” Faye protested. Her honest nature forced her to admit, “Nothing that fits.”

“Then buy something!” Laura insisted. “You’ve got to go! It will be good for you. You can’t just mope around the house for the rest of your life.”

That was true, Faye silently agreed. She leaned against the counter, gazing at her daughter and granddaughter, remembering twenty-eight years ago, when she’d been pregnant with Laura. Then, Faye had
enjoyed
having that extra little basketball-sized attachment on her body. Now, she weighed as much as she had when she was nine months’ pregnant. Furthermore, age and hormonal change made weight accumulate not just in her normal belly, but also in a new rotund protrusion between the bottom of her breasts and the top of her waist. It was rather like having a sleeping puppy lying on a pillow on her lap, except that when she stood up, the puppy, pillow, and lap remained. Plus, every day the puppy grew. It had been a dachshund. Now it was more like a bulldog.

Still, Faye resolved to view her changing body in a positive way. After all, her stomachs were rather
companionable
. Like mascots. She could even name them. Honey, for the larger lower one, Bunny for the upper. The thought made her smile.

“Mom?”

Faye forced her thoughts back to the present. She peered into the refrigerator. “Would you like some scrambled eggs? Maybe an omelet?”

“I’d love some, but don’t evade the issue. You really should go to this party.”

Faye took down her favorite blue-and-white pottery bowl and began to break eggs into it. She and Laura had always given each other good advice. “All right, then, I’ll go!”

Then it was her turn to counsel Laura. She only wished she knew what to say.

6

SHIRLEY

All night long, Shirley dreamed she was at a wonder-ful party. She woke warm and happy, as if she were floating on the memory of her dream.

Later, as she stood at the kitchen window, eating yogurt and granola for breakfast, she saw a bird she’d never seen before fly to the feeder she kept full on the old apple tree in the backyard. Another good omen.

And the day went by flawlessly. All her clients came to her, so she had time to rest and exercise in between. Two of her clients tipped her that day, which was rare. Hiram Folger, who had arthritis, rose from her table saying that was the best massage she’d ever given—he felt like a new man! And poor Betsy Little, who wanted so desperately to get pregnant, only to find herself each month overwhelmed by debilitating cramps, told Shirley she believed she had magic in her hands. Betsy felt she was receiving such good energy from Shirley that someday her body would surprise them all with a strong, healthy pregnancy.

“You’re absolutely right,” Shirley affirmed, not because she wanted Betsy to continue coming for her weekly massages, but because she knew that when the body was involved, half the battle was won by one’s heart and mind.

When her last client left, Shirley brewed a pot of cranberry tea and curled up in a basket chair to find the movie listings in the newspaper. Jimmy had been in a good mood this morning, as well he should have been, because Shirley, floating on clouds of pleasure from her dream, had surprised him with a blow job he said he’d remember all his life. So perhaps she might be able to persuade him to see a movie with her. Usually he hated movies. Jimmy was a restless man, a man’s man, and the only movies he wanted to see were too violent for Shirley. But she felt hopeful this afternoon. There was a movie starring Jack Nicholson that looked good, and Jimmy loved Jack Nicholson. Maybe they’d go out for dinner, too, at the Thai place she loved. Maybe—

The front door slammed, startling Shirley. Jimmy came barreling into the room. He was a big, burly man with a beard that always needed trimming and eyebrows as bushy as his beard. He wore jeans and a studded black leather jacket. His striped T-shirt strained over his beer belly, and his eyes were wild.

“I’m out of here!” he yelled. “I’m blowing this fucking town.”

“Jimmy!” Shirley jumped to her feet. “What happened?”

“That fucking wop, that’s what happened!” Jimmy said. Turning, he stomped down the hall to their bedroom.

Warily, Shirley followed at a distance. Sometimes, when Jimmy got really steamed, he took his anger out on her. From the hall she watched him yank his duffel bag down from the closet shelf. Jimmy worked at a local discount furniture store, loading and delivering furniture, and his boss, Manny Scillio, was forever riding Jimmy about taking too long to make his deliveries. Manny accused him of stopping by a bar on the way. The fact that Manny’s suspicions were true wasn’t of interest to Jimmy.

“Jimmy—”

“He fired me! That stupid cocksucking asshole fired
me
!”

“Oh, hon, I’m so sorry. But you know, maybe it’s a good thing. You’ve hated working for Manny. Now you can find another job, a better job, one you enjoy—”

Jimmy yanked his drawer out of the bureau so hard it fell on the floor, splitting. He shoveled his underwear, socks, and T-shirts into his duffel bag. Jerked the Ralph Lauren Polo button-down shirts she’d bought him for birthdays and Christmas off the hangers and stuffed them into the bag, too.

“No way am I staying in this town. I’m sick of the cold weather, I’m sick of the gray sky and mud. I’m sick of living around wops and gooks. I’m heading south.”

“You’re leaving?”

“Yeah, I’m leaving, and don’t you give me any grief about it, Shirl. You know I’ve been unhappy here. You know I like Florida. I got friends there.”

“Great, friends who sell drugs. Jimmy, you’ll get sucked right back in—”

“Don’t start with me! Don’t even start!” Jimmy brushed past her, into the bathroom to scoop up his toothbrush and Shirley’s toothpaste.

“But Jimmy, I thought—”

He stormed down the hall to the front door. “It don’t matter what you thought, Shirl. Don’t matter what I thought. Things change. I’m gone.”

He left, not bothering to close the door behind him. Shirley stood there, watching him mount his Harley-Davidson. He did look bad on that cycle. He roared off down the street, taking the corner fast, leaning sideways the way he liked, looking dangerous and sexy as the devil.

He vanished from sight. The vibrations of his cycle disappeared from the air. Everything was quiet.

Shirley blinked. She couldn’t absorb it. She couldn’t believe he wouldn’t come roaring around the block, and back up into her driveway and her life.

She just stood there, waiting, like a
dope
, until the furnace kicked on, its ancient rattle alerting her: She was freezing and letting cold air into the house. But she felt that if she shut the door, it would be final. Jimmy would really be gone.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted her mailbox. Fetching the mail was never fun. All she ever got was bills, and it occurred to her that Jimmy, who didn’t help with her mortgage, hadn’t paid for last month’s share of the groceries and utilities. Again.

Reaching into the rusting metal box, she found three pieces crammed in. As she wrenched them out, the lid broke with a squeak, then just hung there, dangling pathetically by one hinge.

She slammed the front door shut and leaned against it, drained of energy and hope. Jimmy was gone.

But the familiar old longing returned, the old and powerful craving for that which would fill the emptiness, dull the sorrow, and bring back the sense of joy she’d felt in her dream this morning. Her old friend/demon/enemy: alcohol.

But jeez Louise, no herbal teas or meditations would get her over this pain of Jimmy leaving.

She flopped down on the sofa and tossed the mail on the coffee table. Sure enough, the mortgage bill was there, and the gas bill.

Shirley Gold, welcome to your life. Tears burned her eyes. Dear sweet Jesus, she wanted a drink! Just one. One small scotch, and she’d feel so much better.

Then she saw, through tear-blurred eyes, the third piece of mail. Something handwritten on quality stock. What on earth?

Grabbing it up, she studied the address. It was her name, all right. She ripped open the envelope. It was an invitation to a party for Eloise Linley, one of her massage clients.

Well, hot damn!

Her dream had been prophetic.

This was enough to make her believe in anything.

Maybe she could even believe in herself.

7

MARILYN

Under the buzzing lights of the university lab, Marilyn bent over a table, brushing with meticulous care at a slab of shale.

It was after seven o’clock on Thursday night. Theodore was off at a conference for a week, so she didn’t need to worry about fixing dinner for him. She could stop by Martino’s, pick up some salads, brew a pot of coffee, spread the newest science journals out on the dining room table, and read.

Faraday McAdam strolled into the room. Faraday was about Marilyn’s age, and handsome, if you liked red hair and a ruddy complexion. He wore a heathy tweed jacket and a cheerful tartan vest.

“Marilyn! I’m surprised to see you here.”

“Really? Why?” Faraday was a colleague of Marilyn’s, a paleobiologist. He was always extremely nice to Marilyn, which proved, her husband Theodore said, that he was jealous of Theodore and trying to weasel the secrets of Theodore’s work from her. Marilyn thought this didn’t quite make sense—Theodore was a molecular geneticist, his field different from Faraday’s—but as Theodore had pointed out, if Faraday didn’t want to pry into Theodore’s work, or at least try to hang on his coattails, why did he spend so much time around Marilyn?

Faraday said, his brow furrowed in puzzlement, “I thought you’d be in Hawaii. With Theodore.”

So there you are, Marilyn thought.
Theodore.
“It’s a scientific conference, Faraday, not a vacation.”

“Oh, come on, you know we always mix pleasure with business at these things. Besides,
you
could have had a vacation. You could have gone along and enjoyed some sunshine.”

They turned to look at the window, where sleet tapped with an almost musical rhythm.

“I wanted to keep working,” she told him truthfully. Well, half-truthfully. It was Marilyn’s own intellectual ardor that kept her bent over her work. Faraday didn’t need to know that Theodore hadn’t invited her to join him on this trip.

“Ah. Well, in that case. But, look. Why not let me take you out to dinner tonight? We’ll go to a Polynesian restaurant and indulge in drinks with flowers in them.”

For just a moment she was tempted. Then she thought of Theodore; he’d think she was a traitor. “No, thanks, Faraday,” she responded. “I have other plans. In fact, I was just getting ready to leave.”

“Too bad. Another night, perhaps?”

“Perhaps.”

He went off down the hall. The building was silent. Marilyn stretched to ease her aching neck and shoulders, and stood for a moment, looking out. Night had fallen, but the university lights backlit the sleet as it gyred in the wind. Nature liked spirals. The sleet sparkled in the night, each tiny bead alive and dancing.

In contrast, Marilyn felt heavy and leaden as she pulled on her camel hair coat and her wool cap and gloves. Wrapping her wool muffler around her neck, she crossed it over her chest, buttoned her coat to the neck, hefted her bags, locked her office, and trudged down the hall and out the door to the parking lot.

Marilyn had listened to the weather report that morning, and dressed with according caution. It was the end of March, so one could expect a day that started off in relative warmth to end that way, but winter was not through with them yet. She could see that not all of her colleagues had been prepared for the barometric plunge.

At the far end of the lot, Cynthia Wang, the new biology assistant, was whooping with laughter as she slipped and slid across the slick pavement. Her gentleman friend reached out to help her, and they both went down in a flurry of legs. Marilyn waited to see whether someone was hurt. Should she help them up? But Cynthia and her friend rolled on the ice, hysterical with laughter. So, Marilyn thought, they’d be all right.

She
had been smart enough to wear her thick-soled, high-ankled, leather walking boots to work, and as she settled in her old Subaru, she tried to feel appropriately self-satisfied. Instead, she felt melancholy. She couldn’t remember when she’d last laughed as she slipped across the ice. Had she, ever?

If you’re born a cockroach, you will not evolve into a butterfly. Marilyn had always found great comfort in the reliability of nature. Early on she’d found her niche, and her life had been tranquil because of it.

But sometimes—

Theodore had left today, to attend a weeklong conference on genetics and the sea. She wouldn’t miss him very much. She always rather enjoyed it when he was gone. She ate odd meals at odd hours: two hard-boiled eggs with lots of salt and four pieces of toast smothered with expensive Dutch raspberry jam, that sort of thing. At night she watched television for irresponsible hours, and not just the news and the Discovery Channel, but old, unabashedly romantic black-and-white movies that often reduced her to inexplicable tears.

She’d been weeping more and more, ever since, a few days ago, she’d inadvertently overheard her son and her husband fighting. Teddy had stopped by, as he often did, to join them for drinks and a brief discussion of the latest scientific news or office politics. Marilyn had stepped into the kitchen to put together a tray of cheese and crackers. Did they want pickles? she wondered. Salami? She’d hurried down the hall to ask them, but froze at the sound of her son’s voice. It was low and angry.

“I don’t understand why you don’t arrange to take Mom with you!”

Silence. Marilyn knew that Theodore was lighting his pipe, an activity that enabled him to gather his thoughts.

“Why should I take her with me?” Theodore asked in a reasonable voice.

“Because it’s in Hawaii. Because Hawaii’s beautiful. Because you are being given free accommodations in a world-class hotel. Because you and Mom haven’t been on a vacation together for years.”

“May I remind you, this is not a
vacation
for me.”

“Oh, come on, Dad. Of course it is. You’ll have to give a paper and attend a few seminars and dinners, but you’ll have plenty of afternoons to explore and swim—it even says so in the invitation!”

Theodore sighed. “Teddy, I understand your intentions are good. But please remember that I have been married to your mother for thirty years. I know what she likes and doesn’t like. More importantly, I know what and who will be helpful to me at a conference. I have a reputation to uphold, remember. Which reminds me. Did you have a chance to read Weingarten’s paper?”

Marilyn had slunk back to the kitchen, bowed by the sadness of her son’s voice, which exposed clearly the sadness of her marriage.

But she had to focus on the present. With a shake of her head, she saw she’d somehow driven herself to Martino’s and parked the car neatly between two others in the parking lot. Right, she told herself. Enough sniveling. She hurried into the restaurant.

To the right lay the dining area; to the left, the little shop with its deli counter. Theodore was a plain meat-and-potatoes man, so Marilyn indulged now, buying pickled mushrooms and antipasto with fat wrinkled Greek olives and a pasta salad with pesto and roasted red peppers. And bread. And wine.

As she fished in her purse for money, she heard a familiar laugh. Where? Who? She paid, gathered her purchases, and headed to the door, then stopped as she heard the laugh again.

It had to be Lila, Teddy’s fiancée. Her laugh was so distinctive. Teddy was in Hawaii with his father. Perhaps Lila was here with her parents. Perhaps Marilyn should say hello—

Peering into the dining room, she spotted Lila immediately. Such beauty. Lila stood out in any crowd. Tonight her hair was pinned up on her head in that careless way young women did it these days, so that the ends fanned out like a turkey’s tail. She wore a red dress with a plunging neckline.

She was smiling. She was throwing her beautiful head back in laughter. She was accompanied by a man. A handsome man, with sleek black hair and gangster looks. He put his hand over Lila’s.

The two obviously knew each other well, or were going to.

Marilyn told herself she should go over and say hello. Undoubtedly, Lila would explain just who this man was, this man who wasn’t Teddy.

“Excuse me.”

Marilyn was blocking the door. Two people, arms full of pungent purchases, were trying to get out. Rattled, Marilyn pushed through the door and out into the cold night, and the only reasonable thing to do seemed to be to keep on going to her car.

As she drove home, Sharon seemed to beam herself onto the passenger seat like a hologram, reminding Marilyn of her warning that Lila was interested in Teddy only for his money.

The house loomed empty and dark. The mailbox next to the front door was crammed, as usual. She collected the correspondence and dumped it, with her book bags and food, onto the dining room table, then went up to her bedroom to change into the comfort of a robe. She turned lights on everywhere to make the house feel warm. She wished she had a dog or cat, but Theodore had too many allergies.

Settling in at the table, she began to read, absentmindedly picking at her food, which had lost its savor. She was worried about Teddy, about the strange man with Lila.

She wished she had someone to talk to.
Really
talk to. The truth was, she was lonely. Her life had been devoted to her family and her work. She’d worked hard, juggling the demands of both worlds, until now she’d arrived at a calm lagoon. Her son was a successful scientist about to be married. Marilyn was a tenured professor and a respected authority in her field. She had many acquaintances, but no real friends. True, she could always call her sister. But she didn’t think she wanted to hear what Sharon would say.

At nine, she made a cup of instant hot chocolate and curled up on the sofa to watch
The Thin Man
, the perfect antidote for her mood, frivolous, glamorous, silly. When it was over, she felt much better.

Back at the dining room table, she read until the grandfather clock in the front hall chimed midnight. Stretching, she looked down at the pile of mail she hadn’t read yet.

Catalogues—toss those. Professional magazines, and
The Smithsonian
, she put aside for herself and Theodore. Bills. And a thick envelope for Dr. and Mrs. Becker. She ripped it open.

An invitation to a party! For Eloise Linley. They used to be close, back when Teddy was in high school with Eloise’s son Jason, but Jason went off to college in California, married, and remained on the West Coast, and Marilyn hadn’t seen Eloise for years, until the funeral for her husband six months ago. Theodore wouldn’t want to go. He considered time spent on anyone but scientific colleagues a waste.

But Marilyn would go, she decided. It was a long time since she’d been to a party. The thought had a kind of frightening allure that made lightning bugs flicker in her heart.