The Hot Flash Club Strikes Again (27 page)

31

It was as if the essential Claudia were disappearing right before Polly’s eyes. As if, had Polly the aid of just one more grade of vision, past ultraviolet, past X-ray, she would be able to watch Claudia’s very atoms detach and drift away from her, up into the warm air.

Now Claudia slept almost all the time. She lay still in her hospital bed, supported by pillows so that she wouldn’t choke on her saliva, eyes closed or, sometimes, eyes open, but so glazed and gazing into a far distance that she was unaware of Polly in the room with her.

Perhaps three times a day, Claudia would awaken. During these lucid moments, Polly would hold a cup of tepid tea with a straw to the older woman’s mouth. Claudia would drink, then she would say, primly, “Thank you.”

“Are you comfortable?” Polly would ask.

“I am.”

“Could I get you anything?”

“Turn off the television. It distracts me.”

“Of course.” But how curious, Polly thought. The television distracts her? From what? Was dying like taking a kind of test, needing one’s full concentration? Was Claudia drifting in her memories, were they as vivid as headlights of passing cars against the windows?

Now when the hospice worker arrived, Polly was free to leave for the entire hour, because Claudia wouldn’t know she was gone. Somehow, though, Polly didn’t feel relieved or sprung. She’d developed an odd sense of responsibility for Claudia, as if she’d been entrusted with taking someone else’s child to their first day at kindergarten or to a station to wait for a train—as if she had to
be
there to see Claudia safely off on her journey. So Polly rushed to the nearest grocery store to gather the necessities and rushed back home again, scarcely noticing the weather, the other people, the traffic, the expanse of the ordinary, busy world.

In the same way, during the long hours she sat with Claudia, Polly could not summon the kind of intelligence it took to do alterations for customers, or even to sew on a button. All she could do was knit. Baby blankets, shawls, mufflers. She kept the lights low throughout the house, except for one lamp behind her chair, which bathed her and her work in its warm illumination. Knitting was so ancient an art, she imagined the scores of years of women keeping bedside vigils during illnesses and deaths, hunched as she was, knitting a blanket, tugging the yarn like time through her fingers. As she sat in the large old house while Claudia slept, Polly did not feel alone.

But at times Polly grew restless from so much silence. She was grateful for the morning arrival of
The Boston Globe,
curled and wrapped in plastic, on the doorstep. It helped lend an order to the day. Whenever during the morning Claudia awoke for her sip of tea, Polly would read aloud the society bits she thought Claudia would like. The Boston Ballet’s new performance reviewed. A marvelous exhibit of Gauguin at the MFA. She read all the wedding and engagement announcements, as well as the obituaries, not knowing who might be important to Claudia. Besides, it made it seem almost as if there were conversation in the room.

Every so often, the telephone would ring, the shock of the unexpected noise nearly ejecting Polly out of her chair. Occasionally it was an acquaintance of Claudia’s, asking about her health. Polly would do as Claudia had instructed her: she would tell the caller that Claudia could not come to the phone right now, but would return the call when she could.

Sometimes, Julia or Beth or Carolyn phoned—when that happened, Polly’s entire body lit up. For a few moments, she was part of the world of the living. And their news was so dramatic.

“Claudia!” Polly said after one conversation. “You’ll never guess what happened! Carolyn found out that Heather’s ‘brother’ is really her boyfriend. She’s been scamming money off Aubrey. Aubrey’s having the marriage annulled. Plus, they insisted on doing a paternity test, and Heather’s pregnant, but the baby is Harry’s, the horrible boyfriend’s, not Aubrey’s. Isn’t this wild?”

Claudia showed no signs of hearing.

Sometimes, for comfort, Polly read aloud from books of poetry: Tennyson. T. S. Eliot. Emily Dickinson. Auden.

Sometimes, she simply babbled.

“It’s wonderful, how Julia and Beth and Carolyn are becoming friends, don’t you think? It cheers me up to think of their collaboration to save Carolyn’s father from the dreadful Heather.” Knit one, purl two. “You know, recently, the English language has adopted the German term
schadenfreude,
which means the happiness you feel when someone you dislike is miserable. Well, I think we should have a term like
freudenfreude,
too, don’t you? The happiness we feel when someone we love is happy is such a gift, isn’t it?”

Claudia slept on.

“I wonder if my bird feeders need refilling at home. I ought to check. They depend on food being there. Recently I’ve noticed a squirrel trying to get into the feeder.” Knit one, purl two. Silence. “And in the spring, there’s a rabbit who eats my fresh new plants.” Knit one, purl two. “Just think, if the squirrel mated with the rabbit, they’d have a squabbit.” Polly laughed aloud at the word, then laughed more at herself. She knew she sounded just slightly demented. And maybe she was.

Late evening was the hardest time for Polly. The night seemed darker at ten than it had at nine, even though Polly knew this wasn’t logical. Polly still slept in the upstairs bedroom, with the intercom on, but her sleep was broken, uncomfortable, and full of turbulent dreams. She came to dread midnight, when she climbed the stairs to bed. Loneliness loomed at her from the shadows of the room like a faceless creature with a dark cape.

——————————

“Jehoshaphat is five months old today,” Polly announced one morning. “I wonder if he’s sitting up by himself yet. Probably not. Amy probably has the poor child bound to her body with ropes woven from her own hair. I never thought David would end up working on a farm, eating twigs and berries, and especially I never thought he’d be so, well—
submissive
—to a woman. Of course, I’m sure you never dreamed your son, Tucker, who attended all the best private schools, including
pre
school, would end up married to a plump Irishwoman who takes in sewing. Yet Tucker and I were so happy together. I do hope you know that, Claudia. I want to believe David’s as happy with Amy as I was with Tucker. I
have
to believe that.” The needles spinning out a new baby blue blanket went still in her lap. “I wish I could see my grandson.” She glanced over at Claudia, who slept on, oblivious. With a little sigh, Polly picked up her needles and went back to her knitting.

——————————

Saturday night, Sonny said, “Wow, Beth, you look great!”

Beth twirled. She’d bought this turquoise silk dress with the short froufrou chiffon skirt especially for the Youngs’ anniversary party at the Marriott. “So do you!”

“No,” Sonny grumbled, “I look like a Las Vegas pimp.” He and his brother, Mark, and his sister, Suze, were going to sing a medley of romantic tunes for their parents, and Suze had insisted the men wear tuxes in harmonizing variations of blue. “But if I refuse to wear this thing, that will give them even more proof that I’m a snob.”

“I think you look absolutely dashing,” Beth teased, “in a camp, Johnny Depp in
Pirates of the Caribbean
kind of way.”

Sonny rolled his eyes. “Come on. Suze insisted we get there early.”

The party wasn’t to start until eight, but at seven thirty, when Beth and Sonny walked into the ballroom at the Natick Marriott, they found Suze, Mark, and his girlfriend, Barbie, already there. Suze was setting little boxes of chocolate at each place at the table. When she saw Sonny and Beth, she raced up to them.

“How does it look?” The little beads of perspiration on her forehead sparkled more than the sequins on her sapphire blue dress.

“As great as it did two hours ago when I helped you hang the streamers,” Sonny said.

Beth wanted to kick him in the shin. She wished she’d had a sister as softhearted and generous as Suze. “I think it’s just dreamy.”

“Do you really?” Suze clasped her hands and looked around the room. “What do you think of the color scheme?”

“It’s heavenly,” Beth told her honestly. Shades of pale blue twined with silver on the balloons, tablecloths, napkins, and streamers. Great masses of dried blue hydrangeas served as centerpieces for the main table and filled silver pots around the room. “Can I help you do anything?”

“The band’s coming and I want to be sure they’re set up all right. Sonny, you could help with that.” Suze turned to Beth. “Would you finish putting the party favors around?” She handed her a white paper shopping bag filled with small boxes.

“Sure.” Probably, Beth thought, it would be inappropriate if she fell to her knees and kissed Suze’s feet in gratitude. She tried to act as if she found it perfectly normal that Suze had for once included her in the family’s duties. She went around the room, putting the little blue and silver boxes at each seat, then drifted to the main table to read the place cards. She found one with her name on it, next to Sonny’s. It was at the very end of the table, but someone had to sit at the end of the table, and at least she was included. One giant step forward, she thought, laying her evening bag on her chair.

Near the head table stood an easel holding an enormous cardboard panel covered with photos of Merle and Bobbie Young in all the phases of their life together. As Beth studied it, she felt her spirits lift as her eyes filled with sentimental tears. Such a passage of years, so many smiles. A black-and-white snap showed Bobbie as a seventeen-year-old in a Dairy Queen uniform, grinning at Merle, who had a full of head of thick brown hair pomaded into a kind of Elvis Presley pompadour. Next came a photo of Merle and Bobbie leaving the church on their wedding day, laughing and bending their heads beneath a rain of rice, and then the shots were full of babies. The years paraded past as the children grew. To Beth’s utter amazement, no photo of the beautiful Robin was on the panel, probably because there was so little room. Of course, neither was there a photo of Beth, but she hadn’t expected there would be. Except—she bent closer—in the final snapshot, taken this past Christmas in the Youngs’ living room, she spotted one brown boot, which she was certain belonged to her.

She turned away from the photographs. The room had filled with people. Julia was over by the bandstand, holding her camcorder on her shoulder, nodding diligently as Suze gave her instructions. Although the band had begun to play soft rock, no one was dancing; they were all gathering at the open bar or loading plates from the buffet. Laughter floated through the air like balloons.

Beth searched for Sonny in the crowd and found him surrounded by several people his parents’ age. Mark was with them—and so was Robin. Her blond hair swept up in a French twist, her dress was a long sheath of ice blue. She looked like a princess.

Someone touched Beth’s shoulder. Julia put her arm around her. “You look gorgeous, kid.”

“Not as beautiful as Robin,” Beth whispered. “Did you see her?”

“Yes, I did. No doubt about it, she’s a beauty. But Sonny’s engaged to
you,
remember? Listen, I won’t hang out with you much tonight, we don’t want them to think we’re too close. I just wanted to say hello.”

“Okay,” Beth agreed. “Hey, look, Robin has a date!”

“Yeah, I noticed. Tell you what. Every picture I get of her, I’ll be sure she’s with him. Subliminal advertising, okay?” Julia checked her watch. “It’s almost eight. I’ve got to be by the door to catch the guests of honor when they come in. Have fun!” She shouldered her camcorder and went off.

“Hey!” Sonny pushed through the crowd to grab Beth’s hand. “It’s almost time. Let’s get up front!”

The crowd was swarming toward the main door, faces flushed with anticipation. Men dressed in tuxes and suits and women resplendent in dangling earrings and glittering dresses made way for them, some of the men patting Sonny on his shoulder as he passed, the women covertly scrutinizing every square inch of Beth’s clothes and body. All these people had known Sonny’s family
forever.
Carpenters, schoolteachers, plumbers, Little League coaches, Little League kids grown up with their own little kids riding their shoulders as if at a parade, they all loved Merle and Bobbie Young.

They reached the front. Mark yanked Sonny toward him. Sonny kept his hand on Beth’s, pulling her into the row of family members just as Merle and Bobbie entered the ballroom.

“Surprise!” the crowd roared.

Merle stood stock-still with his jaw hanging open, and Bobbie burst into tears.

After that, the evening passed in a blur. They feasted and sipped champagne while people rose to toast the Youngs and relate their favorite anecdotes. Beth worked on memorizing their faces, names, and other relevant facts. Harold with the bulging belly and bawdy humor had been Merle’s best friend since kindergarten. Eloise with the rabbit teeth and aggressively blond hair had been Bobbie’s maid of honor at the wedding. Lovely red-haired Ethel, who looked at least ten months pregnant, told the crowd about being Sonny’s first girlfriend, in sixth grade, and how she’d thought the best part of it had been Bobbie’s coconut-chocolate-chip cookies.

After the toasts, the dancing began. As Sonny squired Beth around the dance floor, she noticed Merle dancing with his wife, his daughter, Mark’s girlfriend Barbie, and Robin.
I will not take it personally if he doesn’t dance with me,
Beth told herself, girding herself for disappointment, but when Merle approached Sonny to cut in, she nearly fainted with gratitude.

By the end of the evening, Beth was euphoric. The only Young who’d not made her feel totally welcome was Bobbie. Bobbie had allowed Beth to kiss her cheek, but she pulled away quickly. When Julia gathered the immediate family together for a group photo, Bobbie had insisted on having “her girls” near her and Merle: Suze on Merle’s left, Robin on Bobbie’s right. Mark stood where his parents directed him, to Suze’s left, with Barbie on his own left. That meant Sonny had to stand on Robin’s right. He pulled Beth into the frame, putting his hand firmly on the front of her gown at waist level, making their union clear. Beth put her left hand over Sonny’s, hoping the engagement ring would show up and that Bobbie wouldn’t have her excised from the final photos.