The Summer Cottage (16 page)

John smiled at him. “Yes. I just thought I’d wait up for you. Sometimes we pass like ships in the night, you and I. Can you sit?” Thomas sat in the chair next to his father, the chair normally occupied by his mother. “How was your evening?”

“It was fine, Dad.”

“Helen told us you had a date.” And there it was—the reason behind John’s late-night reading session. And because his father was a very reasonable man and Thomas trusted him, even though many of his friends barely spoke to their parents, Thomas told his father about his dinner with Anna and Amy, about the circumstances behind her single-parent status. John nodded as he listened, and then said, “She sounds like a lovely young woman.”

“She is, Dad.”

“You sound serious about her.”

“Dad, we just met.”

“I understand that. But sometimes, when we meet people who we think will be a positive influence in our lives, we can get serious quickly.”

Thomas hesitated. Did he want to tell his father that he was, indeed, already feeling serious about Anna? “I like her,” he said. “That’s all for now.”

“Well, enjoy her company then,” said John, closing his book and setting it on the table between them. Thomas shifted his weight to the front of the chair. “Do remember that you are headed off to college in the fall and that your studies at Princeton will keep you very busy.”

“I sure will,” said Thomas, springing out of the chair. “I’m going to grab a quick snack before bed.”

“You do that, my boy,” said John. “Sleep well.”

As soon as Helen heard her father close his bedroom door, she descended her bunk-bed ladder, crept down the hallway, and eased her way down the stairs to the living room. She walked quickly through the darkness to the kitchen, which was lit by the light under the stove hood. Thomas was standing next to the fridge, drinking from a half gallon container of milk. “Hi,” she said.

Thomas spilled milk down his chin onto his sweater. “Jesus, Helen, you scared me. What are you doing up?”

“I’ve been waiting for you to come home.”

“Because you squealed on me?” Thomas looked at her sternly.

“I’m sorry, Thomas,” she began. “It was out of my mouth before I knew what I was saying. Mom and Dad didn’t know where you were.”

“I told Mom I wouldn’t be home for dinner.”

“She forgot, Thomas. And then when I mentioned that you were on a date, all eyes were upon me.” Helen’s eyes were moist. She could feel his disappointment.

Thomas put the milk carton down and bent down to hug his sister. As soon as he said, “It’s okay, Helen,” she started to cry. “Hey, hey, what’s this?”

“Are you in trouble, Thomas?”

Thomas wiped Helen’s two tears from her cheeks, gave her another squeeze, and then released her. He stood tall. “No, I’m not in trouble—at least not with Dad. This is okay. What I did tonight was okay. Anna is a single woman my age. She just happens to have a child.”

“Why does she have a child, Thomas?”

“Her boyfriend left her. He didn’t want children.” Thomas turned his attention back to the counter and the milk, which he lifted with one hand. He took another gulp.

“That’s sad.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Anyway, I’m sorry, Thomas. I should have kept my big mouth shut.”

“That’s okay, Helen. I wouldn’t want you to lie about anything anyway.”

“You can be mad if you want.”

“I’m not mad,” said Thomas. “Did Mom make cookies today?”

“Yes,” said Helen, feeling forgiven. “They’re in the pantry. I’ll get them.”

After a glass of milk and two peanut butter cookies each, they walked upstairs. Thomas patted the top of Helen’s head and said good night. In his room, he took off his clothes, save his boxers, and climbed into bed. A warm breeze blew in the windows, lulling him to sleep. In the morning, he would tell his mother everything she wanted to know. He would tell her about Anna. He would tell her about Amy. He would tell her about Anna’s selfish boyfriend. He would be truthful about everything, except his feelings.

 

He did not see his mother until the following afternoon, after his bakery run and newspaper delivery. When he walked into the kitchen she got right to the point, saying, “I understand you and your father had a conversation when you got in last night.”

“Yes,” said Thomas, looking in the fridge so he wouldn’t have to look at her.

“He assures me that this situation is not serious.”

Thomas turned his gaze onto his mother’s face. “What situation is that?”

“Thomas, don’t play with me,” said Claire, hands on hips. “You are at the very beginning of what promises to be a very productive and successful life. Don’t let this kind of distraction derail your motivation.”

It was fruitless, Thomas knew, to argue with a statement like this. When his mother made up her mind, she rarely changed it. Facts were irrelevant. “Right-O,” said Thomas, shifting his attention back to the fridge. “Helen said there was a burger leftover from the other night.”

“Bottom shelf, left,” said Claire, looking back at the pot of fish chowder on the stovetop. She was satisfied this was a dalliance, this relationship with the woman on the other side of town. And while she didn’t want the woman to get hurt, she admitted to herself that she didn’t really care—as long as Thomas stayed on track.

C
HAPTER
19

 

C
laire opened her eyes, blinking at the bright sunlight that came streaming through her windows. For a moment, she wasn’t sure what day it was, and then decided upon Saturday. It was the weekend, yes, and today was the day Thomas would arrive, and she would have her four children together in the house for the first time in as long as she could remember. Had it really been thirty years? Helen had been in the house all along, and Pammy had come for a short stay every summer. Charlotte, depending on whom she was married to or dating and where in the world she was living, showed up periodically. But Thomas had not been back to the cottage since that summer after his senior year in high school. It had not been intentional, Claire had decided long ago. He had simply been too busy making money to take any time off from whatever job or internship claimed sixty hours of his week. He had rarely taken time off, telling his mother whenever she had invited him to the cottage that he didn’t need vacation time. He found it counterproductive, a setback, like school children returning to the classroom after a bookless summer and remembering nothing from their previous year’s instruction. It was a well-documented fact, Thomas had told Claire, that teachers spent the first two months of the academic year reteaching what the children had already learned.

Using her arms, Claire propped herself up on her pillows. Now that her eyes had adjusted to the light, she wanted to look out at the water. Still, after all these years, just seeing water quickened her heartbeat. It was all that time in the pool. When she was a competitive swimmer, she had felt more comfortable in the water than out of it. The chlorine—its smell, what it did to her hair and her skin—was so much more than a chemical that kept the water clean. It was to her like the scent of baking bread was to others, a warm, welcome homecoming.

This is what this weekend was, wasn’t it—a homecoming? It was a forced event, one that wouldn’t have happened without her insistence, her interference, but she felt no remorse for her actions. What homecoming didn’t come with a price? Rearranged schedules, travel, inconvenience—every family gathering exacted its costs from its participants. Life was like that, Claire thought, as she shifted her weight upward, so she could sit on her bottom. You got out of it what you put into it. And those unwilling to take risks or to put effort into something lived marginal, lackluster lives. It was this lesson that she had tried to impart to her children. And the physical and emotional distance between her children told her she had been less successful than she thought.

It had worked for her, after all. Her Smith College education and swimming career had opened doors for her that were locked shut for many women her age. By the time she was twenty-six, she had traveled extensively, given press conferences, signed autographs, and—most important—earned the respect of her male peers. She, like many of her classmates, was certainly interested in earning the admiration of men her age. But it was the respect they showed her that put her in a different league altogether. In fact, she was in
their
league, the athletic league, and because she excelled at what they most revered, she was as close to being one of them as women got. The brazen boasting, pursuit of physical excellence, discussions about the secrets of a stellar performance—the men never tired of this banter. As long as she was breaking records in the pool, they never tired of her. She had been an equal at a time when most women were considered little more than Saturday-night dates. Was it wrong for her to want this elevated status for her children?

She had to use the bathroom, but she was hesitant to get out of bed. In bed, she felt whole again, free from the ravages of cancer and its perfunctory, invasive treatments; free from the pain and weakness that challenged her during the daylight hours. In bed, she could fool herself into thinking she was still an athlete, albeit an aged one. She could daydream about swimming to the raft or running around the backyard or tennis court with her children. She could transport herself back to a better time, when the children were under her wing and when John was alive. He had been her measuring tape, allowing her the inches and feet she needed to run the household her way, but pulling her in if she went too far. He had cautioned her about pushing the children—and had intervened a number of times over the years when she had reduced one of their daughters, usually Pammy, to tears. And at the time, she had occasionally thought of him as soft, weak. He was the quiet, introspective type that Claire had always found interesting, but she wondered if her true appreciation for him was in retrospect. She had sometimes thought, earlier in her life, when she was running around at eighty miles an hour, that he wasn’t as capable or motivated as she was. As it turned out, he was simply not as competitive.

The urge to urinate finally drove Claire to shift her legs and feet from underneath the thin summer-weight blanket to the floor. “Helen?” she called. When she got no response, she tried again, louder. “Pammy?”

Pammy, who was on the porch drinking coffee, quickly ascended the stairs and walked into her mother’s room. “What is it, Mom?”

“Where’s Helen?”

“She went for a walk.”

“And you didn’t go with her, I see.”

“I’m tired, Mom. I didn’t sleep well last night.”

“Well, I’m sorry to hear that,” said Claire, who wasn’t the least bit sorry. People who didn’t sleep well or didn’t feel well or had allergies, Claire thought, should keep their problems to themselves. As her high school coach used to say to the team when they complained about tough practices,
Get over it
.

“Can I help you with something?” asked Pammy. “There’s more coffee in the kitchen if you’d like a cup.”

“I would very much like a cup.” Claire scooted her bottom to the edge of the mattress. “But if I don’t get to the bathroom in the next thirty seconds, we’re going to have a mess on our hands.”

“What can I do?”

“You can either help me up and down the hall, or you can grab my walker from the corner.”

“I’ll take you,” said Pammy, offering her arm.

“This is not a prom date, Pammy,” said Claire. “I’m weak, and I’m going to put my full weight—such as it is—on you. Are you ready?” Pammy braced herself. “Here we go.” They moved out of the bedroom and down the hallway to the bathroom at what Claire referred to as a snail’s pace. “I hate this,” she said, when they finally reached the bathroom.

“Hate what?”

Claire’s eyebrows shot up. “Hate being completely dependent on others for whatever I need, especially when those others are clueless.”

“Hey, I’m trying to help here.”

“Get me to the toilet, please,” said Claire. “And then close the door on your way out.”

Pammy did as instructed. It was after the door was shut and Claire, Pammy guessed, was on the toilet, that Pammy heard the words “thank you.”

“I’ll be right here if you need me,” Pammy called in response.

“Bring my walker downstairs. And when Helen gets back, tell her I’ll need her help getting dressed this morning. Nothing seems to be working properly at the moment.”

“I can help you.”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’ll have Helen’s help. She does this every day and knows the routine. Thank you though.”

Pammy went back into her mother’s bedroom and grabbed the walker from the near corner. She carried it downstairs, surprised by its light weight, yet seemingly sturdy design. As soon as she set it up on the porch, Helen walked through the front door. “Is Mom up?”

“She’s in the bathroom,” said Pammy. “She wanted the walker down here.”

“Okay,” said Helen, removing her front-zip sweatshirt. “Did she say she’d need help down the stairs?”

“She didn’t say,” said Pammy. “Helen, what is going on here?”

“What do you mean, Pammy?”

“I had no idea she was so weak.”

“Well,” said Helen, looking at her sister’s face, “if you’d read my e-mails, you’d know exactly what was and is going on.”

“I have read your e-mails.”

“So, you are well aware that the cancer treatments just about killed her and that the effects of those treatments have left her with very diminished physical capacity. She’s dying, Pammy. That’s why we’re all here.” Helen turned her back on her sister and walked into the kitchen. Before she had finished her glass of water, Pammy was standing next to her.

“I know she’s dying, Helen. I just didn’t realize it was happening so quickly.”

“Well, it is.” Helen finished her water.

“You don’t sound very sad about it.”

“Oh for God’s sake, Pammy, I live with it, with her, every day. I’ve seen her go from a vibrant physical specimen to what she is now, as close to a corpse as possible without actually being one. I help her out of bed when she needs it. I help her get dressed when she needs it. I help her in the bathroom. I help her in the kitchen. I drive her where she needs to go. I get her food. I prepare her meals. I keep her company.” Helen refilled her water glass and chugged it. “So, yes, I’m sad about her condition, as I have been for some time. I’m also sad that you, Charlotte, and Thomas have no idea what either of us is going through.”

“You never said . . .”

“Yes, I
have
said. I’ve explained in e-mails. I’ve scanned and sent doctors’ reports. Have you read anything?”

Pammy had tears in her eyes. “Yes,” she said. “I have read everything. But I don’t think I really understood—until right now.”

“Well, yes, you wouldn’t understand,” said Helen, “because you haven’t visited Mom since Thanksgiving, even though you live two hours away. And a lot has happened since Thanksgiving, Pammy. Again, this is why we’re here. Wake up.”

Pammy looked at the floor. “I’m sorry, Helen.”

“As you should be.” Helen walked back out of the kitchen, through the dining room, and into the living room. She climbed the stairs and knocked on the bathroom door. “Mom? Are you okay?”

“Come in here and help me, dear,” said Claire. “I can’t seem to get up.”

Helen walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She helped her mother off the toilet, pulled up her underpants, and helped her into the hallway. Together, they shuffled to Claire’s bedroom, where Helen sat Claire down on the bed. Helen then retrieved Claire’s favorite linen jumper from the closet, a white T-shirt from the bureau, and her white leather Birkenstock sandals from underneath the bed. “Are you ready?”

Claire raised her arms over her head. “Let’s do this. And then we can have some coffee. I’ve never wanted a cup more than I do right now.”

“You and me both,” said Helen, lifting the cotton nightgown over her mother’s head.

When they finally reached the porch, after a ten-minute walk down the hallway and staircase, Pammy was waiting for them. She had filled their mugs from a fresh pot of coffee, and she had put an assortment of the pastries she’d brought from New York on a china plate, each piece cut in half. She had fluffed the pillow in her mother’s chair that supported her back when she was sitting. And she had given her mother’s lap blanket a good shake outside.

This was what she was good at, at making people feel comfortable. Back when she and Mark were happy together, Pammy often had dinner guests to her apartment, the apartment he lived in five or six days a week. She would ask guests two weeks in advance, as any more time than that seemed too planned, desperate even. And then as soon as she had the set number—she liked eight around her dining room table—she’d start the preparations. After work, she ironed the table linens, pored through cookbooks, shopped for table accessories. The week of the gathering, she’d start the food preparations. She often made the dessert first, popping unfrosted cakes and other confections into the freezer so they wouldn’t get stale. Then she made the sauces and the soups, followed by the sides: the wild rice, the potato pancakes, the mushroom and rice cakes, the sweet corn pudding. And then the appetizers, using whatever seasonal ingredients looked best. Often the main course was a simply prepared piece of red meat, poultry, or fish, which she thought was the perfect complement to her more complicated offerings. Everyone raved about her dinner parties, exclaiming they had never tasted better food and that, as their thank-you e-mails often said,
the company was even better!
But not many of her guests asked her to their apartments and suburban houses. Mark told her this was because no one could cook like she could. How, after all, could they serve her a grilled frozen burger, when she had served them trout with butter and almonds?

As soon as Claire was settled into her chair, she wrapped her hands around the mug Pammy handed her. After her first sip, she sat back and closed her eyes. “I don’t know how anyone can start a day without a good cup of coffee. Is this flavored with something?”

“Yes. It’s cinnamon raisin—perfect for a weekend morning,” said Pammy. “I get it from a specialty shop in the Village. It’s just across the street from my office.”

Claire had never been especially fond of or impressed by specialty food items. They were taking over her independent grocery store shelves and coolers, these organic, exotic, hard-to-find-until-now produces, grains, and meats. What was better than a good steak, baked potato, and Caesar salad? Sure, she liked to experiment with sauces and soups in the kitchen. And she could bake for hours on a winter afternoon. But all the ingredients in her recipes could have been easily found by her mother or grandmother. “I like Maxwell House myself,” she said.

“Really?” said Pammy.

“Really,” said Claire. “Ask Helen. She buys and makes my coffee all the time.” Claire and Pammy both looked at Helen. Helen gave her mother a look that only the two of them, because they had spent so much time together, would understand. “But this is a nice change. I like it.”