Don't Forget to Write: A Novel(69)

“I don’t have to replace her,” I said. “I just thought—”

“I’m not your mother, Marilyn. I suggest you speak with your parents before you make plans.” She reached around me for her book.

“Ada, please—”

“We have nearly four more weeks until Labor Day,” Ada said crisply. “A lot can happen in four weeks. I don’t make plans that far in advance regardless.”

I got up, shaking my head angrily, my strategy to be on my best behavior and make myself indispensable to her forgotten. “You know, I’m trying to help here. It’s not just me being selfish.”

Ada flipped another page. There was no way she was actually reading. “Not ‘just,’ no. Thank you so much for your act of selflessness in offering to put one woman out on the street to stay with another and avoid your family. We truly appreciate your sacrifice.”

I glared at her. “Fine. You two can sit around like the witches that you are, and who cares what happens to me?”

“My, it sounds like I’ve missed plenty of excitement this summer,” Lillian said from behind me, making me jump.

Ada calmly folded down the page of her novel and placed it on the coffee table. “That was fast,” she said, rising. “Are you hungry?”

“Famished.”

“Wonderful. Let’s go to lunch.” She looked at me. “Are you done with your tantrum? I’m not sure they allow misbehaving children.”

I shook my head. “You go. I’d hate to intrude.”

Lillian put a hand on my arm. “Please come. I’d like to get to know you better.”

Ada stalked past her. “Leave her be. She can join us for dinner if she’s over this little pique by then.”

Lillian sighed, following Ada, with a sidelong glance back at me.

But after they left, I went to the window to spy.

“—that about?”

I saw Ada shake her head. “She’s been getting all my attention all summer and is jealous, I think.”

Lillian made a tsk-tsk sound. “Oh dear. I’ll win her over yet.”

“You shouldn’t have to. You’ve had a hard enough time.”

Ada started the car, and I couldn’t hear them over the engine, but Lillian said something that made her laugh.

Once they were gone, I went to the living room phone and called my mother, not caring that it was long distance.

“Kleinman residence,” Grace answered, sounding bored.

“It’s Marilyn. Is Mama home?”

“Marilyn? Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” I said in annoyance. “Put Mama on, please.”

“But why are you calling?”

“Grace. Put Mama on the phone.”

There were murmured voices and a shuffling sound before my mother spoke. “Marilyn? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong.”

“Then why are you calling?”

I sighed. “Ada said Daddy is sending me back to school?”

My mother exhaled, then spoke more quietly. “I believe so, yes. He hasn’t sent the check yet.”

“Mama, what would you think if I stayed here instead?”

“Why would you want to do that?”

I didn’t know how to answer that question and make her understand. “I like it here,” I said eventually.

“Marilyn, I don’t understand. Is it a boy? I spent all summer trying to get your father to come around after what you did, and now you’re saying you don’t want that?”

The last ray of hope I had been holding on to began to sink into the pit of my stomach. “It’s not a boy. I—I just haven’t decided what I want to do yet.”

“Well, decide quickly that you want to come home, because he’s going to sign that check any day now if he hasn’t already.” I didn’t reply and she softened. “I miss you.”

I missed her too. And Daddy, despite the circumstances under which we parted. But the idea of returning to my childhood bedroom in the brownstone made me feel sick. So I told her I missed her as well and that I had to go before I ran the phone bill up too high.

“Enjoy this last month,” she said. “You’re making such wonderful memories.”

I wanted to say, “Like you did?” but I couldn’t. If she hadn’t told me, it wasn’t fair to let her know Ada had. And she would suspect, if Ada told me, that I’d had my own troubles. So I agreed noncommittally, said that I loved her, and hung up.

Then I went out to the porch and lay down on the wicker love seat, wishing Lillian didn’t exist.





CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR


I wandered down to the beach while they were gone, but I couldn’t focus on my book. Instead, I wound up sitting on my towel, watching the waves break on the shore. Daddy was going to send the payment for college. I would be closer to Dan. But what if I didn’t want to be closer to Dan? Dating him here felt safe and exciting at the same time. Dating him in New York—was there any scenario where I didn’t wind up living the exact life I wanted to avoid?

My shoulders sagged. Why did it all have to be so complicated? I didn’t want both a fiancé and my parents to die in order to live my own life the way Ada had. But what other options did I really have?