Jordan and I had put on our nicest white dresses for lunch, but even the effort of getting dressed had made us practically combustible. We’d landed on the couch, and we were fanning ourselves, when Nick and Jay arrived together. I heard the door, heard them walk down the hallway, then enter the parlor and say hello. And I immediately thought, This is a mistake. This is a terrible, terrible mistake. I thought of Jay and his awful creeping fingers at his pool the other day, and I had the urge to run out, to run upstairs, to hide away in my bedroom until everyone had gone home. But truly it was too hot to move, and so I didn’t. I just lay there on the couch, letting Jordan hold my hand and fan me.
The telephone rang again in the distance, and I heard Tom answer it. “He should’ve invited his woman in the city, too,” I said. “Then it really would be a party.”
Nick denied that such a thing could be true in that sweet innocent overearnest midwestern way he had of looking at the world. Agreeable and earnest. It occurred to me in that very moment that things were never going to work out between him and Jordan. Jordan was much too cynical. She could never stand for such earnestness over the long haul.
Jay stood across the room, dressed in a pink suit, his arms crossed in front of his chest. Tom’s voice elevated from the hall, but his words were still impossible to understand. Jay frowned and strode toward me. “He’s no good for you,” he said, his voice husky from the heat.
He leaned down toward me all of a sudden, grabbed me, and kissed me on the lips. He pressed hard, and it was so hot that I could barely breathe.
“Mama?” Pammy’s voice suddenly cut through the heat, and I sat up quickly and pushed Jay away hard enough that he stumbled a little. I put the back of my hand to my lips, speechless for a moment. What had she seen and what did she think?
I was shaking, but I held out my arms. “Come here, my precious.” Pammy ran in to hug me. Her nurse had dressed her in white, arranged her blond curls with a pink bow. “Don’t you look divine.” I kissed her soft damp forehead, her curls tickling my lips. My love for her suddenly struck deeper inside of me than anything I’d ever felt for any man.
“I weared my white dress. Just like you and Aunt Jordan.” She giggled, and I clung to her. Regret ratcheted its way from my stomach to my chest to my throat, bitter and hot. “Where’s Daddy?” Pammy asked now, like she could sense everything that was wrong about this moment. She pulled away from my arms and stared uneasily at both Nick and Jay.
“He’s gone in the other room for a moment…” I said.
Her eyes roamed slowly across Jay’s face. He smiled at her, and she frowned. And the way her face turned in that moment, it hit me that she would someday grow to be a woman. I wanted more for her than to be a fool. I never wanted men to treat Pammy the way they treated me. I wanted her to be brave and bold, and fearless and independent. I kissed her head again and felt tears welling up in my eyes.
“I’m a mother,” I announced to the whole room, like it was news. But then I looked Jay square in the eye. “I’m this little girl’s mother.”
Jay frowned, like he didn’t understand. But here I was, weeks later, answering that silly question he’d asked me at Nick’s. Why couldn’t we just erase the last three years? That was why. She was why.
Nick looked at me, thoughtful. “She’s a little you, isn’t she, Daisy?” he said.
His words burned my face, my heart. Pammy had to be better. I wanted so much better for her. I had to make sure she was better.
* * *
A FEW HOURS later, after a long and tense lunch where I drank not one but two gin rickeys, we all ended up in the city, a suite at the Plaza Hotel with a few bottles of whiskey. I’d had too much to drink by then, and I could barely remember why we came here, or whose idea it was. Tom had made some big to-do about switching cars back in East Egg, and he’d driven Jay’s yellow Rolls-Royce into the city with Nick and Jordan, forcing me in the coupe with Jay. I’d closed my eyes and pretended to sleep, until I actually had fallen asleep. I didn’t understand what sort of game Tom thought he was playing, but all it served was to make him even crankier by the time we were all together again at the Plaza. And my uneasy nap had me feeling much the same.
It was so sweltering hot in our suite now, and Tom had trouble getting the windows open. I huffed, still drunk and annoyed—it seemed like someone as strapping as him should be able to open a goddamned window. The gin floated in my stomach, a hot swollen hatred for him. For Jay, too.