Two hours later, her eyes were burning, and her neck ached. She’d learned the name of Henry “Hal” Shoemaker’s law firm, and where he’d gone to law school and college, and the year he’d made partner. She knew the name of his daughter, and his home address. She’d learned that his wife’s real name was not Daisy. It was Diana, and, somehow, that unsettled her almost as badly as finding the picture had. It made her think that she was the rough-draft Diana, the one who got crumpled up and tossed in the trash, while his wife was the final version, the one who was beloved, cherished, marriage material.
Daisy and Hal had one child, a daughter, who was thirteen （if Beatrice Shoemaker was on social media, Diana didn’t want to know. Even while gripped by this insanity, she had limits）。 The Shoemaker clan lived in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania, in a house that she could view on Curbside, and that she knew, thanks to public real-estate records, that Hal had purchased from Vernon Shoemaker in 1998 for one dollar, and that it was now assessed at just over two million dollars. Vernon Shoemaker owned the house in Truro, but his Facebook page informed her that his sons and grandchildren were regular summer guests.
* * *
“Can I ask you a question?” Michael had brought home steamed lobsters for dinner, in an attempt to cheer her up. He was cracking a tail enthusiastically. Diana was nibbling, without appetite, at a swimmeret. “You know everything there possibly is to know about this guy except his blood type. What’s the endgame? What are you planning to do?”
She didn’t answer. She didn’t have an answer. What she did was change the subject, then clear the table, and wash the dishes, and climb up to the sleeping loft, willing herself to fall asleep.
She woke in the middle of the night and lay awake, waiting until five o’clock in the morning. She thought about the girl she’d been, and all the girls and women, violated by their bosses and their colleagues, by men whom they’d trusted and admired. She thought about her niece, and her sister’s resignation, that this was just the way of the world, that Sunny had no right to expect anything different. She asked herself whether the world could change if she just sat by and did nothing. Just as the sun was rising, she slipped out of bed, careful not to wake her husband or the dog. She propped the note that she’d written the day before against the sugar bowl on the kitchen table, and padded outside, into the predawn dark. Her new car, a Prius, barely made a sound when it started. She turned it on, checking to make sure that the bag she’d packed the day before, while Michael was at work, was on the seat beside her, and went gliding silently through the darkness. She’d be halfway down Route 6 before Michael realized she was gone, on her way to New Hampshire, and the Emlen Academy.
19
Daisy
It had been Hal’s idea to host the Melville Upper School spring cocktail party, an undertaking he’d proposed right after they’d gotten Beatrice enrolled. “How can we get involved?” he’d asked, turning his most charming smile on Lynne Parratt, who ran the school’s development office, and when she’d said that they were still looking for a venue for their spring cocktail party, he said, without even glancing Daisy’s way, “We’d be happy to host.” He’d put his hand on Daisy’s shoulder and said, “My wife is a wonderful cook.”
As soon as they’d gotten in the car, Daisy said, “You could have asked me first, you know.”
“It’s important for Beatrice that we get to know the school’s community. And,” he’d said, before Daisy could voice additional objections, “it’ll give you a chance to show off. Maybe drum up some new business.”
It’ll give me a chance to work for three days straight without getting paid anything, Daisy thought, as her husband planted a kiss on her lips. She’d have to clean the house, from top to bottom, dealing with the clutter that seemed to multiply itself exponentially whenever her back was turned, and see if Mireille, the cheerful, competent Frenchwoman she hired when she needed extra hands, would be available. She’d have to rent barware and cocktail chairs and serving pieces; she’d have to order flowers and deal with entertainment, not to mention managing the logistics of the auction itself. Worst of all, she’d have to find something to wear. If there’d been a single benefit to having a kid out of state in boarding school, it was that she got a hiatus from having to squeeze herself into shapewear and make small talk at a school function. Now here she was, less than nine months later, dragging herself to Saks, where being over a size eight meant the salesladies would make you feel very, very small.