She pretended not to need the attention, but she soaked it up, a desperate parading peacock.
At one of last year’s meetings, she’d gotten loose-tongued tipsy, and tried to come clean to Harriet Nessel. My degree is in organizational psychology, Jen had lectured, not literature.
“I know,” Harriet said. “You study animals now.”
“I study the people who study the animals,” Jen had admitted. “It couldn’t be farther from popular fiction.”
“I guess that depends on your thoughts about the animal/human divide,” Harriet said drolly. “Has so-called civilization removed us as much as we like to think? Food for thought, dear, food for thought.”
Point: Harriet.
（Harriet had probably been tipsy, too. The drinks at book club were always shockingly strong.）
Jen realized that she probably missed teaching more than she had admitted to herself, and even if it wasn’t the cure-all she pretended it was, for the time being, the Cottonwood Book Club was the closest she was going to get to an exchange of ideas.
Abe and Paul were right. She should go. Jen rushed upstairs to grab a sweater and put on earrings, because the other women always looked so put-together and even though Jen pretended she didn’t care, obviously she did on some deep level—and then, as she stood in front of her bureau, Jen’s hand extended like some horror movie claw to reach into the sock drawer, palm Dr. Scofield’s business card, and slip it into the back pocket of her jeans.
By the time Jen got to Harriet Nessel’s house, a long line of cars extended far down the street. She pulled behind a dark SUV. Its door opened and Priya Jensen, one of the club’s core members, stepped out, tall and gorgeous as ever. She tossed her silky black hair over her shoulder, waved at Jen, and went inside.
If Priya or any of the others knew that book club was Jen’s “one thing,” they would probably stage an intervention, albeit one with themed finger sandwiches and a gift bag stuffed with lavender-scented hand lotions and candles.
Priya and the rest of the book club group regulars—manic Janine Neff and Deb Gallegos, who did the elaborate drinks, and Annie Perley, who reminded Jen of a plucky kid sister from a situation comedy—were constantly planning Fun Events: cocktails and tailgates and ski weekends. All of their kids seemed to be friends and most attended Sandstone K-8, the local public school.
Before their move, Jen had flown out to visit schools on Abe’s behalf. At Sandstone, she had been struck first by the blindingly aggressive level of activity: everyone—teachers and students—seemed to be kicking balls, or singing and dancing, or hurrying through the halls while talking and laughing. They were shiny-haired, white-toothed, zipped up in brightly colored fleece jackets.
Jen had walked out before the tour began.
Foothills Charter School was out-of-district, which had been inconvenient at the time, but was now a blessing. The women of book club wouldn’t have heard any gossip about Abe’s expulsion.
After Jen’s first book club meeting, Janine made it a point to invite Jen to a barbecue, so Abe could meet the other kiddos his age. While Jen had felt a bizarre pride that she’d faked normalcy convincingly enough to be asked, she had ultimately declined. Abe had no place at a barbecue in this neighborhood.
Jen wasn’t embarrassed by Abe, but she knew that he invited judgment. The slouch, the slightly forced smile, the intense and stony stare. He was that kid.
But Abe was so much more than that kid!
When people put him in a box or alienated him or she saw that inevitable flicker of derision across their faces, Jen burned like a devil doused with holy water.
Jen wasn’t one of those moms, the kind who insisted her child was perfect, but there was so much hypocrisy. Everyone preached tolerance to difference, but nobody practiced it.
She was stalling.
Jen took Scofield’s card from her jeans pocket and held it between her thumb and forefinger. He’d bet big on himself and sprung for the expensive card stock: the thing didn’t even buckle.
This shouldn’t surprise. Scofield was all about image, with that slicked-back gelled hair and that pungent cologne, probably to mask the odor from those bare feet shoved into loafers. He was immature and brusque and mansplainy and hadn’t let Jen get a word in.
Jen knew now that it was flat-out wrong to label a child as young as Abe. They could probably find several respected doctors who would agree it had been malpractice.
Someone must have sued Scofield by now, or maybe his license had been revoked. But even if he was still practicing, Scofield certainly wouldn’t remember Abe.