Except—
Annie stopped fiddling with the pillow and forced eye contact with Lena.
Around them, suited caterers did the final preparations, lit the tea lights, placed the silver trays on the buffet tables.
Annie had always craved a connection to Lena and Rachel. She’d insisted they live in Cottonwood to be close to them, which Tim’s large check had allowed them to afford. She used to walk past the Meekers’ house every day, try to catch a glimpse of either of them.
She’d fantasized that they would see Laurel and just know.
A year or two after the night of the accident, Annie sat in Deb Gallegos’s backyard as their daughters, bare-chested in swim diapers, splashed in an inflatable wading pool.
Out of the corner of her eye, Annie saw Lena’s white SUV drive past. She noticed the absence of that familiar pounding in her ears. Her body wasn’t twitching to follow.
She liked Cottonwood, she realized, she was happy here.
It was beautiful, there were excellent schools and friendly neighbors. Their family could grow here, could pretend to be just another boringly comfortable unit until it felt like the truth.
“Please say something.” Annie’s voice was plugged and nasal. “Do you want me to tell Rachel? I can tell her that the accident wasn’t all her father’s fault.”
“God, no,” Lena said.
“I’m sorry,” Annie said. She started to cry again.
Lena allowed herself a moment before she put her hand on the rough pillow, atop Annie’s fingers. Annie sniffled, glanced up.
Lena could tell Annie everything. It was an appealing thought: the two of them carrying the burden together.
But in Annie’s eyes, Lena saw a hint of something released.
What good would it serve?
From the street came the sound of a car door slamming. “Look at the balloons,” a voice said, “the balloons!”
Don’t be selfish. Rachel’s voice in Lena’s head was unyielding: Give her this.
“It was an accident,” Lena said. “It was all a horrible accident.”
Annie’s exhale was shaky and relieved. She shut her eyes and pressed the tips of her fingers into them. Her shoulders slouched, then heaved.
“We’re going to be fine, dear,” Lena said. The phrasing was an echo of something she’d heard before.
Evan. She sounded like Rachel’s Evan, reaching through a dark, cold void, trying to manufacture a closeness from nothing.
Lena gripped Annie’s hand a little too hard. “It’s all going to be fine.”
CHAPTER SIXTY
Jen, supine atop her bedspread, cold bathroom towel compress over her eyes, could hear the vacuum in the kitchen.
At the gentle knock on the door, she lifted the compress. Paul hovered by the bed. “Abe is vacuuming up the glass,” he said worriedly.
“I don’t trust him anymore.”
Paul sat down next to her on the bed. “You just need a break.”
“Colin has an ulcer and is barely returning my texts, Laurel has a rock through her window, Harper got slashed. The bodies keep piling up. And I just defend him.”
“You love him.”
It wasn’t love. It was ego or pride or something even more animal, gnawing, ugly, selfish. If this was love, Jen didn’t understand how the world kept spinning under the weight of it.
“Well,” Paul said. “Abe’s cleaning up down there at his own insistence. I think he’s worried about you.”
“He’s worried about his getting his computer monitor,” Jen said dryly.
“He seems genuinely contrite and concerned.”
Jen gave Paul an incredulous look.
“I know, I know: I’m not here and I’m an idiot.” Paul’s voice was hurt. He was upset, still, about Jen’s accusations all of those months before over dinner.
“You’re not a total idiot.” She tried to smile.
“We talked for a long time. I don’t think he’s the vandal. Honestly, who even knows whether the conduct disorder label fits.”
“Are you kidding?”
“I’m not. He’s grown up a lot this year, Jen. He’s trying so hard, and if the diagnosis pins on his lack of remorse, well, let me tell you: he has buckets of remorse and self-doubt.”
Jen searched Paul’s face.
“Yes, it’s messed up that that’s good news, but welcome to our world. You do see the real him, Jen, that’s what I’m saying.”
Maybe this was what co-parenting Abe required: together on a seesaw, trading off who was grounded and who held sky-high delusions. This time it was Paul up where the air was too thin.