Emily has her way, of course.
Dawn doesn't offer much argument. She gives in quite easily. We leave Emily's house around five, leaving her mother banging around noisily in the kitchen. We decide to take Emily's car and come back for mine later. Before heading to Stacey's, we drive downtown to the A&P for last minute sodas and garlic that Stacey called and requested we bring. Emily didn't tell Stacey about Dawn. I didn't expect her to. I doubt anyone did. Dawn will be our surprise for the party.
I suspect this won't end well.
Stacey lives on Elm Street with her mother. Her dad lives in New York. He's a jerk. Stacey's never said so, but I'm sure she knows. Emily, Julie, and I have discussed it quite often. Mr. McGill never sees Stacey. Several years ago, she visited him every other weekend, but now she doesn't even visit once a month. He's always canceling their plans. In the fall and winter, he never comes to Stacey's math competitions and in the spring, he doesn't come to her swim meets either. It's almost like he doesn't exist at all. My parents, at least, make an effort to attend my tennis matches and swim meets. They aren't always there, but they try.
Stacey is lucky though because she has Mrs. McGill for a mother. Everyone likes Mrs. McGill. It's sort of like how everyone likes Mrs. Stern, except that Mrs. McGill is normal. My mother is very fond of Mrs. McGill. Mom likes Mrs. Stern, too, but Mrs. Stern confuses her. They don't really have anything in common. But Mrs. McGill is very stylish and she and Mom can talk about clothes and about New York, where they both used to live. I think my mother has missed that in a way, having things in common with another mother, like she used to with Mrs. Mason before they grew apart.
"Maybe this isn't such a great idea," Dawn says, doubtfully, when we're standing on Stacey's porch and Julie's rung the doorbell.
"Nonsense," Emily replies. "We're setting this straight tonight. This has gone on long enough. You can't spend the entire summer bickering over...over whatever it is you're bickering over. And really, who wants to live with their grandparents?"
"I don't mind," Dawn says.
I remain quiet. I'm not sure I could live with Gran very long.
The door opens and Stacey stands inside the foyer, grinning. "Hey!" she exclaims and then her grin drops momentarily when she spots Dawn standing behind Julie. Stacey recovers without missing a beat, but there's worry flickering in her eyes. "Hey everyone! Come on in!" Stacey cries and steps back, holding the door open.
"Look who we found," Emily says, leading the way into Stacey's house. "We invited her along. I hope that's okay. My mother says she's sorry but she doesn't have any garlic. Don't worry, we picked some up at the A&P along with the sodas."
"Thanks," Stacey says and shuts the door behind Dawn, the last one inside the house. "We only have diet. Mary Anne and I forgot to buy anything else. Um...hi, Dawn. How are you?"
"I'm fine," Dawn answers and folds her arms over her chest. She glances around, searching for Mary Anne.
"Mary Anne's in the kitchen," Stacey says, as if reading Dawn's thoughts. "Um...let me...I'll be right back." Stacey turns and rushes out of the foyer and through the living room and dining room.
"Are we just supposed to stand here?" Julie asks, shifting the grocery sack in her arms.
"We'll give them a minute," I tell her and go into the living room where I lean back against the couch. I reach my arm over the side and scratch Stacey's cat's head. He's curled up asleep on one of the cushions. Stacey really needs to put him on a diet. I don't know how the cat isn't dead yet.
Stacey reappears from the dining room with Mary Anne behind her. Neither of them are smiling, their expressions unreadable. They stop and stand together, side by side, facing the rest of us. Stacey finally smiles, the corners of her mouth turning upward slightly. "We're almost ready," she announces.
Emily, Julie, and I don't reply. We're waiting for Mary Anne or Dawn to speak.
Dawn breaks the silence first. "Hey, Mary Anne," she says, casually, arms still folded. It's strange how her usual self-confidence abandons her so readily.
"Hi, Dawn," Mary Anne replies, stiffly. She has her arms straight at her sides, appearing very formal and awkward. Maybe she feels it because she slips her hands into the front pockets of her jean shorts. "How are you? How are your grandparents?"
"We're all fine," Dawn answers. "How are things at the McGills?"
"Great."
Another uncomfortable silence sinks around us until Emily crashes through it and announces, "I'm thirsty!" and charges through the living room, right between Stacey and Mary Anne and waves her arm for us to follow her. Sometimes Emily's pushiness is a blessing.
Emily's first through the kitchen door with Julie and I right behind her. The three of us freeze in place the moment we're inside the kitchen, causing Dawn and Stacey to bump into us. Mrs. McGill's standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot and beside her is Mallory Pike. I groan, inwardly. I should have known. Mallory Pike pops up everywhere. Stacey feels some kind of obligation toward her because she and Mallory and Mary Anne were in the same baby-sitting club in middle school. Mary Anne pretends, but I know she doesn't feel the same way toward Mallory that Stacey does. Maybe it has something to do with, too, that Stacey's and Mallory's mothers used to be best friends. They aren't friends anymore. Stacey isn't sure why, but I think I know - Mrs. McGill wised up. There must be something wrong with Mrs. Pike. She raised Mallory after all.
"Mallory came over to borrow a pair of sandals, so I invited her to stay," Stacey tells us, cheerfully. She knows how Emily, Julie, and I feel about Mallory. Julie tolerates Mallory best of all. Julie can tolerate most anyone.
Mallory turns around and regards us, leaning back with her palms against the countertop. Her red-orange hair is pulled back in a tight ponytail and she's wearing a skimpy green floral-print sundress. Mallory typically looks vaguely skanky. She'll be pregnant soon, I'm sure. "Hello," Mallory greets us, coolly. She raises an eyebrow. "Hello, Dawn," she says and glances over, questioningly, at Stacey and Mary Anne.
"Hey, Mal," Dawn replies and the rest of us echo a hello after her.
Mrs. McGill turns around, smiling at us, and sets her spoon on the spoon rest. "Hi, girls. I hope you're hungry. Stacey and Mary Anne have been working hard on dinner. I've been supervising, so it's safe to eat."
"Thanks, Mom," Stacey says with a touch of crabbiness in her voice. She and Mrs. McGill don't always get along. Stacey claims Mrs. McGill nags her too often. I agree that Mrs. McGill is a bit clingy and overprotective and I'd never want my mother to be like that, but Mrs. McGill isn't so bad. She could be much worse. She could be Mrs. Bernstein.
"And it's really nice to see you again, Dawn," Mrs. McGill says, wiping her hands on a dishtowel and crossing the kitchen to where Dawn stands. She puts an arm around Dawn and squeezes her arm. "I haven't seen you since last summer at least. It's nice to see all of you again. Stacey and I are both so busy these days, it seems none of you are ever here."
"We'd probably come more often if you kept better food in the house," Julie tells her.
"Julie!" Stacey exclaims and Mrs. McGill looks surprised, but doesn't say anything.
Julie acts like Stacey didn't protest and goes to stand beside Mallory at the stove. "What are we having for dinner?" she asks.
"Pasta with marinara sauce," Mary Anne answers and joins Julie and Mallory at the stove. She glances over her shoulder, briefly, back at Dawn. It's impossible to tell what she's thinking. "We're making garlic cheese bread, too. That's why we needed the garlic. We used all of ours in the sauce. We made dessert, too. It's a surprise though."
"You're in luck, Dawn," I say, lightly. "No red meat."
Everyone laughs, sort of uncomfortably. Even Mary Anne may chuckle. Her back is to me and I can't tell.
"We would have made meat sauce," Mary Anne says, more into the pot than to any of us, "but Emily can't eat meat and dairy together."
I get the feeling Mary Anne's now disappointed about this.
Dawn senses this, too. I can see it in her face.
"What would everyone like to drink?" Stacey asks, jumping in. She and Mrs. McGill begin pulling glasses out of the cabinet and filling them with ice. Meanwhile, Mary Anne starts dicing the garlic gloves on the cutting board and beside her, Mallory grates the cheese for the bread. I'm uncertain how I feel about Mallory Pike preparing my food. Hopefully, anything she may carry will be neutralized in the oven.
Emily, Julie, Dawn and I sit down at the table while the others bustle around, finishing last minute tasks. The plates and silverware have already been set out on the dining room table, so there isn't much left to do. We chat for awhile with Stacey and Mrs. McGill joining in every so often. Mary Anne doesn't say much and neither does Mallory. Mary Anne's just slid the bread into the oven when the telephone rings.
"Hey, Emily," I say to her, "I think your dad's calling for you to come home and fill out your Wellesley application."
"He is not," she snaps back. "He wouldn't do that. Besides, he'd never call here. He doesn't like to use the telephone unless he's calling relatives or the Sterns."
Mr. Bernstein is such a freak.
"That's for me," Mrs. McGill announces, untying her apron. "I'll take it in the den," she says and rushes out of the kitchen.
"She's in a hurry," I observe.
Stacey glances up from the bowl she's pouring the farfalle pasta into. "Yes," Stacey agrees. "I think something's going on at work. She's there all the time. I hope...I hope she's not going to lose her job or something." Stacey frowns and returns her attention to the pasta.
"I don't think so," Mary Anne says, tipping the marinara sauce into the bowl that Mallory's holding.
"Yes, why would they fire your mother?" I ask. "She has actual taste. She knows what she's doing. I've seen some of those people she works with. They should be fired based on what they wear to work."
Stacey smiles and walks out of the kitchen with the pasta. Mary Anne and Mallory follow behind her.
When they leave, Julie says, "I think we all know who Mrs. McGill's on the phone with right now." Julie raises her eyebrows up and down.
"Oh, shut up," I reply and toss a wadded up napkin at her.
"I won't even ask," Dawn says, "but I am wondering, Emily, how your father calls customers. Doesn't he ever have to do that?"
"Sometimes. Usually my mother does it though."
"Your dad's weird, Emily," I inform her. It's the truth and she must already know.
"He is not. He's - " Emily begins, irritably, but Stacey interrupts by flying back into the kitchen and announcing, "We're ready!"
The four of us pick up our glasses and follow Stacey into the dining room. Mary Anne and Mallory are already seated at the dining table. Stacey slides into the chair at the head of the table to Mary Anne's left. Interestingly enough, Dawn pulls out the chair directly across from Mary Anne. I end up next to Dawn, between her and Mallory, which is not my ideal placement. Mallory reeks of cigarettes. Emily and Julie sit on the opposite side with Mary Anne.
"Are we supposed to wait for your mother?" I ask Stacey.
Stacey looks over her shoulder toward the den. The door is shut, but we can hear Mrs. McGill laughing on the other side. "No," Stacey replies. "She'll be on the phone for a while, I think. She promised to stay in the kitchen anyway. Good thing, too, because I'm sort of upset with her. We had an argument this morning and she hasn't apologized, even though it was completely her fault."
"What was the argument about?" Julie asks, scooping the farfalle noodles onto her plate.
"Something stupid. She got mad because I forgot to unload the dishwasher last night. She's so testy sometimes. I don't know what's wrong with her. Do you think she's pre-menopausal?"
"How old is she?" I ask.
"Forty-two."
"Maybe so," I say and take the bowl of pasta from Mallory. "Or maybe she's just upset that you didn't unload the dishwasher."
"Well, she didn't have to get so worked up about it," Stacey replies and tightens the band at the end of her french braid. She brushes several bread crumbs off the front of her red tank top. "She can be so ridiculous sometimes. You know how it is." Stacey rolls her eyes.
I shrug and spear several noodles with my fork. I take a bite and fight the urge to spit it back out. "This is really garlic-y," I say when I've managed to swallow.
Across the table, Emily and Julie have just put forkfuls of pasta into their mouths. They wear identical, peculiar expressions on their faces, but turn them up with smiles while they chew.
"Really garlic-y," Julie agrees with a forced smile.
Stacey's eyes widen. "Is there too much garlic?" she asks, worriedly.
"I like it," Dawn says and takes a heaping bite.
"So do I," Mallory echoes.
"Well, when you live in a zoo, I suppose you're used to eating anything," I tell her and then pause before adding, "But this is really good," and shove down another bite. Mrs. McGill was obviously not paying close enough attention.
Stacey and Mary Anne share a smile and continue eating. After a couple minutes, Stacey stands, picking her glass up off the table. "I'm getting another diet soda, does anyone else need anything?"
"More root beer," Julie and Emily say together. It creeps me out when they do that.
"Can I have some more ginger ale?" Dawn asks.
"Sure," Stacey says.
"I'll help you, Stace," Mary Anne offers, rising from the table. She takes Emily and Julie's outstretched glasses, but ignores Dawn's.
When Stacey and Mary Anne vanish into the kitchen, Julie drops her fork and hisses, "Emily, what was your mother making for dinner tonight?"
"I don't know. I could call and ask her. Is Mrs. McGill off the phone yet?"
I cock my head to the side and listen. Faintly, I hear Mrs. McGill's voice. "No," I tell them. "But when she gets off, go call."
"I don't know what you're all complaining about," Dawn says, polishing off the rest of her pasta. "This is great."
"Here you go then," I tell her, tilting my plate over hers and scraping my pasta onto it.
"Mine, too!" Emily cries, thrusting her plate across the table. I switch it with mine and have half of Emily's pasta on Dawn's plate when Stacey and Mary Anne return from the kitchen. I scowl down at the plate when I realize that now I have to pretend to enjoy the rest while Emily has a clean plate. I turn my scowl on her and she smiles.
"Grace, Julie, and Emily hate your food," Mallory informs Stacey and Mary Anne.
Their faces fall. Mary Anne appears absolutely crushed.
"Ow!" Mallory screams. "That's my foot!"
Julie smirks at her.
"We do not hate it," Emily insists and lifts her plate. "See, I ate all of mine and Grace is nearly done with hers."
"You are such a liar, Emily Bernstein!" Mallory exclaims, reaching down to rub her foot. "What kind of a Jew are you, lying to your friends like that? You scraped your food onto Dawn's plate!"
"I did not!"
"She did not," Dawn agrees, stabbing her fork into the pasta. She sips her ginger ale before taking the bite.
Mary Anne glares at Dawn. "Well, now we know you're all lying!" Mary Anne cries.
"When have I ever lied to you?" Dawn asks.
Mary Anne doesn't answer. She pulls on one of her loose pigtails and stares down at her half-eaten dinner.
"I've never lied to you," Dawn tells her.
"No, but you know what you did," Mary Anne replies, angrily.
"That? That is so stupid, Mary Anne! I didn't do anything to you! Stop blaming me! Blame my mother, blame your father, blame yourself! I'm not even involved in this!"
"Yes, you are. It's all about you. It's always all about Dawn," Mary Anne snaps and jumps out of her chair so fast, the chair falls over. Mary Anne storms out of the dining room, shoving through the door into the kitchen. It swings behind her and stills.
We sit silently, the seconds ticking past audibly from the clock on the wall above our heads. Finally, Stacey pushes back her chair and wordlessly follows after Mary Anne. The door hasn't even swung closed yet when Emily also stands. "This is all my fault," she says and hurries around the side of the table and through the kitchen door.
Dawn stands next. She doesn't speak to Julie, Mallory, or I. She stands and steps away from the table and goes into the kitchen. As the door closes behind her, we hear her say, "Mary Anne, I want to talk to you."
I whirl around to face Mallory. "What's wrong with you?" I demand. "Why are you even here? Shouldn't you be out getting impregnated by Ben Hobart?"
Mallory glares at me. "You should have just eaten the damn food, you stuck up bitch," she snaps. "I'm sorry it's not caviar and truffles."
"You're the one who started this!" I cry, voice rising. "We were pretending to like it! They never would have known! You just had to open your big fat mouth, didn't you? Instead of your foot, stick to inserting parts of Ben Hobart's anatomy in there!"
Across the table, Julie snorts.
"How Christian of you," Mallory replies and then flings her plate of pasta in my face.
Julie gasps.
I am stunned.
The warm sauce slides down my face and neck, dripping onto my green sleeveless blouse and down the gap between my breasts. Several farfalle noodles have slipped there, too, and gathered with the sauce in my hair. I wipe the sauce from my brow with the back of my hand.
"Ah..." I say with a sigh and pick up my plate and dump it in Mallory's lap.
"Dammit!" Mallory shrieks, jumping up. "That's hot!"
"Certainly that's not the only burning sensation you've felt down there," I reply, calmly, and begin picking the noodles out of my hair.
Mallory reaches out and yanks my hair. She grips it hard as I yelp, tugging me up from my chair. "Let go!" I shout, flailing my arms at her and the next thing I know, Julie's crawling across the table, yelling at Mallory and lunging for her. Julie misses. She tumbles off the table and lands on her side at my feet. I trip over her and go down with Mallory's death grip still on my hair, twisting it and pulling it. Mallory comes down, too, and the three of us are on the ground, in a hair pulling tangle when the kitchen door swings open again and the others charge out in a line.
Dawn and Mary Anne are arguing.
They stop when they see us.
"What's going on?" Stacey demands.
Mallory releases my hair. I release Julie's ponytail, which I thought belonged to Mallory.
I sit up and run my fingers back through my hair. "There's nothing going on," I reply.
Mary Anne spins around to face Dawn. "See what you've started?" she exclaims.
"Me?" Dawn squeaks. "How can you blame me for this? You know what? I'm done. I'm calling Granny and Pop-Pop." Dawn starts to walk away.
"Yes! Yes!" Mary Anne calls after her. "Run away! That's all you ever do! Run away and leave the mess behind!"
Dawn freezes in mid-step. She remains frozen, frozen like the time and air around us.
"Run away!" Mary Anne repeats, loud and furious.
Mrs. McGill appears in the doorway. "Girls!" she exclaims, surveying the scene. "What is going on in here?"
No one answers.
Dawn walks away and slips past Mrs. McGill in the doorway. Her Birkenstocks sound her retreat, smacking dully against the living room carpet and then louder against the foyer tile. The den door closes.
"Well?" Mrs. McGill asks, hands on her hips.
"Nothing's going on, Mom," Stacey lies.
Mrs. McGill looks at Stacey, critically, doubtfully and moves her eyes across Emily and Mary Anne, and then down to the floor where Julie, Mallory, and I still sit. She stares at us. "Mallory Pike! Grace Blume! Julie Stern!" she cries. "What have you been doing?"
"Just enjoying this delicious meal," Julie answers.
Mrs. McGill stares at us a moment longer. "Mallory..." she finally speaks, calm and serious, "why don't you go home now? In fact, I think it's best that everyone goes home."
I rise to my feet, shaking back my hair. My insides grow warm. I can't believe Mrs. McGill is tossing us out of her home. I remain unruffled. I offer a hand to Julie and help pull her to her feet. I leave Mallory alone on the floor. It's up to her to bring herself up again.
"Of course, Mrs. McGill," I say, pleasantly. "We're very sorry."
At the front of the house, the den door creaks open, followed by the front door. It shuts quietly. Dawn has left.
"Where is Dawn going?" Mrs. McGill wants to know.
"She called her grandparents," Stacey replies.
Mrs. McGill nods and glances around again. "Please clean up this mess, girls," she tells us and then pushes through the door into the kitchen.
I don't know when I was last so embarrassed.
"Why don't you just go home, Mal?" Stacey suggests.
Mallory doesn't look at us. She simply leaves, slipping through the kitchen door without a word. I hope we are done with her now. I hope Stacey is done. Done like Dawn, fed up and final.
I crouch down and begin picking the noodles off the carpet. Julie and Emily join me. Stacey and Mary Anne remain in place where they are, not speaking, not moving. I wonder what passes silently between them. They speak, like Emily and Julie, without words.
Mary Anne begins toward the doorway to the living room. She begins and halts. She stands there several moments, underneath the ticking of the clock, stands and stares through the archway at the front door. The moments drag on at a near stop and finally, Mary Anne turns back around and goes into the kitchen. We hear her voice mixing with Mrs. McGill's as the door swings shut.
"We're sorry," I tell Stacey.
Julie nods. "We are," she agrees. "But that crazy Mallory Pike started it."
"Mallory is my friend, too," Stacey replies. She isn't angry. Her words are simple, spoken as the honest truth. "But I understand."
Dawn is gone when Emily, Julie, and I go out the front door. We assume her grandparents came for her. We circle the neighborhood twice in Emily's Toyota, but we never see her, so we turn back around and head to Emily's house.
"I feel really bad," Emily says when she pulls up to the curb outside her house.
"What happened in the kitchen?" I ask.
"Not much," she answers. "Nothing much that made any sense anyway. I suppose Dawn and Mary Anne know what they're talking about, but it sounds like gibberish to me."
"You know what?" Julie says, unlatching her seatbelt. "I don't think either of them has any idea why they're mad at each other. They're just mad."
"Maybe," I agree and open the car door and step out into the warm June air.
"Do you want to come in?" Emily asks me when she's also out of the car. She shuts her door. "We can see what my mother made for dinner. "
I shake my head. "No thanks," I say and begin walking to my Corvette, searching through my purse for my keys. "I'll call you tomorrow."
Emily and Julie wave goodbye and start up the walk to Emily's house. One of Emily's many cats is on the path and rolls over as they approach. Emily scoops it up and carries it inside. The door closes behind them as I turn over my car.
My parents are home when I pull into the garage. I feel the hood of their Lexus as I pass by. It's cool. They've been home awhile. I come into the kitchen through the garage and toss my purse on the counter. The house is very quiet. Odd since when my parents are home, my mother's voice usually fills the house, loud and wanting to be heard. I open the refrigerator and pull out a pineapple soda, pop the tab, and take a sip, surveying the refrigerator contents for something good to eat. I settle on a granola bar from the pantry.
"Is that Grace?" my mother's voice rings out from the living room.
"No. It's a burglar," I call back.
"Thanks for the warning!"
I come out of the kitchen with my soda and granola bar. Mom and Dad are in the living room on the couch. Dad's stretched across the couch on his back, his head resting in Mom's lap. He's removed his jacket and tie. His glasses rest on the coffee table. Mom's massaging his temples with her fingers.
Mom looks up at me when I enter. "What happened to you?" she asks.
For a moment, I'm puzzled. Then I remember that although I wiped off my face and neck at Stacey's, there's still dried sauce on my shirt and in my hair. I sit down in the armchair opposite Mom and Dad. I cross my legs and hold my soda can on my right knee. "Mallory Pike threw pasta on me," I tell her.
"Someone threw pasta on you?" Dad asks without opening his eyes.
"Why is some girl throwing pasta on you?" Mom demands.
I shrug. "Because she can't handle the truth that she's a whore," I answer.
"Well, that explains it then," Mom replies. "Should I call her mother?"
"No. Her mother may be even crazier than she is. What's wrong with Dad?"
"Hal had a rough day at work," Mom explains, continuing to massage Dad's temples. "It's a very stressful time in his department. He's overworked. Alla is no help. He has to do everything himself. Alla is a moron. I've been saying it for years. She's worthless."
"Alla isn't the problem," Dad replies.
"Shh..." Mom says, softly, covering his mouth with her hand. "You need peace and quiet." She bends down and kisses his forehead. Still massaging, she looks over at me and smiles. "What did you do today?" she asks in a voice barely above a whisper. Rarely does she speak so softly. "I called this afternoon but you didn't answer."
"I've been out all day. I went to Gran's and Emily's and Stacey's."
"A busy day. You went to my mother's again? What can you possibly be doing over there?"
I shrug. "She's helping me with my summer reading, remember? But we didn't do that today. She wasn't feeling well."
"Again? What the hell is wrong with her?"
"I don't know," I answer with another shrug. "She's like that sometimes."
"I know exactly what she's like," Mom says and looks away from me and down at Dad. "Is that better, Hal?" she asks him.
"Infinitely, my dear."
Mom smiles down at him. "Would you like me to fix you a drink?" she asks.
"Not now."
Mom lays her left hand on Dad's chest and with the other, strokes his head, slowly and fondly, smiling down at him. It feels like when I am with Emily and Julie or Stacey and Mary Anne and they enter their own world, wrapped up in each other and their private jokes and moments, and I remain on the outside, on the other side of the glass, peering in.
"You can't possibly sit around reading all the time," Mom says to me. "I know you, Grace. You don't like reading. What is it you're doing there? Is your grandmother filling your head with all sorts of nonsense?"
"No."
Mom's silent a moment, staring down at Dad. "Is she telling you things about me?"
"No. Not really," I reply. "Sometimes I watch her garden and sometimes we play tennis. We watch General Hospital. Gran listens well. She gives reasonable advice."
Mom snorts. "Really? I don't recall her ever giving me any advice. No, that's not true. She once told me I have an overlarge forehead. Oh, wait, that wasn't advice. That was just an insult."
"Gran said you have an overlarge forehead?" I ask and raise an eyebrow. I study Mom. Her forehead is a bit high. Self-consciously, I touch my own.
"I like your forehead," Dad says to Mom. "It's one of your most attractive features. After your hair and your eyes. And your legs."
"And my ass and my breasts."
"You have lovely hands, too."
"Well, as long as my enormous forehead cracks the top ten," Mom says, lightly, and smiles. Her eyes don't match the smile.
"She's never said anything about your forehead to me," I tell Mom and it's the truth. "Today, she said that you're very lovely." That is also the truth.
Mom eyes me suspiciously. "I'm sure there was an insult hidden in there somewhere," she says.
"I don't think so," I reply and know that's a lie. It doesn't matter. I know Mom likely doesn't believe me anyway. "Also today, Gran told me about when you were born."
Mom looks over, startled. "She did?" Mom asks, surprised. "What did she tell you?"
"About choosing your name."
"Oh..." Mom says and her face relaxes. "My mother certainly has become chatty in her old age. I think she says more to you in a single day than she's said to me in my entire life."
I watch Mom a moment, considering her reaction. I let it pass. "She said your father wanted to name you Vivian. She said she had already chosen Fay."
Mom snorts again. "If there's anything in this life I can thank my mother for, it's for giving me a decent name. Vivian! How awful. I can't believe my name isn't Vivian. I credit the drugs. Your grandmother must have been heavily doped up to be so insistent about my name. Had she been in her usual state of mind, we'd all be named Vivian."
"I like Vivian," Dad says.
"I don't," Mom replies.
"Who chose my name?" I ask. I've never thought to wonder, let alone ask. My parents rarely speak of when my mother was pregnant or when I was born or when I was a baby. My past is sketchy like theirs, bits and pieces dropped into the open, a million others hidden away, and unspoken.
"Your name?" Mom says and glances down at Dad. "Hmm...do you remember, Hal? I think we chose it together."
"We did," Dad agrees.
"Yes," Mom says with a nod. She turns back to me. "We bought a name book and went through it together and circled all the names we liked. I don't remember the other ones. Do you, Hal?"
"Morgan."
I wrinkle my nose.
Mom laughs. "It's a perfectly fine name! Your father wanted to name you Fiona after the company. He thought it might get him another promotion."
"Thank you for not naming me Fiona," I reply and twist the tab on my soda can. "Did you buy the book together?"
"I guess so. Probably. Why?"
I shrug. "No reason," I say, even though it suddenly seems very important knowing that they went out together to purchase the book and then sat together on the couch in their apartment, turning the pages, reading names aloud and circling the ones they liked, marking out the ones they did not. If she made that kind of effort, Mom couldn't have been so upset about me anymore.
Mom smiles at me, then turns her attention to Dad. She bends down and kisses his forehead. "How is your head?" she asks him.
"Better. Thank you, my dear," he says and takes her left wrist and presses his lips to it.
In the morning, when I wake, there's a Post-It note stuck to my forehead. I lift it off and turn it over. Written in my mother's handwriting is: Vanessa!