Class(92)

“I’ll give it some thought,” Karen promised him. And for a second or two, she actually did…

Later that night, they got incredibly drunk and had incredible sex—at least from what she remembered the next day.

In the morning, they slept in, then went snorkeling and saw neon fish in shades of blue and orange. After lunch, they lounged around the pool. In the late afternoon, drunk on the sun, they collapsed on the bed. They’d just begun to make love again when Clay paused, crinkled up his eyes, and said, “Do you ever just think for a moment that the crazy people might actually be right, and the world is about to end or something? Like all that hokey stuff about the Messiah showing up and passing judgment is actually going to happen. And that God really is some old white guy with a long white beard. Wouldn’t that be hilarious?”

“To be honest, I don’t spend that much time worrying about it,” said Karen, laughing. “But I do worry I’m one of the crazy people.”

“Well, then, come here, Crazy Karen Kipple from College,” said Clay, pulling her on top of him. He was laughing too.

At that same moment Karen saw her phone vibrating across the room. In her attempt to block out real life, Karen had turned off the ringer before she’d even gotten on the plane. At first, she tried to ignore it. Then it happened again. It was clear that someone was trying to reach her. But whatever it was, couldn’t it wait?

Clay was sliding down her bathing suit when, across the room, Karen saw her phone shimmying yet again. By then, she was deep in the throes of her own internal vibrations and able to block out the sight. Another ten minutes must have gone by. Or maybe it was twenty. Finally, she collapsed in a heap, and then so did Clay. Then she remembered again, slid off the bed. “Where are you going?” he murmured.

“One second,” she said.

It turned out there were seven missed calls from Matt’s cell, and he’d left four messages. Karen stood frozen as she listened to the first one, a constricted feeling in her chest. “Please call me,” he said. That message was followed by “Can you please call me, wherever you are?” And then “Jesus Karen, I don’t know where you are but please for the love of Mary, call home—it’s an emergency.” And finally, “This is fucking ridiculous. Where the fuck are you? I’m so sick of this bullshit. Do you even care that your daughter is in the emergency room? Yes, that’s right. She had an accident on the monkey bars this morning and got taken away in an ambulance, and you’re completely AWOL.”

Karen felt as if her head had become detached from her body. “Oh my God—this can’t be happening,” she said.

“What can’t be happening?” asked Clay from across the room, his eyes still mostly closed.

“Ruby—my daughter—she’s had some kind of accident in the playground, and she’s in the ER.” Karen grabbed her clothes off the floor and began struggling frantically to fit her arms and legs into the appropriate holes.

“Oh—shit,” he said, lifting himself up onto his elbows and half opening his eyes. “What happened?”

“She fell off the play structure or something. I don’t know.”

“What’s a play structure?” said Clay.

“You know—a jungle gym,” said Karen, swallowing her words. Socially conscious parents didn’t use the term anymore; it was considered retro, if not vaguely racist, though Karen wasn’t entirely sure why. But Clay probably wasn’t up on stuff like that.

“Kar—I’m sure it’s not that bad,” he said.

“Why are you so sure?” she said, shimmying her skirt over her hips.

“Kids fall all the time. That’s, like, the whole point of being a kid.”

“Clay, she got taken away in an ambulance!” said Karen, fitting her feet into her sandals while she tried and repeatedly failed to button the top of her skirt. “I’ve got to go back to the airport.”

“Karen—wait—you’re panicking for no reason,” he said.

“Of course I’m panicking!”

“But, I mean, isn’t your—husband there to deal with it?”

“Yeah, but I’m her mother!”

“Okay but—”

“But what?” Karen paused to search his face.

Clay grimaced, looked away, sighed. “It’s just—we have a whole day and night left.”

Did he really expect her to fit in a last day of kite-surfing or beachcombing before she left? “Clay, I’m really sorry,” she said. “I’m disappointed too. But I can’t stay.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do here all alone?” he said, sitting upright and sounding almost—was it possible?—peeved. As if she were letting him down, ruining the weekend. It was all about Clay, even when it was about someone else. And this was apparently Clay in a crisis, looking out for his own interests.

Or maybe those were the only interests he was able to recognize. “I don’t know—pick up one of those tiki-bar waitresses at the other end of the beach,” Karen shot back.

“Gee—thanks for the permission,” Clay replied, his tone sarcastic.

But Karen had more pressing concerns than her married lover having to fend for himself for twenty-four whole hours. She dialed Matt from the side of the pool, her heart thumping so hard it hurt. The phone rang. Please let Ruby be okay, she prayed to an old man with a white beard, just in case he turned out to be real.