I Liked My Life(24)

Brady wrote Happy Birthday! on the bathroom mirror with lipstick, the way I always had. Eve giggles at the effort, and also, I think, at seeing the display in a man’s handwriting. It does look funny. Yesterday I repeated the words lipstick mirror about three thousand times so he’d remember the tradition. His Come-to-Jesus-Moment after Eve’s accident hasn’t been the miracle transformation I’d imagined. He’s still too raw, too angry, and—since there’s no reason to sugarcoat anymore—too innately selfish. He wants to put Eve first, but not as much as he wants whatever the hell it is he wants. His inner dialogue is a wheel of excuses: next time … she won’t care … if I’d been sober I’d have handled it better.

Eve brushes her teeth, stupefied by the idea that I’ll miss her seventeenth birthday. And eighteenth. And nineteenth. As the number ticks up, she presses the brush harder and harder against her gums, lost by the enormity of how much time she has on earth without me. Minutes pass where Eve mentally disassociates from her physical action. Stop, I command. Stop. You’re hurting yourself. She receives my plea and returns to the present, spitting toothpaste into the sink. It’s bright red, her gums exposed. Eve swishes fresh water in her stinging mouth, then heads downstairs.

Brady has chocolate-chip pancakes going. That hasn’t been Eve’s favorite since she was nine and ate too many despite my warning, but she keeps that to herself. I’m nervous for them. I watch the scene play out as I imagine a writer finishes a chapter, hopeful the conclusion complements the rising action, but unsure it will.

“Happy birthday,” Brady says, as apprehensive as I am.

“I don’t know about that, but thanks.” She smirks. “I got your note. Was that color Kissalicious pink or Heart Stopper red?”

“It was called The One on Sale at CVS.”

Rory was at the pharmacy when Brady bought it. I didn’t want them to meet in that moment—Rory was frenzied, picking up nausea medication for her poor mother, and Brady wanted to get in and out without anyone noticing the lipstick he was embarrassed to be buying—but I was overruled by fate. Brady grabbed a basket on his way in, planning to hide the lipstick under a bag of chips. When he got to the cosmetics section, he realized he was being foolish and, rudely, abandoned the basket in the middle of the aisle. Along came Rory, rushing toward the exit, prescription in hand. When she tripped on his booby trap, Brady rushed to help. “I can’t believe someone left that there,” he said boldly.

Rory waved off the hand he offered. “Oh, I’m fine. But I am beginning to wonder at what age I’ll learn to watch where I’m going.” She picked up her purse before meeting Brady’s eyes.

Smile, I instructed Brady. He did, so she did. “You’re all right?”

“I am.”

“Too bad,” he said with a grin. “No grounds for a lawsuit.”

Rory laughed. “Which is a shame since my brother’s an attorney and I could use the money.”

As she turned to leave, Rory registered the lipstick in his hand. “Have a nice night,” she said, walking away.

“It’s for my daughter,” he called to her back.

She turned to wink. “Whatever you say.”

I couldn’t have orchestrated it better. They have a natural chemistry. With Eve’s tutoring starting next week, the timing is perfect.

“Hungry?” Brady asks, bringing me back to the moment.

“I’ll eat if you will,” Eve says.

“Is that a critique?”

“No,” she replies carefully, “but it’s a birthday wish.”

I help Brady take in the meaning of her words—your daughter is worried about you. He wonders when their roles reversed. “I’ve been eating, you know,” he says. “Just not at dinner.”

“Yeah, I figured, since you’re still here and all, but I’d like to see it firsthand.”

I’ve been encouraging Brady to show Eve his sense of humor, trying to lighten their interactions (as much for me as them), and I can tell he’s about to go for it. “You know what I absolutely love?”

He says it in a childish voice that piques Eve’s interest. “What?”

“Those cracked honey-mustard pretzels. They cut my mouth like shards of glass and give me cold sores, but even in my grief I can’t help myself. I’d have disappeared if it weren’t for those damn things.”

It’s such a genuine exchange, which is all Eve wants. She rewards him with a smile. “Whatever works, right?”

“Right.”

There’s a knock at the door. “It’s probably one of your adoring fans,” Eve says. “I’ll get it.”

“If you’re right, I’m not here.”

I find it hilarious how royally they’ve both misinterpreted the neighbors’ intentions. Susan Dundel aside, the women who stop by are doing so out of concern, for Eve more than Brady. They aren’t stalking him. It’s an organized schedule of twice-weekly check-ins. And they’re not all divorced; Brady’s innate cynicism has combined with his huge ego to determine that they have an ulterior motive and it must be him. Mary is a happily married therapist who was aggressive because she wanted to see Eve in her home environment to ensure everything was kosher. She wasn’t batting her eyelashes at Brady—she was scanning the foyer. The conversations are awkward because no one knows what the hell to say. It’s not like I died in a car accident.