Everything Leads to You(67)

“Why our house?” he asks, so I explain the part to him and I can tell that he likes the idea of it because he keeps looking around in awe and saying, “Who would have guessed?” and smiling.

“I’ll talk to Edie,” he says. “It’s fine with me, but you know who’s in charge around here.”

He winks, and just as I’m winking back, Ava calls, “Hello?” from the doorway.

“I can’t remember the last time I had so much unexpected company,” Frank says.

Charlotte says, “This is Ava.”

“Come in,” Frank says, and when Ava steps inside I get goose bumps again but for an altogether different reason. Her hair is swept off her shoulders with bobby pins. She’s wearing a camisole as a tank top, a light green satin that makes her eyes even brighter, makes me want to be nearer to her.

“Hi,” she says to all of us, and the rasp in her voice is enough to make me swoon.

But then I remember what she’s here for and that I didn’t have time to give Frank any warning.

“Frank, remember how we were looking for Caroline Maddox last time we were here and you told us that she had a baby?”

He nods yes.

“We found her. This is Ava.”

Instead of turning to Ava he looks harder at me. At first I thought he might not have heard me, but then I realize that he’s just taking a moment to process this news, and I feel a trace of what I felt when I opened the door to Ava that first night. Like I’m trespassing again.

“I hope it’s okay that I came,” Ava says.

He finally turns to her.

“Sure, sweetheart. Sure. Come into the living room. Let’s have some of these cookies.”

He turns off the TV, and I feel even worse because clearly all he wants is to watch the Dodgers in peace and here we are ruining it.

Charlotte places the pink box on the coffee table next to all the magazines and opens the top. The cookies glisten up at us. Frank reaches for one.

“I suppose you want to hear the whole story.”

“If it’s okay,” Ava says. “The woman who adopted me never told me what happened.”

“That’s a shame.”

Frank takes off his glasses. He rubs his eyes.

“I don’t like to think about this sort of thing,” he says. “When I was a young man I fancied myself a philosopher. I enjoyed thinking about the tragedies of life. I thought all the feeling out of everything. But not anymore.”

“I’m so sorry, Frank,” I say. “We didn’t mean to upset you. We should have called before we came. I just got the idea about using your house for the movie and—”

“It’s all right,” he says. “So I’m upset. So what? It’s your life.” He glances at Ava and nods. “If you have a right to anything in this life, it’s to know your own history.”

He takes a bite of the cookie. Takes his time chewing and swallowing. We sit in silence and wait.

“So this is what happened,” he says. “When Caroline first moved in she would tease me about the state of the garden. Pitiful, she told me. You think you can do better? I asked her, and, well, she showed me. In a matter of weeks she cleaned it up, got it blooming. We would have long talks sometimes when we were out there working. She was a dreamer. Always imagining an extravagant future. A penthouse overlooking the ocean. That’s what she wanted someday. But for the time being, we had an arrangement about the flowers. She was to keep them pruned and watered, and we would help her out with the rent. She did it for a little while. But then she took a turn. It was clear just to look at her. Soon the garden was overgrown and the flowers were starting to wither. We hadn’t seen Caroline around for a couple of days. I started getting upset. Edie wanted me to take the responsibility away from her, but I knew she couldn’t afford the full rent, especially with the baby. With you, I mean.

“I had been calling her, you see? Calling and calling and she wouldn’t answer. But I knew she was around. Her car was in the lot and at night she’d have parties. Some of the neighbors would complain and once in a while Edie would go up there but I never wanted to get into it. You see, I really liked her. I thought she was the sweetest girl. She only showed me her sweet side. Maybe that’s why I looked the other way when she was a few days late on the rent and when she didn’t do the gardening she was supposed to. I was getting to the point where I was going to have to give into my wife, you see, and raise Caroline’s rent.