The Neighbor's Secret(23)

“Of all our happy topics, this one is always my favorite,” Paul said.

“We can’t die, you know. Ever.”

“So you’ve informed me.”

The Mercedes in front of them suddenly stopped short and began backing up in a fruitless attempt to turn left on a road that was mostly behind them.

Paul slammed on the brakes and then the horn. “Asshole,” he said. “There’s no room behind me. Where do they want me to even go?”

“I’ll run in from here.” She opened the door. “Watch something calming on your phone.”

The town park in the middle of Main Street was an ode to autumn, with clusters of pumpkins and red-and-yellow leaf garlands twined around the lampposts. People wore knit scarves and tall boots and everything appeared gilded by the sunlight, which was so thick as to look artificial.

A dozen kids around Abe’s age had overtaken some of the picnic tables. Their laughter, the effortless way they bit into each other’s burritos and leaned their gawky bodies against each other, gave Jen an ache deep within her body.

Not a sociopath among them, she suspected.

(Although Dr. Shapiro had told them that it was more common than you’d think. A lot of CEOs, she’d said matter-of-factly.)

Jen sprinted to the baker’s stand, grabbed the last two baguettes, and then because the line was brief, and she and Paul deserved it, made her way to the good espresso cart.

Jen decided that she felt relatively calm. They had a plan now, which was good. It was always better to have a plan.

The two women at the front of the line left with their paper cups and waved at Jen: Priya and Janine from book club.

“Those beautiful pumpkins are a slap in the face,” Janine said, after the cheek-pressing had been completed. She was referring to the crop of large pumpkins clustered around the gazebo.

“Why?” Jen said.

“Because of the vandal,” Priya explained.

“What’d he do now?”

“Pissed all over Pumpkin Walk,” Janine said.

Cottonwood had several Halloween celebrations and Pumpkin Walk was, if memory served, the one where everyone put an intricately carved jack-o’-lantern on their stoop.

“Oh dear,” Jen said. “Not literally?”

“Metaphorically. As in he went house to house and smashed all of our carved pumpkins.”

“Not all of them,” Priya said.

“Enough of them,” Janine said. “We called the police and they don’t care. Wouldn’t you think they would?” She eyed the baguettes under Jen’s arm. “Is that from Glenwood Bakers? Did you happen to notice if there’re any left?”

“These were the last.”

The way Janine’s face crumpled disturbed Jen as much as anything had this morning: the woman always seemed so impervious.

Jen handed her a loaf.

“You,” Janine said, “are the absolute nicest. Is Foothills off too on Monday? Because we’re all getting together at my house to make caramel apples. You and Abe should come.”

Own it, Jen.

“Abe isn’t at Foothills anymore.”

“Why?”

Just a little conduct disorder.

“He’s an anxious kid,” Jen said. “It wasn’t a good fit.”

“Katie gets anxious too,” Janine said. “She’s a perfectionist. We’ve been really happy with Sacred Heart. Small and cozy. You should check it out.”

“Do you guys know anything about the Kingdom School?”

“Nan and Wes’s school?” Priya said.

“Nan Smalls, yes. Is it very religious?”

“I’d assume. They left my church because it was too loosey-goosey,” Priya said. “Nan is amazingly compassionate.”

“Does she live in Cottonwood? I was trying to figure out where I’ve heard her name.”

“She lives closer to town.” Priya grimaced. “And you’ve probably heard about her son.”

Yes, that was it. Last year, Jen had sat down on one of the benches by the gazebo and noticed the gold plaque—IN MEMORY OF DANNY SMALLS, OUR ETERNAL ANGEL.

Who would have calculated his heartbreakingly short life span? Jen had found an article online about a memorial 5K in honor of Danny Smalls, drowned, age four, in a swimming pool. There had been a photo of an adorable chubby-cheeked boy.

Jen hated to use someone else’s tragedy for perspective, but sometimes it worked that way, as a reminder that it could always be so much worse.





CHAPTER NINE



The cancer memoir was divisive from the start. Most declared it to be the world’s greatest love story, but a small and extremely vocal cadre dismissed it as treacly garbage.

Jen Chun-Pagano led the Treacly Garbage group, whose main complaint was that the wife didn’t seem like a real person.

But she is a real person, insisted the Greatest Love Story contingent. It’s a memoir.

“What pediatrician do you know who rides a motorcycle,” Priya said, “and swigs absinthe straight from the bottle? She’s a fantasy.”

Jen pumped her arms. Yes! Exactly, and Janine scolded them both for picking apart a man’s memories of his dead wife, because some things should be sacred, and yes, the author had gotten remarried suspiciously quickly after his wife’s death, but who was the Cottonwood Book Club to tell him how to grieve?