The Neighbor's Secret(36)

The night’s one bright spot was that Lena found the discussion riveting. There was a spark of curiosity in her expression that Annie had never seen before.



* * *



“Everyone was so nice,” Lena said as she and Annie walked down Jen’s dark driveway to Annie’s car.

“I told you,” Annie said.

The storm had moved east and left behind a warm mist. Lena felt the evening’s exhilaration evaporate off her. “And those drinks were very strong.”

“Don’t worry.” Annie paused meaningfully before she opened the passenger door. “I’m fine to drive. I only had a sip.”

As Annie backed out of the driveway and turned onto the road, Lena looked out at the blur of lights below them. She rarely went out at night, and forgot how cozy the neighborhood could look after dark, how the house lights dotting the valley seemed so inviting.

“It’s a fun group,” Lena said. She had not admitted to even Melanie how nervous she’d been about book club. She was glad to have brought the cupcakes—they had loved them.

“How was it to see Harriet?”

“Good. She’s still a prolific note-taker.”

“It’s probably mostly gossip,” Annie said dryly. “She’s a bit of an information hoarder. Once, Deb peeked at her notepad and Harriet had scribbled down everything we’d said before the book discussion. Deb said, ‘Harriet, you can’t do that,’ but Harriet wasn’t even embarrassed.”

“She hasn’t changed a bit. Everyone seemed so familiar. They remind me of—”

“Who?”

They reminded Lena of her friends from the neighborhood, a generation before. That zinging heady energy of a group of women at ease with each other. Most of Lena’s friends from before had moved away, which was part life cycle and part, Lena suspected, a reaction to Tim’s accident, which had certainly popped Cottonwood’s bubble of safety.

Life—people—did succumb to patterns and rhythms. The neighborhood was an assembly line. Miniature fungible dolls on a conveyor belt, moving in, moving out. Low-stakes drama and routines year after year after year.

People thought their lives were so important, but they were tiny specks, ants. There were decisions that had seemed mammoth to Lena before, and she saw now they hadn’t mattered in the least.

She swallowed the rough lump in her throat. Sometimes the abstract thought of time passing, all that normalcy, all that minutiae that she’d missed out on, made Lena unbearably sad. Even with a bad marriage, she’d had such a nice little life.

Once she admitted a version of this truth to Dr. Friendly, who had given her a coping trick: look ahead to the concrete future, not back in the rearview mirror.

(Not very sensitive of you, Dr. Friendly, to rely on a car metaphor.)

In the immediate future, Lena would write Jen a thank-you note. She had done a lovely job hosting and decorating, although Lena wouldn’t have picked the floral print wallpaper in the powder room, which was too dark and overpowering for the small space. She knew from her design magazines that the pattern was on-trend, but something softer would have worked better.

They had pulled into Lena’s driveway, but Annie’s pensive expression kept Lena from reaching for the door handle.

“Is it normal?” Annie said. “The drinking? Because everyone acts like it’s some rite of passage.”

As Lena weighed her response, the car’s front seat seemed impossibly tiny.

“I’m not going to lie about the dangers,” she said. “But teenagers are idiots. They try things, they move on. You gave Laurel consequences, and you’re talking to her about it. That’s all you can do.”

Annie’s face screwed up, as if she was collecting courage to confess something. “There’s a family history of alcoholism,” she said in a rough blurt.

“Well,” Lena said gently, “I understand that.”

“You do, don’t you?” Annie’s mouth zipped tight, her eyes alight with a realized bond.

“It’s fairly common. People manage.” Lena felt her cheeks get hot and was glad for the darkness. She desperately wanted to return to the silliness and camaraderie from tonight. The group’s conversation had felt as welcoming as a warm hearth.

“I think they liked the cupcakes,” Lena said quickly. “Do you?”

“They loved the cupcakes,” Annie said. Sharp drops of rain had started up again, plopped onto the windshield.

“I’m planning to go again next month,” Lena said. “And maybe on one of those weekend walks Janine organizes.”

Annie snorted. “Janine will hunt you down if you don’t.”

“She seemed energetic enough to do just that.”

Annie smiled. “She has a confession, you know.”

“What?”

“Sorry. Inside joke.” Annie glanced at Lena. “Every time she gets tipsy and we read a steamy book, which is a lot, Janine confesses that she made out with a woman in college and it was hot and then she laughs about it for like a half hour. No one can figure out why she acts like it’s such a big deal, but fifty bucks she’s doing it right now.”



* * *



“Why do I feel like this.” Jen was aware that her voice was emerging in a Rex Harrison–esque sing-chant. “I only had two Stolis.”