Well Behaved Wives(21)
Pammie had always loved animals, but Peter had said no to any pets, except for the occasional carnival goldfish won with the accurate toss of a ping-pong ball. Armed with only water from the spigot and fish food flakes, Pammie had kept her last fish alive for three months. She’d spent hours reading about goldfish, staring through the bowl.
Peter had said she was obsessed. Thinking about it now, Lillian would reclassify that as happy. Yes, happiness was an individual thing.
Though a goldfish wasn’t a dog, maybe this was a nudge. Pammie could work in a pet store or for a vet. She could study animal husbandry. Funny word. Lillian was steps ahead and decided to play devil’s advocate. “Taking care of a dog is different from playing with one,” she said to disguise her enthusiasm.
“It really would be a big help,” Mrs. Gold said. “I hate the idea of a kennel, but we’ll have to leave early in the morning, and we won’t be home until after dinner. How about if we do a trial run?”
Pammie nodded, with no attempt to hide her excitement. “When?”
Mrs. Gold glanced at her watch. “Tonight? Penny can come too—keep Susie out of our hair.”
Lillian’s daughters pleaded with clasped hands. Could she really say no to them?
“And they can stay for dinner if that’s okay. To learn Duke’s routine.”
“Are you sure?” Lillian asked, to be polite. She and Peter would have an evening to themselves.
Susie smiled and nodded. “We’re sure.”
Duke barked as if adding his vote, and they all laughed.
Mrs. Gold grabbed Duke’s leash, and Susie followed as they walked off across the lawn, waving at Sunny on the steps before she disappeared inside the front door. The girls changed into play clothes, which is how Lillian still thought of their casual after-school and weekend wear, even though Pammie and Penny had been too old to play for quite a while.
Lillian longed momentarily for the days of baby dolls, matching smocked dresses, and patent leather Mary Janes. She had taught her daughters about being a housewife because they’d watched her dote on Peter, watched how she single-mindedly focused on him and ignored herself.
It was time to rethink her daughters’ roles before it was too late.
Perhaps it was time to rethink her own and the example she set.
Lillian kissed the girls on their heads. “Mind your manners, but have fun.”
“What will you and Daddy do without us?” Penny asked.
Lillian pecked her younger daughter’s cheek for good measure. “We’ll think of something.”
Once the girls had walked past the hedges, Lillian turned to Sunny. “Why don’t you go home early? I’ll finish up dinner.”
Sunny’s mouth dropped open in faux protest while her hands began slipping on her sweater, buttoning it from the bottom up. “First a dog, now dinner. What has gotten into you?”
Lillian knew exactly what had gotten into her, and there’d be more of it before the night was up.
Chapter 10
LILLIAN
Lillian stood alone in her kitchen and pulled the red ties of her apron around in front of her and tied them in a large, symmetrical bow. She smoothed the fabric, her hand sliding over the blue rickrack trim and momentarily reaching into the empty patch pocket. The apron was a ploy, of course, as much as her Halloween hobo costume had been at age nine, complete with charcoal beard and a bindle fashioned from one of her father’s work shirts.
Lillian never cooked a morsel.
She peeked at the supper Sunny had prepared, as she had throughout her marriage.
These days, Sunny cleaned the Diamonds’ house twice a week and cooked on the third day, filling the Frigidaire with delicious family-style meals Lillian couldn’t have replicated if she’d tried—meatballs, meat loaf, brisket, pot roast, roast chicken. Baked chicken, chicken fricassee, chicken pot pie, cutlets, noodle soup.
And all the side dishes.
So long as supper was on the table, Peter didn’t care who had prepared it.
He never questioned Lillian’s happiness either, which could make tonight a challenge.
In college, there was work to be done by the motivated. Lillian, intent on making the world a better place, had stuffed envelopes until midnight for a local councilman, instead of attending parties. Her only complaint was the occasional paper cut, and she was content, knowing she was making a difference.
The exhilaration that accompanied her contribution had prompted her to volunteer for the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis when a friend asked her to. How exciting to work alongside the activist and fellow Philadelphian Miriam Moore, who was researching a polio vaccine. Lillian had agreed that as a healthy young lady, it was her duty to help.
Then, that junior-year summer, she’d seen Peter Diamond again on the Margate City beach. In his own way, Peter had adored Lillian since the moment they’d met on the same beach when she was fourteen, Pammie’s age. He had been a skinny fifteen-year-old and his family lived in their oceanfront house every summer, not a walk-up rental two blocks from the beach, like Lillian’s family.
She was living with her grandparents back then, and she’d wanted nothing more than to be plucked out of Overbrook Park, to be married, and to have a husband provide a life for her. That was all her grandparents wanted for her.
Peter excelled as a provider even then—when his teenage care consisted of buying ice cream from a vendor and giving her carefully chosen seashells, instead of this five-bedroom house with an iron gate.