Neighborly(4)

“In a flower bed.”

“Always with the flower beds.” He lifts Zoe high in the air as she giggles. Yolanda recedes before I can officially meet her, but I have a feeling I will eventually. “It’s all fun and games until somebody loses their tulips!”

Sadie stretches her arms as if to say to Brandon, “Pick me up, too!” I do some knee bends to give her a ride of her own. I fear her fussiness. We’re trying to make an impression here.

Brandon says, “The thing I love about these parties is the freedom. Everyone watches everyone else’s kids. You can just take off and be an adult for a while.”

I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to just take off. I can’t picture not knowing that Sadie’s in a flower bed. But I love that I’m entering a world where people look after one another and each other’s children. It’s an enclave of trust and safety. I’ve never had that before, not even as a kid. Definitely not as a kid.

“There you are!” Tennyson, the sexy face painter, comes up to join us. “Leave it to Branstone to monopolize the guest of honor.” Brandon gives her a side hug. She has a beer bottle sweating in her hand, and I eye it enviously. It’s not the only thing I envy, since her body is incredible. She’s tan and fit, in a short black catsuit that is at once completely ridiculous and entirely flattering on her. Her face isn’t traditionally pretty (her eyes are close together and her lips are thin), but she just oozes good health and self-confidence. “I’m Tennyson.”

“I’m Kat.”

“Love that.” She swigs from her bottle and wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. A few stray brown strands escape her carelessly perfect bun. I have the sense that she’s at least forty or even forty-five—her sort of confidence feels like it’s grown into—but her smooth skin belies this. “How are you settling in?”

“Pretty well.”

It’s not exactly true. I’ve done as much unpacking as I can, but there’s still so much building and assembly for which I have to rely on Doug. Handiness is not my forte.

Tennyson lowers her head so she’s level with Sadie. She strokes Sadie’s hair, then closes her eyes rapturously. “I miss this age.”

Sadie reaches out and grabs one of Tennyson’s complicated dangling earrings. “No,” I admonish, trying to sound just the right amount of firm. It has no effect. I work to remove the earring from Sadie’s grasp, and she starts crying. “Sorry.” I know I shouldn’t feel embarrassed; she’s just a baby.

Tennyson is laughing. “No worries. I remember this age. She’s putting everything in her mouth, right? Dropping things twelve times in a row so you’ll pick them up?”

“The world’s just one big experiment in cause and effect,” I say.

“That’s a cool way to put it.”

Sadie’s stopped crying, thankfully, and is just studying the throng around us in fascination. She hasn’t been in a crowd for a long time, not since I fled the moms group.

“You look at that baby girl,” Brandon says, “and you know you need another.”

“I’m definitely not saying that,” Tennyson responds. “My IUD is staying right where it is, thank you.”

“You know who I’ve heard is trying for another?” Brandon looks around and hooks a thumb in the direction of a tall redhead I haven’t yet met. “After that labor of hers? Color me shocked.”

“You’re such a gossip.” Tennyson laughs.

“I don’t repeat any true secrets. I mean, you were going to find that out sooner or later anyway.” Brandon makes a convex motion with his hands to indicate a pregnant belly.

“When it comes to your children,” I say, “you forget the pain so fast.” They both give me curious looks. “I mean the pain of labor.” I have the sense of being out of sync, that they were speaking lightly and I went heavy. I try to paper over it by asking Tennyson, “Which kids are yours?”

A woman must have overheard because she joins our conversation, with a laugh like music. She’s short, her brown hair in a low-maintenance pageboy, wearing a plain tank top and jeans and holding a thumb-sucking toddler in her arms. “Which kids aren’t hers?” The phrase could seem barbed, yet her delivery is pure honey. She’s instantly endearing, with a round, childlike face and simple wire-framed glasses. She even smells innocent, like some sort of throwback soap. Do they still make Ivory? Tennyson has a scent that’s a little bit musky and a little bit spicy. Cardamom, maybe? It doesn’t even seem like a perfume, more like an emanation.

Tennyson points to the massive Colonial that’s directly across the street from my house. I’ve seen bands of teenagers trooping in and out of there since we arrived but hadn’t yet met the parents. “Yeah, we’re the Brady Bunch. Vic had four from his marriage, I had three from mine, and we had one together in a bout of total irresponsibility.”

“You’re the Brady Bunch, and she’s the Gerber baby,” the other woman says, her soft voice going even softer as she regards Sadie. Then she smiles at me. “I’m Raquel. And this is my little one, Meadow. We live in 1805. We’re the ones who need to take better care of our lawn.” It’s a good shorthand: ironically, Meadow lives in the only house with a patch of cappuccino-colored grass on the entire street.