The Queen of Hearts(60)
“Yes.”
“I look very attractive, sweetie dear.” She twirled.
“Where did you get those clothes, Lainie?”
“I traded.”
“With who?”
“I don’t know. Do you love it?”
Rowan was dispatched to help Delaney hunt for her clothes as Zadie and I tried to find Drew. The girls eventually returned with a bewildered two-year-old boy, who had been unable to articulate to his alarmed parents why he was now clad only in pink smocked overalls. Apologies were issued and suspiciously accepted; a clothing exchange was conducted. The Ansons and I slunk away.
“Thank you, baby,” Zadie called to Drew as he strode away from us with Delaney tucked like a football under one arm, her legs furiously churning in the air behind him. With his other arm, he was gesticulating at the twins, who appeared to be zooming in different directions. There was no sign of Rowan.
“Have a good jog,” he replied cheerfully over his shoulder, blowing her a kiss. I looked away.
We hit the sidewalk outside the church at a fast clip. The streets surrounding the church were a riotous blaze of fall colors: the gusty wind blew gold-and flame-colored leaves into our faces as we flew along. I concentrated on the rhythmic pounding of our shoes on the pavement, enjoying the absence of thought, until Zadie finally spoke.
“How are you?” she panted.
I answered the question honestly. “I’m depressed.”
She slowed to a trot and looked at me. “I know that’s normal, but it still sucks. I’m sorry.”
I nodded. “Right,” I said briskly. “Tell me what you’re thinking about how to approach the Packards.”
This seemed like a straightforward question to me—what exactly to say to them and how to phrase it—but Zadie launched into an analysis of first Boyd’s and then Betsy’s personalities, complete with anecdotes from her friendship with them, and how they’d reacted to various social occurrences, and how she’d reacted in turn to them, until my head was reeling with emotional overload. By the time she wrapped up, I decided just to trust her on the subject of the Packards.
“Tell me about the note from Nick.”
Her face, which had been cast in an expression of empathetic concern, became instantly animated. “The note!” she squawked. “Can you believe that? He’s still trying to make contact. Why would he care if we were friends?”
“He said that to me too,” I offered warily. This conversational path was strewn with potential pitfalls, but I couldn’t see a way to avoid it.
Zadie’s jog turned into an agitated hop. “I think he can’t relax unless he’s messing with somebody,” she said. “And he didn’t just send a note. There was an obscene pile of chocolate, too.”
“Did you keep it?” I asked.
“I did not,” she said piously. “I gave it to the front office people.”
“All of it? You didn’t have one bite?”
“Oh, shut up,” she growled. “It was too busy for me to get lunch that day.”
I smiled at her, but then I felt a flash of disquiet. I stopped jogging.
“I hate working with him,” I said to her quietly. “I hope you know that.”
Zadie stopped too. “Oh, Emma, I know you do,” she said, her big golden eyes glistening. “You are so good to me.” We were quiet for a moment, and then she grinned at me, her humor restored. “If you were thinking of having him murdered, you can proceed.”
“I’ll consider that carefully,” I said. I hadn’t followed through on my futile threat to ruin him after he’d joined my practice. At first I’d tried the noble route by simply ignoring him. This became more and more difficult, as he seemingly went out of his way to annoy me: he befriended the scheduler and sucked up all the best OR block time; he befriended Nestor Connolly, the hospital’s CEO, and somehow convinced him hepatobiliary surgeons should be excused from taking overflow trauma call; he befriended all the clerical girls on our shared surgical office floor, who now tittered and grimaced when I walked by. He turned my favorite scrub nurse against me. I endured it, because what else could I do? He possessed the ability to destroy what was left of my life.
Zadie started walking, but then stopped and gave me a big hug. “Nick can go to hell, Em,” she said. “I don’t care what he does. And it’s fine with me if you work with him; you do whatever you need to do to make that okay.”
“Thank you,” I said, marveling for the millionth time at her ability to love me, but she was already walking again. She looked back over her shoulder, reading something in my face.
“But, Emma,” she said cheerfully. “I was kidding. Don’t actually kill him.”
—
We returned to the gym in time for the boys’ last game. It was kind of cute, actually. I found myself watching intently, wondering if there was any way Henry would ever become this coordinated. I was graced with height, but I’m klutzy and dysfunctional when it comes to sports, and sadly, Wyatt wasn’t any better. Henry would have to figure out a way to socially compensate. Zadie’s son Finn was the opposite. I watched him as he strutted around the basketball court, blissfully ignorant of the fact that he was a tiny forty-six-pound white person. In his mind, apparently, he was Stephen Curry. He flicked a lock of sweaty hair out of his eyes and hollered, “Hey, guys! Guys! I’m open!”