What's Mine and Yours(52)
“Hey, good girl,” she said. “You’re fine.” She kissed her nose to give her courage, then sent her off to play.
Dusty wasn’t three yards away when a galloping Lab knocked her to the ground. Dusty snapped in fear, and the red Lab pinned her, its jaws at her neck. Dusty yelped and went still. A camp staffer reached them first, lifted the Lab’s hind legs to pull her off, then leashed her and drew her away. Diane crouched over Dusty. She whimpered, but there was no blood. If the Lab had wanted to hurt Dusty, she could have, but she hadn’t wanted to bite her, only to prove her dominance.
They took Noelle to the new barbecue place not far from the camp for dinner. It was on an otherwise desolate road, all trees and unlit houses. Hidden entrances to the state park were strewn between the trees, a creek snaking through them. This was the part of town where it was most common to find Confederate flags posted in the yards, but the barbecue joint was modern, all glass and neon lights. Nearly half the space was taken up by a wraparound bar in the center, the glittering bottles lined up in rows. It was a gastropub, or so the sign said: FINE BARBECUE AND FINER SPIRITS.
It embarrassed Diane how much she wanted her sister to like the place, to join in her life and approve of it. Noelle played along, oohing and aahing at the bourbon list. She ordered a fourteen-dollar shot and kale salad, while Diane and Alma got their usual: creamy draft beers and a towering plate of pulled-pork nachos. Noelle praised the food, too, but it didn’t make Diane feel any better. It was as if Noelle was indulging them, making do, although nothing was really up to her standards.
“I don’t know why it’s taken so long for a place like this to spring up,” Noelle said. “The university has always been close by. There have always been people here with money to spend. You used to have to drive to another city for a dinner like this.”
“Well, it’s whiter now,” Alma said. “Even in the time I’ve been here, it’s changed. The New Yorkers I used to meet were black women who moved down here in the nineties. Now the New Yorkers I meet are white women who just left Brooklyn.”
“Where are you meeting all these New Yorkers?”
“Book club. Yoga. Around.” Alma shrugged and drank her beer.
“Yoga? Your life is so cute,” Noelle said, and Alma answered her instantly: “I love it here.”
“I bet you do,” Noelle said, and sipped her bourbon. “I couldn’t picture you living in the suburbs. You’d stand out like a sore thumb.”
Alma went red and rose from the table, flustered. Diane watched her go. She hadn’t learned yet that Noelle didn’t mean to antagonize. When she was upset, she grew smug and started telling everyone who they were and who they weren’t.
“You know, for all your disdain for Mama, you can sure be a lot like her. You take out what’s bothering you on everyone else. You offended Alma.”
“I didn’t mean to,” Noelle said and gazed out the window, toward the black road. She looked almost penitent, although she had been icy since she arrived, as if she were bored by the whole ordeal: their mother’s cancer and North Carolina, the fact that they were back together. When they went to the hospital, Lacey May pursued her. She complimented Noelle’s hair, offered her fruit from her lunch tray, handed her the remote to the flat-screen. Noelle ignored her, reading or taking naps in the corner of the room with her sunglasses on. Occasionally, she chimed in on their conversations about neutral subjects—the weather, the kindness of the nurses—never politics or the president. Eventually, she would announce she was going for a coffee and leave. Ten minutes would pass, then an hour, and Diane would go and find Noelle in the parking lot smoking a cigarette. This was how Noelle transmitted to Diane she was ready to go—she left, and Diane followed.
If she didn’t want to be with them, why had she come at all?
“I noticed Nelson isn’t calling.”
“I’m not calling him either. It’s mutual.”
“I thought things were good,” Diane said and realized she didn’t know if it was true.
When they spoke on the phone, Noelle didn’t share much about her life, as if she couldn’t trust Diane simply because they were blood. They had been close once, or at least, that was what Diane remembered. Sometimes she wondered whether she had made it up: the ease of being together when they were girls.
“You think you two will sort it out?”
“Nelson isn’t really one to talk about things. Usually, I can draw him out when I need him. But he doesn’t seem to want that right now, and I’m not going to beg. I know how to take care of myself.”
“Sounds healthy,” Diane said, and she scanned the restaurant for Alma. She wanted to go home. A nice dinner with Noelle was impossible; she was a fool to have tried.
“It hasn’t been that long,” Noelle said. “I just knew I couldn’t handle trying to reach him on top of everything else. I stopped calling when I got here.”
“That was a week ago.”
Noelle shrugged. “A marriage is never harmonious.”
“I suppose it depends on who you marry.”
Noelle shook her head. “You think you know a person, and the problem is you do. You know exactly who they are, and you marry them anyway.” She sipped her bourbon. “At least with a friend, you never expect the other person to take away your loneliness.” Noelle nodded at the empty seat across from her. “Take Alma. You two are so bonded. I can tell. And you make it all work—your friendship, being roommates, the business. You could never do all that with a man.”