The Art of Saying Goodbye - Ellyn Bache [57]
Herb kept droning on about the appalling spelling of the college interns. I kept pushing the unwanted baked beans around my plate. In other years, I’d been pleased with myself for sticking with Herb all the way through his monologue. Now all I wanted to do was escape. I’d eaten too much. I needed exercise. Watching Brynne negotiate arcs of water from the vacillating sprinklers—so composed, moving with such grace and ease among the mostly older children that I couldn’t help but be proud of her—I was jealous, all the same, that she got to run around and I did not.
Lighthearted: that’s how people usually described me. Cheerful. Upbeat. But not then. I was bored, irritated, working myself up to outright rage.
Eight months before, I’d had my first miscarriage. We hadn’t wanted a baby. Mason’s promotion hadn’t come through. We wanted a bigger house. But while the mind says no, still the body grieves. “I’m so sorry, honey,” my mother said, “but this happens to almost everyone. Before you know it, you’ll have another baby. You’ll be fine.” Then, heartlessly, “Up until now you’ve had such an easy life.”
I didn’t forgive her, but she was right.
Now I was trying to get pregnant. I was thirty-five. I’d been trying for six months. After that last, unplanned pregnancy . . . nothing. My doctor said I had “old eggs.” I scheduled sex the way I scheduled dentist appointments. Nothing flirtatious, nothing spontaneous. I was in a race against time.
The reporters laughed again, and the society editor touched Mason on the arm. She was fifty and motherly, but I resented the gesture. I thought, Well, no wonder I’m not getting pregnant! Mason is having too much fun with his little circle of admirers! He’s not paying attention to the task at hand!
As if you had to be goal oriented in order to conceive! As we well knew! Mason was always eager for sex. Spur-of-the-moment sex, half-anticipated sex in front of the TV, planned sex marked in red on the calendar—Mason didn’t care. He was normal in every way. Just look at him, surrounded by groupies! The problem was old eggs. The problem was me.
I looked up just in time to see Mason take a bite of his sandwich, the kind of too-generous bite designed to get it into his mouth before the soggy mess fell apart. Most of it hit its mark—success!—except for one gooey glob of meat and red sauce that dripped from the bottom of the bun and splattered brightly, like a clump of blood and guts catapulted from a gunshot wound, onto the front of his yellow golf shirt.
“Yuk!” someone cried.
A nervous burst of laughter rose from the little crowd. This was different from reacting to a joke. This would be laughing at the boss. Then Karin Branch’s throaty voice, proprietary and not at all nervous, said, “Mason, we can’t take you anywhere!” And the laughter erupted full force.
Unself-conscious, Karin took hold of the front of Mason’s shirt, pulled it away from his body, and brushed most of the offending mess onto the ground. “Hang on.” She kicked off her sandals and ran toward the crowd of children, looking like a child herself, unfettered and carefree as she unscrewed the sprinkler and commandeered the hose that was supplying it with water. “Just a second, kids. I’ll bring it right back!”
A gushing stream of water burst forth, glistening in the sun as she dragged the hose toward the cluster of reporters. I saw what she was about to do. Saw the faces of Mason’s staff bright with merriment. Saw Mason grin and stand his ground.
Karin aimed in his direction but wasn’t close enough to connect. The hose looked heavy