Walking on Broken Glass - Christa Allan [67]
A few more miles. “I’m glad your parents will understand. That helps too. I’d hate having to explain to them why I’m not manning the blender for frozen daiquiris.” I opened the glove compartment. “Is the perfume in here?”
“Oh, I need to talk to you about that.” Carl switched lanes and waited for the turn signal.
“What? My perfume? I found it.” I showed him the bottle of Butterfly. I first bought the perfume because I liked the top of the bottle. It was shaped like the folded wings of a butterfly. The perfume was equally delicate, a combination of flowers and almonds and berries. When the car stopped at a red light, I opened the bottle, applied dots of perfume behind my ears and knees, and returned it to the glove compartment. “So what did you want to tell me?”
“About my parents and the party.”
“What about your parents?”
“Mom had asked me weeks ago if you’d want to be involved in all the details before she made the appointment with the party planner. I should’ve talked to you first, but I told her the end of school was a tough time for you. I figured you didn’t need to be making decisions about catering, decorations, music. You know my mother. ”
Another example of Carl saving me from myself, but this time I was relieved. It protected me from Gloria and her exasperating attention to minutiae. The woman could spend days deliberating between white-white and almost-white paint. And another week deciding if the painters should use flat or eggshell as a base. “I know your mother, so I’m eternally grateful you made that decision for me. Don’t worry. I’ll back you up if she mentions it. But I’m sure after you told her about rehab at Brookforest, she's equally as thankful I didn’t help.”
“Probably. But here's the thing.” Carl pulled into the parking lot of the Starbucks around the corner from his parents’ house. But he didn’t ask if I wanted a venti or a grande.
“What are you doing? Why are we stopping here?” My chest hurt. “What thing?”
Carl turned off the car engine and stared out the front window. “Your decision to go to Brookforest was a shock. You were so determined to go in on the Fourth, even when you knew my parents already had planned the weekend.”
I needed air. Too much perfume. “Please open the windows. Go on, continue.” Whatever the “thing” was, I predicted it was my fault.
“I called your dad first and told him, you know, about why you thought you drank too much and what you’d decided to do. We talked for a long time.” He ran his hands back and forth along the steering wheel.
I unlocked the seat belt. Everything felt tight. The car, the dress, the shoes, the necklace, the truth. If I could have reached the ropes knotting in my stomach I might have strangled him with them at that moment. “You told your parents. Please tell me you told your parents.”
“Of course, I told my parents.”
Noisy teens spilled out of the car parked next to us. Slammed car doors gave me a reason to raise my voice. “I know a ‘but’ when I don’t hear one. But what?”
“It wasn’t just me. Your dad agreed with me.”
A foot stomped on my chest. “About what?” Loud didn’t matter to me now.
He clutched the steering wheel and looked at me. “I didn’t tell them about the alcohol thing—”
The other foot stomped.
“The alcohol THING? THING?” I heard blood vessels popping in my eyes.
“I told them you were having problems coping since Alyssa died. I told them you’d been in therapy, but you didn’t want people to know. I told them the therapist thought this would help you, our marriage.”
The doors were bolted. I mashed the buzzer. No one.
Where did that man go? I buzzed again and slapped my hand against the door. The car behind me was reflected in the glass. I seemed to be slapping it too. Good.
“Hold your horses. I’m coming.” A voice, then a shadow of a figure materialized and moved toward me. I didn’t remember Mr. Jacobs having a rocking limp when I’d left. But it was Mr. Jacobs, and he showed only a ripple of surprise when he