“I could give her a message,” I offered, imagining a jaunty little note left on a Post-it on her fridge: Angry man dropped by who needs to see you urgently. Love, Saskia.
“Don’t bother.” He looked like he was trying hard not to punch a wall. “I’ll come back another time.”
“You do that,” I said spiritedly.
And then he left.
It was strange, but as I closed the door, I actually felt defensive on Ellen’s behalf. There’s something so guileless about her, like she believes everyone is as sweet and sincere as she. When clearly we’re not.
Also, I had a strong feeling I knew that man from somewhere. I just couldn’t quite remember where.
“So what was it like meeting the dead wife’s family?” asked Julia. Her cheeks were flushed from all the wine she was drinking, and she’d rubbed her eyes so her mascara was faintly smudged, giving her a sexily disheveled look. In the restaurant’s shadowy mood lighting she looked the way she had when Ellen and she used to take their fake IDs so they could go out drinking together in high school, during their not especially impressive, short-lived rebellious phase. (Her mother and godmothers had got up to much worse when they were teenagers.)
“Oh, but wait, I want to hear about meeting your dad!” Madeline sat back and laced her hands together under her br**sts and across the top of her big belly. As she moved, Ellen’s elbow bumped against the firm flesh of her belly, and she was shocked by the reality of Madeline’s baby. There was an actual baby just centimeters away from Ellen’s elbow. Not just the idea of a baby. A real live baby curled up under the striped fabric of Madeline’s maternity top and the stretched skin of her stomach. Ellen laced her own hands together in imitation of Madeline and placed them across her own stomach, which was still soft and only faintly, implausibly rounded, as if she’d just been enjoying a few too many pizzas. Her clothes were starting to feel tighter, but it was impossible to imagine that in a few months she’d have an enormous stomach like Madeline’s, one that would give her that characteristic pregnant swaybacked gait, one that would cause people to smile and offer a chair and ask, “How much longer now?”
“Her life is like a soap opera these days, isn’t it?” said Julia.
“Like sand through the hourglass, so are the days of Ellen’s lives,” intoned Madeline in a quite good American accent. Ellen had never heard her put on a voice before to make a joke.
“Remember when she was so calm and Zen? Nothing messy ever happened to her?” said Julia.
“That’s not true!” protested Ellen. “I had messy relationship breakups.”
“No, even your breakups seemed to happen on a higher level of existence than the rest of us,” said Madeline.
“That makes me sound annoying,” said Ellen. She was hurt. It was like she had overheard a conversation that revealed what her friends really thought of her.
Julia and Madeline were too busy liking each other for the first time to notice.
“Oh, not that annoying. Anyway, me first,” said Julia. “The wife’s family?”
“Maybe we should just concentrate on eating quickly and efficiently,” said Ellen, as a waiter appeared at their table with three giant plates balanced on his forearm.
“Let’s skip the movie,” said Madeline. “Let’s just relax.”
“Excellent idea.” Julia settled back in the booth and smiled at Madeline.
Watching them talking to the waiter, confirming what each dish was, leaning back politely to let him spoon out their rice, Ellen saw for the first time that the two of them were actually quite similar. Their carefully relaxed demeanors hid a fragile defensiveness, as if they expected to be criticized at any moment and they weren’t going to stand for it. They both seemed to cling so hard to their chosen personalities. I am this sort of person and therefore I believe this, I think this, I do this and I am right, I’m right, I’m sure I’m right!
Although, then again, maybe everybody did that to some extent. Perhaps all grown-ups were just children carefully putting on their grown-up disguises each day and then acting accordingly. Perhaps it was a necessary part of being a grown-up. Or perhaps it was just that Ellen felt herself to have a more nebulous, less defined sort of personality than both Madeline and Julia.
Or perhaps this was all a load of rubbish, and Madeline and Julia were just being themselves. Lately, Ellen was becoming increasingly impatient with the way she never just accepted anything at face value. She couldn’t quite understand her impatience. It was like she’d suddenly turned against a dear old friend for no good reason.
“It must have been so awkward,” said Madeline. “Meeting Patrick’s old in-laws.”
“Do you think they hated you?” asked Julia. “Replacing their beloved daughter?”
“They were lovely,” said Ellen. “They seemed perfectly relaxed about it, but I made a fool of myself.”
“Oh, no,” said Julia, as though Ellen was in the habit of making a fool of herself. “What did you do?”
“I saw a photo on the wall of Colleen holding Jack when he was a baby and I—”
“You criticized her?” said Julia. “You spoke ill of the dead!”
Julia was terrified of death. Whenever she was confronted with it, she became skittish and weird, as if she could somehow ward it off.
“Does that sound like something I’d do?” said Ellen, as she lifted her spoon to her mouth.
“Shellfish!” screeched Madeline, and knocked the spoon from Ellen’s mouth.
“It’s not!” Ellen indicated the plate in front of her. “It’s the chicken.”
“Oh, sorry, you’re right,” said Madeline. “Carry on.”
“Anyway, I think this whole thing with what you can and can’t eat when you’re pregnant has gone too far,” said Ellen. “The French still eat soft cheeses and drink wine, the Japanese still eat sushi—and their babies are all fine.”
Madeline pursed her lips, as if she wasn’t quite convinced about the quality of French and Japanese babies. “I wouldn’t be taking any risks in the first trimester.”
Julia’s face closed down slightly at the pregnancy talk. “So what did you do when you saw the photo?”
“I cried,” said Ellen.