Family Dynamics (Pam of Babylon Book Five) (16 page)

“Yes, well, it’s just a house,” she mumbled.

Not hardly
, Dan Chua thought. He grabbed her bag for her as she put the key in her front door.

“What did you say your husband did for a living?” he looked at her innocently, but Pam started laughing.

“Real estate demographics,” she answered. “If you want more explanation than that, we are going to have to get on the computer.” She pushed the door open, and Dan followed her through the entrance. Without premeditation, when she turned to close the door, they fell into each other’s arms and began kissing. He had both arms around her waist and was pulling her up to him, and she had hers wrapped around his neck. He felt the length of her body against his and knew in a second that he was already in love with her. And she knew, without worrying that he might be another bad boy like Jack, or a tattle-tale like Andy, or a whiner like Dave, that she could trust Dan. She admired and respected him, and it appeared that she desired him. What more would she need? When the kiss was over, she nestled her face in his neck, and he did the same to her. She didn’t worry about being sweaty from the gym and didn’t worry what he thought of her. She just simply knew that it was right for them to be together.

“Who are you, and where did you come from?” she asked.

He laughed out loud. “The same to you. I’m thinking we should put the brakes on, but I don’t want to,” he said.

“Me, either,” she replied. They separated. “And stranger still, I’m starving. I’m rarely hungry, and never after the gym. You are good for my appetite.”

“Mine, too,” he said. “Do you want to go out?”

“No. I’ll fix something here,” she said and turned to the kitchen. “I want to cook for you.” She stopped in her tracks, looked at him, and started laughing again. “
Not!
That ship has definitely sailed. But we can scrounge something up.” They talked nonstop while Pam rifled through her pantry. After they had a snack, Pam wanted to walk on the beach. They went out the sliders to the veranda and then down the wooden path Jack had installed for his mother, Bernice, what seemed like a million years ago. For being the beginning of summer, the beach was relatively empty.

“What a location,” Dan said. “This is really something else.” He took Pam’s hand, and they started walking north. Pam couldn’t help herself, but her thoughts went back to when Jack was alive. They rarely walked on the beach together. He was solicitous about her findings when she came in after being on the beach—the beach glass and shells she found were displayed throughout the house, and Jack even kept a small piece of her glass on his desk at work. But the beach wasn’t a shared thing. They enjoyed living there, the beautiful view from every window that faced the back of the house, and she’d deluded herself into thinking he was happy there, too. Now, she was with this man ten years younger than she was whom she didn’t really know at all, was ready to bare all to him and hop into bed if the opportunity presented itself, and she didn’t know why. There was just something about him.

They walked for half an hour north, talking nonstop, and then turned around for home. Pam saw something glittering and stopped to examine it—green beach glass. She picked it up, and they spent minutes examining it like it was a piece of gold. After the find, Dan became obsessed with finding glass or shells, and what should have taken half an hour had to have been more than an hour. When they finally got to Pam’s house, he was ready to go in the opposite direction. Pam didn’t have to look at her watch to figure that it was almost dinner time. She was famished.

“I’m starving,” she said. “Maybe we should think about dinner.”

“Didn’t we just eat lunch?” Dan asked, bending over to dig through the wet sand as the waves washed over his feet. Pam peeked at her watch.

“Believe it or not, we’ve been out here almost three hours.” He straightened up and put a small piece of red glass in her hand.

“Oh, my God! Red! Do you know how rare red is?” They looked at it together, holding it up to the sun and then back down on her palm. Not meaning to, she blurted out, “This is a good omen for us.” Dan looked at her, surprised.

“Individually or together?” he asked. Pam was at a crossroads. Was she going to allow Dan to see her enthusiasm for a possible relationship with him? Or play it cool and closed off as she had in her previous life? Had it worked for her in the past? Within seconds, she made a decision. She was going to be who she was, warts and all. Evidently, presenting a contrived face to the world had not worked well prior to this. She would try something different.

“Together,” she said. “If that seems too forward, I apologize, but I’m going to show you a face unseen to the general population. You will find, if you ever get to know my family, that what I just said was out of character. So, what do you think?”

“Together is good. I opt for together.” He put his arm around her and hugged her again. “Come on, let’s go out to dinner. I feel like going to a drive-in and getting a burger and a malt. Is that too low-brow for you, Society Woman?”

She frowned. “Is that my Indian name?”

He burst out laughing. Her face flushed upon her realization that she had used what was probably a politically incorrect term. “No. I was thinking ‘She Who Seeks Glass,’” Dan said.

Pam stood on her tiptoes and kissed him. “I’d like a burger and a malt, too. With french fries.” There was a dive drive-in just outside of town. Pam never went to look in the mirror before she left the house or put a comb through her hair. With funky gym clothes on and no makeup left on her face, her feet sandy and hot, she got into the car with Dan, the two of them talking like it was the last chance they’d get.

Chapter 19

B
ernice Smith was having a lucid day. The stimulation of being with so many people at the assisted-living center proved to be a positive move. She needed little in the way of help when dressing or eating. But with increasing lucidity came anger and resentment toward her daughter-in-law. The nursing staff thought Pam to be as patient as a saint and as generous as she could be. Bernice had regular visits from Pam and Nelda, and once or twice a week, a driver would pick her up at her Fifth Avenue address and deliver her to Nelda and Steve’s trendy neighborhood in Greenwich Village for an evening of drinking and cards.

But this morning, she wanted to be out by herself. Before her son Jack died, she’d walk around her Upper West Side neighborhood to shop or have lunch, often running into him. Bernice always thought it was serendipity, but Jack planned these spur-of-the-moment meetings to surprise her. And today, she wanted that old feeling back—of freedom, the excitement of doing something she enjoyed. After breakfast, she opened her purse and got her wallet out. Pam gave her an allowance. Although the house rules were that no resident was supposed to have more than ten dollars, Bernice counted ninety-three. She left the building without signing out at the front desk, which was standard practice. She walked down Fifth Avenue toward 66
^th
Street, hoping to catch a cab across town. She wanted to be in her old neighborhood, near familiar places. She was hoping she’d find Jack there again, or at least his spirit.

She carefully stepped to the curb and put her hand out. A cab zoomed to her in seconds. She struggled to get the door open; it was amazing how much strength she’d lost in her hands. But she got in without trouble and was just getting seated when the driver sped off.

“Where to, señora?” he asked, looking in the rearview mirror.

“Columbus and Seventy-Ninth,” Bernice said. She sat back, looking out the window as they flew through the park. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, the cab was at the curb on the corner, just as she’d asked. She opened her wallet and took out bills, handing them to the driver. Getting the door open wasn’t as easy. While the driver waited impatiently for Bernice to get out of his cab, she scooted to the end of the seat and, holding on to the door and its side, tried pulling herself into a standing position.

“Knock yourself out, señor,” she said. The driver laughed but didn’t offer to help her. Finally successful, she brushed off her skirt and got out of his way. “Lowlife,” she whispered. Standing on the curb for a few moments turned into minutes as she attempted to get her bearings.
Which way is the mansion?
She walked up and down Columbus Avenue and saw a few familiar buildings; the area hadn’t changed much in the year she’d been gone. But there was no mansion. The home where she’d raised her two boys and lived her life as a wife and a mother was not where it should be. She walked back to 81
^st
and looked. She saw it with her own eyes, but it didn’t register at first. In the parkland where the Smith Mansion once stood, a high rise of steel was going up. The trees and plantings, that priceless cast-iron gate, the fountains—gone. The gorgeous granite driveway, the wide steps that led to the brownstone façade, stained-glass windows in mahogany frames, vanished. Adrenaline pouring into her veins, a frantic Bernice rushed up to the eight-foot-high temporary wire fencing and started screaming. Just barely hearing her above the din of equipment, a lone construction worker took pity on the hysterical woman.

“What’s wrong, Granny?” he asked. “Are you OK?”

“No, I’m not! My God, no, my house! Where’s my house? Where are the lovely moldings? The doors? The slate terrace?” Bernice screamed again. And then she collapsed, a frail skeleton of the dignified woman she used to be. As she fell to the ground, the final indignity—her bowels let loose.

Bernice woke up later in the hospital room, Pam and Nelda at her side.

“Where’s Miranda?” Pam asked, looking around the room for a stroller or sign of her niece.

“Sandra’s got her,” Nelda said. Pam looked at her, surprised.

“Sandra? How in God’s name did that ever transpire?” Pam asked.

“It’s a long story, but she and Tom have been helping Steve paint the townhouse and talking care of the baby for me once in a while, just so I can shop, that sort of thing.”

“If he’d asked me, I would have paid to have the place painted,” Pam said, confused for a moment that she’d been excluded from this latest development. Life was certainly moving on without her.

Nelda, stoic, scurried around Bernice, then filled a basin with warm water and began primping her with a washcloth. Pam was stony, silent. She knew she should have made more of an attempt to explain to her mother-in-law what the outcome of the historic Smith Mansion would be. But there was never the opportunity. Bernice wasn’t completely “with it” whenever Pam visited. When Bernice saw Pam standing at the side of her bed, she lashed out, crying.

“Oh, my God, you!” she screamed at Pam. “You did it! I have you to thank for the worst shock of my life. Worse than my husband dying. Worse than Jack dropping dead. The last connection to my life! Gone! What were you thinking?” Pam opened her mouth to say how sorry she was, but Bernice lit into her again. “Where are the contents? The fabulous art and furniture?”

Nelda stepped in. “Chill out, Bernie,” she said. “Stop talking to my daughter like she’s a dog. If it weren’t for Pam, you’d be in that Medicare dump over in Queens. Trust me, it was all for the best.” Bernice opened her mouth to shout and thought better of it. Her chin dropped to her chest, and she started crying again.

“It was just such a shock! I was trying to find Jack. I know he’s dead. I needed memories of when we were together. And what did I find instead? A goddamned construction site.” Pam stayed silent, but she did take Bernice’s hand. It must have been horrible for her to find her house gone. Pam thought of the alternative. There was one, but it would have placed a huge burden on her. She owned the buildings, so she would have had to renovate the old place and pay for the staff to care for Bernice. She’d be the one with that albatross around her neck, the constant worry and concern. And she couldn’t do it. She didn’t want to worry about Bernice anymore. So she did what she had to do. After Bernice took a fall down a flight of stairs, Pam found the nicest retirement home money could buy and moved her in. She put the mansion on the market, and right away, a group of Japanese businessmen with building plans already approved by the city made an offer. It couldn’t have been easier. No neighborhood historic groups came forward to protest because they understood what the cost of maintaining an old mausoleum like the Smith Mansion would be. Pam held the mortgage to the mansion, but because Bernice was confused, signed the final papers without consulting her. The consequence was having to listen to this tirade. No matter what Bernice said or how much she complained, as soon as the doctor discharged her she was going back to The Eagle’s Nest Manor on Fifth Avenue.

“I’m sorry, Bernice,” Pam finally said. “There was nothing else I could do. If Jack were alive, he’d know who to call, what needed to be fixed first. He and Harold certainly let things slide over there.” Pam had never blamed Jack for anything. All the crap she’d confronted since his death, and she tried to remain loyal to him. Pointing the finger at him, especially around his mother, felt odd. She wasn’t aware of the messes her son left behind.
Let him take a little blame
.
Jack and Harold, too
.