The Next Best Thing (29 page)

A
FEW NIGHTS LATER
, M
ATT PICKS
me up at the Boatworks. I wait in the foyer, looking for his solid Volvo. It’s pouring rain, the noise drumming the Herreshoff above the door. Great night to stay home with a movie. Like I used to do with Ethan. Speaking of Ethan, I haven’t seen him lately—he had another business trip, apparently—but that’s okay. That part of my heart seems to have turned to stone, which is a far cry better than the open, ragged gash it was in the hospital.

Then Matt’s headlights flash as he turns around the corner, and I run out and jump into his car.

The date is everything I’ve hoped for. Very pleasant. We start with a movie, a political thriller with lots of explosions, just what I love. Then comes a somewhat mediocre dinner at a chain Italian restaurant—if my father-in-law knew I was eating here, he would’ve clutched his heart and died on the spot. I order lasagna, Matt gets spaghetti and meatballs.

“I have to say,” Matt says, “I’m really glad you asked me out.” He grins, and I feel a little tug. Not a big one, not a wave…but something. That’s good. If I wanted nothing, I’d be married to Charley Spirito.

“Me, too,” I say.

“Is it strange, being with someone who looks like your husband?” he asks.

“No,” I answer. “I mean, at first glance, sure, you do
look like him. But don’t worry, I can tell the difference.”
He was the real deal, you’re Jimmy-Lite.

“How did you meet him?”

I pause.

“I’m sorry,” Matt says instantly, covering my hand with his own. “It’s none of my business.”

“It’s okay,” I answer, extricating my hand and taking a sip of water. “Ethan set us up.”

Matt pauses. “I guess things didn’t work out there,” he says delicately.

A razor-thin slice of pain cuts across my heart. “No, it didn’t work out.”

“Is he doing okay? After the accident and all?”

“He’s great,” I say smoothly, though I find I have to swallow twice. “What about you? Ever been married?”

Matt tells me about his brief marriage when he was twenty-six, ending in an amicable divorce when he was twenty-eight. Talk turns to business, inevitably. “Have you hired someone to take over the bread?” he asks.

“Not yet,” I say. “I put an ad out this morning, though. Craigslist, the newspaper.”

“Great,” he says. “We want to get cracking on this.”

I cover a yawn. “I should probably get back,” I tell him. “Four a.m. comes pretty early.”

Matt pays the bill and we drive home in the rain, not talking much.

I sneak peeks at his profile…he does look like Jimmy, though the initial shock has faded. He’s been awfully nice about the bread deal. I decide I feel fond of him. And hey, fond is underrated. Fond can last a lifetime. Fond doesn’t leave scars.

My heart twists a little…for a second, that lovely coating of numbness that’s been sheltering me these past
few weeks lifts, and I miss Ethan so much I can barely breathe.

You can’t have everything.
Ethan himself told me that. He was right. It will hurt him to have me move on with someone else, but I was hurting him when we were together, too. And I can’t be with Ethan. He deserves someone who can love him with her whole heart, and damn it all to hell, that’s not me. I had my heart broken once…no. Shattered. Destroyed. Ground into a bloody smear on the sidewalk, and it hurt so much I wondered that I didn’t die from it. I just can’t do that again.

Reminding myself to breathe again, I unclench my fists and stare ahead through the rain-smeared windshield.

Matt pulls up in front of the Boatworks. “Let me walk you to the door,” he says. I look at him. Matt here will take me or leave me. He didn’t know me before Jimmy died. He won’t know what he’s missing. He won’t want more.

“Sure,” I answer.

The rain blows in gusts, and we rush to the shelter of the doorway, the old Herreshoff providing a little shelter from the weather. I can’t wait to be upstairs, safe and alone.

“I had a really nice time,” Matt says.

“Oh, me, too,” I answer. It’s not
that
untrue. “Thanks for a lovely evening.”

He grins. “You’re welcome. I hope we can see each other again.”

I hesitate. Remind myself that a couple of months ago I had a plan for the rest of my life, and it didn’t seem like an illogical plan at all.
Find a husband you don’t love too much. Have a baby.
And maybe Ethan can get over me faster if I’m dating someone else. If he sees there’s really no possibility for us.

“I’d love to,” I answer, and without any further ado, he kisses me.

It’s fine—a gentle, rather respectful kiss. His lips are smooth and cool. Pleasant. Then he pulls me closer and kisses me more deeply, which is also fine, because now I know he’s attracted to me and not just being polite. It’s not the white-hot jolt I’m used to feeling with Ethan, or the heart-melting sweetness of Jimmy, but it’s not devoid of appeal. It occurs to me that boy, my brain sure is active during this kiss, and maybe I could muzzle my internal panel of CNN analysts and just enjoy. But by then, Matt’s done.

“I’ll call you,” he says again with a Jimmy-ish smile. “Are you free Friday?”

“Friday sounds good,” I answer automatically.

“Excellent,” he says, then turns, shields his eyes with one hand and dashes back into the rain to the car. Thunder rumbles in the distance.

“Bye,” I call, watching him pull away. Then I turn to go inside and nearly jump out of my skin.

Ethan is standing not twenty feet away, apparently on his way in from the parking lot. Even from here, I can feel the heat in his eyes. I swallow as he starts walking toward me, his movements somehow predatory. He stops a foot in front of me, ignoring the rain dripping off him. His eyes burn into mine, and my breath catches.

“You don’t kiss him the way you kiss me,” he says, his voice low.

My heart convulses in my throat. “I thought you were away,” I croak.

He ignores my comment. “You’re dating him, Lucy?”

I swallow. “Um…this was the first time. But yes.”

A muscle under Ethan’s eye twitches. “Why?”

“He’s…very nice.”

“He’s my brother’s goddamn twin.”

I bite my lip and don’t answer.

Ethan grips my shoulders hard, his jaw tight, his eyes almost black. “I can’t lose you to Jimmy again.”

My throat slams shut. “I…what?”

“Stop looking for Jimmy and see me,” he says. “See
me,
Lucy.”

“Ethan, I tried with you. I did, but I just can’t—”

“Yes, you can, damn it! Pick me this time, Lucy, and stop chasing Jimmy’s ghost.” He gives me a little shake.

My breath whooshes out of me. “I’m not chasing his ghost,” I say, tears burning in my eyes.

“I loved him, too. I miss him, too. But he wasn’t perfect, Lucy, and you need—”

“Well, he was perfect for me!” I exclaim, my voice cracking. “As you knew he would be, or you wouldn’t have fixed us up in the first place!”

Ethan lets go of my shoulders and looks at me, almost sadly. “Lucy,” he says quietly, “how many college sophomores go around fixing up their older brothers with pretty girls from school?”

My knees wobble dangerously, buzzing with adrenaline. I can only look at Ethan. If I could get a word out of my clamped-up throat, I’d tell him to stop.

“I didn’t think you’d be perfect for him, Lucy. I thought you were perfect for
me.
” Ethan pauses. “And he knew it.”

“Knew what?” My words are a harsh whisper.

“Knew that I was crazy about you. You were all I talked about. I told him I was bringing a girl home from school, someone special, and—”

“Stop it! Stop, Ethan!” My hands fly up to halt his words. “Jimmy wouldn’t do that! He wouldn’t…make a play for me if he knew you—”

“He did.”

“No.” Oh, God, I think I’m about to throw up that mediocre lasagna. The thunder rumbles again, louder this time, and the wind whips cold rain against my burning face.

“I love you, Lucy,” Ethan says quietly. “I always have.”

No, no, no. A thousand memories stab into my brain. The drive back to Providence after that first time at Gianni’s, how I thanked Ethan for introducing Jimmy and me…All those family dinners before Jimmy and I were married, Jimmy and me holding hands, Ethan alone on the other side of the table…The bachelor party when Ethan drove a drunken Jimmy to my house because my fiancé had felt a burning need to serenade me from the lawn at 3:00 a.m. Our wedding! Jesus, Ethan had been the best man…had danced with me at the reception and I never,
never
…And Jimmy had known?

“That just can’t be true,” I whisper, tears spilling over. “Jimmy loved you. He never would’ve hurt you, Ethan.”

“Lucy—”

“No, Ethan! I can’t just…just rethink everything because you…It’s not true. It can’t be. Jimmy wasn’t like that!” A harsh, hitching sob twists out of me. “Don’t taint my memories, Ethan. Don’t you dare. That’s all I have left.”

He looks away abruptly, and I stare at him, defiant tears snaking down my face amid the cold rain. His jaw is tight, his shoulders set. For a second, he closes his eyes, and when he looks back at me, his face is carefully blank.

“That’s all I have left,” I repeat loudly.

He looks at me another few beats, then bows his head. “You’d better get inside before you catch pneumonia.”

“Screw that,” I say harshly, startling myself. “I’m going for a walk.”

And with that, I storm off, across the street, into Ellington Park. I don’t look back.

E
VERYTHING’S GONNA BE ALL RIGHT
…Everything’s gonna be all right…Everything’s gonna be all right…

Just because Ethan said it, doesn’t mean it’s true,
I tell myself as I careen along the gravel pathway. I’m already soaked, hardly noticing the puddles I slosh through.
He’s upset that I’m moving on.
And I have to move on. The image of him being tossed through the air, so damn…fragile…

My crappy lasagna surges up, and I barely make it off the path, throwing up violently into the bushes. Shaking, I stagger over to the nearest bench. Only then do I notice how close I am to the cemetery. A brief sheet of lightning illuminates the night, the asphalt road like a scar cutting between the granite headstones.

Somewhere in there is Jimmy’s grave. My husband’s grave. His body, that big, beautiful form I loved so much, lies in there. Closing my eyes, I tip my head back and let the rain pellet my face. How many tears have I shed for Jimmy? Enough that I used to wake up with salt stains on my pillow. Enough that the skin under my eyes was raw for the better part of a year. Enough that my mother gave me her ultra-expensive eye cream because I looked older than she did.

I
know
Jimmy loved Ethan. He wouldn’t have made a
move on me if he’d known. Ethan had a crush, maybe. That’s all. Jimmy never would’ve hurt him. I’d bet my life on it. He asked Ethan to be his best man, for God’s sake. A half-formed thought darts through my brain at that…there’s something there…but it’s gone, like a fish in a fast-flowing river. It doesn’t matter. Jimmy loved his little brother. Everyone could see that. He’d sling an arm around the shorter, younger Ethan and ruffle his hair. “Hey, Little E.,” he’d say, then kiss his brother’s head.

For the first time, it occurs to me that Ethan must’ve hated that nickname.

I’m so tired. For five and a half years, I haven’t had a full night’s sleep. Except one, now that I think of it. The night Ethan watched over me after I’d come home from the hospital.

Something hot and biting rises in my chest, and I shove it down. It’s too hard. Love is just too frigging hard. Love someone, and they have the power to ruin your life. Jimmy took everything that night, the whole lovely, safe, normal future we were going to have, the person I used to be. I can’t let stories from Ethan—or Doral-Anne, for that matter—erase the Jimmy I hold in my heart.

“Everything’s gonna be all right…everything’s gonna be all right. Everything’s gonna be all right. Everything’s gonna be all right.”
Come on, St. Marley, help me,
I think, my voice cracking as I sing. Can’t imagine that Iris and Rose would approve of me praying to a reggae singer for help, but hey, I never really figured out the rosary. A nearly hysterical laugh wrenches out of my throat. Singing in a thunderstorm outside the cemetery. Jimmy’s widow has finally chugged around the bend.

I lurch to my feet and slog back to the Boatworks. My nose is running, my feet are like ice, and I can only imagine
how I look, my hair hanging in sodden strands, my mascara puddled, no doubt, underneath my eyes. In other words, I probably look as good as I feel.

I make it up to my apartment, and wouldn’t you know? Fat Mikey finally succeeds in tripping me, and I fall over the giant cat, smacking my knee on the hard corner of the table. “Thanks, Mikey,” I say, another dangerous laugh rising in my chest like a storm surge. “The perfect end to a perfect night.”

A dime winks at me from the carpet under the table.

Without another thought, I pick it up and whip it across the room.

“D
ID YOU EVER FIND OUT SOMETHING
about your husbands after they died? Something that surprised you?”

My aunts regard me with surprise. Mom looks up from her crossword puzzle, then looks back down to fill in another clue. It’s 10:00 a.m., and I haven’t slept in, oh, twenty-eight hours. I have eleven and a half minutes left on this last batch of bread, and I intend to put the time to good use. “Well?” I demand.

“What bee’s in your bonnet?” Iris asks, turning her attention back to the pastry dough she’s rolling out.

“I found out a couple of things about Jimmy,” I say. My voice sounds overly loud to me, and the Black Widows exchange a glance, confirming the fact that I’m acting insane.

“What things?” Mom asks.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, shaking my head. “Did you?”

“Well, about a month after Larry died, I found out that he had a secret bank account,” Rose says slowly. “Fourteen thousand dollars in it. His name only.” She looks sheepishly at her sisters, whose mouths are hanging open. “I never found out what he was planning to do with it. Leave
me? Pay off some illegitimate child? Bribe a judge? I never found out.”

“Been watching
The Sopranos
?” Mom asks dryly.

“What did you do with the money?” Iris asks.

“I invested in the stock market,” Rose cheeps. “Stevie never has to work in his life if he doesn’t want to.”

“That was very
prescient
of you, Rose,” my mother says, hiding a grin. “Five down. Nine letters, having foresight.”

“What about you, Iris?” I ask.

She cocks her head and looks thoughtfully over at the Hobart mixer. “Well, sure. Everyone has secrets, right?” She turns her attention back to the sweet pastry dough, her hands deft and quick. “Pete had that little room in the cellar, you know? His tool room?” Mom and Rose nod, and I seem to recall it, too, a tidy little room with an oiled worktable and tools hanging on a pegboard. “So I’m going through it one day after he died, and I come across this locked box.”

“What was in it?” Rose asks.

“I’m getting to that,” Iris growls, glaring at her sister. “So I say to myself, ‘Why would Pete lock something away?’ Maybe it’s flammable, I don’t know. Some chemicals he used to strip furniture. Figure I better open it.” The baking sheet is now filled with empty pastries, and Rose slides over the container of chocolate filling. Iris takes out the scoop, and with the skill acquired from decades of repetition, fills each pastry with chocolate as she continues her story. “Finally I find the key, taped to the under-side of a drawer. Lucy, honey, shove these on the rack for me, and Rose, would you pass me the raspberry?”

Rose and I obey promptly, and Iris starts on another batch of pastries. “So I open the box. Guess what was in there?”

“A human skull,” Mom suggests, making me wonder what secrets she herself might have.

“Not a skull. It was about a hundred copies of
Penthouse
.” Iris jams her fists into her ample hips and snorts. “He’d been getting the porno.”

“The porno!” Rose and Mom cluck in unison.

“That’s right. Had a separate post office box in Kingstown, if you can believe it, so I wouldn’t know about his dirty magazines.”

“How’d that make you feel?” I ask, rubbing my gritty eyes.

“Well, crappy, of course! It wasn’t just the naked pictures. It was the secrecy. He spent hours down in the basement when I thought he was fixing things, and instead he was doing God knows what.” She pauses. “Though he always was pretty, um…amorous when he came up.”

“I bet,” Mom mutters, filling in another clue.

“You always talk about them like they were perfect,” I say, swallowing. The pebble’s bigger than ever.

“Well, what are we supposed to do? Spit on their graves?” Iris snorts, then reaches out and pats my shoulder. “So you found something out about Jimmy. So what. Doesn’t mean he didn’t love you.”

“Of course not,” Rose murmurs, giving me a hug.

“What about you, Mom?” I ask my mother. “Did you ever find out something about Daddy?”

My mom doesn’t even look up from her puzzle. “No, honey. Your father was damn near perfect.”

I wonder if it’s true. Then again, I only had eight years with him, and if Mom’s hiding something, it’s kind of wonderful of her not to tell me, to let me keep that little girl’s adoration.

“What did you find out, Lucy?” Rose asks.

“It wasn’t anything that big,” I lie.

And maybe it wasn’t. Maybe Jimmy steamrolled Ethan a little, but it wasn’t like Ethan and I were an item. We were
pals, no more. Him saying he’s been in love with me since we met…I wonder. He never acted that way. Not before I met Jimmy, not after. In fact, he couldn’t have been more…enthusiastic about us getting married. And then after Jimmy died…no. I don’t want to have to look back at all the years I’ve known Ethan and reinterpret everything. He
never
acted like a man in love…well, maybe a little, recently. But he never said a word. He’d always been simply a friend. My best friend. He loved me, sure.
In
love for years? No.

My eleven and a half minutes are up, so I take the bread rack out—sourdough boules on the bottom, Italian on the top—and slide them off the pans to cool. On a whim, I stick a boule in a paper bag and tuck it under my arm, its warmth as comforting as a puppy.

“I’ll be back in about half an hour,” I announce.

“Bye,” the Black Widows chorus. As I head out the back door, I glance at them—Iris, strong and broad, Rose, smaller and plump, my mother, elegant and cool. Rose says something I can’t quite hear, and the other two laugh.

They’re happy, the Black Widows. Life threw them sucker punches, and they got over it. Their hearts were shredded on the cheese grater of life, just like mine was, and look at them now. Laughing, happy, watching Showtime and bickering with each other. I can do that, too. Be happy, I mean.

The smell of coffee is rich and dark in Starbucks. A few mothers sit around one table, babies on their laps, strollers against one wall. From over the speakers come the mournful voices of Sting and Sheryl Crow in a bittersweet duet.

Perry Wheatley is behind the counter, wiping down the cappuccino machine. I used to babysit her when I was in high school. Her parents always left brownies for me,
as well as a video. They lived in a sweet house on the water, and I’d pretend it was mine, that I was a famous pastry chef, that I’d just been featured on the cover of
Bon Appetit…

“Hi, Lucy! What can I get you?” Perry asks, her face lighting up at the sight of me.

“Hi, sweetie,” I say, smiling. “How are you?”

“I’m great!” she answers, and she does indeed look great. A cute kid turned beautiful, long hair, slender waist, the dewy skin of the blessed. I can remember us playing Adventure on Care Bear Island, a game I’d made up which involved piggyback rides and some happy screaming. Time flies.

“Is Doral-Anne here?” I ask.

Her smile drops, and she gives me a mock grimace. “Um, sure. Hang on.” She goes into the storeroom, says something and scuttles back. “She’ll be right out, Lucy.”

“Thanks, Pretty Perry,” I say. She smiles sweetly, making my heart tug.

Then Doral-Anne emerges. At the sight of me, her
Isn’t Starbucks just the best thing to happen to Planet Earth
expression drops.

“How’s Ethan feeling?” she asks, and I have to say, that’s not what I expected her to say.
Fuck you,
maybe, or
Get out.
Not something polite.

“He’s doing okay, Doral-Anne,” I say. “Do you have a second?”

She scowls at Perry, who’s obviously listening. “Why?”

“I’d like to talk to you.”

With a grunt of disgust and a matching eye roll, she gestures toward the storeroom. “Fine. Come on out back.”

Visions of fifth grade dance in my head, Doral-Anne tripping me at least once each recess, causing my knees to be constantly covered in scabs. Nonetheless, I follow her
through the back, past the bags of coffee and mountains of cups, until we emerge into the parking lot.

“So what do you want?” she asks, her expression once again the familiar sneer.

“I just wanted to say thanks for looking after Nicky Mirabelli when Ethan was hit,” I say. “That was great of you.”

Doral-Anne’s head jerks back in surprise.

“You were a lot more help that I was,” I acknowledge. “I just stood there like a fern. Until I fainted, that is.”

“And started screaming,” she adds, apparently unable to resist the dig.

My face flushes. “Yup.”

She stares at me a minute longer. “Did you want something else?”

I take a deep breath and look at her steadily. “I also wanted to say I was sorry about slapping you. That wasn’t real mature of me. I apologize.”

She looks down. “Yeah, well, you had reason.” She glances at me from beneath her too-long bangs. “I guess it freaked you out hearing about Jimmy and me being an item, huh?”

“It did,” I admit.

She sucks in her left cheek and makes a slurping noise. “Well. Thanks for stopping by. I was wondering how Ethan was. Glad he’s okay.”

I remember the bag under my arm. “Here. A peace offering.” I hand her the bread.

“It’s still warm,” she says, looking down at it with a little smile. The healing power of bread.

A thought occurs to me, so freakish and wrong that I can’t believe I came up with it. Even beyond that, I can’t believe what I say next. “Doral-Anne, Bunny’s is looking for a baker to take over the bread for me. Ethan mentioned
that this Starbucks might close. Whether it does or not, Bunny’s is expanding, doing the whole coffee and pastry thing. But we’re also selling bread to NatureWorks. The hours are early, but you’d have more time with your kids after school.”

Her mouth falls open. With one hand, she pushes her bangs off her face. “Lang, are you offering me a job?”

“I guess I am. If you’re interested, give me a call. Or drop by Bunny’s. The sooner you could start, the better.”