Count My Lies

Chapter 4

4

At one thirty, I take my afternoon break and start toward Quailwood Park. It’s only two blocks away, just over a five-minute walk. I feel anticipation mounting as I near, even though Jay said he was going back to work this week. I can’t help but hope that he’s taken an extra day of vacation or gotten off early, picked up Harper on his way home because he’d enjoyed our conversation as much as I had. What’s more likely, though, is that he spent the weekend with his beautiful wife and darling child, never giving me a second thought. But a girl can dream, right?

It’s a bright, warm day, perfect late spring weather. The little park is swarming, filled with kids and their moms and nannies, screeching and laughing, arms and legs bare. I take two slow laps around the play structure. No Jay. No Harper. I let out a sigh. I stop, then scan the park a third time. Still no sign of either of them. It’s unsurprising, but that doesn’t keep me from being disappointed, which is stupid, I know.

When I’m sure, really sure, they’re not here, I spread my flannel shirt on a little grassy patch under a full-branched tree and sit down cross-legged, take a book out of my bag. It’s a dog-eared copy of Rebecca that I’ve read a hundred times. I open it to a bookmarked page, but I can’t concentrate. I stare at the same paragraph for several minutes before I give up. All I can think about is Jay. The dimple in his right cheek. The electricity I’d felt when his fingers grazed mine. I wonder what he’s doing right now. In a meeting? Sitting in front of his computer, chin resting on his hand? I groan and close the book, returning it to my bag, then pull out my earbuds and tap the Spotify icon on my phone.

I scroll, finding the song I’m looking for, the one I’ve had on repeat lately. The noise of laughing children fades. I mouth along as Taylor Swift sings about how everyone agrees: it’s her that’s the problem. Same girl, same. Sighing, I close my eyes. Every few minutes, I open them, glancing up at the playground. Just in case. After ten minutes, just when I’m about to pack up and head back to the spa, I catch sight of a familiar face. I freeze. It’s Harper. And she’s looking my way. My heart skips a beat like a tiny hiccup in my chest. I’d think my eyes were playing tricks on me, but I’m sure it’s her because she’s wearing the same purple shirt she had on last week, the one with a white sequined unicorn on the front.

She has her arm outstretched, and I realize she’s pointing—at me. At least, I think she is. Eagerly, I look for Jay, but instead I see a woman next to her.

She looks like she’s in her late twenties or early thirties, dark hair, sunglasses, a wide-brimmed hat tilted back on her head, also looking in my direction. She turns to Harper, then takes off her sunglasses and looks back toward me, squinting. She says something I can’t make out, and Harper nods.

Then a smile spreads across the woman’s face. She begins to wave. Oh shit. I look behind me, just to make sure, but there’s no one there. I’m sure now; she’s waving at me. Tentatively, I raise my hand and wave back.

The woman takes Harper by the hand and the two start toward me, crossing the rubber playground mats onto the grass. Slowly, I uncross my legs and stand awkwardly as they approach, then take out my earbuds, one by one, slipping them into my pocket. My phone drops to my side.

“Hi,” the woman calls out as she nears. Her voice is loud and clear, like a bell. She’s smiling, her teeth an iridescent white. “I’m Violet.” She stops in front of me, extending her right hand. “Jay and Harper told me all about how you helped them with her bee sting. You’re Caitlin, right? The nurse?” She glances at my scrubs.

I nod slowly. Right. Caitlin, the nurse. I slip my hand into hers. Her palm is soft, cool, fingers slender, but her handshake is firm. I notice her nails are well manicured, recently painted. I wonder where she gets them done, if she’s ever been into Rose I’d remember her.

“You’re Harper’s mom,” I say. “Jay’s wife.” Of course she is. She’s gorgeous, just as I knew she would be, but in a more interesting way than I’d imagined. Her nose is strong, brows thick under glossy bangs. She reminds me of a marble statue, handsomely angled features, smooth, hand-polished skin. Venus de Milo at the Louvre, a throng of people crowded in front of her, staring. How I imagine I look when I’m daydreaming, the lights dim.

Violet nods, still smiling. “I was hoping we’d see you here,” she says warmly. “So I could say thanks for the other day.”

I give her a small, modest shrug, looking down bashfully. It was nothing, my shoulders say. Really, though, it was nothing .

“Can you tell Caitlin ‘thank you,’ Harper?”

“Thank you,” Harper parrots. She’s wrapped herself around Violet’s legs, peering at me from behind her waist.

“You’re welcome,” I say. “I was happy to help.”

There’s a pause, then Violet asks, “What were you listening to?”

“Oh.” I glance down at my phone, caught off guard. “Taylor Swift,” I say, hesitating, just slightly. I considered making something up—a podcast might have made me sound more interesting—but the album cover fills my screen; she probably already saw it. “ Midnights .”

I silently hope that she’s not one of those people who finds pop music cliché—listening instead to underground indie bands or one-named folk artists who record songs in cliff-side studios on the rain-drenched coasts of Ireland—but luckily, her eyes light up.

“So good,” she says appreciatively. “It’s one of my favorites.”

I grin and nod. “Mine, too.”

We stand there, smiling at each other, sort of shyly, a comfortable silence between us. I do a quick appraisal, glancing her over. She’s the same height as I am, but thinner, legs long. Her eyes, like Harper’s, like mine, are a dark brown, wide and long-lashed.

She wears a sleeveless white button-up and a pair of beige linen shorts, cinched with a linen belt around her waist, a pair of nude wedges. The top button of her shirt is undone, and when she bends over to talk to Harper, I can see the lace of her bra, her full breasts. The hat she wears is a camel-colored wool fedora, the brim tipped up. It makes her look cool, like one of the girls I always longed to sit with at lunch in high school.

Under the hat, her hair is a mahogany brown, almost reddish, and I wonder if it’s natural. It brushes the top of her shoulders in loose, shiny waves. Just then, she takes off her hat and rakes a hand through her hair, then smooths her bangs, brushing them from her eyes. They’re just a millimeter too long, dusting her lashes. It suits her, though, the way they frame her face, and I find myself imagining how I’d look with the same cut. I haven’t had bangs since fifth grade, when I took scissors to them myself.

As if she reads my mind, her hand goes to her forehead. Her left hand. There’s a perfectly round, pebble-sized diamond on her ring finger. It glints in the sun, as do the matching studs in her ears. “I know, they’re too long,” she says. “I need a trim. It’s at the top of my to-do list, but, well, you know.” She motions to her daughter, then waves her hand in a sweeping motion, like and everything else , laughing. “That must sound incredibly sad—that trimming my bangs is at the top of my to-do list.”

“If you think that’s sad, you should see my to-do list,” I say. “?‘Sad’ doesn’t even begin to describe it. We’re talking tragic. Sophie’s Choice tragic. Bambi-losing-his-mom tragic. Titanic, ‘I’ll never let go, Jack’ tragic.”

Violet laughs, an open-mouthed, throaty chuckle. “You’re funny,” she says, when she stops, smile still on her lips. “What’s on your to-do list that makes it so tragic? Now I’m curious.”

“Well, nothing, actually. I don’t even have a to-do list. That’s what makes it so sad.” It’s not totally true—there’s a stack of unpaid bills on our kitchen table, the bag of recycling on our back stoop that I have to take out, and a dentist appointment I need to make—but I don’t want to bore her. No one wants to hear about someone else’s oral hygiene needs.

She laughs again. “Not having a to-do list sounds like the opposite of tragic. It sounds glorious. Kate-Winslet-ascending-the-stairs-at-the-end-of- Titanic glorious, if we’re keeping with the theme.”

This makes me smile. She’s funny, too.

She puts her hand on Harper’s shoulder, gives it a gentle squeeze. “Well, we won’t keep you. I just wanted to say how much I appreciate—”

“Will you push me?” Harper interrupts, looking up at me with her chocolate eyes. Her dark brown hair is in the same neat braid today, secured with a pink ribbon.

“Push you?” I frown.

“On the swings.” She points toward the playground with her tiny finger.

I look toward Violet, who smiles apologetically at me. “Only if you want to,” she says, shrugging. “I completely understand if you have better things to do.”

“No, it’s fine,” I say hurriedly. “I’d be happy to. No to-do list, remember? Let’s go!” I’ll be late getting back to the spa, but I decide it’s worth it. My next appointment isn’t until three; as long as I leave by a quarter to, I’ll be fine.

Harper puts her hand in mine and pulls me toward the swing set. I lurch forward, surprised by her strength, then regain my footing and fall into step behind her.

We wade through the little bodies darting across the playground, the three of us in a trailing line. When we reach the structure, Harper happily climbs onto the swing, wiggling her legs in anticipation. I put my hands on the small of her back and push. She’s light as a feather. Once she gains momentum, I take a step back, toward Violet.

“She’s sweet,” I tell her. “And she was really brave when she got stung.”

Violet smiles at me. “She’s a good kid. Eager to please. But I’m warning you, she could swing for hours. I’m not sure if you know what you’ve gotten yourself into.”

I smile back. I like Violet already. And I especially like that she seems to like me. I give Harper another push.

“Do you live around here?” Violet asks.

“Not too far,” I say. “Near Second and Bond.”

“That’s right near us!” she exclaims delightedly, as if I’ve shared some extraordinary news. I beam, happy that I’ve said the right thing. “Well, a few blocks away. We’re in Cobble Hill, off Clinton and Kane. Have you lived here long?”

I nod. “Since high school.”

We live in Carroll Gardens—the neighborhood just south of Cobble Hill—a small pocket in Brooklyn filled with young families and swanky boutiques, close enough to the water that when the wind blows, there’s just the slightest tinge of salt in the air. My mom and I moved here before it was wildly trendy, when the rents were still reasonable, before the restaurants and bars earned Michelin stars, before it cost north of one-point-five million for a two-bedroom, one-bath.

We moved to take care of my aunt, my mom’s older, and only, sister. Her health was, as my aunt put it, in the shitter—kidneys failing and liver not far behind—and she needed someone to take her to her weekly dialysis appointments. It was only a matter of time before she kicked the bucket, she’d say, sighing.

We moved into her spare bedroom, sharing a queen bed and tiny closet between the two of us. My aunt was right: she died less than eighteen months later. We emptied her room a week after the funeral, packing up her clothes, dismantling her hospital-style bed. My mom waited another week, then ordered a bed set from Macy’s and moved into my aunt’s old room, leaving me in the guest room.

Before my aunt died, she added us to the lease as co-tenants, so we pay the same rent each month as she did when she moved in in the late nineties—just under a thousand dollars. The neighbors above us pay four and a half times that much. If we were looking for a place to live today, we’d be lucky if we could get into a studio in Queens.

Cobble Hill, where Violet lives, is an even nicer neighborhood than ours, filled with new money, couples with trust funds, seven-figure salaries. The brownstones are all renovated, facades refurbished, restored to their historical glory. If she and Jay can afford a home there, they’re even wealthier than I thought.

Just then, Harper leaps off the swing, joining Violet and me. She slips her hand into Violet’s. “I’m hungry, Mom. Can I have my M I could give it to him in person. “Six is great,” I say, smiling broadly. I usually don’t leave the spa until closer to six thirty, but I’ll make up an excuse to duck out early. I worry if I ask to come later, she’ll rescind the invitation. Kids are early eaters. Another time , she might say, and I can’t risk that.

“Perfect.” Violet grins back. “What’s your number? I’ll text you our address.”

I leave the park as happy as I did when I met Jay.