“What a charming visual. Forgive me for not recognizing you at first. When Lulu told me her model friend from New York was coming for a visit, I naturally pictured someone a little …”
“Thinner?” I finished, noticing the way Ester’s eyes traced my curves. I posted my hands on my hips and dared her to look away. “In the real world, there are a lot of different standards of beauty.”
“Evidently.” Ester pursed her lips. “In any event, I’m here for Jack. Not that this interaction hasn’t been delightful.”
Uh-oh. That’s right. I still haven’t found Jack.
“I … He’s asleep!” I said before thinking.
“Asleep?” Ester said with narrowed eyes. “Why, it’s nearly four in the afternoon. Something tells me Lulu wouldn’t be fond of the idea of you throwing off her son’s sleeping schedule like this.” She made a clicking noise with her tongue. “Of course, I suppose that’s something only a mother would think of.”
I bristled, not so much because she had hit a nerve or anything. Sure, kids were something I wanted … in the far off future. It was sort of the way a person wanted to go to Europe or plan for retirement. I was going to think about it, just not today.
No, the thing that really pissed me off was the slithering notion that she might be right. Lulu was a mom, and I wasn’t. There were things that she went through that I wouldn’t understand, things that this stuffy witch apparently would.
“Look, I don’t know what to tell you. He’s asleep. Come back later,” I said, motioning toward the still open door.
“You sure about that?” She smiled.
My teeth clenched, wondering what she knew that she wasn’t telling me. But I didn’t have time to consider that. A shriek, loud and decidedly panicked, sounded from outside.
I darted to the door to find Lulu standing in the driveway, a spilled bag of groceries littered at her feet and her hands clawing at her temples, the way they did only when she was really freaking out.
“Jack!” she yelled, her eyes planted on the backyard. “Jack get back from there!”
Leaving the groceries behind, she bolted toward the house faster than any pregnant woman this close to popping ever should.
“Lulu, slow down,” I said, flinching at the fire coloring her eyes. “The doctor said you’re supposed to take it easy.”
“And you were supposed to be watching him!” she said much louder than I had anticipated. She pushed past me, almost knocking me down with her momma bear bruteness as she made her way out the back door to the huge expanse that was her backyard.
I went after her, trying hard not to react to the smug satisfaction that Ester didn’t even attempt to hide.
“That’s the strangest nap I’ve ever seen,” Ester remarked as she followed me outside.
At first, I didn’t see him. The yard was completely empty, save for the customary swing set and sliding board that seemed to be everywhere now. God, people sure loved to procreate around these parts. But as I followed Lulu’s running (and bouncing) frame, that quickly changed.
Jack was beyond the white wooden fence that cut off the backyard and separated it from Bookman’s Woods, which had always traced the outskirts of much of the town but seemed bigger now than it had when I was a kid.
Jack splashed around, running his hands through a shallow running stream and laughing like some sort of carefree hyena.
I bolted toward them, easily catching up with Lulu as she made it to the fence.
“Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!” she yelled, moving down the fence, looking for the break that Jack had undoubtedly squeezed through. “Jack, you get back from there!”
She was breathless, holding her belly and wheezing.
“Lulu, calm down!” I said, scanning the fence. “He’s right over there. We can see him. There’s no reason to—”
“What the hell do you know?” she barked at me. “You were supposed to be watching him, and you let him go here of all places! Do you have any idea how dangerous—” She bent forward, clutching her stomach and panting even harder.
“It’s just a stream, Lulu,” I said. I reached for her, but Ester was already there, making soothing sounds into her ear and pulling her away from me.
God, how’s that for symbolism?
Jack stood up, as if sensing his mother was in pain. His eyes cut to the left, and following them, Lulu pointed.
“Th-there,” she muttered breathlessly.
A piece of the fence had broken, leaving the smallest of openings in the otherwise unyielding white wood.
“I’ll get him,” I said
Lulu was way too pregnant to crawl on her belly, and I had seen enough women like Ester to know that they didn’t get their hands—much less their dresses—dirty for anything.