“Tell me,” Adam said.
“It’s harder to know what’s true and what isn’t.”
“You mean like did you get the job because of your looks or your résumé?”
“Yes. Or does someone like you for your looks or because of what kind of person you are. And you want to know what else?”
“Sure.” Adam yawned and rolled over onto his side and threw his arm around me. “God, I love lying down next to you.”
“Me too, baby.” I smiled then, thinking Adam could be so sweet.
“So? What else?”
“I think he screws around on her.”
“Why would he do that?” Adam said, trying to sound blasé.
He knew I was always right about these things.
“I don’t know. But I’d bet the ranch on it. One other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“If you think I’m going to spend this vacation watching you drool over her like a puppy, we may as well go home tomorrow.”
Among the pillows, the sheets, and the comforter there was silence followed by more silence while I bunched them and twisted the covers, sending a clear signal of my annoyance. Adam was as still as a corpse, probably hoping I would think he had already drifted off to sleep.
The last thing he heard me say was, “I mean it, Adam.”
Morning came earlier than expected for Adam and later for me.
“Tell Mom I love her, okay?” Adam said on his way out the door.
“Where’re you going?” Max asked.
“To make a fool out of myself,” Adam said.
“I love you too!” I called out from upstairs.
“Have fun!” Luke said.
“See you later,” I said.
I came padding down the stairs in a tie-dyed caftan and bare feet.
“Morning, boys! Don’t sit too close to the television,” I said. “You’ll ruin your eyesight. Did you eat?”
“Yep,” Luke said. “Dad made us breakfast.”
“What are you watching?”
“Rugrats,” Max said.
“Ren & Stimpy is on next,” Luke said.
“Okay, well, what do you say to brushing your teeth and then let’s hit the pool?”
Max stood up. It looked like he wanted to go put on his bathing suit but he couldn’t tear himself away from the television. He was hopping from one foot to the other.
“Go use the bathroom, Max.”
“When a commercial comes on!”
“Now!” I said.
Max ran down the hall.
I looked at the kitchen counter in dismay. The knife that had spread peanut butter on the toasted waffles was stuck to the counter, the open box of waffles was thawed, and the cap for the container of milk was MIA. I sighed, counted the remaining waffles, and knew that my boys had eaten two apiece. I poured myself a mug of coffee and began putting everything away. I hated buying that kind of food for my children, but when we were on vacation I let a lot of rules go by the wayside. Otherwise it wouldn’t have seemed like a vacation.
It wasn’t too long before everyone was ready for another day in the sun.
“Rufus? You want to go sit in the sun?”
Rufus knew better. Sit in the sun? Rufus looked at me as though I had asked him to sit in the oven. He turned, directed his body to the tiled area in front of the refrigerator, lumbered over to it, walked in a circle, and curled up on the floor. He raised his eyes to me, big, watery, red-rimmed, chocolate bonbons that they were, and he sighed the most world-weary sigh that a dog or a man had ever emitted. My heart melted.
God, I love this dog, I thought.
I leaned down and scratched behind his ears.
“You rest, old man,” I said, “and I’ll see you around lunchtime.”
At last, I was able to get my sons organized with all their toys and gear and off we went to the pool. Eve was there reading a book while her daughter splashed around in the shallow end of the adult pool.
“Come sit with us!” Eve called out, waving me over.
“Thanks!” I said and dropped our towels and so forth on a lounge chair next to her. “You’d think we’re going on safari with all this stuff!”
“It’s the truth!” Eve said and called out to her daughter. “Daphne? Come say hello to Max and . . .”
“Luke,” I said.
“Max and Luke!”
Max and Luke were very busy putting on their goggles, and before Eve’s little girl had time to get out of the pool Max and Luke cannonballed into the deep end, sending up a huge plume of water. Fortunately, Eve and I were the only adults there.
“They’re river rats,” I said. “What can I tell you? They started swimming the day they were born.”
“They’re boys! What do we expect?” Eve said, not bothered by their antics in the least.
We watched as my boys swam underwater to the shallow end and pulled Eve’s little girl underwater. Screaming ensued and a morning of endless competition was born. Eve couldn’t stop laughing as she watched them get to know each other.
“They’re like puppies,” she said, “sort of sniffing around each other before they get into the games.”
I shook my head in agreement. “This is the best thing that could happen to them! A diversion.”
We watched them for a bit, then I said, “Where’s your au pair?”
“Oh, it’s her morning off,” Eve said.
“Say, how’s your mom feeling?”
“Cookie? Oh, she’ll be fine.”
“You call her Cookie? That’s so cute!” I said.
“Well, Daphne started it when she was just starting to talk. She would see her and ask for a cookie. Naturally, she gave her one. So she became Cookie. Anyway, she never sits in the sun. She’s trying to avoid aging.”
“How’s that working?” I smiled.
“Well, she looks great, but I think she’s getting a little batty.”
“What do you mean? Is she forgetful? I mean, that’s pretty normal.”
“No! That’s the whole problem. I wish she would be forgetful! She’s . . . well, sometimes she can be very inappropriate.”
“Oh,” I said, wondering what that could mean. “Well, we have to love our parents, warts and all, right?”
“Yes, I suppose so. Hey, Daphne! Give Max his noodle back!”
The pool was a bowl of Chinese soup and the kids were the wontons, floating, bouncing, and bobbing. Unfortunately, they began to play Marco Polo at the top of their lungs.
I looked at Eve and said, “I despise Marco Polo.”
Eve soon came to understand why. The Marco-ing and the Polo-ing was an incessant barrage of highly irritating noise pollution.
Eve went to the edge of the pool and said, “Kids? It’s time to play something else.”
Luke and Max looked to me as if to say, She’s not our mom!
“Don’t even start,” I said. “Noise pollution. Got it?”
Their faces were dramatically sorrowful, so much so that when Eve’s eyes met mine we had to put our hands over our mouths so the children wouldn’t see us laughing. At last we had found common ground. By the time Adam and Carl returned from golf, sweaty and laughing, we were all practically old friends.
Later, when Adam and I were alone, I asked about the golf game.
“How’d it go?” I asked.