Adult Assembly Required, page 17
Bob hesitated, then decided to take her word for it and turned on the engine. He noticed her hands were gripping the edges of the seat, and wondered if it would be better to go faster and get home sooner, or slower, which might be easier on her nerves.
“Laura . . . ?” he began. “What . . .”
“Please,” she said desperately. “I’m a nervous passenger, please ignore me.”
“But it would . . .”
“No. Please drive.”
I’ll drive then, thought Bob, wondering what she was thinking about that made her so anxious. The accident, presumably. He tried to drive sensibly and calmly, which was pretty much all he could do to help her. All she would let him do.
Laura was thinking about the things she thought about to stop herself from thinking. She started mentally listing the bones of the foot, of which there are twenty-six. She started reciting organs of the body in alphabetical order, followed by major nerves, and was halfway through the glands of the endocrine system when they arrived home.
It worked, as it often did. Laura was able to turn to Bob as they pulled up and say, without a shadow of tremor in her voice, “Thanks so much for today, I really had fun.” Her face was composed; nothing had happened at all, nothing worth discussing.
“Are you feeling better now?”
She gave him a broad smile. “Of course! Sorry, I guess I’m more easily startled than I thought.” Then she opened the door of the truck and walked toward the house.
Bob rubbed the back of his neck and opened his own door. He was pretty sure he’d just been lied to again.
TWENTY-THREE
As they approached the house, loud music spilled out to the street, and Laura hesitated. “Wait . . . what’s that?”
Bob literally clapped his hand to his forehead. “I forgot. It’s Poker Night.”
Laura stopped walking. “Sorry?”
Bob gazed at her, and a slow smile spread across his face. “Your first Poker Night at Maggie’s, and I’m here to witness it. There is a God.”
Laura snorted and headed into the house. Someone was playing the Pointer Sisters and leaning on the volume. Top ten song of all time.
Bob watched her go and frowned. On the one hand, now he didn’t have to worry about a clumsy good-night, but on the other hand, his time alone with Laura was over. He stopped on the lawn and looked up at the night sky. Despite the humidity and heat of the day, the darkness was unclouded and the stars bright diamonds on velvet. He needed to breathe and settle himself down. He’d been attracted to Laura, and then worried about her, and then confused by her. He’d had a relationship in college with a woman who’d become emotionally unstable, and it had put him through the wringer. He saw how strong Laura was, but twice now she’d freaked out and then pretended nothing was happening. It wasn’t the freaking out that worried him so much. It was the pretending.
Bob shook his head at himself and followed Laura inside.
* * *
• • •
The Larchmont Booster Club was a small but determined organization. Founded in the sixties by a very bored woman with time on her hands, its goal was the “beautification and improvement of the Larchmont Shopping District.” Largely and not all that secretly inspired by Anne of Green Gables and her Avonlea Village Improvement Society, it raised money for things like median flower plantings, repainting the lampposts, repainting the benches, repainting the curb, and generally repainting anything that stood still too long. On the one hand it wasn’t important, but on the other hand it really was, because there was no getting away from the fact that Larchmont Boulevard was easy on the eye.
In the six decades since its founding, the LBC had transformed several times. In its first decade alone it had gone from a Phyllis Schlafly–esque twinset-and-pearls affair to a hippie counterculture collective and then into second-wave feminism and turtlenecks. It had languished a little in recent times, but when Liz at the bookstore was voted in as its new president—in absentia, or they never would have dared—she decided to hold meetings at her friend Maggie’s house every month, and to hold them in the form of Poker Nights. All proceeds to the boosters, of course, and potluck offerings strongly encouraged and discussed over text for days beforehand. Within six months the booster club had enough operating capital to take the rest of the year off, but Maggie kept the Poker Nights going with her own core team.
As Laura walked into the kitchen, she was greeted by the dogs, who got to their feet and kept looking at her face and then at the kitchen island, their tails a blur of hopeful motion. No wonder: The whole surface was covered with small food. A quick scan showed bacon-wrapped dates, those little goat cheese puff things from Trader Joe’s, individual s’mores . . . It was a thing of beauty, and Laura cursed the pancakes she’d eaten. Bob came in behind her and immediately reached past her for a s’more.
She turned to him. “Do you play poker?”
“No,” he said with his mouth full. “One, I don’t know how, and two, Poker Night is women only.”
“Ah,” said Laura, and hesitated. “Do you mind if I . . . ?” She blushed, unsure of the right thing to do. They’d been on a date, sort of but not really, and he’d taken her home, but had also brought himself home, and she’d embarrassed herself . . . Laura could feel her internal rainbow wheel spinning, her social software stalling out.
“Go ahead,” said Bob. “I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”
“OK, well, thanks again for dinner,” she said, bending to pet Herbert, who thought maybe this was a precursor to dropped food and leaned into her legs.
“You’re welcome, thanks again for helping,” Bob said quietly.
“Of course,” said Laura, shooting for jaunty yet nonchalant, but missing and hitting slightly manic instead. So she turned and headed out to the patio.
Bob sighed and looked down at the dogs. Then he took a piece of bacon from around a date and broke it in half.
Holding the pieces above Herbert and Daisy, he said, “She’s very pretty, and she makes me nervous. Don’t tell anyone.” He dropped the bacon fragments.
They never reached the ground, and his secret was safe.
* * *
• • •
The round table had been given a green cloth, and five women were sitting around its edge. Laura saw Liz from the bookstore, and Maggie she knew, of course. The other three women were Nina, Polly, and Anna.
As Laura stepped out onto the patio, the game paused and all the women swiveled in their seats.
“Hey, Laura,” said Maggie, looking back down at her hand. “Don’t mind us, we’re wasting our youth gambling and drinking.”
“Go right ahead,” Laura said, stepping closer. “What are you playing, ladies?”
“Hold’em, of course,” said Liz. “Do you happen to play?”
“A little,” said Laura.
The heads swiveled again, but this time it was for Bob.
“Good evening, lovely ladies of Larchmont,” he said, surprised by how suavely the phrase came out.
Anna and Polly giggled, and Liz made a low hooting noise.
“Ignore her, Bob,” said Maggie. “Menopause does terrible things to a woman’s libido.”
Bob laughed. “Does anybody need anything from the kitchen?”
“I’ll take another beer,” said Nina, who hadn’t raised her eyes from her cards.
Laura pulled a chair closer and sat down to observe. She’d learned poker (and bridge and canasta and gin rummy and crazy eights) from her grandmother, who’d learned cards from her late husband, a mathematician and card counter banned from Atlantic City. Laura still loved the feel of playing cards in her hand, the easy privacy of strategy and observation. She felt a wave of gratitude. Her parents might have taught her to rattle off kingdom and phylum, but her grandmother had given her practical, quotidian abilities. Card games. Knitting. Cooking. Sports. Nine times out of ten those were the skills she turned to when things got hard. The secret to happiness isn’t always in your head. Sometimes it’s entirely in your hands.
The ladies were finishing a game, which Maggie won, and Laura asked if they could deal her in.
She said, “What are we playing for?” and hoped the stakes weren’t prohibitive.
“Bragging rights,” said Polly. “And candy. Each mini York Peppermint Pattie is worth ten bucks, and the Starbursts are a dollar each.”
Laura scanned the table. There were piles of candy at every place, with a suspicious pile of wrappers under most chairs. The players were literally eating into their profits.
Based on the relative height of the pattie stacks, Liz was winning and Nina was close behind. Polly clearly wasn’t all that committed, as she was absentmindedly eating her stack, but Anna and Maggie were still in with a chance.
Maggie turned to Liz. “Blinds are five ten, you’re small.”
Liz threw in five Starbursts, then unwrapped one and ate it. Maggie dealt the cards.
“You seem to be doing well,” Laura said, taking her hand as it was dealt. She peeked: ace, king, spades. Good start.
“No trash-talking,” said Liz.
“That wasn’t trash-talking,” said Laura. “That was an observation.” She picked up a peppermint pattie to see if she could flip it around her fingers as easily as she did a regular chip.
Liz narrowed her eyes at Laura. “I am growing suspicious of your girl-next-door persona, miss. You handle that pattie like a pro.”
Laura shrugged. “Play and see.”
Liz looked at her cards and opened with two patties.
“I’m out,” said Polly, and tossed her cards. She unwrapped a pattie and ate it cheerfully.
The other two also folded, leaving Nina, Liz, and Laura in the hand.
Laura looked at her cards again, looked at Liz, and then said, “Raise you a pattie.”
Nina said, “I’m out, this is too rich for me.” She put her cards down and then said, “Did you know . . .”
Liz said, “Stop,” quite loudly, and stared at her cards. “No poker trivia, we made a rule.”
“Oh yeah,” said Nina, subsiding.
Liz called the pattie, and threw in five Starbursts.
Laura made a mocking noise. “I smell a bluff.” She tossed in five Starbursts to call.
Maggie rolled her eyes and dealt the flop. The three cards lay in the center of the table: seven, eight of spades, nine of hearts.
“Check,” said Liz, rapping her knuckle on the table.
“Me too,” said Laura. “Check.”
Maggie sighed and dealt another card. Ace of clubs.
Liz, who was displaying the worst poker face in the history of the game, grinned and threw in two more Starbursts and another York pattie.
Laura, whose face was as calm as a pond, called.
The final card was dealt: jack of spades.
Liz literally made a crowing noise and pushed her candy across the table. “All in, baby.”
Calmly, Laura called again.
“Read ’em and weep, Knickerbocker, jack high straight.” Liz started clawing back her candy, but Laura raised her hand.
“Not so speedy there, Hollywood.” She laid her cards down. “That would be ace high flush, winning hand.”
“I knew it,” said Liz, throwing her cards on the table hard enough for them to bounce. “She’s a total shark, I can’t believe I fell for the angelic face and sweet disposition. I’m ashamed of myself.” She addressed someone behind Laura. “Bob, be a dear and go put the kettle on. If I don’t switch to peppermint tea right now, I’m going to be crabby in the morning.”
“Sure,” Bob replied, and Laura turned, surprised to hear his voice. He was sitting on the floor in the open kitchen doorway, leaning back on his hands and watching the game. Daisy was next to him, and Herbert was lying by his feet. Laura hadn’t even realized he was there, and she watched him get to his feet and go into the kitchen. Every single woman around the table noticed her body language change. Except her, of course.
“I’m getting tired, too,” said Nina, tossing her cards toward Liz, who was gathering the pack. “I have to open the store tomorrow.” She looked around. “Where’s the bowl?”
Maggie reached under her chair and pulled out a big blue-and-white-china bowl that Laura had previously seen holding fruit. It was full of candy, and Nina swept her winnings off the edge of the table and into the bowl.
“Wait, you don’t even keep the candy?” Laura asked, surprised.
The women all shook their heads.
“It’s for fun,” said Liz as she passed Laura, and patted her on the arm. “This is California, baby, there’s always more candy.”
Maggie raised her eyebrows. “That’s the worst state motto I’ve ever heard.”
Liz snorted. “Better than California: We hunted the grizzly to extinction, or California, home of a hundred thousand earthquakes a year.”
Maggie gazed at her friend. “You’re really wasted in retail. You should be working for the governor.”
* * *
• • •
Bob had meant to go to bed, he really had. After sharing another bacon-wrapped date with Daisy and Herbert, he’d even turned in that direction. But then he’d heard Laura’s voice and turned back again.
He’d picked a spot in the doorway where he could see her but could also slide backward into invisibility if he wanted to. He watched her remove her shoes under the chair and toe-pull her socks off. Her toenails were painted the pale pink of a lemonade berry flower, one of his favorite native plants. He looked at Laura’s profile, her forehead slightly wrinkled as she focused on her cards. She pulled at her lip when she was about to make a bet, and although her face and torso were absolutely still, her feet were kicking and flexing like mad under the table. He watched her hands as she held and played her cards. Long fingers, deft and accurate. He found them beautiful. She wasn’t the prettiest girl he’d ever seen, he told himself, trying to be objective, trying to rein in his runaway horse a little, but there was something about her face that made him want to stop looking at anyone else.
He went to turn on the kettle for Liz, pulling down a mug and hunting in the cupboard for a peppermint tea bag. When he returned to the patio, the ladies were breaking up for the evening.
He frowned slightly. “No tea, Liz?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine,” she said. “You stay here and make sure Maggie doesn’t clean up.” She and the other ladies chatted and laughed their way through the kitchen, followed by Maggie and trailed by the dogs. Bob turned to help Laura, who was already clearing the table.
She grinned at him. “I don’t know if I’ll be invited back,” she said, handing him a stack of plates. “I may have blown my cover too soon.”
Bob carried the dishes inside, and Laura went back and forth quickly, clearing the patio before the hostess had even finished saying goodbye to her guests. Maggie, Anna, and Polly came into the kitchen and started protesting, but Bob waved them away.
“Let the downstairs people take care of downstairs,” he said. “Go to bed, we’re nearly done anyway.”
Anna and Polly needed no encouraging and headed upstairs right away, but Maggie looked around, and sighed. “Fair enough, I see there’s no point in arguing with you.” She peeped out at the garden, where Daisy was Roomba-ing around under the table for dropped candy, sighed again, and then snapped her fingers. “Oh, Laura, I forgot. I put some names for you on a piece of paper and slid it under your door.”
Laura frowned. “Names?”
“Of therapists,” said Maggie blithely. “You can call any of them, they’re all good.”
Laura flushed red, and turned away. “Uh . . . thanks,” she said, and headed out the back door to the garden. “I’ll go check for more dishes.”
Maggie frowned slightly, then turned to take the back stairs up to her floor. “Thank you, Bob, sleep well.”
“You too.” Bob started the dishwasher and joined Laura on the patio. She was standing looking up at the moon, which was full and bright enough for her eyelashes to cast shadows on her cheeks. The moonlight filtered the red from her skin, and she looked completely composed.
“It’s so clear tonight,” she said. “I thought LA was always covered in a haze of pollution, but I see many more stars than I ever saw back home.”
He looked up at the moon, then nodded. “Yup.” Come on, Bob, say something pretty about the moon, something romantic. “Los Angeles is a desert and the day-to-night temperature variation can be pretty big, although there are several areas in the city where there is so much asphalt that the heat is retained far longer than is natural.” Or, alternatively, say something both unromantic and boring, totally your call. “The nights are often completely cloudless.”
“Huh,” she said, wishing she’d brought a cardigan, or that she was near one of those asphalt patches. She liked the way Bob spoke to her. It reminded her of her family, informative like they were, but without the implicit criticism that she didn’t know this information already. She was about to turn and say something, when she suddenly remembered she had a list of therapists lying on her bedroom floor and felt ashamed.
“Do you want anything to drink?” Bob asked. “I think there’s beer left.” He noticed her shiver. “Or I could make some more tea?”
She turned. “No, thanks, I should really go to bed.” She kept her eyes down. “I had a really good time today, you were right about Edward and Lili, they’re lovely. And Clare might be my new favorite person.” She hesitated, wanting to apologize again for panicking, but decided to pretend it never happened.
Bob nodded and stepped back to give her room, resisting the impulse to reach out and touch her as she walked by, close enough for her hair to brush his upper arm. By the time the thought had even formed in his head, she was through the kitchen and in the hallway.
