Frank is grieving, Joyce thought, and he doesn’t even know it. She started the dishes, remembering when this had been a sweet spot in her day. Nina would perch on the countertop and squeeze dishwashing liquid on the sponge while Frank read a chapter from one of the Narnia books. Could that really have been last fall?
There was no more reading aloud. No more spontaneous hugs, not even any TV couch time. Nina’s life revolved around her friends and soccer, a game that made Joyce go limp with boredom.
I guess I’m grieving, too.
As she rinsed the last pot, she heard Frank yell to Nina through her closed door, “Are you doing your homework in there?”
Frank still thought there was a strategy for avoiding the thunderstorms of Hurricane Nina, but Joyce was beginning to suspect that there was no way through the next few years without getting drenched every few hours. Maybe that’s why I’m up in Gloucester so much, she thought, as she looked up Francesca’s phone number and muttered, “Duh, as my daughter would say.”
Francesca was all that Joyce remembered, breezing into the Gloucester house later that week. Joyce followed her hot-pink linen pantsuit from one room to the next and felt her modest vacation home morph into a tacky double-wide trailer.
In the kitchen, Francesca stopped and in a near whisper said, “Well, at least they didn’t leave you with orange linoleum and yellow countertops. I’ve seen much worse.”
Joyce felt both murderously defensive about Mrs. Loquasto’s taste and mortified at her association with it. “Coffee?” she offered.
“No thanks,” Francesca said, and opened an enormous book of color samples on the counter. She flipped straight past the greens to a page of dark purples and explained that in “situations like this” it was better to go for contrast.
Joyce’s face betrayed her. “Purple is neutral,” Francesca reassured her. “Besides, someone as interesting and artistic as yourself should have an interesting and artistic home,” she said, snipping out swatches named Pretty Putty, Golden Light, Bluish, and Lemon Crème and laying them beside Summer Aubergine, which Joyce continued to eye with suspicion.
“Buy a quart and just paint a swatch. Live with it for a while,” Francesca said. “If it still doesn’t work for you, call me.”
Joyce waved as Francesca backed her sleek black Saab out of the driveway. She walked over to the Madonna, whose gray concrete arms reached down toward last year’s withered mums. “I like being told that I’m interesting and artistic,” she said to the statue, and pinched its solid cheek. “Don’t you?”
At Ferguson’s, the clerk advised against the cheap brushes she brought to the counter. “A good brush gives you a nice finish, even if you use lousy paint,” said the young man, who smelled faintly of beer. “Since you’re springing for the good paint, you may as well get the good brushes. That’s what my uncle tells me. And he’s a professional.”
He was a good-looking kid, twenty years old, if that, with deep brown eyes and sandy hair that hung over his shoulders. He told Joyce how to wash and hang the brushes so they would stay in good shape. There was a tattoo on his forearm, a little blue star or maybe a starfish.
Joyce thought about leaning down to kiss it.
Later that day, waiting in the car for Nina to get out of school, she remembered the tattoo and wondered what the hell was going on with her. Nina slammed the door hard.
“Hi, sweetie.”
“I’m in a bad mood, Mom,” Nina warned.
“What’s wrong?”
She shrugged violently and said, “Lucy and Ruth were talking about me behind my back. They say I’m stuck-up and fat.”
“Fat?” Nina’s ribs were practically visible through her T-shirt.
Nina flashed Joyce a look that warned against disagreement.
Joyce took a breath. No matter what she said, it would be wrong, though saying nothing wouldn’t work either.
“Mom,” Nina demanded, “do you not even care that my back is killing me and my throat hurts?”
“Of course I care,” Joyce said as sympathetically as possible.
“Yeah. Right.” Nina pounded the button for her radio station and crossed her arms. Through her daughter’s silence Joyce counted six commercials — acne remedy, a television show, running shoes, a contest for concert tickets, a candy bar, another TV show — before they arrived at the field.
“Jenny’s mom will pick you up,” Joyce shouted as Nina slammed the door and ran toward the other girls, her aches and pains forgotten.
Joyce drove around the corner and pulled over. She tried to put things in perspective. She thought about how much she really loved her daughter. She thought about how supportive Frank was of her decision to freelance from home. She thought about how much she loved the beach at Good Harbor.
But it didn’t work. She turned off the ignition, leaned back into the headrest, and let herself cry.
KATHLEEN BARELY SLEPT the night before her appointment with Dr. Truman. Startling awake every hour, she counted Buddy’s sleeping breaths to calm herself and finally took the first birdsong as permission to get out of bed. She walked to the end of the block, threading her way between the neighbors’ houses to watch the tidal river turn gray, then blue in the growing light. By the time she returned, Buddy had the kettle boiling.