Part 4 (2/2)
”Why wouldn't it be?”
”Your father and me...”
”Father and I.”
She sticks her yellow tongue at him. ”Your father and I haven't been apart that long.”
”Mom, it's been over two years. You know he's had girlfriends.”
”Okay, fine. I guess I wasn't ready before and ek cetera.”
”Now you are?”
”I don't know. I've been thinking about a lot of things lately.” She stirs her drink with the straw, sucks some more. ”You'll be gone soon and maybe I don't want to be all alone.”
Cameron pictures her on a date with a lawyer. He's been to her work a few times a law office where she answers the phone and files papers and every man there looks and smells the same. Suits and ties, cologne and breath mints.
When Ruben asks if she wants a third drink, Molly exclaims, ”Only if you don't mind me being face down on the floor!” then lets loose with a laugh that makes Cameron sink down in the booth. Ruben only grins, his gold front tooth glinting in the candlelight.
”You're so embarra.s.sing,” Cameron hisses.
”Oh, lighten up. None of your friends will see you here. Your precious reputation is safe.” She swats him with her napkin. ”You may have to drive us home, though.”
As he pulls out of the parking lot after dinner, Molly says, ”Your grandma's birthday is coming up. Don't forget to get her a card or you'll never hear the end of it.” She pulls a pack of Virginia Slims from her purse. ”D'you mind?”
”It's your car.”
”The only time I smoke anymore is after I've had a drink.”
”Or three.”
She lights it after two tries, cracks the window, blows the smoke out. The radio announcer tells them what's going on in the world. ”Find us some music, please. Life is too short for all this bad news.” Cameron twists the k.n.o.b until an easy listening song comes on. She hums along with the words about fantasy worlds and Disney girls, her eyes closed, and is asleep before they get home.
23.
Claire can't stand to be in church today. She's been feeling that way a lot lately, that if she's not in the shower or in her room with the door shut she might go crazy.
When the Rollins family goes to First Church of Christ during the fall months, it is understood that sometimes their dad will not attend, and other times will need to skip the after-service socializing to speed home. This is because the church of the Dallas Cowboys has his undying loyalty. Claire and Bryce have wondered if he would attend weekly services at all if his wife weren't so insistent on setting a good example. On Sundays like this one, when the Cowboys will be playing the afternoon game, he sits in the pew next to Bryce and Claire, wearing his every-Sunday plaid blazer.
Their mom stands up in front with the rest of the choir. She loves this church so much that she even works in the office during the week.
The perfect family.
Today's sermon: ”The Truth About Temptation.”
Pastor Mark, s.h.i.+ny bald head and neatly trimmed beard, leads the congregation in thanking G.o.d for this beautiful day, then asking Him to watch over the two hundred and sixty-nine souls aboard the Korean airliner shot down by the Russians. ”May you protect and keep them for all eternity. Amen.”
The music starts next; everyone picks up their hymn books. This time in the service is when people get weird, putting their hands up in the air like the ”YMCA” song, smiling all crazy. If Claire's being watched she can mouth the words to most of these songs convincingly.
While her mom always seems super into the choir performance, her dad just stands with his eyes closed. The way they act in church pretty well sums them up as people.
”Bathroom,” she whispers to him between refrains of ”Holy, Holy, Holy.”
Even in the stall, Claire can hear the hymns vibrating through the walls. Meredith's family only goes to church on holidays things are so unfair sometimes.
Right past the bathroom is the youth group rec room, with the ping-pong table, old Atari system, and closet full of board games up to the ceiling. To keep going past that is to come to the Sunday school cla.s.srooms, where young Claire once thought of church as a chance to bask in the love of Mrs. Cindy, who read Bible stories to the seated children, her voice putting Claire into a wonderful trance.
How Claire wishes she could still be back there, before she'd been banished from paradise to the adult service. When Mrs. Cindy left to have a baby, 6' 7” Pastor Gary took over the program. Claire used to pray every night that Mrs. Cindy would come back.
At the end of the sermon, Pastor Mark tells them to go and enjoy this beautiful day G.o.d has given us.
Later, changed out of their church clothes, Claire and her parents sit in the den at home. The football game on TV blares loud enough it's like actually being there. On the couch, Claire reads the Sunday comics in the newspaper: ”Garfield,” ”Hagar the Horrible,” ”Blondie.”
”I wish we got cable,” Bryce says, walking in with a vine of green grapes.
”Why should we pay for TV when you can watch for free?” their mom answers from behind the newspaper in her chair.
”For more channels. MTV and stuff.”
”More s.m.u.t.” She finishes Arts & Entertainment. ”I'm making some extra food for the Vanzants tonight. You can take it over to them, Bryce.”
”Can't Claire do it?”
”Claire's done her part over there. It won't hurt you to do a simple thing like this.”
”Sh, sh, s.h.!.+” Their dad leans forward in his seat. On TV, a green team chases a white team.
A commercial comes on and he sucks down the remnants of a soda, then rattles the ice in the gla.s.s toward their mom. ”When you get a chance.” She closes the paper, stands, takes his gla.s.s into the kitchen. He says to Bryce, ”I don't understand the appeal of watching those music videos when you can just listen to the songs.”
Claire finds the horoscope in the paper. Cancer: You are a champion at gazing into the distance, but not as good at seeing what's right under your nose. At this moment she sees exactly what's under her nose chatter about the grocery list and Bob somebody and what do we feel like for dinner. Talk, talk, talk.
She feels like screaming.
”I'm gonna go outside,” she says.
”Good,” her mom says, returning with the newly bubbling gla.s.s. ”You don't want to waste your day sitting in front of the television.” Her dad doesn't hear her; the game's back and he's hypnotized.
Outside, Claire rides her bike up and down driveways, jumps curbs. No hands. Eyes closed. On the ends of the handlebars are the nubs of her glittery ta.s.sels, snipped off after seventh grade. Ghosts of old hopscotch patterns live on as faint chalk on the sidewalk.
Cameron washes his big old car. Mr. Batson pushes his lawnmower back and forth. Her dad steps out on the front porch, smokes his cigarette while staring at a silver sliver of jet pa.s.sing high overhead.
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