“Oh, Elaine,” her mother said, facing forward again. “Elaine wouldn’t be caught dead with us. Wait till you see her, Willa. She gets all her clothes at Goodwill these days and she listens to what I wouldn’t even call music and her friends are downright strange.”
“Now, now,” Willa’s father said. “It’s not as bad as all that.”
“Yesterday,” Willa’s mother told Willa, “I asked her to clean her room because your side of it was completely submerged. I mean, I couldn’t even see your bed for all the clothes piled on it. But later I went up to check and she hadn’t done a thing. She’d gone off by then with her, I don’t know, boyfriend? Friend? Partner in crime? This boy who’s a whole foot shorter than she is, Marcus, his name is, all dressed in black and wearing one earring; has never so much as given me the time of day. So anyhow, when I saw the state of the room do you know what I did? I opened the window and I heaved all her clothes down into the backyard.”
Derek gave a little hiss of amusement, and Willa’s mother sent him an appreciative glance. “Jeans, tops, sweaters,” she told him, “these dead old men’s pajamas she favors…all of it. Out the window. Clean across the yard. Long black skinny tights straggling over the barbecue grill.”
Now Derek laughed aloud.
“My wife is very tempestuous,” Willa’s father told him.
Willa hated when he said that. He always made it sound like a virtue. He gave a prideful lilt to the word, and when he sought out Derek’s face in the rearview mirror his eyes were rayed with smile lines.
“Well, I don’t get it,” Willa told her mother flatly. “All you did was spread her mess around further. I don’t know what good that did.”
“Oh, honey, just you wait till you have a teenage daughter yourself and you’ll understand,” her mother said. “My life is a living hell.”
Willa sank into silence. Derek set a hand on top of hers, and she let it stay there, but she kept her face turned toward her window.
The countryside here was much more interesting than Illinois, she felt. She hoped Derek was noticing that. (He always talked as if California were so special.) There were tumbling green hills resembling bunches of fresh parsley, and mysterious hollows already darkening in the late-afternoon shadows, and nearer to the highway little cabins sat surrounded by rickrack fences and ramshackle sheds, washing machines on their front porches, hound dogs splayed in the dirt yards, tractors rusting out back. The trip from the airport took over an hour, and Willa watched the scenery that whole time without speaking while her mother, up front, was all charm and gaiety and hostessy curiosity. Did Derek have brothers and sisters? Yes, two brothers, both younger. And did she understand correctly that he was about to graduate? Right, and not a moment too soon; he was ready to start his real life. What did he plan to do next; did he know? He already had a job back home in San Diego; a friend of his dad’s owned a sporting-goods chain and he had offered Derek an executive position. Willa’s mother said, “Oh, how lovely! Because of your tennis skills, I guess,” which was embarrassing because it revealed that Willa must have discussed him with her family. “Yes, ma’am,” Derek said. Willa had never heard him say “ma’am” before. It seemed he had switched to a foreign language to accommodate the natives. She scowled at a passing pickup with three overalled boys lounging in the rear, their backs slouched against the truck’s cab. How they would have hooted at all this genteel small talk!
* * *
—
The house had been spruced up for their visit, Willa could tell. There was a pot of pansies on the porch that must have been bought within the last couple of days, because her mother could kill off a plant in no time, as she cheerfully admitted herself. In the foyer Willa smelled a combination of lemon Pledge and Mr. Clean, and when she took Derek upstairs to the guest room she could see the fresh vacuum-cleaner tracks on the carpet. “This is where you’ll be sleeping,” she told him, entering first. The window was open and a breeze was stirring the curtains. A vase of daffodils stood on the dresser. Clearly, her mother had gone to a lot of trouble.
Ordinarily the sight of the guest-room bed, with its multiple rows of giant pillows and fussy, overstuffed cushions slanted against the headboard, made Willa’s toes curl in protest as she imagined how her feet would jam against the footboard. But Derek said, “Nice,” and he set his duffel bag on the new foldout luggage stand, and Willa saw that it was nice, actually.
“Where’s your room?” he asked. He took hold of her wrist as he spoke and drew her toward him.
“Oh, down the hall,” she said vaguely.
Now he had her nestled against him, and he murmured, “Do I get to visit in the night?,” with his breath ruffling the top of her head.
“No, silly, I share with my sister,” she said, but she didn’t pull away.
“So you will have to visit me, then.”
“Not a chance!” she said, laughing. Then she looked up to see her sister glancing in as she passed the doorway. She was wearing what looked like a man’s long overcoat, brown tweed and much too warm for the season, and her hair hung in two straight curtains that barely parted to make room for her face. “Oh, Lainey,” Willa said, hastily separating from Derek. Elaine came to a reluctant halt. “I’d like you to meet Derek. Derek, this is my sister, Elaine.”
Elaine raised her left eyebrow—or the part of her left eyebrow that could be seen, at least. Her eyes were so heavily outlined in black that she resembled a pileated woodpecker. “Don’t let me interrupt anything,” she said, and she continued down the hall.
Derek and Willa exchanged a wry look.
“So!” Willa finally said in a bright voice. “Bathroom’s directly across from you, towels are on the shelf above the tub…”
Derek reached out to encircle her wrist again, and she allowed it, but she said, “Let’s go downstairs and see what’s for supper, shall we?”
Downstairs, Willa’s mother was setting a tray of juice tumblers on the coffee table. An uncorked bottle already stood there—cream sherry, Willa saw as her mother began pouring. She was surprised. She was shocked, in fact. Her parents didn’t drink. Her father had never found any liquor he could stand the taste of, he always said, and her mother just didn’t have the habit of it, although she’d been known to accept a flute of champagne at a wedding reception. But now her mother said, “Sherry, Derek?” delicately lifting a brimful glass with just her fingertips, and he said, “Oh, well, thanks,” and accepted it.
“Sherry for you, Willa?”
“Thank you, Mom,” Willa said.
She couldn’t bear for Derek to show any sign he found this laughable: the sweet, thick sherry served just before supper and the squat, slightly sticky juice glasses. But no, he acted perfectly solemn and respectful, holding his glass in front of him without taking a sip until Willa’s father arrived from the kitchen with his own drink (iced tea). Then Derek said, “Cheers, everybody,” and everyone murmured, “Cheers,” and took a sip.