Mustard-chusetts. All it needs is a tiny Dijon Mayflower, sailing across the ocean of Dr.Martin’s tie.
Claire chuckles under her breath. When she finally looks back up at Dr.Martin, he’s frowning, and Claire realizes he’s been trying to say something to her. There’s a small piece of paper in his hand, which he’s trying to hand over.
“Sorry,” Claire says, straightening her posture and averting her eyes from the distracting stain. “Could you repeat that?”
“I was saying, I think you might be struggling with some anxiety. These will help,” he says. “Take one with each meal.”
Claire takes the paper; scrawled across it in messy writing is a long and complicated word.Chlordiazepoxide.
“Are you sure these are necessary?” Claire asks. She’s not sure what she’s being prescribed, exactly, and even when it’s coming from a doctor, she doesn’t like the idea of taking something blindly.
Dr.Martin waves her off. “It’s easier to conceive when you’re relaxed. Malaise can throw off the body’s rhythms.”
“Then maybe it’s Pete who needs the pills. He’s got no rhythm at all,” she says, chuckling. “Two left feet.”
The doctor doesn’t laugh. He frowns deeply, and reaches for his prescription pad again. “Are you sure you’re sleeping enough? Maybe I should prescribe you something for that.”
“No, that really isn’t—I’m sorry,” Claire says. Another nervous laugh bubbles up from her chest. “Just a bad joke.”
Thankfully, Dr.Martin puts the pad down, though he’s still frowning. “Right. Well then, besides a bit of a rapid heartbeat, you’re in good health, Mrs.Davis. We’ll see you again soon, and you can tell me how the medication is working.”
He stands, opening the door for her, and Claire hops down from the examination table feeling duly chastened.
The walk home is a long one. The doctor’s office is further into town than she usually goes, and it took her almost an hour to get here. She has no intention of going to the pharmacy—the prescription is crumpled in the bottom of her purse and she plans on it staying there, but she does have to stop at the grocer for her weekly shop before heading back to their little suburb of Acacia Circle.
Her feet don’t take her straight to the store, though. She meanders through the park instead. It’s a perfect early spring day, and women are out and about. They socialize with friends, push prams, and lay out picnics for their young families. As always, Claire feels no desire to be among them, caring for her own future children. Observing is enough. More than enough, in fact—it’s a reminder of Claire’s brokenness.
It's not only Pete that she’s not doing right by, in hesitating over motherhood. It’s also her own mother, who has always wanted grandbabies and is cursed to have only one child who could give them to her. Even though she lives in Florida now, thriving in her second marriage after Claire’s father passed, she still asks about the status of Claire’s womb every time she phones up.
Once upon a time, Claire might have been inclined to stop and sketch on a day like today. Maybe capturing these idyllic little family outings could magically make her want what they have. But it’s been a long time since she had a moment to draw in the park, the way she did when she was a teenager. She doesn’t have the time for that kind of frivolity anymore. She has a house that needs keeping.
So, Claire keeps walking. She finds her way to her usual grocer, pushing her squeaky cart aisle by aisle and grabbing things by memory. She hardly ever needs to write a list anymore—Pete is a creature of habit. He leaves the same amount of cash for groceries every week, and Claire has the necessities down to an art. It’s so second-nature that Claire often ends up lost in thought until she hits the checkout.
A bag of frozen carrots. Two packs of bacon. There are two toddlers wrestling in a cart in the middle of the aisle, while their tired-looking mother is distracted by a sale on frozen TV dinners. They remind Claire of Tom and Jerry—one slightly larger than the other, bonking his sister insistently on the head with a box of Cream of Wheat while she gnaws on his arm. Being an only child, Claire has always wondered what having a sibling might be like, but passing their cart makes her reconsider. A few lonely days in childhood are probably better than being smacked about the head.
A carton of eggs. A quart of milk. There’s a display of Ovaltine set beside the milk refrigerators, and Claire picks up a box out of pure nostalgia—she used to love the stuff, until she got too old for it. Pete probably wouldn’t notice if she bought some. He never checks the cupboards. After a moment of consideration, Claire sets it in her cart.
Three cans of mushroom soup, and one of peas. Claire ducks around a woman with a cigarette in her hand, and the smoke makes greyish swirling patterns as it rises towards the ceiling. Claire tries not to wrinkle her nose as she grabs the cans. She’s always been glad she never started smoking. The smell of it is unbearable. Next is a box of puffed rice…
As Claire rounds the corner into the cereal aisle, her mental list skids to a halt.
There’s someone in her way.
This shouldn’t be such an obstacle. Claire could easily scoot past like she has in every other aisle, but this time her feet seem to have rooted themselves to the linoleum. The woman is unlikeany person Claire has ever seen in real life, and she finds she’s unable to do much besides stare.
The woman is fairly young, probably around Claire’s age, and arresting to look at. She’s much shorter than Claire, not helped by the fact that she’s in flat-soled sandals; Claire can see painted toenails, a deep navy blue, which shouldn’t be an interesting fact but somehow seems fascinating. Her legs are also bare, no stockings in sight, all the way up to the knee-length hem of her black slip dress. A leather belt cinches it to her waist, and the long sleeves drape a bit as the woman stretches up to reach futilely for a box of Sugar Crisp tucked away on the top shelf.
Her face, when she turns towards Claire, is entirely unfamiliar. Sharp features, highlighted with the kind of hip makeup that Claire only sees in magazines. An aquiline nose with a strong, angular bridge. Dark olive skin, dramatic almond-shaped eyes, and black hair hanging loose and straight around her shoulders. This woman is glamorous. She looks carefree and stylish. European, maybe? It’s a struggle to guess at where she might be from.
Claire can’t stop looking at her. She looks like she belongs on a beach somewhere. She looks like a catalog model, like those ladies in Vogue Magazine. No…even better. The women in Vogue don’t have such a perfect curve to their waist. They don’t have that kind of generous bustline. They don’t have the same subtle smile, or those warm brown eyes.
Warm brown eyes which are staring directly at Claire.
“Sorry. Do you need me to move?” the woman says.
Claire’s mouth opens and closes once or twice before she finally remembers her manners. She springs into action, scooting her cart to the side of the narrow aisle.
“Oh no, I can fit. See?” Claire gestures down at her cart, smiling widely. She feels silly when the woman only nods, the corner of her full lips quirking. The almost-grin makes Claire’ssmile feel all the more forced. Claire is sure, somehow, that this woman’s real smile would be dazzling. She can imagine how she might draw it.
