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"Tully, apologize?"
Kate couldnt help smiling. "I know. I know. But how come I always have to be the one to let things go? How come I always have to make the first call?"
"You just do. "
It was true; always had been. Friendships were like marriages in that way. Routines and patterns were poured early and hardened like cement.
Kate went into the bathroom, brushed her teeth, and climbed into bed with him.
He turned off the bedside lamp and rolled over to face her. Moonlight shone through the window and illuminated his profile. He held his arm out, waiting for her to snuggle up to him. She felt a surge of love for him that was surprisingly sharp, given their years together. He knew her so well, and there was a cashmere comfort in that; it wrapped around and warmed her.
No wonder Tully had so many sharp angles and harsh edges; shed never let herself be softened by love, wrapped up in it. Without kids or a husband or a mothers love, shed grown selfish. And so, yet again, Kate would let go of her anger without an apology. She shouldnt have let it simmer so long anyway. It was remarkable how quickly time passed. Sometimes it felt as if theyd just had the blowup. What mattered now was not the words, spoken or withheld, but rather the years of friendship.
"Thanks," she whispered. Tomorrow shed call Tully and invite her over to dinner. Like always, that would put an end to their fight. Theyd move effortlessly back onto the road of their friendship.
"For what?"
She kissed him gently, touched his cheek. Of all the views she loved, this mans face was her favorite. "Everything. "
On a gray, drizzly morning in mid-November, Kate turned her car into the middle school parking lot and joined the snakelike line of SUVs and minivans. In the stop-and-go traffic, she glanced to her right.
Marah sat slouched in the passenger seat, looking surly. Her expression and her mood had been dark ever since the blowup over the modeling class in New York.
Before, Kate now saw, there had been bricks between her and her daughter. Lately there was a wall.
Usually it fell to Kate to smooth over any of the rough patches in the road their family traveled. She was the peacemaker, the referee, and the mediator, but nothing she said had worked. Marah had stayed angry for weeks now and it was taking a toll on Kate. She wasnt sleeping well. It pissed her off, too, these silent treatments, because she knew Marah was manipulating her, trying to break Kate down.
"Are you excited about the banquet?" she forced herself to ask. At least it was something to say. The whole eighth grade was excited about the winter banquet, as they should be. The parents—including Kate—had expended a huge amount of effort to create a magical night for the kids.
"Whatever," Marah said, looking out the window, obviously searching for friends in the crowd of kids outside the school. "Youre not going to chaperone, are you?"
Kate refused to be wounded by the remark. She told herself it was normal; shed been telling herself that a lot lately. "Im the decorations chairman. You know that. Im hardly going to work on this event for two months and then not see our work. "
"So youll be there," Marah said dully.
"Dad and I both will. But youll still have fun. "
"Whatever. "
Kate came to the drop-off lane and stopped. "The Mularkey family school bus is here," she said. Behind her, the boys giggled at the familiar joke.
"That is so totally lame," Marah said, rolling her eyes.
Kate turned to her daughter. "Bye, honey. Have a nice day. Good luck on your social studies test. "
"Bye," Marah said, slamming the door.
Kate sighed and glanced in the rearview mirror. The twins were playing together in the backseat, making their plastic dinosaurs fight. "Girls," she whispered under her breath, wondering why it was that adolescent girls simply had to be mean to their mothers. Clearly it was normal behavior; shed spent enough time with her friends and peers to know that. So normal it was probably part of evolution. Maybe the species needed girls who thought they were grown up at thirteen for some bizarre, hidden reason.
A few minutes later she dropped the boys off at school (kissed them both goodbye—in public) and began her own day. First off was a stop at Bainbridge Bakers, where she got a latte, then she dropped off some books at the library and headed down to Safeway. By ten-thirty, she was home again, standing in her kitchen, putting the groceries away.
Just as she was closing the fridge door, she heard the familiar Girlfriend Hour theme music coming from the TV in the living room, and she followed it. She rarely watched the show all the way through—how could she, with her busy schedule?—but she always turned it on so she knew what the episodes were about. Both Johnny and Tully sometimes quizzed her.
Kate hitched her leg over the end of the sofa and sat down.
On-screen, the theme music died down and Tully walked onto the cozy, were-just-a-couple-of-girls-hanging-out-in-your-family-room set. As usual, she looked beautiful. Last year shed decided to let her hair grow out into a sleek shoulder-length bob, and shed returned to her natural reddish-brown color. The sophisticated girl-next-door cut and color only emphasized her high cheekbones and chocolaty eyes. A few well-placed shots of collagen had given her perfect lips, which she coated in just a hint of gloss but almost no color.
"Welcome back to The Girlfriend Hour," she was saying now, trying to be heard over the din of applause. Kate knew that people sometimes stood in line for six hours to be in the studio audience, and why not? The Hour, as it was called by fans and media alike now, was fun and breezy and occasionally even inspiring. No one ever quite knew what Tully would say or do next. It was part of what kept people tuning in, and Johnny made sure that everything ran like a well-oiled machine. True to her word, Tully had made them all rich, and Johnny, in turn, always made Tully look good.
