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“Adam is a professional, and frankly, I’m grateful to have a strong young man around to help out with things,” she said, and then tilted her head apologetically toward William. “No offense to any not-so-young men present.”
William just blinked and shrugged, but Richard’s voice floated down from above. “Too late,” he said, appearing on the stairs. He’d changed his clothes and combed his hair, and was holding a small white pill between his thumb and forefinger. “I did find some Xanax, if Mother wants—”
“She doesn’t,” Mom said, and Richard shrugged and popped the pill in his mouth, swallowing it with a grimace. “If you say so,” he said. My mother guffawed.
“You know, you could apologize,” she said.
“For what?”
“Richard.”
“What?!”
“You know we talked about this,” Mom said darkly. “When she asks about Daddy, we should say he’s at work, but he’ll be home later. Weagreed.”
Richard snorted. “You agreed. I think it’s obscene. I won’t do it.”
Diana looked back and forth between them, clasping her hands nervously. “Dora, do you really think that’s wise—”
“I don’t care about what’s wise, I care about what’s cruel,” Mom said, her voice rising in pitch. “You haven’t been here. You don’t understand. When she doesn’t remember and you tell her that he’s dead, it breaks her heart just like she was losing him for the first time. I can’t bear it.”
The cough and rumble of a motor sounded and the old pickup truck I’d seen outside rolled past the window and down the driveway, the sneering man behind the wheel.
Diana cleared her throat. “Honestly, Dora, I have to wonder at your judgment. Are you just letting anyone walk into the house these days? That man was leering at your daughter, did you know that?” she said, pursing her lips.
My mouth dropped open. “That’s not what I—” I started to stammer, but my mother just guffawed.
“Leering? Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “Do you even know who that was? It’s Jack Dyer. Shelly’s son. You remember her, don’t you? From when we were kids?”
Diana frowned, looking distinctly disappointed. An old acquaintance from childhood was much less exciting than a strange pervert on the premises, apparently. “Shelly? Barely. She was your nanny, wasn’t she?”
“And yours,” Mom said, but Diana shook her head.
“No. I remember when Daddy hired her. Mother was pregnant with you, so I would have been eight or nine. She was exhausted all the time, she couldn’t keep up with the house. That’s when Shelly came. But she hardly paid any attention to me and Richard. We were too old,I guess. Although I seem to remember that she was very young and pretty. Richard even had a little crush on her—”
“I did not,” Richard interrupted.
Diana shrugged. “Well, anyway. So that’s her son? I don’t remember him at all.”
Richard snorted violently, and everyone stared. “Are you serious?” he said. Diana looked indignant, and he rolled his eyes melodramatically. “Good lord, sister. It was only the scandal of the century. Shelly got knocked up out of wedlock by a merchant seaman and decided to keep the baby. You can imagine how that played, at a time like that in a place like this.”
I did the math: Jack Dyer looked to be about my mother’s age, which would put his birth date sometime in the late 1950s. Not a great time to be pregnant and unmarried in a tiny New England town, that was for sure. Another few years and Shelly could’ve been an early crusader in the sexual revolution; instead, she’d gotten caught in the tail end of a Golden Age Puritan shame spiral.
“That’s messed up,” I said.
“It was a different time, young Delphine.” Richard chuckled. “A merchant seaman could spray his merchant semen with wild abandon and then ride off into the sunset, footloose and fancy-free.”
“Gross,” I said.
“Anyway, it was quite the outrage. Our parents fought like hell about it. Dad wanted to get rid of her, and if Mother hadn’t been so attached to Shelly, she would’ve been out on her ear.”
“Daddy said that?” My mother looked shocked. Richard looked annoyed.
“What would you know about what Dad was like?” he said. “I doubt you even remember—”
“Shhhh,” Diana said frantically, and gestured across the foyer. Adam was back and waiting at a polite distance, pretending not to listen, even though he must have heard. He smiled at me and I felt a flutter of gratitude.
“I made Miss Miriam a cup of tea and got her settled with Netflix,” he said. “She’s in the room with the green sofa, watching that baking show.”
