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The first time they’d broken up, before they’d had a child together, Lisa had been the instigator. They’d discovered through his mother that her father, Jack, was Ryan’s father, too. Lisa just couldn’t deal with it and had ended the relationship. But after a while, she’d realized she was only punishing herself and invited Ryan back.
In the short time they had been apart, he’d had a torrid affair with Sandra Benson, who had accused him of rape, then he’d married Laura Long, who was now with Will, and impregnated his other half-sister, Alison, at one of Pam’s July 4thbeach parties. The memories made Lisa snort with laughter at the gallows humor.
Thoughts of everything she and Ryan had overcome flashed through her mind, but none of it could compare with him leaving her now because he couldn’t stop fooling around.
Trudging up the beach, she kept her head down in case her mother was looking out the window. The last thing she wanted was to have to explain what was happening to Pam.
Currently, her mother was an annoyance to be dealt with as little as possible. None of the things Pam had promised to do to be a better grandmother had come to fruition; she’d quicklyforgotten about a promise to run on the beach with Megan and Miranda, now that Dan was officially in residence.
And although Lisa was glad her mother was finally getting settled, there was a lingering, maddening angst about Lisa’s ex-husband, Dan, being the guy Pam was settling with. Even her sons were confused. “Why’s Dad living with Grannie?”
The surf came in fast and furious, and she had to jump away to keep from getting her shoes wet.
“Hey, Lisa!”
She was already far enough north that she’d reached Igor Roman’s house. His son Tony’s girlfriend, Kassandra, waved from the terrace.
“Kassie!” Lisa cried.
When they’d met at Sandra and Andy’s house the year before, Lisa had hit it off with Kassandra, the stay-at-home mom of five and the cardiac surgeon an unlikely pair. Running down the dune from the house, Kassandra met her halfway. She grabbed Lisa’s arms.
“You will not believe this. We’re going to buy the house.”
Lisa pointed to the huge glass monstrosity. “Thishouse?”
“Yes! I can’t wait to have coffee with you and get pregnant. Not that those two things are related.”
Barking out a laugh, Lisa hugged her. “I’m speechless.”
“I know. I sprung it on Tony, and he’s still in shock.”
“What about the job? Will you open a practice down here?”
“Oh, hell no. I’m going to do consulting and then refer. Part time.”
“Do Sandra and Andy know?”
“Yes! They were just here a while ago. It’s so weird; you know how when you make a major decision, there are always some niggling points that are left dangling? There’s nothing like it with this. Tony may have some, but I’m letting him work those issues out on his own.”
“Wow, you’re so well adjusted,” Lisa said, thinking of Ryan moving into his creepy month-to-month rental.
“I think it’s because I know what I want, and I don’t have any time to dawdle. I’m going to be forty in June. If I really want a big family, I’d better get busy.”
“Will you miss surgery?”
“No! I was more or less pushed into it by my father.”
Kassandra’s dad still practiced in Ann Arbor.
“What will he say when he hears?”
“Really, at this stage, I don’t care. I’ve reached a point in my career where I either get a partnership with Igor’s old partners, which is unlikely, or continue as an associate, and I’m over that. I’m sick of the call and the things that go along with being low man.”
“It’s foreign to me. I can stay in my pajamas all day if I want.”
“Well, that’s what I aspire to,” Kassandra said. “Last month, one of my false eyelashes came loose during a surgery, and the anesthetist at the head of the table had to pull it off before it dropped into the wound. I knew then I was finished.”
“Why do we women do that to ourselves?” Lisa thought of her mother’s recent spate of plastic surgery.
