“Something for every kind of outing, Chrissie,” Linda announces, shoving things into my arms. “The guys like to tear up the village at night. There is no telling where we’ll end up when we stay at The Farm.”
Tear up the village. So there is more than getting fucked and fucked up. There is tearing up the village.
After thanking Linda, I go back to my room and toss everything on the bed. I make a face and start to search through my new wardrobe. I’m relieved to find a little yellow sundress almost exactly like something I would buy, and a pair of panties not too stripper awful. I settle on a pair of high-top tennis shoes to finish off my outfit.
The guys are not downstairs when I go into the kitchen to find Linda. There are only the wives in the living room, lounging and laughing on the cushy furnishings there. I hear music, muffled and distant, and I wonder where it’s coming from.
“Where are the guys?” I ask Linda. I so don’t want to spend a day indoors with the girls.
“Rehearsing in the barn.”
“So, what are we supposed to do?”
“You’re watching it, girlfriend.” Linda tilts her head as if it helps her to hear the guys in the barn. “From the sounds of it, it sounds like they’re trying to behave nicely together. I expected fireworks, since they haven’t played together in six months. We’re lucky we’re not hearing the barn being torn down around us. I really thought the shit was going to hit the fan in five minutes.”
I pour a glass of orange juice and grab the toast Linda was kind enough to make for me. I look out into the living room with dread and reluctance.
Linda looks at me. “Come on, Chrissie. Let’s get out of here for the day. The guys are going to be tied up all day. Let’s go to the village.”
We take the Rowans’ shiny red Ferrari to the village, top down, and there should be a law passed against Linda driving anywhere. It’s not just the speed that’s getting to me, but her complete lack of focus on the road. She doesn’t stop talking, not ever, and when I talk she fixes on me, hanging on every word as if unaware she’s going nearly eighty on a narrow country road.
She cuts into a parking spot in the center of town, and as we walk down the street it soon becomes clear that Linda Rowan is nothing new in the village. The locals watch us as we walk and stare at Linda, not in an oh, they are famous sort of way, but rather an oh my god the weirdo has returned type way. For what it’s worth, Linda behaves nicely in Lake George. Please, thank you, and other pleasantries.
Unexpectedly, she pulls me into a thrift store. “If you need any more clothes this is the best place to find it in the village. You wouldn’t believe the shit they have here.”
She starts searching busily through tables and racks. We try on silly hats, rummage through purses, and Linda falls in love with an incredible sixties style mini dress that somehow managed to end up on a Goodwill table. She looks beautiful in it, Linda looks beautiful in everything, and I smile as she pays for the dress. This the little dress from the thrift store makes her happy in a way I haven’t seen before. Is Linda happy underneath it all? It’s hard to tell. It is hard to tell what any of the dysfunctional feel.
Linda tucks her wallet into her purse. “Why didn’t you buy anything? Are you a snob or something?”
I laugh because I know she’s just messing with me. “You got the best dress there.”
She smiles and drags me from the store. “I used to love thrift shopping when I was in college. No money, just trying to find treasures. Do you girls do that in Santa Barbara?”
“Not so much.”
Linda’s face lights up. “I love this place. I need to grab some books. It’s going to be a long week without any new ones.”
We next stop at a used bookstore, because Linda likes used and not new. We are very similar in some ways. I toy with the idea of stopping in at the little boutique on the corner to buy some new clothes, so I can return Linda’s things to her, but I haven’t worked out in my head how to return them without hurting her feelings. She was happy to be able to lend them to me. I don’t have the heart to tell her I hate them.
As the day wears on, I start to feel a little emotional. Linda’s manner is almost parental, and I wonder if shopping with Mom would have felt like this if she had lived. I never got to do any of these girl things with my mother, not like this.
As we buy ice cream, I get the courage to ask. “How old are you, Linda?”
Linda’s laughs. “I’m thirty, and yes I know I come across as a mother hen. Just part of always having to be the one who keeps everyone from killing each other.”
We take our ice cream to a bench by the lake and sit there, staring out at the water.
Linda closes her eyes, exhales slowly, smiles, and then opens her eyes again. “I love sitting and just watching people.”
“Me too.”
“It’s good that you’re getting a little quiet time for yourself. This can’t be an easy adjustment. I remember what it felt like for me when I was you.”
“You?”
Linda laughs. “New girl in the pack. Fortunately, only Kenny and Bianca were together back then. The guys hated me. Len gave me such shit.”
Oh no. Something in her voice makes it nakedly clear why she and Alan are so close. They had a thing together, probably before Jeanette. At some time in Alan’s complicated history they had a thing.
I look at Linda and I feel sick. Why does everything about Alan contain some sort of hidden bomb, unexpected and emotionally unsettling. I toss my cone into the trash.
“Can we go back now?”
She rummages through her purse for her keys. “Sure. It’s almost dark anyway, and I hate to drive those roads in the dark. No street lights.”
Linda takes a fast lick of her cone, tosses it, and springs up from the bench, totally unaware that she’s just killed the enjoyment of the day for me.
She plops down into the driver’s seat and waits for me. “I think you have dinner duty tonight. Bianca turns into a total bitch if we ignore her schedule. Like she’ll have to wash one extra dish once in her life. So obsessed with the equality thing.”
“Then we have a problem. I don’t know how to cook.”
I turn to stare out the window. She jams the car in gear and pulls from the curb.
I can feel her eyes studying me. “That’s OK. I can help you.”
“No, Alan can fucking do the cooking for me since he’s the reason I’m trapped here.”
“OK.”
Linda backs off. We drive in silence, Linda alternately staring at me and the road.
I start to cry halfway back to the farm. Linda is trying to drive and is anxiously studying me.
“Please, Chrissie, stop crying!”
I stare out the window and ignore her.
Linda slaps her mouth with her hand. “Me and my big mouth. I’m sorry, Chrissie. I would never do anything to hurt you. It wasn’t deliberate. I don’t think sometimes. I just really like you. I feel comfortable talking to you, and I just don’t think.” I can feel her stare on me. “Shit! Me and my big mouth.”
“It’s no big deal. I’m fine.” My voice is quiet, hollow, like a pouty child and I hate that.
“Bullshit, you are not fine and I can see it.”
The Ferrari screeches as she turns off to park on the side of the road.
Her probing stare is locked on me again. “Chrissie, if it’s no big deal, why are you crying?”
“I’m just a fucked up girl. Can’t we just leave it at that,” I snap, still not looking at her.
“No,” Linda says, in a long and heavy way. “You brought me into it, so no I’m not leaving it alone. And by the way, everyone is fucked up. That doesn’t make you special around here.”
Her weird reassurance pushes a soggy laugh out of me. I look at her now. “OK, this is stupid. I know it is stupid. It’s just people…they’re not easy for me. I never feel like I’m close to anyone. Like I get them. Not my dad. Not you. Not Alan. And not my brother. And I’m just so tired of always being surprised and hurt by everyone.”