“I didn’t look crossing the street, and I got hit by a car,” I said. “So you make sure you look both ways and always hold a grown-up’s hand.”
The mom looked back at me.
It was Darby Dennings, sidekick of Amy Beckman, Queen of the Cheetos, receiver of hugs. Amazing how I knew everyone instantly, as if I hadn’t been gone for fifteen years.
“Sorry if he’s bothering you,” Darby said with a smile. Her eyes flicked up and down, assessing my injuries, her gaze lingering on my purse. “That’s a great bag,” she said. “Mind if I ask where you got it?”
“Oh, um...I think I got it at—”
I’d bought it at a snooty boutique on Newbury Street after I was hired by Boston Gastroenterology Associates. Roseline, who had a serious shopping addiction, believed that every woman needed to own a purse that was way too expensive. We’d made a day of it, both of us still heady with our salaries, and settled on this one, made of buttery brown leather so smooth and supple I wanted to date it.
It had cost an amount that still embarrassed and thrilled me.
“I got it at T.J. Maxx,” I said.
“You can get great stuff there,” she said. “The one in Portland?”
“Boston.”
“Is that where you’re from?” There wasn’t so much as a flicker of recognition in her eyes.
“Mommy, I want a cookie!”
She ignored the little guy, smiling at me, and I saw myself through her eyes for one deeply satisfying second. Granted, the sling. But still, my hair was shiny from the straightening iron and the high-end products I used to tame it. Makeup was Chanel. I wore a blue cashmere sweater and Lucky Brand jeans and buttery leather Kate Spade flats.
“I’m from here, actually,” I said. “Nora Stuart. How are you, Darby?”
Her jaw dropped, and her face went from pleasant to flushed, her smile fading. “Well, holy crap.”
“These are your kids?”
“Yeah. Uh, Matthew, Kaylee and Jordan.”
“Hi, kids,” I said. “I went to school with your mother.”
The children didn’t respond or notice or care.
“You lost weight. Christ. I didn’t even recognize you.” Her eyes narrowed as if I’d played a trick on her.
“Whatcha want there, Darby?” asked Lala.
Then the door opened again, bringing a gust of cold air, and in came a good-looking guy.
Darby glanced at him, too. “Hey, Sully.”
Good God. Sullivan Fletcher. Twin brother of Luke Fletcher, god of high school. For a second, I wobbled on my bad knee.
He did a double take when he saw me.
“Nora! Hey. How are you?” He didn’t smile, but he didn’t scowl, either.
“Hi,” I breathed. “Fine, thanks, Sullivan. Um...how are you?”
He looked good, thank God. I never did learn exactly what had happened to him in that car accident senior year...just that he’d had a brain injury. I remember they said he was expected to recover, but you never knew what that truly meant.
But the years had been kind to Sullivan Fletcher. Once, he’d been an ordinary-looking boy, brown hair, brown eyes. Now age had given him character. His face had lost its boyish softness, and his jaw and cheekbones were hard and well-defined. Curling hair, on the shaggy side. He was tall, maybe six-one and rangy and...well, interesting.
And he was normal. My adrenaline burst was followed by relief. Those words—traumatic brain injury—had haunted me. Every time we’d had a TBI case in residency, I’d thought of Sullivan Fletcher.
But here he was, looking completely healthy and...well...good.
Really, really good. My mouth was dry with relief.
“I heard you were back,” he said.
“Yep. I am.” So much for witty repartee.
I wondered if Luke had turned out, as well. Once upon a time, I had loved Sullivan Fletcher’s twin, right up until I hated him.
“Darby, what do you want? I don’t have all day,” said Lala.
“A loaf of rye. Jesus. Do I ever get anything else?”
“I want a cookie, Mommy!” said the little guy. The other two had yet to look up from their phones.
Lala put the bread through the slicer, wrapped it and handed it over, taking Darby’s money at the same time. “Help you?” she said to me.
“Could I please have a donut?”
“Just one?”
“Yes, please.”
“You’re in Boston now?” Sullivan asked.
“That’s right,” I said, nodding. “Here for a little while. Are you getting donuts? I love them. I mean, you know, who doesn’t, right? Donuts should be the universal sign of happiness. We could win wars with donuts. And, hey, no one makes donuts like Lala, right?”
You are a highly trained physician, my brain told me. Snap the fuck out of it.
Sullivan’s eyebrows drew together a little.
“What do you do for work?” Darby asked, making no move to leave.
I dragged my eyes off Sully, trying to regain my cool “Um...I’m a doctor.”
“A doctor?” she said. “A real doctor?”
“Yep. I’m a gastroenterologist.”
“What’s that?”
“Stomach and digestive track.”
“Gross,” Darby said.
I usually had a reply for that, some alleged Mark Twain quote about the joys of pooping, but my mind was blank. Was Sullivan mad at me? What had happened to Luke? Did he still live here? Should I apologize? Maybe I should just get out of here.
Yes. That one.
“Here you go,” Lala said, and I handed over a couple dollars, then hobbled out, my bad leg locked, the other feeling weak.
Sully held the door for me. “See you around,” he said.
“Yes,” I said. Another eloquent answer.
Then, before I made more of an ass of myself than I already had, I stiff-legged it down the street. I kept my head down, the fear that had splashed at me earlier now rising like a fast tide.
Luke Fletcher would definitely know I was back now.
8
When it finally became clear that my father wasn’t coming back anytime soon, I did what unhappy girls do all over the earth, and especially in America.
I ate.
That first, joyless summer crept past in inches. A new school year started, and I was hungry all the time. Loneliness for my father was like a sinkhole, and I couldn’t find enough food to fill it, despite always taking seconds, always scraping my plate.
Then I started eating in secret, sneaking down to the kitchen at night when my mother was in bed to stuff a leftover meatball in my mouth, chewing the cold, tasteless wad, reaching for another before I even swallowed. I told my mother I could make my own lunches now and added extra slices of American cheese, folding one in quarters, pushing it into my mouth while I slathered the bread with mayonnaise.
At school, I started stealing dessert from the cafeteria, even though I was a cold-lunch kid. Pudding or Jell-O with fake whipped cream on it, the big hard cookies that spattered crumbs everywhere. I’d go through the lunch line, pretending I needed an extra napkin, and subtly grab a little bowl or cookie or Twinkie, then slip off to the gym, which was always empty at lunchtime, and swallow my treat in gulps, tasting only the first bite, shoving the rest in as fast as I could.
I didn’t have friends anymore. All those years of rushing home to see what Dad and Lily and I were going to do (because it was better than anything in the world) had left me outside the harsh world of junior high, where cliques were carved in stone, and cafeteria seating was more complex than the British peerage.