Page 52 of Good Days Bad Days
But what happens when the woman on the flying trapeze loses her grip and falls with no net?
“I know, but—” His Adam’s apple bounces up and down, and I pick at the lid of my drink. “I wanted to see you, too,” he says as he grips my forearm, turning me gently.
“I told you. I’m not ready.” My eyelids quiver and I breathe in the scent of my coffee in an effort to keep calm.
“I’ll do anything to make it better. What can I do? Please ...”
The anguish in his voice infuriated me the night I discovered the messages, but something has changed, because now it doesn’t seem like manipulation.
I let my gaze rise to meet his. The dark circles under his eyes are intensified by the redness of his lower lids, and I think about the last time he looked this way, when I had a devastating ectopic pregnancy in our first year of marriage, our one and only attempt at having a child together, something we’d wanted desperately. But that tragedy wasn’t something either of us chose or made happen out of sneakiness or ego or lust.
“That’s the problem, Ian. I don’t know if youcanmake it better.”
He takes in a long, unsteady breath. He’s mad. Ian rarely loses his temper, but I know his tells. Who is he mad at? Me for not forgiving him instantly or himself for putting us in this situation? I don’t know and I’m not up for asking. I want what I came to Lake Geneva to get—space.
I change the subject.
“Thanks for offering to help my dad. Maybe you can talk some sense into him.”
He lets out a long breath like he’s reluctant to drop the topic of possible reconciliation and then looks over his shoulder at the house. My dad is making his way back to where we’re standing.
Ian presses his lips together till they turn white from the pressure. “I’ll do my best.”
“I talked with Nurse Mitchell, and you’re cleared for a visit,” my dad interjects, pushing his blocky phone into his shirt pocket, a big smile on his face like the cold and the stress of the ongoing renovations don’t affect him.
“I’ll stay here, then, and go through a few things with Greg, if that’s all right,” Ian says as though I’d invited him to meet my mother, which I definitely had not.
“Yeah, that sounds like a plan,” I say, not wanting to call him out in front of my dad, who is beaming now.
“Your mother will be so pleased to see you and Olivia.”
I try to muster a sincere smile. I should be happy, my parents are finally meeting my daughter, my dad is proud of me, proud of her, interested in my life, but I’m numb to it right now. Just like the way Ian’s love and apologies come off as hollow, so does this. Or maybe I’m the one who is hollow, empty, unwilling to accept anyone’s fallible love.
I join Olivia in the car, elbowing her out of the driver’s seat where she’d pointed all of the heating vents when she started the engine. My dad shouts one last thing, but it’s muffled by the car’s engine revving. I pull out and point the car toward Shore Path Memory Center and ask Olivia if she understood what he said.
“I don’t know,” she says, readjusting the vents. “It sounded something like ‘She’s having a good day.’”
A good day.It’s the phrase I’ve come to dread, the one that tells me my mom, the firing squad, the critic, the hoarder, is back. And we’re on our way to see her.
Great.
Chapter 20
Greg
September 5, 1970
Highway 50
I slow my speed as we hit Main Street in Lake Geneva. The glowing neon makes me wish we could stop in one of these little cafés, have half a sandwich and a cup of soup and forget everything.
“I’m gonna miss this place. It’s so magical here in the summer. I’ve always wanted to see some of the big houses up close. It must feel like a dream living in one of those,” Betty says as we crawl past the Lake Geneva public beach with its tall white lifeguard towers. In the distance I spot the Riviera boathouse, where I saw Hal Iverson and danced with a cute girl from Appleton who gave me her number. I never called her, but every time I see the boathouse I think of Maggie Brady and wonder if she ever went back there looking for me.
“I once hiked the whole shore path with my scout troop.” I add to the conversation as we glide through the town.
“I heard about that path. It goes all the way around the lake, right?” she says, squinting at the black waters reflecting the moonlight in wavy lines across its surface.
“Yup. I heard every couple of years the summerhouse people try to change the rules, stop the unwashed masses from walking through their yards. It’s only twenty miles long, but our troop stopped at Camp Augustana overnight. It took us two days.”
