Page 58 of 28 Summers
“Iamgoing to call it Frayed Edge,” he says. “Thanks, Mal.”
“Give me a commission, please.” She throws back what’s left of her tequila andwhoa!It hasYou’ll pay for this laterwritten all over it, but it does the trick. She feels nothing but a slow, dirty burn inside. “This wedding is…I don’t even know.” She longs to tell Fray about the love triangle that has ruled her life for the past six years, nine months, and two weeks and how it has been, maybe, revealed to have another side. But it would be too much for Fray—or anyone—to digest. And Fray might feel like telling Coop in the name of “protecting” Mallory.
Next, Mallory considers telling Fray that she saw Valentina crying in the bathroom, but she doesn’t want to stir that pot either. The wise thing is to keep quiet.
“I’m going to keep quiet,” she says, because she’s drunk and can’t keep quiet.
Then an astonishing thing happens: Fray turns Mallory’s face toward him and they start kissing. Fray maneuvers himself off the wall and ends up standing to the left of Mallory’s legs, which are bound together by the ballet-slipper-silk skirt of her sheath.
Mallory is enjoying herself. Is it weird that she’s kissing Fray, a person she has known since she was a little girl? She might feel that way tomorrow, but tonight she’s hungry for his attention. Besides, she has always had a thread of sexual curiosity about Fray, deeply sublimated, but come on, he was older, a little dangerous, and off-limits to Mallory because of Cooper and Leland, which only made him that much more intriguing. He’s sober, he knows full well what he’s doing, so Mallory can only think that either Fray has held a torch for her all this time or Mallory has somehow transformed herself into an object of desire, either of which would be gratifying. In any case, she lets Fray lead her to the woods on the far side of the eighteenth hole and they make love leaning against a tree, which sounds rushed and uncomfortable but is, in fact, the opposite. Fray takes his time and deals with the restrictions of her sheath so expertly that Mallory wonders if he often makes love to bridesmaids at wedding receptions while leaning against trees. What neither of them thinks about until the last possible minute is birth control; Fray promises he’ll pull out and then breaks that promise.
When they walk back to the reception, the band is playing “At Last,” which is the song Mallory danced to with Jake at Coop’s first wedding. She seeks him out—and sees him staring right at her and Fray. His eyes remain on her as she reaches up and pulls a leaf from her hair.
He shakes his head almost imperceptibly, or maybe he doesn’t shake his head, maybe Mallory is imagining this gesture of disapproval, of jealousy. Mallory longs to take his hand and pull him onto the dance floor, she longs to whisper in his ear,Yes, I was just in the woods with Fray, but it’s you I love, it has always been you, it will always be you, Jake McCloud.
But she can’t. Ursula is sitting right next to him, shaking the ice in her glass. Ursula has told Mallory she’s pregnant and maybe Ursula told her something else as well, or maybe she didn’t, but either way, Mallory can’t go near Jake for the rest of the night.
“Wanna dance?” Fray asks.
“Sure,” Mallory says.
Labor Day is ten weeks later. Mallory is waiting in the Blazer when Jake steps out of the Nantucket airport. He climbs in without a word. Mallory turns the key in the ignition without a word.
Mallory turns down the no-name road, and dust, sand, and dirt billow behind the Blazer in a cloud, just as they always do. Mallory has burger patties waiting under plastic wrap in the fridge, six ears of corn, shucked, four perfectly ripe tomatoes from Bartlett’s Farm sliced and drizzled with olive oil and balsamic, and a wedge of Brie softening next to an artful pile of water crackers and a small dish of chutney. There are novels stacked on Jake’s side of the bed—this year,Bee Season,by Myla Goldberg, andThe Blind Assassin,by Atwood—just as there always are. But this year, something is different. Maybe more than one thing.
Mallory pulls into the driveway, turns off the car, and looks at Jake.
“Home,” she says, trying for cheerful.
“Ursula is pregnant,” he says. “I know I should have called, but I wanted to tell you in person. I thought you deserved that.”
Mallory can’t decide if she should act surprised or not. Not, she decides. She appreciates the effort to get it all out on the table right away so they can talk it through, then enjoy their weekend.
“I understand,” she says. “Better than you know.”
“What?” he says.
“I’m pregnant too,” she says.
Part Two
Thirties
Summer #9: 2001
What are we talking about in 2001? A Tuesday morning with a crystalline sky. American Airlines Flight 11 from Boston to Los Angeles crashes into the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m. United Airlines Flight 175, also from Boston to Los Angeles, crashes into the South Tower at 9:03. American Airlines Flight 77 from Washington Dulles to Los Angeles hits the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. And at 10:03 a.m., United Flight 93 from Newark to San Francisco crashes in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. There are 2,996 fatalities. The country is stunned and grief-stricken. We have been attacked on our own soil for the first time since the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in December 1941. A man in a navy-blue summer-weight suit launches himself from a 103rd-floor window. An El Salvadoran line chef running late for his prep shift at Windows on the World watches the sky turn to fire and the top of the building—six floors beneath the kitchen where he works—explode. Cantor Fitzgerald. President Bush in a bunker. The pregnant widow of a brave man who says, “Let’s roll.” The plane that went down in Pennsylvania was headed for the Capitol Building. The world says,America was attacked.America says,New York was attacked.New York says,Downtown was attacked.There’s a televised benefit concert,America: A Tribute to Heroes.The Goo Goo Dolls and Limp Bizkit sing “Wish You Were Here.” Voicemail messages from the dead. First responders running up the stairs while civilians run down. Flyers plastered across Manhattan:MISSING.The date—chosenby the terrorists because of the bluebird weather—has an eerie significance: 9/11. Though we will all come to call it Nine Eleven.
If there’d been anything else we cared about that year before this happened, it was now debris. It became part of what we lost.
Ursula loves being a mother.
This surprises no one more than Ursula herself. Her pregnancy was difficult. Everything that could go wrong did: she had aggressive morning sickness, she got carpal tunnel in both hands, she had gestational diabetes, and, finally, in her seventh month, placenta previa, which put her on bed rest until her delivery date.
This last development, the bed rest, was not received well at work. Hank Silver did the predictable thing, showing up at Ursula’s apartment and suggesting that maybe her priorities were shifting, maybe instead of relentlessly pursuing partner, she wanted to consider part-time hours, a support role.
“The Mommy Track?” Ursula asked with no small amount of disgust, for that was what everyone called it. “You know me better than that, Hank. I’m going to close this case from bed. And after the baby is born, I’m going to work twice as hard. I will make partnerthis year.That was my goal when I started. That’s my goal now.”
(Hank knew to tread carefully; the last thing he wanted was a sexual-discrimination suit. But Hank had five children; he understood better than anyone that children changed things. They took priority, as Ursula would soon find out.)
