Summer Days, Page 2

  “There’s a digital scale at the studio,” she replied, as if she had spyware in his brain. “And she actually gets on it. When other people are around.” She licked the tip of her finger and flicked a page of her magazine. “Not. Very. Bright.”

  He remained silent, and then felt unchivalrous for not standing up for Meredith. A voice from a lifetime ago floated up from the recesses of his mind. “Obviously, I expect a little more from you than you’re willing to give.”

  He bristled. Why should he stand up for someone who’d walked out on him?

  And it had to be said, the gaping holes in Meredith’s education had always stunned him. Not very bright? How could he argue with that? Once, when Meredith had been quizzing him for a graduate school entrance exam, it had become clear that she completely misunderstood the concept behind the word binary. God only knows what theater majors studied in college, but it was tragically apparent that budding thespians weren’t getting past base-ten mathematics.

  “We would have been better off having a stay-cay in the city,” Gina said. “We should be hunting for an apartment, not traipsing around Peru with these characters.”

  They had decided to move in together, but both their apartments were too tiny to make a practical home for two, even in the short term. Her house-hunting vacation would have been more sensible, but he wasn’t feeling sensible. If there was anything he’d learned from past romantic failures, it was that sensible sank relationships.

  He had all sorts of romantic things planned for this trip. Activities lined up pleasantly in his mind, mirroring the to-do list app on his phone. First, the candlelit dinner in Cuzco at the special restaurant he’d found. Followed by a romantic journey into the Andes, topped off with a proposal at the top of the world, against the backdrop of the glorious ruins of Machu Picchu.

  That last cost him a moment’s worry. Sure, they looked glorious online, but were they? Also, the place would probably be crawling with tourists. It might be like popping the question in the middle of Times Square, and if that was the case, what was the point of traveling all that way and spending so much money—?

  No. That kind of thinking was very Old Sam. He was New Sam now. New Sam didn’t do cost-benefit analysis when it came to marriage proposals.

  A signal dinged throughout the cabin, and the flight attendant announced that the captain had okayed the use of electronic devices. Janie tossed her magazine into his lap and whipped out her iPad.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Checking messages.” She tapped and scrolled, reabsorbed into the world they were flying away from.

  Suppressing a sigh, he started reading a travel article on Wisconsin. The writer was attempting to move away from the cheese-and-beer angle and create some razzle-dazzle about his subject, but in the end he just focused on the expensive cheese, the high-end beer. Sam struggled to keep his mind from wandering.

  He’d have to pick up a paperback at the Miami airport.

  He wondered what Meredith read on long flights. In the old days, she’d always gone to the library and come back lugging armloads of stuff, more than anyone could read in the time the library permitted. Then she would forget the due dates, or a book would end up lost behind a couch cushion, and the delinquent fees would mount. Within three months of arriving in New York, she owed the library eighty-nine dollars—which seemed mathematically impossible. Short of hurling books into the East River, how did anyone end up owing that much? He’d set up an Excel file for her on her computer to keep track of what she borrowed. She forgot to use it.

  The puzzling part was, Meredith had seemed to resent his giving her that spreadsheet. It was as if she thought that by trying to fix a problem for her, he was judging her, or criticizing her. When really it just pained him to see her tossing money away.

  Money had been so tight that summer. Boxed-macaroni-and-cheese tight, sometimes. An aspiring actress, Meredith had limited herself to temp jobs to accommodate auditions she never got called for. And though he made okay money working in a bank, rent ate up over half their income, and the rest just seemed to dissolve after a couple of weeks of meeting friends at bars after work and for movies on weekends. Eventually it dawned on them that they weren’t in college anymore. By the sultry end of August, he was saving for graduate school, and they passed most of their time in their tiny apartment, trying to economize. Video games and cards for entertainment, cheap wine from Trader Joe’s, lazy sleeping-in weekends . . . The apartment had been cramped, the future completely precarious.

  He’d never been so happy. He’d never been in love before. Really in love. All the goofy symptoms his friends had displayed back in high school—the vacant grins, the humming of mindless pop songs out loud without realizing it—he had exhibited for the first time at age twenty-three.

  “Oh. My. God.”

  Gina’s cheeks had turned a chalky white.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Another fish tank catastrophe in New Hampshire. The third one this week.” She frantically tapped out a missive on the screen’s keyboard. “An orthodontist’s office this time. The Perfect Pride people are in a panic.”

  He frowned. This must have to do with an account she did PR for. “I thought Perfect Pride made dog food, cat food . . . stuff like that.”

  Her lips tightened. “Fish food would fall under the category ‘stuff like that.’ ”

  “Oh.” He tilted his head. “I had some goldfish die when I was a kid. I forgot to put drops in the water or something.”

  “This isn’t about drops. It’s about Perfect Pride Fish Flakes. And these weren’t crappy little feeder fish you win at a street fair; these were exquisite tropical fish that cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars. I can’t believe this is happening—and now, of all times.” She smiled tightly and took a sharp breath. “I need to draft a release, okay? Read your magazine and chill. I’ll come up for air in a minute.”

  He was going to remind her that they were on vacation, but that might have pushed her over the edge. Instead, seeing his chance to stretch his legs before the drink cart came up, he stood and headed to the back of the plane. At Meredith’s row, he noted the empty window seat. In the middle, Janie sat reading the article on Wisconsin. Looking up from a picture of a Holstein, she darted a quick, suspicious, accusatory glance at him.

  He hurried on.

  A short line snaked away from the washrooms in the back of the plane, jamming the aisle. Sam considered going straight back to his seat, but Gina would still be working, he still wouldn’t have a book, and now the drink cart was pulling even with his row. He stood hunched, ignoring the irritated glances from the people sitting in the aisle seats. Nearby, a baby started wailing. Was it any wonder he avoided traveling? Planes were torture for everyone, even for the recently born, who at least had plenty of legroom.

  The man in front of him turned around. It was Seth. “Typical,” he confided to Sam in a not-very-quiet voice. “There’s always a line when my bowels are at their most volatile.”

  The woman ahead of them pivoted and shot Seth a look of alarm.

  “So . . .” Stroking his beard contemplatively, Seth leaned in to Sam. “So you knew the sister. Old girlfriend?”

  Sam shrugged. “It was a long time ago. Technically, we were just apartment mates.”

  “Lived together, no less!” Seth chuckled. “Personally, I think Janie’s way hotter, even if she is sort of . . . you know. High-strung. But I sort of go for sophisticated women.”

  Sam smiled tightly and repeated what he’d told Gina. “Well, when Meredith and I were together—apartment mates—we were a lot younger. Just out of college. We’re both probably a lot different now. I didn’t even recognize her at first.”

  The washroom door jerked open, and Meredith burst out, her eyes widening at the number of people waiting, then popping open a little more when she saw Sam at the end of the line. She edged past them all as the person in front of Seth gave him her place.

  “Hey,�
�� Meredith greeted Sam. “I had no idea you were coming on this trip.”

  “Me neither,” he said. “I mean . . . I didn’t know about you. Of course. I didn’t even know you were in New York. Or that Gina and your sister knew each other.”

  She nodded. “That’s New York—big city, small world.”

  “For all I knew, you were still in London.”

  Was he mistaken, or did she flinch a little? “No, I’m back. Have been for some time. Years, actually.”

  The smile disappeared, and suddenly he regretted mentioning London. The Meredith of his memory was usually such a good-natured, laughing kind of person that he’d forgotten her way of looking wounded. It was something about those big brown eyes in her pale face, framed by that reddish hair. In the blink of an eye it was so easy for her to appear fragile, under siege. Her war-orphan look.

  “Well . . .” She moved to continue to her seat, but was stymied when she saw the drink cart. She was trapped now too. Her brows knit for a moment, but then she laughed. “Eventually, aren’t we all going to end up crushed into the flight attendant alcove? It’s going to be like the Marx Brothers with all the people crammed into the stateroom.”

  “ ‘And two hardboiled eggs,’ ” he piped up, not quite succeeding at a Groucho impersonation. He and Meredith had seen A Night at the Opera together one night at the outdoor summer movies in Bryant Park.

  A chortle erupted out of her, and suddenly seven years didn’t seem that long ago.

  Ten rows away, Janie’s head bobbed over the top of her seat. She peered back at them for just an instant, but an instant was all it took. Sam’s smile dissolved.

  Meredith’s laughter trailed off too, and she eyed him curiously. “How long have you and Gina been together?”

  “Not long . . .” He shook his head. “Well, eight months.”

  She tipped her head to one side. “Longer than . . .”

  Longer than he and Meredith had lived together. Not that there was any comparison. He and Gina were more serious—thinking about marriage. Something he and Meredith had never reached the point of discussing. They’d been at a different stage in their lives then, so it wouldn’t have made sense. Also, she’d run off to London.

  Technically, he and Gina hadn’t discussed marriage yet, either, except in a “maybe someday” kind of way, but he hoped this trip would change that. Unconsciously, he patted the ring box in his pocket.

  Awkwardness stretched the seconds out to their ragged limits, until Meredith nodded over his shoulder. “Restroom’s free.”

  Sam fled into the tiny compartment, nearly bashing his forehead against some ceiling protuberance in the process. Despite the fact that he couldn’t stand straight, the coldness, and the general ick factor, it was a relief to have a little privacy. His heart thumped. He wished he had thought of something better to say to Meredith after all these years. But what? What was there to say?

  Not a day went by that I didn’t think of getting on a flight to London to find you.

  Of course, saying that would have been entirely inappropriate. Gina occasionally dressed him down for being socially tone-deaf, but even he knew that sometimes the best thing was to stay mum. Especially to an old girlfriend. Especially when new girlfriend was waiting for you in 9A.

  When he left the washroom, there was no line. The drink cart had vanished. He hurried back to his row, careful not to look at Meredith and Janie as he passed. As he dropped into his seat, Gina twisted her lips at him. “I thought maybe you’d decided to camp out in there,” she said. “I had time to draft an entire damage-control message for after the recall.”

  He stammered about the line and the drink cart, ending with, “Meredith was stuck too,” spoken so breathlessly it sounded as if he were confessing some indiscretion.

  “You poor thing,” Gina said. “So what did you guys talk about?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. What’s there to say?”

  “To her? Not much. She’s never been chatty the few times she’s come to the studio. From what I can glean from Janie, Meredith is one of these goofballs who’s never quite gotten it together. She does catch-as-catch-can legal proofreading for a living—and I’m sure without Janie, who’s an attorney, she wouldn’t even have that. Occasionally she lands an audition. The rest of the time she’s involved in some theater in Astoria. Modern stuff—you know, showcasing original works by undiscovered genius playwrights in Queens. Bet they’re packing them in.”

  “Well, being an actress can’t be easy.”

  Gina nodded. “Especially not when you’re the size of a caribou. I mean, who wants to look at that?”

  He framed a diplomatic answer, but she didn’t give him time to use it.

  “Anyway, from what I can tell she’d be lost without her sister. Janie goes way beyond the call of duty to keep her from making stupid mistakes. Even packed her off to London once.”

  Sam froze. “London?” He sensed he should stop Gina, yet was unable to form words that would do the trick.

  “Poor Janie. She buttonholed some professional contact there who could give Meredith a BS internship. And believe me, if Janie was willing to shell out for a plane ticket, she must have been desperate—that woman is cheap. But apparently baby Meredith had attached herself to some loser.”

  “Loser,” he repeated.

  She snorted. “Mr. McBoring-Boring, to hear Janie tell it. Evidently he wasn’t even very well-off. It’s hard to see what Meredith saw in this zero. And then, to top it all off”—Gina lowered her voice—“Meredith had a miscarriage, and the guy’s basic reaction was phew.” She shook her head. “A real gem.”

  It was all he could do to stay in his seat. It hadn’t been a miscarriage—it had been a false alarm. And he’d never said phew!

  He’d said, “Oh, thank God.”

  His face felt fiery hot, and he looked out the window into an opaque sky of clouds.

  McBoring . . .

  This was all coming through the Janie filter, he reminded himself. Janie had never thought he was good enough for Meredith. But even so, some of it must have come from Meredith . . . and some of it was simply the truth.

  Gina beetled her brows at him. “You aren’t feeling airsick, are you?”

  He shook his head.

  “Good.” She leaned her head against his shoulder and sighed. “I’m so glad you talked me into going on vacation. I’m not doing another lick of work. Every mile farther I get from the office, and Perfect Pride, and fish food recalls, the happier I feel. How about you?”

  He nodded, which she probably couldn’t see anyway. Inside his head, questions roared over the 747 jet engines. So Janie had admitted she’d talked Meredith into going to London all those years ago. That would indicate that Meredith hadn’t been so eager to leave him as he’d always assumed.

  So why had she?

  CHAPTER 2

  “If you really want to lose weight, wheatgrass juice is the way to go.”

  Meredith glanced at Seth and then back to the line in Starbucks, where Janie stood with a couple of others from the yoga group. Meredith had been watching her and Janie’s carry-ons while Janie talked to the airline person at the gate and then grabbed coffees for them.

  Seth didn’t drink coffee. To hear him tell it, his diet consisted primarily of wheatgrass juice and macadamia nuts.

  “Have you ever tried wheatgrass juice?”

  She shook her head, only half paying attention. Her gaze kept sweeping the terminal, searching for signs of Sam and Gina. They had gone off by themselves. Thank heavens. Seeing him had rattled her brain, dislodging memories she’d tried to keep buttoned down for years. The best strategy for this trip would be to avoid him as much as possible.

  “I would have been able to give you a taste right now, if they hadn’t confiscated my bottles.” Seth shrugged. “But I’m not worried. I’ll probably be able to buy more in Cuzco. And if not, they make tea from coca leaves that’s supposed to have amazing healing properties.” He chomped another nut. “
They probably have lots of natural diet remedies too.”

  She turned to him. “I’m not on a diet.”

  He bobbed back on his heels. “Just sayin’, wheatgrass juice is a lot more healthful than brownies.”

  “I don’t eat Slim Delites products.” The brownie had tasted like cardboard, for one thing. But the commercial had been a once-ina-decade windfall that had allowed her to take this trip. “That’s a commercial. Just because you see people on the television doing things, it doesn’t mean those people do those things in real life.”

  The man wasn’t listening. He nodded toward Claudia, the group leader, who was in line next to Janie. Janie should have been the actress. She’d inherited Liz Taylor looks from their mother, and she was also the sister with stage presence and command. But of course, Janie wouldn’t have been able to stand a life based so much on whim, chance, and uncertainty. Though heaven knows, there were enough of all those things in the law. But with a much better payoff.

  “Don’t you think she’s hot?” Seth asked.

  “Janie?”

  “God no. I know she’s foxy.”

  Meredith blinked. She wasn’t sure she’d heard a man call a woman foxy since . . . well, ever.

  “Claudia,” he clarified.

  Hot? Meredith was accustomed to thinking of Claudia as a mentor or goddess figure rather than an actual corporal being who could be gauged for hotness. Her face was fixed in that serene look Meredith imagined came from having done yoga forever and never experiencing a cramped muscle or negative thought. She was The Other.

  “I’ve never heard that she’s involved with anyone.” Seth’s expression was set in contemplation. “Think I have a chance?”

  She squinted at the specks of nut lodged in Seth’s black beard.

  He sighed. “Me neither.” His gaze fixed on Meredith. “Are you seeing anyone?”

  Oh God. Another person to avoid. She imagined herself a few days from now, cowering in remote corners of Incan ruins while the rest of the group did their sun salutations at Machu Picchu.

  Seth chuckled. “I mean, I know you and that Sam guy were an item once, but he’s taken now. Anyway, that was forever ago. College, right?”