Olivia Goldsmith - The Switch

“Sylvie! Sylvie, baby! Are you okay?”

Mildred had been rehanging the bedroom curtains and had looked down to see the L her daughter made in the lawn as she had done this crazy thing. Now Mildred stood at the edge of the pool. She couldn’t swim—never had—but she’d jump in to attempt to save her daughter if she must. Mildred was relieved then to see that Sylvie’s head had broken through the leaf-strewn surface of the water. Sylvie, a good swimmer, breaststroked gracefully over the trunk of the car and across the pool, still holding on to her purse. Her shoes had fallen to the bottom, but the shorts and blouse she had on felt surprisingly heavy, pulling her down. Still, Sylvie managed to move through the cold water to the ladder.

Mildred was panting, one hand against the ladder rail, the other hand on her heaving chest. “You frightened me,” Mildred said. There was a scream from the other side of the property and Mildred started and turned her head. Sylvie, still in the pool, couldn’t see but knew whose voice it was. “Oh god,” Mildred muttered. “I know she never washes her curtains, so what’s her excuse for seeing this?” She squatted down to get closer to Sylvie and extended her hand to help her. “Your ex-sister-in-law is waving to you,” she said.

Climbing the ladder, Sylvie turned and saw Rosalie’s dark head over the pickets of the north fence. “Trouble in Paradise?” Rosalie yelled.

Mildred, ignoring Rosalie, carefully helped her daughter out of the pool. “Why did you do that?” she asked.

“So I’ll remember where I parked?”

“Are you being flippant with your mother?”

Sylvie opened her purse, oblivious to the water that poured out, and dropped in her car keys. She snapped the purse shut. The noise it made, like a tiny sedan door closing, did not sound as solid as usual. “Flippant?” she echoed, distracted. She was a little dazed, but at least she could breathe.

“Sylvie, you do realize you’ve just done a very strange thing? If you don’t, it’s even stranger.”

Sylvie turned to look at the scene behind her. Three nectarines and a head of lettuce were now floating on the top of the pool. The car glinted up from the bottom like a silver fish lying under aspic. What had she done ? And why had she done it? She put her hand up to her eyes to wipe away the water streaming down from her hair, only to realize there were also tears rising over her bottom lids. What had she done? Was she crazy? “I just want Bob to notice me,” she admitted in a whisper.

Mildred nodded, then opened the door to the outdoor cabinet that Bob had always laughingly called “The Cabana.” Oh, he was a card, Bob was. Sylvie shivered in the cool autumn air as she watched her mother take out two faded beach towels. “Sylvie, sweetheart,” Mildred said, “men don’t notice their wives. A new blonde in the neighborhood, yes. A sports car, absolutely. But after forty-six years of marriage, just ask your father what color eyes I have.” Mildred looked deep into her daughter’s own eyes. “Give it up, Sylvie.” Mildred wrapped one of the towels around Sylvie’s shoulders and handed her the other one. “For your hair,” Mildred directed. Rosalie had thrown her left leg over the fence. “What can I do?” she hollered.

Exasperated, Mildred raised her own voice. “You can move out of the neighborhood, Rosalie. You’ve been divorced from my son for three years.” Rosalie had almost managed to breach the fence. Sylvie knew Rosalie was lonely since the divorce and with her kids away, but though she tried to feel for her, Rose was shameless in her interfering with the family. She wouldn’t sell her house or leave the culde-sac; she wouldn’t stop snooping and gossiping and showing up uninvited. After her settlement from Phil had left him broke, she still insisted he had secret funds. And that everyone was better off and had more resources than Rosalie.

Now Rosalie the Resourceful got her right leg over the fence and jumped into the yard.

Rosalie made a beeline for the pool and stared into it. “Holy shit! I heard it but I didn’t see it.” She squatted down, looked at the car, and grinned. “Is this gonna be covered by the warranty?” she asked. She reached out and grabbed the lettuce, floating near the edge of the pool coping, and brought it over to Sylvie. “God, you’re a mess,” Rosalie said as she surveyed Sylvie, who was dripping like a defrosting freezer. Rosalie held up the lettuce. “Salad, anyone?” Mildred snatched it from her. “What’s happened to you, Sylvie?” Rosalie asked. “I mean, aside from the dunk? I couldn’t see you in the dark last night, but you look awful. You looked so much better the other day when I saw you with Bob leaving Vico’s. He was driving pretty fast but I could have sworn you’d lost weight. I thought you’d lost weight,” Rosalie said doubtfully, looking at the wet clothes clinging to her sister-in-law.

“I wasn’t with Bob in his car the other day,” Sylvie said. “He moves too fast.”

“He was putting the moves on you, all right.”

“Go home, you loon,” Mildred snapped and began propelling Sylvie away from the scene of the crime. Sylvie knew Mildred felt sorry for Rosalie, just like she did, but still, the woman was brash and insensitive. That’s why she’d been such a perfect match for Phil, and it had broken Mildred’s heart when they split up.

“I wasn’t in Beautiful Baby,” Sylvie called over her shoulder. Did all of Cleveland spend its free time sighting her in places she wasn’t? Next she’d be seen with Elvis.

“You’ll have to continue this little chat later.” Mildred turned her back on Rosalie and guided Sylvie gently but firmly into the house to the music room. She locked the French doors behind them and sat Sylvie down on the bench.

Rosalie, outside, tried the door handle.

“I haven’t ridden in Bob’s convertible in years. I’m not totally crazy,” Sylvie told her mother.

“Evidence to the contrary,” Mildred said, and took the towel from around Sylvie’s head. “You need a touch-up at the roots,” she added.

“I’m letting them gray and grow in,” Sylvie said.

“Then you are crazy,” Mildred told her daughter.

“Why? Bob didn’t even notice when I changed the color.”

“Well, he’ll notice this,” Mildred predicted, looking at the pool.

“My god. How will I tell him?” Sylvie felt her stomach lurch.

There was a banging on the window. Rosalie was pointing to the door lock. “As if,” Mildred sniffed. Sylvie looked at the poor locked-out woman. But she just couldn’t cope. She needed comforting now, and some calmness. Rosalie was too self-involved to offer that. For some reason, imagining Rosalie alone in her house next door made Sylvie lonely herself. Well, she realized, she was lonely. Even with her mother here beside her. She gestured for Rosalie to go away. Rosalie paid no attention.

“Maybe I am nuts,” Sylvie said, and nearly sobbed. “It’s pathetic to be so hurt because your husband is ignoring you. I just can’t figure out if he always did and I didn’t notice because the kids were around or if he’s ignoring me in a whole new way.”

“Oh, Sylvie,” Mildred sighed. “This is all so normal and predictable. I did the car thing too, back when your father was still running the lot. Maybe not as dramatically, but every time we had a big fight, I’d rear-end somebody.”

“You did? What did you tell him?”

“That the brakes failed, and that’s back when they were still calling it ‘the ultimate driving machine.’”

“So it’s hereditary?” Sylvie asked. “Being crazy?”

“From your father’s side.”

Rosalie began rattling the door. Mildred turned and surveyed her. “Isn’t it strange? She seems to think it’s accidental that she’s excluded,” Mildred observed to Sylvie. “Just remember,” she added, “I didn’t like her while she was married to Phil.” She turned her full attention back to Sylvie. “But I admit my son unhinged her. Poor thing. She’s crazy by marriage.” Mildred sighed. “Phil could make any woman nuts. Not like Bob.”