Elin Hilderbrand - The Castaways

“So, let me ask you,” she said. She was, as ever, at Jeffrey’s desk, in his chair, overlooking charts and graphs of various crops’ growth, piles of invoices to go out to restaurants, and bills. Jeffrey sat on a milk crate a few feet away. “Did you notice a change in Tess last winter?”

He narrowed his eyes. “Maybe,” he said. “She seemed sadder to me, less gullible, less innocent. All of which you can chalk up to a woman who had been through what she had been through with Greg.”

“Every Saturday night, five o’clock, rain or shine, we used to go to mass, right?”

“Right,” Jeffrey said.

“So, at the beginning of February, the start of Lent, she quits church altogether. She cancels on mass for the first time, saying she has a PTA meeting. At five o’clock on Saturday? And there, at the church, I see both Karen and Lizzie, president and vice president of the PTA, and I know there’s no meeting, I know she’s lied to me. But the thing is that Karen and Lizzie were always at five o’clock mass and Tess knew it, so why would she hand me that particular story if she knew she was going to get caught?”

“Did you say anything to her?” Jeffrey asked.

“No. I let it go.”

“And then?”

“Then she skipped Ash Wednesday. For the first time in thirty years, she did not go to get her ashes. When I asked her what was up, she said her day had been busy. She had a conference with a parent after school. Then she canceled on mass the following week, and then the next week she told me she would meet me at St. Mary’s and she never showed. And when I called her, she said her car wouldn’t start.”

“The Kia?” Jeffrey said.

“The most reliable car in the history of automotives,” Andrea said. “And there was other stuff…” It was all little stuff, stuff only Andrea would notice: Tess’s tone of voice, her attitude. She was at times euphorically happy and at other times she burst into tears for no reason. She was uneven. But all women were uneven, weren’t they? They suffered from PMS, hormonal ups and downs; Tess had had her share of reproductive chaos. Maybe her body chemistry was out of whack. But deep down, Andrea didn’t buy it. Tess was not like other women. For starters, she was a kindergarten teacher: she was patient and kind, creative and organized. She loved children and she believed in the power of paint and crayons and glue and clay and story-books. She had a class pet, a long-haired rabbit named Knickerbocker. She liked to play kick ball and push kids on the swings; she kept a drawer full of snacks and clean underwear and Band-Aids. Her room was always clean, she always wore a skirt or dress, she did not raise her voice. When she wanted quiet, she turned out the lights and held a finger to her lips. She was a saint. To see her moody and peevish… something was wrong.

Andrea had asked Ed more than once, “Do you think there’s something wrong with Tess?” In response, Ed would shovel in mashed potatoes or grunt from behind the newspaper. If Andrea pressed him for an answer, he would say, “She seems fine to me.” Andrea called this a typical male answer. To which Ed said, “When I give you a typical female answer, you can complain.” Andrea brayed with disgust and Ed gave her some line about how women clearly felt things more deeply; they read sub-text where men saw only white space.

“If you think there’s something wrong,” Ed said, “why don’t you ask her?”

Right. Andrea found, however, that she was afraid. Afraid of her own best friend, her own younger cousin, whom she protected and worshipped. It took a night at Delilah’s house and seven glasses of wine for Andrea to confront her. It was Oscar night. Every year Delilah served champagne and good caviar and she made Beef Wellington and they all dressed up (Addison always wore a tux and Phoebe her Valentino or Dior, and the rest of them did what they could). They filled out ballots, threw money into a pot, and the person with the most correct guesses won. This was usually Jeffrey, which was ironic, since he was constitutionally unable to stay awake through an entire movie. Oscar night usually saw them very drunk, and this past year had been no exception. Andrea stumbled across Tess sitting alone on the stairs in her black lace top and black silk pants, and Andrea, with chardonnay courage, decided that this was the time to confront her.

Is everything okay?

Tess looked up, unsurprised by the question. Yeah.

No, I mean it. Something’s going on. What is it? You haven’t been to mass in weeks.

I’m finished with the Lord.

What does that mean?

I don’t want to talk about it.

Are you mad at me? This was Andrea’s fear, a fear greater, perhaps, than she was willing to admit. Andrea knew she was tough, she knew she was prickly, aggressive, unforgiving, she knew there were women who disliked her and that even Phoebe and Delilah had their moments with her. But she had always saved her nicest, kindest, sweetest self for Tess.

Tess softened. No. God, no, Andrea. I could never be mad at you.

Andrea felt herself about to cry chardonnay tears. She had been racking her brain, trying to figure out if she had done something wrong, if she had made some kind of egregious misstep that had hurt Tess.

Is it… April Peck?

April Peck? Tess looked confused. Then she shook her head and her chin wobbled. April Peck is such small potatoes.

Such small potatoes . The phrase had stuck with Andrea because it was an odd turn of phrase, and because those were the final words on the topic. Addison had come bumbling into the conversation, interrupting them, pulling Tess to her feet, imploring her to come watch. They were about to announce best actress.

“Small potatoes?” Jeffrey said now.

Andrea looked at him. “What do you think that meant?”

Tess canceled lunch dates, she skipped her monthly book group, she claimed to be taking an intense Pilates class at the gym that met three afternoons a week. The Pilates class met from four to five on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, but one Wednesday, Andrea saw Tess in the ever-reliable Kia barreling down the Polpis Road at five minutes to five. She was driving like a bat out of hell, which was what caught Andrea’s attention in the first place (this may have been a standard complaint from the police chief’s wife, but in her opinion, people on this island drove way too fast). Then Andrea saw it was Tess and she nearly called her, though the last thing Tess should be doing was speeding and talking on the phone. Andrea checked her mental calendar, trying to figure out what would have put Tess on the Polpis Road at five minutes to five on a Wednesday. Didn’t she have Pilates class? The health club was on the other side of the island. Andrea was the police chief’s wife, not the police chief, but she decided to do some investigating herself. The detective work was elementary. Andrea called the health club to inquire about the Pilates class held at four o’clock on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The man who answered the phone was flummoxed.

“Pilates? We offer Pilates Tuesday and Thursday at ten A.M. and Monday and Thursday at six A.M. and six P.M.”

“Nothing on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at four?”

“Spinning class Monday and Wednesday at three. Jazz dance Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at five-thirty. Do you want jazz dance?”

“Jazz dance?” Andrea said.

Later she called Tess at home. Tess was upbeat. “I’m making quesadillas,” she said.

Andrea paused. “How was your Pilates class?”

“It was great!” Tess said. “I can feel it working. My abdomen is so much tighter.”