Curtis Sittenfeld - Eligible

“Sorry,” Liz said. “I was in the basement.”

“Hi, Liz,” Ham said.

Lydia scowled. “Doing what?”

Oh, to be twenty-three, Liz thought, to make out in that way that left your lips swollen and your skin blotchy. Not that Lydia was by any means an innocent, but still — something about her kissing her new boyfriend in their parents’ kitchen while everyone else in the house was asleep made Liz wistful.

“I was trying to sort through some junk, and now I’m going up to bed,” Liz said. “Hi, Ham.”

“I read some of your articles online,” Ham said. “The one about Saudi Arabia was fascinating.”

“You don’t need to butter her up,” Lydia said.

Ham laughed. “You think because you don’t care what happens in the Middle East, no one else should?” Looking at Liz, he said, “How long were you over there?”

“Ten days,” Liz said. “And thank you.”

“Don’t bother hitting on her,” Lydia said. “She has some married boyfriend she thinks none of us know about.”

Ham grinned at Liz — his good nature almost made Lydia’s alarming statement seem like no big deal — and then he leaned in and kissed Lydia’s nose. He said, “At the risk of encouraging you, your jealousy is kind of cute.”

POKING AROUND ON websites for local real estate agencies, Liz discovered that a former Seven Hills classmate named Shane Williams was, by all appearances, successfully selling houses to and for Cincinnatians, among them several professional athletes; Bengals and Reds players both offered written testimonies of Shane’s aptitude. While Hyde Park didn’t seem to be the main area where Shane conducted business, he had nevertheless sold a handful of properties within a few miles of the Tudor. Liz remembered Shane fondly; he had been warm and outgoing not only in high school but also the three or four times they’d crossed paths in their twenties, when their classmates had gathered at bars the night before Thanksgiving.

However, in spite of Shane’s professional credentials and personal charm, Liz wasn’t certain she should contact him. The reason she wasn’t certain was that Shane was black and her mother was racist. As with her anti-Semitism, Mrs. Bennet’s racism was of the conversational, innuendo-laden variety. She would never be so ignorant as to announce that black people were less intelligent or moral than their white counterparts, but without compunction she’d tell Liz not to shop at the Kroger in Walnut Hills because it was “dirty,” and once at Christmas when Liz had suggested giving Mervetta a cashmere sweater, Mrs. Bennet had said, “For heaven’s sake, Lizzy, Mervetta wouldn’t appreciate cashmere.”

Liz was pretty sure a black adult had never visited her parents’ house in a social capacity. Over the years, black men had fixed the Bennets’ balking dishwasher and overburdened air-conditioning pumps, had removed their garbage and repaved their driveway; and for more than a decade, Mervetta had arrived at the Tudor every other Friday at eight A.M. to vacuum their carpets and scrub their toilets. But it was only ever black girls, Seven Hills classmates, who, in attending birthday parties and sleepovers, had been invited into the Tudor simply to enjoy themselves. And whether or not Liz contacted Shane wouldn’t change this fact; he, too, would be an employee.

Yet surely hiring the kind of white, female, middle-aged real estate agent her parents might run into at the country club was a bad idea, and likely to spread gossip about the financial situation in which the Bennets had found themselves. There was, of course, such an abundance of white, female, middle-aged real estate agents that Liz certainly could find one who didn’t belong to the country club and whom her parents didn’t know. But she liked the idea of working with someone familiar.

Was it delusional to hope that her mother’s potential discomfort about Shane’s race would be eclipsed by her far greater discomfort about needing to move? Be the change you wish to see in the world, Liz thought, and she emailed her former classmate.

FOR SEVERAL MORE mornings, Jane didn’t run with Liz, and on the fourth day, when Liz came back upstairs after eating breakfast, Jane still lay in bed. Liz crossed through the bedroom to take a shower and, after she emerged from the bathroom, dressed quietly. When Jane spoke, however, it sounded as if she had been awake for some time. She said, “Will you hate me if I go back to New York early?”

Liz turned around. “Of course not. You probably need to see your obstetrician, right?”

“They don’t actually test much before the end of the first trimester, although they might because of my age.”

“You’re not thinking—” Liz paused and rephrased the question. “Are you considering, ah, terminating?”

“I keep waiting for a text from Chip,” Jane said. “I have this idea he’ll invite me to come over.”

“I think you’ll hear from him,” Liz said, though as the days had passed, her optimism about what more he’d have to say had diminished.

“I really, really wanted a baby,” Jane said. “It was what I wanted most in the world. And now—” She didn’t finish.

Liz said, “But you know Chip, and you don’t know the baby yet. I’m sure we’ll find your baby totally delightful, but it’s hard for an abstract idea to compete with someone you’ve been hanging out with.” Lifting a beaded bracelet from the top of the bureau, Liz added, “I keep meaning to tell you I found a website for this organization called Alone But Together. It’s for women who choose to have kids on their own.”

Jane smiled sadly. “I’ve been a paid member for two years. You haven’t said anything to Mom, have you?”

“God, no.” That Jane wouldn’t be able to hide her secret indefinitely was a fact that Liz assumed she didn’t need to convey. And Jane’s wish to leave Cincinnati was wholly understandable to Liz, even if the idea of staying behind without Jane was disheartening. As Liz slid the bracelet over her left hand, she thought of the year Jane had skipped May Fete because she, Liz, had chicken pox. Liz meant it when she said, “Whatever you want to do, you have my support.”

ONCE AGAIN, THE scent of nail polish led Liz to Kitty; this time, Kitty was creating on her fingers an intricate tiger pattern of black stripes over a reddish-orange background.

“Lydia and Ham seem kind of serious,” Liz said. “Are they?”

As she dipped the brush back into the bottle of black polish, Kitty said, “Ask her.”

“Will you suggest that she invite him to a family dinner? I think Jane and Chip might be done, and meeting Ham could soften the blow for Mom.”

Still focused on her fingers, Kitty said, “If you want to make Mom happy, marry Willie.”

“Ham seems like a good guy, but if I tell Lydia to invite him, she’ll refuse just to spite me.”

Kitty glanced up. “Do you know Ham?”

“I’ve talked to him a few times. Why?”

“There are things about him that might surprise you.” The smug and coy expression on Kitty’s face — Liz didn’t care for it.

Nevertheless, she said, “Like what?”

Kitty shrugged. “Just things.”

“Is he actually a jerk?”

“No.” Really, Kitty looked irritatingly pleased with herself. Partly to change the subject and partly because it was true, Liz gestured at Kitty’s nails and said, “Have you ever considered doing that professionally? You’re really good at it.”

Kitty’s expression turned sour. “You’re so condescending.”

“Kitty, I work in an industry where the best makeup artists and stylists are treated like rock stars. Not that those kinds of careers are the norm, but I bet a regular person can make a decent salary.” Or a regular person could make a salary that compared favorably, Liz thought, to no income at all.