a school event. He was a man who had just discovered that his wife was planning to leave him. A hurt man. A betrayed man. An angry man. But just a man.
Confusion. Clear. Confusion. Clear.
When Gwen had arrived to babysit the boys, Perry had turned on the charm as though something vital depended on it. She was cool with Perry at first but it turned out that Elvis was Gwen’s weak spot. She launched into a story about how she’d been one of the “golden girls” when Elvis’s gold Cadillac toured Australia, until Perry cut in smoothly, like a gentleman stealing a woman away at a dance.
The rain eased as they drove into the school’s street. The street was jammed with cars, but there was a space waiting for Perry near the school entrance, as if he’d prebooked it. He always got a parking spot. Lights turned green for him. The dollar obediently went up or down for him. Perhaps that’s why he got so angry when things didn’t go right.
He turned off the ignition.
Neither of them moved or spoke. Celeste saw one of the kindergarten mothers hurrying past the car in a long dress that forced her to take little steps. She was carrying a child’s polka-dotted umbrella. Gabrielle, thought Celeste. The one who talked endlessly about her weight.
Celeste turned to look at Perry.
“Max has been bullying Amabella. Renata’s little girl.”
Perry kept looking straight ahead. “How do you know?”
“Josh told me,” said Celeste. “Just before we left. Ziggy has been taking the blame for it.”
Ziggy. Your cousin’s child.
“He’s the one the parents are petitioning to have suspended.” She closed her eyes briefly as she thought of Perry slamming her head against the wall. “It should be a petition to have Max suspended. Not Ziggy.”
Perry turned to look at her. He looked like a stranger with his black wig. The blackness made his eyes appear brilliant blue.
“We’ll talk to the teachers,” he said.
“I’ll talk to his teacher,” said Celeste. “You won’t be here, remember?”
“Right,” said Perry. “Well, I’ll talk to Max tomorrow, before I go to the airport.”
“What will you say?” said Celeste.
“I don’t know.”
There was a huge heavy block of pain lodged beneath her chest. Was this a heart attack? Was this fury? Was this a broken heart? Was this the weight of her responsibility?
“Will you tell him that’s not the way to treat a woman?” she said, and it was like jumping off a cliff. Never a word. Not like that. She’d broken an unbreakable rule. Was it because he looked like Elvis Presley and none of this was real, or was it because he knew about the apartment now and everything was more real than ever before?
Perry’s face changed, cracked open. “The boys have never—”
“They have,” cried Celeste. She’d pretended so very hard for so very long and there was nobody here except the two of them. “The night before the party last year, Max got out of bed, he was standing right there at the doorway—”
“Yes OK,” said Perry.
“And there was that time in the kitchen, when you, when I—”
He put his hand out. “OK, OK.”
She stopped.
After a moment he said, “So you’ve leased an apartment?”
“Yes,” said Celeste.
“When are you leaving?”
“Next week,” she said. “I think next week.”
“With the boys?”
This is when you should feel fear, she thought. This is not the way Susi said it should be done. Scenarios. Plans. Escape routes. She was not treading carefully, but she’d tried to tread carefully for years and she knew it never made the slightest difference anyway.
“Of course with the boys.”
He took a sharp intake of breath as if he’d experienced a sudden pain. He put his face in his hands and leaned forward so that his forehead was pressed to the top of the steering wheel, and his whole body shook as if with convulsions.
Celeste stared, and for a moment she couldn’t work out what he was doing. Was he sick? Was he laughing? Her stomach tightened and she put her hand on the car door, but then he lifted his head and turned to her.
His face was streaked with tears. His Elvis wig was askew. He looked unhinged.
“I’ll get help,” he said. “I promise you I’ll get help.”
“You won’t,” she said quietly. The rain was softening. She could see other Audreys and Elvises hurrying along the street, huddled under umbrellas, and hear their shouts and laughter.
“I will.” His eyes brightened. “Last year I got a referral from Dr. Hunter to see a psychiatrist.” There was