he’s not getting sick.”
“Poor peanut,” Sam said.
“Guess who had his first solid food today?” Elisabeth said. “The pediatrician said to wait until he’s six months and, even then, just purees to start. But Andrew was eating a cracker, and Gil plucked it out of his hand and ate it, like he’d done it a million times. Can you believe that?”
Sam thought of all the saltines she had seen him eat. Delmi was a mother of five, so sure of herself, that it had never occurred to Sam that Gil was too young.
She had watched a child take his first steps while babysitting on a Friday night in high school, and never mentioned it to the parents.
In London, she sometimes took the twins to the park and let them dig in the dark earth, against their mother’s wishes. They had no shovels to dig with, so she let them use silver soup spoons. At first, they freaked out when their hands got dirty, holding their palms up in alarm. Her last week before leaving, Tom found a slug in the dirt and dropped it into his mouth. Sam felt almost proud. She felt like Mary Poppins at the end of the movie. Her work here was done; she could float away.
“A cracker!” was all she said now. “Aren’t you a big boy?”
Elisabeth kissed Gil.
“This one is an old soul, Sam. He knows things. I swear.”
9
Elisabeth
HALLOWEEN FELL ON A FRIDAY.
Elisabeth had never had trick-or-treaters before. It was the sort of thing she daydreamed about when she imagined owning a house. In a fit of excitement, she bought a dozen bags of candy two weeks in advance. She and Andrew had since devoured the contents of three of them.
Now she stood, shaking what remained into two wooden salad bowls. She tossed the candy with her hands as Sam looked on from her seat at the kitchen island. Gil was in Sam’s lap, dressed as a mouse. Their neighbor Pam had offered Elisabeth the costume, a hand-me-down worn by her two kids. It was a one-piece gray fleece suit, with a tail and a hood that had oversize floppy pink ears sewed on. Elisabeth and Sam could not resist putting Gil in it first thing that morning, and adding black eyeliner whiskers to his cheeks.
“We don’t want all the good candy on top, and the boring stuff at the bottom,” Elisabeth said now. “I’ve got to mix it so the kids see a variety of options.”
“You don’t have any boring stuff,” Sam said. “I always wondered about those people who give out Raisinets. Do they, like, hate children?”
In fifteen minutes, Sam would go home. Weekends now were the opposite of what they used to be—Elisabeth dreaded the days without Sam’s company, the long stretches with no childcare. She accomplished nothing on the weekends. The only part she looked forward to were Sunday nights, chatting with Sam on the sofa upstairs. Those were often the only real conversations she had all week. By the time Monday morning arrived, she practically threw Gil into Sam’s arms, starving for a bit of freedom.
She told Nomi that this made her feel like a terrible mother.
All mothers hate weekends, Nomi said. TGIM!
Elisabeth’s phone buzzed on the counter. A text from Faye: Pic of G in his costume, please! Bad day over here—another letter from the bank about the house…Nana needs a pick-me-up.
Elisabeth sent Faye a few of the roughly one hundred photos she’d taken earlier, pushing down the feeling that she was responsible for her mother-in-law’s predicament. She imagined Faye sending a message like that and wondering why Elisabeth didn’t just say, Let us help you.
She flipped the phone over so she couldn’t see the screen.
“What are you up to tonight?” she asked Sam.
“Costume party at State. Isabella and I are going as those creepy twins from The Shining. But, like, a sexy version. Her idea.”
“That sounds fun.”
“Ehh, it’ll be like every other party, but with less clothing. I kind of hate Halloween. It’s such a sexist holiday.”
“Hmm,” Elisabeth said. This had never occurred to her.
Years ago, Andrew invited her to a Halloween party, their fourth or fifth date. They ended up sneaking off to the roof with a bottle of wine and talking. They lost track of time. When they finally came back downstairs, the party was over. The hosts had gone to bed.
Tonight, he would probably insist on working once he got home. He was putting together an application for a conference in Denver, where, if