Friends and Strangers - J. Courtney Sullivan Page 0,92

there and I was fine, and then all of a sudden I started acting like a huge bitch for no reason. Poor Andrew was sitting beside me, not knowing what to say, as oversize yellow balloons with smiley faces painted on them bounced off our heads. We left after three songs. Who does that?”

“You’d be surprised,” Violet said, as if patients came in every day complaining of Jimmy Buffett–induced despair. “What about it depressed you?”

“I have no idea.”

“Give it a minute. Think.”

Elisabeth tried, but she felt like she was making up an answer, not having some kind of epiphany.

“Maybe it was the sense of community. The shared love of Hawaiian shirts and homemade hats and rum drinks. The joy they all exuded. I wish I loved anything half as much as those people loved Jimmy Buffett.”

“Community,” Violet said. “That makes sense.”

“It does.”

She scribbled something in her notebook, then looked up. “When was this?”

“Years ago.”

“So the feeling of not having a place you belong, it’s not new. Not necessarily to do with moving here.”

Elisabeth considered this, the rare wise observation on Violet’s part.

“I guess that’s right,” she said. “I was alone a lot as a kid. Inappropriate things happened around me, and I didn’t know what to do with them. It’s yet another reason why I resent my parents’ money. No one feels sorry for a rich girl with terrible parents. In most people’s eyes, my problems weren’t problems at all.”

“How are things with Andrew?” Violet asked.

“Fine. Good. He keeps pushing for a second baby.”

“Even though he knows you don’t want one.”

“He thinks I do secretly want one, but I’m scared.”

Violet looked skeptical.

“Maybe he’s right,” Elisabeth said, feeling suddenly protective of Andrew. “He knows me better than anyone. There was a time I didn’t know if I even wanted one. Now I can’t imagine life without him. Then again, we got so lucky with Gil. I don’t want to tempt fate. Our family’s chemistry feels—delicate. A daughter would be especially terrifying. I’d ruin her for sure. Everything is so good. I don’t want to jeopardize that.”

“You say things are so good. But you and Andrew never tell each other what you mean,” Violet said. “He still has no clue about all that money you gave to your sister.”

“It was a loan,” Elisabeth said.

It felt shameful that Violet, whom she didn’t even particularly like, should know this about her, and not Andrew, the person she was closest to in the world.

“Have you thought about couples’ counseling?” Violet said, as if it was the first time she had mentioned the idea.

She brought it up at almost every session.

“I can’t see either of us doing that,” Elisabeth said.

Violet closed her eyes. Annoyed or asleep, it was hard to say.

When the session ended, Gil had just woken up and was chattering away in the stroller.

“Thanks,” Elisabeth said as she wrote out a check. “I’ll see you next Friday.”

“Actually, I won’t be here next week,” Violet said.

“Taking a vacation?”

There was always this moment at the end. Elisabeth had made herself vulnerable, and now time was up. It was like having someone switch on the lights at an orgy.

Violet seemed uncomfortable with the question. “Yes.”

Elisabeth wanted to ask where she was going, the way she would ask any other person who had just told her she was going somewhere. But she knew Violet would consider this boundary crossing.

“Did you ever see that movie What About Bob?” Elisabeth said.

“I don’t think so.”

“Bill Murray? No?”

Whenever Elisabeth asked if she’d seen a movie, or read a novel, or an article on the front page of the Sunday Times, Violet said no. Elisabeth wondered if she simply consumed nothing of the culture, which was odd in its own right. Or if telling Elisabeth she had read something would, for Violet, constitute sharing.

Elisabeth called Andrew from the car to discuss.

“How can you be expected to pour your soul out to a person who won’t tell you even the most minor details about her life. Is that normal? What do you think?”

Andrew said, “I think therapy is making you worse instead of better.”

At home, she found a Christmas card from Sam in the mailbox.

Elisabeth tore it open, baby still in her arms, as if Sam herself might pop out of the envelope.

She wished she had gotten it together to send Sam, or anybody, a card. She knew she was supposed to have one made up with an adorable picture of Gil on the front, the sort of cards she’d been receiving