Perfect Tunes - Emily Gould Page 0,28
in a warning tone.
She turned to Laura and looked straight into her eyes and grabbed one of her hands. Laura’s own family were not big touchers. Laura prevented herself from recoiling.
“I didn’t mean to imply anything about your drinking, dear. We all have our own ways of coping, right?”
Laura nodded mutely and sipped her water. She tried to think of something to say that would erase the awkwardness and enable Daisy to see that she was a sane, stable person and a great match for her son. But what was the right thing to say? She wished Dylan would step in here and give her a clue.
Davey jumped into the breach, ultimately. “So, Ms. P., it was so nice of you to come and get us, and to let us all come crash at your house.” He made it sound like they were all in high school.
“Oh, please, call me Daisy,” said Dylan’s mom. She smiled. “I’m just so happy you all can come stay with us. I’m so happy you’re safe.”
Dylan’s childhood home was a red farmhouse, surrounded by tall, thick-trunked maples whose green leaves were just beginning to yellow. There was a black Lab on the porch and a curlicue of smoke coming from the chimney like in a child’s drawing. The dog made a beeline for Laura and rose up ecstatically as she petted her, pushing her back into Laura’s hand and circling her with polite barks of welcome. Laura felt loved and trusted immediately by the dog, and when Dylan saw this he smiled a genuine smile, a smile Laura had never seen before. She felt a surge of hope and gratitude, and she continued petting the dog as the rest of them went into the house and put their things in bedrooms, Daisy chattering happily the whole time.
Later, after a long dinner accompanied by glasses of soda, Dylan’s quiet, bearded dad and Daisy went to bed, and Dylan and Callie and Davey and Laura headed out into the dark woods behind the house with a flashlight. They walked a short path till they got to a clearing with stumps in a small circle, and Dylan took a small blown-glass pipe out of his pocket and packed a bowl.
“We have to ration this because it has to last us till we get back to the city,” he said very seriously.
“That’s soon, right?” Laura didn’t want to seem eager to leave, but she was. Something about Dylan’s family and the eerie quiet of their rural home was the opposite of calming. No matter how disturbing and dangerous things were in New York, at least she felt at home there. She wanted to be with Dylan, but for reasons she couldn’t quite pinpoint, she didn’t want to be with his mother.
“We were supposed to leave for LA on Tuesday,” said Davey. “I mean, we are. Are we still going on tour?”
“Is anything that was supposed to happen still happening?” said Callie. “My boss at the store hasn’t even returned my calls.” Laura realized that it hadn’t occurred to her to call in to Bar Lafitte, but it was possible they were open; people needed bars.
“I don’t know. Do you want to go back, Laura? It feels sort of … safer here,” Dylan said.
She watched him as he drew smoke into his lungs with a desperate pull. He didn’t seem like he felt safe. She didn’t really feel safe, either.
“I want to go home,” she said.
The next day was pleasant, or as pleasant as it could be. At least the disaster had moved to the periphery of their focus, only coming to the forefront when they turned on the radio or looked at the newspaper. During the day, they took a long walk in the woods with the dog and then piled into the minivan and drove to a café. For whole long stretches of time, up to ten or twenty minutes, Laura even forgot why they were there.
After lunch they walked up and down the two blocks of stores, and Callie pulled them into a wine store. They got a few bottles, just the kind of thing that, if you were a guest in someone’s house for a couple of days, would be normal to bring. Though when they got home, around 4:00 p.m., they divided the bottles and the boys went down to the basement, where Dylan still kept a drum set and some guitars, and Callie and Laura sat on the front porch with coffee mugs