Perfect Tunes - Emily Gould Page 0,48
Laura’s age when he’d first met her. No one in her bougie neighborhood believed that an English-speaking white woman under thirty could be a toddler’s mother, not her babysitter.
All week long, whenever she’d been able to work the upcoming trip into conversation, Laura had told Marie about how much fun she was going to have at Kayla’s house and what a big-girl treat it would be to sleep in an unfamiliar bed and to eat breakfast from unfamiliar dishes, to the point where she worried that no possible slumber party could ever live up to how wildly exotic she’d made it seem. Marie had, after much deliberation, picked out a select, top-flight crew of toys to bring with her, and Laura had watched with heart-mangling pride as she explained to these toys, using some of the same enticing vocabulary Laura had used with Marie, how much they were going to enjoy their adventure. The whole time, Laura thought about how, if this went well or even okay, they were going to do it again, and again. She both did and didn’t want it to go well. She had no idea what she wanted.
On the morning of the show, Laura managed not to cry in front of Marie as she dropped her off with Matt and Kayla. She hugged her tightly once but didn’t linger. She could hear Marie crying the entire time she was racing for the door, taking the stairs so quickly she worried about tripping over her own feet and falling. It seemed to take forever to get out of their building. When she got out to the sidewalk she allowed herself one gasping full-body sob and then a fast-paced block of silent tears. She texted Matt, asking him to tell her when Marie chilled out, and hoped that he wasn’t lying when he texted back to say that the girls were already busy investigating the little suitcase full of toys Marie had brought. By the time she met up with Callie a half an hour later in Manhattan, Laura was feeling almost normal.
* * *
They were staying in a group house that often hosted touring musicians, which Laura had expected to be gross but turned out to be less gross than her own apartment. It benefited a lot from having high ceilings and the vaguely healthy ambiance created wherever you see a lot of bikes.
Laura didn’t get a good look when they were arriving, because it was much later than her usual ten-thirty bedtime and she crashed immediately on the couch provided for her, but in the morning, when she woke up hours earlier than anyone else, she had the entire place to herself and realized it was gorgeous—light blazing through the windows’ thick old glass, well-established houseplants sending a green smell into the air to mingle with the vinegary whiff of the clean countertops. It was so nice just to be somewhere besides home. Even though she and Marie had been in the new place for only a couple of months, there was already a patina of toddler grime on everything: Goldfish crackers fossilizing in the little divots where the radiator met the floor, greasy handprints visible on the walls when the light hit them at the right angle. It was exotic for Laura to wake up somewhere where cleaning up was someone else’s responsibility. The people who lived here probably had a chore wheel. A vestigial part of her brain made a note to ask if they were looking for new housemates, but then she remembered that she didn’t live in Philly and also that she already had a roommate: her tiny child. It had happened: for a fraction of a second, Laura had inhabited the version of herself who would have existed if her daughter had never been born, and it felt good.
The utopian group house began to seem less so when its residents began to stir, their noises emanating from behind old, thin walls. Laura washed her face hurriedly in the small downstairs bathroom and left a note for her bandmates before venturing into the world outside.
She’d never spent much time in Philly, but something about its modest architectural ambitions felt immediately homey and comfortable to her; there was something of Columbus here, for sure. But there was also NYC-style beauty here, of both humans and buildings. When it happened, it was even more striking amid the disrepair and kitsch. She walked through the Italian Market, dawdling over a choice of breakfast pastry