The Pull of the Moon_ A Novel - By Elizabeth Berg Page 0,60

her Dad and, oh, wasn’t that like nails on a chalkboard. But Dorothy did the noble thing and said yes, she was, too. Uh-huh, yes, he did seem happy now, Dorothy said, and she just wanted to throw up.

Hilly’s fiancé is a doctor. A proctologist, but still. Dorothy is working up to asking the question that—come on!—must occur to everyone to ask him: What exactly made you choose this line of work? When Dorothy tried to ask her daughter about it, all Hilly did was get mad. She’d said something like perhaps Dorothy would should consider the fact that preventing cancer is a pretty noble goal. But that still didn’t answer the question, did it?

Dorothy thinks it was a book her daughter read that made her start being mean to men. Who knows, if Dorothy had been mean to Pete Decker in high school, they might have gotten married. They went out once in high school—well, not on a date technically, but they did spend some time together on the class trip to Washington, and Dorothy was awfully nice to Pete and then of course that was that, he never called her. But if they had gotten married they probably would have gotten divorced, and she wouldn’t be looking forward so much to going to a high school reunion. Apart from her friends Linda Studemann and Judy Holt, she’s really only going to see him. And, to be honest, to show off her recent weight loss. That was the one nice thing about her divorce: During the grief part, before she realized how much better off she was without her husband, she lost twenty-three pounds. She bets she’ll look better than the cheerleaders and even that Candy Sullivan who was queen of everything. Not that Candy Sullivan is coming. According to Pam Pottsman, who is the contact person for this year’s reunion, Candy went to the five-year reunion and hasn’t gone to any since. “Is she dead?” Dorothy asked, ready to offer an impromptu eulogy praising Candy’s good points, even though Candy never gave Dorothy the time of day. But Pam said no, Candy wasn’t dead, apparently she just thought she was too good to come, and then they both started talking about what a snob Candy always was, and how she wasn’t even really all that. “Did you know she stuffed her bra?” Pam said, and Dorothy said, “Really?” and felt that delicious rush, and Pam said, “Yup, I sat across from her in Mr. Simon’s psychology class and I saw Kleenex coming out of the top of her blouse one day and I whispered to her that it was showing and she got all embarrassed and stuffed it back in and wouldn’t look at me.”

Pam told Dorothy how a lot more people were coming this year than ever before, probably because it was the last reunion their class was going to have, and she named several of their classmates who had signed up. Dorothy thinks it will be fun to see poor Mary Alice Mayhew, who is coming for her very first reunion, just like Dorothy. Though there the similarity ends, thank you very much. Such a little mouse Mary Alice was, walking down the hall and looking at the floor, all hunched over her school books. She wore awful plaid dresses and she never wore nylons, always thin white ankle socks, not even knee socks. And loafers that were not Weejuns, you could tell. From a mile away you could tell. Poor thing. And wait, didn’t she put a penny in them? There’s always one of them. In their school, it was Mary Alice Mayhew. Oh, and Lester Hessenpfeffer, who was screwed the moment he was born and his father reportedly yelled, “Change our name! Change our name? Why should we change our name? Let the rest of the world change their names!” Lester had told that story once when someone teased him about his name—he was always an affable guy who didn’t take things personally.

Poor Lester. Never dated. He had such a cute face, but he was too much of a brain, and too sensitive. He probably ended up in computers. Maybe he got rich, like that homely Microsoft guy. And if so, you can bet your boots that Dorothy will be saying hello to him, too.

If Mary Alice Mayhew really comes to the reunion, Dorothy will make a point of being nice to her. Yes she will. She’ll buy her a drink—oh, what a hoot to think of buying Mary Alice Mayhew a drink. So odd to think that they’re old enough to drink now. Mary Alice had silver cat-eye glasses with rhinestones on them and her hair always looked like she’d taken the rollers out and not brushed it. Dorothy has heard plenty of stories about how ugly ducklings come to their high school reunions as swans, but she’d bet money that Mary Alice looks much the same, only with wrinkles. She wouldn’t be the Botox type. Dorothy’s position on Botox is Thank God. Who cares if you can’t move your eyebrows around like caterpillars on a plate?

“Is Pete Dexter coming?” Dorothy asked.

He is.

“And his wife, too?”

“Nah, he never brings her. You know Pete. Oh, I can hardly wait to see him again. What a dreamboat he was.”

“Oh, did you think so?” Dorothy studied her nails casually, as though she and Pam were talking in person. If you wanted to sound a certain way, even on the telephone, it was good to act a certain way—the feeling crept into your voice. You were supposed to smile when you were talking on the phone if you wanted to sound friendly. Which a lot of people who do those recorded voices seem to do, though recorded voices make Dorothy want to bang the phone against the wall until the wires fall out.

“I thought Pete Decker was the most handsome boy in school!” Pam says. “Didn’t you?”

“I don’t know. I guess a lot of people found him attractive.” Dorothy sniffed then and changed the subject. No need for Pam to know of Dorothy’s designs on Pete; Pam was quicker than Twitter at spreading things around.

ELIZABETH BERG is the author of many bestselling novels as well as two works of nonfiction. Open House was an Oprah’s Book Club selection, Durable Goods and Joy School were selected as ALA Best Books of the Year, and Talk Before Sleep was short-listed for an Abby Award. Her bestsellers also include The Year of Pleasures, The Day I Ate Whatever I Wanted, and Dream When You’re Feeling Blue. Berg has been honored by both the Boston Public Library and the Chicago Public Library and is a popular speaker at venues around the country. She lives near Chicago.

The Pull of the Moon is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

2010 Ballantine Books Trade Paperback Edition

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

RANDOM HOUSE READER’S CIRCLE & Design is a registered trademark of Random House, Inc.

Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., in 1996.

This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming hardcover edition of The Last Time I Saw You by Elizabeth Berg. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Berg, Elizabeth.

The pull of the moon / Elizabeth Berg

p. cm.

eISBN: 978-0-345-51542-1

1. Title

PS3552.E6996P85 1996 813′54—dc20 95-41934

www.randomhousereaderscircle.com

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