Katherine told her. Sometimes she looked at Claire like she’d lost her mind, like she’d forgotten how hard it could be to find a decent apartment in New York and would end up living on Katherine’s couch forever. But Claire remained hopeful.
THE DAY THAT CLAIRE MOVED OUT OF THE HOUSE, Max followed her around with Nina, making Nina’s arm wave. “Say good-bye to your aunt,” he said. “Tell her how much you’re going to miss her.” She remembered how, when she left for college, Max had cried in her dorm room. He was ten at the time, and tried to pretend it wasn’t happening. He seemed sort of the same now, holding Nina up and talking behind her, saying, “Aunt Claire, how can you leave me? You’re going to miss me so much.”
And she did miss them, of course. As soon as she left, she missed them all, more than she had before she moved back. It was like she felt their absence more now. That was the worst part about leaving home—no matter what, it always felt a little sad. But not for one second did this mean that she doubted her decision. She was leaving and that was that.
When Claire told Lainie she was moving, she nodded like she’d been waiting for the news. “I hoped maybe you’d stay. That you’d like it here so much you wouldn’t want to go back.”
“Lainie,” Claire said, “I can’t stay here.”
“I know, I know. I knew you’d go. I just thought maybe you’d change your mind.”
“I’ll come visit, I promise. Probably more than I ever did before.”
“Good,” Lainie said. “Because once I have this baby, I’ll probably never be able to leave the house again. I’ll be under house arrest, so you’ll have to come to me.”
“I will,” Claire said. “I promise.”
And she had been home three times already since she moved out. She loved seeing Nina, holding that sweet little baby. And then Lainie had her fourth baby, a boy that they named Tommy. Lainie and Cleo got the babies together pretty often, would put them next to each other on blankets and let them play side by side. They referred to Nina as Tommy’s girlfriend and talked often about their future wedding. Claire knew they were kidding, but she swore those little babies smiled at each other.
Every time Claire came home, Weezy made a big deal of it. They all had dinner, and Martha came home to be there too, like it was a special occasion, like they all hadn’t eaten together every single night just a few months ago.
WHEN THE BROKER TOLD CLAIRE that there was a studio on Pineapple Street that was for rent, she almost screamed. She tried to stay calm, but she knew that barring a major disaster (a serious mice infestation, for example), she was going to take it. Pineapple Street had been her favorite one from the start, the place where she hoped to find an apartment. She started to think that she was getting very lucky.
The apartment was one of the smallest that Claire had ever seen. But it was clean and solid and the girl that was moving out told her that she loved it there. (And she seemed honest, even if she did have Care Bear sheets on her bed.) There was a little half wall that hid the bed from the rest of the apartment, and enough room to put a tiny couch and TV comfortably. Claire didn’t have any furniture anyway, since she’d sold it all, and she promised herself that she was going to get only the basics—a bed, a couch, and maybe a little table.
Katherine had come to see it with her, had looked around and then at Claire. “You could find a much bigger place by me,” she said. But Claire took it and Katherine just shrugged. “It’s your overpriced apartment,” she said.
The night Claire moved in, she had a few friends over and they sat on the floor and drank wine out of plastic cups. They ordered Thai food and ate it out of the containers, passing around spring rolls and noodles. After dinner, they left to go to a bar, since they were all feeling a little cramped by then. Claire was almost hyper that night, was excited at every suggestion someone made, could barely keep from skipping to the bar.
“You look like you just moved to New York for the first time,” Katherine told her. “You’re acting like a tourist or something.”
Claire