spot on her waist where David had held her.
“Yes, but we have to stuff them so they can be in everybody’s mailbox over the weekend.”
“We’ll get it done, Dad.” Allie ate at a fast clip, the way they did these days.
“It will take tonight and tomorrow night to get it done.”
“Dad, it won’t take that long,” Allie said, but her father liked nothing better than a plan. He kept a running Things to Do list and divided the tasks into Short-Term and Long-Term, which her mother used to tease him about.
“No, we couldn’t possibly do it ourselves, just the two of us.” Her father stabbed his hotdog, barely looking up. “There are about four hundred families in the development, and each house has to get an envelope. There are three sheets that have to go in each envelope—All About Jill Garvey, the entry form, and the waiver and release form. We lost time over the printer snafu, so we didn’t get to collate. So we have to collate, then stuff.”
“So we’ll start now.” Allie wished she could cheer him up. “We’ll make it fun. We can put on a movie. If we go to the video store after dinner, it will be early enough to get a new release. We can stay up as late as we want. It’s not like I have school tomorrow.”
“No, it’s all set up. The committee is coming over. More hands make less work. They’ll be here in an hour.” Her father shook his head, wiping his mouth with a napkin, which he neatly refolded and returned to his lap. “I’m herding the cats.”
“Oh, okay.” Allie felt her chest tighten. They were about to be invaded by a slew of women, including her mother’s best friend, Fran, who’d been in Pittsburgh for some time, taking care of her own mother. Allie called her Aunt Fran and knew Aunt Fran didn’t realize how bad things were with Allie’s mother. “Dad, Mom was really sleepy today. I couldn’t wake her up for dinner.”
“She’ll be fine.” Her father sipped his water without meeting Allie’s eye.
“I wonder if whatever meds she’s on, they need to change the dosages again.”
“They know what they’re doing.”
“But I don’t even think she ate. When I came home, there were no dishes in the sink. When she eats, she leaves the dishes.”
“She’ll eat when she’s hungry. We’ve discussed this. They said she’s having ‘complicated grief.’ You can’t rush it.” Her father rose with his plate, gathered his silverware, and went to the sink, turning away.
“Aunt Fran’s going to go upstairs.”
“Fran knows she’s under a doctor’s care.” Her father rinsed his dish, his back turned. “Besides, she might not come. Jim might have torn his rotator cuff.”
“But what if she goes upstairs? They only talk on the phone. Since she’s been away, Aunt Fran hasn’t seen—”
“I’ll tell Fran your mom has the flu. She won’t go up.”
Allie blinked, surprised. She had never known her father to lie, and Fran wasn’t stupid. “Mom doesn’t have the flu, Dad.”
“It’s no one’s business what she has. No one’s business but ours.” Her father turned from the sink. “Understood?”
“Yes,” Allie answered, realizing she now had a second secret.
CHAPTER 8
Sasha Barrow
Hold on, Melanie.” Sasha set the phone down and put on the flowy white dress in front of the floor-length mirror. It slid down her body, then clung to her hips. Sasha was pretty and tall enough to be a model, but she had higher hopes. She was going to be a world-famous fashion designer like Diane von Furstenberg, Donna Karan, or Coco Chanel. She liked everything about designing clothes except sewing, which was boring.
Sasha spun around in the mirror, dreamy. She loved clothes, noticing every detail about the cut, stitching, and fabric. She practically studied chiffon, silk, and the tweed in her mother’s Chanel suits. It was called boucle, Sasha had taught herself. She read Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and WWD and sketched all the time, trying out ideas. She wanted, someday, to run a fashion empire like the Fendis and the Missonis, with ateliers in all the European capitals and seamstresses to sew for her. She’d personally oversee every piece in her collection before the girls went down the runway. The designer always walked last, and Sasha would make her runway appearance to thunderous applause. She could almost hear it now.
“Sasha, you there?” Melanie asked on the other end of the line.
Sasha came out of her reverie and picked the phone off the bed. “Chillax.”
“I’m sorry, I was just