“Good,” Lauren said. “You should cry about it every day. It’s a good release. Crying helps you live longer.”
“Real y?” Isabel a asked. “I’ve never heard that before.”
“Wel , I sort of made it up. It’s a theory that I have. But it makes sense, doesn’t it?”
“Maybe,” Isabel a said.
“Listen, whatever you decide to do wil be the right thing,” Lauren said.
“How do you know?”
“Because if it wasn’t the right thing, then you wouldn’t choose to do it.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Isabel a said.
“Or does it make perfect sense?” Lauren asked.
“Are you drunk?”
“Yeah, I think I am.”
“Good,” Isabel a said. “Me too. Let’s order gril ed cheese.”
“Did you think any more about it?” Harrison asked.
“Yeah,” Isabel a said.
“I real y want you to come with me. I don’t want to be there alone.” He took her hand and waited for her to talk. “Don’t you want to be with me?”
“You’re the one that’s leaving in the first place,” Isabel a said.
“Isabel a, I don’t think you should move to Boston with Harrison unless you two are engaged,” her sister, Mol y, said. She’d cal ed Isabel a just to tel her this. “Mom thinks it too.”
“You know what else Mom thinks?” Isabel a asked. “She thinks your haircut was a mistake. I do too. I don’t think you should get a lesbian haircut unless you are real y ready to make the leap into that lifestyle.”
“I’m trying to help you,” her sister said.
“I’m real y trying to help you too,” Isabel a said. “Do not cut your hair again. I know it wil take years to get it to an acceptable length, but you need to do it. In the meantime, clip a bow in it or something.”
Mary was trying to tel Isabel a a story, but she kept crying. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“It’s okay,” Isabel a said.
“This didn’t happen with Henry,” Mary said. “I think my hormones are permanently damaged. I can’t stop crying.”
“I’m sure you’l be back to normal soon,” Isabel a said. “Now, what happened next?”
“Okay.” Mary took a deep breath. “So I’m at Target, and I’m trying to return the bottles, and the woman at the counter told me that they had a policy that you could only return three things in a month. And so I couldn’t return the baby bottles even though someone gave them to me as a gift and I didn’t need them.” Mary stopped here to blow her nose.
“Okay,” Isabel a said. “Okay. Try not to get too upset.”
“I know, I know. I just told that bitch that we got duplicate presents and she acted like I was trying to shoplift. She kept saying, ‘Ma’am, you need to calm down.’ Like it was my fault.”
“She sounds awful,” Isabel a said.
“She real y was,” Mary said. Her voice wiggled just a little. “Okay, I’m done. Now we need to talk about you and Boston. Do you think you’re going to go?”
“I’m not sure yet. What do you think?”
“Sometimes I wish Ken would be transferred to another state,” Mary said.
“Real y?” Isabel a asked. “You want to move?”
“No, not move. But if Ken was transferred to Boston or something and then he traveled al during the week. That would be nice.”
“Real y?” Isabel a said.
“Yeah, I mean, I could have the remote every night and we’d stil see each other on the weekends. It would just be nice to have some alone time.”
“Wel , you’d stil have the kids,” Isabel a said. “You wouldn’t real y be alone.”
“Right. Yeah, I guess it wouldn’t work.”
“Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, it’s fine. Sometimes I’m just tired of having people al around me. Sometimes Ken asks as many questions as Henry. He offered to go to the store yesterday and then he cal ed me three times while he was there. If he doesn’t know what kind of American cheese we buy now, wil he ever?”
“Probably not,” Isabel a said.
