Barefoot: A Novel

bun. She was wearing El en’s wedding pearl on a gold chain. She was as glamorous as a soap opera star to Brenda, but this fact only served to piss Brenda off. Vicki pushed into Brenda’s room and threw herself facedown on the bed, as though she were the one with a broken heart. “He wants to meet up with al these people I don’t know at the Main Lion. Lame. And afterwards, he wants to go to a breakfast party that some kid in the marching band is having.

Lame.” She lifted her head. “I just don’t feel like making the effort.”

“You don’t feel like making the effort,” Brenda said. Now here was a classic Vicki Lyndon moment. She had a great dress and an even better date to a dance Brenda would have murdered to go to—and she was threatening to stay home . . . why? Because it wasn’t cool enough for her.

“You should go with him,” Vicki said. “He’s your friend.”

Yes, Erik was Brenda’s friend. However, in the universe of proms and prom dates, this mattered little. “He didn’t ask me,” Brenda said.

“Wel , he’s out of luck,” Vicki said. “Because I’m not going.”

“Mom wil make you go,” Brenda said. “She’l say it’s rude to stand him up. And in very poor taste.”

“She can’t make me go,” Vicki said. She eyed Brenda in her sweatpants. “She’s not making you go to Rites of Spring.”

“She hasn’t started trying yet,” Brenda said.

Vicki unzipped her dress and wriggled out of it, like a snake shedding its skin. “We’l stay home together. Rent a movie. Drink Dad’s beer.”

Brenda stared at her sister. Was she being serious? Vicki didn’t like staying home, and especial y not with Brenda. But maybe . . . wel , if nothing else, Erik would see Vicki’s true colors. He would realize he should have asked Brenda instead.

“Okay,” Brenda said.

Vicki cal ed Erik at home to spare him the indignity of showing up at the Lyndon house in his tux with a gardenia in a plastic box.

“Sorr-eee,” she said. “I don’t feeeeel wel . I have real y bad men-strooool cramps. I’d better stay home.” She paused. “Sure, she’s right here.”

Vicki passed the phone to Brenda.

“I just got dumped,” Erik said. “What are you up to tonight?”

“I’m supposed to go out,” Brenda said, though she did not tel him where or with whom. “But . . . since Vicki’s not feeling wel , I might stay home and keep her company.”

“Can I come over?” Erik asked.

“Come over?” Brenda said.

“Yeah. To hang out with you guys.”

Vicki sliced her hand across her throat.

“Sorry,” Brenda said. “Not tonight.”

In the end, Erik went to the prom by himself, and when word spread that he’d been stood up by Vicki Lyndon, his popularity swel ed. The band let him sing a Bryan Adams song. It was the best night of his life. The next day, he cal ed Vicki to say thank you. Brenda and Vicki had stayed home and made popcorn and drunk warm Michelobs and watched their favorite movie, This Time Forever, which made them both cry. They fel asleep on either end of the sofa, with their legs entwined in the middle. Brenda sat in the oncology waiting room pretending to read People magazine, but in truth she was praying fast and furiously, her lips moving while she crossed herself with her right hand. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Dear Lord, please let Vicki live. Please, Lord, please, I beg you, please: Let. Her. Live.

It became usual that, at some point during Brenda’s waiting-room vigil, her phone would ring. Brenda always checked the display with a mixture of hope (for Walsh) and dread (of Brian Delaney, Esquire)—even though it was almost always her mother. After a while the nurses who wandered in and out from behind the administrative desk knew to expect El en Lyndon’s cal . They thought it was cute—the cal from mama. Brenda vacil ated between gratitude for the cal s and annoyance. El en had had her left knee replaced just after Easter— all that skiing caught up with me—and she was stil recovering. Otherwise, she would have been right there —either living in Melanie’s room instead of Melanie, or renting Number Twelve Shel Street, where she could monitor al developments herself. El en Lyndon was more frantic about Vicki’s condition than Vicki was, and thus it was left up to Brenda to placate her mother, to assure her that yes, everything was going along as expected, Vicki’s blood count was holding steady, and the kids were fine. This gave Brenda a sense of empowerment and calm control. But Brenda became increasingly irritated by her mother’s anxiety. Twice a week it became Brenda’s responsibility to talk her mother off the ledge. Brenda found herself saying the same phrases over and over until her mother became hypnotized and repeated the phrases back to Brenda. Never once during these phone cal s did El en Lyndon ask about Brenda. Brenda tried to ignore the fact that her mother had ceased acknowledging Brenda at al , except as a messenger. Now, Brenda took the cal , saying, “Hel o, Mom.”

“How is she?”

Brenda couldn’t help being maddening in return. “How are you? Stil with the cane? Is there Nantucket sand in your knee brace?”

“Very funny, sweetheart. How’s your sister?”

“She’s fine, Mom.”

“Her blood count?”

“Red cel s steady. White cel s down, but not by much.”

“Has she lost . . .”