“Like Brigitte Bardot!” they yelled at the same time. Pru’s heart was racing.
Jacob turned down the volume on the radio. “We should stop and get Annali a dog,” he said.
“Does Patsy want a dog?”
“Not for Patsy. For Annali. For her birthday. She’s going to be three.”
“Yeah, well, a three-year-old isn’t going to take a dog out for walks.”
“If you see a pet store, pull over, and we’ll get her a dog.”
So far she hadn’t seen anything for miles except for farm stands and motels. “Okay, Jacob,” she said. “But maybe you should check it out with Patsy first.”
Jacob didn’t say anything. He drummed his knees, and sang along with Chrissie Hynde.
They arrived just before noon. Jacob took the rickety beach house stairs two at a time. Pru opened the trunk and took out their bags. When she looked up at the house, Jacob had both of them in his arms, Patsy and Annali.
JACOB PUT HIS ENERGY TO GOOD USE SHOPPING, CHOPPING, and cooking. He had an insane amount of energy. Omelets with mushrooms when they arrived, chocolate fondue and strawberries. He banged nails into walls and drove wedges under the new refrigerator to straighten it and caulked the bathroom shower. He ran along the beach chasing Annali and played games with her in the arcade on the boardwalk. By the time dinner rolled around, Pru was exhausted.
He made beef Wellington for dinner, and then—at last, thought Pru—sat down to watch a basketball game on the television. She and Patsy began cleaning up the kitchen. Patsy was going over her plans for the move. She would have to quit the teaching job that she’d just begun, and find something new. Annali came over with a dead beetle she’d found, and they both admired it. “Show Jacob,” Patsy said, and Annali scooted right off, carefully cupping her hands around the bug carcass.
Pru was dying to suggest to Patsy that the job situation gave her another good reason to wait on moving, at least until the spring, but remembered she’d promised herself to butt out. She was about to offer to help with the moving van, when there was a loud cry from the living room.
“Honey, no!” Pru heard Jacob yell, then: “Dammit, Annali!” She looked up in time to see Jacob stand up, and Annali fall gently to the floor on her bottom. Annali looked up at Jacob, her eyes wide in surprise. Jacob looked down at her, then at the hand he’d pushed her with, as if it belonged to somebody else.
“Oh, honey,” he said. “Annali,” he said, reaching for her.
Annali sprang up and ran from the room. Patsy put down the dish towel she was holding, and followed her into the bedroom, closing the door gently behind them.
“Shit,” Jacob said, “I can’t believe it. I pushed her.”
He sat back down on the couch, muting the volume on the TV. “Christ. I feel like a monster.” He put his head in his hands. “I can’t believe it,” he said again. He looked truly miserable.
“She’ll be okay,” Pru said. “Kids are tough.”
But he didn’t answer. Pru thought he seemed a little more distraught than the circumstances called for. He hadn’t exactly pushed Annali, from what she’d seen. It looked more as if he had sort of tried to pull her to the side, but she’d become unbalanced and fallen to the floor.
Jacob kept watching the door to the bedroom, but he made no move to go to them. At last he turned off the TV and went outside. Pru finished the dishes, occasionally looking out of the glass doors to where Jacob stood at the railing, staring off at the ocean. Presently, Patsy came out of the bedroom.
“Where’d he go?”
Pru pointed to the deck. “He’s pretty upset,” she said.
Patsy went out to him. Pru watched them through the doors. Patsy tried to get him to look at her, but he wouldn’t. Finally she pulled him by the hand down the stairs to the beach.
The phone rang and Pru went to answer it. It could only be Nadine, at home by herself.
“I miss my girls!” she said. “I’m so jealous of you all there together. How’s it going?”
Pru could hear the clack of her knitting needles in the background.When her mother was agitated, she knit like nobody’s business. When Leonard was sick, she made matching hats, ponchos, and mittens for Pru, Patsy, and Annali. The lovely, intricate patterns would have taken a normal person several months to finish. Her mother did them in a couple of weeks, sitting by his bed at home, then in the hospital, then home again, for his final days.
She told her mother about the incident with Jacob and Annali.
“Poor Jacob,” her mother said. “Do you remember pushing her off the swing, last year?”
“God, yes. I think you spent more time consoling me than her.”
“It’s something every parent has to get used to, you know. There’s nothing that shows you how not perfect you are like being a parent. Jacob’s used to having all the answers, I think. I don’t think you could be a doctor, otherwise.”
“I’ve been thinking,” said Pru. “Is she allowed to move with Annali? What about Jimmy Roy?”
“We haven’t heard from Jimmy Roy in a while,” her mother said, sighing.
“Really?” Pru was surprised. She knew Jimmy Roy had been gone for several months, but he’d always kept in touch, little post-cards and letters to Annali. He’d sent her pictures of penguins, which were tacked up on the wall behind her bed.
“I guess Jimmy Roy could stop her from moving,” her mother continued, “but I don’t think he will.”
“No,” Pru agreed.
