to talk to you, too. Can you stick around for a minute after dinner?”
“Sure.”
The group made its way into the dining area, and once we had feasted, Helen stood up and gave a quick speech. Applause followed her report that we had donated a record amount to the shelter and its programs against domestic violence. Nominations for officers for the next year were called for, and I deftly avoided being drafted.
Becky sat next to me throughout the evening. Ivy sat at my other side. Alicia, unmerciful, was at our table, too.
“Andre’s married to his fifth wife,” she said. “That’s five years now, and a record.”
“Alicia, who the hell cares?” Becky said, and asked if I wanted my dessert. It was something that was supposed to be mousse, but looked closer to moose, so I told her it was all hers.
“All I’m saying,” Alicia went on, “is that at the age of fifty-five, he seems to have settled down.”
Becky leaned over and whispered, “Not that the women in this town are safe. Word is, Jerry is just as bad as his old man.”
I had already heard rumors that Andre’s son by his first marriage was a womanizer. I looked over at Sharon Selman, Jerry’s mother. Becky caught my glance. “Not Sharon’s fault, of course.”
“No,” I said, “I guess not. Maybe not even Jerry’s. Andre has kept Jerry as close as he’s kept Lisa distant.”
“Andre’s loss,” Becky said.
“I agree.” I found myself thinking about what Alicia had said. “Becky, Andre had a heart attack five years ago. Think that made him decide to change his ways?”
“Maybe, but Lisa told me that Andre’s on hypertension medication, too.”
“He has high blood pressure?” Ivy asked.
“Yes. Lisa was telling me about all of his prescriptions. The one for high blood pressure-well, my guess is that old Andre may suffer the occasional side effect of impotency.”
“Someone should have diagnosed his high blood pressure years ago,” I said.
Becky laughed. “Maybe someone did. Another possible side effect of that medication is priapism.”
“What’s that?” Alicia asked.
“A condition that’s very hard on a man,” Becky said-with a straight face.
Alicia didn’t seem to get it. Or maybe she did, and that’s why she went home early.
Later, after the meeting wound down to a close, I stood talking to Marcy and Roberta in the lobby of the Cliffside. Becky and Sharon and several other women were nearby, all of us reluctant to end this year’s time together. At one point, I looked over my shoulder toward Claire Watterson, who was married to the president of the Bank of Las Piernas. Each year, at SOS meetings, she made a point of spending some time talking to me. I enjoyed her company, but tonight, she didn’t seem to be herself. Normally vivacious, she had been quiet and withdrawn all evening. I beckoned her to join us, but she shook her head and gave me a little smile, then walked farther away from the group.
I turned my attention back to the others. Roberta was telling us about her work as the director of counseling at a privately operated community services center. Most of her work was with the homeless.
“I’ve heard about the center,” I told her. “I remember that the business owners in the area went before the Planning Commission about it.”
“They were opposed to it at first,” Roberta admitted. “But we had help from some local philanthropists- including Helen-who convinced the commission that it was the best place to let us locate-right among the people we serve. Now that we’ve been there a while, they’ve accepted us.”
“I’ll have to come by and see it.”
“Sure. I’m leaving for an out of town meeting tomorrow, which makes my schedule a little hectic this week. But call me next week and I’ll give you the grand tour of the center-oh! I almost forgot to tell you! An old friend asked me to say hello to you…”
She stopped speaking and, looking over my shoulder, smiled broadly. When I turned around to see what had distracted her, I saw Lisa Selman strolling toward us.
Lisa was smiling, too. She had her father’s blond hair and her mother’s light gray eyes and dark brows. Her other features were clearly her father’s and yet not masculine on her, giving her a strong but pleasant face. Even though she was ostensibly there only to give her mother a ride home, she wore a modest but sleek black dress- one that was not at odds with the elegant evening wear of the women coming from the banquet. She looked poised, sure of herself. A woman, I realized. No longer the adolescent prankster I was introduced to in the mid- 1970s. An adult.
I go through this every time I see her, which is usually no more frequently than once a year. If those were the only moments in which I received a reminder that time was advancing, I don’t think it would bother me much. Unfortunately, I get these reminders more frequently than I get membership renewal notices from my local public television station.
“Lisa! You’re looking great,” I said, and gave her a hug.
“Hello, Assemblywoman Selman,” Roberta said, smiling.
We chatted for a while, then Lisa said, “Give me a call, Irene, and we’ll make plans together while I’m here. I’m staying at my brother’s place.” She wrote the number on the back of a business card. Her smile changed slightly as she handed the card to me, and I saw a hint of her old mischief in it. “No room at my mom’s place-she’s renting my old bedroom to a college student.”
“You could have stayed with me,” Marcy said. “There’s still plenty of room. The couch folds out into a bed.”
Lisa laughed. “Mom, even the attic at Dad’s is better than that old sleeper sofa.”
They laughed, but I wasn’t so comfortable with the memories she had evoked. Andre had a three-bedroom house. Back when I was dating him-when Lisa was about twelve or thirteen-Andre used one bedroom for an office and slept in another. The third was reserved for Jerry. When Lisa visited, she stayed in an attic room that was finished, but had no closet. “He doesn’t want me here,” she once told me with a shrug, as if it were an accepted fact of life.
Marcy suddenly realized she had left her purse in the banquet room, and went back to get it. As one of the other women began to talk to Lisa, Roberta turned to me and said, “I’ve got to be going. I just wanted to let you know that seeing you has really made a difference in Lucas Monroe.”
“Lucas Monroe?” I said, puzzled. “I haven’t seen him in years. Not since before I went to work in Bakersfield.”
She looked troubled. “Really? He claims-well, maybe he was mistaken.”
“He claims what?”
“That he saw you about a month and a half ago,” she said. “While you were waiting for a bus.”
3
LUCASMONROE= The Man on the Bus Bench. Try as I might, it was impossible for me to completely accept that equation as the truth.
Lisa, Becky, Sharon, and others overheard Roberta mention his name, and remembered him. Roberta glanced around at their expectant faces and looked uneasy.
“Roberta…,” I said, then shook my head. I couldn’t make sense of what she had just told me.
She put an arm around my shoulders, keeping her voice low as she said, “Look, he wants to have his act together when he sees you.”
I pulled back a little, looking at her face.
“Don’t worry,” she said, misreading my distress, “he’s cleaned up, and I get the feeling that the things he wants to talk to you about are
“Is Lucas a lawyer now?” Becky asked, making us both aware that we were still within earshot of the
