A Happy Family Without Me novel · Chapter 3 of 24
Chapter 3: Comments
The principal calls Fenella in because parents have seen the clip, Maeve reads her the comments, and Torsten changes the locks and writes her a bill; at the fall fair Lorna hugs her in public and whispers that Garner says she knew for years.
On Monday morning, nobody in the school office looked at me.
I am the school nurse, so I get a lot of looks. Kids hold out scraped knees. Teachers hold out coffee.
That day the secretary studied her screen, and a mother signing in her son kept her sunglasses on.
At ten the principal's door opened.
"Fenella, have you got a minute?"
I sat in the chair I had sat in a dozen times for lice outbreaks and flu numbers.
She turned her monitor halfway toward me and then turned it back.
"I've had nine emails about a video," she said.
"I've seen it."
"Nobody wants to take a side."
"Then they shouldn't take one off forty seconds of footage," I said.
She folded her hands.
"The parent group runs the fall fair on Friday, and Lorna has asked whether you'd rather sit this one out. She says she's worried about you."
I almost laughed.
"Lorna has run the first aid table schedule for three years," I said. "I'm the nurse. The table is where the nurse sits."
"I'm only passing it along."
"Then pass this along. I'll be at the table, in my lanyard, and I won't say a word about my marriage to anyone who doesn't ask."
The principal nodded slowly.
"And if someone asks?"
"Then I'll answer," I said.
In the hall I took my phone out and, for the first time, didn't read the comments.
I walked across Lindell Street at four o'clock instead.
Torsten Reddick was in his driveway with a sander and a sheet of marine plywood.
"Do you change locks?" I said.
He turned the sander off.
"I do boat hardware," he said. "It's the same lock, just smaller."
"I need all three doors. I gave a copy of the key to someone who isn't a friend."
He looked at me for a moment and didn't ask who.
"I can do it tonight."
"What do I owe you?"
"Eighty-five an hour, plus parts. I'll write it up."
"That's what you charge at the shop?"
"That's what I charge anyone," he said.
I had braced for sympathy and for pity and, worst of all, for him to wave off the money.
This was better.
"Fine," I said. "No favors. A bill."
"A bill," he agreed, and he put out a hand to shake on it.
It was warm and rough, and I let go first.
He came at seven with a toolbox. Poppy sat on the stairs and watched him take the old cylinder out of the front door.
"Why are you changing it?" she asked.
"Because your mother asked me to."
"Is it because of Lorna?"
Torsten's hands stopped. He glanced at me over her head.
"It's because I said so," I told her. "Go and brush your teeth."
She went. She went slowly.
"I'm sorry," I said once she was gone. "She hears everything."
"She's eight. They notice everything."
He tested the new key three times, locking and unlocking, and then handed me a card with the number scrawled on it.
On the back he had written a bill. Two hours, one lock set, one deadbolt. A hundred and ninety-four dollars.
"Cash is fine," he said.
I paid him from my purse, and he took the exact amount.
Friday came fast.
The school gym smelled of popcorn and floor wax.
I sat at the first aid table in my lanyard with a box of bandages and a bowl of lollipops, and I did what I had told the principal I'd do.
People looked, and then they stopped looking.
At two, Lorna came in through the double doors in a green sweater, with a tray of cupcakes balanced on one hip.
She saw me from across the gym and set the tray down on the nearest table.
She crossed the floor with her arms already open.
"Fenella," she said, and her voice cracked. "Oh, honey."
Every parent within twenty feet turned around.
She put her arms around me and held on, and her hair smelled like the vanilla candle she'd given me last Christmas.
Her mouth was by my ear.
"I didn't want it to go this way," she whispered. "He told me you knew about us for years."
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