The Husband's Secret(84)
Rob launched into a long story as Rachel kept walking toward the school office. She went by one of the Year 1 classrooms and heard bubbles of children’s laughter floating out the door. As she glanced in, she saw her boss, Trudy McDuff, streak across the classroom with one arm lifted in the air like a superhero, while the Year 1 teacher put her hand over her eyes and giggled helplessly. Was that a disco strobe light flashing white lights around the room? Tess O’Leary’s little boy certainly wouldn’t be bored on his first day of school, that was for sure. As for that report Trudy was meant to be working on for the Department of Education . . . Rachel sighed. She’d give her until ten a.m. and then she’d drag her back to her desk.
“So is that okay, then?” said Rob. “You’ll come to Lauren’s parents’ on Sunday?”
“What’s that?” said Rachel. She walked into her office and put her handbag on her desk.
“I thought maybe you could bring a pavlova. If you like.”
“Bring a pavlova where? When?” She couldn’t process what Rob was going on about.
She heard Rob take a deep breath.
“On Easter Sunday. For lunch. With Lauren’s family. I know we said we’d go to you for lunch, but it’s just impossible to fit everything in. We’ve been so busy with all the arrangements for New York. So then we thought if you came over to their place, we could see both families at once.”
Lauren’s family. Lauren’s mother had always just been to the ballet or the opera or the theater the night before, and whatever it was would have been simply extraordinary or exquisite. Lauren’s father was a retired barrister who would exchange a few courteous pleasantries with Rachel before abruptly turning away with a politely baffled expression on his face, as if he couldn’t quite place who she was. There was always a stranger at the table, someone beautiful and exotic-looking who would dominate the conversation with endless talk of their recent fascinating trip to India or Iran, and everybody except for Rachel (and Jacob) would find them enthralling. There appeared to be an endless supply of these colorful guests, because Rachel had never met the same one twice. It was like they were hired as guest speakers for the occasion.
“Fine,” said Rachel resignedly. She would take Jacob off and play with him in the garden. Anything was bearable if she had Jacob. “That’s fine. I’ll bring the pavlova.”
Rob loved her pavlovas. Bless him. He never seemed to notice that Rachel’s wonky-looking pavlovas were a somewhat lowbrow addition to the table.
“By the way, Lauren wanted to know if you want her to pick up any more of those macarons that we brought over the other night.”
“That’s nice of her, but actually they were a little sweet for me,” said Rachel. (In fact, Rachel was now obsessed with macarons, and Marla had asked her youngest son, who worked in the city as a something-or-other, to send “one of his underlings” out to buy another box. Poor underling. But better an underling should suffer than for Rachel to admit her daughter-in-law had done something right.)
“She also said to ask if you had fun at the Tupperware party last night.”
Lauren must have noticed Marla’s invitation on the fridge when she picked up Jacob on Monday. Show-off. Look how interested I am in my mother-in-law’s elderly little life!
“It was perfectly fine,” said Rachel. Would she tell him about the video? Would it upset him? Please him? He had a right to know. She sometimes felt uneasily aware of how little notice she’d taken of Rob’s grief, how she’d just wanted him to stay out of her way, to go to bed, to watch TV, to let her cry in private.
“Bit boring, eh, Mum?”
“It was fine. Actually, when I got home—”