In early November, Amanda signed the papers for a brick split-level house on North Humphrey Street. Although only ten minutes away from Oak Park’s spectacular Frank Lloyd Wright houses, it existed in a region as separate in her imagination as another era.
Mike disapproved. “At least find a place with its own garage.”
But the houses with garages sat on lush grounds. Amanda wanted manageable space, not yard work.
She moved during Christmas, while Mike and the Drs. Morrison treated Evie and DeeDee to Disney World.
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On Christmas Eve, she set up the kitchen, using stuff from her married life. The furniture, rugs, and draperies, she and Mike had agreed to leave in their old house, since it would fetch a better price if it looked semi-occupied.
Except for the kitchen, Amanda would buy new furniture during the after-Christmas sales. Her daughters would return to a cozy, new life, the best she could give them.
Unpacking boxes in a chilly kitchen still swirling with paint fumes, she did what she never did: fall into a reverie of her brief, dazzling adventure with Walter and how it had vanished forever.
Rinsing her dinner dishes, she listened to D’Angelo’s Voodoo through headphones. Afterwards, she searched through the modest three bedrooms for her cache of secret mementos. Inside a battered, dusty box filled with her high-school yearbooks, soccer trophies, diplomas and scholarship letters, she dug up a Mickey Mouse T-shirt wrapped around orange Crocs and a Hannah Montana jacket. From the jacket’s sleeve, she pulled out a photograph, protected by bubble-wrap, of Walter and her waiting to get on Space Mountain. Facing her, his profile to the camera, he was crouching beside eleven-year old Amanda who smiled unabashed, a bare arm flung over his shoulders.
Eyes brimming, she put everything back in the box. She paced the rooms and opened her cell phone. Walter’s number, which she’d looked up after Olivia had asked her to be a bridesmaid, appeared on automatic dial.
Olivia answered, “Merry Christmas, whoever you are,” and waited.
In the background, Walter asked, “Who is it, honey?”
Amanda snapped the phone shut. Perhaps the background voice belonged to Olivia’s fiancé. No. Her head shook, no. Amanda knew Walter’s voice.
She stared out the bedroom’s side by side windows, and phoned Farrah, a secretary from work who had invited Amanda to join her on a retreat in Mexico.
“Definitely, come tomorrow,” Farrah said. “Christmas day is great for travel.”
Amanda used what she had considered the living room furniture money to book the flight and stay two nights, but of course, plastic was plastic.
The morning after she arrived, Farrah brought her to the luxury hair salon and urged Amanda to get honey-colored highlights. Her hair soon looked much the same as it had when she was a girl.
She took an afternoon fitness class on a deck overlooking the beach. When the class ended and everyone dispersed, she lingered, pressing her hands into the warm wooden floor. She played with her shadow and attempted a cartwheel for the first time in ten years. Oof. She landed heavily and off-balance, but kept trying.
By the time the handsome instructor, Alan, returned for his iPod, she was absorbed in five smooth turns. He grinned and asked her to teach him. He fell and laughed and before long gave up, preferring to watch her wheels describe wide arcs.
They ate dinner together on a terrace and strolled along the beach. He pointed out stars, naming several constellations, which, she noticed, prepared her for what was next. Next, he kissed her. They walked some more and he kissed her again for a long time. He stroked her hair and praised her eyes and mouth, her nose and chin and fingertips.
That night and the next morning she and Alan engaged in friendly, appreciative sex. And after getting dressed, they agreed it was all the more wonderful because she was leaving just after lunch.
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