The Grown Ups Read online

  “When I was a kid I didn’t really think of it as a risk, I thought of it as abandonment.” Sam felt the impact of his sentence as everyone got quiet. “Anyway, I guess that’s old news now.”

  “Hey, sorry, dude,” Ted offered. “I didn’t realize it was a tough subject still.”

  Sam shrugged. “A lot of shit went down that summer, that’s all.” In his peripheral view he saw Suzie squirm in her seat and take a large gulp of wine. Was she worried that Sam was going to bring up her father? He looked down at his plate. She was his sister-in-law now, and he had to protect that familial bond. He could feel Bella’s eyes on him, but he couldn’t look at her and see disappointment yet again.

  When the bottles of wine they had brought with them were almost gone, Ted stood. As he stretched and yawned he invited all of them to take a day trip the next morning to Martha’s Vineyard. A college friend of his had recently moved there to work the family farm. To make amends for being such a giant prick, but all for Bella’s benefit and not Ted’s, Sam heard himself agreeing, and immediately regretted it. Peter and Frankie begged off, claiming they had to wait for the rest of the group to arrive the next day, and Suzie said she just wanted to sleep on the beach. By then it was too awkward for Sam to try to get out of taking an excursion with Bella and Ted.

  Sam stacked plates and carried them into the kitchen as everyone cleared the deck. He pretended not to hear Ted and Bella shuffle upstairs to a bedroom. Frankie and Peter had come inside and were bent over a chessboard in front of the fireplace. Sam went out to the deck to retrieve the last of the glasses and was surprised to see Suzie still there. She had nearly disappeared into two large blankets; her hands and a glass of red wine were all that was visible.

  Suzie nodded toward the bottle on the floor by her chair. “Have one more drink with me?” Her words were soft and slurry.

  Sam sat down next to her, picked up the bottle, and took a long swallow.

  Suzie giggled. “Good man.”

  Sam shook his head at the taste. He had been drinking beer and the wine tasted sour. “So, how are you?”

  Suzie closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the blankets. “I’m sorry about that night.” She opened her eyes and squinted over at Sam. “I wasn’t thinking very clearly or I would have called you.”

  “Hey, come on.” He shrugged off her apology.

  They sat looking out at the water without speaking for a long time. Suzie finished her wine and tucked the empty glass inside the nest of blankets. Sam wanted to go to bed. But he didn’t want to leave her alone. “Where’s Michael?”

  “On call.”

  “Too bad he couldn’t come.”

  “Yeah. So, how do you like Ted?”

  “He seems great.”

  She laughed quietly. “Liar.”

  “What?”

  Suzie put her fingers to her lips like she was about to tell a secret. She shook her head.

  Sam felt a rush of fatigue that made the back of his head hum. He could close his eyes and be dead right here, or find a bed now. “I think I’m going to turn in. Did you drop your stuff in a room?”

  “I’m all set, Sammy. Don’t worry about me.” Suzie extricated a hand from the pile of blankets and waved her fingers. “I’m going to sit here a while longer, stare at the churning sea, and ponder the enormity of the cruel universe.” She gave him half a smile before she turned away to face the water. She was either dismissing him or saving him.

  Sam hesitated. “You know, for the record, I think Ted’s a dick.”

  Suzie smiled. “There’s my boy.”

  “I’m not your boy,” Sam said, irritated. “Don’t say that.”

  “I‘m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it. I was just waiting for the real Sam to appear.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re getting at, Suzie.” Sam had never been this annoyed with her. But it occurred to him in that moment that maybe he didn’t like Suzie all of the time.

  Ted’s friends had fifty-five acres in Edgartown on Martha’s Vineyard where they planted a variety of crops, including corn, beans, squash, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, beets, lettuce, spinach, and potatoes, along with a culinary herb garden and berries, peaches, and plums. On the farm was a tremendous post-and-beam barn, inside which was a kitchen where they produced seasonal dishes and baked goods for sale as well as eggs and freshly slaughtered beef and lamb from the farm in Chilmark that another son ran on family-owned land. The owners, Brian and Lori, had raised four kids on the farm, and all of them had their hands in the family business in some capacity. Zeke, the son that Ted knew, had gone to school for aquaculture, which in Sam’s limited understanding of Ted’s rambling explanation had something to do with irrigation systems.

  Out behind the barn an extension of the kitchen opened to the outdoors, where there was a roasting pit, grills, and, beneath an arbor crosshatched with vines, a long table made of planks of reclaimed wood resting on sawhorses, surrounded by stumps that could accommodate at least thirty people. The view over neatly plowed fields and shimmering expanses of green was stunning.

  Lori insisted they stay for lunch. Sam devoured a zucchini and tomato pie, arugula and kale with lemon dill dressing, a delicate quiche threaded with scallions, and a peach tart. Everything they ate was from farm to table, and while Sam savored the flavors, he also ate ravenously, as if he couldn’t get enough. After lunch, while Ted went off on a tractor with Zeke, and Bella sat at the table with Lori, Sam invited himself into the kitchen. Brian told him they had recently doubled the size because they were considering adding special-event dinners to their currently all-takeout menu; that part of the business was thriving, and the demand was only growing.

  Sam fell in love in that kitchen. The surfaces were gleaming lengths of professional stainless, as were the walk-ins and ovens, but the walls were still the rough barn board. Overhead, notched beams crisscrossed the ceiling. Industrial-sized fans spun in lazy circles from those beams. What sealed the deal for Sam were the windows above the sinks, an expanse of glass that looked out onto a generous swath of the fields and beyond. The windows at the catering kitchen had looked out on a brick-walled alley.

  The chefs, two women in their early twenties, showed Sam around. One was going into her final year at Boston College and had spent the last four summers working there, and the other was new to the farm this year. She had tagged along with a boyfriend who planted and tended crops, but Sam recognized her starry-eyed look as his own as she talked about the farm. They allowed him to skim through the recipe notebooks, all the evidence of trial-and-error dishes recorded in each chef’s hand. Because of the seasonal work, a lot of the chefs had used the farm kitchen as a launching pad to other kitchens, yet a few returned, their handwriting showing up in six-month cycles in the lined notebook pages.

  Sam went back outside. Bella was sitting at the table alone. When she saw him she grinned. “You love this, don’t you?”

  Sam sat on a stump across from her and rested his elbows on the table, inexplicably remembering that last morning in her college apartment. They had taken a long, hot shower together and then he’d made breakfast. Sam remembered condensation on the naked windows, a spray of cinnamon toast, coffee, Bella sitting across from him at the table, the curled wisps of wet hair leaving damp circles on her shoulders, her smile. He realized as he looked at her now that in the time they had been apart he had mastered so many more ways to fail her. “It’s a lot more than I expected,” Sam admitted, not giving Ted any extra credit.

  “You know you could work here, right? I mean, Lori and Brian said they hire people all the time. There are never enough hands. Wouldn’t that be amazing?”

  Sam laughed at how simple she made everything sound. “Well, look who’s planning my next step.”

  “Oh, God, Sam.” She blushed and ducked her chin to her chest. “I was just saying I could see you here, you know, cooking, surrounded by all of this.” She swept her arm out to her side.

  Sam nodded a
nd looked beyond Bella to the fields. He heard the rumble of a tractor in the distance, most likely Ted and Zeke on their way back. “How’s Ted liking the city?” he asked, wanting to steer the conversation away from him.

  Bella stuck out her chin. “Fine,” she declared, as if Sam were crazy to ask.

  Sam left it at that as Ted and Zeke reappeared. There was a certain swagger to Ted’s step that made Sam want to punch him. Since they had been at the farm Ted had quoted Thoreau at least four times. Sam couldn’t imagine Bella digging his act, but apparently she did.

  Ruthie, Mindy, and Celia were at the house with Suzie when they got back from Martha’s Vineyard. The girls were on the beach below the deck, stretched out on their backs on brightly colored blankets, chins tilted to the sun. Frankie and Peter sat in low webbed chairs under a large umbrella with a cooler of beer between them. Bella hung over the railing calling out to the girls, while Ted hovered at her side, cupping her elbow in his hand, urging her away from her friends and upstairs for a nap before dinner. He had nuzzled her neck the entire ferry ride back, and Sam was beginning to take it personally.

  Sam had brought bags of produce and meat from the farm, enough for several meals. He took the bags and went into the kitchen to unpack everything, cracking open a cold beer and cranking up the music. When the food was spread out on the counter he felt an anticipation and excitement he rarely felt for anything else in life. He decided to use the lamb chops for dinner, seared with a nice salted crust but still a little pale pink in the center, along with a vegetable strudel made of squash, onions, basil, tomatoes, eggplant, and goat cheese, a roasted potato salad with a lemon, garlic, red pepper, and olive oil dressing, and a sausage and minestrone soup. Dessert would be warm berries and fresh cream. He whistled as he put the ingredients he wasn’t going to use away and began to set up the chopping stations.

  As Sam slid the pan of potatoes into the oven to roast, he heard a familiar voice behind him. “Can I help?”

  Sam turned from the stove to see Bella on the far side of the kitchen. The bridge of her nose was sunburned. He must have looked startled, because she laughed. “Have you turned into one of those chefs who can’t have anyone else in the kitchen?”

  Sam laughed, thrilled to see her standing in front of him without Ted. “God, no.” He pointed to the onions. “Can you chop?”

  She smiled. “Give me a knife.” She pointed to the magnetic strip where a line of German knives (easily the cost of one month’s rent in Manhattan, Sam could not help but notice) was waiting. She selected a medium-sized knife and Sam slid a cutting board toward her. “Large or small pieces?”

  “Small, please.”

  She grinned and rubbed her face, the blade of the knife close to her cheek.

  “Jesus, Bell, put the knife down first.”

  She gave him a half smile. “Relax.”

  “Blade down on the cutting board, and I will consider it.”

  “You lied. You are so one of those chefs who doesn’t want anyone else in the kitchen.”

  Sam looked up from salting the cubes of eggplant. She was grinning at him. Where had this Bella come from?

  “Seriously?” he asked, teasing her back. “Me?”

  Bella rolled her shoulders forward and put her head down in earnest. She sliced the onion in half and then proceeded to make hash marks lengthwise before she turned the onion and made them again in the opposite direction.

  They chopped in assembly-line order. Sam slid vegetables in Bella’s direction and she made neat piles along the granite counter. When she was done she put down her knife, grabbed two beers, and handed one to Sam while he prepped sauté pans and a stockpot just as everyone began filing in from the beach. More beers were opened, the girls, including Bella, went off to shower, and Frankie and Peter picked up their long-running chess game.

  Sam set the table out back, fired up the grill for the lamb chops, and turned everything else to simmer while he sat on the deck to finish his beer. He heard the shower running through the open bathroom window and tried hard not to think about Bella’s naked body under the spray.

  From the far end of the table Frankie raised his beer. “To Sam: without you there is only cold cereal in my life.”

  Peter banged on the table until dishes and glasses rattled and a bottle of beer tipped over into an empty dish. Mindy smacked him on the shoulder playfully and then leaned in to kiss his cheek. Just as her lips grazed his skin he turned to kiss her hard on the mouth.

  Frankie whistled for attention. “But seriously, you guys, how is it that I’m still looking at your same damn faces after all these years? Why don’t we have any other friends?” He paused and looked over at Ted. “No offense to you, Teddy.”

  Ted had been hanging on Bella all through dinner. Right now he had an arm slung around her shoulders and their chairs pushed as close together as possible. “Is Ted our friend or Bella’s date?” Sam spat out involuntarily, and then tried to avoid looking directly at Bella.

  Ted didn’t take Sam’s middle school bait. Instead he nodded his chin at Frankie and said, “None taken.”

  Sam shifted in his seat and caught Suzie’s eye. The expression on her face was blurry in the candlelight. He thought she smiled at him. Sam crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in the chair.

  “I love you guys,” Frankie crooned. “I love you.”

  Celia pushed back her chair and stood up. “Who wants to go for a walk on the beach?”

  Ruthie lifted her hand, which was still attached to Suzie’s. They giggled as one stood and the other fell back down before they righted themselves.

  Frankie pushed back his chair. “I think you ladies need an escort.” He offered his arms and Celia and Suzie grabbed ahold of the sloppy sleeves of his sweater. “We don’t want you to get in some unfortunate Natalie Wood type accident.”

  “We are not going out in a boat. And who says we need an escort?” Ruthie shook her head vigorously. Sam knew she was softer than she looked. Bella had confided in the kitchen earlier that Lucy had recently broken Ruthie’s heart by sleeping with a man. Ruthie had sobbed to Bella that she had done everything Lucy had wanted, she had changed everything so Lucy would love her more, but she couldn’t grow a dick. Sam realized that he had never changed for anyone; his answer was always to leave. What kind of person did that make him?

  “Never mind the details,” Frankie called after the girls as he stumbled over his own feet to keep up as they moved ahead of him toward the stairs. “You don’t need a boat to drown.”

  Sam left the two couples at the table and went into the house for another beer. Once he was inside he started to fill the dishwasher. He purposely made a lot of noise; he didn’t want to know where Bella and Ted were, or if they had gone upstairs. After a while, Mindy came in carrying a stack of bowls. She set them down near the drainboard and reached for a berry from the strainer as she left again. Peter trailed after her, and soon Sam was alone in the kitchen as they disappeared upstairs. Sam kept at the task of cleaning up, getting lost in the repetitive motions until there was nothing left to do. Not yet feeling tired, he stretched out on the couch with the intention of watching a movie.

  He was surprised, then, when he felt a pressure on his shoulder like someone’s hand pressing him down into the cushions. Sam opened his eyes to the kind of dark, still quiet that happens only just before dawn. When had he fallen asleep? It took him a moment to figure out that Michael was sitting on the coffee table, leaning over him, whispering his name.

  “What the fuck?” Sam said.

  “Sammy, I’m sorry. Where’s Suzie?”

  “Asleep, I’m guessing.”

  “I don’t know which room.”

  “Neither do I. Fuck, Michael, what are you doing here now?” Sam’s eyes adjusted to the lack of light. He expected Michael to appear haggard after an on-call shift and driving all the way out to the Cape, but he didn’t. In his dark polo shirt he looked like he did when they were kids. For a second, in Sam’s sleep
fog, he imagined Michael telling him he knew where their mother had hidden the Christmas presents.

  “Can you help me?” Michael whispered.

  “Can’t it wait until the morning? Pick a couch.” Sam pointed to the opposite side of the room, where an empty couch was Michael’s for the taking.

  “I need to see her.” Michael shook his head. “I need to see her now, Sam.”

  Sam sighed, and sat up and motioned for Michael to follow him upstairs. The hallway was an elongated L; the master bedroom, where Peter and Mindy were sleeping, faced the ocean. Sam pointed down the hall to the rest of the rooms. The first room on the left was where he had dumped his duffel bag the night they arrived. The door was ajar, his bed empty. He could hear Frankie snoring in the room next to his. Suzie was going to be in one of the other two rooms on the other side of the hall. The only problem was he didn’t know which one, and he didn’t want to open a door and find Bella and Ted.

  He could feel Michael’s breath on his shoulder as he hesitated in front of the room across from his. Impatient with Sam’s indecision, Michael quickly reached around Sam and pushed open the door. Inside were two double beds, a mound of luggage between them. Ruthie and Celia were curled like parentheses in the bed on the far side of the room. Closer to the door were Suzie and Bella.

  Michael darted into the room and collapsed onto his knees next to the bed. He gathered Suzie in his arms, and Sam watched Suzie startle awake and then start sobbing into Michael’s shoulder. Sam heard the words I’m sorry, and I love you, but he thought they said them at the same time. Either way, it was hard to tell who was sorrier.