Untethered Read online

  Char used to joke with him, “You act like a kid searching for Easter eggs. Can it possibly be that exciting, after all these years, to find another ‘opportunity to drive rapid and sustainable improvement to the manufacturing process’?” Magic language in the Six Sigma world—Char and Allie both spoke it fluently. Bradley, who had always been a good sport about the teasing, would laugh and say surely her question was rhetorical.

  Char regarded the table. Dirty cups and saucers were stacked in lopsided tiers. Some had fallen over, creating brown Rorschach blots on the plastic tablecloth. A few crumpled napkins and discarded bits of cookie lay beside the dishes, having failed to make the final step into the garbage can.

  “He’d have a field day with that,” she said, tsking. “He’d probably stop the reception and sort everyone into teams to analyze the various areas of process breakdown. There’d be a report-out by each team, a comparison of before-and-after metrics. There would definitely be Excel spreadsheets involved. Did I tell you about our New, Improved, and Streamlined Dinner Prep and Clean-Up System? Ask Allie sometime. It was insane.”

  “I wonder if now is the time for us to back off on the ‘unbending perfectionist’ comments,” Will said. “It was one thing when he was here to defend himself.”

  “He loved it,” Char said as her friend Colleen appeared at her side and took Char’s hand in hers.

  “You must be talking about Bradley,” Colleen said, kissing Char’s cheek, then Will’s. “I heard ‘unbending perfectionist.’”

  Like Bradley and Lindy, Colleen had grown up in Mount Pleasant. She liked to pretend Bradley had been this obsessive since elementary school. Lindy, who had followed three years behind Bradley and Colleen in school, liked to pretend he had been completely different back then, and that his desire to stay in their home state, in their hometown even, working in the industry she had grown tired of hearing about, had come as a divorce-worthy shock. Char suspected both women of indulging in a healthy degree of revisionist history.

  “When did Ms. Hollywood make her entrance?” Colleen pointed with her chin to Lindy, who stood on the other side of the room, telling some evidently hilarious story to a group of people.

  Everyone in Lindy’s circle had their heads tilted back in laughter except Allie, who stood obediently beside her mother, one of Lindy’s hands on her shoulder. Allie looked uncertain, and Char couldn’t tell if the girl was planning her escape or hoping her mother would pull her closer. She wondered if Allie even knew.

  “About fifteen minutes ago,” Char told Colleen. “Flight delay. She missed her connection to Lansing so she had to get a cab from Detroit. Sounds like it was a bit of a nightmare. Roads are terrible—”

  “It could be a sunny day in July and Lindy would make it sound like a nightmare coming back here,” Colleen said.

  “Be nice,” Char said. As she spoke, Lindy touched a finger to the top of Allie’s shoulders, and her daughter, in response, stood straighter and taller. Lindy inclined her chin and retracted her hand.

  “And that outfit,” Colleen said. Lindy’s hemline was six inches higher than that of any other woman over twenty, and while the rest of the female guests of a certain age wore dark leggings, Lindy’s long, tanned legs were bare. “She might as well get a tattoo that says, ‘I don’t live here anymore.’ I’m sure they could inject the ink at the same time as the Botox. Did I ever tell you about the time she came back wearing a fur? In August?”

  Char pinched Colleen lightly on the arm. “Stop. Her dress is black. You’ve got to give her props for that.”

  Until then, every time Char had seen Lindy, whether in the flesh or in a photograph, the woman had been wearing head-to-toe pink. It was her signature color. “You have to be your own brand,” Lindy liked to say. “Pink is the color of love.” She owned a wedding-planning business in Hollywood. Love by Lindy: You say yes, we do the rest.

  “Fine,” Colleen said. “I’ll play your High Road game for, um, how long is she staying?”

  “Until Wednesday.”

  “God. Five days? I’ll need a few breaks.”

  “I think it’s great that she’s up here for that long, for Allie,” Char said. She pulled Colleen’s arm until her friend turned toward her. “Isn’t it great that she’s up here for that long, for Allie?”

  Colleen looked at the ceiling.

  “Colleen,” Char said.

  “You’re conveniently ignoring the fact that there’s a ‘down there’ from which she had to travel in order to see her own daughter.”

  “Colleen.”

  “Fine. It’s great that she’s up here for Allie.”

  “Good girl.” Char pointed to the refreshment table. “You may have a cookie.”

  “If there are any left,” Will said. He motioned to a young girl running toward them from the other side of the social hall, gripping several cookies in each hand.

  “CC!” the girl cried in the raspy voice Char loved, using the nickname Allie had come up with for her stepmom years ago and still brought out in times of affection. It had started out as “CharChar,” but at some point, Allie had decided that was too juvenile and shortened it to a “cooler” version.

  “Morgan!” Char bent down, opened her arms, and caught the ten-year-old, teetering back with the force. “It’s Morgan Crew,” she told Will, looking up at him. “You know, the one from Allie’s Monday-afternoon thing.” She turned back to the child. “I had no idea you were here! You must have snuck in while I wasn’t looking. Allie will be so thrilled—”

  She looked over the girl’s head to see if Allie had noticed her. Of course she had—everyone in Lindy’s circle had turned at the noise as the child ran past, shouting to Char. As the adults went back to their conversation, Allie stole away, snuck up behind Morgan, and tapped her on the shoulder. “This is a stickup. Give me all your cookies.”

  “Allie!” Morgan spun around, throwing her arms around the teenager with twice the enthusiasm she had used with Char.

  Over the girls’ heads, Char saw Dave Crew, Morgan’s father, approaching, clad in coat, hat, and gloves. At his side, Morgan’s four-year-old brother, Stevie, also bundled for the outside, jogged to keep up. Following behind, Morgan’s mother, Sarah, pushed one hand through the sleeve of her own coat while the other held her daughter’s.

  “Hello!” Char said, looking at each of the Crews in turn. “I was just telling Morgan that I had no idea you had come!”

  “Of course we did,” Sarah said as she stepped closer. “Your family is important to ours.”

  Dave smiled in agreement as he planted a hand on his son’s head. The boy was trying to leave his father’s side to join the girls, who were now huddled together, arms around each other, whispering. “Let them do their thing,” Dave told his son, who pulled once to try to get loose before giving up.

  “It’s nice to see you, Stevie,” Char said, trying to make standing with the adults somewhat bearable for him. She extended a hand, palm toward him, and he reached up to high-five her, slapping her hand with too much exuberance, as he always did. Char gasped, as she always did, and pretended to inspect her hand for broken bones.

  Stevie laughed with delight. Any interaction that didn’t require words was a welcome one for him, as was any that he could predict and repeat. Morgan had explained this solemnly to Char when they met in early September at the tutoring program that brought the two girls together. When Char later came up with the high-five/broken-hand routine, Morgan had clapped soundlessly and mouthed, “Thank you!” over her brother’s head.

  “Thank you for coming,” Char said to the boy.

  “At!” Stevie responded, his eyes bright behind his thick glasses, one hand gesturing at the table near the door, or possibly at nothing.

  Char smiled encouragingly and waited for him to say more, but Stevie had evidently conveyed his message and was regarding her as though he expected a
response.

  “At . . . church?” Char tried. He nodded, and Char didn’t know if it was because she had correctly guessed the ending to his sentence, or because he didn’t feel like trying again. This was always the way she felt when talking to the four-year-old. She wondered how many of his messages were incorrectly interpreted over the course of a day.

  “Yes, you are at church,” Char said, choosing the easy way out. She promised herself she would try harder the next time she saw him in the waiting room at tutoring, and turned from the boy to his parents. “It was very thoughtful of you to come, and really above and beyond.”

  “Oh, no,” Sarah said. “It wasn’t at all. After everything Allie has done for Morgan, it’s really the least we could do.” The tutoring program matched high-achieving high schoolers with underperforming elementary school students and met every Monday after school for two hours. Some of the tutoring pairs had moved to an every-other-week schedule, some had disbanded altogether, and, as with any school activity, there had been a number of absences in any given week. Morgan and Allie hadn’t missed a single session in five months.

  Char regarded the hugging, whispering pair. From the back, they could be sisters, with the same straight, straw-colored hair, now almost the same length after Morgan had spent the past few months growing hers so it would hang below her shoulders, like Allie’s. From any other angle, there wasn’t quite the resemblance. Morgan was paler than Allie, and she had ten freckles for each one of the older girl’s.

  But most noticeably, Allie was tall for her age, with long, lean, muscular limbs, while Morgan was short, her protruding belly making her seem far younger than her ten years. The little-girl body made her hoarse voice—her “pack-a-day rasp,” Bradley had called it—that much more unexpected.

  “No! Way!” Char heard Allie say as Morgan nodded her head emphatically. “Oh, Morgan,” the teenager said, tousling the younger girl’s hair. “I never know if I should believe you or not. You tell the craziest stories.” She ran a hand over the top of Morgan’s head again and laughed.

  Char turned back to Sarah. “I don’t think you owe Allie any more than she’s already getting. It seems like a pretty reciprocal relationship to me.”

  “They are a pair,” Sarah said. “Anyway, we felt it was important for Morgan to come and pay her respects. And we wanted to pay ours, too, of course. And to tell you we’re praying for you.” She touched Char’s arm. “‘Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.’” Her husband murmured his agreement.

  “Thank you,” Char told them, wondering if that was the correct way to answer. Sarah had quoted scripture to her in the past and Char had tried a few different responses, but none of them ever seemed right. In this instance, though, “Thank you” seemed like a fairly good choice.

  “I find the Apostles to be such a comfort,” Sarah said. “There are some nice lines in John, too. ‘I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.’”

  Char was debating whether to repeat her thank-you when Dave instructed his wife, sotto voce, that it was time for them to go. Sarah nodded and turned to her daughter, holding out the child’s coat. “Morgan honey, come get your coat on.”

  Morgan, in the middle of an animated story, gave her mother a pained look, and Sarah let her arm fall to her side. “Okay, a little longer.” Her husband turned toward her and Sarah shrugged. “She’s happy, at least.” He started to protest, but she spoke first. “Plus, it’s for Allie more than anything.” But she told her daughter, “Five more minutes and that’s it. Daddy’s concerned about the roads.”

  Before either her daughter or her husband could object further, Sarah turned her gaze away from both of them. She smoothed nonexistent wrinkles from the front of her coat and picked two minuscule pieces of lint from her sleeves. She tied and retied her scarf until she seemed satisfied with the knot, and, finally, she pulled a pair of coordinating gloves from her purse, inspecting each before she put them on. Char had seen Sarah every week since early September, and not once had the woman failed to be immaculately put together.

  Dave shifted from foot to foot and ran a finger inside the collar of his shirt, pulling the fabric away from his neck. The Crews didn’t dress formally for church, Sarah had told Char before, and Dave was a mechanic, used to wearing roomy jumpsuits over broken-in jeans and a T-shirt. Char guessed that the suit he wore today was the only one he owned, and that it came out of the closet only for weddings and funerals.

  “So,” Dave said, “Allie sure has grown up since I saw her last.” He had attended the tutoring program’s Orientation Night at the start of the school year, as had Bradley, but since then, it was Sarah and Char—and Stevie—who had waited together outside the tutoring room each week. “Almost sixteen, Morgan tells us. Getting her license soon. June, I think Morgan said? That’s a big step, huh?”

  Char blanched. “I . . .” she stammered, but she was at a loss. She had forgotten. Not Allie’s birthday, but the fact that Char might not be part of it.

  She, Bradley, and Allie had talked about this birthday more than any of the other five that Char had been involved in. Allie was going to sign up for the first driving test slot of the day, and after she passed, the three of them were going to go out for brunch. They had discussed it only a week ago, in fact. Allie brought her laptop into the living room, where Char and Bradley were cuddled on the couch, watching a movie. Allie held out her computer, letting them see the No schedule currently available message on the driving school’s website.

  “How do they expect to run a business, with this lack of planning?” Allie asked, pointing to the screen.

  “It’s five months away, Allie,” Bradley said. “Most kids your age don’t plan past the next week. They’ll probably put it up around April or May.”

  “Well, Stanley’s let me make a brunch reservation for that day.”

  “You’ve already made a reservation for your birthday brunch?” he asked.

  Her expression answered the question, and Bradley laughed. “Hand me that laptop. I’m going to schedule the golf club garden room for your graduation party in two and a half years. Maybe while I’m on their website, I’ll book your rehearsal dinner. The year 2030 sounds good to me.” Nudging Char, he asked, “You free then?”

  Allie, who had turned over the computer, snatched it back. “Ha. Ha. Ha. Way to make fun of your kid for being ultraorganized, Father of the Year. Next, you’ll be saying my GPA’s too high. ‘Slack off, kid,’” she said, in a bad imitation of Bradley. “‘Study less, smoke and drink more.’”

  “Nothing above eighty proof,” he said, a finger in the air. “And filtered cigarettes only. I’m still your father—I have to set limits.”

  “Maybe you won’t be invited to my birthday brunch,” Allie said in faux annoyance as she left the room. “CC and I can have a girls’ date.”

  Char swatted Bradley, who was still laughing. “I really do love the initiative,” he called after his daughter.

  Char felt her eyes fill at the memory. This wasn’t one they had talked about over the past few days, and the shock of it caught her off guard. She brushed away a tear, and Will put a hand on her shoulder.

  Dave looked from the wet-eyed widow to her brother. “Oh, I’m sorry. I seem to have said the wrong thing.”

  Will squeezed his sister’s shoulder and told Dave, “There’s some, uh, question about whether Allie will be here in June, or in California with her mother.”

  “Her mother?” Dave turned to his wife, who widened her eyes at him. “Oh, right,” he said. He aimed a thumb over his shoulder toward Lindy. “We met her earlier, didn’t we? The, um, vibrant one? Linda?”

  Colleen stifled a laugh at the description as Sarah corrected him. “Lindy.”

  “But she lives in Hollywood, doesn’t she?” Dave said. “Or near it, or she works there, or something? And she’s been there all this time, while Allie’s been li
ving here, with you? It sounded like that was the permanent arrangement. So, I assumed—”

  “It was,” Char said. “But it’s not so simple now. I’m her stepmom.” She considered that statement, and amended it. “Was. I was her stepmom. My only connection to her was through my marriage to her father. Without him, I don’t have . . .” She stopped herself from saying “anything.” It seemed melodramatic. But there wasn’t a more accurate ending to her sentence, so she let it trail into nothing.

  She had asked Bradley about it once, whether he would like her to legally adopt Allie. He told her it wasn’t an option unless his ex-wife officially relinquished her parental rights, and she would never do that. Being an absentee mother was one thing—Lindy could justify it by claiming that the combination of her career and the best interests of her daughter meant she should be on the coast and Allie should be in the wholesome Midwest. But officially giving up her rights to her daughter? That would be an admission of something Lindy could never bring herself to confess out loud.

  Char hadn’t pushed at the time. There hadn’t been a reason to. What did it matter if she was Allie’s legal parent, rather than a mere stepparent? It was a technicality, nothing more. Char was part of the girl’s life. Wasn’t that what counted?

  Of course it was.

  As long as Bradley remained alive.

  Standing in the social hall, Char touched two fingers to the corner of each eye and turned to look at the willowy girl who giggled with Morgan as they played some kind of clapping game. The girl who had never, technically, become her daughter, and who was now, technically, no longer even her stepdaughter. Char’s fingers weren’t enough to stem the tears, and she had stupidly thrown out the tissue her brother had given her earlier. She reached behind her, to Colleen, and an instant later felt a new tissue being pressed into her hand. She held it against one eye, then the other, and told herself to get it together before Allie noticed.