“Anyway, they were beautiful,” she said.
“Yeah, beautiful and dumb,” Phil teased. “And goldfish are even worse. They don’t have the brains to know their own mother, Terr.”
She didn’t know what touched her off. Maybe she was tired and didn’t want to be teased. Maybe thinking about school starting soon was getting to her. She was going into junior high—a definite difference from elementary school. Or, maybe it was none of those things. She didn’t get mad too often at her father. But suddenly she shouted at him. “You always want things your own way. You don’t want me to buy goldfish because it’s my idea!”
Hearing her, Barkley whined in a squeaky voice, as if he were a toy poodle instead of a big mutt.
“Barkley, quit that whining,” her father said. “What’s the matter, Terr?” He looked absolutely amazed.
“Nothing!” How could she tell him when she didn’t know herself? “I’m going for a walk!” She had learned this from him. There were moments when he, too, had to “go for a walk,” and by himself. She went up to the field and sat in the grass, and then lay down and watched clouds. She became calmer and felt as if someone were saying to her, It’ll be all right, Terri.
When she came back her father was outside fixing a window on the camper. “See anything interesting?”
“Man on a pink horse,” she said, still a little snappy.
“Did you see the sky?” He pointed. The sun was setting, huge, fiery red, with a band of pure green just above it. A strange sunset.
“It’s a sun show,” Phil said. “The greatest art on earth! Did you ever see anything like that?”
“Only about a thousand times.”
He rolled his eyes. “Thirteen, and already a full-fledged skeptic.” He put his arm around her waist. “You go ahead, get those goldfish—”
“No, I don’t want them.”
“A couple goldfish would be nice. They’d swim round and round all day, round and round and round and—”
“All right, all right.” She had to laugh.
A few days later, while she was fixing lunch, the phone rang. She was surprised. It had been installed only the day before. “I bet it’s Daddy,” she said to Barkley, picking up the receiver.
“Hello—Terri?” a woman said. “This is Nancy Briet. Remember me?”
“Sure. Hi, how’d you get our phone number?”
“Your father called me this morning.”
“He did?”
“Oh, sure, we’ve had quite a few nice little conversations these past couple weeks.” That was news to Terri. “Listen, I want you two to come to dinner. I promised, remember!”
“How’s Leif?” Terri said.
“Oh, super! I’m getting him enrolled in day care for the fall when I go back to school. Oh, boy, am I scared about that!” She gave a big laugh. “Listen, your father said check with you on a good day for dinner. How about Friday night?”
“Okay,” Terri said.
“Come hungry. I’m going to cook up a storm.”
The Friday dinner went so well that on Sunday, Phil, Terri, Nancy, and Leif all drove out to a county park for a picnic. While Phil and Terri worked on the fire, Nancy played with Leif. “My leafy Leif, my little tree.”
“Not a tree.”
“Oh, excuse me! You’re a branch.”
“Not a branch!”
“A twig?”
“No!”
She picked him up and held his face to hers. “I know, you’re just my Leif.”
“You look like Madonna and Child,” Phil said.
“We do?” Nancy looked pleased.
“Madonna in blue jeans,” Terri said, “and Child with mud on his nose.”
“Oh, Terri, you know how to help a woman keep her feet on the ground,” Nancy said. Later she was surprised to find out Terri’s age. “I thought sure, fourteen or fifteen.”
“What’s the difference?” Phil said.
“Oh, a lot, Phil. A year at that age—? A lot.”
“You only thought I was older because I’m tall,” Terri said. She was almost always the tallest girl in her class.
“No, that isn’t really it.” Nancy turned to Phil. “There’s something about your daughter—I would call her very poised. She knows how to be around grown-ups, don’t you agree?”
Terri wished they’d drop the subject. Maybe she appeared poised to Nancy, but what she felt was embarrassed to be talked about in that confidential way, as if she weren’t present.
“Let me tell you,” Nancy said, “I’ve had girls Terri’s age babysitting Leif, and oh boy, they can be real little pains. Just so self-absorbed.”
“Want to play, Leif?” Terri turned her back, but of course she could still hear Nancy and her father.
“That’s a very, very nice kid you’ve got there, Mr. Mueller.”
“I like her.”
“Well, I do, too!” Nancy said, but from the way she had been looking at Phil, Terri thought it was him she really liked. He did look very handsome and full of fun that day in Levi’s, sneakers, and a Mickey Mouse tee shirt that said, Don’t Mouse With Me.
At first, Terri wasn’t sure how much she liked Nancy. Nancy talked fast and loud and sometimes swooped Leif up into her arms as if he were a pillow or a stuffed toy, holding him around the waist, his legs dangling. Leif didn’t seem to mind, laughing and pounding on his mother until she noticed and straightened him up.
Again on the following Friday, the four of them ate supper together at Nancy’s place. Phil brought a bottle of wine and Nancy had a fire going in the fireplace, although it was a warm evening. Nancy and her father got into an argument later—not much of one, but Nancy didn’t back down. “I don’t understand the way you two live,” she said. “So you have a bed and a couch and two spoons and three plates. Don’t you want things?”
“We have each other,” Phil said.
“That’s all very nice. I have Leif and he has me. I still feel the need for my own stuff—you know, it gives you a sense of home, no matter where you are. Don’t you think so, Terri?”
“I like the way we live,” she said. Did Nancy think she wouldn’t defend her father? She wouldn’t have said for the world that Nancy’s argument had touched something in her, some longing that wasn’t satisfied.
Nancy went on arguing and Terri said she’d read Leif a story and put him to sleep. But he wanted to play jumping games. “Okay, we’ll play Hot Lava,” she said, making it up as she went along. The whole game was this: Leif perched on his bureau, arms outstretched. Terri cried, “Hot Lava! Hot Lava all around, Leif! Leap for your life!” Then he jumped, she caught him, they hugged and kissed, he was safe, and they started all over again.
She turned around to see Nancy standing in the doorway watching. “I can see him in twenty years. He’ll be walking up the aisle with his bride and whispering in her ear, ‘Hey, I know this neat game.’”
“One more,” Leif said. Terri put him up on the bureau.
Funny, but she liked the game almost as much as he did. There was something so satisfying in catching him, feeling his arms go around