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VI
Jason Smith,” Sari said, as soon as she had greeted Lucy. She had found her in the back of the store, where the wall was lined with diamond-shaped cubbyholes filled with different-colored balls of yarns. Skeins of wool were also piled up in wooden general store bins. Yarn stores usually gave Sari the same feeling that candy stores did when she was little-there was the same rainbow of choices spread out before her and the same anticipation made both wonderful and tense by the knowledge that all these choices had to be eventually narrowed down to a selection. Tonight, though, she barely glanced at the colors around her. “What do you remember about him?”
“Jason Smith?” Lucy repeated. She ran her fingers lightly along a row of blue wool skeins. “Too rough. I want it really soft… You mean Jason Smith from high school? Man, I haven't thought of him in years.”
“I know. Me neither. What do you remember?” Lucy thought for a moment as she slid along the wall, fingering more yarn. “Good-looking asshole.”
“How big an asshole?”
She plucked out a ball of wool and studied it thoughtfully. “Big. I think. But he kind of had a right to be because he was so hot.”
“Debatable,” Sari said. She leaned back against the cubbies and folded her arms. “He was one of the guys who tortured Charlie, wasn't he?”
“A lot of people did that,” Lucy said, tossing the skein back and picking up another one.
“I know,” Sari said. “But I think Jason Smith was one of the worst ones.”
“Maybe. I don't remember. What I do remember is he was always being followed around by a bunch of girls, because he was good-looking and a jock. Why'd you bring him up, anyway?”
“He brought his kid into the clinic today for treatment.”
“No way!” Lucy raised the yarn she was holding up to the light. “Pretty, don't you think?” She lowered her hand. “So Jason Smith has a kid with autism?”
“Yeah. And, by the way, I could probably get fired just for telling you that, so keep it between us.”
“He's not old enough to have a kid with autism, is he? How old is the kid?”
“Three.”
“Babies having babies,” Lucy said with a shake of her head. She searched through the bin of wool that matched the color she had picked out. “Do you think there are fifteen balls in here? I need fifteen.”
“Don't forget to check the dye lots.”
“Oh, right.”
“You know,” Sari said, watching her sort through the yarn, “we keep doing that. You, me, and Kathleen.”
“What? Forget to check the dye lots?”
“No-I mean, we keep acting like no one our age could possibly have kids. We even act surprised when people we know get married. But we're not that young anymore. People our age get married and have kids all the time. People a lot younger than us do. At some point, we've got to accept the fact that we're not college students anymore and haven't been for a while.”
“I’ve accepted it,” Lucy said, making a pile of the yarn on top of a chair. “I don't like it, but I’ve accepted it. Okay, that's nine, ten, eleven-”
“It's just…” Sari stopped and stared at the growing pyramid. Then she said, “It was really weird seeing this guy. Last time I saw him was probably high school graduation. And here he comes in with a kid and he's a parent like all the other parents I see every day. It was weird. Like he had become a grown-up but I hadn't.”
Lucy stopped counting and looked at her. “What are you talking about? You were the professional in the room, and all be did to be there was blow some sperm. Any fifteen-year-old can get a girl pregnant.”
“I’m not really a professional,” Sari said. “It'll be years till I get my license and can practice in my own right.”
“Doesn't matter. You were still the expert.” She turned back to the yarn and counted it again with little pecks of her index finger. “Twelve, thirteen… Shoot, I don't think there's quite enough.”
“What are you making, anyway?”
“A sweater.”
“For yourself?”
“For James, actually.”
“Wow,” Sari said. “That sounds serious.”
“It's just a sweater,” Lucy said.
“Yeah, right. Just hours and hours and hours of work. Hours and hours and hours.”
“I know,” Lucy said. “That's okay. I like knitting.”
“Still, knitting for a guy means you think it's going to last. I wish I knew James better-we've only ever met in passing.”
“We should all have di
“I don't know,” Sari said. “I’d have to cancel my date with this hot guy I’ve been seeing who gets really jealous when I go out without him. Have I mentioned that he's imaginary?”
“The problem is your job,” Lucy said. She scooped up the whole pile of yarn and dropped it back in its bin. “Every guy you meet at work is married.”
“Or on the spectrum. Hey, I like that green.” Sari picked up a skein and showed her. “Don't you think that would look nice on James?”
“Yeah, I do. Help me check the dye lots.” They started to search through the barrel of yarn. Then Lucy stopped. “Oh, wait-I just remembered something else about Jason Smith.”
“I’m counting D-44s. What?”
“He slept with Portia Grossman.”
Sari looked up. “Shut up! She was our class valedictorian.”
Lucy nodded. “He did. I’m sure of it. I remember her strutting around, telling her friends during homeroom. They were all so jealous, I was jealous.”
“You just said he was an asshole.”
“I said he was a good-looking asshole. There's no one hotter in the whole world than that, Sari.”
“Not to me. There are only twelve D-44s, Luce.”
“I think there are enough D-47s. See if you can find one more in there.” Lucy watched as Sari rooted through the bin. “There's just a vibe about bad boys, Sari. Like they could get a little angry, a little dangerous, and in bed that would be-”
“Jason Smith tortured my brother,” Sari said. “I could never be attracted to him.”
“Yeah, all right,” Lucy said.
The total for the yarn came to two hundred and fifty dollars. Lucy sighed and paid it.
Sari lay in bed that night feeling lonely. Kathleen had moved into her new place that afternoon, which was a good thing-she took up a lot of space, both because she was so tall and because she was… well, Kathleen. She had, for example, woken Sari up at four the previous morning because she thought it would be “fun” to bake cookies and talk, and Sari, who had to be up at seven to go to work, cursed at her and pulled a pillow over her own head so she could go back to sleep.
But tonight she could have used Kathleen's company.
For the first few years of her life, Sari had shared a room with Charlie, because the house had only three bedrooms and Cassie had thrown a fit when they tried moving newborn baby Sari in with her. Even at the age of five, Cassie was spending a lot of time alone in her room with the door shut-presumably living out a fantasy life that improved on her real one-and she wasn't about to give up her privacy without a fight. So Sari's crib was set up in Charlie's room, which he accepted without question. He accepted everything without question. Possibly because he didn't have the language then to ask a question. But also because he was, by nature, passive and accommodating.
When Sari turned five, they moved to a bigger house, and she got her own room. She was thrilled-no more worrying that Charlie would suddenly decide to empty everything off the shelves or methodically pull every hair out of her dolls’ heads as he occasionally had done in the room they shared.
But for years after that, if she woke up during the night because of a bad dream or because she heard a strange noise or because it was raining out-for any reason at all-the loneliness of her own room would become unbearable. She would slip out of her bed and dash across the hallway to Charlie's room. Before she had even reached the threshold, she could hear his snoring-he was already growing fat and had always had allergies, and the combination made him a noisy sleeper.