Proper Care and Maintenance of Friendship (9781609417291) Read online

  “Geez, Sarah. Where the heck did this come from?”

  The memory struck Sarah like a fist.

  Rachel sprawled against a mud wall in Burundi, blowing a smoke ring in the blue light of the moon.

  For a girl elbow-deep in all the world’s muck, Sarah, when it comes to love you waste a lot of time chasing rainbows.

  Rachel, when you’ve spent three hours digging shrapnel out of the leg of an eight-year-old, then we’ll talk, okay? Until then, let me keep my hot, handsome rainbow.

  Kiddo, there’s this thing about rainbows. They’re perfect from afar. But when you get real close to them they just disappear.

  “It came from Rachel.” Sarah turned her face away, toward the patients still milling on the road, and toward a slow-dawning realization about her own impossible expectations of one particular man. “When she visited me in Burundi, she had a lot to say about rainbows.”

  “Sarah-belle.” Kate wrapped her hands around Sarah’s arm and pressed her cheek against her shoulder. “For what it’s worth, I think you might be the most incredible woman I know.”

  Kate and Sarah were still sitting like that sometime later, when the back door to the clinic squealed open.

  Colin poked his head around the edge. “There you two are. I’ve been looking for you. We’re just finishing up.” He squinted through the trees. “We need to pack up. If we don’t get on the road soon, we won’t reach Bangalore by dark.”

  Sarah gently shifted Kate off her shoulder. “That last boy, is he out of surgery?”

  “They’re closing him up now.” Colin’s shirt, once pressed and pristine, now hung limply from his broad shoulders. Sweat stained the collar. He walked toward them, unrolling the sleeves, buttoning them around his strong-boned wrists. “Incredibly complicated case. We had to balance the muscle forces on the lip and nose without repositioning the nasal septum. Kid’s going to need a rhinoplasty in a few years, but at least he won’t be aspirating milk into his lungs anymore.” He shook his head. “Don’t see many cases like that in L.A. You know, Sarah, you were absolutely incredible in there. I never understood why you didn’t study to be a doctor.”

  “Not her calling.” Kate pushed herself to her feet. “I’ll go help Sam pack.” Kate ran her hands down her wrinkled suit and gave Sarah a meaningful look that said, I’ll leave you two alone.

  Not that it mattered, Sarah thought. With his hair tousled, sweat gleaming on his forehead, and his face bright with excitement, Colin looked, more than ever, like the young man she’d loved in Paraguay. But even as her heart moved in that familiar, painful way, she told herself to stop. Now, as he had all day, he’d fixed his professional expression tight on his face, the one she’d come to dread. Despite his bright, affable voice and plenty of harmless talk, his eyes warned, Stay back.

  Colin gestured to Kate with his thumb as she slipped inside the clinic. “Is she all right? She looks wrung out.”

  “It’s complicated. It has to do with another of Rachel’s letters.”

  “Ah.”

  Down came the wall. The subject of Rachel’s letters was rife with treacherous emotional currents—involving him, and her, and this strange, tense relationship—and, as usual, Colin avoided, quite deftly, swimming in those waters.

  Sarah plunged on. “Kate’s going to change her flight plans when we get back to the hotel. She wants to leave Bangalore as soon as possible—even as early as tomorrow morning.” Her throat tightened, but the words came out before she could stop them. “Colin, I’m going to leave with her.”

  She lifted her chin and faced him. She tried to modulate her heartbeat and the rate of her breathing. She had to leave. They couldn’t go on like this. She couldn’t go on like this.

  Physically, she wanted him. Even now, she couldn’t help noticing how light dappled his skin and cast in shadow the vale by his sturdy collarbone. The collarbone she’d bitten last night, just before he’d seized her hips to stop her from doing what they both wanted.

  But emotionally, they were still continents apart.

  He took a few steps back, then thrust his hands in his pockets. He swiveled away and found interest in the jungle canopy, rustling in the breeze above their heads.

  She hadn’t expected him to protest. Nor had she expected him to plead with her to stay. But as the silence stretched, disappointment came anyway. She swayed slightly where she stood. She’d known since she’d received Rachel’s letter that this day would come. She’d imagined the scenario in a dozen different ways. But no imagining could brace her against the sudden unhinging, and the deepening sense of vertigo.

  “Ah, Sarah.” He’d lost the affable voice. “I haven’t been much of a superhero this time around.”

  “You were a superhero today, to the kid whose face you just reconfigured.” She credited the huskiness of her voice to the lingering effect of the clove cigarette. “And you were a superhero to those medical students who hardly breathed while you taught. You’re still the best surgeon I’ve ever seen.”

  That wasn’t the absolute truth. Dr. Mwami in Burundi could work miracles under the light of a flashlight, with gunfire in the distance. But it was different. Sometime during his years away, Colin had developed a skill so specific and so fine-tuned that it was a sort of magic.

  “I’m not talking about work.” He crossed his arms and glanced around, taking in the dirt road, the rough plaster of the clinic, the shivering greenery of the jungle—anything but her, standing still in the shade. “I intended to handle this better. Every morning I told myself I’d be straight with you. But then you’d look at me with that wonderful expression on your face. You seduced me with that look, Sarah. Back in Paraguay. And here.” He shrugged, then shoved his fists in his pockets. “What can I say? I let myself be seduced by my exotic, adoring nurse.”

  Exotic? With her pale, freckled skin and mouse-brown hair, she considered herself perfectly ordinary. Certainly not an instrument of seduction. Overseas, she always felt like plain vanilla next to rocky road or marble swirl or butter pecan or almond mocha.

  Or rich, dark chocolate.

  “Tell me, my Vermont-bred minister’s daughter,” he said, tracing a pattern in the dirt with his foot, “what kind of sin is it, to want to be the man you think I am?”

  She shook her head, uncomprehending.

  “Is it vanity? Or is it pride?”

  “It isn’t a sin to want to be a good man.”

  “That’s the real reason I didn’t come back to Paraguay. I’d made choices you wouldn’t approve of. If I had come back, you would have been disillusioned completely. It’s pretty hard to keep the cape on, Sarah-belle. It weighs a ton. Rather than destroy what we had… it was easier to just put your memory away.”

  On a shelf, she thought, flinching. Labeled “Passionate Affair in the South American Jungle.”

  “And now, of all times, now, when I’m halfway around the world; when back home I’m starting a new business, and my entire life is in flux—”

  And, Sarah added silently for him, you’re about to marry another woman, by the name of Victoria Lee, the toast of southern-California society.

  “—and here you appear. Out of nowhere. Reminding me of the life I once had, and the better man I used to be.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself.” It was true. Colin still could work magic on the operating table. He still gave his time to international relief. He still hated petty annoyances like broken equipment, rickety cars, or ignored schedules. He still counted strokes when he brushed his teeth. And he still had the terrible habit of ignoring—and avoiding for as long as he could—an uncomfortable emotional situation. She didn’t think any less of him for these all-so-human faults. “Honestly, Colin, you haven’t changed a bit since Paraguay.”

  “Oh, I have.” He pulled a strange smile. “Superheroes don’t lie, Sarah. And they certainly don’t cheat on a fiancée.”

  And there it was, acknowledged. The engagement that had been announced at such length in the Los Angel
es Times. He and his fiancée had registered for silver and crystal at Tiffany’s. Sarah had considered saying good-bye to Colin by sending him a gravy boat from their china pattern, but the piece cost more than four months of rice for the camp.

  Which is worse, Sarah-belle, me kissing a married woman, or you banging an engaged man?

  Sarah shook the dust from her skirt. “I should go.” Permanently. Crawl back to the States and find a way to forgive herself for tempting a man away from his promise to another woman. “Sam may need help with the equipment—”

  “Don’t go.”

  Suddenly he stood before her. He reached out and cupped her tangled mop of hair in his palm.

  “Colin, don’t.”

  She curled a hand around his wrist. It was a strong wrist, a surgeon’s skillful hand. His touch made her ashamed of herself and oddly disappointed in him. She didn’t want him to kiss her. Not now. Not anymore. Something had shifted in her heart, something fundamental. The change was still too fresh to bear examining. Jo would understand, if she were here. Jo would handle this just the right way. Jo would say her good-bye and kiss him off and walk away, letting the velvet chains of commitment fall into the dirt behind her.

  All Sarah knew was honesty. “It was wrong of me to chase you down like this, Colin, when I knew your heart was committed elsewhere.”

  “You wanted to find me.” He tugged gently on her hair. “I know you did.”

  “Had Rachel not sent me that deathbed letter, I would have kept your memory on the shelf, too.”

  Pristine. Perfect. And forever unchallenged.

  That would have hurt a whole lot less.

  “Maybe.” His gaze drifted to her throat. “But in your heart, you wanted to find me.”

  “And I’m glad I did.” That was a platitude, but she let it stand. She didn’t know how she felt right now, with Colin more intense than he’d been all week, more open and intimate than she wanted him to be. “But it’s time for me to leave. What I really want—the only thing I should have ever expected from you in the first place—is a proper good-bye.”

  The amber rings around his pupils contracted. “You don’t mean that. We made love.”

  “Yes,” she said, damning her voice for breaking. “We did. It was sweet, but it was wrong.”

  “No. No.” He shook his head, working up the words. “It was not wrong.”

  “Colin—”

  “I’m not ready, Sarah Pollard.” He stepped in to her. “Damn me for a fool, but I’m not ready to let you go.”

  chapter thirteen

  “Kate!” Jo fumbled with her phone and then struggled up off the couch. She tossed the cashmere throw over Grace, who lay rapt, watching the animated movie Cinderella. “Sugar, are you finally home?”

  “I wish I were.” The connection crackled. “I’m calling from Bangalore. At about six trillion bucks a minute.”

  “Stay on the line. I’ll pay you for the charges—just don’t hang up!”

  “Hanging up is Paul’s job. He’s done it to me twice today. I’m counting on you to tell me if my children are still alive.”

  “Last time I called your house, they were just fine.” Jo raced to the pile of papers spread across her kitchen table, searching for a particular yellow pad. “Tell me you’re drinking yourself blind and belly-dancing in hotel lobbies.”

  “Jo, it’s India, not a Bollywood movie, and I haven’t seen a single one of those stars with the great hair and the unpronounceable names.” She paused. “There is a hot black Brit, though. A friend of Sarah’s.”

  Jo started, remembering Paul’s crazy suspicions from their last phone conversation. “Kate, you know I’m all for the easy loving—but you’re very married.”

  “I know. Yes. I am still married.”

  Jo paused, hearing the fear in Kate’s voice. The last time Jo had spoken to Paul, asking him about—of all things—macaroni and cheese, there had been such a furious, unrelenting undertone to his narrative that she’d given up trying to convince him Kate hadn’t lost her mind.

  “Sugar, if you’re wearing the ring, you’re still married.” Jo couldn’t imagine any other situation between the two of them. “Now, tell me, did Sarah finally spill?”

  “Yeah. You got Grace.”

  “The surprise behind door number three.” Jo glanced into the living room. All she could see was Gracie’s tousled dark hair against the arm of the sofa. Right now, the mice were struggling to bring the key up the stairs to save Cinderella from missing the ball. No wonder mothers had the TV on all the time. It gave them a moment of peace. “That’s Rachel and her twisted sense of humor.”

  “Any bones broken yet?”

  “Five stitches.”

  “You, or her?”

  “Her. She was sleepwalking, right down my stairs. The psychiatrist says that’s normal for a grieving girl.”

  Across the satellite connection, Jo heard an ominous hiss. Maybe it was just a hitch in the line. “Kate? Are you still there?”

  “First things first,” Kate said. “For the love of God, get her out of the psychiatrist’s clutches.”

  “I—”

  “Look, some kids definitely need them. Maybe Grace will need one, too. But I just think there’s a whole lot you can do before… before the third-person therapy and the drugs.”

  Jo felt a strange settling. Maybe she’d done something right. “I refused the drugs. But she’s still sleepwalking. I’ve got gates everywhere. You know, those baby-gate things? The place looks like a damn kennel.”

  “That may be overkill. But better too much than too little. Is that why you called me?”

  “No. Well… yes.” Jo glanced down at the papers strewn across the table, bloody blue with ink. Phone numbers of nanny services, laundry services, tutoring services, local schools, pediatricians. Books on raising the seven-to-twelve-year-old child. She had her laptop open to every mothering Web site she could find. Not a single one could tell her how to decipher children’s clothing sizes. “I called because…” She braced herself for taking the hit. “I called because I could surely use your help.”

  Jo held her breath. She wouldn’t blame Kate for tearing into her. She expected it. Jo had just handed her a golden opportunity for avenging years of insolent and snarky remarks. Jo’d been remembering each and every one of them: Honey, remember the rules? No talking about husbands or children over wine. Tell me, Kate, is Paul incapable of shuttling a kid to soccer? Sugar, if you want to sacrifice yourself on the altar of motherhood, that’s just fine, but don’t expect me to delay the appetizers because of it.

  But Kate was the only serious at-home mother she knew. Oh, there were women at work, pushed onto the mommy track, but she’d made a point of avoiding them, because they were always so frazzled and overwhelmed. As for her own mother… well, Jo hadn’t been out of her tweens when the car accident happened.

  Through the crackling of the line, Jo heard a muffled sound. Then another. “Get it out of your system, Kate. It’s ridiculous, I know. I’m ridiculous. You should have seen the freaks that showed up for the nanny job. I mean, one of those women walked in without shoes.”

  “Jo—”

  “And just taking care of the hair. The hair! I thought Grace combed it herself. Turns out she doesn’t. Well, that means it hadn’t been combed for about five days! I gave up and went to that salon Bangz—yes, the Bangz, in SoHo—just to pay someone to run a comb through it, without her screaming like I’m murdering her. I got Mario, who has about the same amount of sense as me when it comes to kids. Get this: They gave me my three hundred dollars back just to hustle the kid out of the salon.” Kate was still making strange hiccupping sounds. “I guess Rachel was popping mushrooms on top of some snowy mountain when she made this decision. She probably thought this was a great joke, but I tell you I just think, when it comes to a kid, you’ve got to make a well-thought-out choice, and here she has thrust that choice upon me. If I get through the next week without destroying the poor kid, I’ll kiss yo
ur ass in a window.”

  “Welcome to my world.”

  Something in Kate’s strangled voice made Jo pause. Above the noise of the television and the breaking up of the connection, she listened more closely to the muffled, rhythmic sounds.

  “Geez, Kate. You’re crying.”

  “No, I’m not.” Kate blew her nose. “Well… yes, I am.”

  “Honey, are you drunk?”

  “Hell, I wish I was. I’d go to the bar downstairs and get myself a drink if I didn’t look like someone just wrung me out. I’m not crying because I’m sad. I’m crying because I’m happy. Someone actually needs me.”

  “Girl, what happened to you over there?”

  “Later. It’s a really long story. Let’s take care of Gracie first.” She cleared her throat. Jo envisioned her straightening up on the hotel bed, pulling down her oversized T-shirt, slipping on the reading glasses she didn’t like to admit she needed, and getting down to work. “Now. What do you need?”

  For the next half-hour, Jo scribbled furiously. She wrote lists of medicines she needed to have at hand at all times: cortisone ointment, antibacterial lotion for cuts, Band-Aids of all sizes, a thermometer, liquid acetaminophen, liquid ibuprofen, pectin drops for coughs, and Benadryl and Caladryl lotion for mosquito bites and allergic reactions. Kate asked if Grace took medicine orally, and when Jo hesitated, she horrified her by reminding her that there are always anal suppositories.

  The advice came hard and fast. If a kid doesn’t want to take a bath, promise bubbles or let her go in her bathing suit, and if she doesn’t have one, let her go in her underwear. I mean, really, Kate said, what’s another piece of wet clothing? Since Jo’s tub didn’t have a sprayer, Kate advised buying a special tube that fit over the faucet and ended in a rubber ducky spray. It’d help when she needed to wash Grace’s hair. Combing hair? Do it while she’s watching TV or eating breakfast or otherwise distracted, use a wide-toothed comb, keep it in braids to reduce knotting, and you have to do it every day.