Thursdays at Eight

“You just wait,” Peter told his son. “When you’re forty, you’ll see things very differently.”

Adam gave them an odd grimace, then carried his cup back toward his room. “I’m going online,” he announced as he disappeared down the hallway.

“Where were we?” Peter asked and reached for Julia again.

Chapter Five

CLARE CRAIG

“Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.”

—Erica Jong

“This is so nice,” Liz Kenyon said, sliding into the booth across from Clare in the Victorian Tea Room on Friday afternoon. Clare dredged up a smile, although the year wasn’t beginning well. Barely two weeks into January, and the issues with Michael were once again staring her right in the face.

Clare was pleased—no, she was relieved—to see her friend, even though they’d had breakfast with the others just the day before. There were things she needed to talk about that she wasn’t comfortable saying in front of the whole group. Liz was the person who’d understand. Who might even have some practical advice or at least encouragement.

The restaurant was close to Willow Grove Memorial where Liz worked as administrator, which made it convenient for both of them.

A decisive woman, Liz picked up her menu, looked at it for no more than a minute, then set it aside.

Clare required much longer to make her selection, but only because she found it difficult to concentrate. Her head reeled, and making the simplest choice seemed beyond her at the moment. Spinach salad or a Monte Carlo sandwich? It wasn’t a life-and-death decision but it took more effort than she was able to muster. There didn’t seem to be a dish appropriate for spilling out one’s heart to a friend.

When she finally closed her menu, Clare glanced up to see that Liz was watching her. “Are you okay?” Liz asked quietly.

With anyone else, Clare would have plastered on a phony smile and offered reassurances. She didn’t think she could fool Liz. Nor did she want to.

Just as she was about to explain, the waitress arrived to take their orders, and looked to Liz first.

“I’ll have the seafood sauté salad,” Liz said and handed her the menu.

The woman nodded. “Good choice,” she murmured.

She turned to Clare, but by then neither the spinach salad nor the sandwich sounded appetizing. “I’ll have the same thing.”

“Very good,” the waitress said in the same approving tone she’d used earlier.

Liz waited until the woman was out of earshot. “I thought you didn’t like seafood.”

“I don’t.”

“Then why’d you order the seafood sauté salad?”

Clare wasn’t aware of what she’d ordered; furthermore she didn’t really care. She hadn’t planned this lunch so she could eat. She needed support and advice, not food. “Oh, well,” she muttered.

“Clare, what is it?” Liz studied her, staring hard. “Something to do with Michael, no doubt?”

Clare nodded and chewed at her lower lip. “Alex and Michael have been meeting behind my back,” she said bluntly. “I knew they were talking—Alex admitted as much shortly after the first of the year. Then on Tuesday, Alex said he wouldn’t be home for dinner because he was working late. It was a lie. I phoned the computer store and learned that Alex had left before five.”

“You asked him about it?”

Clare nodded. “He’d gone to dinner with his father. He didn’t mention Miranda, but I suspect she was there, too.” The knot in her stomach tightened at the thought of her son dining with her ex-husband and his live-in lover. The pain never seemed to go away. Whenever Clare felt she was making progress, some new crisis would emerge. Some emotional stumbling block—like this one. She just hadn’t expected it to involve her youngest son.

“It bothers you that Alex is seeing his father?” Liz asked.

“No.” Well, she didn’t really like it, but she was committed to her sons’ right to communicate with their father. In any event, that part wasn’t nearly as troubling as the lie. “I don’t want to stand in the way of the boys having a relationship with Michael. Our differences don’t have anything to do with Mick or Alex.”

“Is that lip service or do you really mean it?” Liz had a way of cutting straight to the heart of the matter.

“I mean it—at least I think I do. Sometimes it’s hard to know. I’m just so angry with Alex.”

“Alex, not Michael?”

“Michael, too, because it seems to me that Alex is imitating his father’s tactics. He didn’t want to admit he was having dinner with Michael, so he did it without telling me.”

“But he did tell you he’d been in contact with his dad.”

That was true enough. “Alex said Michael had phoned him. Well, this is a lot more than a simple phone call. What I object to most is the secrecy. As if my not knowing was somehow supposed to protect me.”

“What did Alex say when you confronted him?”

By the time her son had walked into the house, Clare had been so angry she’d barely been able to speak to him. To his credit, Alex didn’t deny seeing Michael. He calmly told her where he’d gone, then he went to his room, leaving Clare to deal with impotent rage. She was convinced this was Michael’s revenge for her taking the job at Murphy Motors.

“Alex lied to me, and I think Michael encouraged him.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know my ex,” she snapped.

“Clare,” Liz said softly. “I’m on your side, remember?”

“I know…I know. Part of me is relieved that the ice between Alex and Michael is broken. I mean, I realize how difficult our divorce has been on Alex. He was always so close to his father.” She felt herself tense as she thought of the pain her ex-husband had inflicted on their family. Poor Alex had been put in an impossible position. He loved both his parents and yearned to please Michael as well as her. That she could understand, but not the lie. Surely he knew what his dishonesty would do to Clare when she found out.

It wasn’t only his relationship with her that Michael had destroyed. Mick and Alex weren’t getting along, and Michael was the source of that trouble, too. He’d managed to drive a wedge between the two brothers, and Clare feared that was about to happen between Alex and her, too.

“On his way out the door recently, Alex oh-so-casually said that Michael might be attending the soccer games. Now I find out he’ll be there tomorrow afternoon.”

“And you won’t be there if your ex is?”

“Can you blame me?” She scowled. “At least Miranda’s not coming. Alex told me that much, anyway.”

“No, I don’t blame you.” Liz patted her arm. “It’s perfectly understandable,” she said. “I wouldn’t go under those circumstances, either.”

Clare instantly felt better. “What am I supposed to do now?”

“What do you mean?”

Michael had already taken so much from her, and Clare couldn’t tolerate his stealing more. “I enjoy watching Alex play. I’m the one who drove him to and from soccer practice for the last twelve years. I’m the soccer mom who treated the team to ice cream and slumber parties. The other parents are my friends.”