Shy Charlotte’s Brand New Juju (Romantic Comedy) (4 page)

“I don’t think that’s true.”

“Yeah. It is. For example…when was the last time you left
your house, on a vacation?”

“I don’t know. It’s been a while, but…We’re here, aren’t
we?”

“I know. But this is a little different. This isn’t a
vacation. This is a time away for you to better yourself.”

“It is?”

“Yes.” Fiona looked at the ceiling and sighed. “It’s been at
least fifteen years, Charlotte. Gracie says you guys have
never
done it.
Never taken a vacation that didn’t involve visiting a relative. She just told
me this at breakfast.”

“It’s just not true.” Charlotte tried to think about it. She
and Caleb had planned to do all kinds of things once they got on their feet. It
had just taken longer than expected.

“It just…seems like you are letting life pass you by. And I
remember….growing up….if we had let you, you would have spent your entire
summer in the studio painting freakin’ trees or reading your freakin’ books.”

“Painting trees is doing something. Reading books is doing
something.”  

“No, you have to
move
to do something.”

“No you don’t.”

“See? You have no idea how frustrating it was to grow up with
you. Mom and Dad were always banging their heads against a wall to get you to
have fun. To
do
stuff.”

“I was valedictorian. I was president of the Honor Society.
I earned a full ride academic scholarship and graduated
summa cum laude
with Phi Beta Kappa honors.”

“That’s because all you did was study.”

“Oh right. And you have to move to be doing something. So
studying doesn’t count. Earning accolades doesn’t count.”

“Precisely. Because, look around you, Charlotte. It got you
nowhere. And you didn’t even get to have any fun.”

Charlotte’s memory flashed to the parties their mom and dad were
always hosting. All the commotion and the music and the crystal tumblers
half-filled with single malt. They were ever telling Charlotte to lighten up, to
throw caution to the wind, to have more fun. And sometimes Charlotte would hide
in her bedroom closet with a flashlight, a pair of socks tied around her head
so she could hear herself think. All of those people, always in her house— they
wore her out. But Fiona could generally be found smack in the center of the
crowd, perhaps standing on a table, singing or twirling.

It had been five years since Mom and Dad packed up and moved
to their ancestral homeland, to Glasgow. Charlotte and Fiona had both promised
to visit, but they hadn’t yet. What would her mother and father think of this
pact…this promise of transformation? She could almost smell her mum’s whisky-soaked
breath, could almost see her punching her tumbler into the air and shouting
“Aye, Charlotte! Aye!”

Charlotte missed her, suddenly, and her tone softened. “Look,
I know you want to help.” She put a hand on Fiona’s back. “And I thank you for
all your work and for all your…feedback. But I need to do this myself. I can
get my juju back…or whatever you said…but I need to do it on my own terms.”

Fiona turned away and blinked. She opened her mouth to say
something. Then closed it again.

“You can understand that, right, Fiona?”

Fiona stood. She hadn’t dressed yet, but her silky emerald nightgown
made her eyes a brilliant, blazing green. Her breasts sat erect in their places
like two rocks, marbled with blue veins under taut translucent skin. She sighed.
“Can I at least do your hair, today? Can I do some highlights? Cut all this
off?” She reached over to grab at the ends of Charlotte’s hair. “All those
raggedy ends?”

Charlotte shook her head. Then she took her plate and
entered the swinging door into the kitchen, where she tossed her cantaloupe
into the trash and gobbled four slices of bacon from the kids’ plates in the
sink.

As she chewed, she remembered how very much she disliked
breakfast meat. And yet, there was something about being told not to eat something
that made her crave it all the more.

***

The house was quiet. So quiet. When her own house was empty,
it felt snug and warm; the silence like a quilt that she drew around herself,
cocooning her energy for that time when the kids would once again throw open
the door and tell her noisy, jostling tales from the school bus and the middle
school cafeteria.

But when Fiona’s house was empty, it felt chilled, with a
dreary, desolate quality. As Charlotte moved through the halls, she felt
disembodied, floating like a ghost.

They had all gone to the salon: Fiona and Gracie, Hannah,
Maxwell, and Maddox. Just as they were loading into Fiona’s Range Rover,
Charlotte had backed out.

“I’m not sure I’m feeling well,” Charlotte said, which was
mostly true.

“But you have to see my salon!” Fiona rebutted. “You simply
must.”

“I’ll see it another day. Tomorrow maybe. I just…I suddenly
don’t feel up to it.” And this was the truth. She knew she was being petty and
small, but she wasn’t sure she could see another of Fiona’s successes. She
wasn’t sure she could tour another monument to Fiona’s good, solid decisions
and all her blessed
action
. The worst part was, Charlotte hadn’t
realized there was so much wrong with her until she had arrived here. Maybe her
life had become a bit of a bore…

“Mom.” Gracie flashed her mother a look that said,
I
don’t want to go without you. Help!  

“You guys will be fine without me,” Charlotte said. “And I
want to hear all about it when you get back.”

“But what are
you
going to do?” Hannah asked.

“I think I’ll lie down and maybe get settled in here a
little.” She dug in her wallet and handed Gracie two crisp twenty-dollar bills.
“Why don’t you girls take everyone out for ice cream?” she said.

Fiona groaned. “Ice cream?” She slumped her shoulders,
exaggerating it so everyone could see.

Maddox and Maxwell bounced on the balls of their feet. “Yes!
Ice cream! We never get ice cream!”

Maddox threw his arms around Charlotte’s upper thighs, which
was as high as he could reach. “I love ice cream more than anything else in the
whole world, Aunt Charlotte.”

“What are you trying to do to me?” Fiona asked.

Charlotte smiled sheepishly. “Sorry. Sorbet? Italian ice?
Frozen yogurt?”

“Alright, load in the car.”  Fiona made a weeping motion
with her hand. “We’ll see about the ice cream. Maybe we can find some nice
dried fruit instead. I bet I even have some raisins in the glove box.” And then
they were gone. Apparently, this was the battle Fiona had chosen. Food.

First Charlotte tried to sleep. She had to do something to
get rid of this blasted headache, but she couldn’t get past that buzzing
sensation in her brain, the same one she experienced in the middle of the
night. Ever since the girls were toddlers, she would often wake at two in the
morning; her mind fully alert. It was as though a surge of adrenaline had woken
her, and it would take two or three hours to sufficiently dilute in her bloodstream
so she could drift off to sleep again. Meanwhile, she would listen to the night
sounds of her home, soft snores from Caleb, the clank and hum of the water
heater, the settling and occasional popping of the joists deep in the floor.

As she lay there, she tried to take advice from a book she
had read. She would try to feel grateful for each of the things in her life, cradling
them in her mind, one by one. After a moment or two, however, her mind would shift
on its own accord and she would begin thinking other thoughts. Thoughts and
questions. Always the same ones, deep in the night: Was there more to life than
this? What did she really like to do? Was there a point to doing anything at
all? Why didn’t she enjoy doing things other women enjoyed, like sewing
Halloween costumes and volunteering for school dances? Was she wasting her life
and her potential?

Charlotte’s throat constricted as she remembered the
tight-lipped smiles the girls had given her when she told them about Fiona’s
invitation, just after she had sent Caleb away with only a suitcase and a
toothbrush. The way the girls had responded when Charlotte had asked them, “Do
you think we should go? Do you think we should take a summer to go somewhere
else? Somewhere new?” The girls had looked at her, and then they had looked at
one another, steadily for a long while, and then Gracie had said, in a small
voice, “Do you think this would help you? Would it be good for you? For us?” Then
Charlotte had nodded, and they had folded her in their arms and stood in the
kitchen and swayed from side to side, arms locked over backs.

What would she have done if they had asked to stay in
Missouri, with their father? If one of them had asked to stay behind?

And when she had told Caleb their plans, his jaw had grown
tight, his teeth clenched. He wanted her back. She knew this. And he would
agree to anything, even her leaving, if it meant she might return, feeling
better, picking up their life and their marriage exactly where they left off.
When she told him she was going away, she had seen a flutter at his temple, a
pulse of tension. Was his hair thinning? That would serve him right.  

She had given up everything for him. She had been a
straight-A college senior. Then Caleb’s pregnant girlfriend.  Then a
summa
cum laude
graduate. Then a mother. And that’s when her ambition died. All
she wanted to do, suddenly, was raise her girls. And so she married the man who
knocked her up. The sexy, young literature professor who every undergrad wanted
to visit for office hours. She just hadn’t realized it was still this way.

Caleb said he hadn’t done anything with that woman. That he
hadn’t even touched her. That strong dark woman with the dark, dark lips. This
is what Caleb said, but Charlotte knew.  

And today, as she tried for a nap in the sunny guest
bedroom, atop the coverlet that she had already pulled tight for the day, her
mind whirred in the way it always did when she was lying down, not sleeping. First,
she marveled at how she’d actually been looking forward to a fresh start here,
at Fiona’s house. The very idea of it had gotten her through the last week with
Caleb. The fights, the denials. But now, suddenly, she worried that she had
made a dreadful mistake. Why did she feel so petty? Why couldn’t she ever
manage to transform
herself
, using her own methods? And why hadn’t she
realized how very much work there was to do? On her own?

On her own. That’s exactly what she would do. She would use
these three months as a time to improve herself. To eat right and exercise. To
get back in touch with the things she enjoyed. She would return to Missouri
looking and feeling better than ever. On her own.

Granted, Charlotte tended to have an easier time starting a
diet when she was full from a meal. Once she got hungry, she found it became
exponentially more difficult. But now—today—the hunger pangs and growls told
her that she was finally doing something right. That she had already begun on
the path to her metamorphosis and rebirth.

Charlotte sat straight up in bed.  She swung her legs to the
side and found herself on the way to Fiona’s fitness room.

She started on the elliptical, a lanky contraption that hummed
and whirred as she pushed with each foot. Charlotte was surprised to find
herself breathless in only a few minutes and with the machine still in its
default mode, with minimal resistance. And what was with all the mirrors?  They
were everywhere, wall to wall.

Charlotte kept her eyes on her feet to avoid staring into
her own reflection, and this was making her dizzy and unsteady. She had worked
out for only a short time when a wave of anguish and dissatisfaction swelled
over her, then seized her by the throat.

Charlotte wobbled off the elliptical machine and sank down
in the corner of the room, low enough where she couldn’t see her reflection,
and she drew up her knees all the way to her chest and she laced her hands
around her ankles and she let the tears fall without lifting a hand to her face.
Where had this rush of sadness come from? What was wrong with her?

Her first response: Everything. Her second response: High
elevation and low blood sugar. Charlotte always did have a bit of a blood sugar
problem. She felt faint sometimes before breakfast, and Hannah and Gracie had once
told her that she really shouldn’t diet because it “made her kind of mean.”

She stood and ambled to the kitchen, wiping her tears now on
her bare arm. She snorted and sniffed. God, she hoped Fiona didn’t have a
surveillance system.

Fiona’s kitchen pantry was as large as Charlotte’s master
bathroom at home. The shelves had been stained a deep espresso color and, once
inside, it was hard to see what treasures they held. Jars and canisters donned
clean white labels and everything was stacked and lined up just so.

Ah, now there was something. Something good. Positioned
directly in the front and down low, where the kids could reach it. A jumbo
plastic tub of peanut butter. A nice, huggable-sized container. Extra smooth.
She sank to the floor, once again, holding the tub in her lap. She snapped open
the lid and plunged in two fingers. As soon as she placed it in her mouth and
the great gob of creamy, familiar, glossy roasted goodness made its way into
her belly, she felt a surge of happy fullness. Fulfillment.

She licked her fingers clean, which took some time. Then she
replaced the lid on the tub and sank back against the shelves. She tasted a
bitterness then. Shame, perhaps?
 
Maybe there
was
something wrong
with her. Maybe it just took coming out here to realize how far she had fallen.

***

Caleb zipped his Samsonite suitcase. Was this really all he
would need for a month or two…or however long he’d have before the book’s official
launch? His publicist would soon be sending Advanced Reading Copies to
libraries, bookstores, and media outlets. He had been able to make his edits and
his new Acknowledgements page before it went to press, which gave him a flutter
of hope.