The Secret of Joy (10 page)

The minibus was quiet for another few minutes until Joy pulled to a stop in front of a condo complex in Brunswick. “We’ve just arrived at gentleman number one’s house,” Joy said. “Prepare to meet the very attractive Clinton Witowski.”

There was a flurry of compacts opening. Hair being smoothed and fluffed. Teeth being checked for cookie crumbs. And then a man appeared at the bus. He slid open the door with a “Hello, ladies” and a charming smile and sat in the row behind the women. Dead in the center.

Clinton Witowski appeared to be in his early forties. His thick dark hair was receding, but it was sexy man hair. And somehow the crow’s-feet and grooves around his mouth added
to his appeal. There was something Marlboro Man about him, though there was nothing cowboy in his appearance.

The women changed instantly when he boarded. They all sat up straighter. Victoria perked up considerably. “So we’re members of the Wiscasset Divorced Ladies Club,” she told him. “Have you ever been married?”

“Twice,” he said, leaning forward. “But neither divorce was my fault. I took my vows very seriously. My first wife couldn’t handle it when I was deployed, so that was that. So I made sure my second wife was also in the military, someone who’d understand, and she ended up falling for her commander.” He went on for a bit too long about how he was a former military captain who now worked in a civilian capacity as an engineer for the Brunswick Naval Air Station.

The women swooned with their
sorrys
. Rebecca listened to the women’s chatter—every now and then they’d let Clinton get a word in—and looked out the window. She supposed she and Joy couldn’t very well talk in the bus; they’d have to wait until they arrived in Portland, where they could have some privacy.

A half hour later, Joy stopped to pick up Bachelor Number Two. Victoria, Maggie, and Ellie stared out the window. They were practically foaming at the mouth, until they got a glimpse of him. Also tall and very thin, he wasn’t so much unattractive as he was awkward. He walked up to the bus and smiled so shyly that the trio’s maternal instincts rose up.

“May I introduce Jed Harker,” Joy said. “Jed, in the first row are Ellie Rasmussen, Maggie Herald, and Victoria Dale. Clinton Witowski is the gentleman behind them. And here in the passenger seat is Rebecca. Strand,” she added after a moment.

The women said hello and shook Jed’s hand. Jed was so shy he could barely look up. He sat next to Clinton, who slapped him on the back and almost knocked him off the seat.

The women were all over Jed, asking him questions, and he slowly opened up. He was single, never married, thirty years old. He’d only had a few relationships and had even been engaged for a few weeks. The fiancée had met someone else.

“Isn’t that always the way?” Victoria said. “They meet someone else. What I don’t understand is, why aren’t they happy with what they have? Why is someone else’s vagina so much more interesting than mine?”

Rebecca almost choked on the cookie she was nibbling. Joy glanced at her and smiled, then seemed to remember she didn’t want to be friendly and refocused on the road.

Jed’s eyes had bugged somewhat. Ellie patted his hand. “Get used to it.”

“You know what?” Victoria said. “Last year I put a profile on Match.com, met someone, went on a few dates, and he told me it wasn’t working out, that I wasn’t what he was looking for. Well, I was everything on his ‘Ideal Woman’ list and in his stupid paragraph with its ‘u’ for ‘you’ and ‘2’ for ‘two’ and juvenile ‘b4.’ I finally figured out that what’s on a piece of paper and what’s flesh and blood are very different things.”

Clinton nodded. “You can’t account for chemistry. You can want this or that in someone, but chemistry is chemistry.”

And blood is blood
, Rebecca thought out of nowhere. She glanced again at Joy, this total stranger who shared her DNA, who shared her father.

“I never seem to have chemistry with anyone,” Jed piped up.

“That’s because you’re so shy,” Ellie said, patting his shoulder. “We’ll fix that.”

Jed smiled. “That’s why I signed up. I figured I’d do better in a group.”

For the next ten minutes, Jed and Clinton talked about the Red Sox, while the women covered their former mothers-in-law. Rebecca realized she’d left Michael’s mother’s wedding gown on the hook behind the door to her office. That
had
to mean something.

“Okay, everyone,” Joy said. “Last pickup.”

Once again, the women were frothing in anticipation. Joy parked in front of what looked like a three-family house with a balcony on each story. She checked something in an overstuffed datebook, then rang one of the buzzers. A few minutes later, a husky man followed her to the orange bus, carrying an enormous duffel bag.

“Ellie, Maggie, Victoria, Rebecca, Clinton, Jed, meet Victor.”

“Victor and Victoria,” Clinton said. “Musical!”

Victor appeared to be trying to figure out which of the women
was
his musical match, then shoved his duffel bag in the back and climbed in next to Jed. Victor was pretty much the opposite of Jed. He never stopped talking. Or eating. He carried a baggie of what looked like gummy worms and held them above his mouth. Thirty-five, with something of a goatee, Victor had an attractive face and carried his extra fifty pounds or so pretty well. He wore the kind of patterned sweater and Dockers that Harold Goldberg favored for dress-down Fridays. He was a salesman of office chairs and knew everything about pneumatic seat heights and lumbar support.

“So tell us your story,” Victoria asked him when he finally stopped going on about chairs and which sports teams he rooted for. She twirled a long red strand of hair around her finger. She’s interested, Rebecca realized.

He turned to Victoria, his expression deadly. “My story? My story is that women are lying bitches.”

Everyone stared.

“I kid!” he exclaimed, and then belly-laughed alone.

“Smooth,” Clinton said.

“Real smooth,” Jed added, then laughed his head off. And just like that, Jed had joined the party.

The bed-and-breakfast, in the Munjoy Hill section of the city of Portland, had a stunning view of Casco Bay and the Portland Observatory, but no room for Rebecca.

Joy frowned. “No, I called a few hours ago and booked an additional room at the single rate.”

The proprietor shook her head. “I took no such call.” She stopped. “Oh, goodness. You must have spoken to Lizzie, my daughter. She’s fifteen and thinks it’s hilarious to book nonexistent rooms. I’ll make sure she’s disciplined.”

Joy sighed. “But we have an extra person.”

The woman peered at her computer screen. “Well, we could bring a cot into your room. It’ll be tight, but a cot will fit. No charge for the extra bed.”

Joy let out a deep breath.

“I could sleep in the parlor,” Rebecca offered. They’d passed a chintz-covered living room with a Victorian sofa and upholstered chairs.

“Okay,” Joy said.

Rebecca’s face fell.

“I kid,” Joy said without a smile.

Everyone decided on Mexican for dinner. The restaurant the proprietor recommended was down a cobblestone alleyway of sorts that opened into the waterfront. The Old Port reminded Rebecca of a mini Greenwich Village, but with a crowded harbor and no Gap and no zigzagging yellow taxis. Only one-of-a-kind shops and charming restaurants and a condom shop called Condom Sense, which Clinton wanted to visit.

Ellie and Victoria had given handsome Clinton to Maggie, who needed him most this weekend. Ellie, who really only wanted her husband, took Jed under her platonic wing. Victoria, almost as tall as Victor, giggled as Victor pulled her in the condom shop’s doorway with yet another “I kid!”

So far, so good.

Enchiladaville had a trio of serenading guitar players and a dance floor. Jed danced like Elaine on
Seinfeld
, his arms and legs jerking out at strange angles. But he seemed to be having his first blast. Ellie mostly did the twist. Victoria and Victor had progressed to slow dancing to fast music. And Maggie and Clinton, neither of whom could dance, were deep in conversation, each sipping a margarita.

Which left Rebecca and Joy alone at the table, with mostly empty plates and platters between them. They both faced the dance floor, which saved them from sitting awkwardly across
from each other. Every now and then, Joy would wink or smile at one of her charges with genuine warmth and affection. It was clear she cared about people, cared about her work. And her work was romance. Rebecca wondered what Joy thought about Pia Jayhawk’s affair with Daniel Strand. That her mother had fallen for a married man and had gotten burned bad? That her mother had fallen in love and should have won her man?
Had
her mother been in love with Daniel Strand? Rebecca had no idea of the circumstances.

Joy was grinning at Jed, who had dramatically dipped Ellie during a tangolike number and almost dropped her. Joy’s smile faded when she realized Rebecca was watching her.

“I’m really glad you let me come,” Rebecca said, taking a sip of her own margarita. “I didn’t know what to expect, but even the ride down was fun.”

“That’s why I keep doing it. People just want to find love. And you never know who someone will connect with.”

“How long have you been operating the Love Bus?”

“Just about a year. The Divorced Ladies Club of Wiscasset are my constant clients. I’ve had a few other strays, mostly their referrals. To attract male clientele, they drive an hour in each direction and put up my brochures on bulletin boards in health clubs, sports bars, everywhere they can think of.”

“What did you do before?”

Joy reached for a tortilla chip and broke it in half but didn’t eat it. “I worked on a farm, actually. Grooming bulls and taking care of the babies. I majored in math in college—that’s where I met Harry—and got my teaching certificate to teach middle school and high school, but when it came time to
apply to schools, I found myself applying to farms in the area. All of a sudden I wanted to work with bulls or alpacas. I really loved farmwork.”

Rebecca didn’t even know what an alpaca was.

“And then Rex came along, so I stayed home with him. I found I loved that most of all, actually. And last year, an eccentric old uncle of Harry’s died and left him the orange minibus. He had a little tour company and drove people all over Maine, especially up north. And one day, just kidding, really, I mentioned to Harry that I could continue Uncle Jasper’s life work and take the Divorced Ladies Club on singles tours to meet new loves, and Harry thought it was a wonderful idea, and all of a sudden, my new business was born. Just like that.”

“Would you rather be grooming bulls?” Rebecca asked.

“I guess so. I just sort of fell out of that. And this came along, and it’s fun and gives me my own money again. I like the idea of going back to farmwork when Rex starts kindergarten. That’s in just two years. Maybe one day I’ll have my own farm. But right now, the Love Bus is perfect. It’s happy work. The tours aren’t always successful—in fact, most aren’t—but everyone usually has fun.”

“Was your mother in love with our father?” Rebecca blurted out.

Joy glared at her. “Rebecca, first of all, please stop referring to your father as
our
father. He was not my father, except in the most base biological sense. And second, my mother’s business is her own.”

Rebecca felt her cheeks burn. “I—Okay, you’re right. Sorry. I don’t really know how to do this.”

So your mother is still alive
, Rebecca couldn’t help thinking. She wondered if she’d get the opportunity to meet Pia Jayhawk.

“Me either,” Joy said, offering a bit of a smile.

“He really did care, Joy. Your—Daniel Strand, I mean.” She reached into her bag for the leather box. “He wrote you all these letters. He explains—”

Joy pushed the box back in front of Rebecca. “I don’t care what his explanation was. And I’m not interested in reading the letters.”

“Aren’t you curious about your father at all?” Rebecca asked. She wondered what Pia Jayhawk had told her daughter.

“Nope,” Joy said, dipping a tortilla chip into the little pot of salsa, her eyes on the dance floor.

“Really?”

She glanced back at Rebecca. “Really. He’s nothing to me but biology and DNA. My mother married a very nice man when I was nine.
He
helped raised me. Why would I be interested in some stranger who couldn’t even face up to the most basic of responsibilities?”

Rebecca stiffened. Joy was right, of course.

“He did all right by you, it seems,” Joy said suddenly.

Rebecca nodded. “He was a good man. He really—”

Joy clunked her glass on the table. “A good man. Right. So good he disappeared off the face of the earth when he found out his mistress was knocked up. Don’t come into
my
life and tell me what a good man my biological father was when it’s clearly not true. You can’t be a good person if you turn your back on your own baby. I know this is true more than ever now that I have my own child.”

Again Rebecca’s face burned. “I—” But what was she supposed to say?

Could
you be a good person and still do something that was the opposite of good? What Daniel Strand had done couldn’t simply be called a mistake. Or bad judgment. It was something else. Something Rebecca couldn’t seem to understand. Her father
had
been a good person.

“Sometimes there are circum—”

Joy took a sip of her drink. “Like not wanting to mess up his perfect little life?”

“It’s not that simple, though. Nothing is that black or white.”

“Except a
child
,” Joy said. “Your father got a woman pregnant, and when he was informed of that, he disappeared. What’s gray about that?”

“I just think if you read his letters to you, you would—”

“Rebecca, look. I understand why you tracked me down. I get that. And again, I’m sorry you lost your father. But he’s not my father. You’re not my sister. There’s no family connection here. I’m sorry.”

But you’re my father’s daughter. You are
.