“Save room for dessert,” Jake said. She’d been using some of the still-warm bread to sop up all the amazing sauce that was left on her plate.

After the chocolate mousse for her and just a cappuccino for Jake, they drove back in Jake’s BMW, listening to one of his Roxy Music tapes. It was early fall, but still warm enough to have the windows open, and Jake was driving along the coastal route. Alice kept pretending her mother didn’t exist, imagining that they were going back to the condo they lived in together, and alone. The song was “Avalon,” Alice’s favorite. When they got home, Edith was there, although she was now stretched out on the couch instead of the recliner, and the television was on, the volume turned up way too high.

“Where’d you two go?” she said, as Jake turned the television down. She had propped herself halfway up on an elbow, and was pulling a strand of hair away from her mouth.

Jake said, “Out to dinner, Ed. You forgot about our reservation, and I didn’t want to wake you.”

“What? Where?” Her voice was thick and sleepy.

“The Brasserie. In Kennebunkport.”

“Oh yeah. I’m so sorry, honey. I completely forgot.”

Alice went to her own room as Jake bent and kissed Edith on the forehead. Alice shut her door, and sat on the edge of her bed, wondering if Jake and Edith really had had plans to go to the restaurant and her mom had forgotten. Or had Jake just made that up? She remembered the chicken, her mom’s attempt at cooking dinner, but that didn’t mean much of anything. Her mother was forgetful, and even if they’d had dinner reservations, that didn’t mean she’d have remembered them. Thinking about it was starting to give Alice one of her headaches, like fingers jabbing into her temples, so she took four ibuprofen, changed into her pajamas, and got into bed. She lay there awake for a long time, staring up at the textured ceiling, so similar to the apartment ceiling from back in Biddeford, although that ceiling had had glitter in it. She took deep, regular breaths, trying to get back inside the bubble, the one in which Jake took her to French restaurants all the time, and they traveled to Europe, and her mother no longer existed. She could feel the headache start to go away, like poison seeping out into her pillow, and then her limbs got heavy, and her eyes closed, and she was asleep.

Chapter 5

Now