“How do you get along with your stepmother?”

She made a face. “Not so great. She’s high-strung. I’m polite, but there’s nothing warm and fuzzy in our relationship.”

“How long have they been married?”

“Four years. He met her at an AA meeting. It was early on, when she first joined. I gather she was a bad drunk. Lost jobs, wrecked cars, binged with the best of them. She finally reached a point where she had to turn it around or die. He knew her all of three months before he proposed. The wedding was two weeks later.”

“Your father’s a member of Alcoholics Anonymous?”

She shook her head. “Briefly. I know it sounds cynical, but I think he was looking for a way to meet women. Celeste still goes to meetings a couple of times a week.”

“He waited a long time after your mother died.”

“No, no. There was Phyllis, the wife before Celeste.”

“Oh, sorry. That’s right. I remember hearing about her. What’s the story there?”

“He married her when I was seven. I guess she didn’t take to the role of mother substitute, so that only lasted a couple of years. A few years post-Phyllis, he dated a woman who worked at the same company. She was neat and he adored her. I liked her, too. He didn’t marry her, but she ended up suing him anyway, so it might as well have been a divorce. By then I was off at Pomona College and missed the fireworks.”

I’d have asked what the woman sued him for, but I knew we were talking about Taryn, so I let that slide as she went on.

“Essentially, if you count my mother on one end and Celeste on the other, that’s only four serious relationships in twenty-eight years. That’s, what, an average of one every seven years?”

“Not so bad when you put it that way.”

“We’ll see how long Celeste lasts. Not a lifetime, I can guarantee.”

“What’s their relationship like?”

“Very compatible. He’s a bully and she’s a mouse. They act like everything’s fine, but it’s not. We have them for dinner once a month, and that’s as much as I can tolerate. As a matter of fact, they’re coming up tomorrow night, so that’s one chore I can check off the list.”

“You think your relationship might change once the baby’s born?”

“Like we’d see them more often? I’m sure he’s hoping so, but I don’t.”

“I never know what to make of conversations like this,” I said. “I sometimes have this fantasy that life would be wonderful if only my mother and my father were alive. Then I hear stories like yours and I want to get down on my hands and knees and rejoice.”

She laughed. “I better get a move on. I need to get to the grocery store and I’m sure you have work to do.”

“Could I ask a quick favor? I’d like to write to Sacramento and request a copy of your mother’s death certificate, which means I’ll need her date of birth.”