I awkwardly step aside so Martha can get her work done. “Excuse me,” I mumble.
Most people I worked for used to leave the house when I was cleaning, and I appreciated that. Even if the employer was not actively telling me how to clean, which some of them did, I always felt like they were silently judging me when they were in the house. Or watching me to make sure I wasn’t stealing anything. And even if they weren’t doing either of those things, they were simply in the way.
Finally, I give up on the egg. I grab a banana instead, because it’s the only breakfast I can think of that doesn’t involve cooking. I carry my slightly brown banana out to the living room and plop down on the sofa with my phone in my other hand.
Maybe I can take Wednesday mornings off instead.
I sort through my emails, dealing with what I can. The kids have been at their new school for less than a week, and already, I’ve got dozens of emails from the school. The principal seems compelled to write to all the parents daily. That is a stark difference between this school and the previous public elementary school in the Bronx. We may not be paying tuition here, but the parents expect a lot. Daily emails, apparently.
I end up deleting almost all the emails from the school. I mean, how many messages can you read about the upcoming book fair or something called Lego Lunch?
The banana isn’t terribly satisfying, but it does the job. I figure I’ll go get some errands done outside the house while Martha is cleaning. Except when I get off the sofa and turn around, I almost jump out of my skin.
Martha is standing rigidly at the entrance to the kitchen.
She is so still. She almost looks like a robot standing there—or is “cyborg” the correct terminology? Either way, it startled me. I thought she was busy cleaning in the kitchen, but apparently she’s been standing there and staring at me for God knows how long. And when I catch her doing it, she doesn’t look away. She is unapologetically staring at me.
“Yes?” I say.
“I didn’t want to bother you,” she says.
“Um, it’s fine. What do you need?”
She hesitates for a few seconds, as if carefully measuring her words. Finally, she blurts out, “Where is your oven cleaner?”
Is that why she was looking at me so intently? She was just confused about the location of the oven cleaner? Is that really all it was?
“It’s in the cabinet right by the stove.” Where else would it be?
Martha nods at my answer and returns to the kitchen. But I still feel a little uneasy. Even if Enzo wants us to have a cleaning woman, that doesn’t mean it has to be Martha. I’d rather not have a cleaner who won’t quit staring at me. But on the other hand, she’s already working here. If we find someone else, I’ll have to fire her. I have never fired anyone in my life, and I’m not looking forward to it.
Maybe this will be fine. After all, she knows where the oven cleaner is now, and according to Enzo, her rates are very reasonable. Suzette’s house is spotless, so she’s obviously good at what she does.
And like Enzo said, I deserve this.
ELEVEN
Nico has a playdate today with Spencer, the boy who lives at 13 Locust.
This playdate was nearly impossible to arrange. We’ve been living here for two weeks, and this was the first opening. I had to provide Janice a copy of Nico’s vaccination record—no joke. I’m surprised she didn’t require blood and urine samples.
But it’s worth it, because Nico is always bouncing off the walls on the weekends, and he doesn’t have a bunch of friends nearby like he did at our old apartment. The playdate is at three o’clock on Sunday afternoon at Spencer’s house, but starting at one, Nico asks me roughly every fifteen minutes if it’s time for the playdate yet. It gets to the point where every time he says the word “Mom,” I want to scream.
“Mom,” he says at a quarter to three. “Can I bring Little Kiwi to Spencer’s house?”
Enzo and Nico decided they didn’t want to wait for a praying mantis egg to hatch and all the mantises to eat each other, so instead they purchased a baby praying mantis that arrived last Monday. Nico named the praying mantis Little Kiwi in a weird homage to one of his favorite fruits.
“Not if you ever want to be invited back,” I reply.
Nico thinks about this. “Can I bring my baseball and bat?”
Tryouts for Little League were a week ago on Friday, and Nico made the team, which is great because it’ll be another way for him to make friends and burn off some of that pent-up energy. But as a result, he’s been even more obsessed with baseball than he was before. Enzo has been tossing the ball around with him every night. It’s very cute to watch, because Enzo narrates every move like an actual baseball game. He comes up to the plate, he swings at the pitch… He gets a hit! He runs to first base, second base…
“Okay,” I agree, although I’m slightly worried that Nico is going to let the ball get out of control and break a window, at which point Janice will have a stroke. He has a good swing, but he is not quite as good at control.
Finally—finally!—it’s three o’clock, so we can head over for the playdate. Ada is sprawled out on the sofa, reading a book, her glossy black hair splayed out behind her. Once again, I am struck by how beautiful my daughter is. I don’t even think she realizes it. God help us all when she does.
“Ada,” I say, “do you want to come with us?”
Ada looks at me like I’ve lost my ever-loving mind. “No, thank you.”
“Do you have any friends that you want to have playdates with?” I ask her. “I’m happy to drive you.”
She shakes her head. I hope she’s making friends at school. She is not nearly as outgoing as Nico, but she has always had her little tight group of friends at school. It must be hard to start over in fifth grade, and Ada is not the type to complain. Maybe I’ll suggest a girls’ night out for the two of us, and I can probe a bit to see how things are going.
I consider inviting Enzo along, but then I realize I haven’t seen him all afternoon. He must be working. He had a lot of clients back in the city, but he’s trying to relocate all his business to the island, so he’s been hustling a lot. He’s incredibly concerned with our ability to make our mortgage payments. I appreciate what he’s doing, but at the same time, I wish he were around more.
Anyway, it looks like it’s just going to be me and Nico heading over there. So I grab my purse and we walk across the cul-de-sac to 13 Locust—the house that supposedly used to be for servants. As we pass Suzette’s house on the way over, I can’t help but notice a lot of noise coming from the backyard. What are they doing back there?
When Janice opens the door for us, her face falls, like in spite of the invitation, she had been hoping we might not show.
“Oh,” she says. “Come in, I guess.”
“Thanks,” I say.
As we step onto the welcome mat inside her house, she points down at our feet. “Shoes off.”
I slip out of my closed-toe sandals, and Nico kicks off his sneakers, which, to my horror, go flying down the hallway. I race over to retrieve them and place them gingerly in the shoe rack. We have barely left the house today, so I have no idea why his sneakers are caked in dirt. And when I look at his socks, they are equally dirty. How did that happen?
