Little Monsters

by Adrienne Brodeur

Abigail resembled Ken, especially in the mouth and coloring, but she was not beautiful like him. She had slightly too-large teeth, which diminished her chin and jaw, making her look nervous, vulnerable, and—if Steph were to be brutally honest—a bit rodent-like.

“There’s plenty of pumped milk in the fridge. Let’s not put off naming this kiddo a moment longer. How about we get a little drunk and just do it? Then we can leave for Cape Cod tomorrow, burden-free.”

“You’re a Pisces,” Toni said, pouring a splash more booze into each of their glasses, “Latin for fish. Your ruling body is Neptune, your element is water, your birthstone is aquamarine, your color is turquoise… Need I go on?” Maybe astrology wasn’t complete bunk after all.

Memorial Day. The smell of freshly cut grass and honeysuckle. An American flag snapping against a sapphire sky. Seagulls rising and falling, treading air in the wind. The sun reflecting brightly on the white clamshell driveway, dimming intermittently when clouds floated past, dragging bloated shadows.

Every party for the next two years is going to be about Ken’s campaign.” “Ugh,” Abby groaned.

David squeezed her hand. “I’ll come by the studio for a visit soon. I have something important to tell you.”

and was fifteen weeks pregnant with a baby boy, the gender having been recently confirmed by ultrasound. David’s baby. They’d always confided in each other, but the simple truth was Abby wasn’t ready to share this news.

Abby’s thoughts raced, wondering if it had to do with his marriage. Then his phone quacked. Rebecca. The woman had a sixth sense when they were alone. “Sorry,” David said. “I’ll be right back.” And he headed up to the house. Petty as it was, Abby felt gratified that Rebecca’s notification sound was a quack. But that quickly gave way to jealousy: maybe the quack was an endearment, and Rebecca was his sweet duckling. Then shame: Abby was sleeping with the woman’s husband, albeit very occasionally. Stop, she told herself, pushing away the guilt. David had been hers first. Rebecca was the interloper.

Their attempts at sexy were so over-the-top as to be cartoonish, counterintuitively highlighting their innocence.

She didn’t like to admit it, but men scared her. Men alone. Men in groups. She hated the power they had, remembering the times men had touched her without asking.

“Don’t you guys think they’re a little young for you?” she asked, keeping her voice light. Ken gave a tight laugh. “As far as I know, there’s no law against looking.” “Still,” Abby continued, gaining courage, “it’s a little gross.” “What’s a little gross?” Jenny asked, appearing out of nowhere with a tray of crab quesadillas and cocktail napkins. Abby could have kissed Jenny for her perfect timing. “Oh, you know, leering at teenage girls,” Abby said, emboldened by her friend’s presence. But instead of agreeing, Jenny shot her an icy look. To the men, she smiled and said, “You boys are positively infantile.” Ken gave his wife’s bottom a cheeky squeeze and Jenny sauntered back up the hill, swaying her hips. “Your wife’s awesome,” one of them said. “That she is,” Ken said. He gave Abby a withering look. To his friends, he said, “I don’t want you guys to miss the food and drinks. Why don’t you head up to the house and I’ll catch up with you in a bit.” As Matt and Henry headed toward the deck, Ken grabbed Abby’s elbow. “What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?” he hissed. “What the hell, Ken? Let go.” Her brother’s hands were large and powerful enough to easily palm a basketball or the top of her head. “You’re hurting me.”

“Do you even realize that’s Peony out there?” Ken looked back toward the dock and squinted. Peony and her friend were giggling over their iPhones, looking like children again. A moment of recognition passed over

How could a person paint—or do anything for that matter—knowing that a nutjob could be lurking outside?

Irony? Foreshadowing?

“We’ve met before, haven’t we?” Steph lifted her chin, welcoming her half sister’s gaze. “I don’t think so,” Steph said. “But anything’s possible, I suppose. We’ve been coming to the Cape—to P-town—for years.”

She put the baby to her breast and noted a battered copy of Frankenstein, opened and lying flat on the cushion beside her. The book looked like it’d been read a thousand times.

He didn’t look like a sexual predator or a serial philanderer, and definitely not like the kind of guy who’d had drunken sex with a teenager in the back of his car a few months earlier.

!!!!!! Kens future?

Steph reached to collect Jonah from Abby’s arms, and their fingers touched, sending an electric jolt up Steph’s arm. Abby pulled her hand back, and Steph wondered if she felt it, too.

How had one glass of wine turned into the whole bottle again?

The next time she saw her father, Jenny was in rehab again, her third stint. When Theodore Lowell entered her room, it was with none of his usual bluster. He folded his large frame into the chair beside her bed, and said simply, “No more nonsense, Jennifer. Your mother needs us.” The words that followed included: “metastasized,” “stage IV,” “palliative care.”

Ken had struck it big as he’d always told her he would. She just wished her own life felt less empty.

Adam’s seventieth birthday/retirement extravaganza, still two months away, but gathering force. You’d think it was a royal wedding for all the energy it was commanding.

Steph will be there. Drama

Ugh. Jenny knew it was irrational to be mad at Abby. It was her husband’s strange fantasy, after all, and had nothing to do with her best friend. But Jenny couldn’t unsee or unhear what she’d walked in on: Ken online in a private chat room, telling a pajama-clad young woman how all he needed was “to be held.” Had he called her Abby? Jenny had stood behind him for several seconds before clearing her throat to alert him of her presence.

Omg?

I love that unruly monster just the way it is.”

don’t know how you do it, Jenny.” Abby sounded genuinely impressed. “I couldn’t go to a cocktail party every night, let alone throw one.” But Jenny had neither gone to nor thrown a cocktail party. She’d been alone.

She’d started with a tonic and lime, but when that wasn’t doing it for her, she poured in a splash of gin, enjoying the sunset from the porch. Then, feeling blissed out, she decided to splurge on a bottle of Sancerre with dinner—only she hadn’t bothered with dinner, just a couple of crackers and some Gouda to maintain the delightful buzz.

Jenny yearned to tell Abby everything: her feelings of purposelessness, her drinking, Ken’s disturbing online proclivities.

When they were roommates, they’d shared everything. But boy, had Jenny gotten it wrong when she thought that marrying Ken was a way to stay close to Abby and cling to their bohemian past. Instead, her marriage made everything about their friendship more difficult.

“Maybe we could figure out a workaround. Do you remember when we made that rule that it was okay to smoke in foreign countries?” Jenny nodded. “What if we did something like that around our friendship? Our new rule: What’s said in the Arcadia, stays in the Arcadia. What is shared in my home goes nowhere. Sealed in a bubble.” Abby took her last bite, licked her fingers, and unwrapped one of the brownies.

She was drunk. She thought of Betty Ford again. Perhaps a clinic named in her honor would be purposeful enough.

Despite Jenny’s comparative bluster at RISD where she’d worn feminist T-shirts every day—I Believe Anita, Girl Power, Smash the Patriarchy—it was Abby who’d live out their ideals.

being announced at the reception as Mrs. Ken Gardner.

Oof

“Who else knows you’re pregnant?” Jenny asked. “Not a soul,” Abby said. “Well, I mean, no one who counts. My OB, of course. Oh, and this random couple who came into the studio earlier in the week. Two women. They had a new baby, and for whatever reason, it all just sort of spilled out.”

a tiny being blossoming in a torso; an iris-like aperture overlaying the whole; two children tangled in a curious knot.

No!

George had suggested he try to recall the euphoric feelings of falling in love, and Ken pictured the first time he’d ever laid eyes on Jenny. She’d been climbing out of Abby’s red convertible VW Bug in cut-off shorts and a bikini

He couldnt have abby so he chose her bff?

He didn’t know. He just wanted the day to be perfect. “What? A guy can’t twirl his wife without getting the third degree?” Ken clapped his hands. “Let’s get going, ladies. The sandwiches aren’t going to make themselves.”

He’d pick his battles today.

Given his childhood, the fact that he’d somehow created happy and well-adjusted children was remarkable to him. Above all, he loved their friendship. Abby had been his closest ally once, but at some point along the way, she discarded him without looking back.

Chill

Yes, this was going to be a perfect day.

“What did you see?” he called from the bow where he released the anchor. Frannie and Tessa were already at the stern, waiting for the Francesca to slide back over the mysterious treasure. “Unsure,” Frannie said, a hand on her brow to shield her eyes. “It looked man-made. It was sticking up funny.” “I saw a flash of color, maybe gold,” Tessa said and hurried below to grab their masks and fins. Seconds later—splash!—the girls had hurled themselves off the back of the boat. “Good luck,”

“And what about you?” Ken asked. “Are you having a great day?” “Well, let’s see. Children deliriously happy. Husband not working. Day on the water.” Jenny pretended to consider it carefully. “I’d have to say yes. So far, so good.” Ken understood that the day was still his to lose. “Excellent. All part of the master plan. Stay exactly where you are. I’ll get lunch ready.” He lifted the side brim of her hat and placed a kiss where her hairline met her neck. Jenny’s eyes popped open, her carefree look suddenly gone. “Hey, sorry. Didn’t mean to get ahead of myself. Go back to your Zen state, please,” Ken said, getting up. “It’s okay,” Jenny said, touching where he’d kissed her. “I just wasn’t expecting it.” “I hope we can get back to a point where you are expecting it and maybe even welcoming it,” Ken said, smiling. “I’m trying. I really need you to know that. I’m working on all of it.” “Good. That’s good to hear,” Jenny said, applying

Juicy

“I need to talk to you about something,” she said. “Not necessarily right this moment, but soon.” Ken sat back down, knowing if he remained silent, she would fill the void. “Look, I know I’m not supposed to get involved. And I will never fully understand what’s up with you and Abby”—Jenny lifted the brim of her hat to look Ken in the eyes—“but something has got to give. The Arcadia situation must change. I’ve stayed out of it, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have an opinion.” Ken stiffened but nodded agreeably. “It’s just, well, you need to make things right there, Ken. Everyone knows that Abby deserves to own that place outright. It’s what your mother would have wanted.” At the mention of his mother, Ken felt his muscles clench and his chest tighten. Who exactly was “everyone”?

And Ken enjoyed every minute of it, basking in his daughters’ adoration.

“How about: ‘Thanks for the amazing day, Dad’?” Ken said. He was going for funny but ended up sounding needy. No wonder Tessa thought he was an idiot. Ken was incapable of being cool—just as Danny McCormick had pointed out decades ago. A wave of loneliness tugged at him. What

Eye roll. Eye roll. Ken hated when his sister’s face made a guest appearance on one of his daughters. But there was Abby, written right into Tessa’s expression.

“You know what, Tessa?” Ken said, stepping closer so that he towered over her. Then he put his face at her level and lowered his voice into an angry hiss. “The rigged system didn’t seem to bother you ten minutes ago when you were deciding between lobster rolls and sushi.”

Immature

his near-perfect day circled the drain. God, he hated himself. He would hate himself even more later; the aftermath of his rage always felt worse than the rage itself. Why couldn’t he be the father he wanted to be?

“How about this: when you and Frannie inherit the property, you two can do what you want with it. Turn it into a commune, for all I care.” Too late. Tessa wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Already in the works,” she said coolly. Ken looked to Frannie for an explanation. “It’s kind of true,” Frannie said, giggling. “It’s what Aunt Abby says she’s going to do with the Arcadia. Turn it into an artists’ cooperative.” “Is that so?” said Ken. So, once again, it was Abby.

Then a rapid sequence of unpleasant scenes flashed before him: Emily collapsing on the hospital floor; Ken returning from school with a black eye; Abby pushing food around her plate, refusing to eat; Gretchen hurling a mug at him. Sweat prickled like ant bites over the surface of his skin. Adam opened his eyes. He needed a drink.

Adam took a long sip of bourbon and felt a prickle at the base of his neck, alerting him that he was being watched. He looked into the mirror and perused the line of reflected faces: the lonely one, the inebriated one, the anxious one. Then he found the source of the feeling: a dark-haired young woman observing him from the far end of the bar,

when he noticed the woman looking at him again. Only this time, she held his gaze with a look so concentrated that it shimmered the air around her like heat coming off asphalt. She was decidedly not your average tourist taking in the gay scene or the bay views. She looked purposeful—as if she was here for a reason.