by saying that I was sharing this with him because there is serious damage control to be done, and he needs to be in the loop? I’ve shared information on students with him in the past, and he’s always been good for his word. He can be trusted.’ The other end of the line was silent. ‘Kate?’
‘I’m wishing you weren’t principal of the high school. I’d have preferred to fly under the radar.’
Susan wondered if that was resentment she heard. Unnerved, she said, ‘Right now, I’m wishing it, too. But don’t be angry at me, Kate. I didn’t dream up this scheme.’
‘I know.’
She waited for Kate to say more – Kate, who could always go with the flow, believing that everything worked out in the end. But that Kate was silent.
‘It’d be nice to have a little control over what happens now,’ Susan argued. ‘That’s another reason to share this with Phil. And about Mary Kate – how long can you hide it – maybe two months?’
‘No one cares if my daughter is pregnant. I never finished college. No one expects great things of my kids.’
‘Excuse me? Kate, your kids are all at the top of the class.’
‘But no one’s watching us. Alex was pulled over once and ticketed for having open beer in the car, and no one cared. I like being anonymous.’
‘Do you honestly think that if one of your twins had made a pregnancy pact with friends when she was in high school, no one would care? Come on, Kate. It’d be on the front page of the paper!’
‘Omigod,’ Kate shrieked. ‘Is that where we’re heading with this?’
Susan couldn’t answer. At every turn, it seemed, there was another layer to the horror. Trying to stay calm, she focused on Phil. ‘That’s another reason to tell Correlli. He has an in with the paper. If he can’t keep it out of the press, at least he might be able to control what they print.’ Tired as she was, frightened as she was, she had to convince Kate. ‘Look. I won’t say anything unless Sunny agrees, too. There’s no point in telling Phil half the story. It’s either all or nothing.’
‘What if you told him without using our names? Wouldn’t that solve your problem?’
‘It might solve mine, but it wouldn’t solve yours. He’d guess right away it was Mary Kate, and if he didn’t, one question to any of Lily’s teachers would bring up her name. That teacher might ask another, who might mention it to a third, and before you know it, speculation is rampant. Far better that I tell it all to Phil in confidence. And here’s the thing. Phil is really good with kids. He might be a help with our girls.’
Kate sputtered. ‘How can he help? It’s not like he has a say in whether Mary Kate keeps her baby, and he sure as hell won’t help pay its way. Oh, we can manage, Susie, I know we can. But I wanted my kids to do more than just manage. I keep asking Mary Kate what she was thinking when she took it upon herself to do this, and each time, she goes off on a long discussion of how she’s looked at it from every angle and knows it will work. But she hasn’t looked at it from my angle or from Will’s – or from Jacob’s. I can’t imagine what he’ll feel when he finds out. Our daughters didn’t look past themselves. They didn’t consider us.’
Relieved that they were on the same side about this at least, Susan said, ‘No. And Phil will know eventually. Let me tell him now.’
‘I should ask Will. He works for the company. What if the company has a problem with the pregnancies? Will Pam cover?’
Once Susan would have answered in the affirmative, but there was so much yet to play out. ‘I don’t know. She stormed in here earlier, angry that I hadn’t told her about Lily. She doesn’t know about Mary Kate and Jess yet, and I couldn’t warn her about Abby, for which I will be eternally damned. Believe it or not, Pam isn’t as worried about Perry & Cass as she is about the School Board. Our being friends puts her in a vise. Honestly? If push comes to shove and she has to take a stand, I’m not sure whose side she’ll take.’
‘She’ll take yours. I’d put money on that. She loves you. You represent everything she wishes she could be.’
‘Unmarried?’ Susan asked dryly.
‘Your career, your focus. She looks to you for advice. I’ve seen it even when Sunny and I are right there. She asks you, not us. By the way, what does Sunny say about this?’
‘She’s my next call. I can wait until you talk this over with Will. Or I can test the waters with Sunny,’ she said, taking a lighter note. ‘I can pretend you’ve given me the okay – you know, take a page from our kids’ book – the old my mommy says it’s okay trick. If Sunny agrees, you won’t have much of a leg to stand on.’
Kate snorted. ‘Like I have much of a leg to stand on now? I still wish you weren’t such a big cheese. But go ahead. I don’t have to ask Will. He’ll know you’re in a bind. Just make sure Phil doesn’t blab until we’re ready. I’m counting on you, Susie. Don’t let us down.’
One of the advantages of being principal was that Susan’s schedule was more forgiving than if, say, there were twenty-five juniors waiting in a classroom for her to discuss Jane Eyre. Emergencies were part of her day. She could postpone a teacher meeting or class visit, and the world accepted that she was dealing with something urgent.
So, asking her assistant to reshedule sophomore English observation, she ignored a computer screen filled with pending email and left school. She walked quickly; it was a cold day. The wind was blowing dried leaves from branches, whipping others up from the ground. When her hair flew, Susan tucked it into her collar and double-wrapped her scarf, leaving a hand in the wool for its warmth. The scarf was of sock yarn from the fall collection – called ‘Last Blaze’ – and perfectly matched the reds and oranges the leaves had so recently been. They were faded now, but her scarf, knit double-stranded in flame-like chevrons, was as bold as ever.
Head low against the wind, she pushed on to Main Street. She trotted past a tour bus that was pulling up at the curb, crossed diagonally, and continued on another block to Perry & Cass Home Goods. One foot in the door, and she was enveloped in the scent of spiced pumpkin. Thanksgiving was coming on fast, with autumnal tableware, wood carving boards and ceramic serving pieces prominently displayed. Seasonal candles and potpourri were on one side, cookware on another, but it was at the back of the store, where yarn filled huge baskets, that Susan spotted Sunny.
She wore dark green today, coordinating slacks, sweater, and hair bow. Susan immediately recognized the sweater as one Sunny had knitted the summer before when the first of the fall colors had been painted and skeined. A rich hunter shot through with tiny wisps of russet and gold, it was one of Susan’s favorites. Sunny was an exquisite knitter, the only one of the four who could be trusted doing straight stockinette. Every stitch was precise.
She was talking to a display designer, seeming engrossed until she saw Susan, at which point she was immediately distracted.
‘Um, that might work,’ she said to the designer, ‘um, it probably will – but don’t line the baskets with anything dark. I want this part of the store to be, um, bright. Excuse me, I’ll be right back.’ Hurrying over, she guided Susan to a nook where mounds of goose-down pillows and comforters would be a buffer, and even then, kept her voice down. ‘What’s happened? Does someone else know?’
‘No. That’s the problem,’ Susan said, and told her about Phil. She hadn’t even finished before Sunny was shaking her head.
‘Uh-uh. I refuse. This is too humiliating. It’d be one thing if Jessica was in love with someone, like Mary Kate is. She could get married and be part of an adorable young couple who, by the way, is having a baby – but that’s not the case at all. Jessica has no intention of getting married and every intention of keeping this baby. I’m so angry with her, I don’t know what to do.’
‘I’m angry at Lily—’
‘Not