Free Between Husbands and Friends by Nancy Thayer Page A

pick up my glass. “I don’t know. I couldn’t catch my breath. Maybe I’m allergic to something. Developing asthma.”
    “You’d better see a doctor.”
    “I probably just need lunch.”
    “It’s not a normal response to stop breathing because you’re hungry,” Stan points out.
    He follows me into the kitchen and leans against the wall, watching me tear lettuce and rinse it. “Want some salad?” I ask. “And I’ve got some great rolls.”
    “You just fed me.”
    “Several hours ago.”
    “Thanks, but I’ve gotta go.”
    I open a can of tuna, then bend over to squeeze the water into the cats’ dishes. Instantly Midnight and Cinnamon race into the room, their tails high, bristling with self-importance. “I’ll call you tomorrow, after I talk to Mrs. Mackey.”
    “Right.” Stan heads off down the front hall, then comes back into the kitchen. “Lucy.”
    “Yes?” I’m shaking a glass jar of salad dressing.
    “You know Max is going to be okay about this CDA thing, don’t you?”
    I’m surprised, touched, and slightly on guard.
    “Of course I know that. Max deals with knottier problems than this every day. It’s just part of his job.”
    Stan holds up his hands as if in surrender. “Hey. Me friend.”
    “I know that, Stan. And I’m grateful.”
    “It’s just that I think maybe you had an anxiety attack. Outside. On the steps. When you dropped your tea.”
    I hesitate before answering, considering his suggestion. “Maybe.”
    “You can look up information about anxiety attacks on the Net,” Stan says. “They’re not unusual, you know.”
    “You’re sweet,” I tell Stan, which I know is the perfect thing to make him cringe. It reminds him that he’s younger than me, that I’m more capable. I have a husband. I have children.“And I will check into it if it happens again.”
    “Cool.” He turns to go.
    “Stan. Jared Falconer has offered me a job.”
    Stan turns back. “Wow. You going to take it?”
    “I don’t know. I’ve got the summer to decide. I, um, I haven’t told Max yet.”
    “Why not?”
    “Well, you know. I mean, the salary’s absurdly high.”
    “Max seems strong enough to deal with that.”
    “And everything would change.”
    “Everything changes all the time anyway.”
    “Yeah, you’re one to talk.”
    “You’d have to commute.”
    “I know.”
    “I’d have to get a new partner.”
    “I know.” I look at Stan. “What do you think I should do?”
    “Man, I don’t know. You better talk to Max.”
    “You’re right. I will.” And I will, but I don’t know when.

Summer 1987
    By the time Margaret was three, I felt like a complicated, accomplished adult. Being pulled in two directions by a husband and baby seemed right for the Gemini I was, calling forth from me qualities of competence and ingenuity I’d never known I had. I could rock a baby in one arm and write an obit with the other. I could talk on the phone to the high school superintendent while changing a diaper. I could appear as a sweet, storybook mother when I kissed my little girl good night, then morph into a sex goddess as I walked into my bedroom. I could speak effectively for the environment at a town meeting, then go home to color princess paper dolls on the floor with my daughter. Suddenly I had so many roles to play that I felt like a small-town TV station that just got cable.
    Yet I was … I won’t say
bored.
I wasn’t bored. But part of me, the girl in me, was not satisfied. Kate was a godsend to me with her sarcasm and trenchant remarks and good honest lust. That we had two children of the same age who actually liked to play with each other seemed like a good omen for the future.
    It would be far too much to hope for that our husbands would like each other. I toyed with the idea of inviting the Cunninghams over for a casual dinner; Max could barbecue swordfish, I could serve my mother’s lemon cream pie, Matthew and Margaret could play in the yard. But when I met Chip