Read Online Sussex Drive: A Novel by Linda Svendsen - Free Book Online Page B

flick for her party. Meryl Streep, who really should have gotten a handle on her menopausal weight, nonetheless was pursued by three handsome middle-aged men, mouths wide open, packages apparent.
    She hit speed-dial to her dad and got his voice mail.
    After breakfast with Peter and Pablo, with contraband cantaloupe snuck to Mister Fuzzy and Señor Wuzzy, their gerbil castle-condo placed carefully on the buffet in the dining room, and after signing Pablo’s ESL test, which he’d been invited to redo, and ensuring that clean gym uniformswere squished into backpacks that couldn’t be over so many crippling kilograms, Becky walked her sons to Rideau River Elementary. Martha had already been chauffeured to the National Gallery of Art, where Greg had “volun-told” her to do an internship during the gap year. Actually, Becky and the boys were driven as far as Acacia Avenue and then followed by security as Becky led them—the boys arguing loudly about which book was more evil,
Warlock
or
The Giver
, both of which Becky had domestically banned for pagan content. For the ten minutes it took to travel the route, she inspected the front doors of the various ambassadors’ residences—the nation who needed to launder (and hem!) their flag, another country whose mansion could use Debbie Travis for a colour makeover—and Stornoway, where the Leader of the Opposition could be seen swaying in his tai chi poses on the raked lawn, intimidating the Iranians across the street.
    The public school, predictably, was composed of older buildings, portable classrooms and an afterthought sort of playground. At the entrance, Becky made nice with the other moms, none of whom ever mentioned the election. Everyone also pointedly avoided talking about the markets and their instantly eroded net worth and dramatically scaled-down foreseeable futures. She lent her purple Sharpie, fished out of a foxhole in her Coach hobo bag, and highly recommended her own Ottawa U. orthodontist to a newcomer from the Netherlands. She always looked out for the NATO allies. A text dinged in her pocket. Her dad,getting back? But no, it was the National Gallery curator’s senior administrative assistant, who had just sent Martha home with flu symptoms. Becky didn’t linger. Some of the women were avoiding eye contact with her.… Whatever.
    Martha rested her forehead on the toilet seat in her personal bathroom, which Peter had taken to calling the Ben. “Martha’s in the Ben again,” he’d say when they were summoned to supper or for a prayer circle. Martha’s bedroom had been Ben Mulroney’s room, Peter informed her. Becky thought that the former prime minister’s son had done well by the Mulroney name, unlike his own father. Greg couldn’t bear to hear the surname in any variant and even flinched at
macaroni
.
    “How you feeling, honeybee?”
    “I don’t feel well, Mom. Thank you for checking on me.” Martha was subdued.
    “Of course, sweetie.” Becky crouched beside her and stroked her hair. “What are your symptoms?”
    “I threw up at the gallery. On my blazer. I feel as if I might faint. I’m tired.”
    Becky felt her daughter’s forehead, which was slightly pimply on the hairline, oily and coolish, clammy.
    “Do you think you might vomit again?”
    “I don’t know, Mom. I wish I could tell you.” She dropped her chin and retched.
    As Becky pulled Martha’s hair back, the hair band slipped into the bowl and Martha gripped the edges of the toilet.Becky didn’t think twice. She plucked the hair band out of the puke, a mash-up of Martha’s tiny breakfast, and tossed it in the sink. Then she washed her hands, dried them and squatted back beside her daughter, rubbing circles of mother comfort onto her back.
    That was the downside to galleries. Tourists were attracted from godforsaken parts of the world, embarking and debarking through a diabolical maze of germ hubs—airports. Or groups of schoolchildren, with their sneezes and snot,