The Secret Ingredient for a Happy Marriage by Shirley Jump

Author:Shirley Jump
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2018-05-15T00:00:00+00:00

Sarah sat in the kitchen chair, arms crossed, face defiant. “I didn’t do anything.”

Nora sighed and sat in the opposite chair. The second she’d entered the house after Ben left, she’d heard yelling in the kitchen, with Magpie trying her best to referee. Now Sarah was in a time-out, and Jake was on the back porch with Magpie, his little shoulders hunched. “You got into a fight with your brother. And you broke his truck.”

Sarah shrugged. “He started it.”

“Maybe so, but that doesn’t give you permission to fight with him or break his toys. You’re the older one, Sarah, and you should know better.”

Sarah cut her gaze to the floor. The chair was low enough for her feet to touch the tile, and she swung her bare toes back and forth against the cool melon-colored surface. “Why are we here?”

The question surprised Nora. “I thought it would be fun to go on vacation. Aren’t you having fun?”

Sarah shook her head. Tears brimmed in her eyes. “I want to go home. I want to see Daddy.”

Nora sighed. At some point, she had to tell the kids the truth. Was it wrong to want to keep them in the dark a little longer? To not disrupt their world right away? “We will, soon. And you just got back from seeing Daddy.”

Sarah shrugged. She gripped the side of the chair and lifted her teary eyes to her mother’s. “Why were you fighting with Daddy? Why can’t you just be nice to him?”

God, had Sarah seen their argument in the street? Nora should have thought before she’d said anything to Ben, especially in full view of the house. All she’d seen was white-hot anger. She hadn’t thought about front-facing windows and two kids on the other side. And for the second week in a row, Worst Mother of the Year goes to…Nora Daniels.

Nora’s first response was to lie again, to pretend she and Ben weren’t fighting. But kids picked up on the subtleties, the tension that sparked the air. On the rare occasions when her parents had an argument, she’d known. Ma would be working on one side of the house, Dad on the other, a wall of silence thickening the air.

Over the last two years, the kids had asked her a couple times why she was sleeping in the guest room, and she’d made a joke about Daddy’s snoring. She’d hoped they were young enough not to question that reasoning.

“Your father and I are going to argue sometimes. All people argue, even you and me,” Nora said. “Daddy and I don’t agree on everything, but we agree on how much we love you both.”

“Then why isn’t Daddy here? How come he didn’t stay with us? He needs a vacation too.”

“He couldn’t get time off from work.” Another lie, because she hadn’t even asked Ben.

“But Daddy’s the boss. He can give himself a vacation.”

Eight years old and already so wise, and so aware of all the nuances of the lives of her parents. Nora tried to think back, but all she remembered from her eighth year was the death of her father.

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