The Hot Flash Club Strikes Again by Nancy Thayer Read Free Book Online Page A

with the man she would have lived in a root cellar if he’d asked her. She told him of course.
    They married, and Julia moved into Tim’s sweet little saltbox with its picket fence and wild-cherry tree. Julia, who had decorated her own apartment in cool teak, natural hemp, and ivory linen, became chatelaine of the home daintily, and in Julia’s view, gaggingly, decorated by Annette, Tim’s first wife. The wall-to-wall carpets Julia vacuumed were deeply plush rose-silver. The dishes she washed were white, adorned with roses, and the kitchen wallpaper had roses twining up a green trellis. Belinda’s room was a symphony of lavender. Julia turned the pink-and-gold, blossom-bedecked master bedroom into a guest bedroom for Annette’s parents, who lived in western Massachusetts and often visited. She redecorated the former guest bedroom for herself and Tim, stripping away the chiffon, scarf-valanced, rose curtains, brocade spread, and floral sheets. She painted the walls a warm cream and hung thirty of her favorite framed photographs. She chose a bed with a plain teak headboard, and a dresser of matching wood. Now, when she needed to catch her breath or escape from the smothering flowers, she had a place to come.
    Tim cleared a space in the basement for Julia’s workshop, and she did work there, but not as often as she’d intended. Running a home and taking care of Belinda took a lot of time, and she wanted to do it right. She wanted very much to help Belinda feel safe with her. She knew it was crucial to provide a nurturing, familiar environment for the child.
    On the other hand, Julia mused now, as she folded Belinda’s clean clothing into the drawers exactly as Belinda liked it, sometimes Julia felt she was ruled by a mute, midget tyrant who could have given Gandhi a few lessons in passive resistance.
    If Belinda didn’t like something, she stuck out her lower lip, dropped her eyes to the floor, and looked pathetic. She refused to leave the house unless her clothing was put on in an inexplicable order. She wouldn’t eat unless the food was presented to her in a specific sequence, and vegetables she wouldn’t eat at all. When Tim suggested she stop watching television and get ready for bed because she had school the next day, tears threatened, with the result that most nights Belinda fell asleep in front of the TV.
    Recently, it seemed to Julia that Belinda’s compulsions were increasing. This week at the grocery store, when Julia refused to let Belinda take a pack of Oreo cookies off the shelf and eat them right then and there, Belinda had burst into tears and refused to walk with Julia, slumping down in a dead weight. Julia had had to leave her loaded cart, carry Belinda to the car, drive back to the house, and return to shop at night when Tim was home. Yesterday, at the mall, Belinda had imperiously pointed at an expensive Madame Alexander doll. “Sorry, sweetie, not today,” Julia had said. Belinda sagged, weeping like an abandoned angel. Again, Julia had had to curtail her shopping.
    She’d been so embarrassed, carrying a seven-year-old, sobbing girl through the mall. People cast curious and sometimes critical eyes her way. Julia was terrified that Belinda would throw a similar fit in front of Agnes, Belinda’s maternal grandmother, Annette’s mother, who disliked Julia and watched eagerly for signs that Julia was making Belinda unhappy. One of the difficulties was that Agnes’s path to complete happiness was paved with sugar—
lots
of sugar, the same nutritional monster prohibited by all the savvy moms of Belinda’s peers. Whenever Agnes came for a visit, she brought a jar of Marshmallow Fluff. No matter the time of day, she’d bustle into the kitchen to make Belinda and herself peanut-butter-Fluff sandwiches. “Mm-
mm
!” she’d gloat. “Isn’t this delicious!” Belinda would happily nod, slurping away at the gooey mess, while Julia kept herself busy preparing tea or coffee, valiantly keeping her