Page 38 of The Wives of Hawthorne Lane

Georgina

Hawthorne Lane

Georgina adjusts the knife and fork beside her plate, nudging them into neat parallel lines, before checking her watch again.

Sebastian is nearly half an hour late now.

Across the table, Christina is on her phone, texting or playing some sort of game, Georgina isn’t sure.

She normally doesn’t allow cell phones at the dinner table, but Christina has been made to wait on her brother, who may or may not decide to grace them with his presence, so she’s letting it slide tonight.

Georgina called Sebastian earlier and left him a message reminding him of what time he was expected home for dinner, but he hadn’t responded, nor has he bothered to come home on time.

Colin has always stressed the importance of their children being served homemade meals, family dinners.

Though the same rules have never applied to Colin, Sebastian is certainly aware that they still apply to him.

It frustrates Georgina to no end that he continues to flout them.

“You might as well start eating,” she tells Christina.

Her daughter looks up from her phone, blinking at Georgina from behind the lenses of her glasses as though her mother had just spoken a foreign language.

“Go on,” Georgina adds. “No sense in letting it get cold.”

Christina sets down her phone and begins to serve herself a portion of Georgina’s roasted asparagus.

“So how was school today?” Georgina asks across the near-empty dining room.

“Er, fine,” Christina replies. “I had an English test. It was easy, though.”

“That’s great,” Georgina says, nodding her approval.

“I actually wanted to talk to you about something.” Christina sets her fork down, stealing a quick glance at her darkened phone screen.

Georgina forces herself not to react. Not to let her face betray the fact that she already knows about Lucas, knows that Christina has secretly been spending time with him.

She’d been waiting for her daughter to open up to her about this new relationship, and this seems like the perfect time to have that conversation, while it’s just the two of them.

Georgina is glad that Christina feels comfortable coming to her with such things, that she’s built a strong enough foundation for their relationship that they can talk like this.

“I’m thinking of applying to UCLA next year.”

“What? California?” This isn’t at all what Georgina was expecting. “But you’ll only be a junior! You still need to finish high school!”

“There’s an exchange program,” Christina says, her eyes on her plate. She picks up her fork and pushes a stalk of asparagus around the edge. “I’d do my senior year in California, get a head start on college courses.”

“Honey, I don’t know…” Georgina thinks of her daughter all alone on the other side of the country, and then she thinks about how Colin would react to this request. He’d never allow it. “You’re so young to be so far from home.”

“It would be a long shot that I’d even get in, but there’s a fellowship I could apply for.” The words bound eagerly from Christina’s mouth now, as if they’re competing to be heard. “My English teacher said that he’d help me with my application, and he thinks that I could have a real chance and—”

“No.” It comes out more forcefully than Georgina intended, and Christina falls silent, her eyes round in surprise.

Georgina feels terrible. She could hear in Christina’s voice how excited she is about this opportunity, how important this is to her, but there’s no sense in giving her false hope.

Even if Georgina were to agree to it, she’d never be able to get Colin on board.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t think it’s a good idea. ”

“But I didn’t even tell you about the program. Maybe I could—”

The front door swings open, the sound of it interrupting the moment.

“Sebastian?” Georgina calls as she stands from the table.

Christina looks at her, a mixture of disappointment and resignation heavy in her pretty green eyes.

Georgina’s heart contracts in her chest. Her daughter is so young to have her dreams snatched away from her, but she doesn’t know how to help her.

“We can talk more about this another time, okay? I promise.” She wishes that Christina would understand that Georgina isn’t trying to hurt her, she’s trying to protect her, to let her down more gently than her father would.

“Yeah,” Christina says with a sigh. “Fine.” She slouches in her seat.

Sebastian saunters into the dining room. “I’m home. You can stop calling me now.”

Georgina releases a heavy sigh, folding her arms over her chest. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“No.” Sebastian shrugs. “Not really.”

“You were supposed to be home for dinner.”

“Well, I wasn’t.”

“I can see that,” Georgina snaps.

Sebastian rolls his eyes as if his mother is nothing more than a bothersome gnat. “I had dinner out anyway.”

“Out?”

“Yes,” Sebastian sneers. “Out. As in outside of this house, as in with my friends and not my mother. ” He spits this last word as though it’s unpalatable to his tongue.

“That’s incredibly disrespectful, Sebastian. You can’t speak to—”

“Mom!” he shouts.

From the corner of her eye, Georgina sees Christina jump in her seat.

“It was one fucking dinner, okay?” Sebastian’s palm comes down so hard on the table that the china rattles. “Get off my fucking back about it!”

Georgina stares, open-mouthed, at her son. At this nearly grown man standing before her with such disdain in his eyes. When had he become so angry? When did he start to hate her this much?

“What exactly is going on here?”

Everyone in the room turns at the same time to face Colin, who stands menacingly in the entryway to the dining room.

“Well?” he demands.

No one dares to speak.

“Sebastian,” he barks. “Outside. Now.”

—

Georgina paces the floor of her bedroom.

She’d come up here earlier after Colin pulled Sebastian outside, hoping that if she cracked open the window above the yard, she might be able to catch a snippet of their conversation.

She hoped Colin would take a firm hand with Sebastian for once, that he’d rein their son in where she’d clearly lost control.

Georgina couldn’t make out much of what was said but she distinctly heard the sound of laughter floating toward her.

As she waits for Colin to come upstairs to change, she busies herself by fluffing the pillows, smoothing the duvet, reorganizing the books on his nightstand so that the corners align just so.

It’s what she does when she’s anxious: She cleans.

It brings her some comfort to take control of her surroundings, to bring order to what she can.

Georgina recognizes that this is likely a by-product of growing up in the relentless chaos of her mother’s hoarding, feeling ashamed of the dust and the dirt but being powerless to change it.

Though, Georgina supposes, she could certainly have developed worse habits.

She hears the heavy thud of Colin’s footsteps ascending the stairs, and in moments he is pushing open the bedroom door.

Georgina looks at him expectantly, waiting for him to recount the details of his discussion with Sebastian, but he says nothing as he pulls on the knot of his tie, loosening it around his neck.

Normally she’d take Colin’s lead, wait for him to talk, but he looks, Georgina thinks, surprisingly calm, given the circumstances. Perhaps she could just ask…

“How did it go?”

“Huh?” Colin works at his cuff link. “Oh, fine. It’s been sorted out.”

“So you spoke to Sebastian about his behavior?” She can’t stop thinking about the laughter she overheard.

She imagines the two of them outside sharing a joke, doling out pats on the back.

She wonders if the tone would have been so jovial if it was Christina’s behavior in question.

She doubts it. Colin has always been far too indulgent with Sebastian.

Colin’s hand stills on his cuff, and Georgina freezes. He looks at her, his eyes as cold as ice. “I told you I handled it.”

“Sorry,” she says, wringing her hands nervously.

“And stop fidgeting like that. You’re like a damn child.”

Georgina forces her hands to her sides, and as she does, her diamond bracelet catches on the fabric of her dress.

She feels the compulsion to fix it, so strong that it’s a physical itch that won’t be satisfied until she can correct the flaw, but she doesn’t.

She makes herself stand there and ignore the imperfection.

“So how was your day?” Colin asks, his voice suddenly honey-sweet.

The unexpected change of direction is dizzying, and Georgina finds herself at a loss to remember what exactly she’d done all day. “G-good,” she stutters.

“G-good?” he parrots. “Any specifics?”

“Well, I did some gardening, I picked up your dry cleaning…” She counts the tasks off on her fingers as she goes back through her day, wondering why he’s suddenly so interested in how she spent her time.

Colin rarely asks about the banality of Georgina’s day-to-day activities.

There must be a right answer here, something specific he’s fishing for, but she can’t imagine what it is.

“Oh, I also finalized some of the details for the fall festival. I checked in with all the vendors, and the permit for the fireworks show came in, so—”

“Did you have any company at the house?”

“Company?”

“Yes. You know what that means, don’t you? Was anyone here at the house? Someone who doesn’t live here?”

“No…” She didn’t have any company today, so she’s not sure what Colin is getting at, but she knows her husband, and she knows there must be a reason he’s asking.

“Well, that’s interesting,” he says, his finger tapping on his chin performatively. “Because Sebastian told me that you did.” Something changes in him then, as if a cold front has swept across his handsome face, turning it to something ugly and hard.

“I don’t know what—”