Read Online Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It by Maile Meloy - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Maile Meloy
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from you two,” George said. “You’re both so conservative.”
“No we aren’t.”
“In terms of your life choices.”
“Maybe we made her feel safe,” Aaron said. “So she can be brave.”
“It seems genetic,” Aaron said. “It could be. Diabetes is passed that way—over and down, like a knight in chess.”
“No it isn’t!”
“Yes, it is.”
“There’s no gene for bravery that you have and I don’t,” Aaron said.
“Then maybe I taught her to be fearless, by playing those games.”
“Why don’t you have your own kids and speculate about their character traits?”
“If I were having a kid,” George said, “you’d just tell me I couldn’t afford it.”
And that was true.
Aaron didn’t like George’s courting of Claire, and didn’t like George inviting her skiing before he invited Aaron and Bea, but he couldn’t keep her from his own brother. She might need bone marrow someday, he told himself. She might need a kidney. Also there was the fact that Claire loved her uncle. So they went off to ski, for Presidents’ Day, because George had ambivalently asked them to.
THE FIRST MORNING, they all met in the gondola line. Jonna, the new girlfriend, flashed a nervous, welcoming smile, and Claire, back from California on a ticket that wasn’t cheap, hugged her tightly. Then she hugged George. Claire’s cheeks were pink with health and cold and happiness, and she wore a blue fleece hat that said UCLA on it. She asked Jonna questions as the gondola rose, and Aaron was inordinately proud of her: she was so vibrantly young and engaging and unself-absorbed.
Jonna, on the other hand, was a puzzle. If Aaron had met her on the street, he wouldn’t have pegged her for a ski instructor. She didn’t seem hardy or sporty or gregarious; she seemed delicate, prickly, and undernourished. She was wiry, about thirty-five, with a peroxide-white cloud of hair around her face, and a small diamond stud in one nostril that must have been hell in the cold. Aaron gave silent thanks that Claire had not gone in for piercing her face. Then he heard Jonna say that her father was a lift operator when she was a kid, so she skied for free, tagging along after the instructors in place of being babysat. That made sense. She was a ski brat the way people were military brats, and it had made her insecure. That was typical of George’s girls. He liked them needy and dependent, the opposite of Bea, who ran an emergency room and was born to command. The puzzle solved, Aaron stopped listening and watched people make their way—some quick and graceful, and some in a slow, shuddering slide—down the mountain below.
At the top, Claire went off with George and Jonna, the better skiers, and Aaron stayed with his wife. Bea never left the groomed runs where she could make long, easy turns all day without breaking a sweat. Years in the ER had left her with no attraction to danger. On the chairlift, they compared notes on Jonna. Bea guessed it wouldn’t last, that Jonna wouldn’t be able to buoy George up the way he needed.
“There’s a look little girls have who are adored by their fathers,” Bea said. “It’s that facial expression of being totally impervious to the badness of the world. If they can keep that look into their twenties, they’re pretty much okay, they’ve got a force field around them. I don’t know if Jonna ever had it. I think she’s always known about the bad things.”
“Does Claire have the look?” Aaron asked.
Bea turned to look at him, with amused affection behind her goggles. “Are you kidding?” she asked. “With you and George both? She’ll have it when she’s eighty. She’ll never get rid of it.”
THE FIVE ALL MET for lunch, piling hats and gloves on a long table, with the snow melting on their unbuckled boots, carrying cheeseburgers and fries on cafeteria trays. George was slowed by handshakes and questions from people he had taught to ski, and when he finally brought his tray,
“No we aren’t.”
“In terms of your life choices.”
“Maybe we made her feel safe,” Aaron said. “So she can be brave.”
“It seems genetic,” Aaron said. “It could be. Diabetes is passed that way—over and down, like a knight in chess.”
“No it isn’t!”
“Yes, it is.”
“There’s no gene for bravery that you have and I don’t,” Aaron said.
“Then maybe I taught her to be fearless, by playing those games.”
“Why don’t you have your own kids and speculate about their character traits?”
“If I were having a kid,” George said, “you’d just tell me I couldn’t afford it.”
And that was true.
Aaron didn’t like George’s courting of Claire, and didn’t like George inviting her skiing before he invited Aaron and Bea, but he couldn’t keep her from his own brother. She might need bone marrow someday, he told himself. She might need a kidney. Also there was the fact that Claire loved her uncle. So they went off to ski, for Presidents’ Day, because George had ambivalently asked them to.
THE FIRST MORNING, they all met in the gondola line. Jonna, the new girlfriend, flashed a nervous, welcoming smile, and Claire, back from California on a ticket that wasn’t cheap, hugged her tightly. Then she hugged George. Claire’s cheeks were pink with health and cold and happiness, and she wore a blue fleece hat that said UCLA on it. She asked Jonna questions as the gondola rose, and Aaron was inordinately proud of her: she was so vibrantly young and engaging and unself-absorbed.
Jonna, on the other hand, was a puzzle. If Aaron had met her on the street, he wouldn’t have pegged her for a ski instructor. She didn’t seem hardy or sporty or gregarious; she seemed delicate, prickly, and undernourished. She was wiry, about thirty-five, with a peroxide-white cloud of hair around her face, and a small diamond stud in one nostril that must have been hell in the cold. Aaron gave silent thanks that Claire had not gone in for piercing her face. Then he heard Jonna say that her father was a lift operator when she was a kid, so she skied for free, tagging along after the instructors in place of being babysat. That made sense. She was a ski brat the way people were military brats, and it had made her insecure. That was typical of George’s girls. He liked them needy and dependent, the opposite of Bea, who ran an emergency room and was born to command. The puzzle solved, Aaron stopped listening and watched people make their way—some quick and graceful, and some in a slow, shuddering slide—down the mountain below.
At the top, Claire went off with George and Jonna, the better skiers, and Aaron stayed with his wife. Bea never left the groomed runs where she could make long, easy turns all day without breaking a sweat. Years in the ER had left her with no attraction to danger. On the chairlift, they compared notes on Jonna. Bea guessed it wouldn’t last, that Jonna wouldn’t be able to buoy George up the way he needed.
“There’s a look little girls have who are adored by their fathers,” Bea said. “It’s that facial expression of being totally impervious to the badness of the world. If they can keep that look into their twenties, they’re pretty much okay, they’ve got a force field around them. I don’t know if Jonna ever had it. I think she’s always known about the bad things.”
“Does Claire have the look?” Aaron asked.
Bea turned to look at him, with amused affection behind her goggles. “Are you kidding?” she asked. “With you and George both? She’ll have it when she’s eighty. She’ll never get rid of it.”
THE FIVE ALL MET for lunch, piling hats and gloves on a long table, with the snow melting on their unbuckled boots, carrying cheeseburgers and fries on cafeteria trays. George was slowed by handshakes and questions from people he had taught to ski, and when he finally brought his tray,
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