Meg and Jo

by Virginia Kantra

  “His mother’s recipe,” Jo repeated, like she couldn’t get over it.

  Amy shrugged. “I still think he should have called. Or texted. This is sort of stalker creepy.”

  “He is not a stalker,” Jo declared.

  “He left you a package on the porch. That says stalker to me. You should be more careful about setting boundaries.”

  Jo’s eyes narrowed dangerously. And then she laughed. “Look who’s talking. Instagram queen.”

  Amy smiled like a cat in the cream.

  “All right, children,” I said. To my sisters? The twins? “Time to wash up for supper.”

  Peace restored, we cleared away the nail polish and set the table.

  It wasn’t until much later, after my sisters had left for the farm, that I had a chance to open my computer and read Jo’s blog for myself.

  A wave of longing rolled over me as I read. The story was so Jo. It was so us, the way we used to be. The wave receded, leaving an ache behind.

  I was reading the comments—almost a hundred of them—when John came into the kitchen. “Down for the count,” he reported.

  I managed a wobbly smile. “Thanks, honey.” Bedtime with Daddy was becoming a routine. A good one, for all of us.

  He put his hand on my shoulder. “You okay, babe?”

  My throat felt tight. “Jo wrote a story on her blog. About the first Christmas Daddy was deployed.”

  “And that upset you.”

  I swallowed. Nodded. “It’s just . . . It made me remember a lot of things. How special it felt. How close we all were.”

  “You were. You are. Your family intimidated the hell out of me when we started dating. Still does, sometimes. Especially Aunt Phee.”

  I grasped his hand. Squeezed gratefully. “You were wonderful with her last night.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  I told him about the visit to the hospital, about my father’s trip to D.C., about my mother asking him to move out. John listened in his quiet way, not interrupting, his warm, brown eyes on my face. “I thought their marriage was perfect,” I said. “That my mother was perfect. But now . . .”

  “Your mom is great.”

  “My family is a mess.”

  “You’re still a family.”

  “John, my parents are separating.”

  “My dad walked out on my mom. That makes him a lousy dad. But it didn’t make us—Mom and my brother and me—less of a family.”

  I flushed. “It’s just . . . Reading Jo’s story, it took me back. It’s all true, but it’s not true. Like everything I remember, everything I felt, wasn’t real.”

  “People change,” John said. “Bad things happen. That doesn’t mean the good things didn’t happen. You can remember the good things.”

  “My mother did everything for my father.”

  “Well, that’s their problem right there. He took her for granted.”

  “She never complained.”

  “Because that’s not who she is. Abby’s not going to tear your father down. Not to you.”

  “I just don’t understand why she would ask him to leave now.”

  “She’s been thinking about it a long time, you said.”

  “I don’t understand that, either.”

  John rubbed his jaw. “Okay. Say I’ve got this team. One great returning senior and a bunch of other guys. And my star, the senior, he’s all in. He comes to every practice, he busts his ass, he breaks his heart, he wins all his matches. But he’s only one player. He can’t carry the team by himself. At some point—maybe he gets injured, maybe not—the other wrestlers have to pull their weight. They have to put up points for the team to win. When Abby went into the hospital, you stepped up. Your sister stepped up. And your dad walked away.”

  “He didn’t simply walk away,” I said. Remembering what Mom had said. “He had a commitment.”

  “He made a commitment to your mom first. She should have been his first priority.”

  “John.” I looked at him, this man I had married. “Are you sorry you decided to leave coaching? Teaching, I mean.”

  “We decided together. So you could stay home with the kids.”

  “But you love coaching.”

  “I love you more.”

  A little flare of warmth as I digested this. “Do you think my father loves my mother?”

  “As much as he can.”

  “He was always bringing her flowers. Every time I went to visit, she had a different bouquet.”

  John didn’t say anything. I watched the blush creep up his neck and realized. “It was you,” I said. “The poinsettias, the flowers . . . They were all from you.”

  “Big deal,” John said gruffly. “Anybody can buy flowers.”

  “But you did. Oh, John.” I threw myself into his arms. He held me tight. This, this was real. My parents’ marriage was a fantasy, a happily-ever-after that was ending now. And, oh, it hurt to let it go. “I always wanted a marriage like my parents had,” I said, the words muffled against his shoulder.

  “Then you married the wrong guy.”

  “John!”

  He smiled a little. “I’m nothing like your dad.”

  “No,” I said, relaxing against him. “No, you’re not.” I laid my head against his chest, lightness creeping in to fill the hollow inside me. “I guess I don’t have to be like my mother, either.” Doing everything by myself. Fixing everything by myself.

  “I’ve always admired Abby,” John said. “But she’s more than somebody’s mother. She’s more than somebody’s wife. She’s a strong woman. You take after her that way.”

  “Thank you.” I sighed. “You’re wrong about one thing, though.”

  “What’s that?”

  I raised my head, smiling. “I married exactly the right guy.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Jo

  Eric commented on my blog again. It felt wonderful, intimate, and the teensiest bit intrusive, like having him in my apartment. Correction—like having him in my apartment while everybody I knew hung around the fire escape, peering through the window and trying to figure out what we were doing.

  I didn’t know what we were doing.

  But when those tattooed arms popped up in my comment feed, my heart gave a happy little bounce. He started by replying to comments on his mother’s cookie recipe. A top chef, commenting on my blog. My readers loved that.

  There were comments that weren’t all about me or about Eric, too. Remarks about the two of us together, curious questions from total strangers, excited encouragement from friends, funny stories from readers about couples who cooked together or worked together or wanted to one day. Traffic on the entire site was up 500 percent, and my affiliate account was going to reward me with a nice deposit at the end of the month.

  My pal Rachel called from Portland. “Oh my God, Jo, why didn’t you tell me you were seeing Eric Bhaer?”

  “I’m not.” Technically, it was true. I hadn’t seen him for almost two weeks. Thirteen days and ten hours, if I was counting. Which I wasn’t. “I work for him. Worked.”

  “Really? Because according to your blog, you two are a thing.”

  I squirmed with pleasure and discomfort. “It’s complicated.”

  “That’s a Facebook status. Not something you say to one of your closest girlfriends.”

  I laughed. “When—if—I ever have something to tell, you’ll be among the first to know.”

  She told me about spending Hanukkah with her boyfriend’s family in Lake Oswego. She hadn’t found a position with a design firm yet, but she was working as a barista not two blocks from her new apartment, serving coffee to freelancers, hipsters, and stay-at-home moms. I didn’t know if I could relocate for love, the way Rachel had. But she sounded so happy. I was happy for her. We ended the call with promises
to catch up again soon.

  The farm was quiet. Too quiet, with my father gone, even though Amy was staying in her old room down the stairs and Meg came over with the twins almost every day. I wrote another post about the short dark days of the dying year, the fallow pastures, the resting goats. How, under the sleeping surface, the land slowly renewed itself for spring. My old advisor would have sniffed at such an obvious metaphor for the creative process. But Eric wrote back to me. That is, he wrote a long comment about the kitchen in early morning. How he used the quiet hours, the review of old ingredients, the delivery of fresh ones, to create each day’s menu.

  And my readers ate it up. Other chefs commented. I recognized the names. So many hits. So many clicks. More links. More shares.

  Ashmeeta called. “So, you’re in North Carolina,” she said without preamble. “What happened?”

  I explained. Not about Eric, but about my mother and the farm.

  “But you’re going back, right? To New York? To Gusto? I mean, obviously your boss wants you back.”

  Yearning caught my heart and squeezed. “You really think so?”

  “Nah, I bet he stalks all his kitchen staff online,” Ashmeeta scoffed. “Of course he wants you.”

  I reached for my hair to tug it into a ponytail and encountered . . . curls. I was done with running away. And I wasn’t going back. “Actually, I was thinking of letting the apartment go. I mean, I can write anywhere.”

  “So come to Boston. It’s cold, and I’m lonely.”

  I felt the pull of old friendship. “Tempting, thanks.” But I wasn’t making another move without a clear direction.

  “Come on. Clam chowder. Baked beans. Me, on the nights the boss from hell doesn’t make me work late. What more do you need?”

  “I’m not sure.” I looked around at the bare bones of my attic room, the exposed beams of the roof, the hand-stitched quilt on the bed, the shining glimpse of water from the window. “But I’m in a good space for now. And my mother needs me.” Or the goats did.

  I promised to visit soon.

  The goats didn’t need much, just fresh water, clean bedding, and alfalfa hay. The pregnant does ambled around their enclosure, their bulging sides making them look like boats or balloons or basketballs, round and hard.

  “God, I remember that stage,” Meg said when she dropped in that afternoon. She pressed a hand against her stomach. “I thought I’d never see my toes again.”

  “I’ve seen your toes. You’re not missing much.” The curl of her fingers, the curve of her mouth . . . “You’re not, um . . . ?” I glanced at Daisy and DJ, playing peekaboo in the hay.

  “Oh no.” Meg laughed. “We just got a puppy. I don’t need another baby.”

  Clover came up and rubbed against the fence. I scratched her forehead. “Speaking of babies, kidding season starts in a couple of weeks. I’m going to need some help.”

  “Beth will come home from school on the weekends. And Mom usually gets some kids from 4-H to help with the bottle-feeding and cuddling.”

  “What about a vet? Does she still use Dr. Dunn?”

  Meg’s brow creased. “I think so. I have to look at the bill.”

  “I can just call his office.”

  “Wait until I see how much we owe him, okay?”

  “Why?” Her lips pressed together. I felt a tickle of apprehension. “Meg, how much do we owe him?”

  She sighed. “You might as well know. Mom took out a loan on the farm. I made the payment for December from the farmers’ market deposit, but I want to see how the numbers look going into January before we take on any more debt.”

  “And you’re just now telling me this?”

  “We were sort of preoccupied with Mom.”

  “Have you talked to her about this?” She nodded. “Dad?”

  Meg looked away.

  I felt sick. “And he left anyway?”

  She wouldn’t meet my eyes. Because I was Dad’s favorite. Because she wouldn’t criticize him to me, would never make me choose between my loyalty to our father and the rest of the family. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it,” she said. “I’m meeting with the buyer for All Seasons next month. Or if that doesn’t work, I’ll find a food broker. Getting into stores would make all the difference in the world. If we can make it through the kidding season, we’ll be fine.”

  A rush of affection filled me, along with a familiar sense of inadequacy. Responsible Meg.

  Except real people weren’t all one thing, Amy said. Maybe Meg was as mixed up—as full of different strengths and fears, impulses and dreams—as Amy. Maybe she was the responsible one because we didn’t give her a choice. Mini Mom by default.

  I started to apologize. Squeezed her hand instead. “We’ll take care of it together.”

  * * *

  Amy took the news of our parents’ separation better than I expected. “It’s weird thinking of them apart,” she said when she got back from the hospital.

  “They’ve been apart before,” Meg reminded her. She held out her hands to the twins, playing in the kids’ pasture. “Every time Dad was deployed.”

  Daisy and DJ straggled out of the enclosure, muddy and rosy and tired.

  “Yeah, but he always came back,” Amy said.

  “He’ll come back this time, too,” I said with more certainty than I felt. “He’ll apologize or something.”

  “You’re just saying that because you’re his favorite,” Amy said.

  “I’m saying it because nobody could actually live with Aunt Phee.”

  “I could.” Amy tossed her head when I stared. “What? It’s a big house.”

  “She came for Christmas dinner. It was nice,” Meg said.

  “But she’s so judgmental.”

  “She wasn’t judging us.” Meg’s mouth curved. “She was silently correcting our mistakes.”

  Amy snickered, which set us all off.

  Sobering, Meg said, “I don’t think Mom will take Dad back.”

  “I wonder what he did to piss her off,” Amy said.

  I latched the gate carefully behind us. “Besides leaving town while the farm is in debt and she’s recovering from surgery?”

  “I think he stopped seeing her,” Meg said quietly.

  “He visits her every day.”

  “Visited.” Past tense. I winced.

  “He visits lots of patients. He prays with them and cries with them and comforts their families. He shows up for perfect strangers. But not for Mom,” Meg said. “Not for us.”

  Amy feathered her fingers through her hair. “Then she should have said something to get his attention.”

  “She did,” I said.

  We all were silent.

  “Men suck,” Amy said.

  “Not all men,” Meg said.

  “All men but John. And Arm-Porn Guy,” Amy added generously. “Unless you’re still mad at him.”

  I shrugged as we walked toward the house, trying to shake off my discomfort. “I’m not mad. I’m grateful. I figured when I changed the content—when I posted that Christmas story—it would turn off a lot of readers. And instead, they’re more engaged. And I’ve got a lot more of them. Which is good, right? Only my blog’s not all about me anymore. It’s about us. Me and Eric. It’s . . . weird.”

  “Oh my God, you poor baby. People are reading your blog. What a disaster,” Amy said.

  I smiled reluctantly.

  Meg hugged me. “So Eric’s been a help. I know you don’t like relying on other people. But it’s okay to accept a little help sometimes.”

  Amy sniffed. “Says the control queen.”

  “I’m reformed,” Meg said.

  Which made me laugh.

  A red Ferrari muscled up the drive, tires spitting gravel. “Car,” Meg said, reaching for the twins.

  “It
’s Trey,” said Amy.

  “Magnum, P.I.,” I said.

  “Hello, March girls.” His smile was the same, quick and charming. “I came to see . . .” His gaze narrowed. “What did you do to your hair?”

  I raised my hand self-consciously to my head.

  “She cut it, genius,” Amy said.

  “Hey, Trey,” I said. “How was your Christmas?”

  “Dull. Grandfather and I had dinner at the club. I came to see if you’d go out with me tonight. I owe you after Alleygators.”

  “You paid the tab. And the damages,” I said.

  “Yeah, but I usually show a girl a better time.”

  “They probably fake it. To protect your ego,” Amy said.

  That dark gaze sliced to her. “I thought you’d be back in Paris by now.” I frowned. It wasn’t like Trey to be rude.

  “I’m going to New York first.”

  Which was news to me. “When?”

  “For New Year’s. A friend of mine is playing in a band. I leave tomorrow.”

  I watched as he visibly pulled himself together. “Need a ride to the airport?”

  “I’d rather walk.”

  His smile stiffened to a rictus grin. “Come on, Amy. Don’t be like that.”

  She tossed her head. “I’m the same as I ever was. You’re the one with consistency issues.”

  “What is up with you guys?” I asked.

  “Ask him,” Amy said at the same time Trey said, “Nothing.”

  Nothing? The air almost crackled between them. Meg and I exchanged glances.

  “I had a layover in Paris this summer,” Trey said after a charged silence. “Amy offered to show me the sights.”

  “I didn’t know you went to Paris,” I said.

  “You weren’t returning my calls at the time.”

  Meg lifted DJ into her arms. “I can take you to the airport tomorrow,” she said to Amy. Making peace.

  Amy shook her head. “It’s okay. I’ll call an Uber.”

  “I’ll take you,” I said.

  “Great.” She flashed a smile at Trey. “So I guess you’re not needed here.”

  “I see that. So . . .” He glanced at me. “Tonight? Seven?”