Duet in September (The Calendar Girls)

by Gina Ardito

  I let myself in and tried to breathe in the comforts of home, but came away chilled and empty. Food held no appeal, nor did sleep. Only one place could soothe my frazzled nerves. I changed my clothes and headed for my hot spot.

  While my speakers blasted an assortment of raucous classic rock, I focused on creating new works in glass. I had no particular designs in mind. My brain couldn’t seem to land on any particular idea so I just lost myself in the routine of heating, swirling, blowing, and shaping. Both my cell and house phone rang at least a dozen times. I ignored them. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, didn’t want to relive memories of the last few weeks. I only wanted peace. Impossible, I know, but hey. I could wish, right?

  Funny thing about glass: turn the heat up high enough, and it adapts to any shape with the right amount of cutting and scraping. People, on the other hand, more fragile than glass, tended to disintegrate under fire. I hated myself for what I’d said to Aidan today. Poisonous words meant to kill any tenderness he might harbor. I shook off the image of his stricken expression and chugged from my water bottle to remove the bitter taste from my mouth.

  Hours later, David Lee Roth wailed at me to Jump when I assessed the night’s work. I placed the finished pieces in the lehr and stared in chagrin. I’d created half a dozen robin’s egg blue wine goblets, etched with stick figure piping plovers in the center of each bowl. Not hard to see where my mind had taken up residence. The cracks in my heart splintered, and I sank to the floor, a weepy mess.

  A mere day had passed, and I missed him already. After my mother left, Paige, Dad, and I had struggled to find a new normal. Now I’d struggle again to find a life without Aidan. I’d known him less than a month, yet in that brief time he’d tied my world—and my heart—into knots that kept him wrapped up inside me.

  If I were a different person, living a totally different life, I would have clung to him, maybe even married him eventually. If I could have been worthy of a prince like him. I didn’t care about his family money, although I would have preferred he had a lot less zeros attached to his bank balance. His pedigree, on the other hand, I didn’t deserve.

  The Coffields were Long Island royalty, and I was the daughter of the town tramp. I didn’t even know the man who fathered me. He could’ve been a criminal, for all I knew. I bet the contessa would be thrilled to see her son linked to a woman with a mottled past. Didn’t every woman in high society want a bastard for a daughter- in-law?

  I was getting ahead of myself, of course. Aidan and I had barely started dating, and here I was anticipating marriage trouble. Not that we’d ever have reached that stage. Eventually, I would have had to tell him the truth. Once he knew about my unknown father, my mother’s abandonment, he’d realize I was shoddy goods and move on to some Hamptons princess. I had hoped the pain would be less brutal now rather than later, but tonight, my heart felt shredded.

  My cell phone rang again, rattling against the insulated box on the wall. In the break between songs blaring from my speakers, I caught the familiar vocals of Twisted Sister. Paige. Well, even talking to my sister beat sitting on a dirty floor, mourning what could never be. I eased myself to a standing position and carefully removed the phone from its safe haven. Hitting the connect button, I placed the phone to my right ear, and plugged a finger in my left ear.

  “What?” I shouted over the music.

  “I’m in your yard,” Paige shouted back. “Drop what you’re doing and come out with your hands up.”

  Cute. Apparently, my sister, happy in love with the town sheriff, assumed law and order humor would amuse me. She was dead wrong.

  “Give me five minutes.” I could have said no, but what would be the point? She’d only hang around outside until I finally made an appearance. Mom might wait ten hours, but Paige could stay for weeks. I finished cleaning up, turned off the equipment, and silenced the music before stepping out into the late summer night.

  The light sea breeze chilled my overheated skin. Crickets chirped. A rogue firefly blinked yellow-green in search of a mate. I knew exactly how desperate that bug felt.

  “It’s about time.” My sister stood outside in the copse of maple trees that separated my yard from my neighbor’s. She wasn’t alone.

  At first, I thought Sam had come with her. As I tread closer, I realized the shadow behind Paige was much too small to be big, burly Sam. I sucked in a sharp breath when her companion’s identity crystallized in my head.

  “Why’d you bring her here?” I demanded of Paige.

  My mother stepped out of the tree line. “Because I want to clear up a few misconceptions with both of you.”

  I turned toward my house. “I have nothing to say to you.”

  “You made the accusation, Nia Elise Wainwright,” my mother snapped. “And now you’ll give me an opportunity to defend myself. You owe me that much.”

  I whirled on her, my hands fisted to keep my claws sheathed. “You’re the second person today to tell me I owe them something. And since I had to give him up, thanks to you, I think my debts are pretty much paid.”

  “Nia?” Paige took a hesitant step forward. “What do you mean you ‘had to give him up’? Who? Aidan?”

  Tears blocked my throat and, on a quick nod, I raced toward the sanctuary of my house.

  “Why?” My sister’s question came from too close behind me, and I turned to see her jogging nearer.

  “Ask her.” I stabbed a finger at Mom before opening my front door to slip inside.

  Paige slapped a hand on the door and stuck her foot in the jamb, in a successful bid to keep me from avoiding her. “Talk to her,” she said in a low voice. “Give her a chance.”

  “To what? To lie to me the way she so obviously lied to you?”

  My mother reached the porch in time to hear my comments. “I’ve never lied to Paige. Or to you, for that matter.”

  “You said Donald Wainwright was our father,” I reminded her, ignoring my sister’s gasp while I turned my resentment on the woman I believed responsible for my pain. “But we both know that’s not true, don’t we?”

  “Wrong, Nia. Legally, Donald Wainwright was your father, and I’m your mother.”

  “That hardly gels with Daddy’s doctor’s report that showed we couldn’t possibly be related. ‘Legally.’” I framed the word with curved fingers and an emphasis toward sarcasm. “What exactly does that mean anyway?”

  My mother waved a large manila envelope under the yellow glow of the porch light. “It means, young lady, that you and your sister were adopted.”

  Chapter 25

  Nia

  “Adopted?” I stared at my mother, aghast. Adopted. The idea had never occurred to me. Why would it?

  My mother must have smelled my blood in the air because she stepped forward and shoved my front door open with one quick punch. “Can we come in now or do you want your neighbors to hear all the gory details of your private life?”

  I allowed them into the foyer, too shell-shocked to do more than shake my head. I kept hoping I’d wake and find today hadn’t even happened yet. “Wait, hold up. What do you mean, we’re adopted? That’s impossible. I mean…” I pointed between the two of them. “…Paige looks just like you. She always has.”

  My mother spared a smile in my sister’s direction. “Paige looks just like her father.” Without waiting for any additional direction, she strode into the dining room and slapped her golden envelope on the gleaming top at the head of the cherry wood table. She pulled out the chair there and sat before turning to the two of us. “Care to join me?”

  We could only follow, struggling to catch up physically and mentally.

  “You know our real father?” my sister asked as she took the seat on our mother’s left. “Who is he?”

  “My brother, Charlie.”

  Her brother? So, wait. Our uncle, who we’d never met, was actually our father? My brain spun in a vortex of questions. My knees couldn’t take anymore, and I sank into the chair on Mom’s right.

 
“Did you know our mother, too?” I prodded.

  “Not really,” Mom said. “I never technically met her. At least, not in the way you would expect to meet your sister-in-law. She was already comatose by the time your father—I mean Don—and I reached the hospital.”

  “Comatose?”

  “Mmm-hmm. Your mother suffered major complications during her pregnancy: high blood pressure, dizzy spells, blurry vision, all sorts of weird stuff. Within hours of the delivery, her kidneys shut down. She passed away three days later.” She shook her head slowly. “At least she got to hold you both and tell you she loved you before she died.”

  “And our dad?” I said. “Your brother? What happened to him?”

  Again, Mom shook her head. “Charlie was a mess even before his wife died. Afterwards, he was…lost. He wasn’t prepared to take on the responsibility of newborn twins. He begged Don and me to take you both, to adopt you and raise you as our own, and we did.” She scooped up the envelope and unwound the string clasp. “It’s all in here. The adoption records, your birth certificates, there’s even some photos of Charlie and Patty.”

  She flipped open the top and rifled through the contents. When she pulled out a photograph and slapped it on the table next to me, I drew closer. A bride and groom, beaming with love and joy, smiled up at me. The bride was tall with long red hair skimming her bare shoulders and hazel eyes that crinkled at the corners. I had the groom’s chin and nose, but otherwise, the bride and I could have passed for…well…for twins.

  “She looks a little like me,” I said and gently traced the slope of the woman’s face. My real mother’s face.

  As for Paige, put her in a tux and glue a pencil-thin blond moustache above her lip and bam! She was Charlie.

  “Look,” I told her and held up the photo.

  Paige leaned over the table to get closer to the image of our parents. “Wow,” she murmured.

  I stared into my sister’s eyes. The same thoughts must have run through both our heads. In the course of the day, we’d lost our mother and father, found two new parents, and lost one yet again.

  A sad smile creased Paige’s face, and I turned back to Mom. “So where’s our father now? Why didn’t we ever meet him?”

  Mom sighed, and her blue eyes watered. “Eight years after you were born, Charlie was killed when his motorcycle slid on a wet patch of asphalt and collided with a truck.”

  “Eight years later? Around the time you…” Paige didn’t finish the sentence. She didn’t have to.

  Mom nodded. “The lowest point in my life.” Her voice was rough, sandpaper on an open wound.

  “Why didn’t anyone ever tell us the truth?” I asked. “I mean, in this town? Surely everyone knew we were adopted. That’s an awfully big secret for this town to keep.”

  “No one knew. Well, no. That’s not true exactly. Don and I knew. Your grandparents knew. No one else.”

  “But how could that be? I mean, you couldn’t exactly be your slim, petite self around the gossips in this town one day, and then present your new twin girls the next without pricking some old bat’s sonar.”

  “Sure I could.”

  My mother then proceeded to explain her history to us, how she met our father—Don—the made-up pregnancy scare to get married, her loneliness and isolation, first in this house and later in the house on Wavecrest. Paige seemed to take most of this information in stride, which meant she already knew a lot of the details. I, on the other hand, drank it all in with varying degrees of bafflement, empathy, and outright wonder.

  “What about school records?” Paige asked. “Didn’t the school require copies of our birth certificates to enroll us?”

  I knew how they’d meandered around that issue. “Grandma,” I told Paige. “Grandma was the secretary for the Snug Harbor superintendents for twenty years.”

  Mom nodded.

  One question ran uppermost in my mind, and I had no ready answer. “Why didn’t Daddy tell us when we were older?”

  “I would imagine because he didn’t want you to feel abandoned by the last remaining parent you had.” She offered me a sad smile. “It’s why I left you in his care. He and I were never right for each other, but he was, by far, the very best father for you girls. I never doubted he’d take care of you and love you until the day he died.”

  “He did. He was the best dad there ever was.” Tears stung my eyes.

  I would have thought after all the crying I’d done in the last twenty-four hours, the inner well would be dry by now. But no. That familiar lump rose in my throat, and I sniffed loudly. Paige and my mother joined in and soon, all three of us were a weepy mess. We cried for what we’d lost: people and time, as well as for what we’d gained: knowledge and truth. My heart and conscience bled as I thought of all the horrible thoughts I’d ever conceived about this woman. She wasn’t a saint; she’d made mistakes. Who hadn’t? She was, after all, like the rest of us, human.

  For the first time in twenty five years, I placed my hand inside this woman’s. “I am so sorry, Mom.”

  She squeezed my fingers. “I’m sorry, too, baby.”

  Love surged between us.

  Mom pushed her chair back and rose, arms open wide. “Can I hug both my girls now? Please?”

  We practically tripped over ourselves to embrace. Arms encircled, more tears flowed, and joy infused us from head to toe. Nothing in the world had ever felt as warm and wonderful as this moment.

  “Now that that’s all settled,” Paige interjected from her place on Mom’s right side. “What’s for dinner? I’m starving.”

  I laughed and so did Mom. Mom. Weird, huh? I couldn’t wait to tell Aidan about—

  Aidan.

  I loosened my embrace around Mom and Paige to turn away. No way did I want them to see me cry. I was pretty sure they’d discern the difference between tears of misery and tears of joyful reunion. “I can probably whip up something quick,” I murmured and aimed for the fridge to hide my face from their scrutiny.

  “Nia?” Paige, of course, saw right through my subterfuge. “What’s wrong?”

  “How hungry are you really?” I said. “I can stir fry a quick orange chicken with broccoli, if that’s good enough. Or I can pull a tray of eggplant parmigiana out of the freezer if you’re looking for something more substantial.” My voice cracked on the last word.

  Substantial. I could have had something substantial in my life. Maybe. Instead, I’d taken a man’s heart, more fragile than glass, and shattered it.

  I yanked open the refrigerator door only to have a hand reach out and slam it shut again.

  “Hey.” Paige said low in my ear. “Talk to me.”

  I clamped my lips closed and shook my head.

  “What happened with Aidan?” she prodded.

  Broken at the mention of his name, I sank to my knees on the floor and covered my face with my hands. “I screwed up big time.”

  Paige knelt beside me. “Tell me.”

  “Nia?” Now Mom joined the circle around the refrigerator. “What’s wrong, baby girl?”

  I couldn’t spill my guts in front of her. Especially since her alleged past was the reason I’d decimated my relationship with Aidan.

  My sister must have sensed my reasoning because she answered for me. “Love problems.”

  Dismissive, but accurate I guess.

  Mom took my hand and pulled me up and into her arms once again. “Now you listen to me, Nia,” she murmured. “Misunderstandings can be fixed. We’re proof of that, right? Whatever the problem is, don’t let it simmer. Talk it out.” She stepped back to include Paige in the rest of her conversation. “As for dinner, I’ll pass. I’m going back to my hotel.”

  “Wait, Mom,” Paige said. “I’ll drive you.”

  “Nonsense. It’s a beautiful night for a walk. I’ve given you two a lot to discuss. I’m leaving that envelope for you to go through. There are documents in there you should review. I’ll be at The Hermitage until the thirtieth, if you want to contact me. No
pressure, mind you. Just in case you have any questions. And I’m registered under my maiden name. Harris.” She winked. “I still know how to fly under the radar.”

  She hugged and kissed us both, and on the click-clack of heels across the parquet floor, disappeared into the night.

  “She’s different than I remember,” Paige remarked, staring after her. “More…I don’t know. Just ‘more.’”

  “Mom 2.0,” I replied.

  She laughed. “Yeah, maybe.” Cocking her head, she ran a gentle hand up my sleeve. “Are you okay?”

  “No,” I admitted. “I can’t believe I screwed up my life so totally. If I hadn’t said anything stupid this morning…” I shook off the memory of the bitter words. “And on top of that, I reek.” I turned my head to sniff my shoulders. “God, how can you stand to be so close to me?”

  Rather than stepping away, she edged closer and wrapped an arm around me. “We’re twins. We stick together through good and bad. If you stink, I kick your butt upstairs to shower while I fix something for dinner. When you hurt, I find a way to bandage the boo-boo.”

  I sighed. “Not this time.”

  She waved a hand. “Defeatist attitude due to delirium caused by body odor,” she rattled off. “Go shower. Then we’ll figure something out.”

  “Why can’t you mind your own business?”

  “A., because I’m crazy in love, thanks in part to you, and I want to return the favor.”

  “And b.?”

  “B., because anyone who looks at you and Aidan can see you’re falling for each other. One thing I learned lately is that love isn’t conditional. If he really loved you yesterday, and I could tell he did, he still loves you today. He’s just hurt right now. But we’ll fix that.”

  I arched a brow at her. “Yeah? How?”

  She shoved me away. “Shower first. Your fumes are killing my brain cells. I hope you’ve got that eggplant in a microwaveable dish for defrosting. Because I don’t relish taking an icepick to my dinner, and I need a substantial meal to play Cupid. Now, scoot!”