by Jane Green
Stephen is a little different. He is, for starters, exceptionally tall. Nell is no slouch at five foot ten and a half, and while she’s certainly more comfortable with her height now than when she was in high school, the fact of Stephen’s height alone—he towers over her at six foot four—makes her feel little, and vulnerable. His height reminds her of Lewis Calder. Much about Stephen reminds her of Lewis Calder. He is big and brawny, with an easy smile and low expectations.
She liked him the very first time he came in, felt him watching her as she moved about the room, collecting empty coffee cups, stopping to chat with the locals, grabbing a mop to clean up some spills on the floor.
Nell had not had a date in years. She tried not to think about it too often; when she did she’d sometimes start to worry there might be something wrong with her because she just never missed having a man in her life. For years she buried herself in single-mom-dom, raising River, consumed by the work involved in having to be the mother, father, babysitter, farmer, coffee-shop owner, everything.
People would often ask her where her parents lived, and when she said her father had moved to California a few years back, but her mother was in Westport, they would exclaim how lucky she was—what a help she must be!
While she was a better grandmother than mother, Ronron could never be relied upon to pick up any slack. She was more a good-time grandmother: huge fun if she was in the mood and didn’t have any other plans, but she would never stop and cancel something she wanted to do for anyone else.
Ronni is still shockingly self-absorbed. That is what Nell would say about her mother, if she was ever inclined to talk about her at all. But what would be the point? Nell isn’t the type of woman to moan and groan about her terrible childhood, the deficiencies of her own parents that have led to her leading a life alone.
Nor does she need to punish her mother for it, unlike Lizzy, who tells everyone who will listen about what a narcissist her mother is, and Meredith, who is over the pond and far away, and never, almost never, comes home.
Neither of her sisters is able to accept their mother with all her self-absorbed, dramatic flaws. They resent her for not being warm, interested, concerned—for not being maternal. Whereas Nell learned never to really expect anything from anyone, not since Lewis Calder left her high and dry with a baby in her belly. She finds life is generally easier when you operate this way. And as a result, she feels less angry at her mother than her sisters seem to be.
Nell doesn’t really accept Ronni, but her proximity means she is the one to whom her mother turns when she needs something. Nell does a basic job of looking after her. She was the one who insisted, finally, on her mother going to a doctor. The falls were happening more and more, and the last time she had visited, she watched as a cup of hot tea fell out of her mother’s hand.
Her mother has always, for years and years, complained steadily but then insisted that she was fine. Nell has long been in the habit of believing her, because of her mother’s legendary hypochondria and bids for attention. If there truly were something wrong, surely she would be milking it for everything she could get.
And yet. So she insisted her mother go see a doctor. Afterward, Ronni did not report back immediately, as she normally would have done. When Nell did eventually see her, she had a limp and a cane. She said she was suffering from some motor neuron issues, which could be managed. She said she was changing her diet, cutting out all carbohydrates and sugar, trying to reduce inflammation. Hopefully, she said, she would be walking without a cane again soon.
“Maybe River can come and spend some time with me,” her mother said. “When he has a break from grad school.”
Nell stared at her. Her mother had always swooped in for the occasional visit with her grandson. She’d never suggested he come and stay with her.
“Maybe the three of us could go on a vacation somewhere,” her mother went on, as Nell resisted the urge to gape at her with open mouth.
Nell hasn’t had a vacation in years. She’s much too controlling to leave the farm in the hands of anyone else. Why on earth would her mother want to have a vacation with the three of them? Frankly, Nell can’t think of anything worse. Not to mention, what would she do on a vacation? Lie on a beach and deepen her already dark farmer’s tan? She shudders in horror. She has always been happiest working.
She works hard. Raising her son, running the farm, ignoring vacations. She has been perfectly happy with her life, although as River grew older she would occasionally think of what it might be like to have someone around. But whenever that thought arose, she’d remind herself that she lived in a relatively small town, a town in which she pretty much knew everyone, and if she spent the rest of her life on her own, that would also be absolutely fine. There was more than enough to keep her busy.
And then Stephen walked into the barn. Easy to be around, he hung out longer than the others, long after people had left the café otherwise empty. For some weeks now, she has been pouring herself a cup of coffee after the morning rush and sitting with him out on the porch, chatting easily.
He ran a farm in Montana when he was young, and knows just what it is like to be a farmer, to grow crops, to raise animals. Nell has no livestock to speak of anymore, other than the kind of animals that would qualify as a petting zoo. Still. He knew what her life was like without her having to explain it, a fact that made her instantly comfortable with him.
He is a single dad of two grown-up daughters. These past few weeks, Nell has found herself looking forward to her chats with him, happy every time he walks in. When they talk, she feels understood.
She knew he would eventually ask her out, and determined, long before he did so, that she would say yes. They have now had three dinner dates, each of them lovely. He is old-fashioned and courteous, holding the door open, standing when she has to leave the table and when she comes back, walking around to her side of the car to open the door.
And Nell, who is so self-sufficient, who has never seen much of a difference between men and women, who has more than proven herself in a man’s world, found herself first shocked by his politeness, then pleased. It made her feel like she had been transported into an old Cary Grant movie. Not that Stephen is anything like Cary Grant.
She likes him very much, likes the way he thinks, the way he talks, likes how she feels around him. The only thing she isn’t sure about is her attraction to him. It should be there, but somehow it isn’t. At least, she doesn’t think it is.
She doesn’t have too much experience, but she once knew passion, of course, many moons ago with Lewis Calder, when all he had to do was brush the back of her hand with his fingers and a surge of electricity would run through her body, leaving her breathless and gasping. It was so long ago. Perhaps that doesn’t happen to a woman in her forties, she thinks. Perhaps it is just me. Perhaps it is that there is no chemistry with Stephen.
Everything else about Stephen is perfect. Tall, smart, funny, kind, and handsome enough. Not head turning, but neither, Nell has to admit, is she. Nor has she ever been the kind of woman who is particularly interested in what people look like.
At their last dinner, when Stephen drove her back to the farm, she didn’t know whether or not to ask him in, worried that she would be leading him on, feeling stupid that she was worrying about such a thing at the ripe old age of forty-two.
She didn’t invite him in, but he did get out of the car and walk her up the path to the front door, and he did, rather awkwardly, pull her to him on the porch. She laughed in an embarrassed fashion as his lips were suddenly planted on hers, and there she was kissing him, reaching around to feel the sheer breadth of his back as he bent his head. Curiously, when he pulled away, she felt nothing other than a vague embarrassment at making out on the porch.
It wasn’t unpleasant, it just . . . was. It was fine. She quite liked being held; that she did have to admit. It had been a long time since she had been
held in a man’s arms, which was really rather lovely. But the kiss itself? It didn’t really do anything for her, which started the old worry up again. Was it her? Was it him? Was she—and this was the thing she had always, always worried about—was she . . . frigid? Was it possible that Lewis Calder was the only man who had found—would find—the key to making her gasp in pleasure, tingle to her toes, shake with lust? And if she never found that feeling again, would that be bearable? Could she settle down with a lovely man like Stephen, who took her in his arms and made her feel safe? Could she sleep with him, lie beside him in bed every night, even if she didn’t feel anything at all when they touched?
She mentally shakes herself every time these thoughts flutter in her mind. They have been out for dinner a few times, that is all. How ridiculous for her to be thinking long term, worrying about their life together, their future.
And yet, there is something so compelling about him. Can you have one without the other? Can you have tremendous friendship, companionship, partnership, without passion? For years Nell has watched passion in other people’s relationships dissolve over time. Sometimes it dissolves to nothing, but sometimes it is worse. It becomes resentment and rage, loneliness and fear.
But it does always seem to dissolve, and if that is necessarily the case, how important is it in the first place? She knows what other people would say. Lizzy would say that passion is compulsory in the beginning because even though it goes, as it has gone with her and James (and Lizzy is the first to admit this, even with James in the room; James just shrugs, knowing that trying to stop his wife from saying anything that’s on her mind would be an entirely futile exercise), there are still moments when you look at your spouse, or you smell him, or you see him walk into a room unexpectedly, looking handsome as hell, and your heart lifts and does a small flip, and you know it is still there, even if it’s mostly hidden. This, she would say, is the foundation on which every strong relationship is built.
Meredith would not say that. Meredith would likely say absolutely nothing on the subject of passion, but Nell’s pretty certain that’s because there’s no passion whatsoever with Derek. Once you got past his pretty-boy looks, who could possibly feel passionate about Derek?
At the dinner when they met, Nell found him humorless and patronizing and arrogant. And what on earth does he have to be arrogant about, other than the genetic blessing of his features, which, frankly, have nothing to do with him? She could add that he is also deeply petty and narrow-minded, but what would be the point. She is almost certain Meredith feels exactly the same way about him as she does. She can’t imagine what her sister is thinking, getting engaged to such a man, other than that Meredith must not see past his looks, or more likely, must think he is the best she can do.
If Nell were closer to her, she would talk to her about it. But Meredith hasn’t really spoken to her or Lizzy since that awful last time they saw her, and Nell doesn’t want to risk alienating her altogether. Not that they could be further apart right now, a fact of which Nell is increasingly regretful. She wishes they were closer, she and her sisters. She understands that their lack of relationship is more to do with their family background, with none of them having a healthy notion of what family means. Nevertheless, she wishes they could all let the past go, forgive each other for whatever transgressions they might have made over the years, and be there for each other.
Tonight Stephen has invited her to his house for dinner. She is worried it might be smart, fancy. Nell has no idea what to wear, but knows that following the kiss from the other night, tonight is almost certainly going to be the night that he invites her up to his bed. Maybe her feelings about that kiss will prove to be entirely wrong. Maybe she was just in the wrong headspace. Maybe tonight she will have a couple of glasses of wine, and that tingling will happen again, the tingling that used to happen all those years ago with Lewis Calder.
eighteen
Every time Lizzy approaches the small brownstone in their leafy Brooklyn neighborhood, she pauses as the waves of delight and disbelief wash over her. It’s not like she wasn’t brought up with everything she ever wanted—she is well aware her childhood was charmed, at least in terms of material possessions, the houses they lived in, the vacations they took. But none of it was hers.
This charming little house is all hers, bought with a combination of savings, the TV deal, and the advances from both her cookbook and the line of products. She saw this house alone, while James was still working at his job in Manhattan and unable to get away to come see it. She tiptoed around the rooms, practically holding her breath, as the smile on her face grew wider and wider. It was unfathomable to her that they could afford a whole house, in a pretty neighborhood, with great restaurants and coffee shops on every corner and, even better, great schools.
She walked through, noting that each floor had two square rooms that opened into each other. All the windows had old paneled shutters that could be closed, although the Realtor explained that she had sold many houses with similar shutters and no one ever used them. They were easy to remove, she said, which was what everyone did.
Not me, thought Lizzy. I will strip the layers and layers of old, thick paint off, find the lovely warm wood underneath, and admire them every day as I curl up on the old sofa we stumble upon at a thrift shop, covered with a suzani rug and Indian hand-blocked pillows, as I extend my toes into the soft bamboo throw on the sofa. Not me, she thought, as she walked downstairs to the basement kitchen and family room, both small and dark, knowing that the burgundy walls could be painted a sunny yellow or a cornflower blue and lights could be added and surely, surely those windows could be made larger, that back wall could maybe become glass . . .
Upstairs there was a library, every wall filled with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves with many more books than the shelves could handle, and as she walked in, she saw that all the books were about food.
“Whose house is this?” she whispered to herself, walking over to the desk and studying the papers that were lying on it, the piles on every surface. She gasped when she saw the name, a food writer she had obsessively followed for years. This is where she writes? Lizzy turned around reverentially to look at the house with fresh eyes. This is where she entertains? On this rickety table with mismatched chairs in the dark burgundy kitchen?
It is meant to be, she announced to James, after she said good-bye to the Realtor and practically skipped to her car, clutching her phone with excitement as she called him. It is bashert, she said, invoking a Yiddish word she hadn’t thought of in years, not since she would sit on the knee of her lovely Jewish grandfather when they visited their grandparents in London when she was a young girl.
“It’s what?” James was laughing at her ebullience.
“It means it’s fate. This is supposed to be our house.”
He went to see it that evening. And agreed. And still, every day when she comes home, a year later, she pauses and hugs herself. She still can’t believe it is theirs.
James is standing in the living room with a huge pair of goggles on and a wand in each hand, earphones on his head. He is moving slowly, gingerly, every now and then shooting the trigger on a wand. Lizzy’s heart plummets. At least, she thinks to herself, with more than a small amount of derision, he isn’t watching porn. At least it’s the zombie game.
“James!” she barks, knowing the only thing he can see right now is groups of zombies lurching toward him and his guns, probably the machine guns, at the ends of his virtual hands. She pulls the headphones off his ears as he turns, startled. “Where’s Connor? And what have we said about you not doing the virtual gaming when Connor is in the house?”
“He’s sleeping.” He takes the headphones and goggles off and drops the wands, guiltily. “He’s fine. I just put him down.”
“What do you mean, he’s fine? You texted me that he has a fever. Does he or does he not have a fever?”
“He does, but it’s o
nly ninety-nine point one. I thought I’d let him sleep it off.”
“Does that even count as a fever?” She stares at him, but he shrugs. “Did you give him anything to bring it down?”
“No. Should I?”
“How else did he seem? Was he tired or lethargic, or complaining of anything else?”
“He’s definitely tired.” James doesn’t meet her eyes.
“What time did he go to bed last night?” She was out, the keynote speaker at a charity dinner in Midtown to raise money to help feed homeless children. It was a late night, although she is used to late nights. Once upon a time, before Connor, James would come with her everywhere. They were a couple. Lately they have been feeling like . . . colleagues. Colleagues that don’t particularly get on very well, who are forced together in the shared project of raising their son. And last night James was home with him.
“Later than we thought.”
She inwardly rolls her eyes at his euphemistic use of “we.” “What time? Nine? Ten?”
James grimaces. “I think it was closer to eleven.”
“Jesus, James. He’s five years old, and he had camp today. Of course he’s exhausted. How did you let him stay up so late? What were you thinking?”
She is standing in the doorway, her purse still over her shoulder, her hands on her hips as she glares at him. James continues to shuffle around the room, putting the virtual reality stuff away, but ignoring, Lizzy now sees, the many empty bowls and cups that litter every surface.
“Oh. My. God. Seriously? You haven’t put any of this stuff in the dishwasher? I can’t stand this, James. I am working my ass off to support you, and Connor, and I really don’t ask for much. I ask that you are a responsible parent to him, and that you keep the house clean and tidy when I can’t. And you don’t even do that. I don’t know what to say.”