Emma picked up her knife and divided the massive cinnamon bun in two. As she handed half of it to Maureen her phone rattled against the tabletop.
“See what I mean? It’s Ian again. This is the second text today and it’s only eight-thirty.” Emma sighed. “He’s not a bad guy, you know that. He’s just . . . upset. Andie says Ian’s having trouble letting go of his connection, not only to me but also to my family. She says his persistence is denial and that I should be patient with him.”
“Well,” Maureen said, “that’s Andie, always trying to be kind. But I’d be tempted to tell him in no uncertain terms to back off.”
“Enough about Ian. Are you still seeing that guy you told me about the last time we spoke?” Emma asked. “The contractor, Jim.” That was something else that had changed for Maureen, Emma thought. After her messy divorce she had pretty much shut down her social life and refused even to consider dating. But about the time she had gotten her look in hand—and started taking swimming lessons and adult education courses at the community college—she had re-entered the world of dating. Maureen had told Emma that she felt she had gone from being just “the girl next door” to being someone noticeable in the eyes of Oliver’s Well.
“Yup,” Maureen said. “Things are going well. Jim’s a doll. I can’t find anything significantly wrong with him, and believe me, I’ve looked. Even his ex-wife doesn’t make waves in his life, or in mine. And his son’s announced he’s staying in California after he graduates college. He’s already got a job lined up at the company where he’s been interning, so there are no worries about Jim’s having to support a disaffected kid. Sorry if I sound so very practical about it all, but I’m too old to be saddling myself with someone else’s difficult family. Mine can be enough of a challenge. Not Mom and Dad so much as my sisters.”
Emma smiled. “I’d say you’re being very smart. So what’s going on with your sisters?”
“The usual. Fiona’s still got middle child syndrome or whatever it is that makes her a drama queen at the age of forty-six. And Kathleen’s bossier than ever. I think that when Justin, her oldest, went off to college last year she started to feel, I don’t know, redundant. Not a day goes by when she doesn’t call one of us to tell us what we should or shouldn’t be eating or drinking or doing, all according to her Internet ‘research.’” Maureen laughed. “None of us listen, but we pretend to.”
“Kathleen was always a bit of a know-it-all,” Emma agreed. “So, has Jim met your parents yet?”
“Yeah, and they like him very much. Of course, it’s been their fondest wish since I got divorced that I find ‘a nice young man’ to settle down with. I suspect they’d welcome anyone halfway decent as long as he wasn’t an outright criminal.”
“Maureen,” Emma laughed, “that’s awful! Your parents love you.”
“I know,” Maureen admitted. “I’m exaggerating. Anyway, I’m in no rush to get married again, and though Jim’s floated the idea, he seems to accept that I’m just not ready to make that leap.” Maureen shrugged. “I might never be.”
“Once burned, twice shy?”
“More like why bother? I have a good job, a nice little house, and a few very good friends. Not to mention my adorable goddaughter, Maeve Olivia Fitzgibbon.”
“She is pretty cute,” Emma agreed. “I saw her in town with her mother when I was here in June. Anyway, love and commitment . . .” Emma shook her head. “I have to believe that a lifelong partnership is worth whatever challenges it presents.”
Maureen laughed. “Maybe. We’ll see how I feel by the time I’m fifty. Maybe by then I’ll have decided not to spend my final doddering years alone.”
Emma checked her watch; it was a refurbished Rolex she had treated herself to after a very successful year. “Yikes,” she said. “I should be getting on. Danny’s asked me to check out a few real estate agents and pick one to handle the sale of the house.”
“You won’t need a real estate agent if you decide to buy out your siblings,” Maureen pointed out.
“True. But keep that a secret, okay? It might turn out to be just a passing fancy.”
“My lips are sealed. I’ll see you again?” Maureen asked, rising from her seat. “I know you’re going to be a busy little bee. . . .”
Emma, too, got up from the table. “Absolutely. I’ll need you to help keep me sane.”
“Families.” Maureen sighed. “Can’t live with them . . .”
The women parted, Maureen off to her job at Wharton Insurance further down Main Street, and Emma toward the first real estate agent on Daniel’s list. But when she got to the door of the Greenfern Agency, she stopped, turned around, and walked back toward the municipal parking lot.
Not yet, she thought, the image of the man she had noticed earlier in the bakery flashing across her mind’s eye. There was plenty of time.
CHAPTER 16
It was almost ten o’clock and Andie, Daniel, and Anna Maria were in the kitchen at the house on Honeysuckle Lane. Emma was still out, probably, Andie guessed, paying a visit to one of the real estate agents on Daniel’s short list as she had promised to do that morning after breakfast with Maureen.
Her brother and sister-in-law had come by unannounced not long before. After a glance at the contents of the fridge, Daniel had made a call on his iPhone and was still busy with the call several minutes later.
Anna Maria lifted the empty press pot from the table. “Do you want more coffee?” she asked Andie.
“You shouldn’t be waiting on me,” Andie scolded. “And no, I’ve had enough coffee, thanks. And two of your croissants, which are even better than those they sell at Cookies ’n Crumpets. Where did you learn to make them so perfectly flaky?”
“Daniel taught me, of course.” Anna Maria lowered her voice conspiratorially. “Don’t tell him I said this, but the student has surpassed the teacher.”
“Who’s Danny on the phone with? One of your staff?” Though Andie wasn’t consciously listening, she had caught a few words that made her assume the call was related to Savories and Seasonings.
Just then, Daniel ended his call and joined the women at the table. “Bob said he could do the party at the Branley Estate,” he told them.
“Bob’s working for you?” Andie asked. “But he’s on disability. It was that awful injury to his knee that forced him to sell the plumbing business. He shouldn’t be carrying heavy trays of food and wine.”
Daniel shrugged. “He needs the money. He does what it takes.”
“Bob’s careful, Andie,” Anna Maria assured her. “And he wears a brace on the bad knee.”
Andie knew all about the brace; she and Bob corresponded weekly. But she wondered if Daniel or Anna Maria knew that, or if they knew that she regularly sent money to Bob for Rumi’s care and education. It wasn’t information she would offer, but Bob might have mentioned it in passing to her brother.
“You know,” Daniel said, “you really treated Bob pretty badly all those years ago. And he was never anything but good to you.”
Andie felt as if she had been hit in the stomach. What was the term? Sucker punched. She saw Anna Maria gave her husband a look of warning. “Daniel . . .” her sister-in-law began.
“What?” he said. “It’s true.”
“It was better for Bob, too,” Andie said quietly, “that our marriage end.”
Daniel laughed in undisguised disbelief. “How can you say that? How could you have known that for sure? He was a wreck when you walked out. He loved you.”
I shouldn’t continue this conversation, Andie thought. This is wrong. But she found herself replying. “I’m sorry for hurting him, really. But I—”
“Did you even love him when you married him?” Daniel demanded.
“This is ancient history,” Anna Maria said firmly. “Can’t we talk about something more happy, something in the spirit of the holiday, like the kids’ pageant?”
Daniel shook his head. “I want to hear what Andie has to say.”
&n
bsp; “I did love him,” Andie said carefully. “You don’t marry someone you don’t love.”
“Well, all I know is that he didn’t deserve to be dumped like that.”
Anna Maria turned to her, and Andie saw the unhappiness in her eyes. “Andie,” she said, “don’t let your brother paint you a picture of Bob as someone who needs your pity. He’s done just fine for himself. He’s not unhappy.”
I know that better than anyone, Andie thought. Still, she smiled gratefully at her sister-in-law.
Daniel frowned. “I have to go. There’s a crate of vegetables that needs to be picked up from Kramer’s Farm and then a case of wine from the liquor store.”
He didn’t offer a farewell to either woman, and when he was gone they were silent for a long moment. Andie thought about what anyone deserved in this life, good or bad. And she wondered if anyone ever had a right to decide what another person did or did not deserve. Daniel was only a teen when her marriage with Bob ended; he had been and still was in no position to judge her.
Suddenly, Andie felt Anna Maria’s hand on her shoulder. “Sometimes,” Anna Maria said quietly, “he gets overly protective of the people he loves. And I’m sorry about what he said to you at dinner last night, that nonsense about low self-esteem. I should have apologized to you before now.”
“What Danny says is not your responsibility,” Andie replied. “But I’m sorry it made you feel uncomfortable. Danny shouldn’t sit in moral judgment on people. Especially when he doesn’t know all the circumstances around the decisions they made. When he doesn‘t know what was in their heart.”
“You’re right,” Anna Maria said. “He shouldn’t, and it’s not really like him to . . .” Anna Maria took her hand from Andie’s shoulder. “Can I help you sort through this massive box of old school papers Daniel wants taken care of?” she asked.
What Daniel wants . . . “That’s all right, Anna Maria,” Andie said. “You have enough to do without having to waste your time looking at bad penmanship and old math lessons.”
Anna Maria smiled. “I do have to do some prep for a gig before the kids get home from school. Chickens don’t debone themselves.”
Andie resisted the urge to wince and wished Anna Maria a good day. When her sister-in-law had gone Andie continued to sit at the kitchen table, box of childhood notebooks and spelling tests untouched. This is not going to be an easy visit to get through, she thought. It will be a time to be endured and survived. But she had been expecting nothing good nor bad, had made no assumptions about what she would find. She had thought she was ready to accept what was. But sometimes, Andie realized sadly, she thought wrong.
CHAPTER 17
“Why did Mom keep this old schoolwork?” Emma said, laughing. “I suppose I could understand her wanting to keep the A papers and the ‘Great Work!’ reports, but look.” She held up a yellowed piece of lined paper. “Here’s one of my third-grade essays covered in red corrections.”
“Not an A effort?” Andie asked. It was later that afternoon and the two sisters were in the den, tending to the contents of the house as they had been instructed to do.
“More like a C.” Emma tore the paper in two and dropped it into the small metal trash can that sat by their father’s old writing table.
Andie shook her head and peered again into the long white envelope she held.
“What’s that?” Emma asked.
“Coupons. I found them in a kitchen drawer and they’re all wildly out of date. What’s Daniel been saving them for?”
“Maybe he just didn’t notice them. Or maybe . . .” Emma shrugged.
“Whatever the reason,” Andie said, “they’re going right into the recycling bin.”
“I don’t think Mom recycled,” Emma pointed out. “At least, not that I know of.”
The doorbell rang then and Emma went to answer it. Rumi stood on the doorstep, dressed in jeans, a nubby blue sweater, and a lightweight puffy jacket. A backpack was slung over her right shoulder.
“Hi,” she said. “I just came by to pick up a scarf I left here the other night. At least, I think I might have left it here. I can’t find it.”
It seemed a flimsy reason for stopping by, but all Emma said was, “Sure, come on in.”
Emma led the way to the den, where Rumi dropped her backpack onto the floor. “It’s a mess in here,” she said. “There are like, papers everywhere.”
Andie smiled. “Grandma seems to have been a bit of a pack rat. What brings you by? Come to help us sort through table linens and old spelling tests?”
“No.” Rumi shrugged. “I just stopped by to see if I left a scarf here.”
“I haven’t seen a stray scarf. What color is it?” Andie asked.
“Um, red?” Rumi said, a question in her tone. “But maybe I didn’t leave it here after all.”
There is no scarf, Emma thought. Rumi just wanted to see her mother. And hopefully, not to antagonize her. “Is that another of your necklaces?” Emma asked her niece.
“Yeah,” Rumi said, putting her hand to her chest. “I just finished it last night.”
“What’s the stone?” Emma asked. “It’s beautiful. It’s almost psychedelic.”
“Labradorite,” Rumi told her. “I think it’s my favorite stone. It helps you to connect to your subconscious and it also protects you from other people’s negative energy. And some people say—”
“Some people say what?” Andie asked.
“Nothing.” Rumi turned to Emma. “Why isn’t Ian here with you?” she asked. “He always comes with you for the holidays.”
“We broke up,” Emma told her. “Well, I ended things.”
“Oh. Sorry. I liked him. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Emma said. “Thanks. What about you? Are you seeing anyone?”
Rumi shrugged. “No. There was a guy I sort of liked last summer, but nothing came of it. And right now I’m so busy with school and work I don’t even have time to think about having a boyfriend.” Rumi looked to her mother. “No need to ask Mom if she’s involved with someone.”
“I’m still happily and contentedly on my own,” Andie said.
Rumi picked up a shallow green marble bowl that Emma remembered had once been used for an ashtray, many, many years ago when people routinely smoked inside their homes or the homes of their hosts.
“I wish Dad would meet someone,” Rumi said, turning the bowl over to peer at the underside. “He says he’s fine on his own, but I don’t believe him. I don’t think he’s been on three dates since he and Rita got divorced, and that was years ago.”
“ ‘Each drop of my blood cries out to the earth. We are partners, blended as one.’ ”
Rumi looked quizzically at her mother. “What do you mean?” she asked.
“I mean that maybe your father would rather wait until he recognizes his partner than waste time on dating women he knows not to be ‘the one.’ ”
Rumi didn’t reply; she returned the marble bowl to the end table and flipped open the cover of the art book sitting there.
“Relationships take work,” Emma added. “And they can be fragile. And sometimes, they just shouldn’t be in the first place.”
Rumi abruptly turned around. “Like the relationship between Grandma and her first fiancé, the one she broke up with to be with Grandpa. Obviously that relationship wasn’t meant to be, because she and Grandpa were so happy together. Besides, she told me she never had any regrets, not even for one minute.”
“What?” Emma turned to her sister. “Mom actually broke an engagement?”
Andie shrugged. “This is the first I’m hearing of it.”
“You mean you guys didn’t know?” Rumi said, eyes wide. “Wow.”
“So, who was this man?” Emma asked. “I have to tell you I’m absolutely stunned.”
Rumi shrugged. “Grandma didn’t tell me his name. What she said was that after college she was staying with an aunt and uncle in DC, and it was their job to introduce her to the right sort of man
, someone from her social set, someone who would make a suitable husband. So they did, and the guy asked Grandma to marry him and she said yes. And then, she met Grandpa.”
“And we know about that,” Andie said. “Mom and Dad talked about it all the time—that fateful meeting, they called it, two strangers meeting on a city bus, of all places, and falling instantly in love. But they never once mentioned the fact that Mom was already engaged when it happened!”
“Why would she keep it a secret from her own children?” Emma asked. “When did you learn this, Rumi?”
Rumi shrugged again. “About a year before Grandma died, I guess. She told me she’d been dreaming about him—the guy she dumped. She told me that in the dreams she’d be apologizing to him for breaking things up and that he wouldn’t look at her. When she tried to touch him he’d turn away. Stuff like that. I told her she shouldn’t think about it, that it was all so long ago he’d probably forgotten about her.”
“Rumi!” Emma said.
“I didn’t say it to be mean!” Rumi protested. “I just didn’t like to see Grandma upset about something she couldn’t change. For all she knew the guy might have been super happy without her. But as people get older they get haunted by the past, don’t they? They can’t let go of it. I remember in the last year of his life Grandpa was always talking about how good he was at baseball when he was a kid, but how his parents didn’t have the money to pay for a uniform and stuff, so he couldn’t play on the school’s team. I must have heard that story thousands of times. Well, maybe hundreds.”
The past, Emma thought. How it does prey on us . . .
“I suppose Mom gave back the ring,” Andie said. “It wouldn’t be like her not to.”
“She tried to give it back,” Rumi told them. “But the guy wouldn’t take it. He said he still loved her and wanted her to have it.”
“Wow.” Emma shook her head. “Two men madly in love with Caroline Carlyle. Mom, the most respectable woman who ever lived, the third point of a love triangle.”
“Well, she was beautiful,” Rumi pointed out.
Christmas on Honeysuckle Lane Page 9