“That’s just sound thinking—you’ll thank me come tax time.”
“Nora, I haven’t filed taxes since—”
I held up my hand as if I were trying to stop traffic. “Please, don’t tell me. That way I can’t incriminate you in court. But seriously, Mom was pretty fun when she wasn’t trying to wrangle Dad and me. She had the best stash of dress-up clothes and costume jewelry. She was big on crafts. In the summer she would make huge watercolors on bedsheets tacked up to the old barn. She taught me how to throw pots and how to crochet. The blanket on the back of the couch Mom and I made together.”
“I always thought it was Dad who was the creative one and Mom who was the taskmaster.”
“No, Dad was the dreamier of the two, but I would say Mom was actually the more creative one. She could figure out a way to solve any problem.”
“I wish I had known that side of her.”
“She had a sense of urgency when she got sick. I think she didn’t want to leave anything undone.” Out in the field, a farmhand raked hay into a long, wooden feed tray. The cows ambled toward it. “Can you imagine, knowing you might leave two kids in Dad’s hands?”
Kit laughed. “She was right about that. He was not prepared to be a single dad. So how did he deal with all of Mom’s lecturing and bossing around?”
“I think he was grateful for it. That’s the thing. I think he fell in love with Mom in part because he knew he needed somebody to hold on to the end of the kite while he was floating among the clouds.”
“Dad needed tethering?”
“Sometimes. I mean, it was Mom who worked the cash register. You know if it had been Dad he wouldn’t have charged anyone.”
“Remember that time he bought the homeless guy breakfast without telling him who paid for it?” Kit asked. We had been on vacation with Dad in Maine. A man had come into the restaurant we were eating in asking for money. The hostess wanted to throw him out, but Dad quietly told her to get the man anything he wanted and to put it on his tab.
“That was classic Dad.”
“I don’t need a tether,” Kit said, sucking on the end of one of her braids. It was as if she were answering a question she had asked herself. “Every decision I have ever made has been about not being tied down.”
“You don’t have to be tied down to be connected to someone, though, Kit. Think of it like the mint plants in Mom’s garden. They were all connected, but they spread and sprouted up wherever they wanted to.”
Kit was silent for a few minutes. Finally she asked, “Did you like being married?”
She had me there. Every year with Sean had felt a little heavier. “Sean and I were not a good example of a healthy, balanced relationship.”
“But how do you know?”
“What a healthy relationship is? I’d start by not entering into it at the age of fourteen.”
“How do you know you’ve found someone that will let you be like mint?”
“We’re talking about Max, right? He’s full of joy, Kitty. I can’t picture him trying to hold you back.”
“That’s what he keeps saying.” Kit shoved a huge piece of the maple fudge she had bought for Max into her mouth and focused on chewing.
“Has he asked you to—?”
“No, no. He hasn’t asked me anything. But he’s always, like, trying to make plans. You know. For the future.”
A deep belly laugh rose up and out. “God forbid.”
“You know what I’m saying. I don’t want to get myself so tied down, so in a rut that I’m like a root-bound plant—”
“In a too-small pot,” I said to the windshield. “Like me.”
“Nora, you know I don’t mean it like that.” But her face was full of apology.
“I know,” I said, and turned the key in the ignition. “I didn’t want to end up root-bound, either.”
* * *
When we arrived back at my apartment, Max was sitting on the living room floor surrounded by cardboard boxes, a spiral-ringed notebook propped up on his bent knees, typing figures into my mom’s old calculator.
“Hey, baby,” he said, smiling up at Kit.
Kit leaned down, balancing herself on his knees and kissed him. “It’s good to see your face,” she said sweetly.
“This old thing,” Max said, rubbing his palms across his stubbly cheeks. “Hey, Nora,” he called and waved as I stepped over several boxes to reach the kitchenette. “Did you take a stab at another burnt sugar cake?”
“On my own? Never!” I said, and reached for a bottle of wine. “No one’s come looking for it, anyway. ”
“Tomorrow’s Friday. You never know. I’ll throw a couple in the oven tomorrow morning just in case.”
Kit moved from box to box, squealing at tripods and cooing at soft boxes to diffuse the lights.
“If you take everything out, we’ll just have to repack it before we haul it over to Peggy’s,” Max said calmly as he watched Kit take out roll after roll of thick black tape and put them on the floor.
I looked at all the boxes. “It’s not a problem, but why did you bring everything up here, anyway? Wouldn’t it have made more sense to leave it in the Vanagon and drive it straight to Peggy’s?”
Max ran a hand through his hair. It looked like he hadn’t seen a shower since he had left Guthrie three days ago. “That’s the thing. The Vanagon is still down in Massachusetts.”
Kit stopped rifling through a box of cables. “What?”
“I left you a message. The transmission blew. It’s a total rebuild, and it’s going to take the guy some time to gather all the parts.” Max stretched his legs out and shook them one at a time. “I didn’t have Peggy’s street address, but I had this one on my phone, so I had to have everything shipped here.”
Kit eyed the calculator. “How much?”
“With the parts and the labor, almost ten grand.”
“Shit.” Kit sat down beside Max and leaned against him.
“I know. I thought about scrapping it, but it’s been our home. It didn’t make sense to just get rid of it.”
“You did the right thing,” Kit said, rubbing Max’s forearm. “The Vanagon has plenty of adventures left in it.”
“That’s what the mechanic said. He was impressed with the body, and the state of the engine.”
I wanted to ask how they were going to pay for it, but I knew the answer. Fifty thousand dollars. That meant they were down 20 percent of their budget. How could they be so calm?
Max kept his eyes on Kit. “The camera from Craigslist was crap, but the guys over at B and H had a great price on a used one. It’s just one model before the one we hoped for.”
“That will work,” Kit said. I admired how positive she sounded.
“They gave us a break on the lighting kits, too, and all the cables.”
“Did you get the mics?”
“Are you still going to be able to make the movie?” I asked. I didn’t need to hear the full inventory. I needed to hear that I hadn’t leveraged the diner for nothing.
“We’ll have to cut back on some stuff. Like craft services.”
“Maybe you could help us out there, Nora? Would you order sandwich stuff at cost, and let us use the kitchen at the diner to make food for the crew?” Kit asked.
“Of course,” I said.
“We’re not going to be able to hire the assistant director of photography like we had hoped.”
Kit leaned over and kissed him. “It will all be fine. Better than fine. Sometimes the most creative thinking comes out of need. Remember that time when the airlines lost all the costumes for that music video?”
“And we re-created them all out of stuff from the dollar store!” Max reached over and scooped her up so that she was sitting on his lap. “You are an inspiration—you know that, right?”
I tossed my car keys at them. �
�Why don’t you get all of this stuff over to Peggy’s and pick up a couple of movies at the library on the way home. I’ll make the popcorn.”
“No butter,” Kit and Max said at the same time.
“No butter for you guys.” I would be making a buttery bowl all for myself.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Breakfast had been busier than usual on Friday, keeping me from hanging up the red, yellow, and green crepe-paper garlands I had scored at the party store. A mix of regulars, tourists, and summer people, most of whom were flanked by their children and grandchildren, were getting an early start to their Labor Day weekend. The highlight of the weekend was tomorrow’s Corn and Tomato Festival; after that, it would be time to head back to their autumn and winter lives in the city. By noon almost all of the tables were filled, and a line started to form outside. In the middle of the lunch rush Charlie came out of the kitchen, dragged a chair over to the front door, and climbed up and removed the bell above the door, to the applause of everyone sitting at the counter.
Elliot walked in with a man I didn’t recognize. I wished that I could chat with him, but I was in the middle of filling water glasses for a large table full of tourists in town for the festival. I watched as Fern grabbed a couple of menus and led them toward the back. Elliot smiled at me and waved as he passed, glancing over his shoulder to look at me one last time before he disappeared into the back dining room.
“Excuse me, miss? The water?”
I looked down at the glass. It was filled to the brim and water was spilling over onto the Formica.
“Sorry about that,” I said, swiftly pulling a clean side towel from my apron and wiping down the table. “Your waitress will be right over.”
The diner buzzed until long past two. Fern and I collapsed into one of the booths after the last customer had paid his check. Charlie brought us both large glasses full of icy Diet Coke with wedges of lime.
“Now that was a lunch shift,” Fern said, pulling out singles from her stuffed apron pockets. “I could use a couple of shifts like that a week.”
I looked at the sales report from the cash register. “You and me both. I wish Guthrie had a festival every week.”
Burt Grant walked in, posters under his arm, and asked the young waitress working the counter for a cup of coffee to go.
“Hey, Burt,” Fern called. “Did you get all the tents set up?”
He came over, coffee in hand. “Yup. We’re ready to go. How about you all? I hope you’ll save me a cider donut to eat after we drag Rowan into the mud.”
Fern laughed and patted the seat next to her. Burt slid in, placing the posters down on the table.
“What have you got there?” she asked. “Are they for the festival? We need a better slogan than “Old-Fashioned Family Fun.”
Burt looked up at me shyly before flipping one of the posters over.
Keep Guthrie Small!
Against changing the zoning laws that would make it possible for large corporations to develop land in Guthrie?
Stop by the Hammer and Nail and sign the petition.
Every signature counts!
“Give me one,” I said, holding out my hand. “I’ll hang it in the window.”
“You will?” Burt asked, incredulous.
“Of course,” I said, taking the poster and sliding out of the booth. “I have to run a quick errand,” I said to Fern. “Make the high school girls do all the resets when they come in. I’ll be back later.”
* * *
I stepped out of the sticky heat of the afternoon and into the cool, softly lit, beige-colored everything of the Pudding Hill House, my life savings in the form of a cashier’s check weighing down my purse as if I were carrying a sack of baking potatoes. Mary Beth Swindon met me in the hall in front of her office.
“Great to see you, Nora. Come on in.”
After she closed the office door and settled back into her ergonomic office chair, I handed her the envelope. “The health-care proxy forms are in there as well. Did you need anything else?”
Mary Beth opened the envelope, smoothed out the forms, and put the check aside. “Are you sure about this, Nora? I know this is a lot of money for you—it’s a lot of money for anybody. And Ms. Cole isn’t exactly your responsibility.”
The check represented the $3,000 I kept in cash in my freezer, the $5,000 I had in my personal checking account, and the $9,794 of the $12,000 I kept in the Miss Guthrie account for the never-ending little emergencies at the diner. It made me queasy just to think about it. “It feels like the right thing to do—what Peggy would have wanted.”
“You’re a good person, Nora. But we already know that.”
I sighed. When had I developed the reputation for being so good? All I did was run the diner. It made me want to go shoplift something.
“My husband mentioned you were thinking of selling to that HG?”
I braced myself for the lecture. Every day since word got out, I had received e-mails, phone calls, and visits at the diner from folks wanting to share their opinion on whether or not to sell to HG. Notes were left on the backs of Miss Guthrie guest checks, sometimes without a tip. I was even stopped in the feminine hygiene aisle of the White Market by a Christmas tree farmer. I couldn’t go anywhere without the citizens of Guthrie giving me speeches about the importance of growth or about the sanctity of the small town.
“We did receive an offer from them, pending the town vote to change the zoning of Peggy’s land.” I didn’t want to give Mary Beth my opinion; if she spread the word I was against the sale to HG, other potential buyers might not be in a hurry to come forward.
“You do what you need to do. Between you and me, it would be nice to be able to buy laundry detergent by the case without having to drive all the way to Littleton.” Mary Beth looked over the forms. “I’ll submit these to the state this afternoon. I’m sure they’ll approve you as health-care proxy—they always prefer that someone in the community makes these kind of decisions.”
I stood. “Thanks, Mary Beth. I’ll let myself out.”
I walked down the hallway toward the front door. Instead of the calming sounds of smooth jazz that were usually piped in the reception area, I heard the thump of someone playing the bongos, and the unmistakable sound of Max’s deep voice.
“Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.”
I peeked in the dayroom. Kit was sitting cross-legged on a cushion on the floor, hands resting on her knees, palms open, her hair twisted up in a yellow chiffon scarf trimmed with little silver mirrors that caught all the light and sprinkled it across the faces of the residents. Max was beside her in his usual white T-shirt and jeans, his head down, hitting the drums with his fingers and palms. They both had their eyes closed.
“Om na-mah Shi-va-ya. Om na-mah Shi-va-ya,” Max sang.
“Om na-mah Shi-va-ya. Om na-mah Shi-va-ya,” Kit answered, her voice round and sweet. “Everybody join in when you feel ready.”
The room was packed with residents, some in wheelchairs, others resting on the love seats and chairs. A few of the aides and the head nurse leaned against the wall, clapping the beat.
“Shivaaya namaha. Shivaaya namah om.”
Kit stood, grabbing a large purple velvet bag by her side. She smiled and waved at me. She walked from resident to resident, handing out maracas and little wooden egg-shaped shakers that sounded like they were filled with rice, and something gold and glinty. When she got to me, she took my hands in hers and slipped black elastic bands attached to little brass cymbals onto my middle fingers and thumbs.
“Perfect,” she said, moving on to her next victim. “There’s no wrong way to do this, friends,” she called, demonstrating how to use a castanet. “Make a joyful noise!”
I tapped my cymbals together. They made a flat sound like change being tossed into the cash register drawer. I felt a dry hand on my arm. When I looked down, a man wi
th wisps of white hair on his head was smiling up at me with pearly false teeth. “Pull right back up after you strike the cymbal, sweetie. That’s how you get the nice ring.” He moved his finger and thumb away from each other, sort of the opposite way a lobster moves its claws. I tried to mimic the motion. The cymbals chimed loud and bright.
“Oh,” I said, surprised. “How did you know?”
The man gave me a thumbs-up. “Used to play percussion with the Boston Symphony. They work the same way as the big ones.”
Max picked up the pace each time he began the chant again. By the third or fourth time, the dayroom was a riot of sound. Some of the elderly residents were playing instruments, others were singing responses to Max’s call. Others were just tapping their fingers on the arms of their chairs. Everyone looked happy. Kit danced around the room, chiming her own set of finger cymbals at the end of each line.
Max ended the chant with a freestyle solo on the bongos. With a whoop he stood up, wiping the sweat off his face with the hem of his T-shirt, flashing the starlets of the 1940s to an appreciative crowd. Max put his hands together as if in prayer and bowed to the room.
“I bow to you, dear friends. I bow to myself. I bow to Shiva, who knows all of our true selves.”
The residents clapped. A few shook their maracas and egg shakers. Max beamed at all of them, bowed one more time, then grabbed a glass pitcher from a small table at the front of the room. “Does anybody need some water? Raise a hand. Shiva doesn’t want you getting dehydrated.”
Max poured small cups of water, helping the aides with a few of the people whose hands were too shaky to bring the cup up to their lips. Kit collected the instruments, pausing to talk with each of the residents, laughing and chatting as if they were all her dear friends.
“Wasn’t that fun?” Kit asked, holding her hands over her head and playing the cymbals in fast triplets, as if she had learned from an expert belly dancer.
“What was it exactly?” I asked.
“Kirtan. It’s the practice of Bhakti, the yoga of devotion.”
The Late Bloomers' Club Page 17