by Mary Campisi
Maggie was impressed that this man, a newcomer to their sleepy town, would even be interested in helping the children let alone shelling out his own money to do it.
“What happened to Nicole’s mother?” Curiosity won out over indifference. Had she died? Or had they become just another statistic, like herself and Jeff?
“Her mom died when she was four. Car accident.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.”
“They don’t have any other family either.”
“How sad.”
“Nicole says she wishes I were her sister.”
Maggie chose to ignore that last comment.
“So why isn’t Mr. Webster traveling all over the world anymore? And why did he ever decide to settle in our little town?” He was probably bored out of his mind. Jeff had always hated this town. When the opportunity for bright lights and a big name in the city came along he bailed out fast, informing Maggie that a wife and child didn’t fit into his plans anymore.
“He loves this place. He came to our class to talk about his work a few weeks ago. Mr. Webster told us there’s so much beauty around us we could live a lifetime and not see it all. He said we should go outside and walk in the woods, or look at a tree or a stream and see and feel the colors and shapes.”
“But why Pendleville?” Maggie asked.
“Because he said Pennsylvania was like an artist’s palette with color and texture all wrapped in one.” Danielle held out her hand and began counting off on her fingers. “Spring, green and yellow, summer, blue and pink, fall, orange and red, winter, white and black.” She tilted her head to one side. “I never thought of it that way, but it’s kind of neat, isn’t it?”
Maggie nodded. What kind of man could hold the attention of a twelve year old long enough to impart a lesson that was welcomed? And remembered? Maggie had to admit, the persona of Matthew Webster intrigued her.
“And he also said it was time to put down some roots. Get himself and Nicole settled in a place they could call home. They came here two years ago on a camping trip and fell in love with the town. It took a while for Mr. Webster to finish his assignments but now they’re here to stay. So, Mom, doesn’t he sound neat? When do you want to meet him?” Danielle smiled at her mother, reminding her of a puppy trying desperately to please its master.
“Why is it so very important that I meet this man? Or any man for that matter?” She had a comfortable, secure, if not slightly boring life. Just the way she liked it.
Danielle rolled her eyes again. “For company.”
“I already have the best company in the world,” Maggie said, leaning over and squeezing Danielle’s hand.
“I mean adult company. Man company.” Danielle looked at her mother and her expression became very serious. “It’s time, you know.”
“Time?” Maggie repeated, not believing her daughter was giving her the same lecture she’d heard from her own mother two weeks ago.
“Yeah, you know. Like go out on a date.”
“I’ve been very busy lately.”
“Mom, you’ve had exactly seven dates in the last three years and two of them were ones Grandma and I set up for you.”
“Don’t remind me of your scheming ways or your grandmother’s. I’m still mad about the way you two tricked me into going on those dates.” Henry Mosler, the plumber, and Eugene Gleason, the hardware store owner. They had been about as exciting as a socket wrench. It would have been fine if she had wanted to become a plumber’s apprentice or learn the difference between a washer and a sinker, which she didn’t. But as a potential new man in her life, no thank you.
“I always thought they were kind of geeky but Grandma said they came from good families.”
It was Maggie’s turn to roll her eyes. “Grandma and her family lineage. Does Mr. Webster come from a good family, too?”
Danielle shrugged. “I don’t think he has much of a family at all, except Nicole.” She looked her mother straight in the eye and whispered, “But we could change all that, Mom.”
Maggie sighed and shook her head. Her daughter just never gave up.
“Nicole can’t wait to meet you. I told her all about you. Well, just the good stuff. I didn’t tell her about the ratty old sweats you wear around the house or how your voice is off-key when you sing. She’ll find that out soon enough and by then she and Mr. Webster will both love you and it won’t matter.”
Maggie shook her head again. “No.”
Danielle folded her arms over her small chest and stuck out her lower lip. “Why not? It’s not like you’re ugly or anything. Lots of my friends think you’re really pretty. For a mom,” she added.
“Yeah, for a mom and an old one at that.”
Danielle tilted her head and studied her mother. “Thirty-six isn’t that old.”
Maggie arched a brow. “Last week you thought thirty was ancient. What changed your mind?”
“Well, Mr. Webster is thirty-nine and he looks really good. So, Nicole and I decided you were both still young enough to get married and who knows, maybe even give us a little brother.”
“Danielle!”
“Okay, so maybe it is a little early to be discussing kids.”
“A little.”
“Okay, I just want to ask you one more question and then I’ll drop it.”
Here it comes.
Danielle fiddled with her hair and cleared her throat twice. “If you met Mr. Webster and he turned out to be all of the things I said he was, would you give him a chance?”
Maggie groaned. “You never give up do you?”
“Just tell me, Mom, would you give him a chance?”
“Okay, okay,” Maggie said, raising her hands. “Listen to me and try to understand. I love my work. The craft business we have gives me an opportunity to express myself through wood, tiles, ceramic, silks. You name it, I create it. And make a darn good living at it, too. There’s no man handing me an allowance or paying my bills. Then there’s you and Grandma. You’ve both been my world for more years than I can remember. Just the three of us. If I were to even think of a relationship with a man he would have to be all the things you mentioned and more.”
It was the truth. She could never settle for a mediocre relationship again and thought it pointless to date for the sake of dating. In the early days after her divorce, men called her regularly for dinner, the movies, a ball game. Maggie had turned them all down, opting to stay home and cuddle up with a good book. After a while, the calls dwindled until they became almost nonexistent. It was just as well. The men had all been mediocre and Maggie would bet her next paycheck Matthew Webster would fit into that category, too.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Mr. Webster is totally awesome.”
***
Three days later, Maggie and Danielle plowed down the snow-laden country road to the McKinley Tree Farm.
“Mrs. McKinley has the best hot chocolate and peppermint sticks. I look forward to those as much as picking out our tree,” Danielle said.
“I know, so do I.” Maggie rounded a curve and spotted the huge black-and-white McKinley Tree Farm sign. “The McKinleys have been doing this since I was a little girl.”
“Wow, Mom, that is a long time.” Danielle laughed. “Almost pre-historic.”
Maggie laughed too and pulled the SUV into the field designated for parking. Snow fell in huge wet flakes, covering the ground with a fresh blanket of white. Since their discussion three days ago, Danielle hadn’t mentioned Matthew Webster’s name. Perhaps she’d thought about their talk and reconsidered her matchmaking plan. Danielle didn’t usually give up that easily but Maggie was not about to pry and open up the subject of Matthew Webster again.
Danielle ran several feet ahead, kicking up huge clumps of snow as she forged her own path. “Come on, Mom,” she said, motioning with a gloved hand. “Let’s go over by the Douglas firs.”
Maggie followed, tramping along the path Danielle had created. Snow clung to the
trees, glistening like diamonds. The setting was an artist’s palette with color and texture all wrapped in one. Winter is black and white. The words ran through her brain before she realized what they were. Matthew Webster’s words. Pushing them aside, she forged ahead, her gaze focused on Danielle’s purple stocking cap.
They spent the next half hour walking up and down the rows of trees, considering, deciding, and looking for just the right tree. After the eighteenth one, Danielle smiled and said, “This is it. What do you think, Mom?”
What she thought was that this one looked the same as the fifth tree they’d seen. And the sixth, seventh, and the next eleven. “It looks fine to me,” Maggie said, shaking a little snow off the branches.
“Great!” Danielle yelled, suddenly very excited. She glanced at her watch for the tenth time in the last half hour. “I’ll run and tell Mr. McKinley we found a tree and he can send someone to cut it down. Don’t move from that spot. And can I get my hot chocolate and peppermint?” Her words fell out in a rush, as though she was suddenly in a great hurry to leave.
“Sure. Danielle?”
“Yeah, Mom?”
“Why have you been looking at your watch every five minutes since we got here?” What was she up to?
“Just wondering what time it was,” she said. “Bye.” Then she turned and jogged toward the little log cabin and her annual goodies.
“Kids,” Maggie muttered under her breath.
She spent the next ten minutes waiting for Mr. McKinley. Snow fell like a curtain, turning everything white. A real Winter Wonderland.
“Excuse me, Miss,” a deep voice called from behind. Definitely not Mr. McKinley. “Is this tree taken?”
Maggie turned and looked up into deep blue eyes, the color of a summer sky. She stood captivated, taking in the man’s rugged good looks—dark hair, strong jaw, cleft chin, tall muscular build. No, this was not Mr. McKinley.
“Is something wrong?”
“No.” She shook her head. “No.”
The man laughed. “Is that no to both questions or one?”
It was Maggie’s turn to laugh. “No, nothing’s wrong. My daughter examined eighteen trees and insisted we take this one. I’m standing guard until she gets back with Mr. McKinley.”
The handsome stranger shook his head. “That’s odd. My daughter looked at twelve while I was helping Mr. McKinley load a tree and then she escaped for hot chocolate, telling me she wanted the Douglas fir in the fourth row, three back.”
Maggie and the stranger looked at one another. “Wait a minute,” Maggie said, remembering how her daughter kept glancing at her watch, hurrying through the trees, scampering away. She should have guessed something was amiss—Danielle never rushed anything and rarely even wore a watch. “Would you happen to be a photographer?”
The man nodded. “How did you know?”
“And I’ll just bet your name is Matthew Webster, isn’t it?”
His blue eyes narrowed, moving over her face, her hair, studying her in detail. “Maggie?”
She nodded, a faint smile on her lips.
The man threw back his head and laughed. “This is the first time I’m actually going to thank Nicole for butting into my love life.”
“You have a little matchmaker in your family too, huh?” Maggie asked, grinning.
He laughed again. “I sure do, but she’s never joined forces before. That could prove deadly.”
“Do you think we can fend them off?” Maggie teased.
“I don’t think I want to,” Matthew said, his blue gaze meeting hers.
Despite the cold and snow, a wave of warmth washed over her. “Nor do I,” she said softly.
Bursts of yelling and cheers startled them both. They turned and spotted two figures running toward them.
“Finally,” Danielle said, out of breath when she reached them.
“Hi, I’m Nicole.” A pretty girl with brown hair and blue eyes held out a red-mittened hand.
“I feel like I already know you, Nicole,” Maggie said, shaking her hand.
“Sorry we kind of tricked both of you,” Danielle said. “But we knew you’d like each other once you met.” She looked from one adult to the other. “You do like each other, don’t you?”
“Of course they do, silly,” Nicole said. “Didn’t you see how they were looking at each other? It was so obvious.”
“Yeah, they did kind of have weird looks on their faces,” Danielle agreed, her eyes darting from one to the other.
“All right you two. You’ve done your jobs. I think Maggie and I can take it from here.”
He smiled down at her and Maggie almost forgot to breathe. Danielle was right. Matthew Webster was totally awesome. And then some.
The End
Chapter 6
The Death of Mary Alice Olivetti
Some say it was the Catholic Church that killed Mary Alice Olivetti. Others say it was her mother, Nicolena’s obsession with holy water and olive oil. And there were others still who blamed the rest of us, throwing out words like indifference and ridicule.
Me, I think it was a mix of all three, a trinity if you will; Church, mother, and us. I was Mary Alice Olivetti’s friend, her best friend, according to her. It wasn’t true, not for me, at least not in the beginning. I let her be my friend because she copied psychology notes for me while I did more important things like wrote my name along the margins of a black and white steno book, block style. And she saved me a place in the cafeteria line on pizza day, like it was an honor for her to be doing it. Of course, there were the pizzelles—vanilla because I didn’t like anise—thirty of them that she brought once a week to our lunch table to guarantee herself a seat.
Mary Alice believed us when we said Alex Delensen had a crush on her. Didn’t she know the captain of the football team would never look twice at a girl with a big fat braid who wore rosary beads around her neck and black elastic pants with white cotton shirts?
I don’t like to think too much about the early days when I thought she was just the new girl in the robin’s-egg-blue house with yellow trim whose parents spoke broken English and drove a beat-up Plymouth Fury.
I like to dwell on the after; after I went to her house that day to deliver a dozen freshly made cannoli because my mother said we were just as Italian and just as Catholic as the Olivetti’s even though we didn’t wind our hair in tight buns or hang a crucifix in every room.
“Do they really have a crucifix in every room?” I’d asked my mother as she arranged the cannoli on a Styrofoam tray layered with wax paper.
She looked up at me and raised a black brow, an Italian black brow. “Go deliver the cannoli,” she’d said. “Then you tell me.”
The Olivetti house was two blocks from ours, up a hill and around a bend on a patch of land surrounded by clumps of crabgrass and holy statues. There was one of the Virgin Mary tucked in the flower bed by the front door, hands extended, a stone visage of white purity, blessing, and welcome. Another was of Baby Jesus decked out in a scarlet robe and matching crown, two tiny fingers forming a peace sign. He was propped against the opening to a fence that led to the backyard and what looked like grape vines. The house was newly painted to robin’s-egg-blue, the trim a daffodil yellow, except for the screen door that hung at an odd angle, its off-white paint peeling around the edges.
I’d stood there, half holding my breath against the smell of garlic and burned grease filtering through the screen in a cloud of stale disgust. My eyes were glued to a scrap of chipped paint on the door, the tray of cannoli in my hands, wondering what Mary Alice would say if she knew we took bets on the size and color of her underwear. White, Hanes, number nine had been my guess. Full-cut. When I looked up, she was standing on the other side of the screen.
“Vivi, hi.” Her voice was softer than usual, almost a whisper. “What are you doing here?” She didn’t open the door, didn’t step outside either, just stood there, a dull red splashing her olive skin.
I held out the cannoli, my ey
es darting to the door handle, then back to her face. Well? Wasn’t she going to invite me in? I wanted to check out the crucifixes.
Before I could say anything, Mary Alice’s mother swooped down on us in a rush of oily flesh and rapid Italian.
Nicolina Olivetti was a big woman with a chest that tucked itself into her waist and disappeared under a grease-splattered white apron. Her hands were long and square, her gray-black hair stretched into a bun so tight her eyes looked half Asian. She wore a housedress that fell just below her knees and was the same blue as the house. The slippers on her swollen feet were soiled to a brown-gray though they might have been white when she bought them.
My gaze darted back to her face. There were creases on Mrs. Olivetti’s high forehead and around her thin lips but the rest of her skin was pulled tight, stretched over a long nose and broad cheekbones as though there hadn’t been enough flesh to cover the bones.
But it was those eyes that pulled me in, made me clear my throat twice. They were deep black; onyx, midnight, opaque, the kind that grabbed you tight, held on, x-rayed, scanning layers of brain and memory and secrets. I thought Mrs. Olivetti saw right through me down to the bet I’d made on Mary Alice’s underwear.
I looked away.
She turned to Mary Alice, spoke in the same high-pitched, staccato Italian she’d used earlier. Mary Alice answered, her voice soft at first then rising to within a decibel of her mother’s. I heard my name, once, twice, three times. Mrs. Olivetti pointed at me with her left hand, shook her head. The thin gold band on her third finger made me think of Mary Alice’s father, Umberto; small, thin, stoop-shouldered with a shock of white hair and round wire-framed glasses. I never heard him speak, even the one time when Father Charles introduced him after Mass. He’d just stood there and nodded, his thin lips pulling open enough to reveal two crooked front teeth. I figured he’d given up on talking after he married Mary Alice’s mother. Who wouldn’t?