“I’m sorry,” Maddy blurted as she climbed the porch steps. “I meant to be back here by nine to help you.” She reached into the crate of holly and withdrew an armful of clippings.
“No need for apologies,” Rose said, wishing she could somehow find the right tone of voice, the right words, to bridge the widening gap between them. She pointed to a bare spot on the north side of the basket and watched as Maddy filled it with luxuriant branches. “Hannah made her bus without trouble, I assume.”
Her heart sank. Literally sank. She could feel it drop lower in her chest as Maddy’s jaw settled into an all-too-familiar angle. Even Priscilla was looking up at her with a faint hint of scorn.
Oh, Rose, Rose . . . when will you learn to keep your mouth shut?
“Of course she made her bus.” Maddy met Rose’s eyes over the empty carton. A crushed holly berry lay at her feet. (Rose would have to remember to wipe that up before her guests returned.) “Why wouldn’t she? I’m not in the habit of making my daughter late for school.”
Don’t mention all the commotion this morning . . . don’t mention Priscilla’s “accident” . . . take a deep breath, Rosie, and start all over again.
“A package arrived for you while you were out.” The man had shown up at her door unannounced, a pale and slender elderly gentleman who was back in his Dodge before Rose had a chance to ask his name.
The guarded, slightly sullen expression in Maddy’s eyes vanished. “The samovar?”
“I didn’t open it, but—”
Maddy swooped Priscilla up into her arms and raced for the front door. She lingered for a second with the door open and Rose was about to chide her gently for trying to heat the entire neighborhood when she realized Maddy was waiting for her.
Rose put her pruning shears down next to the carton of holly, brushed her hands along the sides of her tweed pants, and followed her daughter inside.
“Who delivered it?” Maddy asked over her shoulder as she made a beeline for the office.
“It wasn’t UPS or the postal service,” Rose said, wiping a smudge of dust from one of the hall tables as she galloped past. “Just an old man in a plaid wool jacket and a fedora.”
Maddy chuckled. “A fedora?”
Rose laughed, too. “My thoughts exactly.”
“Was he nice?”
“I don’t know,” Rose said as Maddy pounced on the package. “He handed me the parcel for you, I said thanks, he said don’t mention it, and that was that.”
“String!” Maddy said, fingering the twine.
“And a brown paper package.” Rose leaned against the desk, struggling against the urge to straighten Maddy’s stack of papers. “I feel like we should burst into song.”
It took only a split second for Maddy’s smile to turn into a full-fledged laugh. A current of absolute, pure delight flooded Rose’s being. Oh, baby, how I’ve longed to make you laugh that way! It’s been so long since we laughed together. . . .
Maddy plucked a pair of shears from the top drawer of the desk and cut the string with a flourish. “Remember when Gina and I decided we were going to stage The Sound of Music in Grandma Fay’s front room while she was making Thanksgiving dinner?”
“I don’t think I ever heard my mother use that language before in my life.”
Maddy tore off the brown paper with wild abandon. “I don’t think I ever heard my mother use that language before, either.”
The years tumbled back onto themselves until Rose wasn’t that much older than Maddy. It was their first Christmas without Bill, and she had felt awkward and defensive about her failure as a wife. She had been determined to be the DiFalco who would break the string of bad luck, the one who would show them how easy it was to be in love and married and happy all at the same time. Her divorce had hit her hard, much harder than she had ever admitted to anyone but Bill himself. Only he knew about the long, lonely nights. The phone calls. The declarations of love. The inability to compromise. The fact that no matter how hard they had tried, they always fell short of happily ever after.
“Oh.” The sound of Maddy’s disappointment snapped her back to the here and now. “You were right, Ma. Hannah’s magic lamp is nothing but a rusty teapot after all.”
Rose trained a critical eye on the curved lines of the samovar. The graceful swells, the slender spout, the intricately worked leaves and vines that wove their way around the handle.
“Yes, it’s in terrible shape,” she said, “but I have to admit it’s beautiful, Maddy. Hannah’s going to love it.” Not that she understood the whole magic-lamp business, but there was no denying it was an attractive teapot.
Maddy trained her critical eye on Rose. “I think I like it better when you don’t mince words. This is a ridiculous lump of rust. It’ll give Hannah nightmares!” She gathered up the box and the tissue paper and was about to toss the teapot into the mess and haul it out to the garbage when Rose stopped her.
“Give me an hour,” she said, taking the parcel from Maddy. “I bet you don’t recognize the samovar when I’m finished with it.”
Maddy looked confused and more than a tad suspicious. “I screwed up,” she said, with perhaps less of an edge to her voice than Rose had come to expect. “I should have gone to Toys “R” Us instead of wasting my time on that on-line auction. You don’t have to pretend I found a diamond-in-the-rough, Mother.”
“But that’s exactly what you did find,” Rose protested, and she set out to prove her point.
MADDY FOLLOWED HER mother into the kitchen, where Rose ordered her to pour them each a cup of decaf while she gathered up her potions and lotions and special cleaning rags. Rose claimed she didn’t believe in magic, but in Maddy’s opinion nothing short of some real hocus-pocus had a snowball’s chance of success.
“Why bother?” Maddy said as she slid a mug of coffee across the counter toward Rose. “It’s nothing but a bucket of rust, just like you said.”
“I like a challenge,” Rose said as she slid her beautifully manicured hands into a pair of rubber gloves. “Why do you think I took on the Candlelight?”
“I would’ve thought I was enough of a challenge for you for a lifetime.”
“You were that.”
Maddy waited for the zinger, but none was forthcoming. Was it possible they were having a real conversation? She settled down at the kitchen table to peel some apples for that evening’s individual tarts with pecans and caramel while her mother launched into the impossible task of turning a piece of junk into a well-polished piece of junk.
“What’s that stuff?” she asked as Rose poured a glob of something creamy and foul-smelling onto one of the rags.
“Trade secret.” Rose began applying the stuff to the side of the samovar with long, smooth strokes. “Grandma Fay’s grandmother came up with it back in Ireland. She used it to clean the Squire’s silverware. Fay made four bottles of it just before she died. This is the last of the lot.”
“You know,” said Maddy, “I’ve never been clear how Great-great-grandma Mary managed to meet and marry a guy from Sicily. You wouldn’t think too many paisans wandered through County Cork in those days.”
Rose’s slender shoulders lifted, then fell as she reapplied the glop to her cleaning rag. “Apparently one did. The story I heard when I was growing up was that Great-great-grandpa Vincenzo saw her in church and fell in love with her at first sight.”
“But what was he doing in her little Irish church?” Maddy persisted. “How did he get there?”
Rose refolded the rag, then began to buff a small portion of the samovar with short, brisk strokes. “I think he worked for a shipbuilder or something.”
“And—?”
“And that’s all I know.”
“I wish I’d asked Grandma Fay more questions while she was alive.”
“That makes two of us.” Rose applied more polish to the rag. “All of those stories gone forever. It’s a terrible shame.”
“What about Great-aunt Louise? Do you think she might
remember a few stories?”
Rose sighed deeply and brushed a lock of hair off her face with her forearm. “Lou isn’t doing too well these days. She set fire to her kitchen twice back in August. Jack and Tommy and their wives decided it was time she sold the house and went into assisted living.”
A shudder ran up Maddy’s spine at the thought of feisty, eccentric Aunt Lou relegated to some anonymous rabbit warren of rooms where old people waited to die. “She has five kids. You’re telling me not one of them could make room for her?”
“Lou said she would lie down naked in the middle of the Garden State Parkway before she moved in with any of her kids.”
“Where is she now?”
“Shore View.”
“Isn’t that where the Bella Capri used to be?” For more generations than Maddy could count, the Bella Capri had been the place for weddings, proms, and all manner of local celebrations.
“I’m surprised you remember.”
“That’s where they held my senior prom.”
“Six days before you packed your bags and left town.”
Maddy forced herself to concentrate on the apple she was peeling and not the old resentments her mother’s words called back to life. “I don’t recall anyone begging me to stay in Paradise Point.”
Rose’s hand was a blur as she buffed a small portion of the samovar with lightning quick strokes of the cloth. “You always spent summers with your father. I knew one day you would make the Northwest your home.”
“But you thought I would come back one day, didn’t you?” She had to have believed that. Why else would she have let Maddy slip away from her so easily and with so little fuss?
“I hoped so,” Rose said, fingers wrapped tightly around the handle of the kettle, “but I didn’t think it would take fifteen years.”
“Neither did I,” said Maddy as she reached for another apple. I still can’t believe I came back at all.
Shore View Home for Adults
“Mrs. O’Malley.” The nurse’s soft voice startled Irene as she struggled up from a dream. She dreamed a lot these days, wonderful dreams about her childhood when the world was golden and sweet as summer wine. “Jessica is here to talk to you.”
“Jessica?” Oh, how she hated the crackly, dead-leaves sound of her voice. An old lady’s voice. The voice of a crone or a witch from one of the folk tales from long ago. “I don’t know any Jessica.” The name felt foreign to her tongue, to her brain. Were any of her great-grandchildren named Jessica? She didn’t think so.
Sometimes it was so hard to remember.
“Hi, Mrs. O’Malley.” The girl smelled like green grass as she approached the side of Irene’s bed. Her hair was sleek and blond, tucked neatly behind her small ears. “Thanks for letting me stop by and ask you a few questions.”
“You’re welcome,” Irene said. She liked this girl who looked and sounded like Aidan’s daughter. The one who had brought her the picture. What a happy baby, so tiny and—but she wasn’t a baby any longer, was she? She was a beautiful young girl whose name would come back to Irene in a second. She knew it would. The child was part of her family, after all.
The two young women who stood at the side of her bed exchanged looks. They thought Irene didn’t see them, but she did. Old age was a secret society, invisible to all but the few who knew how to say goodbye and keep on living.
“Jessica is from Seton Hall.” The nurse’s smile was bright. She was a good woman who couldn’t be blamed for wanting to be somewhere else. “She’s majoring in gerontology with a specialty in the mobility problems of advanced old age.”
“I’m thrilled that you’re willing to give me some of your time, Mrs. O’Malley,” the girl said. “I’ve never interviewed anyone as old as—” Her face turned bright red, and she busied herself by searching for something in the huge brown tote bag slung across her chest.
It was no secret to anyone, much less Irene, that she was the oldest resident of the Shore View Home for Adults. That alone wasn’t enough to generate much notice, but the fact that she was also the only woman in the state who was old enough to have welcomed in the last century and remained sharp enough to remember it garnered her a certain notoriety. Sometimes it seemed to Irene that every medical student, journalism major, and just plain nosey individual between Manhattan and Philly had found his or her way to her bedside, eyes shining with youthful enthusiasm, notebooks bulging with questions, preconceptions firmly locked in place.
So many questions! They were so young and they knew so little about the world. The simple fact of her years embarrassed them, made them fumble for kinder ways to speak the truth of it. She had been that way once, averting her eyes from age and infirmity, secure in the knowledge that it would never happen to her while she remained safely tucked away in a world that was never meant to last.
They set up their tape recorders on the little table next to her bed, an electronic net to catch her memories before they (or she) slipped away. They fumbled with microphones and batteries, with electrical cords and balky cassettes, while Irene wondered when pencil and paper had gone out of style. They were so intent upon asking their questions, so intent upon dazzling her with their insight and their understanding, that her answers flew right over their shiny, well-shampooed heads.
“I’ll be back in thirty minutes,” the nurse said, lingering in the doorway. “We don’t want to tire out Mrs. O’Malley.”
“Mrs. O’Malley will take care of Mrs. O’Malley,” Irene said firmly. Even those who should know better still believed that old and helpless went hand-in-hand.
Jessica sank down onto the upholstered chair next to Irene’s bed. “You don’t mind if I tape you, do you?” she asked, holding out a tiny square of metal and plastic for Irene’s inspection. “My handwriting sucks and I want to make sure I quote you accurately.”
It didn’t matter to Irene. The questions were always the same and her answers never varied. Where were you born? How many siblings did you have? Did you go to school? Did you work? How old were your parents when they died? Children . . . grandchildren . . . great-grandchildren . . . Can you remember, Irene . . . Do you remember . . . Will you tell us . . .
And she told them what they wanted to know, told it to them in the same way she had told everyone else since the night her old life ended and her new life began.
But this time something was different. Maybe it was the questions the girl asked or the sweet lilt of her voice. Maybe it was simply the fact that there was so little time left and so many sins to be accounted for. Whatever it was, for the first time Irene wondered what would happen if she told the truth.
Once upon a time I danced with kings and princes. . . . Once upon a time I loved a boy with eyes as blue as the sky over St. Petersburg . . . and he loved me . . . oh, how he loved me. . . .
So many lifetimes ago, back when she had believed happiness could be contained in the palm of her hand like one of the Tsar’s jeweled Easter eggs.
How many years had she wasted asking God why he had decreed that she would escape the carnage of those terrible days? What had she done to deserve being set adrift, alone in a land she no longer recognized? Her family slaughtered. Her friends destroyed. Running from country to country, begging for shelter, pleading for help, terrified by the danger that lurked everywhere, from everyone.
The Irishman found me sleeping in a doorway near the docks . . . more dead than alive . . . such kindness in his eyes . . . more kindness than I thought one heart could hold . . . more kindness than I could understand.
She had tried hard to deserve that kindness. When the babies came, she had prayed the sorrow inside her heart would vanish like a bird on the wing, but it never had. The years came and went more swiftly than she could count while she waited for happiness to find her, but it wasn’t in God’s plan. Sorrow was in her blood and in her bones, and, may the Almighty forgive her, she passed that terrible legacy on to her children and her children’s children.
But through it all Micha
el had protected her secrets. How well he had protected their family and loved them. He kept the world from their door with the same fierceness of the warriors from her long-ago youth.
If only she had been able to love him.
If only she had been able to bestow that one simple gift upon a man who had deserved that and so much more, a man who had deserved a wife whose heart was still hers to give.
From the very beginning Aidan had been special to her. As a tiny baby he had somehow managed to find his way into the one small part of her heart that hadn’t already turned to stone. This one will break the chain of sorrow, she had thought as she held him in her arms and met his blue-eyed gaze. This one will finally know happiness.
But it wasn’t to be. The forces she had set into motion all those years ago were too powerful to be denied.
She had always made the selfish choice, right from the very beginning. She was one of life’s survivors, and survival often exacts a terrible cost. She had buried her two sons knowing life’s joys had eluded each one of them, and now it seemed as if the same fate awaited their last surviving child as well. Maybe that was her punishment then, to live long enough to see her mistakes repeated again and again in an endless chain of sorrow.
To see the sadness in a beloved grandson’s eyes and know there was nothing she could do to change it.
To know in her heart that every choice she had made along the way was responsible for his pain.
There was nothing God’s hell could show her that could equal that.
THEY DIDN’T TELL you about this when you were on the knife-edge between life and death. They talked about how great it would be when you were better, when the hospital and all of its incumbent horrors were a thing of the past, when you were finally able to pick up the pieces of your old life and watch them settle into their new shape.
They didn’t tell you there was one more level of hell to get through before you got there, because if they did, you just might cash in your chips and call it a life.
Physical rehabilitation might not be everyone’s idea of hell, but it was as close as Aidan cared to get. The first twelve months under Nina Peretti’s form of tough love had damn near wiped him out. The man who had been able to bench-press a Buick and not break a sweat had been replaced by a scarred and skinny wreck on crutches.
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