Tea and Primroses

by Tess Thompson

  “I don’t think so. Maurice is dead. Sigourney’s locked up. Her mother died several weeks ago. No one can hurt you now or I would never have come.” He brought my hand to his mouth and kept it there for a moment, his lips pursed against my skin. “I never stopped loving you. Not for one minute. There was never anyone but you. All these years, no one but you. It devastated me when I heard from Janie you married Miller and yet I knew I had no claim on you.”

  “I had to get married.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I was pregnant.” This was said so softly that it caused him to lean forward to hear me better.

  “You were pregnant?”

  I stood, then, and offered my hand. “Come into my office. There’s something I want to show you.”

  We walked down the hall and he coughed, deep in his chest, stopping to lean against the wall for a moment. I could see then that he was indeed older and fragile, and yes, ill, too.

  “Damn cough,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “Never mind that.” I took his arm and led him into my office. I had him sit on the sofa and opened the curtains to let more light into the room. I switched on the gas fireplace, hoping to get warm and perhaps stop shaking. “This is my place, Patrick. My favorite place.” I spread my arms to indicate the room. Outside, the sea and sky were shades of gray.

  “It’s just as I imagined.” He crossed his legs, interlacing his hands around his knee, smiling at me. “I used to sit in my yard in my jeans and bare feet in the grass and read your books. With every word I imagined you here on the coast. I remembered what you looked like when you wrote, how your face would reflect whatever your characters were doing or saying. And I would close my eyes and concentrate on sending rays of light to you, knowing it was the only way I could love you.”

  On the table near the door was a table with photos, mostly of Sutton and Declan. I picked up two of Sutton. The first was a photo of her on her second birthday, her light brown hair in ringlets, her green eyes shining with tears. The other was a recent photo I’d snapped myself of her working at the bakery in Portland. She was stunning in it, her teeth perfect and her smile wide. And her green eyes. “This is my Sutton.” I pointed at the baby photo. “She was terrified of this photographer. He was dressed as a clown. She hates clowns.”

  He looked up at me, a question in his eyes.

  “Just like you,” I said. “And this is her at work. She apprenticed under this awful but talented man for almost five years. He owns one of the finest baked-good shops in Portland.”

  “A baker?”

  “Yes. Patrick, look at her eyes. Look at her body. What do you see?”

  “I see my mother.” His eyes were shiny with tears now. “Oh my God.”

  “Yes,” I said. “She looks just like your mother.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were pregnant?”

  “I was going to. I’d only just started to suspect it the weekend you went to New York. But then, well, you know what happened when you came home. And I was so afraid and alone and Miller was just there, like he’d always been, waiting for me, hoping I would come back. I told him the truth about the baby and he asked me to marry him anyway and I said yes, in some kind of misguided attempt to give Sutton a normal home and because the bitterness and loneliness were eating me alive. I had to choose a life, some kind of life with people who loved me, who wanted me.” I told him, then, of my mother’s death, and how it had changed me. I grabbed another framed photograph and turned it around to show him. “This is my mother. She died while reading my book.”

  “So you were wrong.”

  I nodded, knowing immediately what he meant. “Yes, she read my work.” I sat next to him. “Sutton’s so much like you. Principled and smart, loves working with her hands—there’s nothing practical she can’t do. And she hates writing. Can you imagine? From the moment she could talk she wanted to be in the kitchen baking so I gave her my blessing, never tried to make her be like me, as my mother did.”

  “Does she know the truth?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, God, Constance. I’ve missed so much.”

  “I’m sorry.” I put my arms around him. He pulled me close. We cried together, all the grief and loss and love purged with our salty tears. After a time, we stopped and began to talk of everything, of all the years between now and then. It turned dark outside and finally hunger drove us to the kitchen where there was a pan of frozen lasagna in the freezer, made by Sutton. We continued to talk as the room filled with the aroma of herbs and tomato sauce. I poured wine and we sat at the table in the kitchen and then we were quiet, eating and listening to the waves crashing into the shore below us.

  “What else is on your list to do?” I asked him, the truth of his situation having made its painful way into my chest. He’s dying. I will have to let him go all over again.

  “There’s nothing else on the list. It was just you. But now there’s another item.”

  “Sutton?”

  He nodded. “Yes.”

  I put down my fork. “I’m not sure she’ll understand.”

  He was quiet, looking at his plate. Three more waves crashed onto the shore below us. “I just want to meet her. She doesn’t need to know who I am. It’s too late for that, I suppose. And I don’t want to hurt her. Or you.”

  “You’d do that for me?”

  “I would do anything to protect your happiness. Always have, always will.”

  “Sutton’s not here. In town, I mean. She’s in France for two months, working under a master baker.”

  He smiled, his voice light. “I’ll just have to stay alive, then, until she gets back.” He cleared the table of the dishes while I sat, sipping my wine and looking out the window.

  When he returned to the table, he brought the wine bottle and poured us each more before sitting.

  “There was never anyone but you, either,” I said, referencing his earlier confession, the wine making me loose. “I’ve never loved anyone but you.”

  “I wondered, so many times, why you never remarried after Miller’s death. There must’ve been suitors?”

  “No, I didn’t have the heart to even think of such things. After you, after Miller, it was impossible to imagine another man that would ever measure up.” I moved my gaze to the window, watching my reflection. “I can almost see myself as I once was reflected in the glass here.” I pointed to the window. “It erases all the wrinkles.”

  “You look the same to me.”

  “This would’ve been us, you know.” I waved my hand in the air, indicating the room. “Eating dinner and clearing the dishes and talking about books and watching television. Raising Sutton together. Growing old together. It was all I ever wanted. And I’m bitter. I don’t want to be, but I am.” I looked over at him. The pain on his face was almost too much to bear. “I’ve spent most of the last thirty years trying not to be my mother. And now, well, it seems I am.”

  He took my hand across the table. “I know. I’ve spent so much time being bitter that it finally worked its way into my lungs even though I’ve never smoked a day in my life. I’m dying, Constance. And I don’t want to spend one more moment feeling angry. I want to spend the rest of my days loving you.” He stood, offering his hand. “Dance with me?”

  “There’s no music.”

  “I’ll sing.” He lifted me to my feet.

  “Please, no.” I smiled against his chest as we swayed to the silence. He smelled the same, even after all these years: a mixture of wood smoke and leather and spicy cologne.

  “Will you grant a dying man his last wish?” he said into my hair.

  “What’s that?” I looked up. His eyes locked with mine.

  “Let me die here with you. I want you to be the one who escorts me out.”

  “Oh, Patrick, I don’t want you to go.”

  “I’ll wait for you, wherever it is I’m going. No one can keep us apart again. Not even death.”

  He swirled me in a circle, burying h
is face in my neck. And my old body awakened, just as it always had in his arms.

  “Would you kiss me, Patrick?”

  “Yes, if I may?”

  He leaned down and kissed my mouth, long and soft, like he was making up for the thirty years between now and then. And then, just like in the old days, he took my hand and led me upstairs.

  ***

  I dreamt of the cabin that night. The teacups all lined up in a row, the color of autumn leaves outside the square windows. And Patrick and me, young, his arm wrapped around me as we walked under the October sun. The next morning when I woke, it took me a full moment to remember. Patrick was here. He’d come home to me. He stirred and opened his eyes when I moved my legs toward the cool part of the sheet. “Oregon? Is it really you?”

  “Yes,” I whispered. “I had a dream we were young and at the cabin.” I rested my cheek on my hand, turning to my side to drink in every part of him. In the dim morning light the wrinkles of his face appeared smoother—this new Patrick and the old Patrick had merged together in my mind. Now I saw him as if almost thirty years had not passed. “Did you spend a lot of time there?”

  He nodded. “Yes. I’ve lived there this whole time.”

  “Is it the same?”

  He smiled. “Well, I’ve updated the furniture over the years, but yes.”

  “Take me to Vermont one last time?”

  “I can’t imagine anything better.”

  “And when Sutton is home, we’ll come back here so you can know her.”

  He pulled me closer. “Thank you.”

  ***

  We spent two months at his cabin in Vermont. It was thirty years condensed to eight weeks and almost eerie, the way we fell into our old life. I wrote this project on my old typewriter in the office; Patrick puttered around and cooked for me. I visited Doris and John Teller and other old friends. At night, the stars peeped through the trees framed in the square windows above the bed. And in the dark it was as if no time had passed. We were young and unblemished from age and grief. It was not enough, we agreed, and yet, we were grateful.

  ***

  The first night we were back in Oregon, just before Sutton was to arrive back from France, I dreamt of my father. We were bouncing along the highway in his old truck. George Jones was on the radio. I looked over at him. He was young, like in his wedding photograph with my mother. I looked down at his hands. They were white and unblemished with age.

  “Daddy, you look so young.”

  “We’re all in our prime here. Even George.” He pointed to the radio.

  “Where are you?”

  “Well, it’s hard to explain, Sweets, but it’s nothing to worry over.”

  “Patrick came back.”

  He grinned. “Life’s a circle, Sweets. All that’s lost eventually returns.”

  “But you haven’t returned. And I miss you so much every day.”

  “I’m waiting for you here, don’t you worry. And your mother and Clara and Roma. We’re all here. We’ll see you soon enough. Tell Sutton and Declan we’re all looking out for them.”

  I woke in Patrick’s arms. He slept peacefully and I watched his face, his dear, dear face for many minutes instead of hauling myself out of bed like I had done for thirty years to chase words in the early morning light. I traced the features of his face with my finger. He stirred and opened his eyes and smiled. “Oregon.”

  “Go back to sleep. It’s too early to be awake.”

  “I’d rather be looking at you than sleeping.”

  I smiled, feeling the prickly tears that came so often now. “I just dreamt of my father.” I told him the details of the dream. “It felt so real.”

  “Do you think it’s true?” asked Patrick. “Are they all waiting for us? My mother and father? All those you’ve lost?”

  A sense of well-being entered my body; it was a peace I’d not felt since that Christmas morning so long ago when the world was reduced to just the two of us and I thought nothing could ever pull us apart. “You know, I do.” Smoothing his hair with my hand, I let a tear drop from my face, landing on my arm. He put his hand to my cheek.

  “What is it?”

  “I’m going to miss you when you go.”

  “I’ll wait for you there.” He wiped the tears from my cheeks. “And the doc says I’m doing better than he thought was possible. You’re good medicine. I could live another two years at this rate.”

  I smoothed the comforter over his chest and let my hand linger there, feeling the thump of his heartbeat. “I want to tell Sutton the truth.”

  His eyes searched my face. “Why?”

  “She deserves to know you as her father, not just some friend from my past. And you should have this…” I trailed off, not wanting to say the words, before you die.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. She’ll forgive me eventually. She’s like you—thinks of others before herself. And knowing her, loving her, might keep you alive longer than doctors can predict.”

  “Loving you already has.”

  I pressed harder into his chest with my hand, as if my strength could somehow heal what was underneath flesh and between bones. “We’re having lunch later and I’ll tell her face to face. Then, maybe, hopefully, she’ll want to meet you.”

  He smiled. “Now I’m nervous.”

  “Don’t be. You’re about to fall in love with another Mansfield woman.” I unclasped my sapphire necklace and held it out to him. “I want you to give this to her.”

  “But it’s yours.”

  “I’ve worn it all these years to keep you close but now I have you. She’s always loved it and it would mean a lot to her to get it from you, especially after she learns it was your mother’s.” I threw back the covers. “I’ll write a little and ride into town. The blueberries have arrived.”

  I left him to fall back asleep and went to my office. When I sat down at my desk, the old rabbit’s foot I’d kept all these years caught my eye. I held it in the palm of my left hand, stroking it with my thumb. It should be for Patrick now, I thought. Surely it would keep him safe and well, as it had done for me all these years. I wrote a short note to him and put it and the rabbit’s foot next to the teakettle in the kitchen.

  P—

  For you. To keep you safe and well. See you in a bit. I love you.

  —Oregon

  Then I went back to my office and wrote this last section.

  And as I wrote this on my old, trusted typewriter, it occurred to me I haven’t been writing this for no one to read. I realized, Sutton, I’ve written this to you. I was always better on paper than in real life, unfortunately. All the feelings and complexities of my complicated personality were more easily expressed through my fingers moving over the keys of this typewriter than they were sitting across from you at the dinner table. I’m sorry for this but I suppose we’re all prisoners of our own personalities.

  I have many regrets. I don’t suppose anyone can get through this life without them—some small, some large. One of my biggest regrets is that I didn’t assert myself more when you and Declan parted. I felt at the time it wasn’t my place or perhaps I was simply too hindered by the loss of my own great love to understand how to keep the two of you from doing the same. But now, as I reflect upon my own experiences, I realize that my job as a mother was to share my mistakes and the truth so that it might inform your lives for the better. Instead, my silence, my secrets, aided your estrangement.

  So this has been the truth. All of it, splashed on the page with ink decades old. Learn from me, my darling girl. Do not let a lifetime pass without the love of a man who would do anything to be your anchor in a life riddled with uncertainty and loss.

  Patrick spent a good portion of his life trying to protect me. Now it is my turn to protect him. And so I will risk your anger, your possible animosity toward me for keeping the truth from you, because you deserve to know him. And Sutton, what a man he is. There is no one finer, except for our Declan.

  Now, I tur
n my gaze to the view from my desk. The waves come in one after the other and the sky is as blue as I’ve ever seen. I will put this manuscript in my secret drawer until I feel ready to give it to you. I hope it will not be long.

  I remember those I’ve lost but I think, too, of all that is to come. And I think of you, Sutton. I think of Patrick. There will be more chapters to our story after this, of course, but for now I know only this: how lucky I am to love you both for as long as we all remain.

  I know now that life is arranged in a circle. All that’s lost eventually returns.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  WITH TEARS STREAMING DOWN HER FACE, Sutton read the last words her mother had ever written. She put the last page down with the others and swiped at her wet face.

  “Please don’t cry,” said Declan, drawing her onto his lap.

  She cried into his neck. “They could have had a lifetime together, Dec, and instead they didn’t even get a year. Think of the sacrifices he made so she would be safe. It must have been excruciating to let her walk out of his life, but he loved her more than he wanted his own happiness.”

  He brushed her bottom lip with his finger. “I loved you like that.”

  “Could you ever love me again?” she whispered, tucking her face in the space between his neck and collarbone.

  “I never stopped.” He tilted her face toward him. “Not a day, no matter how much I tried.”

  She looked into his eyes, searching for the truth in the deep blue. “Are you all run out, Declan? Could you be content here?”

  “Sutton, the only place I’ve ever wanted to be was by your side. Don’t you know that by now?” He held her face in his hands. “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to be my adventure.” He waved toward the window. “I don’t want to waste another moment apart from you. Unlike your mother and Patrick, we have the choice to be together. We have to seize it before it’s too late. But if you say no to me again I might not live.”

  “No?”

  “To marrying me. Please, Sutton, marry me.”