Return to Little Hills

by Janice Macdonald

  “This is Edie,” she said, then recognized the voice. “Jessie? What’s wrong?”

  “Bobby and me got into this big fight. He was drinking beer and he started getting real mean. I waited until he went to sleep…passed out, and then I packed up some things and got Roger dressed and walked down to the liquor store.”

  “That’s where you are now?”

  “Yeah. It’s not such a good place—”

  “Give me the address. I’ll be there as fast as I can drive. And Jessie, stay by the phone. If anyone even looks at you cross-eyed, call 911.”

  “SOME ANIMALS don’t change much as they grow up,” Peter was explaining to the twins as they stopped to look at one of the exhibits that wound through the tropical conservatory of the Butterfly House. He crouched to the twins’ eye level. “Humans, for example. Although grown-ups might have…more wrinkles and gray hair—”

  “You have gray hair, right there.” Abbie pointed to his left temple. “And on the other side too.”

  “And you have wrinkles by your eyes,” Kate said.

  “And on your forehead,” Abbie observed.

  “The point is,” Peter said, moving on, “that despite all that, grown-ups look very much like children. Bigger children,” he said when they both appeared doubtful. “A head, two arms, two legs.”

  “Belly buttons,” Kate said.

  Abbie giggled. “Pee-pees.”

  “But butterflies,” he said in a louder, more emphatic voice intended to prevent things from getting out of hand, “go through four very distinct stages and they only look like a butterfly in the very last stage.”

  “Peter.” Sophia had appeared with the two older girls. “There’s an interactive thingy over there that the twins might like. Toilet-paper tubes and lollipop sticks and whatnot. There are children over there making butterflies out of colored paper.”

  “I want to make a butterfly,” Abbie said.

  “Abbie, there are real butterflies all around you,” Peter said. And there were. Above and all around them, thousands of butterflies drifted in free flight, alighting on vibrant tropical foliage. Earlier, even the twins had stood still long enough to watch a butterfly magically emerge from its chrysalis. “A butterfly was born right in front of my eyes,” Delphina had said, awestruck. But now the miracle of birth had lost its novelty and the consensus was for making paper butterflies. He shot Sophia a look of resignation and watched, bemused, as they all trooped off to a bank of paper-covered trestle tables.

  “Pity your friend couldn’t have joined us,” Sophia said. “The one who gave you the tickets? A teacher, isn’t she?”

  “Right.” Peter heard a familiar note in his sister’s voice. She had, he suspected, conspired to get him alone for an update on Project Wife. Beth had flown into Sophia’s radar after making Delphina’s butterfly wings, and then again when he’d mentioned the tickets to the exhibit. Although he’d expected Beth to go, she’d claimed a last-minute appointment and suggested he take a friend. Immediately, he’d thought of Edie. As he’d said goodbye to her at Maude’s last night, he’d thought again of inviting her, and then the girls had hugged Maude. If Edie had made some gesture, perhaps, but she hadn’t. Children are like a foreign language to me.

  “So I thought to myself,” Sophia was saying, “even though he already has four wives and a mouthful of gold teeth, I might as well marry him—”

  “What?” Peter gaped at his sister. “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “Just checking to see if you are actually among us,” Sophia said. “I had the feeling that perhaps you were floating up there with the butterflies. Mentally, anyway.”

  “I see,” Peter said.

  “Would you like my opinion?”

  Peter grinned. “On what? And do I have any choice?”

  “You know perfectly well on what. And no, you have no choice. Unless, of course, you want to make a public spectacle of yourself by running through this exhibit with your hands over your ears.”

  “Go on, then.”

  “You’re clearly besotted with this foreign correspondent.”

  “Edie.”

  “Edie, sorry. Is that actually her name?”

  “Actually, it’s Edith, but she detests the name.”

  “Can’t say that I blame her,” Sophia said. “Very old-fashioned and frumpy. Smacks of maiden aunts and dentures. But, as I was saying, I think you’ve come down with a very bad case of unrequited love. Perhaps she’s suitable and perhaps she’s not. But if it’s the former, I think you need to start addressing the obstacles that stand between the two of you and a blessed union. I will want to meet her, of course.”

  “LOOK, I know you need an answer,” Edie said when the newspaper’s executive editor called to tell her she had the bureau chief job and asked if she could be in Hong Kong in two weeks, sooner if possible. “I’m in the middle of a dozen things that need to be wrapped up at home and…I really need time to think things through.”

  After she hung up, she sat on the stairs for a moment, holding her head. This had never happened before. She’d never had any difficulty leaving. Quite the opposite. The last week of her visits had always dragged interminably.

  “No one expects anything from you,” Maude had said on that first day back. But suddenly it didn’t seem that way at all. Jessie clearly needed her. She’d picked up Jessie and the baby from outside the liquor store and brought them back to Maude’s until they figured out some other arrangements. Now Jessie was upstairs asleep, Roger in an improvised crib beside her. It had been after three by the time they got home; she’d woken around seven but decided to let Jessie sleep. Maude, not at all bothered by the prospect of a young houseguest and a baby, said they could stay as long as they wanted. Maude had left after breakfast for a shopping trip to St. Louis with Dixie and her daughter—a trip Edie hadn’t first okayed with Viv.

  That thought raised the Maple Grove specter and the inevitable showdown with Vivian. And then there was the journalism class. She’d given two of them now and was beginning to enjoy them immensely. And finally there was Peter. His daughter Delphina’s poem, stuck on the fridge with a butterfly magnet, was inscribed, “To my new grandma, Maude.”

  From up in the bedroom, she heard the baby murmur. She crept upstairs, peered around the open door and saw a small flailing fist. Jessie stirred and reached out to pat the baby.

  Jessie murmured as Edie bent to lift Roger from the crib.

  “It’s okay,” Edie whispered. “Go back to sleep. I’ll take care of Buster here.” He was warm and damp and wailing indignantly as she carried him downstairs and she smiled down into his pink little face. “I’m not very good at taking care of anyone but myself,” she told him. “Ask the cats. They have to remind me to feed them.”

  In the living room, she unwrapped the baby from his damp blankets and set him down on the couch. “Don’t pee on the upholstery,” she said, “or my mom will kill me.” She unfastened his diaper, grimaced at the acrid ammonia smell. Roger regarded her through round brown eyes. “I forgot the clean diaper,” she told him. “Stay there, okay? I’ll be back in a flash.” The baby cooed and wriggled his legs and Edie decided not to risk him falling off the couch. She scooped him up again, ran up the stairs, grabbed the diaper bag and carried him back to the couch.

  Panting from the exertion, she pulled a disposable diaper from the bag, held it up trying to decide which way went what, then used the plastic tabs to snap it around him.

  “The last time I changed a baby’s diaper, I was in high school,” she told him. “That was a loooong time ago.” She heard a movement in the doorway, and Roger gurgled and waved his legs wildly. “Sounds like Mommy, huh? Breakfast?” she asked with a glance at Jessie.

  “Can I help?” Jessie asked.

  “Nope. Just hold the baby and talk to me.”

  In the kitchen, Jessie set Roger down in an infant seat on the table and Edie checked the contents of the refrigerator. “I’m not the world’s greatest coo
k, mostly because I have no one but myself to cook for and I’m not too fussy.”

  “What about your mother?” Jessie asked. “Do you make stuff for her?”

  Edie set four eggs on the counter and rolled her eyes. “I’ve tried to, but she complains so much it kind of takes all the fun out of it.”

  “You don’t get along with her?” Jessie asked.

  “It’s not so much that we don’t get along. It’s more that we don’t really like each other too much.”

  Jessie looked aghast. “You don’t like your mom?”

  “Well…” Edie grinned at Jessie’s shocked expression. “It’s hard to explain. I love her and in her own way I’m sure she loves me, but…we have a lot of history between us and we tend to set each other off. Although,” she surprised herself by saying, “I think it’s getting better.”

  Jessie said nothing.

  “What about your mother?” Edie asked as she cracked eggs into a bowl. Immediately, she felt like an idiot. If Jessie had a good relationship with her mother, she wouldn’t be taking refuge in the home of a stranger. She glanced over her shoulder at Jessie, who was spooning pureed apple into the baby’s mouth. “Is she in the picture at all?”

  “She lives in New Jersey. She’s a cocktail waitress, but me and her boyfriend don’t get along.”

  “Do you see her?”

  “Not since before Roger was born. But she’s okay. She’s just got a lot of other stuff going on in her life.”

  Edie heated butter, then whipped the eggs a moment before she dumped them into the pan, wondering as she did whether Jessie’s mother had any idea at all of the stuff going on in her daughter’s life. She was still thinking about it when Viv called to remind her that Beth’s surprise party was tonight and there were a million things still to be done and she could really use some help if Edie wasn’t too busy with “the little journalism thing and everything.” Roger’s loud shriek stopped Viv in midsentence.

  “What was that?”

  “Roger.”

  “Who’s Roger?”

  Edie smiled at Jessie. “Roger’s a very cute little boy who’s getting very angry because Jessie—that’s his mother—is trying to feed him carrots and I have the feeling he doesn’t like them very much.”

  Vivian sighed. “You know what, Edie? I don’t even want to know.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “I DON’T HAVE TIME to get into an argument about this,” Viv said later after she’d insisted on a full accounting of how and why Jessie and Roger were now houseguests in Maude’s home. “But I honestly think you’re nuts. No, not nuts, just completely irresponsible and—”

  “Actually, that was a good idea about not getting into an argument,” Edie said. “So let’s not.” She had, as requested, arrived early to help Viv with the party. For most of the afternoon, they’d chopped and stirred and assembled platters of food that now rested on trays in the refrigerator. The guests had all arrived, the guest of honor duly surprised. Now, as far as Edie could see, there was little else to do but join in the festivities.

  “I should probably go do something about myself,” Viv partially emerged from the refrigerator to remark over her shoulder to Edie. “I don’t even have lipstick on. Here…” She handed Edie a platter of deviled eggs. “Can you go hand those out and mingle?”

  “No problem. Go fix yourself up.”

  “I look bad?” Vivian’s hand shot up to her hair. “I didn’t have time to stop at the beauty shop—”

  “Viv. You look fine. I just meant that if you wanted to…gild the lily, I’ve got things under control.”

  Vivian, ever on the scent of sarcasm, frowned. “I’m not sure what you mean but, oh well, I don’t have time to think about that now. I hope to God Ray’s setting the bar up, I told him red and white wine and…oh shoot, I think the meatballs are scorching. Go.” She flapped her hands at Edie. “I’ll take care of this. Make sure Mom’s parked somewhere with a plate of food, though. She’ll get cranky otherwise.”

  “Got it.” Platter in hand, Edie worked her way through the crowd and noticed Maude on a couch talking to Peter. The sight halted her in her tracks. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since they’d cleared the garden, but last night she’d had an erotic dream about him involving butterfly nets and little in the way of clothing—a vivid dream that could make it hard to look at him directly. Peter would keep Maude fed, although the prospect of what Maude might be telling Peter was potentially embarrassing. “Look, Peter,” she imagined Maude saying. “I don’t want to see her end up an old maid and if you don’t marry her, no one will. Sure she snaps, but she’s not all bad. She does feed the cats.”

  She circled the room a couple of times, until the platter was nearly empty, then saw Beth talking to a tall reedy guy with receding red hair. He had his hand on Beth’s arm and they were both laughing as though they’d just shared a good joke. A teacher from Luther, she guessed. Viv said she’d invited the entire staff. Except for Peter, Ray and Beth, Edie knew none of them.

  “Deviled eggs. Going, going…” She offered the platter. Beth’s companion took the last one, then held it up to Beth’s mouth. “Gone,” Edie said.

  “Edie, this is my friend Sam O’Neil,” Beth said after taking a tiny bite. “Edie Robinson, famous foreign correspondent and—”

  “Please,” Edie said, embarrassed, although Sam hardly seemed able to take his eyes off Beth. “Do you two teach together?”

  They both smiled and exchanged glances. Beth shook her head. “Your sister, Edie, I swear. How she managed it, I have no idea, but she somehow found my address book and invited people I haven’t heard from in years. Sam was one of them.”

  “We met a long time ago in a bookstore in Clayton,” Sam said, still looking at Beth. “Fifteen, sixteen years ago?”

  “God, I can’t believe it’s been that long.” Beth held a glass of white wine in one hand and her cheeks were flushed. “It was Christmastime,” she told Edie, “and we were both looking at the calendar selection.”

  “They were kind of picked over,” Sam said, “and I was trying to decide between New Yorker cartoons and some abstract-art thing. I happened to look over to see Beth flipping through a calendar and she had this little smile on her face. I glanced at the calendar and it was babies.”

  “Babies?” Edie asked, smiling at Beth.

  “Babies.” Sam said. “It was cute. They were sitting in huge flowerpots, bursting out of eggshells, that sort of thing. She was so engrossed in the calendar, she didn’t even notice me.”

  “So what happened?” Edie asked, charmed by the story and their obvious delight in one another. “You tapped her on the shoulder and said—”

  “Could you help me pick out a calendar for my mother?” Sam laughed. “Yep, pretty corny, huh?”

  “Well, I was going to guess secretary,” Edie said. “And then what?”

  “Oh, you know Beth.” He winked at Edie. “She’s so damn sweet and trusting. We picked out a calendar and chatted about this and that and then I asked her if she’d like to have a drink somewhere. I envisioned a bar, but we ended up drinking tea at the kind of place my mother would love. I was hooked from day one.”

  “I was, too,” Beth said softly. Head ducked slightly, she addressed her wineglass. “But I just couldn’t believe you felt the same way and so we kind of drifted apart. And then I heard Sam was engaged…”

  “On the rebound from you,” Sam said. “I never stopped—”

  “Well, gotta go do my hostess duties.” Edie interrupted, sensing somehow that it was time for her exit. “Nice meeting you, Sam.

  Back in the kitchen, she found Viv removing a cookie tray of something golden brown and savory from the oven. “God, whatever that is smells fantastic,” she said.

  “Miniature quiches,” Viv said. “Spinach and cheese. I hope I haven’t cooked them too long.” She set them on the counter, glanced around the kitchen. “All right, let’s see…pimento and cheddar pinwheels… God, maybe that’s too mu
ch cheese. I could do a shrimp—”

  “Viv.” Edie slammed shut the freezer door that Vivian had just opened. “Who are you trying to impress? People aren’t here for the food. They’re here because of Beth. Who, by the way, seems pretty blissed-out.”

  Viv looked interested. “She’s talking to Peter?”

  “No. She’s talking to an old flame.”

  “Oh…” Viv shrugged. “Sam O’Neil. He’s just an old friend.”

  “I think he’s a lot more than just an old friend.” She glanced into the living room where, at the edge of the crowd, Sam had his arms locked around Beth’s waist. “In fact, even as we speak, he’s laying a pretty hot lip-lock on her.”

  Viv opened the freezer and brought out a bag of frozen shrimp. “Beth’s in love with Peter. She’s just trying to make him jealous.” At the sink, she ran the shrimp under a stream of hot water. “Beth and Sam go back a long way and I’m sure he’s very sweet. But look at Sam and then look at Peter. I mean, Peter’s flat-out gorgeous.”

  Edie grinned. “Hey, Viv. Who’s really in love with Peter? Beth or you?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Edie.” Viv smacked the still-frozen shrimp against the side of the sink. “I’m happily married.”

  “THERE’S EDITH,” Maude told Peter. “Hope she brings whatever she’s carrying over here…unless it’s that spicy stuff. If Edie made it, it’ll be spicy. Probably have green peppers in it, too.”

  “Shall I go and find out?” Peter asked, but Maude shook her head, pointing to the full plate on her lap. They were sitting on a couch at one end of a vast room, elegantly done up with crystal chandeliers and off-white furnishings. Over the granite fireplace, a gilt-framed mirror reflected the casually dressed crowd who stood elbow to elbow, sipping wine from long-stemmed glasses. Had he not known this was the home of his assistant principal, he would have guessed that it was owned by a wealthy and successful heart surgeon, perhaps, or someone who had made a killing on the stock market. Since Ray’s wife wasn’t employed, Peter speculated idly on how he could afford such a house, but decided that he didn’t care enough to question Maude, an obvious source of information. Maybe Ray sold cosmetics door to door, he decided.