Yes, Bonnie thought. She could. Not caregiving; she had no desire to do that work on a professional level. But she wouldn’t mind selling her quilts, even, as Carol had mentioned, taking on custom projects, and maybe also teaching basic and advanced needlework.
But to come face-to-face with a client or student or customer probably meant a makeover. Bonnie put down her half-empty cup of tea and considered her faded blue T-shirt and shorts. Maybe she would ask Judith to go shopping with her for some new, more tailored clothes. Judith had a good fashion sense.
Would she need to do something with her hair? Wear makeup? She hadn’t worn makeup in at least twenty years! Bonnie’s stomach began to flutter. And then she heard Ken. He was laughing. “Look at you getting all worked up over nothing,” he was saying. “Bonnie, you’re perfect the way you are. Everything’s going to be all right. Now, get moving!”
And Bonnie did. Within moments she was in her car and headed for The Busy Bee. It had been too long since she had talked with her fellow craftswomen, with others who shared her passion, skills, and talents. She would have a friendly conversation with Adelaide and Cindy and see what developed from there.
All would be well. Ken had said so.
Chapter 98
Since she had sold her business, Carol rarely checked her e-mail. There was never anything of real importance these days—a note from a colleague suggesting a lunch date; the announcement of a sale from a store in which she had never shopped; a photo from a former client showing how they had added various personal touches to the interior Carol had created for them.
But this evening, curled up in Ferndean’s den, she found an e-mail from Alex. Carol immediately opened the message. I need to speak to you as soon as convenient, it said. I’ve something very important to discuss.
Carol frowned; she couldn’t remember how long it had been since she had heard Alex’s voice. The last time they had communicated was when Carol had sent Alex a text telling him that she was headed off to Maine for the summer. She hadn’t mentioned her plans regarding Ferndean.
For a moment, she wondered if Alex needed money. It seemed unlikely, but if he had fallen on hard times she would do what she could for him. No questions asked.
Carol looked at the time at the top right of her computer screen and compared it to the time at which Alex’s e-mail had been sent. Just a few moments ago. Buenos Aires was only an hour ahead of New England. It was not too late to call.
Carol reached for her phone.
Alex answered almost immediately.
“You got my e-mail,” he said.
“Just now. So, what is it you wanted to talk about?” Carol asked. She realized her body was tensing.
“I’m dying, Carol.”
In spite of her shoulders feeling rigid, Carol laughed. She couldn’t have said why. “What do you mean dying? We’re all dying, from the moment we’re born. Are you saying—”
“Yes, I have stage four pancreatic cancer. I have six to nine months to live. It’s likely I won’t make it to my seventy-sixth birthday.”
Carol put her hand to her head. She felt odd. Cold. A bit dizzy. “Have you had a second and third opinion?” she asked.
“Of course. There’s no doubt.”
No doubt. No doubt that the father of her child was dying. “I’m so very sorry,” she said, surprised at the steadiness of her voice. She did not feel steady. “I . . . I don’t know what else to say. I don’t know what to do.”
“There is something very specific you can do for me, Carol,” Alex went on. “I’d like to be introduced to our daughter. I know what I promised and if you think it would damage her too badly to learn the truth at this point, then I’ll drop the whole thing. I’m not threatening exposure. Honestly. But I would very much like to speak with her before I die.”
Carol felt a wave of panic surge through her. What would happen if Nicola learned the truth of her paternity? Would it drive her further away from her mother or bring her closer? Carol took a deep breath. This could not be about her, not any longer. She had to think only of her daughter. And of Alex.
“I don’t know how Nicola would feel,” she admitted. “I’m not her favorite person. I haven’t been for a long time.”
“But you’re with her now in Maine?”
“Yes, but . . . Alex, I need to think about this. I won’t delay, I promise. I want to do the right thing for the both of you. I’ll call you with an answer before the end of the week. Is that all right?”
“Yes,” Alex said. The relief in his voice was clear. “Carol? Thank you.”
“Goodbye.” Carol realized that she had whispered the word.
They had been on the phone for less than ten minutes, but in those ten minutes her entire world had turned upside down.
Carol put her hand over her heart. Alex had thanked her. But what did he have to thank her for? She had in effect denied him the experience of fatherhood and withheld the chance of his having a proper wife.
Still, this was the last thing she had expected to hear from Alex, that he wanted contact with their daughter, though why the possibility hadn’t occurred to her before now she couldn’t say. It was a reasonable request from a dying man. From any man who had been kept away from his child, because although Alex had agreed to Carol’s terms regarding Nicola, he hadn’t been in his right mind when he did so. He had been in love.
And Carol had always loved him for the gift he had given her. She imagined him all alone in Buenos Aires . . . although a man like Alex Peters could never be entirely alone; he was a talented friend and was sure to have a support system after all these years. For all she knew, Alex might even have a girlfriend.
Whatever the case, the father of her child was facing the final months of his life.
Carol felt too devastated to cry.
Chapter 99
“What’s going on in that head?” Hermione asked. “You’re a million miles away.”
Nicola startled. She had been staring out the window of Hermione’s living room, seeing nothing. Her mind, if not a million miles away, had been at least in another neighborhood of Yorktide. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Really. Please, go on with your story.”
Hermione, dressed impeccably as always, smiled and waved her hand. “It can wait. Tell me what’s on your mind.”
It might, Nicola thought, be unprofessional to confide in one of Pine Hill’s residents, even one who had previously confided in her, but at the moment she felt she had little choice but to speak.
“It’s kind of silly, really,” she began, embarrassed. “Maybe it’s a sort of existential crisis, if I’m not too young to be having one. It’s just that for the past months I’ve been feeling there’s something else I’m needed for in this life, but I don’t know what it is. For a while I thought that maybe I was being called to join the Peace Corps, but now I think that maybe I’m needed closer to home.”
Kin keeping, Nicola thought. But how?
Hermione leaned closer to Nicola. “Wait,” she advised. “Listen. Breathe. The answer will come to you when you’re ready to hear it. The universe will speak to you when it’s ready to speak.”
“I’m not very good at being patient,” Nicola admitted. “I mean, with myself.”
“Just give it a try.” Hermione smiled again. “Trust me. I’m old enough to know these things.”
Nicola felt the proverbial butterflies take flight in her stomach. “There’s something else,” she went on. “I mean, it’s part of the same thing but . . . In the past few days, I’ve had the strangest sense that something is drawing near, that something big is going to happen. The thing is, I’ve never been particularly in touch with instinct or whatever you want to call it. It’s all so odd.”
“Life is odd,” Hermione said. Her tone was kind. “And that’s what makes it so interesting. Infuriating sometimes, almost unbearable at others, and at other times, heartbreakingly beautiful. You’ll be all right, Nicola. All will be well.”
Nicola reached for
her friend’s hand. And Hermione was a friend. “Thank you,” she said feelingly. “Thank you.”
Chapter 100
“I really like your new haircut. I think Dad really likes it, too.”
Julie smiled up at her daughter. She was in her office and had been scribbling notes for the essay that was the major focus of the Ackroyd Institute’s scholarship application when Sophie appeared. No stomping of feet this time or slamming of doors.
“Thanks,” she said. “I like it, too.”
Sophie perched on the windowsill. “I didn’t mean it when I suggested you have an affair,” she blurted. “I don’t want you to get a divorce. I don’t want to have to choose who I’m going to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with for the rest of my life, tiptoeing around so that neither you or Dad feels left out. And I want my wedding to be happy. I want to take pictures with my mom and dad, not with a stepmother and a stepfather I hardly even know and don’t want to know. And what if I have kids one day?” Sophie went on. “There’ll be like a million grandparents fighting over who gets to see the baby on his birthday! And what if you or Dad don’t get remarried and are all alone? Do you know how awful that will make me feel? Maybe even worse than if you got married to someone totally annoying.”
Julie resisted a smile. Sophie was so young, unabashedly concerned with her own comfort. But could she be blamed for that?
“Most of all,” Sophie went on, “I really do want you guys to be happy. I don’t know what that means, exactly. You probably have to figure that out yourselves.”
Julie’s heart swelled. For a moment, she couldn’t speak.
“You will figure it out, won’t you, Mom?” Sophie went on. “What it will take for you and Dad to be happy?”
“I promise to try my very best,” she said. That much was true.
“Thanks. I’ll be in my room.”
Sophie left the office as quietly as she had entered. A moment later, the doorbell rang and Julie got up to answer it. Her mother had asked if she could come by to return a book she had borrowed.
Julie realized she would be glad to see her.
Chapter 101
“Something’s different,” Bonnie noted as she stood in her daughter’s kitchen. “But I can’t put my finger on it.”
Julie smiled. “New kitchen towels,” she said, pointing to two bright floral printed towels hanging from the oven door. “It’s amazing what a little color can bring to a room.”
A little color, Bonnie thought, and a refreshed attitude. Julie had lost a few pounds. And she looked neater than she had in some time. And her hair was styled a bit differently.
Carol was right. Something was subtly better. Maybe Carol was in some small degree responsible for this change. All things were possible.
“Tea?” Julie asked.
Bonnie nodded. “Carol hasn’t mentioned her plans to buy Ferndean from me in weeks,” she said as her daughter filled the tea kettle. “I wonder what’s going on.”
“You could just ask her,” Julie suggested.
“I’m afraid to,” Bonnie admitted. “Things between us have been better, not perfect but better. I guess I want to enjoy that for a while.” Bonnie laughed. “How crazy is that?”
Julie put two cups on the table. “You love your sister.”
“Of course, I do. I always have and I always will.”
“And I believe she loves you, Mom, and all of her family. Why else would she have come back to Yorktide? I mean, what’s here for her other than you and me and Nicola and Judith? She’s not exactly a nature lover or a beach bum.”
“She came back for Ferndean,” Bonnie said, but almost as if she was testing the truth of the statement.
Julie quirked an eyebrow. “If you believe that . . .”
Bonnie shook her head. “Oh, I don’t know what I believe anymore. But I’m glad Carol came back. In spite of everything I’m glad. But don’t tell her that.”
“Mom,” Julie laughed, “you’re incorrigible!”
Chapter 102
Carol didn’t know why she had told Alex she needed time to think about her decision. She had to tell Nicola about her father. Didn’t she? Would it really be for the best?
Once again, Carol sat in Ferndean’s cave-like den. Once again, the gloom fitted her mood. Melancholic. Regretful. Frightened.
The emerald necklace her parents had given her on her sixteenth birthday. It was probably her fault that it had gone missing. If she had been in the habit of taking it off before bed the tiny clasp might not have worn out and she would still have that tangible link to her childhood and to Yorktide.
How careless she had been with the things and worse, with the people most important to her!
Shirley and Ronald Ascher.
And dear Bonnie. Carol had never properly expressed her deep gratitude for the care she had given Nicola.
Carol put her hands over her eyes.
Little Jonathan’s death.
The need for someone to genuinely mourn her, like she would mourn Alex when he was gone.
The realization of just how fragile and fleeting life was had been a prime motive for her coming home to Yorktide.
So yes. The answer was now clear.
First, she would tell Bonnie and Judith the whole story, every last unsavory bit of it. And she would ask for their advice about approaching Nicola. That was unprecedented. For better or worse, Carol had always done things her own way, even when that way involved upsetting or inconveniencing others. But in the past weeks she had come to realize that she was not in control of the dynamics in Yorktide, as she had not always been in control of other aspects of her life.
Ferndean and Yorktide had finally gotten the best of its famous daughter.
Chapter 103
Nicola felt restless. If there was room in her apartment to pace she would have paced. Hermione had said she needed to allow her path to reveal itself. She was supposed to relax and be patient. She was supposed to listen. To what? To the still, small voice within her?
But what if her hearing wasn’t acute enough to hear a still, small voice, her own or anyone else’s?
Nicola considered going out somewhere. Maybe for a walk. Maybe for a beer at one of the craft breweries that were so popular. Maybe to a movie. For the first time in a very long time, Nicola wished she had a friend to call, someone to hang out with, someone with whom she could laugh about silly things.
But she didn’t.
Once, she had had her mother. But that was when she was a child. And her mother had had her.
A memory. Something she and her mother had talked about earlier that summer.
She had a memento of that night . . .
Suddenly, it was vital that Nicola find that old photograph. She was pretty certain she had stuck it between the pages of a book not long after she had moved in with her aunt and uncle. And as Nicola never got rid of a book, ever, the photo had to be there somewhere.
Not in the hardcover copy of A Tale of Two Cities. Not in the paperback edition of Jung’s collected writings. Not in any of the mass market mysteries Nicola consumed like some people consumed potato chips.
Finally, the treasure revealed itself between the pages of a sociology textbook. Nicola sighed with relief. It showed mother and daughter the night they had gone to the Broadway premiere of Seussical. Nicola was wearing the purple dress she had liked so much. Her mother was wearing a casual suit; it might have been silk. She looked like a model.
It was a nice picture. She and her mother were smiling and holding hands. And yet . . .
Nicola frowned. Something was . . . wrong. Or missing. She shook her head. The image itself hadn’t changed. It had always just been the two of them, mother and daughter. But now, something. . .
Nicola propped the photo against the nearest milk carton and continued to stare at it. Again, she was swamped with that strange feeling that something important was about to happen. She felt nervous and scared and excited, both apprehensive and eager to greet whatever it w
as that awaited her.
For a half a moment, Nicola considered calling her mother at Ferndean. Just to say hello. Maybe her mother would invite her over.
But she didn’t reach for her phone.
Chapter 104
Julie pressed the start button on the dishwasher and closed the door to the machine. The daily kitchen cleanup had been done. A load of laundry was in the machine. There were a few items that needed ironing; Julie would get to them later. She would.
Things were changing.
Julie and Scott had acted in concert the night Sophie ignored her curfew.
Scott had noticed his wife’s new haircut.
He had helped make the Mexican meal she had suggested.
The evening before, Julie had asked if he wanted to watch one of their favorite television shows with her.
Scott had sat on the couch with his wife but at the other end. Still, they were side by side and had shared a few comments on the plot and had laughed at the antics of the goofy character. Things had felt almost normal.
Julie found Scott in the garage repairing their ancient lawnmower. It had been a gift from her father and mother when the Millers had bought the house. Though for the past three seasons it had been breaking down every few weeks, Scott refused to let it go.
“Still breathing life into that machine?” Julie asked with a smile.
Scott looked up and wiped his brow with the back of his hand. “It’s got a good two or three years in it,” he said. “That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”
“Can we talk?” she asked.
“Yes, of course. Do you want to go into the house?”
“No,” Julie said. “Here’s fine. I just want to know, if I hadn’t confronted you, would you have gone on with the affair? I know you told me you’d decided to end it, but was that a lie?”
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