October

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I woke up in a tangle of sheets when my cell phone buzzing on my nightstand yanked me from the last shreds of a hazy dream.

Lifting my head, I winced as sunlight slanting between the window blinds sliced through my eyeballs and raked the back of my skull. I reached out blindly, patting the top of my nightstand. My glasses and the TV remote clattered to the floor. When my hand closed over my phone, I pulled it close to my face and managed to decipher the text on the screen.

Hey Carly. It’s Steve. Had fun last night. U free tonight?

Dropping my face into my pillow, I let out a long groan. Steve…the virtual stranger I’d made out with at O’Brien’s Pub. I didn’t find out his last name, but as his face floated to the top of my consciousness, I remembered a few other things about him. His kisses tinged with the taste of booze and cigarettes. His crude jokes that I’d giggled at when I really wanted to roll my eyes. Details got sketchy after my fourth rum and cola, but apparently I’d given him my number.

I did remember slipping off with him to a dark corner, clinging to his T-shirt sleeve to steady myself, and then falling into his arms in a booth behind a potted fern. I’d done this the way I did everything, impetuously, thinking I could lose myself in the moment until I felt better about my life. Definitely not thinking ahead to the way I felt now.

No, I most definitely was not doing it again tonight.

I levered myself upright. My pulse hammering in my temples, I scrubbed my eyes with the heel of my hand, then reached for my glasses on the floor. I slid them on and frowned at my image in the mirror above my dresser.

My face looked drawn and sallow. Mascara smears ringed my squinty eyes. My dark hair lay matted against one side of my head and formed a tangled mass on the other side. I glanced down at the blue cotton nightgown I was wearing, and remembered Faith helping me change out of my snug red sheath dress, which now lay across the chair under the window.

Thank God for Faith. She’d pried me away from Steve, rolled me into her car and driven me to my apartment, lecturing me the whole time on how I’d been sabotaging myself since I broke up with Rob.

I couldn’t argue with her point—but what of it? Only a few months ago, I’d lost the man I loved, just after my flower shop went out of business. I had a right to my pity party.

Grabbing my phone, I found myself tapping on my contacts list, bringing up Rob’s number. My heart clenched when his picture appeared on the screen—the photo I’d taken by Lake Ontario during a wine-tasting tour in Prince Edward County last spring. Back when my life made sense and I saw my future laid out in front of me like a gleaming yellow-brick road.

Last time we spoke, he’d told me I could call him any time I wanted to talk. But what would be the use? I’d be tearing the scab off a wound that had just begun to heal—and besides, I didn’t think his new girlfriend would appreciate the intrusion. I’d only caught one brief glimpse of her from across the road in front of his apartment, but I remembered her face and could picture her now in his bed, waking spooned in his arms, her long auburn curls tickling his chin.

I was still staring at my phone when it buzzed again, this time with an incoming call from my mother. Scowling, I heaved a sigh and considered letting the call go to voicemail. But my conscience got the better of me. The one time I didn’t answer was sure to be the time she’d phoned to tell me my nonna in Italy had passed away and I’d never be forgiven for missing that call.

“Carly, you don’t sound right,” she said in response to my listless greeting. “Are you sick?”

“No. Just groggy.” I dragged my hand down my face in an effort to revive my senses. “I was up late at a friend’s birthday party and just woke up. What’s up?”

“I wanted to know what time you’re going to arrive next weekend.”

“Next weekend?”

“Have you forgotten Thanksgiving?”

“I guess I did.” I glanced at the calendar tacked on my bedroom wall. “Is it your turn to have me this year?”

“Yes. You and Rob spent Thanksgiving at your father’s last year, remember?”

“Right.” Thinking back on it caused a pinch in my chest. It had been a big step for me to take a man to my dad’s place for a major holiday. Then we’d spent Christmas with his parents in Montreal, usurping Mom’s turn, so we went to her place in Eastport for Easter.

“You haven’t been home since June, bambina,” she went on, her voice laced with motherly concern that so often bordered on smothering, with an added twist of guilt. “I miss you.”

“Sorry, Mom. I’ve been busy.”

“I worry about you. Since you broke up with Rob—”

“It’s been three months. I’m okay.” I turned and swung my legs over the side of the bed, and winced when my throbbing brain rebelled against the sudden movement.

I’d hoped to stay in St. Catharines for Thanksgiving and share a low-key turkey dinner with my dad and stepmother. I wasn’t looking forward to the hour-long drive to Eastport, or spending the holiday fending off my mother’s scrutiny over my stalled love life and career.

On the other hand, maybe a change of scenery was what I needed. Maybe a few days away from my apartment would help me drag myself out of the slump I’d fallen into.

“A mother always worries,” she said. “You’ll find this out when you have kids of your own. Someday.”

I pressed my thumb and index finger against my eyelids and bit back a sigh, more than aware of her concern that I was thirty-five and hadn’t yet given her a grandchild. As her sole offspring, I was her one and only hope. I’d never had the heart to tell her I wasn’t particularly eager to bring babies into the world.

“I’ll be there,” I said. “Ci vediamo. Ti amo, Mamma.”

“See you then.” I heard the smile in her voice, as though my ability to remember Italian phrases confirmed I wasn’t too far gone. “I love you too.”