Chapter 29
“Thanks for doing the shoveling, Fliss.” Felicity removed another layer of clothing and sank into a chair at the kitchen table. “No worries, Mom. It’s good exercise. Besides, we’ve only gotten a few inches so far.”
“There’s a lot more predicted,” Molly pointed out. “Remember that time a few years back when we were snowed in for three days?”
“Yeah,” Felicity said. “Mr. Roberts from the hardware store got lost in that storm. By the time they found him he had frostbite. I heard he lost all ten of his toes.”
“Only two toes, Fliss,” Molly corrected. “His wife got carried away the more she told the tale. Still, two toes is two toes too many. The cold is dangerous.”
Nell turned off the gas under the front left burner and carefully poured boiling water over the teabag in her favorite cup. Now might be a good time to tell the girls about her friendship with Eric. But still she hesitated. To share with her children the fact of her long-ago romance as well as the fact of Eric’s being back in her life even temporarily was bound to have a big effect, good or bad. She would wait just a little longer.
“We might want to get to the concert early tonight,” she said. “I read in the paper there’s an important organist scheduled to play a prelude to the program. It might be difficult to get good seats.”
Molly, who was at the table sewing a button on a blouse, shook her head. “Sorry, Mom. I can’t. I totally forgot that Andrea’s party is tonight.”
“Will Mick be there?” Felicity asked.
“No. Andrea didn’t invite him, given what happened between us.” Molly sighed. “I’m so not in the mood for a party, but I promised Andrea I’d be there, and she really helped me out when I was having trouble with a course last spring, so I’m kind of obliged.”
“Felicity?” Nell asked. “You’re still coming with me, right?”
Felicity scrunched up her face. “Sorry, Mom. I just found out this afternoon there’s a one-time screening of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir at the old meetinghouse in South Berwick. Ever since I saw it on television when I was eleven I’ve wanted to see it on a big screen. It’s so romantic.”
“All right then,” Nell said with a smile that hid her disappointment. “You two have a good time and drive carefully.”
“We always do, Mom,” Molly assured her. “I’d better change. I promised Andrea I’d help her set up for tonight.”
“And I need to take a shower. I sweat right through my fleece doing the shoveling. Ugh.”
Once she was alone Nell realized with a bit of a shock that she couldn’t recall the last time she had attended an event on her own, not even a movie at the little Leavitt Theatre in Ogunquit, or a lecture at the Portland Museum of Art, or a workshop at the Strawberry Lane Community Arts Education Center. For a moment she considered asking Jill to go to the concert with her (Eric was booked to host an online forum arranged by his publisher), but then she thought about those websites she had scoured and she decided not to. Instead, she would follow the advice of the experts and embrace independence. She would go to the concert on her own, and she would enjoy the beautiful music and the presence of her friendly neighbors. The community of Yorktide would make a fine companion.
* * *
Nell stood across from the Methodist church on an otherwise empty stretch of road. She had dressed with care, going so far as to wear her best dress, a black wool A-line that came to just below her knees, black knee-high boots (with corrugated rubber soles, of course), and the good camel coat she had bought in the early days of her marriage. She had even put on the pair of pearl earrings Joel had given her one anniversary and a white gold necklace that complemented the pearls. Being on one’s own was a good thing, she had told herself while dressing. It was normal. It was healthy.
But as Nell watched families and couples and groups of friends stream through the front doors of the church, her spirits began to falter. For the full ten minutes she had been standing there she had seen no one enter the church on his or her own. Was this to be her future, she wondered, to be the odd one out, solitary, looking on as other people lived their lives in the company of loved ones?
I can’t do this, she thought. I know I’m being silly and weak, but I just can’t. Nell turned and hurried down the darkened road to where she had parked her car. Twenty minutes later she was home and in her nightgown and robe, the earrings and necklace once again safely stowed in her jewelry box and the dress zipped into its protective garment bag.
Nell left her bedroom and settled in the book nook to wait for the girls to return home. Only that morning she had determined to take control of her future and look at what had happened by evening. Nell took a deep breath. Resiliency and optimism, she thought. One step at a time. Be gentle with yourself. No journey was ever completed without the occasional detour and misstep. Nell reached for the book of poems by Wallace Stevens. Reading was what was required.
* * *
“How was the concert?” Molly asked.
It was just after eleven o’clock, and Nell and her daughters were gathered in the kitchen. Nell was at the stove, stirring a pot of chocolate. Three large mugs waited to be filled.
“Wonderful,” Nell said brightly, pouring the chocolate into the mugs and wondering when she had become such a liar. It was just that she didn’t want her daughters to feel sorry for her. Poor Mom. Too timid (if that was the word) to attend a community concert on her own. “How was the party?” she asked, turning to Molly.
“Lame,” Molly said. “Half the people Andrea invited didn’t show up, so it was just five of us sitting around with all this food pretending to be having a good time when Andrea was really annoyed and Jim and Gary had clearly had a fight before coming over, because they didn’t say one word to each other the entire night and Carl kept checking his phone for updates on some hockey game.” Molly managed a smile. “And then there was me, missing Mick and feeling miserable. Not a fun time.”
“Probably more fun than my night,” Felicity said. “The projector broke down twice and the meetinghouse was freezing. I was shivering so hard I could hardly hear the dialogue. I probably should have gone to the concert with you after all, Mom.”
Nell smiled. “There’s always next year.”
Molly drained the last of the hot chocolate in her mug. “I’m exhausted,” she announced. “I feel I could sleep right through the holidays and into next year.”
“It’s the sadness and the stress,” Felicity said.
Molly smiled ruefully. “I’m aware. Good night, Mom. Fliss.”
A moment later, Felicity followed her sister from the kitchen after giving her mother a kiss on the cheek.
Nell put the empty mugs into the dishwasher. There’s always next year. But would there be? Sure, Felicity had said she wasn’t going abroad with her father, but as Jill had pointed out, she might change her mind again. As for Molly, who knew where she would be next December. I know where I’ll be, Nell thought. I’ll be right here, and Eric, too, will be gone.
And in that case, Nell thought resolutely, I had better tell my daughters about him before the opportunity to do so is past. What really could be so damaging about introducing Eric to Molly and Felicity? He was her kind and good-hearted friend. He was no threat to her family. She would break her long silence in the morning.